They were at the end of the little park before a wooden door as mouldy as the other. M. Bastian opened it, shook the young man's hand and stayed a long time at the end of the wood watching Jean go away and get smaller on the plain, his head bent against the wind, which was still blowing, and more violently. Jean was troubled to the depth of his soul. Between him and each family in this old country he felt he was going to find his father. He was suffering from having been born in the house towards which he was going. He saw the image of Odile as the only sweet thing of this first day, and her eyes were slowly, slowly closing. CHAPTER V COMPANIONS OF THE ROAD The winter did not allow M. Oberlé's ideas about the professional education of Jean to be carried out exactly. The snow which remained on the summits of the Vosges, without being thick, made travelling very difficult. So Jean paid only two or three visits to the wood-cutting centres situated near Alsheim and in the Vosges valleys. The excursions to more distant places were put off for a warmer season. But he learned to cube a pine or a beech without making a mistake, to value it according to the place it occupied in the forest, according to the height of the trunk below the branches, the appearance of the bark, which indicated the health of the tree, and by other calculations into which a kind of divining quality enters, which cannot be taught anywhere, and which makes the expert. His father initiated him into the working of the factory and the management of the machines, the reading of agreements, and the traditions of fifty years kept up by the Oberlés regarding sale and carriage contracts. He put him into relationship with two officials of the administration of the forests of Strasburg, who showed themselves very ready to be of service, and proposed to Jean to explain to him personally the new forest legislation, of which he still knew but little. "Come," said the younger, "come to see me at my office, and I will tell you more things you will find it useful to know than you will learn in books. For the law is the law, but the administration is another thing." Jean promised to profit when occasions offered themselves. But several weeks went by without his having the time to go to the town. Then March came in mildly and melted the snows. In a week, and much earlier than usual, the brooks swelled to overflowing, and the high peaks of the Vosges and Sainte Odile which one could see from Alsheim, which had had their slopes and paths white with snow, appeared in their summer robes of dark and pale green.