humble hands. Here I might find folks who would laugh when I arrived,
and would be glad to share their luncheon with me But--ten years gone
by!

[Illustration: THE TWO CHICKENS.]

This computation chilled my hopes. What family remains ten years in a
spot--above all, a spot on that fluctuating periphery of Paris, where
the mighty capital, year after year, bursts belt after belt? Where
might they have gone? Francine!--Francine must be twenty-two. Married,
of course. Her husband, no doubt, has dragged her off to some
other department. Her parents have followed. March, volunteer, and
disentangle yourself from these profitless speculations!

Ten minutes farther on, in the shade of the fort at Noisy-le-Sec,
I saw a red gable and the sign of a tavern. As a tourist I have a
passion for a cabaret: in practice, I find Véfours to unite perhaps a
greater number of advantages.

[Illustration: LOVE LEFT ALONE.]

Some soldiers of the Fortieth were drinking and laughing in a corner.
I took a table not far off, and drew my cold victuals out of my box of
japanned tin, which they doubtless took for a new form of canteen. The
red-fisted garçon, without waiting for orders, set up before me, like
ten-pins, a castor in wood with two enormous bottles, and a litre of
that rinsing of the vats which, under the name "wine of the country,"
is so distressingly similar in every neighborhood. Resigned to
anything, I was about drawing out my slice of ham, the chicken seeming
to me just there somewhat too proud a bird and out of harmony with the