“What’s the matter, Monsieur the commissary?” asked Lotchè, a brave woman, who did not lose her head under the most trying circumstances. “What’s the matter!” replied Passauf, whose big round eyes expressed a genuine agitation. “The matter is that I have just come from Doctor Ox’s, who has been holding a reception, and that there—” [Illustration: I have just come from Doctor Ox’s] “There?” “There I have witnessed such an altercation as—Monsieur the burgomaster, they have been talking politics!” “Politics!” repeated Van Tricasse, running his fingers through his wig. “Politics!” resumed Commissary Passauf, “which has not been done for perhaps a hundred years at Quiquendone. Then the discussion got warm, and the advocate, André Schut, and the doctor, Dominique Custos, became so violent that it may be they will call each other out.” “Call each other out!” cried the counsellor. “A duel! A duel at Quiquendone! And what did Advocate Schut and Doctor Gustos say?” “Just this: ‘Monsieur advocate,’ said the doctor to his adversary, ‘you go too far, it seems to me, and you do not take sufficient care to control your words!’” The Burgomaster Van Tricasse clasped his hands—the counsellor turned pale and let his lantern fall—the commissary shook his head. That a phrase so evidently irritating should be pronounced by two of the principal men in the country! “This Doctor Custos,” muttered Van Tricasse, “is decidedly a dangerous man—a hare-brained fellow! Come, gentlemen!” On this, Counsellor Niklausse and the commissary accompanied the burgomaster into the parlour. CHAPTER IV. IN WHICH DOCTOR OX REVEALS HIMSELF AS A PHYSIOLOGIST OF THE FIRST RANK, AND AS AN AUDACIOUS EXPERIMENTALIST. Who, then, was this personage, known by the singular name of Doctor Ox? An original character for certain, but at the same time a bold savant, a physiologist, whose works were known and highly estimated throughout learned Europe, a happy rival of the Davys, the Daltons, the Bostocks, the Menzies, the Godwins, the Vierordts—of all those noble minds who have placed physiology among the highest of modern sciences.