The peculiarity of the work of Gustave Droz is its delicacy both in humor and pathos. He surprised the French by making them all laugh without making any of them wince; the sharp wits of his day were forgotten in the unalloyed enjoyment of his simple quaintness, in which there was neither affectation nor sarcasm. Yet as has been said, he was a Parisian of the Parisians, quick to perceive the ludicrous, ready to weep with the afflicted, and to laugh again with the happy. His studies of children are among his best, on account of their extreme naturalness, and are never uninteresting, despite the simplicity of the incidents and observations on which they are founded. In 'Le Cahier Bleu de Mlle. Cibot' he has used striking colors to paint the petty afflictions that beset most lives; but lest these pictures should leave an unpleasant impression, they are set off by others of a happier sort, making a collection that constitutes a most effective lesson in practical philosophy. HOW THE BABY WAS SAVED From 'The Seamstress's Story' "Yes, Ma'm'selle Adèle," said the seamstress, "the real happiness of this world is not so unevenly distributed after all." Louise, as she said this, took from the reserve in the bosom of her dress a lot of pins, and applied them deftly to the trimming of a skirt which I was holding for her. "A sufficiently comfortable doctrine," I answered; "but it does seem to me as if some people were born to live and to die unhappy." "It is only folks who never find anybody to love enough; and I think it's nobody's fault but their own." "But my good Louise, wouldn't you have suffered much less last year, when you came so near losing your boy, if you hadn't cared so much for him?" I was only drawing her on, you see; Louise's chat was the greatest resource to me at that time.