Laigle of Meaux, as we know, liked better to live with Joly than any one else, and he had a lodging much as the bird has a branch. The two friends lived together, ate together, slept together, and had everything in common, even a little Musichetta. They were what they call _bini_ in the house of the Assistant Brothers. On the morning of June 5 they went to breakfast at Corinth. Joly had a cold in his head, and Laigles coat was threadbare, while Joly was well dressed. It was about nine in the morning when they pushed open the door of Corinth, and went up to the first-floor room, where they were received by Matelote and Gibelotte. "Oysters, cheese, and ham," said Laigle. They sat down at a table; the room was empty; there was no one in it but themselves. Gibelotte, recognizing Joly and Laigle, placed a bottle of wine on the table, and they attacked the first dozen of oysters. A head appeared in the hatchway and a voice said,-- "As I was passing I smelt a delicious perfume of Brie cheese, so I stepped in." It was Grantaire; he took a stool and sat down at the table. Gibelotte, on seeing Grantaire, placed two bottles of wine on the table, which made three. "Are you going to drink these two bottles?" Laigle asked Grantaire, who replied,-- "All men are ingenious, but you alone are ingenuous. Two bottles never yet astonished a man." The others began with eating, but Grantaire began with drinking; a pint was soon swallowed. "Why, you must have a hole in your stomach," said Laigle. "Well, you have one in your elbow," Grantaire retorted, and after emptying his glass, he added,-- "Oh yes, Laigle of the funeral orations, your coat is old." "I should hope so," Laigle replied, "for my coat and I live comfortably together. It has assumed all my wrinkles, does not hurt me anywhere, has moulded itself on my deformities, and is complacent to all my movements, and I only feel its presence because it keeps me warm. Old coats and old friends are the same thing." "Grantaire," Joly asked, "have you come from the boulevard?" "No." "Laigle and I have just seen the head of the procession pass. It is a marvellous sight." "How quiet this street is!" Laigle exclaimed. "Who could suspect that Paris is turned topsy-turvy? How easy it is to see that formerly there were monasteries all round here! Du Breuil and Sauval give a list of them, and so does the Abbé Lebeuf. There was all around where we are now sitting a busy swarm of monks, shod and barefooted, tonsured and bearded, gray, black, white, Franciscans, Minims, Capuchins, Carmelites, little Augustines, great Augustines, old Augustines--" "Don't talk about monks," Grantaire interrupted, "for it makes me want to scratch myself." Then he exclaimed,--