Although he did not suspect the fact, the mayor of M. sur M. enjoyed a sort of celebrity.
For the space of seven years his reputation for virtue had filled the whole of Bas Boulonnais; it had eventually passed the confines of a small district and had been spread abroad through two or three neighboring departments.
Besides the service which he had rendered to the chief town by resuscitating the black jet industry, there was not one out of the hundred and forty communes of the arrondissement of M. sur M. which was not indebted to him for some benefit.
He had even at need contrived to aid and multiply the industries of other arrondissements.
It was thus that he had, when occasion offered, supported with his credit and his funds the linen factory at Boulogne, the flax-spinning industry at Frévent, and the hydraulic manufacture of cloth at Boubers-sur-Canche. Everywhere the name of M. Madeleine was pronounced with veneration.
Arras and Douai envied the happy little town of M. sur M. its mayor.
The Councillor of the Royal Court of Douai, who was presiding over this session of the Assizes at Arras, was acquainted, in common with the rest of the world, with this name which was so profoundly and universally honored.
When the usher, discreetly opening the door which connected the council-chamber with the court-room, bent over the back of the President’s armchair and handed him the paper on which was inscribed the line which we have just perused, adding: 'The gentleman desires to be present at the trial,' the President, with a quick and deferential movement, seized a pen and wrote a few words at the bottom of the paper and returned it to the usher, saying, 'Admit him.
' The unhappy man whose history we are relating had