“And you have seen him before?”

“Yes, yes! he belongs to the great house at the end of the street, where there is an iron gate with gilt points.”

The child quickly raised his head, and stopped crying.  The little boy answered all the questions that were put to him, and gave such details as left no room for doubt.  The other child understood him, for he went up to him as if to put himself under his protection.

“Then you can take him to his parents?” asked the mason, who had listened with real interest to the little boy’s account.

“I don’t care if I do,” replied he; “it’s the way I’m going.”

“Then you will take charge of him?”

“He has only to come with me.”

And, taking up the basket he had put down on the pavement, he set off toward the postern-gate of the Louvre.

The lost child followed him.

“I hope he will take him right,” said I, when I saw them go away.

“Never fear,” replied the mason; “the little one in the blouse is the same age as the other; but, as the saying is, he knows black from white;’ poverty, you see, is a famous schoolmistress!”

The crowd dispersed.  For my part, I went toward the Louvre; the thought came into my head to follow the two children, so as to guard against any mistake.

I was not long in overtaking them; they were walking side by side, talking, and already quite familiar with each other.  The contrast in their dress then struck me.  Little Duval wore one of those fanciful children’s dresses which are expensive as well as in good taste; his coat was skilfully fitted to his figure, his trousers came down in plaits from his waist to his boots of polished leather with mother-of-pearl buttons, and his ringlets were half hid by a velvet cap.  The appearance of his guide, on the contrary, was that of the class who dwell on the extreme borders of poverty, but who there maintain their ground with no surrender.  His old blouse, patched with pieces of different shades, indicated the perseverance of an industrious mother struggling against the wear and tear of time; his trousers were become too short, and showed his stockings darned over and over again; and it was evident that his shoes were not made for him.

The countenances of the two children were not less different than their dress.  That of the first was delicate and refined; his clear blue eye, his fair skin, and his smiling mouth gave him a charming look of innocence and happiness.  The features of the other, on the contrary, had something rough in them; his eye was quick and lively, his complexion dark, his smile less merry than shrewd; all showed a mind sharpened by too early experience; he walked boldly through the middle of the streets thronged by carriages, and followed their countless turnings without hesitation.