tions and the Proprietor can attend to them as He sees fit. This idolatry positively revolts me, but I would not object if these good-for-nothings would not drag me into their quarrels with Heaven, but they are mad enough to try to make use of me and the Cross as a talisman against the pests which devour their crops. They wanted the rats driven away from the grain in their barns, so there were prayers, exorcisms, and processions in honor of St. Nicaise;—all this on a bitter day in December, with snow up to my neck; I have had lumbago ever since. Then caterpillars attacked them, and we ad more processions, this time addressed to St. Gertrude, in a March storm with melting sleet;—a racking cough for me was the result. Now we have the locusts, and they want another procession round the orchards; think of it! with the sun like a furnace, and black clouds rolling up before a thunderstorm. I should come back with a rush of blood to the head, chanting the verse 'Ibi ceciderunt, workers of iniquity, atque expulsi sunt!' but it is I who would be cast out,—('Sacred to the memory of Baptiste Chamaille, commonly called Dulcis, vicar of this parish.')—No! I am in no hurry to quit this world, and the best of jokes may be carried too far. It is no business of mine to get rid of their caterpillars, and as for their locusts, the lazy-
