abbe

"The bandits whom the abbe keeps in pay and drink have their useful side, have they?

"You advise me, then, to be reconciled to the abbe?" said Fouquet, ironically.

l'Abbe Fouquet be introduced," said he to the footman.

Two minutes after, the Abbe Fouquet appeared in the doorway, with profound reverences.

"Oh, that is different," cried the abbe; "and we shall understand each other, I hope."

"Monsieur," continued the prisoner, "I am the Abbe Faria, born at Rome.

"My information dates from the day on which I was arrested," returned the Abbe Faria; "and as the emperor had created the kingdom of Rome for his infant son, I presume that he has realized the dream of Machiavelli and Caesar Borgia, which was to make Italy a united kingdom."

"It is for that reason I am delighted to see you," continued the abbe, "although you have disturbed me in a most important calculation, which, if it succeeded, would possibly change Newton's system.

It was on Thursday, the abbe's reception day; people went there in crowds.

"You will see me talking with one of my friends, the Abbe d'Herblay, of whom you have often heard me speak."

This was the Abbe Scarron, always laughing, joking, complimenting -- yet suffering -- and toying nervously with a small switch.

This obligation cost her so much that she consulted her director, the Abbe Couturier, upon the subject of this honest but puerile civility.

"Daughter," said the worthy abbe, "you are blaming the Church, which declares celibacy to be the better way to God."

Mademoiselle Cormon and the Abbe de Sponde belonged to that "little Church," sublime in its orthodoxy, which was to the court of Rome what the Ultras were to be to Louis XVIII.