e weather, setting in early, was hastening the awaking
of the earth. One morning, when Marianne and the children went to join
Mathieu on the plateau, they raised shouts of wonder, so completely had
the sun transformed the expanse in a single week. It was now all green
velvet, a thick endless carpet of sprouting corn, of tender, delicate
emerald hue. Never had such a marvellous crop been seen. And thus, as
the family walked on through the mild, radiant April morning, amid the
country now roused from winter's sleep, and quivering with fresh
youth, they all waxed merry at the sight of that healthfulness, that
progressing fruitfulness, which promised the fulfilment of all their
hopes. And their rapture yet increased when, all at once, they noticed
that little Gervais also was awaking to life, acquiring decisive
strength. As he struggled in his little carriage and his mother removed
him from it, behold! he took his flight, and, staggering, made four
steps; then hung to his father's legs with his little fists. A cry of
extraordinary delight burst forth.

"Why! he walks, he walks!"

Ah! those first lispings of life, those successive flights of the dear
little ones; the first glance, the first smile, the first step--what joy
do they not bring to parents' hearts! They are the rapturous _etapes_
of infancy, for which father and mother watch, which they await
impatiently, which they hail with exclamations of victory, as if each
were a conquest, a fresh triumphal entry into life. The child grows, the
child becomes a man. And there is yet the first tooth, forcing its
way like a needle-point through rosy gums; and there is also the first
stammered word, the "pa-pa," the "mam-ma," which one is quite ready
to detect amid the vaguest babble, though it be but the purring of a
kitten, the chirping of a bird. Life does its work, and the father and
the mother are ever wonderstruck with admiration and emotion at the
sight of that efflorescence alike of their flesh and their souls.

"Wait a moment," said Marianne, "he will come back to me. Gervais!
Gervais!"

And after a little hesitation, a false start, the child did indeed
return, taking the four steps afresh, with arms extended and beating the
air as if they were balancing-poles.

"Gervais! Gervais!" called Mathieu in his turn. And the child went back
to him; and again and again did they want him to repeat the journey,
amid their mirthful cries, so pretty and so funny did they find hi