to his house through crowds of people storming,
raging, and yelling at her. Confined in
one of the lieutenant's chambers, she was
confronted with the mendicant. Both persisted—
he in claiming, she in denying—the parentage
of the boy.

The mother was then confronted with her
supposed son. The lad, previously prompted
and taught his part, when pushed towards the
person whom they told him was his mother,
called her "Mamma." Jeanne Vacherot, whatever
they could say or do, had only one reply,
"That is not my child." Hardened guilt,
inhumanity, unfeeling obstinacy. Shameful
accusations were thrown in her teeth. The
magistrate begged and entreated the widow to
open her arms and her heart to the boy; but it
never entered into his head to question,
separately and calmly, this mother and this son
whom they wanted to force upon her. If
Jeanne Vacherot were really his mother—if
little Monrousseau were really her son—what
could be easier than to make the latter relate
on the spot all the occurrences of his previous
childhood? Could a boy, eleven years of age,
have forgotten them after an interval of only
ten months? But human fallibility cannot
think of everything, not even of what is
absolutely essential. The magistrate, in opening
the examination, forgot that the boy, if he
were Jacques Le Moine, ought to be eleven
years old, and he refrained from putting him
on his oath, for the reason that he was only
eight, or thereabouts.

After several hours of useless torture, Jeanne
Vacherot was remanded. The Lieutenant
Particulier did not dare to put her in prison, as he
had treated the beggar-man; but he urged her
to "take counsel of the night," and ordered
her to appear at a new confrontation on the
morrow. The widow, after what she had seen
of the magistrate and the excited populace,
took counsel, not of the night, but of her own
common sense; and, as soon as the house was
clear, by the dispersing of the loiterers who
lingered around it, she took advantage of the
darkness, and started for Paris.

The events of next day proved that she had
acted wisely. As soon as the news of her escape
was known—and it spread like wildfire—
the indignant mob, enraged at her departure,
broke into the house where she had been
lodging, smashed the windows, and gutted the
rooms. Women, and especially mothers of
families, took the lead in executing this popular
vengeance.

Meanwhile, the Lieutenant Général, Louis
Mordant, returned to Vernon, and took the
affair out of the hands of his substitute, the
Lieutenant Particulier. A regular inquiry was
instituted. One-and-twenty witnesses were
heard, twelve of whom were women, and all of
whom stated their conviction that the beggar-boy
was the widow's son. Thus, Marie Queron,
servant to the Widow Cretté, with whom Jeanne
Vacherot had lodged at different times during
seven or eight years, having with her little
Jacques Le Moine, averred there could be no
mistake about the matter—they were his eyes,
his features, and his voice. It took from the
26th of July to the 12th of August to put all
these depositions in order; and during the
early part of that period the boy lived in the
Widow Cretté's house, constantly surrounded by
idle gossips who wanted to know all that was
passing, and who made the child learn by rote
every particular they knew.

The little tailor, François Varlot, went further
than the rest: he knew how and where
Monrousseau had kidnapped Jacques Le Moine. It
happened in the Rue Saint Martin; the child
told him so during one of his visits to the hospital.
And the boy did not deny it.

They had so often talked to the lad about
Bois-Hiérôme, and he talked so often about it
himself, that the Lieutenant Général thought
fit to take him to the village. There he was
recognised as the son of Lancelot Le Moine by
the farmer, his mother's tenant, the curé, the
Seigneur of Bois-Hiérôme, the seigneur's brother,
and five other inhabitants; and very soon
after that by every single and married woman
in the place. They made him say the name of
a monastery that stood upon a neighbouring
eminence. Was there not a bridge thereabouts?
—"Yes, there was," he answered. "Had not
my brother," the seigneur asked, "a sore place
somewhere when you were here?"—No, indeed."
"Why, yes he had. Think again, my little fellow."
—"Ah, yes! he had a sore place on his
left hand." "I was quite sure he would recollect
it." The whole concluded with a fresh
examination of Monrousseau, who persisted
in stating that he was the father of the
boy. Neither threats nor chains could shake
him a jot.

On the 12th of August, the Lieutenant Général´s
sentence was, that Monrousseau be kept
in prison and in chains; that the child in dispute
be called Jacques Le Moine, the sentence
having the validity of a baptismal certificate;
that the relations of the said Jacques Le Moine
be convoked to appoint a guardian; a provision
of a hundred livres to be assigned to
him; and, to that effect, all the goods of the
Widow Le Moine in the hands of her farmers
to be estreated and seized. Against this
sentence the widow appealed to the Parlement
of Paris; which opened the door to a
labyrinth of law proceedings impossible at the
present day.

The Master of Requests, appointed to preside
over the new inquiry, was Guillame de Lamoignon,
to whom Louis the Fourteenth, on appointing
him First President, said: "If I had
known an honester man than yourself, I should
have put him in your place." At the very first
interview he drew from the mendicant, the boy,
and Jeanne Vacherot, answers which could leave
no doubt respecting the prejudice, the precipitation,
and the blindness of the Vernon worthies.
Examined by a magistrate who heard
what he said without threatening him, Monrousseau
told his tale. Lamoignon could make