"Madame, we must eat. My grandpa gives me more slaps than food, and they
don't fill my stomach, slaps don't. When the cows come in I milk 'em
just a little and I live on that. Monseigneur isn't so poor but what
he'll let me drink a drop o' milk the cows get from his grass?"

"Perhaps he hasn't eaten anything to-day," said the countess, touched by
his misery. "Give him some bread and the rest of that chicken; let him
have his breakfast," she added, looking at the footman. "Where do you
sleep, my child?"

"Anywhere, madame; under the stars in summer, and wherever they'll let
us in winter."

"How old are you?"

"Twelve."

"There is still time to bring him up to better ways," said the countess
to her husband.

"He will make a good soldier," said the general, gruffly; "he is well
toughened. I went through that kind of thing myself, and here I am."

"Excuse me, general, I don't belong to nobody," said the boy. "I can't
be drafted. My poor mother wasn't married, and I was born in a field.
I'm a son of the 'airth,' as grandpa says. M'ma saved me from the army,
that she did! My name ain't no more Mouche than nothing at all. Grandpa
keeps telling me all my advantages. I'm not on the register, and when
I'm old enough to be drafted I can go all over France and they can't
take me."

"Are you fond of your grandfather?" said the countess, trying to look
into the child's heart.

"My! doesn't he box my ears when he feels like it! but then, after all,
he's such fun; he's such good company! He says he pays himself that way
for having taught me to read and write."

"Can you read?" asked the count.

"Yah, I should think so, Monsieur le comte, and fine writing too--just
as true as we've got that otter."

"Read that," said the count, giving him a newspaper.

"The Qu-o-ti-dienne," read Mouche, hesitating only three times.

Every one, even the abbe, laughed.

"Why do you make me read that newspaper?" cried Mouche, angrily. "My
grandpa says it is made up to please the rich, and everybody knows later
just what's in it."

"The child is right, general," said Blondet; "and he makes me long to
see my hoaxing friend again."

Mouche understood perfectly that he was posing for the amusement of the
company; the pupil of Pere Fourchon was worthy of his master, and he
forthwith began to cry.

"How can you tease a child with bare feet?" said the countess.

"And who thinks it quite natural that his grandfather should recoup
himself