That, Victoria, was the proposal that I made to you last night--I repeat it to-day. I have again laid my projects bare before you and in the interest of our country. Adopt the plan; it is the fruit of long years of meditation--and Gaul will march at the head of the nations of the world." A long silence on the part of my foster-sister followed these words of her relative. She then replied with the calmness that marked her words since the entrance of Tetrik into the room: "It was a wise inspiration that caused me to wish to hear you a second time, Tetrik. You abjured in favor of the new religion the ancient religion of our fathers; but almost all Gaul is still loyal to the druid faith." "Hence it is that I considered it politic to keep my abjuration a secret, and in this I have acted in accord with the views of the Pope of Rome. But if you should accept my offer, and should yourself abjure your idolatry at our marriage, I shall then loudly proclaim my new belief, and, according to the opinion of the bishops, our conversion will draw in its wake the conversion of our people. Moreover I have the promise of the bishops that they will glorify you as a saint with all the magnificent pomp of the new Church. And, believe me, Victoria, a power that is consecrated in the name of God by the Gallic prelates and by the Pope of Rome, will be clothed in the eyes of the people with almost divine authority." "Tell me, Tetrik; you abjured the belief of our fathers in favor of the new, in favor of the gospel preached by the young man of Nazareth who was crucified two centuries ago. I have read that gospel. An ancestress of Schanvoch's witnessed the last days of Jesus, the friend of the slave and the afflicted. Now, then, nowhere have I found in the gentle and divine words of the young master of Nazareth aught but exhortations to renounce wealth, to meekness, to equality among men--and here are you, a fervent and recent convert, dreaming of royalty! The young man of Nazareth, so sweet, so tender of the sufferers, the sinners and the oppressed as he was, nevertheless broke out at times into terrible threats against the rich, the powerful, the worldly happy--above all and always he thundered against the princes of the church whom he branded as infamous hypocrites--and, here are you, a fervent and recent convert, seeking to place the royalty that you are striving after under the consecration of just such princes of the church, the bishops! The young man of Nazareth said to his disciples: 'When you pray, enter into your closet, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father which is in secret, and your Father which sees in secret will reward you openly'--and here are you, a fervent and recent convert, proposing to me to render our abjuration and prayers in public, pompously and solemnly, seeing that the bishops are to glorify my conversion in the face of the world. Truly, my feeble intellect, still closed to the light of the new