What I hated most were the earthworms. The red elastic things made me shiver with horror, and if I happened to step on one it made me quite ill. When I had a pain in my side la mere Colas used to forbid my sister to go out. But my sister got tired of remaining indoors and wanted to go out and take me with her. So she used to go and collect earthworms, and hold them up close to my face. Then I said that I wasn't in pain any more, and la mere Colas used to send us both out of doors. One day my sister threw a handful of earthworms on to my dress. I jumped back so quickly that I fell into a tub of hot water. La mere Colas was very angry while she undressed me. I was not very much hurt. She promised my sister a good slapping, and called to the sweeps, who were passing, to come in and take her away. All three of them came in, with their black bags and their ropes. My sister howled and cried for mercy. I was very much ashamed at being all undressed. My father often took us to a place where there were men who drank wine. He used to put me on a table among the glasses, and make me sing. The men would laugh and kiss me, and try and make me drink wine. It was always dark when we went home. My father took long steps, and rocked himself as he walked. He nearly tumbled down lots of times. Sometimes he would begin to cry and say that his house had been stolen. Then my sister used to scream. It was always she who used to find the house. One morning la mere Colas got angry with us and told us that we were children of misfortune, and that she would not feed us any longer. She said we could go and look for our father, who had gone away nobody knew where. When her anger had passed she gave us our breakfasts as usual, but a few days afterwards we were put into pere Chicon's cart. The cart was full of straw and bags of corn. I was tucked away behind in a little hollow between the sacks. The cart tipped down at the back, and every jolt made me slip on the straw. I was very frightened all the way along. Every time I slipped I thought I was going to fall out of the cart, or that the sacks were going to fall on me. We stopped at an inn. A woman lifted us down, shook the straw on our dresses, and gave us some milk to drink. I heard her say to pere Chicon, "You really think their father will take care of them, then?" Pere Chicon shook his head, and knocked his pipe against the table. Then he made a funny face and said, "He may be anywhere. Young Girard told me he had met him on the Paris road." After a while pere Chicon took us to a big house with a lot of steps leading up to the door. He had a long talk with a gentleman who waved his arms about and talked about the dignity of labour. I wondered what that was. The gentleman put his hand on my head and patted it, and I heard him say several times, "He did not tell me that he had any children." I understood that he was talking of my father, and I asked if I could not see him. The gentleman looked at me without answering, and then asked pere Chicon, "How old is she?" "About five," said pere Chicon. All this time my sister was playing up and down the steps with