love each other so, and to part forever!" said Cephyse.
"It is a cruel fate."

"To part?" cried Mother Bunch, and her pale, mild countenance, bathed in
tears, was suddenly illumined with a ray of divine hope; "to part,
sister? oh, no! What makes me so calm is the deep and certain
expectation, which I feel here at my heart, of that better world where a
better life awaits us. God, so great, so merciful, so prodigal of good,
cannot destine His creatures to be forever miserable. Selfish men may
pervert His benevolent designs, and reduce their brethren to a state of
suffering and despair. Let us pity the wicked and leave them! Come up on
high, sister; men are nothing there, where God is all. We shall do well
there. Let us depart, for it is late."

So saying, she pointed to the ruddy beams of the setting sun, which began
to shine upon the window.

Carried away by the religious enthusiasm of her sister, whose
countenance, transfigured, as it were, by the hope of an approaching
deliverance, gleamed brightly in the reflected sunset, Cephyse took her
hands, and, looking at her with deep emotion, exclaimed, "Oh, sister! how
beautiful you look now!"

"Then my beauty comes rather late in the day," said Mother Bunch, with a
sad smile.

"No, sister; for you appear so happy, that the last scruples I had upon
your account are quite gone."

"Then let us make haste," said the hunchback, as she pointed to the
chafing-dish.

"Be satisfied, sister--it will not be long," said Cephyse. And she took
the chafing-dish full of charcoal, which she had placed in a corner of
the garret, and brought it out into the middle of the room.

"Do you know how to manage it?" asked the sewing-girl approaching.

"Oh! it is very simple," answered Cephyse; "we have only to close the
door and window, and light the charcoal."

"Yes, sister; but I think I have heard that every opening must be well
stopped, so as to admit no current of air."

"You are right, and the door shuts so badly."

"And look at the holes in the roof."

"What is to be done, sister?"

"I will tell you," said Mother Bunch. "The straw of our mattress, well
twisted, will answer every purpose."

"Certainly," replied Cephyse. "We will keep a little to light our fire,
and with the rest we will stop up all the crevices in the roof, and make
filling for our doors and windows."

Then, smiling with that bitter irony, so frequent, we repeat, in the most
gloomy moments, Cephyse added,