It is absurd.

Absurd, I don’t know; but delightful, I can answer for it.

Does not grief, after all, call forth enough tears for us to forgive joy the solitary one she perchance causes us to shed!

Life is not so sweet for us to risk ourselves in it singlehanded, and when the heart is empty the way seems very long.

It is so pleasant to feel one’s self loved, to hear beside one the cadenced steps of one’s fellow-travellers, and to say, “They are here, our three hearts beat in unison.”  So pleasant once a year, when the great clock strikes the first of January, to sit down beside the path, with hands locked together, and eyes fixed on the unknown dusty road losing itself in the horizon, and to say, while embracing one another, “We still love one another, my dear children; you rely on me, and I rely on you.  Let us have confidence, and walk steadfastly.”

This is how I explain that one may weep a little while examining a new fur tippet and opening a Noah’s ark.

But breakfast time draws near.  I have cut myself twice while shaving; I have stepped on my son’s wild beasts in turning round, and I have the prospect of a dozen duty calls, as my wife terms them, before me; yet I am delighted.

We sit down to the breakfast table, which has a more than usually festive aspect.  A faint aroma of truffles perfumes the air, every one is smiling, and through the glass I see, startling sight! the doorkeeper, with his own hands, wiping the handrail of the staircase.  It is a glorious day.

Baby has ranged his elephants, lions, and giraffes round his plate, and his mother, under pretext of a draught, breakfasts in her tippet.

“Have you ordered the carriage, dear, for our visits?” I ask.

“That cushion for Aunt Ursula will take up such a deal of room.  It might be put beside the coachman.”

“Poor aunt.”

“Papa, don’t let us go to Aunt Ursula,” said Baby; “she pricks so when she kisses you.”

“Naughty boy . . . .  Think of all we have to get into the carriage.  Leon’s rocking-horse, Louise’s muff, your father’s slippers, Ernestine’s quilt, the bonbons, the work-box.  I declare, aunt’s cushion must go under the coachman’s feet.”

“Papa, why doesn’t the giraffe eat cutlets?”

“I really don’t know, dear.”

“Neither do I, papa.”

An hour later we are ascending the staircase leading to Aunt Ursula’s.  My wife counts the steps as she pulls herself up by the hand-rail, and I carry the famous cushion, the bonbons, and my son, who has insisted on bringing his giraffe with him.

Aunt Ursula, who produces the same effect on him as the sight of a rod would, is waiting us in her icy little drawing-room.  Four square armchairs, hidden beneath yellow covers, stand vacant behind four little mats.  A clock in the shape of a pyramid, surmounted on a sphere, ticks under a glass case.