"Not a doubt of it," replied Trublet. "But listen to what Professor Ball says on the same page. 'It is an incontestable fact that medical men are excessively predisposed to mental aberration.' Nothing is truer. Among medical men, those who are more especially predestined to insanity are the alienists. It is often difficult to determine which of the two is the crazier, the madman or his doctor. People say too that men of genius are prone to insanity. That is certainly the case. Still, a man is not a reasoning being merely because he is an idiot." After glancing a little further through the pages of Professor Ball's lectures, he resumed his writing: "Ordinary indications of maniacal excitement, and, if it be taken into consideration that the subject was of a neuropathic temperament, there is reason to believe that his constitution predisposed him to insanity, which, according to the highest authorities, is merely an exaggeration of the habitual temperament of the individual, and hence it is not possible to credit him with full moral responsibility." He signed the sheet and handed it to Pradel, saying: "Here's something that is innocuous and too devoid of meaning to contain the slightest falsehood." Pradel rose and said: "Believe me, my dear doctors we should not have asked you to tell a lie." "Why not? I am a medical man. I keep a lie-shop. I relieve, I console. How is it possible to relieve and console without lying?" Then, with a sympathetic glance at Nanteuil; he added: "Only women and physicians know how necessary untruthfulness is, and how beneficial to man." And, as Pradel, Constantin Mate, and Romilly were taking their leave, he said: "Pray go out by the dining-room. I've just received a small cask of old Armagnac. You'll tell me what you think of it!" Nanteuil had remained behind in the doctor's consulting room. "My little Socrates, I have spent an awful night. I saw him." "During your sleep?" "No, when wide awake." "You are sure you were not sleeping?" "Quite sure." He was on the point of asking her if the apparition had spoken to her. But he left the question unspoken, fearing lest he might suggest to so sensitive a subject those hallucinations of the sense of hearing, which, by reason of their imperious nature, he dreaded far more than visual hallucinations. He was familiar with the docility of the sick in obeying orders given them by voices. Abandoning the idea of questioning Felicie, he resolved, at all hazards, to remove any scruples of conscience which might be troubling her. At the same time, having observed that, generally speaking, the sense of moral responsibility is weak in women, he made no great effort in that direction, and contented himself with remarking lightly: