"Oh, mother! Sister!" cried the young man. "We are to fight--and under your very eyes--for liberty! How that will inspire us! Alas," he added after a moment's reflection, "why should this be, this fratricidal duel?" "It is a sad fact, my boy," answered Lebrenn with a sigh. "Oh, may the blood shed in such a strife fall upon the heads of those who compel the people to take up arms for their rights--as we shall have to do to-morrow--as our fathers have done in almost every century of our history!" "Thank God, at least in our days the struggle takes place without hatred," replied the young man. "The soldier fights in the name of discipline--the people in the name of their rights. It is a deadly duel, but a loyal one, after which the surviving adversaries shake hands." "But seeing these are survivers only, and I or my son may be laid low on the barricade," replied Monsieur Lebrenn with a benign smile, "there is one thing more I wish to impress upon you, my children. As you will see, where others turn pale with fright we will smile with serenity. Why? Because death does not exist for us; because, brought up in the belief of our fathers, instead of seeing in what is called the close of life only a dismal and fear-inspiring ending that plunges us into eternal darkness we see in death only the severance of the soul from the body, which emancipates the former, leaving it free to rejoin, or to wait for the sooner or later arrival of, those whom we love, and reunite with them on the other side of the veil, which, during our terrestrial life, hides from us the marvelous, the dazzling mysteries of our future lives, infinite lives as various as the divine power from which they emanate. To us, death is but a new birth." "That is the picture I have of death," cried Sacrovir. "I feel sure I will die overmastered by curiosity. What new, wonderful, dazzling worlds there will be to visit!" "Brother is right," put in the young girl with no less curiosity. "It must be beautiful to behold! novel! marvelous! And, besides, never more to be separated from our beloved ones but temporarily in all eternity! What a variety of infinite voyages there are to be made by us together in our new incarnations in the stars! Oh, when I think of that, mother, my head grows dizzy with impatience to see and know!" "Go to, you inquisitive girl! Be not so impatient," answered Madam Lebrenn, smiling, and in a tone of affectionate reproach. "You know, when you were small, I always scolded you when, at your drawing lessons, you seemed to give less thought to the model that you were copying than to those that you were to copy later. Well, my dear child, do not allow your curiosity, however natural it may be, to ascertain what is on the other side of the curtain, as your father expresses it, to cause your mind to wander too much away from that which is on this side."