Municipalities were constituted under the name of corporations; M. Gerbaut was nominated municipal councillor, and our neighbor, M. Sauce, grocer, procureur of the corporation. I say our neighbor, because the two houses were separated only by a lane. The two families frequently visited each other. M. Gerbaut and M. Sauce, with their blushing honors thick upon them, were patriots. Madame Sauce was a fine woman, but coarse and vulgar, a veritable dealer in candles, butter, and sugar; rather given to serving short measure, but otherwise incapable of committing a fraud. The mother of M. Sauce, an old lady of sixty-three or sixty-four years, was a Royalist. The children, the eldest of whom was only twelve, were incapable of having an opinion. We shall see presently what Sophie’s opinions were. Opposite us was the tavern of the “Bras d’Or,” belonging to the brothers Leblanc. Interest made them play a little comedy. As they had the patronage both of the patriotic young men in the town, and the Royalist young nobles from the vicinity, the one brother was a patriot, and the other a Royalist. The elder cried “Vive la nation” with the young tradesmen, while the younger shouted “Vive le Roi” with the noblesse. In the midst of all this, a national decree was propagated, which caused some uneasiness in the province. It was the civil constitution of the clergy. It created an episcopal chair in each department. It ordered the election of bishops and priests to be conducted after the fashion of the primitive church: that is to say, that they were to be elected by a majority of votes; all the salaries of the clergy were to be paid from the King’s treasury; perquisites were abolished. The clergy were desired to take an oath to maintain that constitution; those who would not, were compelled to resign their benefices in favor of those who would. If, after being dismissed, they attempted to renew their functions, they were prosecuted as disturbers of the public peace. From this arose the troubles in the Church, and the division between the constitutional priests and those who refused to take the oath. If one looks back on that great epoch, and on the two remarkable years of ’89 and ’90, one cannot fail to be astonished. Can any one explain the precautions taken by nature, that the men and the events should arrive at the same time for that awful result which followed? In 1762, M. de Choiseul suppressed the order of the Jesuits; that is to say, deprived the Church of its wisest and most powerful supporters. Afterwards, in the years ’68, ’69, and ’70, the Revolution produced Chateaubriand, Bonaparte, Hoch, Marceau, Joubert, Cuvier, Saint Martin, Saint Simon, Lesneur, Les Cheniers, Geoffrey Saint Hilaire, Bichat, Lainancourt, all of whom, in 1792, were in the bloom of life and genius.