e shower of
birds. There were seven of them!"--And they all went into raptures,
amazed, but reciprocally credulous.

She was still smiling as she looked at him; she even began to laugh; and
he lost his head trying to find something suitable to say, no matter
what. But he could think of nothing, nothing, and then, seized with a
coward's courage, he said to himself: 'So much the worse, I will risk
everything,' and suddenly, without the slightest warning, he went toward
her, his arms extended, his lips protruding, and, seizing her in his
arms, he kissed her.

My elder sons never loved me, never petted me, scarcely treated me as a
mother, but during my whole life I did my duty towards them, and I owe
them nothing more after my death. The ties of blood cannot exist
without daily and constant affection. An ungrateful son is less than, a
stranger; he is a culprit, for he has no right to be indifferent towards
his mother.

SHORT STORIES VOLUME XI.

I held my tongue, and thought over those words. Oh, ethics! Oh, logic!
Oh, wisdom! At his age! So they deprived him of his only remaining
pleasure out of regard for his health! His health! What would he do
with it, inert and trembling wreck that he was? They were taking care
of his life, so they said. His life? How many days? Ten, twenty,
fifty, or a hundred? Why? For his own sake? Or to preserve for some
time longer the spectacle of his impotent greediness in the family.

But all at once one envelope made me start. My name was traced on it in
a large, bold handwriting; and suddenly tears came to my eyes. That
letter was from my dearest friend, the companion of my youth, the
confidant of my hopes; and he appeared before me so clearly, with his
pleasant smile and his hand outstretched, that a cold shiver ran down my
back. Yes, yes, the dead come back, for I saw him! Our memory is a
more perfect world than the universe: it gives back life to those who no
longer exist.

But she shook with rage, and got up one of those conjugal scenes which
make a peaceable man dread the domestic hearth more than a battlefield
where bullets are raining.

SHORT STORIES VOLUME XII.

Monsieur Saval, who was called in Mantes "Father Saval," had just risen
from bed. He was weeping. It was a dull autumn day; the leaves were
falling. They fell slowly in the rain, like a heavier and slower rain.
M. Saval was not in good spirits. He walked from the fireplace to the