THE EQUINOX
haute magie that an ecclesiastic was looking for his
address, testifying the greatest desire to see him. Eliphas
Levi did not feel himself immediately prepossessed with
confidence towards the stranger, to the point of exposing
himself without precaution to his visits; he indicated the
house of a friend, where he was to be in the company of his
faithful disciple, Desbarrolles. At the hour and date
appointed they went, in fact, tothe house of Mme. A——, and
found that the ecclesiastic had been waiting for them for
some moments.
He was a young and slim man; he had an arched and
pointed nose, with dull blue eyes. His bony and projecting
forehead was rather broad than high, his head was dolicho-
cephalic, his hair flat and short, parted on one side, of a
greyish blond with just a tinge of chestnut of a rather curious
and disagreeable shade. His mouth was sensual and quarrel-
some; his manners were affable, his voice soft, and his
speech sometimes a little embarrassed. Questioned by Eliphas
Levi concerning the object of his visit, he replied that he was
on the look-out for the grimozve of Honorius, and that he had
come to learn from the Professor of Occult Science how to ob-
tain that little black book, now-a-days almost impossible to find.
“T would gladly give a hundred francs for a copy of that
grimoire,”said he.
“The work in itself is valueless,” said Eliphas. “It isa
pretended constitution of Honorius II, which you will find
perhaps quoted by some erudite collector of apocryphal con-
stitutions; you can find it in the library.”
“T will do so, for I pass almost all my time in Paris in
the public libraries.”
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