I have related what nocturnal persecutions poor Hiraux was made a victim of when he came to see us at les Fossés. It was now our turn to undergo the like. Our rooms were prepared beforehand for the pantomime that followed. The family doctor, Manceau, was the stage manager. He had replaced an old doctor from Soissons named M. Paroisse. I will explain presently why this change took place. The assistant stage managers were Louise, Cécile and Augustine. The appointed victims were Hippolyte Leroy, de Leuven and myself. Hippolyte Leroy was at this period a young man of between twenty-five and twenty-six. He was a cousin of M. Leroy de Corey. He had been one of the body-guard, and was now Secretary to the Inspection at Villers-Cotterets. Later, he became my cousin, by his marriage with Augustine Deviolaine. Our three rooms communicated with one another. We retired to our rooms about half-past twelve. De Leuven was the first to get into bed. He had scarcely lain down before he began to complain of a most intolerable tickling: his bed was sprinkled with the stuff charlatans sell which they call scratching powder. Those unacquainted with this powder should recall the famous scene in _Robert Macaire_, where the two heroes of the book find a trunk, and in that trunk a quantity of tiny packets, containing some unknown substance, whose property was revealed when they touched it. In about five minutes' time Adolphe de Leuven began to scratch himself like both Robert Macaire and Bertrand put together. We offered de Leuven our sincere sympathy. We advised him to rub it off as best he could, to wrap himself in his bed-curtain and to sleep on a couch. Then we went to our own beds, quite convinced that we should find them like Adolphe's. But we searched them in vain: they seemed perfectly free from any preparation of the like nature. We lay down. In five minutes' time Hippolyte Leroy uttered a sharp cry. In stretching himself, he felt a piece of string at the foot of the bed; he pulled this thread, and in doing so, he untied a bag full of frogs. The frogs, gaining their liberty, hastened to disport themselves about the bed, and it was the contact of his human flesh with their animal hide which produced Hippolyte's yell above mentioned. He flung off the bed-clothes and leapt out of bed. The frogs leaped out after him. He had been given good measure; there were quite two dozen of them.