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102 certainly climb those stairs to the gallery, or else"—her eyes had almost closed—"he will run down into the ravine." With that her head sank forward, and the stocking slipped from her hands. In a second her open mouth had emitted a gentle snore, and the boy had disappeared from her vision.

Needless to say, this was the moment which the youngster had been impatiently awaiting, for it marked the beginning of an independent existence, and he was now alone in the wide, wide world. On tiptoe he left the nurse's side, and, peeping cautiously at the other slumberers, kept stopping to throw a second glance at any one who chanced to stir, or to spit, or to snuffle in his sleep. At last, with a tremor of joy in his heart, he made for the gallery, ascended the creaking stairs at a run, scaled also the dovecote, explored the recesses of the garden, listened to the buzzing of beetles, and followed with his eyes their flight through the air. Next, on hearing a chirping sound in the grass, he sought and captured the disturber of the public peace, in the shape of a dragon-fly, whose wings he proceeded to tear off, and whose body to impale upon a straw, in order that he might see how, thus hampered, the creature would contrive to fly. Afterwards,