"Well now, master, boys are not all alike. This boy is clever. I never was. No offense- but I never was so bored in my life as when I was with you."

"All right: and is this little man your brother? » Renaud replied, shyly and sadly:

"Jacques was Mélanie's nursling."

The good man asked no more questions; and the Little Parisian joined the class on the next day.

Renaud watched tenderly over the little scholar. He bought no winter waistcoat for himself, in order that Jacques might have a new suit of clothes. He washed his hands and face carefully every morning. The little wallet was filled with provisions to last all day. Jean made an enormous round to take the child half-way to school before going to his work. When he left him the little chap walked very steadily for fear of tearing his new blouse, and once in school astonished the master by his intelligence. And in the evening what a pleasure it was to follow the shady paths, and join his big brother in the midst of the forest, and then both go home by a short cut! When there, one would light the fire and the other set on the soup; then they pricked two lovely apples, and watched them frothing in the cinders.

Next year, when the Little Parisian had learned to read, Jean became uneasy.

"This boy's too clever for me. I fancy he'll get tired of my company."

And he tried to think of something, besides providing for physical wants, to amuse his little companion. His unselfishness led him even to leave the forest, to frequent the fêtes in neighboring towns. He lifted the boy on to the merry-go-rounds, when the wooden horses turned slowly to the sound of a handorgan; made him take shares in lotteries for macaroons and wine-glasses. They witnessed the rough sports of the young farmers, who drank all the more when they were not thirsty, and whose wit consisted in pinching the waists of the girls and making them scream without being found out. Vehicles filled with whole families drove in, raising a terrible dust. The violin squeaked in the place marked out by ropes for dancing. The dentist "from Paris," established with great pomp on his unhorsed carriage, a huge case of instruments in the front, held firmly on the seat a peasant adorned with a swelled face, and informed the public that he was going to extract the tooth with

the same instrument that he used for crowned heads. At a little distance long tables were spread under sheds, charged with cider and strong-smelling drinks. The landlord's assistant had to make way with his elbows to the billiard table, to separate two sabotmakers who were settling a doubtful game with a fight.

"Do you enjoy the fun, my little Jacques?" said Renaud, trying to look delighted.

"On the contrary, I am bored to death. My head aches, and I feel sick. I like the forest ever so much better."

But there were also fêtes in the forest. There they felt at home, and Renaud took his little friend to all of them.

First, there was gathering the lilies-of-the-valley about Ascension Day. The fields are celebrated for their profusion from Grez to St. Agert. Gentle and simple alike love these sweet flowers, whose milky whiteness gleams in the shade, against the deep green of their pointed leaves. All the idle population of the neighboring towns crowds the forest in the charming season when the lilies burst into flower. The woods change their aspect. Young men from town arrive with their great-coats under their arms; young ladies sing in high soprano voices the romances of Louisa Puget; some young men are exchanging words of love with their sweethearts, others pursuing the objects. of their fancy. In the evening, nosegays pass from hand to hand. The mothers follow, large and imposing, their caps adorned with artificial flowers, the strings floating in the breeze. Greasy papers cover the ground in open spaces. One hears the bottles knock against each other in the baskets carried by means of a walking-stick passed through the handles by some happy couple.

On the Fête of St. Louis (August 15th) the nutting begins. The strangers come again, and once more fill the forest with noisy merriment. The nuts in their hairy envelopes cover the branches. The draper's wife has stuffed her pockets with them; the policeman has filled his basket. The priest's nephew, a corporal on leave, strikes them down with a quarter-staff; the collector's wife uses her yellow parasol to bend down the branches. Some of the young men get excited, and challenge each other to a gymnastic bout. Elsewhere they are dancing in a ring. No one but the barber, who was formerly a waiter in Courbevoie, refuses to take part, and replies scornfully, "I only care for regular dances."

The Little Parisian draws his friend on one side.

"I don't care for this either: let's be off, brother."

"My darling, you love the real forest, then, as much as I do?"

"Yes, I do love it. But you

don't know how I wish that what the people said was true-that dear Jean had a gun, and we could hunt the game together."

Renaud the Poacher trembled.

What! again this longing! How often has he cherished it himself during the two years they have lived together!

"What are you talking about?" he broke out: "are you mad? My gun? I swear it's broken; but why-why are you always thinking of sport?»

