mother. Come, little one, and eat your
breakfast."

Jeanne was such a creature of moods and changes that she forgot her
errand to Marie. She clasped her hands together and murmured her French
blessing in a soft, reverent tone.

Maize was a staple production in the new world, when the fields were not
destroyed by marauding parties. There were windmills that ground it
coarsely and both cakes and porridge were made of it. The Indian women
cracked and pounded it in a stone mortar and boiled it with fish or
venison. The French brought in many new ways of cooking.

"Oh, hear the bells and the music from the Fort! Come, hurry, Pani, if
you are going with us. Pani, are people slow when they get old?"

"Much slower, little one."

"Then I don't want to be old. I want to run and jump and climb and swim.
Marie knits, she has so many brothers and sisters. But I like leggings
better in the winter. And they sew at the Recollet house."

"And thou must learn to sew, little one."

"Wait until I am big and old and have to sit in the chimney corner.
There are no little ones--sometimes I am glad, sometimes sorry, but if
they are not here one does not have to work for them."

She gave a bright laugh and was off like a flash. The Pani woman sighed.
She wondered sometimes whether it would not have been better to give her
up to the good father who took such an interest in her. But she was all
the poor woman had to love. True she could be a servant in the house,
but to have her wild, free darling bound down to rigid rules and made
unhappy was more than she could stand. And had not Mr. Bellestre
provided this home for them?

The woman had hardly put away the dishes, which were almost as much of
an idol to her as the child, when Jeanne came flying back.

"Yes, hurry, hurry, Pani! They are all ready. And Madame De Ber said
Marie should not go out on such a day unless you went too. She called me
feather headed! As if I were an Indian chief with a great crown of
feathers!"

The child laughed gayly. It was as natural to her as singing to a bird.

Pani gathered up a few last things and looked to see that the fire was
put out.

Already the streets were being crowded and presented a picturesque
aspect. Inside the stockade the _chemin du ronde_ extended nearly around
the town and this had been widened by the necessity of military
operations. Soldiers were pouring out of the Citadel and the Fort but
the colonial costume looked queer to eye