of small vices. Frantz, who is at college in the second form, is constantly suspected of laziness, of a life of recklessness in the way of excessive enjoyment of cigarettes and clandestine drinks. He also arouses the displeasure of my æsthetic papa by a certain slackness in manners, by holding his knife and fork carelessly, by rocking on his chair, by neglecting his nails, etc. Thus our dinner is seasoned in a most delightful way.
The evening is the oasis of the day. When Frantz has retired to his lessons or his clandestine drink, and father at ten o'clock has said good-night, mother and I have a cosy chat. We open the door of the stove so that we can see the fire shine through the grating, we put the red shade on the lamp, and make ourselves comfortable on the couch. What do we talk about? About everything and nothing, from the greatest to the smallest, about what we have seen in the papers, about books we have read, about life's great problems, about family events old and new, but above all we talk of love. To hear mother talk of love is so beautiful and so touching, that it brings tears to my eyes. Poor little mother with her big warm heart, who was born to be treated gently by life. Surely she must have had a romance in her young days. It cannot possibly be memories from her married life that fill her thoughts with so much poetry. She did not marry father until she was twenty-seven years old, both her parents had died without leaving her a penny. But it is loveliest of all when
