"I am almost afraid to guess. Perhaps we may be the cause of her
uneasiness?"

"Why so, sister? Because we cannot say prayers, nor tell if we have ever
been baptized?"

"That seemed to give her a good deal of pain, it is true. I was quite
touched by it, for it proves that she loves us tenderly. But I could not
understand how we ran such terrible danger as she said we did."

"Nor I either, sister. We have always tried not to displease our mother,
who sees and hears us."

"We love those who love us; we are resigned to whatever may happen to
us. So, who can reproach us with any harm?"

"No one. But, perhaps, we may do some without meaning it."

"We?"

"Yes, and therefore I thought: We may perhaps be the cause of her
uneasiness."

"How so?"

"Listen, sister! yesterday Madame Baudoin tried to work at those sacks
of coarse cloth there on the table."

"Yes; but in about an half-hour, she told us sorrowfully, that she could
not go on, because her eyes failed her, and she could not see clearly."

"So that she is not able to earn her living."

"No--but her son, M. Agricola, works for her. He looks so good, so gay,
so frank, and so happy to devote himself for his mother. Oh, indeed! he
is the worthy brother of our angel Gabriel!"

"You will see my reason for speaking of this. Our good old Dagobert told
us, that, when we arrived here, he had only a few pieces of money left."

"That is true."

"Now both he and his wife are unable to earn their living; what can a
poor old soldier like him do?"

"You are right; he only knows how to love us, and take care of us, like
his children."

"It must then be M. Agricola who will have to support his father; for
Gabriel is a poor priest, who possesses nothing, and can render no
assistance to those who have brought him up. So M. Agricola will have to
support the whole family by himself."

"Doubtless--he owes it to father and mother--it is his duty, and he will
do it with a good will."

"Yes, sister--but he owes us nothing."

"What do you say, Blanche?"

"He is obliged to work for us also, as we possess nothing in the world."

"I had not thought of that. True."

"It is all very well, sister, for our father to be Duke and Marshal of
France, as Dagobert tells us, it is all very well for us to hope great
things from this medal, but as long as father is not here, and our hopes
are not realized, we shall be merely poor orphans, obliged to remain a
burden to this honest f