"Every man knows himself, God knows all men," snuffled the fanatical
barber who had once delivered a sermon from the Pompe des Brigands.

"He made things lively while he lived, ba su!" droned the jailer of the
Vier Prison. "But he has folded sails now."

"Ma fe, yes, he sleeps like a porpoise now, and white as a wax he looked
up there in the Cohue Royale," put in a centenier standing by.

A voice came shrilly over the head of the centenier. "As white as you'll
look yellow one day, bat'd'lagoule! Yellow and green, oui-gia--yellow
like a bad apple, and cowardly green as a leek." This was Manon Moignard
the witch.

"Man doux d'la vie, where's the Master of Burials?" babbled the jailer.
"The apprentice does the obs'quies to-day."

"The Master's sick of a squinzy," grunted the centenier. "So hatchet-
face and bundle-o'-nails there brings dust to dust, amen."

All turned now to the Undertaker's Apprentice, a grim, saturnine figure
with his grey face, protuberant eyes, and obsequious solemnity, in which
lurked a callous smile. The burial of the great, the execution of the
wicked, were alike to him. In him Fate seemed to personify life's
revenges, its futilities, its calculating ironies. The flag-draped
coffin was just about to pass, and the fanatical barber harked back to
Philip. "They say it was all empty honours with him afore he died
abroad."