The Parisian gamin is respectful, ironical, and insolent. He has bad teeth because he is badly fed and his stomach suffers, and fine eyes because he has talent. He would hop up the steps of Paradise in the very presence of Jehovah. He is clever at the savate, and all creeds are possible to him. He plays in the gutter, and draws himself up at the sound of an émeute; his effrontery cannot be subdued by grape-shot; he was a vagabond and becomes a hero, and, like the little Theban, he shakes the lion's skin. Barra the drummer was a Parisian gamin; he shouted, "Forward!" and in an instant became a giant. This child of the mud is also the child of the ideal; to see this we need only measure the distance between Molière and Barra. In a word, the gamin is a being who amuses himself because he is unhappy. CHAPTER X. ECCE PARIS, ECCE HOMO. The gamin of Paris at the present day, like the Græculus of Rome in former time, is the youthful people with the wrinkle of the old world on its forehead. The gamin is a grace for a nation, and at the same time a malady,--a malady which must be cured. In what way? By light; for light is sanitary and illumining. All the generous social irradiations issue from science, letters, the arts, and instruction. Make men, make men. Enlighten them in order that they may warm you. Sooner or later the splendid question of universal instruction will be asked with the irresistible authority of absolute truth; and then those who govern under the surveillance of French ideas will have to make a choice between children of France and gamins of Paris, between flames in light and will-o'-the-wisps in the darkness.