the darting eyes; this time, at least, he was to be rewarded for his
prudence in looking about him. The object slowly resolved itself into
two crutches between which hung the limp figure of a one-legged man.

"_Bonjour, Monsieur le cure_." The crutches came to a standstill; the
cripple's hand went up to doff a ragged worsted cap.

"Good-day, good-day, my friend; how goes it? Not quite so stiff,
_hein_--in such a bath of sunlight as this? Good-day, good-day."

The crutches and their burden passed on, kicking a little cloud of dust
about the lean figure.

"_Un peu casse, le bonhomme_" he said, as he nodded to the cripple in a
tone of reflection, as if the breakage that bad befallen his humble
friend were a fresh incident in his experience. "Yes, he's a little
broken, the poor old man; but then," he added, quickly renewing his
tone of unquenchable high spirits--"one doesn't die of it. No, one
doesn't die, fortunately. Why, we're all more or less cracked, or
broken up here."

He shook another laugh out, as he preceded us up the stone steps. Then
he turned to stop for a moment to point his cane toward the small house
with whose chimneys we were now on a level. "There, mesdames, there is
the proof that more breaking doesn't signify in this matter of life
and death, _Tenez_, madame--" and with a charming gesture he laid
his richly-veined, strong old hand on my arm--a hand that ended in
beautiful fingers, each with its rim of moon-shaped dirt;
"_tenez_--figure to yourself, madame, that I myself have been here
twenty years, and I came for two! I bought out the _bonhomme_ who lived