"If you might choose what you would have from the finest country in the world, what should it be?" asked Lucy of Mademoiselle. "I should like a great number of things to make our museum more complete. Here are only a few stray treasures." "But M. Carillon is going to send you something very strange and very valuable," observed Adèle. "Something from Egypt, is not it?" "Yes; and I shall be very glad of whatever he may send me; but he cannot give me what I should like best." "I know what you mean. You want some plants. Well, perhaps this may be a dried lotus, or the flowering reed of the Nile. His son has been in Egypt; and how do you know that he may not be sending you plants?" "I should like them alive," replied Mademoiselle. "The potato was brought alive, and it grew and flourished; and I should like to try whether some of the American shrubs could not be made to grow here. There are some of the Madeira mountain plants which I would rather have than wine and oranges." "But what would you do with them? There is no room here for such a garden as we had by the river-side at Lyons; and even in a conservatory the plants would get smoked." "Why, that is true," replied Mademoiselle, sighing. "We must be content with our little museum." "Are you very fond of plants?" enquired Charlotte. "Then I will take you to two or three of papa's weavers----" She stopped short, and bit her lip, and Lucy frowned at her. Mademoiselle asked with a smile, "What of the weavers? Will they show me flowers?" Charlotte answered constrainedly that the operatives of Spitalfields were very fond of their little gardens, and succeeded in raising beautiful tulips and auriculas. "O, let us go! It cannot be far, and it is a very fine evening," said the eager little lady, looking up to the yellow sunshine which streamed in from between two opposite chimneys. Charlotte and Lucy glanced at each other, and neither offered to move. "Why, my children, is it possible?" cried Mademoiselle, putting a hand on the shoulder of each, and looking them full in the face with a smile. "You are afraid, I see, to introduce me to your father's weavers. You are afraid to tell nurse that you have done so, because poor nurse is jealous of the French gentleman, and his little French sister. Is it not so?" The girls seemed about to cry. Mademoiselle went on, "You shall request your father to introduce me to a florist or two. Meantime, we will ask my brother whether there are such among those whom he employs. My girls, we are of one country now,--you and I. Why should there be any tormenting, unworthy jealousy? Tell me why." Charlotte only knew that some people thought,--some people feared,--it seemed so very natural that manufacturers should get the best weavers from one another.