give my
wife a French teacher. As long as she slaughtered the dictionary and
tortured the grammar I adored her. Our conversations were simple. They
revealed to me her surprising gracefulness and matchless elegance; they
showed her to me as a wonderful speaking jewel, a living doll made to be
kissed, knowing, after a fashion, how to express what she loved. She
reminded me of the pretty little toys which say 'papa' and 'mamma' when
you pull a string.

"Now she talks--badly--very badly. She makes as many mistakes
as ever--but I can understand her.

"I have opened my doll to look inside--and I have seen. And now I
have to talk to her!

"Ah! you don't know, as I do, the opinions, the ideas, the theories of a
well-educated young English girl, whom I can blame in nothing, and who
repeats to me from morning till night sentences from a French reader
prepared in England for the use of young ladies' schools.

"You have seen those cotillon favors, those pretty gilt papers, which
enclose candies with an abominable taste. I have one of them. I tore it
open. I wished to eat what was inside and it disgusted me so that I feel
nauseated at seeing her compatriots.

"I have married a parrot to whom some old English governess might have
taught French. Do you understand?"

The harbor of Trouville was now showing its wooden piers covered with
people.

I said:

"Where is your wife?"

He answered:

"I took her back to Etretat."

"And you, where are you going?"

"I? Oh, I am going to rest up here at Trouville."

Then, after a pause, he added:

"You have no idea what a fool a woman can be at times!"

THE ACCURSED BREAD

Daddy Taille had three daughters: Anna, the eldest, who was scarcely ever
mentioned in the family; Rose, the second girl, who was eighteen, and
Clara, the youngest, who was a girl of fifteen.

Old Taille was a widower and a foreman in M. Lebrument's button
manufactory. He was a very upright man, very well thought of, abstemious;
in fact, a sort of model workman. He lived at Havre, in the Rue
d'Angouleme.

When Anna ran away from home the old man flew into a fearful rage. He
threatened to kill the head clerk in a large draper's establishment in
that town, whom he suspected. After a time, when he was told by various
people that she was very steady and investing money in government
securities, that she was no gadabout, but was a great friend of Monsieur
Dubois, who was a judge of the Tribunal of Comme