Coco had for stable companions three fine Swiss cows.  Their names were La Blonde, Blanchotte, and Nera.  You know what the colours were for the names, don’t you?

Petit-Jacques, the stable boy, took care of them.  On fine days he led them to pasture into a bog paddock near the farm up against a pretty wood of silver beeches.  A large pond of clear water covered one corner of the meadow and lost itself in the reeds and iris.  There the fine big cows went to quench their thirst; quantities of frogs went there, too, to play leap-frog.  It was a veritable earthly Paradise.

From the farm Mother Etienne caught the sound of the large bronze bells each with its different low note, which hung round the necks of the cows; thus she could superintend their comings and goings without interrupting her various occupations.  For the farm was very big, as I told you, and had many animals on it.

After the stables and coachhouses came the piggery, the rabbit hutches, and finally an immense poultry-yard divided into a thousand compartments, and sheltering a whole horde of poultry of all sorts; fowls of all kinds and of all breeds, geese, guineafowl, pigeons, ducks, and what all besides.  What wasn’t there in that prodigious poultry-yard?

Mother Etienne spent most of her time there, for the smaller and more delicate the creatures the more interest and care she gave them.

“The weak need so much protection,” this excellent woman would say, and she was right.

So for the baby ducks her tenderness was limitless.  What dangers had to be avoided to raise successfully all these tiny folks!

Did a pig escape?  Immediately danger threatened the poultry-yard.  For a pig has terrible teeth and he doesn’t care what he eats—­he would as soon crunch a little duckling as a carrot.  So she had to watch every minute, every second even.  For besides, in spite of the vigilance of “Labrie,” the faithful watchdog, sometimes rats would suck the blood of the young pigeons.  Once even a whole litter of rabbits was destroyed that way.

To dispose of the products of her farm, Mother Etienne drove twice a week to market in her market-cart drawn by Coco.

She was famed for the best vegetables, the purest and creamiest milk; in short, the eggs she sold were the freshest, the poultry and rabbits the tenderest and most juicy to be had.  As soon as she and Coco came trotting into the market there was a rush to get to her first.

There, as everywhere, everyone loved Mother Etienne.

CHAPTER II

A MOTHER’S DEVOTION

Thus time passed peacefully at the big farm.

One day, however, the quiet was disturbed by a little drama which convulsed the calm but busy spot.