In the middle or the
afterwards of a noisy Mass,--Mass which had been "performed" with
perhaps the bulky tenor giving the "Agnus Dei," with as sensually
dramatic an utterance as though it were a love-song in an opera, and
the "basso," shouting through the "Credo," with the deep musical
fury of the tenor's jealous rival,--with a violin "interlude," and a
'cello "solo,"--and a blare of trumpets at the "Elevation," as if it
were a cheap spectacle at a circus fair,--after all this
melodramatic and hysterical excitement it was a relief to see the
Abbe mount the pulpit stairs, portly but lightfooted, his black
clerical surtout buttoned closely up to his chin, his round
cleanshaven face wearing a pious but suggestive smile, his eyes
twinkling with latent satire, and his whole aspect expressing,
"Welcome excellent humbugs! I, a humbug myself, will proceed to
expound Humbug!" His sermons were generally satires on religion,--
satires delicately veiled, and full of the double-entendres so dear
to the hearts of Parisians,--and their delight in him arose chiefly
from never quite knowing what he meant to imply, or to enforce. Not
that his hearers would have followed any counsel even if he had been
so misguided as to offer it; they did not come to hear him "preach"
in the full sense of the word,--they came to hear him "say things,"-
-witty observations on the particular fad of the hour--sharp
polemics on the political situation--or what was still more
charming, neat remarks in the style of Rochefoucauld or Montaigne,
which covered and found excuses for vice while seemingly condemning
viciousness.
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