And the result of ten minutes talk was a great lump of raw meat, badly wrapped in newspaper, which Paragot, careless of my Paris clothes, thrust on my knees, while he continued to drive Bucéphale. I dropped the beef into the back of the cart. Paragot shook his head. "To-morrow, my son, you shall be clothed in humility and shall clean out the cow pen." "I should prefer to accept your original invitation, Master," said I, "and help with the corn." For Paragot, besides Bucéphale and cows and ducks and pigs and fowls and a meadow or two, possessed a patch of cornfield of which he was passionately proud. He had sown it himself that spring and now was harvest. He pointed to it with his whip as soon as we came in sight of the farm. "_My_ corn, my little Asticot. It is marvellous, eh? Who says that Berzélius Nibbidard Paragot can't make things grow? I was born to it. _Nom de Dieu_ I could make anything grow. I could plant your palette and it would come up a landscape. And _sacré mille cochons_, I have done the most miraculous thing of all. I am the father of a human being, a real live human being, my son. He is small as yet," he added apologetically, "but still he is alive. He has teeth, Asticot. It is the most remarkable thing in this astonishing universe." The dim form of a woman standing with a child in her arms in front of a group of farm buildings across the fields to the right, gradually grew into the familiar figure of my dear Blanquette. She came down the road to meet us, her broad homely face beaming with gladness and in her eyes a new light of welcome. Narcisse trotted at her heels. The rheumatism of advancing years gave him a distinguished gait. We sprang from the cart. Bucéphale left to himself regarded the family meeting with a grandfatherly air, until an earth-coloured nondescript emerged from the ground and led him off towards the house. After our embraces, we followed, Paragot dancing the delighted infant, Blanquette with her great motherly arm around my shoulders, and Narcisse soberly sniffing for adventure, after the manner of elderly dogs. "Do you remember, Asticot?" said Blanquette. "Four of us started for Chambéry. Now five of us come to La Haye. _C'est drôle, hein?_" "_Tu es contente?_" I asked. Her arm tightened, and her eyes grew moist. "_Mais oui_," she said in a low voice. Then she looked at Paragot and the child, a yard or two in front of us. "He is the image of his father," she said almost reverentially. I burst out laughing. Where the likeness lay between the chubby, snub-nosed, eighteen months old baby, and the hairy, battered Paragot, no human eye but Blanquette's could discover. I vowed he resembled a little Japanese idol. "_Pauvre chéri_," said Blanquette, motherwise.