The spring that feeds the pond trickles from the rock, cold and clear. The water first collects into a cup, the size of the hollow of one’s two hands, and then runs over in a stream. These falls call for a mill: that goes without saying. Two bits of straw, artistically crossed upon an axis, provide the machine; some flat stones set on edge afford supports. It is a great success: the mill turns admirably. My triumph would be complete, could I but share it. For want of other playmates, I invite the ducks. Everything palls in this poor world of ours, even a mill made of two straws. Let us think of something else; let us contrive a dam to hold back the waters and form a pool. There is no lack of stones for the brickwork. I pick the most suitable; I break the larger ones. And, while collecting these blocks, suddenly I forget all about the dam which I meant to build. On one of the broken stones, in a cavity large enough for me to put my fist in, something gleams like glass. The hollow is lined with facets gathered in sixes which flash and glitter in the sun. I have seen something like this in church, on the great saint’s day, when the light of the candles in the big chandelier kindles the stars in its hanging crystal. We children, lying, in summer, on the straw of the threshing-floor, have told one another stories of the treasures which a dragon guards underground. Those treasures now return to my mind: the names of precious stones ring out uncertainly but gloriously in my memory. I think of the king’s crown, of the princesses’ necklaces. In breaking stones, can I have found, but on a much richer scale, the thing that shines quite small in my mother’s ring? I want more such. The dragon of the subterranean treasures treats me generously. He gives me his diamonds in such quantities that soon I possess a heap of broken stones sparkling with magnificent clusters. He does more: he gives me his gold. The water from the rock falls on a bed of fine sand which it swirls into bubbles. If I bend towards the light, I see something like gold-filings whirl where the fall touches the bottom. Is it really the famous metal of which twenty-franc pieces, so rare with us at home, are made? One would think so, from the glitter. I take a pinch of sand and place it in my palm. The brilliant particles are numerous, but so small that I have to pick them up with a straw moistened in my mouth. Let us drop this: they are too tiny and too bothersome to collect. The big, valuable lumps must be farther on, in the thickness of the rock. We’ll come back later; we’ll blast the mountain.