See! here is the sycamore you climbed one day to escape me when I wanted you to make believe that you were a girl, as you said, and you had little fancy for such a silly role.

There is the alley where we played ball, and yonder the hedge and the grove where we played hide-and-seek." "Say rather, _cligne-musette_; it is more poetical," he rejoined.

"When I was down in Transylvania I made a _chanson_ about it all, and set it myself to music." "Sing me your _chanson_." "You are mocking at me; my voice is false, as you well know; but I will consent to recite it to you.

The rhymes are not rich--I am no son of Parnassus." With these words, lowering his voice, not daring to look her in the face, he recited the couplets.
"Your _chanson_ is very pretty," said she; "but it does not tell the truth, for here we are sitting together on this bench; we have not lost each other at all." She was so innocent that she had no idea of the torture she was inflicting, and he saw this so plainly that he could not so much as have the satisfaction of finding fault with her; yet he asked himself whether in the best woman's heart there was not a foundation of cruelty, of unconscious ferocity.

He felt the tears start to his eyes; he scarcely could restrain them; he abruptly bowed his head, and began to examine a beautiful horned beetle, which was just crossing the gravel-path at a quick pace, apparently having some very important affairs to regulate.
When M.Langis raised his head his eyes were dry, his face serene, his lips smiling.
"It is very certain," he observed, "that two years ago I must have appeared supremely ridiculous to you.