There was nobody in the church so far as we could observe from the little gallery in which we found ourselves, but when we had gone down a flight of steps into the body of the same, and made to cross towards the door, we were suddenly confronted by a priest in a white cope. My heart jumped to my mouth; I felt a prinkling in the roots of my hair, and stopped dumb, with all my faculties basely deserted from me. Luckily Father Hamilton kept his presence of mind. As he told me later, he remembered of a sudden the Latin proverb that in battles the eye is first overcome, and he fixed the man in the stole with a glance that was bold and disconcerting. As it happened, however, the other priest was almost as blind as a bat, and saw but two civil worshippers in his chapel. He did not even notice that it was a _soutane_; he passed peeringly, with a bow to our inclinations, and it was almost incredulous of our good fortune I darted out of the chapel into the darkness of a courtyard of equal extent with that I had crossed on the night of my first arrival at Bicêtre. At its distant end there were the same flaming braziers with figures around them, and the same glitter of arms. Now this Bicêtre is set upon a hill and commands a prospect of the city of Paris, of the Seine and its environs. For that reason we could see to our right the innumerable lights of a great plain twinkling in the darkness, and it seemed as if we had only to proceed in that direction to secure freedom by the mere effort of walking. As we stood in the shadow of the chapel, Father Hamilton eyed the distant prospect of the lighted town with a singular rapture. “Paris!” said he. “Oh, Dieu! and I thought never to clap an eye on't again. Paris, my Paul! Behold the lights of it--_la ville lumière_ that is so fine I could spend eternity in it. Hearts are there, lad, kind and jocund-” “And meditating a descent on unhappy Britain,” said I. “Good neighbourly hearts, or I'm a gourd else,” he went on, unheeding my interruption. “The stars in heaven are not so good, are no more notably the expression of a glowing and fraternal spirit. There is laughter in the streets of her.” “Not at this hour, Father Hamilton,” said I, and the both of us always whispering. “I've never seen the place by day nor put a foot in it, but it will be droll indeed if there is laughter in its streets at two o'clock in the morning.” “Ah, Paul, shall we ever get there?” said he longingly. “We can but try, anyway. I certainly did not come all this way, Father Hamilton, just to look on the lowe of Paris.”