having made me a respectable man."




CHAPTER IX

At Work on Zosimus the Panopolitan--I visit my Home and hear Gossip
about M. d'Asterac.


During all the next month or six weeks, M. Coignard applied himself,
day and night, just as he had promised, to the reading of Zosimus
the Panopolitan. During the meals we partook of at the table of M.
d'Asterac the conversation turned on the opinions of the gnostics
and on the knowledge of the ancient Egyptians. Being only an
ignorant scholar I was of little use to my good master. I did my
best by making such researches as he wanted me to make; I took no
little pleasure in it. Truly, we lived happily and quietly. At about
the seventh week, M. d'Asterac gave me leave to go and see my
parents at their cookshop. The shop appeared strangely smaller to
me. My mother was there alone and sad. She cried aloud on seeing me
fitted out like a prince.

"My Jacques," she said, "I am very happy!"

And she began to cry. We embraced, then wiping her eyes with a
corner of her canvas apron she said:

"Your father is at the _Little Bacchus_. Since you left he