or music, nor castles, nor
statues, be they carved never so well, nor rowing, nor sailing
galleys, but children.

Understand me, children up to the age of ten years, for after that
they become men or women, and cutting their wisdom teeth, are not
worth what they cost; the worst are the best. Watch them playing,
prettily and innocently, with slippers; above all, cancellated ones,
with the household utensils, leaving that which displeases them,
crying after that which pleases them, munching the sweets and
confectionery in the house, nibbling at the stores, and always
laughing as soon as their teeth are cut, and you will agree with me
that they are in every way lovable; besides which they are flower and
fruit--the fruit of love, the flower of life. Before their minds have
been unsettled by the disturbances of life, there is nothing in this
world more blessed or more pleasant than their sayings, which are
naive beyond description. This is as true as the double chewing
machine of a cow. Do not expect a man to be innocent after the manner
of children, because there is an, I know not what, ingredient of
reason in the naivety of a man, while the naivety of children is
candid, immaculate, and has all the finesse of the mother, which is
plainly proved in this tale.

Queen Catherine was at that time Dauphine, and to make herself welcome
to the king, her father-in-law, who at that time was very ill indeed,
presented him, from time to time, with Italian pictures, knowing that
he liked them much, being a friend of the Sieur Raphael d'Urbin and of
the Sieurs Primatice and Leonardo da Vinci, to whom he sent large sums
of money. She obtained from her family--who had the pick of these
works, because at that time the Duke of the Medicis governed Tuscany
--a precious picture, painted by a Venetian named Titian (artist to
the Emperor Charles, and in very high flavour), in which there were
portraits of Adam and Eve at the moment when God left them to wander
about the terrestrial Paradise, and were painted their full height, in
the costume of the period, in which it is difficult to make a mistake,
because they were attired in their ignorance, and caparisoned with the
divine grace which enveloped them--a difficult thing to execute on
account of the colour, but one in which the said Sieur Titian
excelled. The picture was put into the room of the poor king, who was
then ill with the disease of which he eventually died. It had a great
success