centre of the Kingdom of Dust was the place to gather details of the
history of Parisian rag-picking--particularly as I could do so from the
lips of one who looked like the oldest inhabitant.

I began my inquiries, and the old woman gave me most interesting
answers--she had been one of the ceteuces who sat daily before the
guillotine and had taken an active part among the women who signalised
themselves by their violence in the revolution. While we were talking
she said suddenly: 'But m'sieur must be tired standing,' and dusted a
rickety old stool for me to sit down. I hardly liked to do so for many
reasons; but the poor old woman was so civil that I did not like to run
the risk of hurting her by refusing, and moreover the conversation of
one who had been at the taking of the Bastille was so interesting that I
sat down and so our conversation went on.

While we were talking an old man--older and more bent and wrinkled even
than the woman--appeared from behind the shanty. 'Here is Pierre,' said
she. 'M'sieur can hear stories now if he wishes, for Pierre was in
everything, from the Bastille to Waterloo.' The old man took another
stool at my request and we plunged into a sea of revolutionary
reminiscences. This old man, albeit clothed like a scarecrow, was like
any one of the six veterans.

I was now sitting in the centre of the low hut with the woman on my left
hand and the man on my right, each of them being somewhat in front of
me. The place was full of all sorts of curious objects of lumber, and of
many things that I wished far away. In one corner was a heap of rags
which seemed to move from the number of vermin it contained, and in the
other a heap of bones whose odour was something shocking. Every now and
then, glancing at the heaps, I could see the gleaming eyes of some of