ince."

"I tell you, Jeanne, that there are men condemned to ten years'
punishment and imprisonment who have not done so much to deserve it as
your husband has done."

"Still he had not a bad heart. It was his frequenting alehouses, and the
bad companions he met there who made him the lost creature he is."

"True, he would not hurt a child; but a grown-up person he was not so
very particular."

[Illustration: "_Then Left Me_"
Original Etching by Adrian Marcel]

"Alas, it is no use repining! We must take life as we find it. Well,
when my husband had left me I seemed to regain my courage, for I had no
longer the constant dread of being crippled by him, and so prevented
from earning bread for my children. For want of money to buy a mattress
(for one must live and pay one's rent before thinking of other things),
and poor Catherine (my eldest girl) working with me fifteen hours a day,
we could scarcely earn twenty pence a day both together, and my other
two children were too young to be able to earn anything; so, as I was
saying, for want of a mattress we slept upon straw we picked up from
time to time before the door of a large furniture packer in the
neighbourhood."

"And to think that I have spent and squandered all my money as I have
done!"

"Pray do not reproach yourself. How could you possibly imagine I was in
want or difficulties when I never said a word to lead you to conclude
so? So poor dear Catherine and I set to work again with redoubled
courage and determination. If you only knew what a dear, good child she
is, so honest, industrious, and good, watching me with her eyes to try
and find out what I wish her to do. Never has a murmur escaped her lips;
and yet she has seen much want and misery, though scarcely fifteen years
of age! She has consoled me in the midst of my severest troubles. Oh,
brother," added Jeanne, drying her eyes, "such a child is enough to
repay one for the severest trials!"

"You were just such another yourself at her age; and it is but fair you
should have some consolation amidst your troubles!"

"Believe me, 'tis rather on her account than mine I grieve; for it
really seems out of nature to see a young creature like her slaving
herself to death. For months together she has never quitted her work,
except once a week, when she goes to wash the trifle of linen we possess
in the river, near the Pont-au-Charge, where they only charge three sous
an hour for the use of the boats, beaters,