rsery song,--

"Go no more to the wood, for all the laurels are cut."

]

[Footnote 63: The long floating ends of the neck ribbons.]

[Footnote 64: The Parisian play-writer's English exhibits all the
typical peculiarities noted above. We have our ideal, if not typical,
Frenchman, little less truthful perhaps--taken from refugees and
excursionists, from the close-cropped, dingy denizen of Leicester
Square; our tourist suits, heavy pedestrian toots, "wide-awakes," and
faded fashions, used up in travel--all these things are put down to
insular peculiarities.]

LVII.

I have just heard or read, a touching story; and here it is as I
remember it. In the Faubourg Saint Antoine lives a community of women
with whom the aged of the poor find shelter; those who have become
infirm, or have dropped into helpless childishness, whether men or
women, are received there without question or payment. There they are
lodged, fed and clothed, and humbly prayed for.

Last evening, sleep was just beginning to reign in the little community.
The old people had been put to rest, each Little Sister had done her
duty and was asleep, when the report of a gun resounded at the
house-door. You can imagine the startings and the terror. The Little
Sisters of the poor are not accustomed to have such noises in their
ears, and there was a tumult and hubbub such as the house had never
known, while they hurriedly rose, and the old people stared at each
other from their white beds in the long dormitories. When the house-door
was got open, a party of men, with a menacing look about them, strode in
with their guns and swords, making a horrible racket. One of them was
the chief, and he had a great beard and a terrible voice. All the Little
Sisters gathered in a trembling crowd about the superior.

"Shut the doors," cried the captain, "and if one of these women attempt
to escape--one, two, three, fire!" Then the Good Mother--that is the
Little Sisters' name for their superior--made a step forward and said,
"What do you wish, messieurs?"

"Citizens, _sacrebleu!_"

The Good Mother crossed herself and, repeated, "What do you wish, my
brothers?"

[Illustration: Federal Visit to The Little Sisters of The Poor.]

Now, if Citizen Rigault, who put Monseigneur Darboy down so wittily, had
been there, how briskly he would have told the stupid woman that these
were National Guards, and not brothers, before her. But even Rigault
cannot be everyw