friends, with the account of my life--that life whose continuance I truly
owe to my mother Catharine.

When my actual mother had recovered she returned to Paris; and as my
nurse, who had four boys, could not follow her, it was decided that I
should remain at the château and that my mother Catharine should stay
there with me.

Her cottage was situated among the gardens. Her husband, father Guillaume,
was the head gardener, and his four sons were Joseph, aged six years; next
Matthieu, who was four; then Jerome, two; and my foster-brother Bastien, a
big lubber of three months.

My father and mother did not at all forget me. They sent me playthings of
all sorts, sweetmeats, silken frocks adorned with embroideries and laces,
and all sorts of presents for mother Catharine and her children. I was
happy, very happy, for I was worshiped by all who surrounded me. Mother
Catharine preferred me above her own children. Father Guillaume would go
down upon his knees before me to get a smile [risette], and Joseph often
tells me he swooned when they let him hold me in his arms. It was a happy
time, I assure you; yes, very happy.

I was two years old when my parents returned, and as they had brought a
great company with them the true mother instructed my nurse to take me
back to her cottage and keep me there, that I might not be disturbed by
noise. Mother Catharine has often said to me that my mother could not bear
to look at my crippled shoulder, and that she called me a hunchback. But
after all it was the truth, and my nurse-mother was wrong to lay that
reproach upon my mother Aurélie.