I still continued rather fond of gossiping and amusing myself on Sundays. But no one blamed me for that at home, because I was a good worker during the week. Such a life brought me health of body and good-humor, and a little more sense in my head than I gave promise of at first. I forgot all the vaporings of love, for nothing keeps you so quiet as to sweat with a spade from sunrise to sunset; and when night comes, those who have had to do with the heavy, rich soil of our parts (the hardest mistress there is), amuse themselves best by going to sleep, to be ready for the morrow. That is how I peacefully reached the age when it is allowable to think, not of little girls, but of grown-up ones; and at the very first stirring of such ideas, I found my cousin Brulette still fixed, above all others, in my inclinations. Living alone with her grandfather, Brulette had done her best to be older than her years in sense and courage. But some children are born with the gift or the fate of being always petted and cared for. Mariton's former lodging was let to Mère Lamouche, of Vieilleville, who was poor, and was therefore ready to serve the Brulets as though they paid her wages, hoping thereby to get a hearing when she declared herself unable to pay the rent. It so turned out; and Brulette, finding that the new neighbor helped her, forestalled her, and made things comfortable for her, had time and ease to grow in mind and beauty without much effort of soul or body. SECOND EVENING. Little Brulette was now called "handsome Brulette," and was much talked of in our country-side; for within the memory of man no prettier girl or finer eyes or slimmer waist or rosier cheek or hair of brighter gold had ever been seen; her hand was like satin, and her foot as dainty as a young lady's. All that tells you plain enough that my cousin did not work very hard; she never went out in bad weather, took care to shade herself from the sun, did not wash the clothes, and made no use of her limbs to tire them. Perhaps you will think she was idle? Not at all. She did everything that she could not help doing fast and well. She had too much good sense not to keep order and neatness in the household and take the best care of her grandfather, as in duty bound. Moreover, she liked finery too well not to do a good bit of sewing; but as to hard work, she never so much as heard of it. There was no occasion that she should, and therefore it can't be said she was to blame.