But a bright day has sometimes a weeping dawn, and though for three years or more our life knew perils enough and some sorrows--the story of which I may one day tell--and we shared the lot of all Frenchmen in those times of shame and stress, I had never, no, not for a day or an hour, cause to repent the deed done so hurriedly at Nîmes. Clinging hands and warm lips, eyes that shone as brightly in a prison as a palace, cheered me, when things were worst; and when better days came, and with them grey hairs and a new France, my wife found means still to grace, and ever more and more to share my life. One word of the man to whom under God I owe it that I won her. He survived, but I never saw Froment of Nîmes again. On the third day of the riots cannon were brought to bear on his tower, it was stormed, and the garrison were put to the sword, one man only, I believe, escaping with his life. That man was Froment, the indomitable, the most capable leader that the Royalists of France ever boasted. He got safely to the frontier and thence to Turin, where he was received with honour by those whose aid might a little earlier have saved all. Who fails must expect buffets, however; the cold shoulder was presently turned to him; he was slighted, and as the years went on his complaints grew louder. Once I sought to find and assist him, but he was then engaged in some enterprise on the African coast, and my circumstances were such that I could have done little had I found him. Soon afterwards, I believe, he died, though certain information never reached me. But dead or alive I owe him gratitude, respect, and other things, among which I count the greatest happiness of my life. THE END.