On one occasion, however, Master Ambroise Paré, who had come back to Paris, his patients being all cured, and hostilities somewhat relaxed in the North, was surprised by a visit at his own house from his old acquaintance Vicomte d'Exmès. He received him with the deference due to one of gentle birth and the cordiality with which one welcomes a friend. Gabriel, like a man newly returned from foreign lands, interrogated the surgeon upon matters which everybody knew all about. Having in the first place asked him about Martin-Guerre, who, thoroughly cured, was probably on his way to Paris at that time, he questioned him about the Duc de Guise and the army. In that quarter matters had progressed marvellously. Le Balafré was before Thionville; Maréchal de Thermes had taken Dunkirk; Gaspard de Tavannes had taken possession of Guines and the province of Oie. In fact, the English no longer held one foot of ground in the whole kingdom, as François de Lorraine had sworn should be the case. Gabriel listened with grave face, and apparently with little interest, to this good news. "I am obliged to you, Master," he said to Ambroise Paré; "I rejoice to learn that our enterprise at Calais will not be without enduring results for France, at all events. Nevertheless it was not curiosity to hear of these matters which was my principal reason for coming to you. Master, long before I came to admire you for your great skill at the bedside of the wounded, I remember that certain words I heard you speak moved me deeply; it was one day last year in the little house on the Rue St. Jacques. Master, I have come to talk with you about these matters of religion, which your keen insight has penetrated so to the core. You have definitively embraced the cause of the Reformed religion, I suppose?" "Yes, Monsieur d'Exmès," said Ambroise Paré, firmly. "The correspondence which the great Calvin was kind enough to enter into with me has removed my last doubts and my last scruples. I am now the most thoroughly devoted reformer of them all." "Well, then, Master," said Gabriel, "will you not share your knowledge with a neophyte of the best intentions? I speak of myself. Will you not strengthen my doubting faith, as you would put in place a broken limb?" "It is my duty to comfort and relieve the souls of my fellow-creatures as well as their bodies, when I can do so," said Ambroise Paré. "I am quite at your service, Monsieur d'Exmès." For more than two hours they talked together, Ambroise ardent and eloquent, Gabriel calm and sorrowful, but a docile pupil. At the end of that time Gabriel rose, and said to him, as he warmly pressed his hand,--