“Charles, Charles,” interrupted the old man, as soon as the mob had passed; “what news to-day?” “I am afraid what you have just seen tells only too plainly, sir. The people are gone to the palace to vociferate for bread.” “Well, well, fashions change,” observed M. Raucourt. “In my days the king gave away wine instead of bread.” “If he did so now, sir, it would be a good thing for my trade. It would empty my cellars to supply such a crowd as has just gone by.” “Does not your wine sell, this year?” “Not very well, sir. People buy little of anything at present; but better times will certainly come.” “But, papa, why do not all these people buy bread, if they want it so very much?” asked Julien. “Because there is very little to be bought; and that little is too dear for poor people to buy.” “So they want the king to buy it for them?” “Yes; but the king says he has no money. He is borrowing some, however, and I hope the people will soon be relieved, somehow or other.” “Who lends the king money, papa?” “I am going to lend him some; and so will everybody else that has any.” Little Pauline thought it would be the better and quicker way for her papa to buy the bread himself for the poor, instead of lending money to the king to do so. She was told that perhaps the people might begin to love the king again if he tried to relieve them; and that his majesty would be much pleased at this, for they had not been at all fond of him lately. This news set Marguerite sighing, and the children thinking what they had that they could lend the king. Grandpapa was consulted, while his son and daughter retired from the window to read Antoine’s letter. M. Raucourt thought the king would not wish for Julien’s bird-organ, as he often heard finer music than it could make, and it would now buy very little bread; but why it would buy so little, he could not tell. He recommended Pauline’s making her offering to the queen;—that beautiful, graceful lady that every Frenchman worshipped when she became his queen, and whom every Frenchman would mourn in the dust when the time must come for her to die. The old man was entering upon his favourite long story of the queen’s entry into her capital, when Pauline stopped him with an enquiry whether this beautiful lady would like to have her silk-worms, and how much bread they would buy. As soon as grandpapa could speak for laughing, he told the child that the queen carried more silk on her head at that moment than these worms would spin in a hundred years. The little dog Joli, with his collar and silver bell, was next proposed, and thought more eligible. Joli was called, and looked for in vain under sofa, and chairs, and behind mamma’s harp. While Pauline went in search of him, Julien interrupted papa to know why his bird-organ would buy very little bread, when it had once cost so much money. “Money enough, papa, to buy many loaves of bread.”