The bishop’s father called himself Lara, his mother had been a Demoiselle Narbonne; by combining the names, and prefixing to the maternal cognomen a _De_, the bishop was able to pass himself off as a member of the nobility, and to speak disparagingly of roturiers. Above the parental shop at Strasbourg hung a wooden and painted figure of a plucked goose, the badge of the family profession, and the only heraldic device of which old Lara boasted. The lion, says Æsop, once assumed an ass’s skin; but on the shield of Monseigneur de Narbonne-Lara, bishop of Évreux, abbot _in commendam_ of three religious houses, the ancestral goose ramped and roared as a lion or out of a field gules. The bishop was ambitious of becoming an archbishop and a cardinal; he had therefore to pay his court at once to Versailles and to Rome--a course he was perfectly competent to pursue, for, though filled to the brim with pride, he had not a drop of self-respect. He was a tall, stout and handsome man, but his good looks were marred by the redness and fleshiness of his face, and his proportions were disguised by the pomposity of his carriage. Being a man of consummate shrewdness, he had succeeded in making himself a favourite at Court. His knowledge of German had won him first the bishopric of Gap, and afterwards the more important one of Évreux, when, during the late reign, the Dauphiness had set Austrian fashions. For the same reason, he was now private chaplain to the Queen. He gave capital dinners, and hoped by the choiceness of his cookery and wines to buy the favour of those who had the ear of royalty. By fussy officiousness in the diocese, by worrying his clergy, he hoped to obtain credit for energetic discharge of his episcopal duties, and by favouring the Jesuits, he made sure that his acts would be favourably reported at Rome. Monseigneur was now about to achieve a triumph. Prince Louis-Stanislas-Xavier, commonly called ‘Monsieur,’ the brother of the King, Duke of Anjou, Alençon and Vendôme, Count of Perche, Maine, and Senonches, having business to transact in Normandy connected with the bailiwicks of Bernay and Orbec, of which he was lord, had been invited to the palace by the Bishop of Évreux, and the prince had accepted the invitation. Monseigneur de Narbonne was in a flutter of excitement at the prospect. The same may be said of Mademoiselle Baptistine, his sister, who lived with him. The grand old palace was turned inside out. Painters, gilders, and upholsterers had taken possession of the house, and had banished the bishop into the turret overlooking the garden.