A moment later Virginie was outside, watching the last act in the career
of Jean Jacques in the parish of St. Saviour's.

This was what she saw.

The auctioneer was holding up a bird-cage containing a canary-Carmen's
bird-cage, and Zoe's canary which had remained to be a vocal memory of
her in her old home.

"Here," said the rhetorical, inflammable auctioneer, "here is the
choicest lot left to the last. I put it away in the bakery, meaning to
sell it at noon, when everybody was eating-food for the soul and food for
the body. I forgot it. But here it is, worth anything you like to
anybody that loves the beautiful, the good, and the harmonious. What do
I hear for this lovely saffron singer from the Elysian fields? What did
the immortal poet of France say of the bird in his garret, in 'L'Oiseau
de Mon Crenier'? What did he say:

'Sing me a song of the bygone hour,
A song of the stream and the sun;
Sing of my love in her bosky bower,
When my heart it was twenty-one.'

"Come now, who will renew his age or regale her youth with the divine
notes of nature's minstrel? Who will make me an offer for this vestal
virgin of song--the joy of the morning and the benediction of the
evening? What do I hear? The best of the wine to the last of the feast!
What do I hear?--five dollars--seven dollars--nine dollars--going at nine
dollars--ten dollars--Well, ladies and gentlemen, the bird can sing--ah,
voila !"