gesticulating in the hands of Jacques. I was overwhelmed, like a workman
who had unconsciously produced a masterpiece. I felt myself quite small
in presence of this quivering piece of my own handiwork, and, frankly, a
little bit ashamed of having made it so well almost without troubling
about it. I can not undertake to explain all this, I merely relate my
impressions.

My mother-in-law held out her apron and the doctor placed the child on
his grandmother's knees, saying: "Come, little savage, try not to be any
worse than your rascal of a father. Now for five minutes of emotion.
Come, Captain, embrace me."

We did so heartily. The doctor's little black eyes twinkled more
brightly than usual; I saw very well that he was moved.

"Did it make you feel queer, Captain? I mean the cry? Ah! I know it,
it is like a needle through the heart . . . . Where is the nurse?
Ah! here she is. No matter, he is a fine boy, your little lancer.
Open the door for the prisoners in the drawing-room."

I opened the door. Every one was listening on the other side of it. My
father, my two aunts, still holding in their hands, one her rosary and
the other her Voltaire, my own nurse, poor old woman, who had come in a
cab.

"Well," they exclaimed anxiously, "well?"

"It is all over, it is a boy; go in, he is there."

You can not imagine how happy I was to see on all their faces the