The old nurse, with a practical soul, busied herself about getting breakfast. Lucile, to divert her thoughts, aided her, and soon--such is our composition--found comfort in eggs and bacon. They were relieved to find that a picket had again been posted at the street-door. Bettine discovered this, for Lucile, her mood unchanged, would not look into the street where she had seen such grim spectacles. And she did right, for though the barricade was now deserted, nearly twenty objects that had a few hours before been men, lay around or upon it. But about eleven some labourers arrived with two scavengers' carts; and soon only the bloodstains on the pavement showed that there had been any destruction other than that of property. The morning wore slowly and anxiously away. The firing near the palace was continual, but distant. Sometimes it swelled into a dull roar, at others the individual shots sounded in a sort of quick rattle. At last, at about half-past two, it stopped abruptly. Lucile trembled. The quarrel had been decided, one way or the other. Her mind refused to face all the possibilities. At times she clung in passionate fear to the old nurse, who tried in vain to soothe her; at others she joined her in the household tasks, or submitted to tasting the various meals which the poor old soul prepared for her in the hopes of killing care with comfort. The ominous silence that followed the cessation of the firing did not last long. It was while Lucile was being coaxed by Bettine to eat some custard-pudding that she had made on purpose for her, that the report of the first great gun reached them. The tremendous explosion, though a long way off, made the windows rattle. She shuddered. What was this? She had hoped that all was over; but one explosion succeeded another, until the thunder of a cannonade from the harbour almost drowned their voices. It was a weary waiting for the two women. CHAPTER XIX. AN EDUCATIONAL EXPERIENCE. Lieutenant Tiro reached the Mayoralty in safety, for though the streets were full of excited people, they were peaceful citizens, and on his proclaiming that he had been sent to see Savrola they allowed him to pass. The Municipal building was a magnificent structure of white stone, elaborately decorated with statuary and sculpture. In front of it, surrounded by iron railings and accessible by three gateways, stretched a wide courtyard, in which a great fountain, encircled by the marble figures of departed civic magnates, played continually with agreeable effect. The whole edifice was worthy of the riches and splendour of the Lauranian capital.