"A little, monsieur. I remember so well what I used to know of it, that I talked with that woman almost as readily as I am speaking to you." "Well, is that the whole story?" "Oh! no; but give me time! It seems that this Moorish woman was one of the great band of a hundred and fifty thousand, who perished, almost all of them, some half score years ago, some by hunger and murder on the galleys that were taking them to Africa, others by want and disease on the shores of Languedoc and Provence." "Poor creatures!" said Bois-Doré. "That was the most detestable deed that ever was done!" "Is it true, monsieur, that Spain drove out a million of these Moors, and that barely a hundred thousand arrived in Tunis?" "I couldn't tell you the number; but I can tell you that it was downright butchery, and that beasts of burden were never treated like those wretched human beings. You know that our Henri would fain have made Calvinists of them, which would have saved them by making them French." "I remember very well, monsieur, that the Catholics of the South wouldn't listen to such a thing, and said that they would murder them all rather than go to mass with those devils. The Calvinists were not any more reasonable, and the result was that our good king left the poor wretches at peace in the Pyrenees, waiting for an opportunity to do something for them. But after his death the queen regent wanted to rid Spain of them, so they drove them into the sea, with or without ships. Some, however, consented to be baptized and became Christians, to escape that cruel fate, and the woman in question followed that wise course, although I suspect her of not being perfectly sincere." "What difference does that make to you, Adamas? Do you think that the great Maker of the sun, the moon and the Milky Way----" "I beg your pardon, monsieur?" said Adamas, who had not a very clear understanding of his master's recently acquired knowledge, and indeed was somewhat disturbed about it; "I don't recognize _milky voice_[10] as a French expression." "I will tell you about that another time," said the marquis yawning, for he was drowsing in front of the fire that crackled on the hearth. "Finish your story." "Well, monsieur," Adamas continued, "this Moorish woman remained till last year in the Pyrenees mountains, where she watched the flocks for poor farmers; so that she continued to speak her Catalan patois, which people understand well enough on the other side of the mountains." "And that explains to me how, with your Gascon patois, which is not very different from the mountain patois, you were able to talk Spanish with this woman."