where the youngsters buried themselves amidst the scent of dried fruits, oranges, and fresh apples.  When they got tired of playing in his way, they went off to join old Madame Chantemesse at the Market of the Innocents.  They arrived there arm-in-arm, laughing gaily as they crossed the streets with never the slightest fear of being run over by the endless vehicles.  They knew the pavement well, and plunged their little legs knee-deep in the vegetable refuse without ever slipping.  They jeered merrily at any porter in heavy boots who, in stepping over an artichoke stem, fell sprawling full-length upon the ground.  They were the rosy-cheeked familiar spirits of those greasy streets.  They were to be seen everywhere.

On rainy days they walked gravely beneath the shelter of a ragged old umbrella, with which Mother Chantemesse had protected her stock-in-trade for twenty years, and sticking it up in a corner of the market they called it their house.  On sunny days they romped to such a degree that when evening came they were almost too tired to move.  They bathed their feet in the fountains, dammed up the gutters, or hid themselves beneath piles of vegetables, and remained there prattling to each other just as they did in bed at night.  People passing some huge mountain of cos or cabbage lettuces often heard a muffled sound of chatter coming from it.  And when the green-stuff was removed, the two children would be discovered lying side by side on their couch of verdure, their eyes glistening uneasily like those of birds discovered in the depth of a thicket.  As time went on, Cadine could not get along without Marjolin, and Marjolin began to cry when he lost sight of Cadine.  If they happened to get separated, they sought one another behind the petticoats of every stallkeeper in the markets, amongst the boxes and under the cabbages.  If was, indeed, chiefly under the cabbages that they grew up and learned to love each other.

Marjolin was nearly eight years old, and Cadine six, when old Madame Chantemesse began to reproach them for their idleness.  She told them that she would interest them in her business, and pay them a sou a day to assist her in paring her vegetables.  During the first few days the children displayed eager zeal; they squatted down on either side of the big flat basket with little knives in their hands, and worked away energetically.  Mother Chantemesse made a specialty of pared vegetables; on her stall, covered with a strip of damp black lining, were little lots of potatoes, turnips, carrots, and white onions, arranged in pyramids of four—­three at the base and one at the apex, all quite ready to be popped into the pans of dilatory housewives.  She also had bundles duly stringed in readiness for the soup-pot—­four leeks, three carrots, a parsnip, two turnips, and a couple of springs of celery.  Then there were finely cut vegetables for julienne soup laid out on squares of paper, cabbages cut into quarters, and