I climbs, and ventures into the cabin. Not a soul
was there; so I began collecting all I could find: clothes, a great box,
and, on the deck, four quintals of copper. So, you may guess, I was
obliged to make two journeys. The vessel was loaded with copper and
iron; but here comes Francois and Calabash. Now, then, let's be off to
the boat. Here, you young un, you Amandine! Look sharp, and make
yourself useful; you can carry the clothes; we must get new things, you
know, before we can throw aside our old ones."

Left alone, the widow busied herself in preparations for the family
supper. She placed on the table bottles, glasses, earthenware, plates,
with forks and spoons of silver; and, by the time this occupation was
completed, her offspring returned heavily laden.

Little Francois staggered beneath the weight of copper which he carried
on his shoulders, and Amandine was almost buried beneath the mass of
stolen garments which she bore on her head, while Nicholas and Calabash
brought in between them a wooden case, on the top of which lay the
fourth lump of copper.

"The case,--the case!" cried Calabash, with savage eagerness. "Come,
let's rip it open, and know what's in it."

The lumps of copper were flung on the ground. Nicholas took the heavy
hatchet he carried in his belt, and introduced its strong iron head
between the lid and the box which he had set down in the middle of the
kitchen, and endeavoured with all his strength to force it open. The red
and flickering light of the fire illumined this scene of pillage, while,
from without, the loud gusts of the night wind increased in violence.

Nicholas, meanwhile, attired in his goatskin vest, stooped over the box,
and essayed with all his might to wrench off the top, breaking out into
the most horrible and blasphemous expressions, as he found the solidity
of the fastenings resist all his endeavours to arrive at a knowledge of
its contents; and Calabash, her eyes inflamed by covetousness, her
cheeks flushed by the excitement of plunder, knelt down beside the case,
on which she leaned her utmost weight, in order to give more power to
the action of the lever employed by Nicholas. The widow, separated from
the group by the table, on the other side of which she was standing, in
her eagerness to behold the spoils, threw herself almost across the
table, the better to gaze on the booty; her longing eyes sparkled with
eagerness to learn the value of it. And finally--though unh