old fellow."

"You don't know what you may be at his age."

"Yes, I do know," responded Nepomucene, "I shall be in the sugar-bowl."

"The sugar-bowl?"

"Yes, they'll have made my bones into charcoal by that time; I often see
the carts of the refineries coming to Montsouris for charcoal; they tell
me they make sugar of it." And he departed after another load of wood,
satisfied with this philosophical reflection.

Godefroid discreetly withdrew to his own rooms, closing Monsieur
Bernard's door behind him. Madame Vauthier, who during this time had
been preparing her new lodger's breakfast, now came up to serve it,
attended by Felicite. Godefroid, lost in reflection, stared into his
fire. He was absorbed in meditation on this great misery which contained
so many different miseries, and yet within which he could see the
ineffable joys of the many triumphs of paternal and filial love; they
were gems shining in the blackness of the pit.

"What romances, even those that are most famous, can equal such
realities?" he thought. "What a life it will be to relieve the burden of
such existences, to seek out causes and effects and remedy them, calming
sorrows, helping good; to incarnate one's own being in misery; to
familiarize one's self with homes like that; to act out constantly in
life those dramas which move us so in fiction! I never imagined that
good could be more interesting, more piquant than vice."

"Is monsieur satisfied with his breakfast?" asked Madame Vauthier, who
now, with Felicite's assistance, brought the table close to Godefroid.

Godefroid then saw a cup of excellent _cafe au lait_ with a smoking
omelet, fresh butter, and little red radishes.

"Where the devil did you get those radishes?" he asked.

"They were given me by Monsieur Cartier," answered Madame Vauthier; "and
I make a present of them to monsieur."

"And what are you going to ask me for such a breakfast daily?"

"Well now, monsieur, be fair,--I couldn't do it for less than thirty
sous."

"Very good, thirty sous then;" said Godefroid; "but how is it that
they ask me only forty-five francs a month for dinner, close by here at
Machillot's? That is the same price you ask me for breakfast."

"But what a difference, monsieur, between preparing a dinner for fifteen
or twenty persons and going out to get you just what you want for
breakfast! See here! there's a roll, eggs, butter, the cost of lighting
a fire, sugar, milk, coffee!--just think! the