mighty from their seat," established that all temporal power has God as its

principle and its end, and that it is ruined and destroyed when it turns aside
from the path that Providence has traced out for it and from the end to which

He has directed it.
Applying these sacred rules to the government of Penguinia, he drew a terrible

picture of the evils that the country's rulers had been unable either to
prevent or to foresee.

"The first author of all these miseries and degradations, my brethren," said
he, "is only too well known to you. He is a monster whose destiny is

providentially proclaimed by his name, for it is derived from the Greek word,
pyros, which means fire. Eternal wisdom warns us by this etymology that a Jew

was to set ablaze the country that had welcomed him."
He depicted the country, persecuted by the persecutors of the Church, and

crying in its agony:
"O woe! O glory! Those who have crucified my God are crucifying me!"

At these words a prolonged shudder passed through the assembly.
The powerful orator excited still greater indignation when he described the

proud and crime-stained Colomban, plunged into the stream, all the waters of
which could not cleanse him. He gathered up all the humiliations and all the

perils of the Penguins in order to reproach the President of the Republic and
his Prime Minister with them.

"That Minister," said he, "having been guilty of degrading cowardice" target="_blank" title="n.懦弱，胆怯">cowardice in not
exterminating the seven hundred Pyrotists with their allies and defenders, as

Saul exterminated the Philistines at Gibeah, has rendered himself worthy" target="_blank" title="a.不值得的；不足道的">unworthy of
exercising the power. that God delegated to him, and every good citizen ought

henceforth to insult his contemptible government. Heaven will look favourably
on those who despise him. 'He hath put down the mighty from their seat.' God

will depose these pusillanimous chiefs and will put in their place strong men
who will call upon Him. I tell you, gentlemen, I tell you officers,

non-commissioned officers, and soldiers who listen to me, I tell you General
of the Penguin armies, the hour has come! If you do not obey God's orders, if

in His name you do not depose those now in authority, if you do not establish
a religious and strong government in Penguinia, God will none the less destroy

what He has condemned, He will none the less save His people. He will save
them, but, if you are wanting, He will do so by means of a humbleartisan or a

simple corporal. Hasten! The hour will soon be past."
Excited by this ardentexhortation, the sixty thousand people present rose up

trembling and shouting: "To arms! To arms! Death to the Pyrotists! Hurrah for
Crucho!" and all of them, monks, women, soldiers, noblemen, citizens, and

loafers, who were gathered beneath the superhuman arm uplifted in the pulpit,
struck up the hymn, "Let us save Penguinia! They rushed impetuously from the

basilica and marched along the quays to the Chamber of Deputies.
Left alone in the deserted nave, the wise Cornemuse, lifting his arms to

heaven, murmured in broken accents:
"Agnosco fortunam ecclesiae penguicanae! I see but too well whither this will

lead us."
The attack which the crowd made upon the legislative palace was repulsed.

Vigorously charged by the police and Alcan guards, the assailants were already
fleeing in disorder, when the Socialists, running from the slums and led by

comrades Phoenix, Dagobert, Lapersonne, and Varambille, threw themselves upon
them and completed their discomfiture. MM. de La Trumelle and d'Ampoule were

taken to the police station. Prince des Boscenos, after a valiant struggle,
fell upon the bloodypavement with a fractured skull.

In the enthusiasm of victory, the comrades, mingled with an innumerable crowd
of paper-sellers and gutter-merchants, ran through the boulevards all night,

carrying, Maniflore in triumph, and breaking the mirrors of the cafes and the
glasses of the street lamps amid cries of "Down with Crucho! Hurrah for the

Social Revolution!" The Anti-Pyrotists in their turn upset the newspaper
kiosks and tore down the hoardings.

These were spectacles of which cool reason cannot approve and they were fit
causes for grief to the municipal authorities, who desired to preserve the

good order of the roads and streets. But, what was sadder for a man of heart
was the sight or the canting humbugs, who, from fear of blows, kept at an

equal distance from the two camps, and who, although they allowed their
selfishness and cowardice" target="_blank" title="n.懦弱，胆怯">cowardice to be visible, claimed admiration for the generosity

of their sentiments and the nobility of their souls. They rubbed their eyes
with onions, gaped like whitings, blew violently into their handkerchiefs,

and, bringing their voices out of the depths of their stomachs, groaned forth:
"O Penguins, cease these fratricidal struggles; cease to rend your mother's

bosom!" As if men could live in society without disputes and without quarrels,
and as if civil discords were not the necessary conditions of national life

and progress. They showed themselves hypocritical cowards by proposing a
compromise between the just and the unjust, offending the just in his

rectitude and the unjust in his courage. One of these creatures, the rich and
powerful Machimel, a championcoward, rose upon the town like a colossus of

grief; his tears formed poisonous lakes at his feet and his sighs capsized the
boats of the fishermen.

