man who was employed to examine him by
the police. Dr. Lasseigne says :

"M. Verger appeared one day at the
Madeleine, bearing upon his breast a little placard
upon which was written:

"' I have been hungry, and they have not
fed me; I have been cold, and they have not
clothed me; although I am a priest, and
neither suspended nor interdicted.'

"And he placed himself in a kneeling attitude
before the entrance. The prefecture of
police was excited by a thing so strange, and
believed it to be an act of mental alienation.
I was requested to be present semi-officially
at an interview which was to take place in
the office of the chief of division, M.Metetal,
at the prefecture. I went, and we had a
long conference with M. Verger, in which
we addressed to him a number of questions.
My impression was that he was not mad, but
singularly dangerous. I said to myself, if
he is mad, the insanity can only be epileptic;
but nothing in the information given to me
established epilepsy. I tried to lead his mind
into ways in which he could follow me." . . .
After telling where he had been educated
and what he had been, "he made certain
allusions. He added that the young clergy
had been long enough oppressed, and that
it was time they should have their revenge.
He told me he had not made himself
a priest — to suffer and perish.

"I insisted a long time: I wished to know
if he believed himself to be the victim of
persecutions, this sort of delirium appearing to
me to be possible. On the whole, the accused
did not give any sign of delirium, only he
displayed anger, and rose and struck the
table. We were of opinion that he ought
rather to be subjected to the surveillance of
the police than placed in a madhouse."

The President: " Then you had acquired
the conviction that he enjoyed the full use of
his intellectual faculties."

Dr. Lasseigne: " At that time it was impossible
to consider that man to be attacked
by mental alienation: besides, he was not
accused — "

Verger, with vehemence: " It was I who
was the accuser."

The Vicaire-Général Bautain said he knew
nothing respecting what happened in the
manse.

Verger; " Nobody would know it. You
refused to hear it. You were inconsolable
because you could not shut me up as a
madman. Ah! ah! The Inquisition did
that."

The President asked the prisoner:

"What motive instigated you to commit
this crime?"

Verger: "Long ago the Archbishop, the
Bishop of Meaux, and several other influential
persons conceived the unworthy project of
making an end of me by withdrawing my
powers. They have five different times withdrawn
my powers, although a priest cannot
live except by the altar. That is what the
Gospel says. They prevented me from
celebrating divine service, although I was neither
suspended nor interdicted. Ever since, I have
been driven to extremities. On Christmas
Day, eighteen hundred and fifty-five, I went
to Notre Dame in the hope of softening the
heart of my Archbishop. I knelt down
before him. I wrote him a most submissive
letter, which ended with these words — ' accord
me only an audience of ten minutes.' But
the Archbishop refused it. From this time
I formed the project of printing this work."
(The accused shows a manuscript which he
holds in his hand.) " No publisher would
compromise himself by publishing it. I
therefore left France to have it printed
abroad. It was printed, but not published.
It was because the work (I was near the
workmen while they printed it)— "

The President: " What was the subject of
the work?"

Verger: " It was a revelation of the secret
conduct of the clergy."

The President: " Was it at that period
that you were recalled to the diocese of
Meaux?"

Verger: " No. That book was for me a
resource."

The President: " Was it not at that time
that the Archbishop of Paris interceded for
you with the Bishop of Meaux?"

Verger: "No; it is not true — "

The President: "The letters are there,
nevertheless—"

Verger: " No — Besides, what does it
matter! From whom are the letters? from
the Bishop of Meaux, who will not acknowledge
me as a priest of his diocese, and from
the Archbishop of Paris, who would not have
me in his; for everybody kicked the ball.
These letters exist — yes — but you will not
read them on account of the contradictions
they contain. You must read everything, or
nothing. You must hear the truth, and have
patience to listen to it. It is an affair of
fifteen days or a month. You must hear to
the end. Ah! you only see a man who is
dead, a poignard lifted and a man struck—
you only see a scaffold erected and a man
ascending it—I have worked fifteen years
for this result, and you will not hear me a
single day. Read then these letters, your
social and eternal welfare is interested in
them."

During the year eighteen hundred and
fifty-six the Abbé Guettée had an interview
with the Archbishop, in which the prelate
complained of "a bad priest" who had printed
a book in Belgium against the morals of
himself and his clergy. The Abbé Guettée
replied :

"Monseigneur, I believe you are wrong in
calling him a bad priest, I have seen him
twice, and he seemed to me to be very good—
fort bien."

The attempt to incarcerate the calumniator