den meant a great deal to us. In it we grew almost all that we
ate--potatoes, cabbages, carrots, turnips. There was no ground wasted,
yet Mother Barberin had given me a little patch all to myself, in which
I had planted ferns and herbs that I had pulled up in the lanes while I
was minding the cow. I had planted everything pell mell, one beside the
other, in my bit of garden: it was not beautiful, but I loved it. It was
mine. I arranged it as I wished, just as I felt at the time, and when I
spoke of it, which happened twenty times a day, it was "My garden."

Already the jonquils were in bud and the lilac was beginning to shoot,
and the wall flowers would soon be out. How would they bloom? I
wondered, and that was why I came to see them every day. But there was
another part of my garden that I studied with great anxiety. I had
planted a vegetable that some one had given to me and which was almost
unknown in our village; it was Jerusalem artichokes. I was told they
would be delicious, better than potatoes, for they had the taste of
French artichokes, potatoes, and turnips combined. Having been told
this, I intended them to be a surprise for Mother Barberin. I had not
breathed a word about this present I had for her. I planted them in my
own bit of garden. When they began to shoot I would let her think that
they were flowers, then one fine day when they were ripe, while she was
out, I would pull them up and cook them myself. How? I was not quite
sure, but I did not worry over such a small detail; then when she
returned to supper I would serve her a dish of Jerusalem artichokes! It
would be something fresh to replace those everlasting potatoes, and
Mother Barberin would not suffer too much from the sale of poor
Rousette. And the inventor of this new dish of vegetables was I, Remi, I
was the one! So I was of some use in the house.

With such a plan in my head I had to bestow careful attention on my
Jerusalem artichokes. Every day I looked at the spot where I had planted
them, it seemed to me that they would never grow. I was kneeling on both
knees on the ground, supported on my hands, with my nose almost touching
the earth where the artichokes were sown, when I heard Barberin calling
me impatiently. I hurried back to the house. Imagine my surprise when I
saw, standing before the fireplace, Vitalis and his dogs.

I knew at once what Barberin wanted of me. Vitalis had come to fetch me
and it was so that Mother Barberin should