and sparrows, laughed when he was called a scamp, and felt angry when he was called a thief. He had no bed, no bread, no fire, no love; but he was happy because he was free.

One evening in the early spring, when the breezes were blowing sharply, so sharply that January seemed to have returned, and the citizens had put on their cloaks again, little Gavroche, still shivering gayly under his rags, was standing as if in ecstasy in front of a hairdresser's shop. He was adorned with a woolen shawl, picked up no one knew where, of which he had made a muffler. Little Gavroche appeared to be lost in admiration of a waxen image of a bride, with a wreath of orange blossoms in her hair, which revolved between two lamps in the window. But in reality he was watching the shop to see whether he could not snatch a cake of soap, which he would afterward sell to a barber in the suburbs.

While Gavroche was examining the bride, the window, and the soap, he saw two boys, very decently dressed, both younger than himself, timidly open the door and enter the shop. They both spoke together, asking for charity. Their words were unintelligible, because sobs choked the voice of the younger boy and cold made the teeth of the elder rattle. The barber, without laying down his razor, drove them into the street, and closed the door.

The two lads set off again, crying. A cloud had come up in the meanwhile, and rain began to fall. Little Gavroche ran up to them.

"What is the matter with you?" he asked.

"We don't know where to sleep," the elder replied. "Is that all?" said Gavroche. "Is that anything to cry about, simpletons?" And assuming an accent

of tender care and gentle protection, he said,

"Come with me, boys."

"Yes, sir," said the elder boy.

And the two children followed him as they would have done an archbishop, and left off crying.

As they went along the street, Gavroche noticed a little girl shivering in a gateway.

"Poor girl," said Gavroche. "Here, take this." And taking off the good woolen garment which he had around his neck he threw it over the thin, bare shoulders of the beggar girl, where the muffler became once again a shawl. The little girl looked at him with an astonished air, and received the shawl in silence. The shower, redoubling its passion, poured down. "Hello!" Gavroche shouted. "What's the meaning of this? It is raining again."

And he went on, shivering with the cold.

"No matter," he said, as he took a glance at the beggar girl crouching under her shawl, "she's got something to cover her anyway."

The two children limped after him, and as they passed a baker's shop, Gavroche turned round.

66

"By the by, boys, have you dined?"

"We have had nothing to eat, sir, since early this morning," the elder answered.

Gavroche stopped, and for some minutes searched through his rags. At length he raised his head with an air of triumph, —

"Calm yourselves; here is supper for three ;' and he drew a coin from one of his pockets. Without giving the lads time to feel amazed, he pushed them both before him into the baker's shop, and laid his money on the counter, exclaiming,—

"Bread for three!"

When the bread was cut, Gavroche said to the two boys,

"Eat away."

At the same time he gave each of them a lump of bread. There was one piece smaller than the two others, and he took that for himself. Then he said,—

"Let us return to the street," and they started again in the direction of the Bastile. From time to time, as they passed lighted shops, the younger boy stopped to see what time it was.

*

Some years back there might have been seen in the southeastern corner of the square of the Bastile

a quaint monument. It was an elephant, forty feet high, constructed of carpentry and masonry. On its back it bore a castle which resembled a house, once painted green by some plasterer, and now painted black by the rain and by time.

In this deserted corner of the square, the wide forehead of the elephant, its trunk, its tusks, its castle, its enormous back, and its four feet, like columns, produced at night a surprising and terrible outline. No one knew what it meant, and no passerby looked at it. It was falling in ruins, and each season, plaster becoming detached from its flanks, made horrible wounds upon it. It was to this huge structure that Gavroche led the two urchins.

On coming near the colossus, Gavroche understood the effect which the very great may produce on the very little, and said,

"Don't be frightened, little ones."

A ladder, used by workmen during the day, was lying near the monument. Gavroche raised it with singular vigor and placed it against one of the elephant's fore legs. At the point where the ladder ended, a sort of black hole could be distinguished in the body of the colossus. Gavroche pointed out the ladder and the hole to his guests, and said,

"Go up,

and go in." The two little boys looked

at each other in terror.

"You are frightened!" Gavroche exclaimed, and added, "You shall see."

He clung around the elephant's wrinkled foot, and in a twinkling, without deigning to use the ladder, he reached the hole. He went in like a lizard gliding into a crevice, and a moment after the boys saw his head appear on the edge of the hole.

"Well," he cried, "come up, my blessed babes. You will see how snug it is. Come up, you," he said to the elder. "I will hold your hand."

The elder boy ventured, and the younger, on seeing himself left alone between the feet of this great beast, felt much inclined to cry, but did not dare. The elder climbed up the rungs of the ladder in a very tottering way, and as he did so Gavroche encouraged him by exclaiming,

"Don't be frightened! That is it-keep on moving; set your foot there; now your hand herebravo!"

And when he was within reach, Gavroche quickly and powerfully seized him by the arm and drew him in.

"Swallowed!" he said. The boy had passed through the crevice.

"Now," said Gavroche, "wait for me. Pray sit down, sir."

And leaving the hole in the same way as he had