Alas! he never will see her again! At the Gerards, where they carried
him and the kind neighbor dressed him, they told him that his mother had
gone for a long time, a very long time; that he must love his papa very
much and think only of him; and other things that he could not understand
and dared not ask the meaning of, but which filled him with
consternation.

It was strange! The engraver and his wife busied themselves entirely
with him, watching him every moment. The little ones, too, treated him
in a singular, almost respectful manner. What had caused such a change?
Louise did not open her piano, and when little Maria wished to take her
"menagerie" from the lower part of the buffet, Madame Gerard said
sharply, as she wiped the tears from her eyes: "You must not play to-
day."

After breakfast Madame Gerard put on her hat and shawl and went out,
taking Amedee with her. They got into a carriage that took them through
streets that the child did not know, across a bridge in the middle of
which stood a large brass horseman, with his head crowned with laurel,
and stopped before a large house and entered with the crowd, where a very
agile and rapid young man put some black clothes on Amedee.

On their return the child found his father seated at the dining-room
table with M. Gerard, and both of them were writing addresses upon large
sheets of paper bordered with black. M. Violette was not crying, but his
face showed deep lines of grief, and he let his lock of hair fall over
his right eye.

At the sight of little Amedee, in his black clothes, he uttered a groan,
and arose, staggering like a drunken man, bursting into tears again.