ne, a c'est moin, Lili!"

--"C'est pas tout to nom, Lili;--dis moin, chere, to laut nom."

--"Mo pas connin laut nom."

--"Comment ye te pele to maman, piti?"

--"Maman,--Maman 'Dele."

--"Et comment ye te pele to papa, chere?"

--"Papa Zulien."

--"Bon! Et comment to maman te pele to papa?--dis ca a moin, chere?"

The child looked down, put a finger in her mouth, thought a moment, and
replied:--

--"Li pele li, 'Cheri'; li pele li, 'Papoute.'"

--"Aie, aie!--c'est tout, ca?--to maman te jamain pele li daut' chose?"

--"Mo pas connin, moin."

She began to play with some trinkets attached to his watch chain;--a
very small gold compass especially impressed her fancy by the trembling
and flashing of its tiny needle, and she murmured, coaxingly:--

--"Mo oule ca! Donnin ca a moin."

He took all possible advantage of the situation, and replied at once:--

--"Oui! mo va donnin toi ca si to di moin to laut nom."

The splendid bribe evidently impressed her greatly; for tears rose to
the brown eyes as she answered:

--"Mo pas capab di' ca;--mo pas capab di' laut nom ... Mo oule; mo pas
capab!"

Laroussel explained. The child's name was Lili,--perhaps a contraction
of Eulalie; and her pet Creole name Zouzoune. He thought she must be
the daughter of wealthy people; but she could not, for some reason or
other, tell her family name. Perhaps she could not pronounce it well,
and was afraid of being laughed at: some of the old French names were
very hard for Creole children to pronounce, so long as the little ones
were indulged in the habit of talking the patois; and after a certain
age their mispronunciations would be made fun of in order to accustom
them to abandon the idiom of the slave-nurses, and to speak only
French. Perhaps, again, she was really unable to recall the name:
certain memories might have been blurred in the delicate brain by the
shock of that terrible night. She said her mother's name was Adele,
and her father's Julien; but these were very common names in
Louisiana,--and could afford scarcely any better clew than the innocent
statement that her mother used to address her father as "dear"
(Cheri),--or with the Creole diminutive "little papa" (Papoute). Then
Laroussel tried to reach a clew in other ways, without success. He
asked her about where she lived,--what the place was like; and she told
him about fig-trees in a court, and galleries, and banquettes, and
spoke of a faubou',--without