ikewise increased, compensation for possible loss on one side
being found on another where the harvest proved prodigious.

And, like the estate, the children also grew. Blaise and Denis, the
twins, now already fourteen years of age, reaped prize after prize at
school, putting their younger brother, Ambroise, slightly to shame, for
his quick and ingenious mind was often busy with other matters than his
lessons. Gervais, the girls Rose and Claire, as well as the last-born
boy, little Gregoire, were yet too young to be trusted alone in Paris,
and so they continued growing in the open air of the country, without
any great mishap befalling them. And at the end of those two years
Marianne gave birth to her eighth child, this time a girl, named Louise;
and when Mathieu saw her smiling with the dear little babe in her arms,
he embraced her passionately, and triumphed once again over every sorrow
and every pang. Yet another child, yet more wealth and power, yet
an additional force born into the world, another field ready for
to-morrow's harvest.

And 'twas ever the great work, the good work, the work of fruitfulness
spreading, thanks to the earth and thanks to woman, both victorious over
destruction, offering fresh means of subsistence each time a fresh child
was born, and loving, willing, battling, toiling, even amid suffering,
and ever tending to increase of life and increase of hope.

* * * * * *

Then two more years rolled on, and during those two years Mathieu and
Marianne had yet another child, another daughter, whom they called
Madeleine. And once again the estate of Chantebled was increased; this
time by all the marshland whose ponds and whose springs remained to be
drained and captured on the west of the plateau. The whole of this part
of the property was now acquired by the Froments--two hundred acres of
land where, hitherto, only water plants had grown, but which now was
given over to cultivation, and yielded abundant crops. And the new
springs, turned into canals on every side, again carried beneficent
life to the sandy slopes, and fertilized them. It was life's resistless
conquest; it was fruitfulness spreading in the sunlight; it was labor
ever incessantly pursuing its work of creation amid obstacles and
suffering, making good all losses, and at each succeeding hour setting
more energy, more health, and more joy in the veins of the world.

This time it was Seguin himself who asked Mathieu to purchase a f