They tried to take Maurice away, but he resisted them and threw himself
on that now motionless form.

"Dead!" cried he; "dead! She who had never left me, she who was the
only one in the world who loved me! You, my mother, dead! What then
remains for me here below?"

A stifled voice replied:

"God!"

Maurice, startled, raised himself! Was that a last sigh from the dead,
or his own conscience, that had answered him? He did not seek to know,
but he understood the answer, and accepted it.

It was then that I first knew him. I often went to see him in his little
toll-house. He joined in my childish games, told me his finest stories,
and let me gather his flowers. Deprived as he was of all external
attractiveness, he showed himself full of kindness to all who came to
him, and, though he never would put himself forward, he had a welcome for
everyone. Deserted, despised, he submitted to everything with a gentle
patience; and while he was thus stretched on the cross of life, amid the
insults of his executioners, he repeated with Christ, "Father, forgive
them, for they know not what they do."

No other clerk showed so much honesty, zeal, and intelligence; but those
who otherwise might have promoted him as his services deserved were
repelled by his deformity. As he had no patrons, he found his claims
were always disregarded. They preferred before him those who were better