"Baby, what did you say, sir?"

"I said just as papa does."

What would you? He is a faithful mirror. You are for him an ideal, a
model, the type of all that is great and strong, handsome and
intelligent.

Often he makes mistakes, the little dear, but his error is all the more
delicious in its sincerity, and you feel all the more unworthy of such
frank admiration. You console yourself for your own imperfections in
reflecting that he is not conscious of them.

The defects of children are almost always harrowed from their father;
they are the consequences of a too literal copy. Provide, then, against
them. Yes, no doubt, but I ask you what strength of mind is not needed
by a poor man to undeceive his baby, to destroy, with a word, his
innocent confidence, by saying to him: "My child, I am not perfect,
and I have faults to be avoided?"

This species of devotion on the part of the baby for his father reminds
me of the charming remark of one of my little friends. Crossing the
road, the little fellow caught sight of a policeman. He examined him
with respect, and then turning to me, after a moment's reflection, said,
with an air of conviction: "Papa is stronger than all the policemen,
isn't he?"

If I had answered "No," our intimacy would have been broken off short.

Was it not charming? One can truly say, "Like baby, like papa." Our