CHAPTER VIII.

ANOTHER BLOW. As everybody in his village would be abed by ten o’clock, Pitou was glad to find accommodation at the inn, where he slept till seven in the morning. At that hour everybody had risen. On leaving the Dolphin Tavern, he noticed that his sword and casque won universal attention. A crowd was round him in a few steps. Undoubtedly he had attained popularity. Few prophets have this good fortune in their own country. But few prophets have mean and acrimonious aunts who bake fowls in rice for them to eat up the…