and raising his timid face with a vigorous hand, had asked him:
"Is it true that you want to be a priest?"
The boy had nodded yes, and having been given a sacred picture and a friendly slap he had remained in a corner of the room listening to the conversation between the priests and the women. They were discussing the parish priest of Aar and describing how he went out hunting and smoked a pipe and let his beard grow, yet how nevertheless the Bishop hesitated to interdict him because he would have great difficulty in finding another priest willing to bury himself in that remote village. Moreover, the easygoing priest in possession threatened to tie up and fling into the river anyone who ventured to try and oust him from his place.
"The worst of it is that the simpletons of Aar are attached to the man, although they are frightened of him and his sorceries. Some of them actually believe he is the Antichrist, and the women all declare that they will help him to truss up his successor and throw him into the river."
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