Nor is the baker inactive in her laboratory. She collects the remnants pouring down around her, subdivides them yet further, refines them and makes her selection: this, the tenderer part, for the central crumb; that, tougher, for the crust of the loaf. Turning this way and that, she pats the material with the battledore of her flattened arms; she arranges it in layers, which presently she compresses by stamping on them where they lie, much after the manner of a vine-grower treading his vintage. Rendered firm and compact, the mass will keep better and longer. After some ten days of this united labour, the couple at last obtain the long, cylindrical loaf. The father has done the grinding, the mother the kneading. I have even succeeded in watching the digging of this very deep burrow, thanks to a complicated series of artifices which it would take too long to set forth here. The mother is at the bottom of the pit: she alone attacks the working-face, she alone digs. The male keeps at the back of his spouse. He gradually collects the rubbish and makes a load of it which he lifts with his three-pronged fork and hoists outside with much exhausting labour. This is the moment to recapitulate Minotaurus’ merits. When the great colds are over, he sets out in quest of a mate, buries himself with her and thenceforth remains faithful to her, despite his frequent excursions out of doors and the meetings to which these are likely to lead. With indefatigable zeal, he assists the burrower, herself destined never to leave her home until the emancipation of the family. For a month and more, he loads the rubbish of the excavation on his forked hod; he hoists it outside and remains ever patient, never disheartened by his arduous feats of climbing. He leaves the comparatively easy work of the excavating rake to the mother and keeps the more troublesome task, the exhausting carriage through a narrow, very high and perpendicular gallery, for himself. Next, the navvy turns himself into a collector of foodstuffs; he goes after provisions, he gathers the wherewithal for his sons to live upon. To facilitate the work of his mate, who shreds, stratifies and compresses the preserves, he once more changes his trade and becomes a miller. At some distance from the bottom, he bruises and crumbles the matter found hardened by the sun; he makes it into semolina and flour that gradually pour down into the maternal bakery. Lastly, worn out by his efforts, he leaves the house and goes to die outside, at a distance, in the open air. He has gallantly performed his duty as a paterfamilias; he has spent himself without stint to secure the prosperity of his kith and kin.