Mr. Gordon was a healthy old man, of a serene disposition, who was acquainted with two great things; the one was, to bear adversity; the other, to console the afflicted. He approached his companion with an open, sympathizing air, and said to him, while he embraced him:

"Whoever you are that is come to partake of my grave, be assured that I shall constantly forget myself to soften your torments in the infernal abyss where we are plunged. Let us adore Providence that has conducted us here. Let us suffer in peace, and trust in hope."

These words had the same effect upon the youth as cordial drops, which recall a dying person to life and show to his astonished eyes a glimpse of light.

After the first compliments were over, Gordon, without urging him to relate the cause of his misfortune, inspired him by the sweetness of his discourse and by that interest which two unfortunate persons share with each other, with a desire of opening his heart and of disburdening himself of the weight which oppressed him; but he could not guess the cause of his misfortune, and the good man Gordon was as much astonished as himself.

"God must, doubtless," said the Jansenist to the Huron, "have great designs upon you, since he conducted you from Lake Ontario to England, and thence to France; caused you to be baptized in Lower Brittany, and has now lodged you here for your salvation."

"In faith," replied Hercules, "I believe the devil alone has interfered in my destiny. My countrymen in America would never have treated me with the barbarity that I have here experienced; they have not the least idea of it. They are called savages; they are good people, but rustic; and the men of this country are refined villains. I am, indeed, greatly surprised to have come from another world, to be shut up in this, under four bolts with a priest; but I consider what an infinite number of men set out from one hemisphere to go and get killed in the other, or are cast away in the voyage, and are eaten by the fishes. I cannot discover the gracious designs of God over these people."

Their dinner was brought them through a wicket. The conversation turned upon Providence, lettres de cachet, and upon the art of not sinking under disgrace, to which all men in this world are exposed.

"It is now two years since I came here," said the old man, "without any other consolation than myself and books; and yet I have never been a single moment out of temper."

"Ah! Mr. Gordon," cried Hercules, "you are not then in love with your godmother. If you were as well acquainted with Miss St. Yves as I am, you would be in a state of desperation."

At these words he could not refrain from tears, which greatly relieved him from his oppression.

"How is it, then, that tears solace us?" said the Huron; "it seems to me that they should have quite an opposite effect."

"My son," said the good old man, "everything is physical about us; all secretions are useful to the body, and all that comforts it, comforts the soul. We are the machines of Providence."

The ingenuous Huron, who, as we have already observed more than once, had a great share of understanding, entered deeply into the consideration of this idea, the seeds whereof appeared to be in himself, after which he asked his companion why his machine had for two years been confined by four bolts.

"By effectual grace," answered Gordon; "I pass for a Jansenist; I know Arnaud and Nicole; the Jesuits have persecuted us. We believe that the pope is nothing more than a bishop, like another, and therefore Father la Chaise has obtained from the king, his penitent, an order for robbing me, without any form of justice, of the most precious inheritance of man—liberty!"

"This is very strange," said the Huron; "all the unhappy people with whom I have met have been made so solely by the pope. With respect to your effectual grace, I acknowledge I do not understand what you mean. But I consider it as a very great favor that God has let me, in my misfortune, meet with a man who pours into my heart such consolation as I thought myself incapable of receiving."