ept on striking her. My mother rolled over on the
ground, covering her face with her hands. Then he turned her over on her
back in order to slap her still more, pulling away her hands, which were
covering her face.

"As for me, my friend, it seemed as though the world was coming to an
end, that the eternal laws had changed. I experienced the overwhelming
dread that one has in presence of things supernatural, in presence of
irreparable disasters. My childish mind was bewildered, distracted. I
began to cry with all my might, without knowing why; a prey to a fearful
dread, sorrow, and astonishment. My father heard me, turned round, and,
on seeing me, started toward me. I believe that he wanted to kill me, and
I fled like a hunted animal, running straight ahead into the thicket.

"I ran perhaps for an hour, perhaps for two. I know not. Darkness set in.
I sank on the grass, exhausted, and lay there dismayed, frantic with
fear, and devoured by a sorrow capable of breaking forever the heart of a
poor child. I was cold, hungry, perhaps. At length day broke. I was
afraid to get up, to walk, to return home, to run farther, fearing to
encounter my father, whom I did not wish to see again.

"I should probably have died of misery and of hunger at the foot of a
tree if the park guard had not discovered me and led me home by force.

"I found my parents looking as usual. My mother alone spoke to me "'How
you frightened me, you naughty boy. I lay awake the whole night.'

"I did not answer, but began to weep. My father did not utter a single
word.

"Eight days later I returned to school.

"Well, my friend, it was all over with me. I had witnessed the other side
of things, the bad side. I have not been able to perceive the good side
since that day. What has taken place in my mind, what strange phenomenon
has warped my ideas, I do not know. But I no longer had a taste for
anything, a wish for anything, a love for anybody, a desire for anything
whatever, any ambition, or any hope. And I always see my poor mother on
the ground, in the park, my father beating her. My mother died some years
later; my, father still lives. I have not seen him since. Waiter, a
'bock.'"

A waiter brought him his "bock," which he swallowed at a gulp. But, in
taking up his pipe again, trembling as he was, he broke it. "Confound
it!" he said, with a gesture of annoyance. "That is a real sorrow. It
will take me a month to color another!"

And he called out a