rt
time before. He took what I said with the touching cheerfulness which
comes from a heart in the right place, and which looks upon everything
on the good side. He neither spoke to me of the necessity which obliged
him to work while I could sleep, nor of the deprivations of the old
soldier compared to the luxury of the young clerk; he only struck his
forehead, accused himself of thoughtlessness, and promised to put list
round his door!

O great and beautiful soul! with whom nothing turns to bitterness, and
who art peremptory only in duty and benevolence!

October 15th.--This morning I was looking at a little engraving I
had framed myself, and hung over my writing-table; it is a design of
Gavarni's; in which, in a grave mood, he has represented a veteran and a
conscript.

By often contemplating these two figures, so different in expression,
and so true to life, both have become living in my eyes; I have seen
them move, I have heard them speak; the picture has become a real scene,
at which I am present as spectator.

The veteran advances slowly, his hand leaning on the shoulder of the
young soldier. His eyes, closed for ever, no longer perceive the sun
shining through the flowering chestnut-trees. In the place of his right
arm hangs an empty sleeve, and he walks with a wooden leg, the sound of
which on the pavement makes those who pass turn to look.

At the sight of this ancient wreck from our patriotic wars, the greater
number shake their heads in pity, and I seem to hear a sigh or an
imprecation.

"See the worth of glory!" says a portly merchant, turning away his eyes
in horror.

"What a deplorable use of human life!" rejoins a young man who carries a
volume of philosophy under his arm.

"The trooper would better not have left his plow," adds a countryman,
with a cunning air.

"Poor old man!" murmurs a woman, almost crying.

The veteran has heard, and he knits his brow; for it seems to him that
his guide has grown thoughtful. The latter, attracted by what he hears
around him, hardly answers the old man's questions, and his eyes,
vaguely lost in space, seem to be seeking there for the solution of some
problem.

I seem to see a twitching in the gray moustaches of the veteran; he
stops abruptly, and, holding back his guide with his remaining arm:

"They all pity me," says he, "because they do not understand it; but if
I were to answer them--"

"What would you say to them, father?" asks the young man, wit