quite.

* * * * *

Ernest Meissonier, the artist, began collecting very early. He has told
us that he remembers, when five years of age, of going with his mother to
market and collecting rabbits' ears and feet, which he would take home,
and carefully nail up on the wall of the garret. And it may not be amiss
to explain here that the rabbit's foot as an object of superstitious
veneration has no real place outside of the United States of America, and
this only south of Mason and Dixon's line.

The Meissonier lad's collection of rabbits' ears increased until he had
nearly colors enough to run the chromatic scale. Then he collected
pigeons' wings in like manner, and if you have ever haunted French
market-places you know how natural a thing this would be for a child. The
boy's mother took quite an interest in his amusements, and helped him to
spread the wings out and arrange the tails fan-shape on the walls. They
had long strings of buttons and boxes of spools in partnership; and when
they would go up the Seine on little excursions on Sunday afternoons,
they would bring back rich spoils in the way of swan feathers,
butterflies, "snake-feeders" and tiny shells. Then once they found a
bird's nest, and as the mother bird had deserted it, they carried it
home. That was a red-letter day, for the garret collection had increased
to such an extent that a partition was made across the corner of a room
by hanging up a strip of cloth. And all the things in that corner
belonged to Ernest--his mother said so. Ernest's mother seems to have had
a fine, joyous, childlike nature, so she fully entered into the life of
her boy. He wanted no other companion. In fact, this mother was little
better herself than a child in years--she was only sixteen when she bore
him. They lived at Lyons then, but three years later moved to Paris. Her
temperament was poetic, religious, and her spirit had in it a touch of
superstition--which is the case with all really excellent women.

But this sweet playtime was not for long--the mother died in Eighteen
Hundred Twenty-five, aged twenty-four years.

I suppose there is no greater calamity that can befall a child than to
lose his mother. Still, Nature is very kind, and for Ernest Meissonier
there always remained firm, clear-cut memories of a slight, fair-haired
woman, with large, open, gray eyes, who held him in her arms, sang to
him, and rocked him to sleep each night as the dar