l old iron while the infant sucked. Her milk
cost nothing, and she let her little daughter feed on it for two years,
neither of them being the worse for the long nursing.

Veronique (that was the infant's name) became the handsomest child in
the Lower town, and every one who saw her stopped to look at her. The
neighbors then noticed for the first time a trace of feeling in the old
Sauviats, of which they had supposed them devoid. While the wife cooked
the dinner the husband held the little one, or rocked it to the tune
of an Auvergnat song. The workmen as they passed sometimes saw him
motionless gazing at Veronique asleep on her mother's knees. He softened
his harsh voice when he spoke to her, and wiped his hands on his
trousers before taking her up. When Veronique tried to walk, the father
bent his legs and stood at a little distance holding out his arms and
making little grimaces which contrasted funnily with the rigid furrows
of his stern, hard face. The man of iron, brass, and lead became a being
of flesh and blood and bones. If he happened to be standing with his
back against the corner pillar motionless, a cry from Veronique would
agitate him and send him flying over the mounds of iron fragments to
find her; for she spent her childhood playing with the wreck of ancient
castles heaped in the depths of that old shop. There were other days on
which she went to play in the street or with the neighboring children;
but even then her mother's eye was always on her.

It is not unimportant to say here that the Sauviats were eminently
religious. At the very height of the Revolution they observed both
Sunday and fete-days. Twice Sauviat came near having his head cut off
for hearing mass from an unsworn priest. He was put in prison, being
justly accused of helping a bishop, whose life he saved, to fly the
country. Fortunately the old-iron dealer, who knew the ways of bolts
and bars, was able to escape; nevertheless he was condemned to death by
default, and as, by the bye, he never purged himself of that contempt,
he may be said to have died dead.

His wife shared his piety. The avariciousness of the household yielded
to the demands of religion. The old-iron dealers gave their alms
punctually at the sacrament and to all the collections in church. When
the vicar of Saint-Etienne called to ask help for his poor, Sauviat or
his wife fetched at once without reluctance or sour faces the sum they
thought their fair share of the pa