The Little Parisian looks dreamily up at the green vault over his head; he inhales the scent of the woods; he has all sorts of wild thoughts. The mysterious thicket attracts him; he begins to understand why he loves the Chemins-Verts. He replies:

"I don't know if I am thinking of sport, but I long to get deeper and deeper into the forest, to watch all that goes on, to catch the birds on the wing."

The dead leaves lay in heaps on the path, the wind had blown them into ridges like the waves of the sea. He stepped

over them proudly, and threw back his head, thrilling with youthful excitement, and exclaimed: —

"The forest is ours! this delicious air is ours!"

Renaud saw himself in this enthusiastic child.

A. T. QUILLER-COUCH

(1863-)

HE fiction of the English writer who began by signing his literary work with the initial "Q.," is among the most virile and pleasing written by the younger British school. A. T. Quiller-Couch-the full name of this author-makes stories that are full of vigor and invention; romantic in treatment, yet realistic in their close observation, and in the understanding sympathy with which he studies the life of humble folk and the types and scenes of his native country. He is a Cornishman, and has given his main attention to the people of that locality, spending most of his time within the sound of the Cornish seas. His novels and short tales in spirit and method affiliate him with Barrie, Kipling, and Stevenson, and he is little inferior to them in strength and originality. Although his literary production includes criticism and poetry, his reputation is based substantially on his stories. 'Dead Man's Rock' in 1887 won him much favor, and other books followed in due course: Astonishing History of Troy Town,' Splendid Spur,' and 'The Blue Pavilions,' historical novels; and the collections of short stories entitled 'Naughts and Crosses,' 'I Saw Three Ships; and other Winter's Tales,' 'The Delectable Duchy,' and 'Wandering Heath.' 'Ia,' a novelette, is a tale of love in a Cornish fishing village. Mr. Quiller-Couch's strongest novel is the brilliant The Splendid Spur,' recognized by the critics as one of the most stirring romances by a contemporaneous English novelist. In The Delectable Duchy,' which is finely representative of his short-story work, are grouped a number of Cornish tales and sketches, exquisite for truth, pathos, and poetry, rich with feeling for the lights. and shadows in the life of the Welsh poor. The writer thus ranges from the dramatic to the idyllic, and is successful in both veins. His fiction as a whole is thoroughly healthy and inspiriting. The unpleasant realism and the decadent pessimism of the day he stands quite apart from. Like R. L. Stevenson, he unites the power of making

The
The

stories instinct with adventurous interest, with a literary gift and an insight into character which have gained him the approval of captious critics, and made him a favorite with those who read a story for the story's sake.

In his personality and manner of life, Quiller-Couch seems a man of affairs and of outdoor sports rather than the traditional book-man. He was born November 21st, 1863. His family has lived in Cornwall for generations, and he comes of good stock; father, uncle, and grandfather being distinguished scientists in the fields of biology and medicine. He was educated in various Devonshire schools, then went up to Trinity College, Oxford. As an undergraduate he contributed clever verse to the college paper, adopting the pseudonym "Q.” He was and is an athlete,- as one might infer from his books,- and in his day was stroke of the college boat. He took his degree in 1887, and was appointed classical lecturer at Trinity; but soon turned to fiction, went to London, and joined the staff of the Speaker — Barrie being a fellow-worker. This newspaper connection has been retained ever since, although Mr. Quiller-Couch now lives in a charming country house at Fowey in Cornwall. The volume Adventures in Criticism is made up of selected book reviews representing his journalistic work, which is decidedly fresh and good. The Elizabethan anthology, The Golden Pomp,' also testifies to his reading and scholarship.

The work of A. T. Quiller-Couch is refutation of the charge that the end-of-the-century in English literature has nothing to offer but the morbid and unwholesome. He is a strong, manly writer, whose steadily growing influence is tonic and welcome.

WHEN THE SAP ROSE: A FANTASIA

From The Delectable Duchy. Copyright 1893, by Macmillan & Co.

AN

N OLD yellow van, the "Comet," came jolting along the edge of the downs and shaking its occupants together like peas in a bladder. The bride and bridegroom did not mind this much; but the Registrar of Births, Deaths, and Marriages, who had bound them in wedlock at the Bible Christian Chapel two hours before, was discomforted by a pair of tight boots, that nipped cruelly whenever he stuck out his feet to keep his equilibrium.

Nevertheless, his mood was genial; for the young people had taken his suggestion and acquired a copy of their certificate.