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 "About a quarter of an hour."

"Let us hurry, so as to get our soup."

"We really are late."

"We must run. But your babies are tired. We are only two women, we can't carry three brats. And then, Flécharde, you are already carrying one. A regular lump of lead. You have weaned the greedy little thing, but you are always carrying her. A bad habit; oblige me by making her walk. Well! so much the worse, our soup will be cold!"

"Oh, what good shoes you have given me! I should think they were made for me."

"They are better than going barefooted."

"Hurry up now, René-Jean."

"He is the one who has kept us back. He has to speak to every little peasant girl he meets. That is because he is a man."

"To be sure, he is going on five years."

"Tell me, René-Jean, why did you speak to that little girl in the village?"

A child's voice,—that of a boy, replied,—

"Because I know her."

The woman added,—

"What, you know her?"

"Yes," replied the boy, "ever since she played with me this morning."

"Oh, how big he is!" exclaimed the woman, "we have only been in the country three days, he is no larger than my thumb, and he has a sweetheart already."

The voices grew fainter. All sound died away.