rn out
Inoffensive tree which never had harmed anybody
It was all delightfully terrible!
Mild, unpretentious men who let everybody run over them
Now his grief was his wife, and lived with him
Tediousness seems to ooze out through their bindings
Tired smile of those who have not long to live
Trees are like men; there are some that have no luck
Voice of the heart which alone has power to reach the heart
When he sings, it is because he has something to sing about

A ROMANCE OF YOUTH

By FRANCOIS COPPEE

BOOK 2.

CHAPTER V

AMEDEE MAKES FRIENDS

Meanwhile the allegorical old fellow with the large wings and white
beard, Time, had emptied his hour-glass many times; or, to speak plainer,
the postman, with a few flakes of snow upon his blue cloth coat, presents
himself three or four times a day at his customers' dwelling to offer in
return for a trifling sum of money a calendar containing necessary
information, such as the ecclesiastical computation, or the difference
between the Gregorian and the Arabic Hegira; and Amedee Violette had
gradually become a young man.

A young man! that is to say, a being who possesses a treasure without
knowing its value, like a Central African negro who picks up one of M.
Rothschild's cheque-books; a young man ignorant of his beauty or charms,
who frets because the light down upon his chin has not turned into
hideous bristles, a young man who awakes every morning full of hope, and
artlessly asks himself what fortunate thing will happen to him to-day;
who dreams, instead of living, because he is timid and poor.

It was then that Amedee made the acquaintance of one of his comrades--he
no longer went to M. Batifol's boarding-school, but was completing his
studies at the Lycee Henri IV--named Maurice Roger. They soon formed an
affectionate intimacy, one of those eighteen-year-old friendships which
are perhaps the sweetest and most substantial in the world.

Amedee was attracted, at first sight, by Maurice's handsome, blond, curly
head, his air of frankness and superiority, and the elegant jackets that
he wore with the easy, graceful manners of a gentleman. Twice a day, when
they left the college, they walked together through the Luxembourg
Gardens, confiding to each other their dreams and hopes, lingering in the
walks, where Maurice already gazed at the grisettes in an impudent
fashion, talking with the charming abandon of t