During these stormy nights Bidault-Coquille at the top of his old
steam-engine, under the serene sky, boasted in his heart, while the shooting

stars registered themselves upon his photographic plates. He was fighting for
justice. He loved and was loved with a sublimepassion. Insult and calumny

raised him to the clouds. A caricature of him in company with those of
Colomban, Kerdanic, and Colonel Hastaing was to be seen in the newspaper

kiosks. The Anti-Pyrotists proclaimed that he had received fifty thousand
francs from the big Jewish financiers. The reporters of the militarist sheets

held interviews regarding his scientific knowledge with official scholars, who
declared he had no knowledge of the stars, disputed his most solid

observations, denied his most certain discoveries, and condemned his most
ingenious and most fruitful hypotheses. He exulted under these flattering

blows of hatred and envy.
He contemplated the black immensity pierced by a multitude of lights, without

giving a thought to all the heavy slumbers, cruel insomnias, vain dreams,
spoilt pleasures, and infinitelydiverse miseries that a great city contains.

"It is in this enormous city," said he to himself, "that the just and the
unjust are joining battle."

And substituting a simple and magnificentpoetry for the multiple and vulgar
reality, he represented to himself the Pyrot affair as a struggle between good

and bad angels. He awaited the eternaltriumph of the Sons of Light and
congratulated himself on being a Child of the Day confounding the Children of

Night.
X. MR. JUSTICE CHAUSSEPIED

Hitherto blinded by fear, incautious and stupid before the bands of Friar
Douillard and the partisans of Prince Crucho, the Republicans at last opened

their eyes and grasped the real meaning of the Pyrot affair. The deputies who
had for two years turned pale at the shouts of the patriotic crowds became,

not indeed more courageous, but altered their cowardice" target="_blank" title="n.懦弱，胆怯">cowardice and blamed Robin
Mielleux for disorders which their own compliance had encouraged, and the

instigators of which they had several times slavishly congratulated. They
reproached him for having imperilled the Republic by a weakness which was

really theirs and a timidity which they themselves had imposed upon him. Some
of them began to doubt whether it was not to their interest to believe in

Pyrot's innocence rather than in his guilt, and thenceforward they felt a
bitter anguish at the thought that the unhappy man might have been wrongly

convicted and that in his aerial cage he might be expiating another man's
crimes. "I cannot sleep on account of it!" was what several members of

Minister Guillaumette's majority used to say. But these were ambitious to
replace their chief.

These generous legislators overthrew the cabinet, and the President of the
Republic put in Robin Mielleux's place, a patriarchal Republican with a

flowing beard, La Trinite by name, who, like most of the Penguins, understood
nothing about the affair, but thought that too many monks were mixed up in it.

General Greatauk before leaving the Ministry of War, gave his final advice to
Pariler, the Chief of the Staff.

"I go and you remain," said he, as he shook hands with him. "The Pyrot affair
is my daughter; I confide her to you, she is worthy of your love and your

care; she is beautiful. Do not forget that her beauty loves the shade, is
leased with mystery, and likes to remain veiled. Great her modesty" target="_blank" title="n.谨慎；端庄；羞怯">modesty with

gentleness. Too many indiscreet looks have already profaned her charms. . . .
Panther, you desired proofs and you obtained them. You have many, perhaps too

many, in your possession. I see that there will be many tiresome interventions
and much dangerous curiosity. If I were in your place I would tear up all

those documents. Believe me, the best of proofs is none at all. That is the
only one which nobody discusses."

Alas! General Panther did not realise the wisdom of this advice. The future
was only too thoroughly to justify Greatauk's perspicacity. La Trinite

demanded the documents belonging, to the Pyrot affair. Peniche, his Minister
of War, refused them in the superior interests of the national defence,

telling him that the documents under General Panther's care formed the hugest
mass of archives in the world. La Trinite studied the case as well as he

could, and, without penetrating to the bottom of the matter, suspected it of
irregularity. Conformably to his rights and prerogatives he then ordered a

fresh trial to be held. Immediately, Peniche, his Minister of War, accused him
of insulting the army and betraying the country and flung his portfolio at his

head. He was replaced by a second, who did the same. To him succeeded a third,
who imitated these examples, and those after him to the number of seventy