This was a greater boon than it may appear. Troubles were only too likely to assail a Jewish household, and to know a place where Belasez could seek shelter and be certain of finding it, was a comfort indeed, and might at any hour be a most terrible necessity. Abraham kissed the robe of the Countess, and poured out eloquent blessings on her. Belasez kissed her hand and that of Margaret: but the tears choked the girl's voice as she turned to follow her father. The arguments against idolatry which Margaret had heard from Belasez were ghosts easily laid by Father Nicholas. A few vague platitudes concerning the supreme authority committed to the Apostle Peter, and through him to the Papacy (Father Nicholas discreetly left both points unencumbered by evidence),--the wickedness of listening to sceptical reasonings, and the happiness of implicit obedience to holy Church,-- were quite enough to reduce Belasez's arguments, as they remained in Margaret's mind, to the condition of uncomfortable reminiscences, which, being also wicked, it was best to forget as soon as possible. But there had been one listener to that conversation, of whom neither party took account, and who could not forget it. This was Doucebelle de Vaux. In her brain the words of the young Jewess took root and germinated, but so silently, that no one suspected it but herself. Father Nicholas had not the faintest idea of the importance of the question, when one morning, during the Latin lesson which he administered twice a week to the young ladies of the Castle, Doucebelle asked him the precise meaning of _adoro_. "It means, in its original, to speak to or accost any one," said the priest; "but being now taken into the holy service of religion, it signifies to pray, to supplicate; and, thence derived--to worship, to bow one's self down." "And,--if I do not trouble you too much, Father,--would you please to tell me the difference between _adoro_ and _colo_?" Father Nicholas was a born philologist, though in his day there was no appellation for the science. To be asked any question involving a derivation or comparison of words, was to him as a trumpet to a war-horse. "My daughter, it is pleasure, not trouble, to me, to answer such questions as these. _Colo_ is a word which comes from the Greek, but is now obsolete in that tongue, wherein it seems to have had the meaning of feed or tend. Transferred to the Latin, it signifies to cultivate, exercise, practise, or cherish,--say rather, in any sense, to take pains about a thing: hence, used in the blessed service of religion, it is to regard, venerate, respect, or worship. Therefore _cultus_, which is the noun of this verb, signifies, when referred to things inanimate, tending or cultivation to things animate, education, culture; to God and the holy saints, reverence and worship. Dost thou now understand, my daughter?" "I thank you very much, Father," said Doucebelle, quietly; "I understand now."