THE SCARLET VEST.

Eugene Labelle was a native of Picardy, and about the commencement of the primary French revolution was just ripening into manhood.

His father was a husbandman and laboured a farm, which, though of small extent, was sufficient to satisfy his wants and aspirations. Being of a pious disposition he kept himself studiously aloof from the flatulent theorists who then agitated the land, and who strove to hurl the cross from its pedestal, and to erect on its ruins the brazen image of the strumpet goddess of reason.

The family of Labelle, the elder, was composed of Eugene, and an orphan cousin of the latter named Marie Dorion. Very comely were the externalities of the maiden, and of cognate pulchritude were her moral attributes.

Gentle, good-humoured, witty, and impulsive, it is nothing strange that she captivated the heart of her youthful relative. After the wonted curriculum of moon-light promenades, vows were exchanged between the parties, and Labelle père having given his consent, it was arranged that the curé should complete the transaction as soon as Eugene had attained the status of majority.

Marie Dorion possessed another admirer in the person of a contiguous agriculturalist called Brodeur Cauchon. Most fitly did the surname of this personage adumbrate his appearance and proclivities. Stunted and gross in person, exhibiting a projecting upper lip, teeth which remained patent after the mouth was closed, and posessed of a cranial thatch which might be more appositely termed bristles than hair, he constituted an ungainly porcine libel upon the "human form divine." When to all this is added the fact, that his tastes were sensual, and his temper cruel, treacherous, and revengeful, that man would be consumedly unreasonable who questioned his right to the designation of a "little pig."

It is hardly necessary to say that the fair Marie lent no favourable ear to the suit of this bipedal variety of the sus tribe. In fact, with all her amiability of nature she could not conceal her repugnance to his person; and

obtuse as Brodeur was he failed not to mark that the maiden's eye fell with aversion at his advent, and recovered its animation when he took his departure.

As an almost necessary sequence, this state of matters filled Cauchon with rage, both against Marie and her accepted lover. The former he thirsted to possess, if only for the purpose of making her miserable, and the latter he could have torn piece-meal with all the appetite and gusto of a famished hyena.

There was one object which always had the effect of aggravating to boiling heat the worst passions of his ulcerated nature. That was a scarlet vest, embroidered by the fair Dorion's own hands, and presented by her to Eugene on one of the anniversaries of his birth. The sight of this garment had the same effect upon Cauchon that a red rag has upon a wayward bull. It reminded him of the success of his abominated rival, and so lashed him into paroxysms of temporary insanity. He could with equal composure have witnessed the damsel cleaving to the bosom of her betrothed as the piece of dress which she had fashioned.

Things were in this position, when the revolution burst forth like a hurricane of hell, as unquestionably it was. The scum boiled to the surface of the social caldarium. Religion, rank, and virtue were trodden

into the mire by democratic hoofs, and murder bedecked itself in the soiled ermine of disinherited justice.

Brodeur Cauchon joined himself to the filthy dominant tyranny, and ere long became a prominent "friend of the people." Never was he so thoroughly in his element as when dipping his heel in the blood of an "aristocrat ;" and passing sweet were the roistering draughts of wine which he drained from the desecrated chalice of the parish church. The character of the cup lent an infernal zest to his potations, and supplied it with a relish which only the children of perdition could appreciate.

Amidst the faithless the Labelles were "faithful found." With pious honor they regarded the demoniac scenes which were enacted around them, and as they did not attempt to conceal their sentiments they soon became obnoxious to the champions of the "rights of

man."

A series of persecutions, instigated by Cauchon, was raised against the devoted family, which terminated in the sequestration of their little property, and the hounding them forth upon the bleak churlish common of penniless life. This blow was more than the old man could bear up against. Within three weeks from the sale of his paternal acres, the quiet grave received him, and his son and niece removed to Paris, hoping to find there the

employment and security which were denied them in the once peaceful scenes of their nativity.

They had reckoned, however, without their host. Brodeur, whilst revelling chin deep in the luxuries of crime, never lost sight of the ruling lust of his existence. The scarlet vest, like a meteor, beckoned him perennially on, and a short time elapsed ere he followed his intended victims to the capital.

He brought with him from the Province a reputation for "patriotism," which secured him the favour and countenance of the monsters who, for her million transgressions, then ruled the destinies of most miserable France. By these ogres, Brodeur was appointed to a responsible situation in the prison of the Conciergerie, his function being that of lieutenant or deputy-in-chief to the head jailer.

This was a sphere which ripely harmonized with the tastes and inclinations of the wretch. In taunting and domineering over the hosts of noble and virtuous victims which constantly replenished that dismal structure, he experienced a never-ending saturnalia of delight; and he tasked his invention to add poignancy to his own gratification by enhancing their sufferings. Amongst other ingenious devices, he constructed a model of the guillotine, which he exhibited in his jocular moods to the