Auguste entered the orchard, therefore, and saw a young woman picking apricots. She had neither the refined features nor the charm of Denise. She was simply a rosy-cheeked, fresh, buxom damsel; but there are men who prefer that to waterfalls, grottoes and labyrinths constructed at vast expense; Auguste was one of them. Who would believe that a simple petticoat may be awarded the preference over the marvelous creations of art; that it may disturb the peace of an empire, overturn a republic, crush a whole people, astound the universe, ordain laws, and cause half of mankind to lose their senses? O Cleopatra, Elizabeth, Delilah, Judith, Ninon! your petticoats wrought all these miracles! To be sure, it was not your petticoats exactly to which your thanks were due. The stout girl was standing on a ladder that rested against the tree, and was plucking the ripest fruit. Auguste walked to the ladder and looked up; I presume that he was looking at the apricots. "I say! what are you doing there, monsieur?" said the girl, when, upon turning her head, she discovered the young man. "My dear girl, I am admiring. I am a great lover of the beauties of nature, and I am as well able to appreciate them in sackcloth as in silk." The stout girl, who did not understand this language, concluded that the gentleman was fond of apricots, and offered him one, saying: "Here, monsieur, here's one that's good and ripe." Auguste took the apricot and walked still nearer the ladder. "I'm afraid that you'll fall," he said to the gardener; "I'll hold the ladder." "Oh! it ain't worth while, monsieur, thanks; I know how to do it; anyway I can cling to the branches." However, Auguste remained at the foot of the ladder, and as the girl was on the fourth rung, the young man's hand naturally found itself in close proximity to her leg, and, naturally again, that hand caressed a woolen stocking encasing a calf with which a dancer at the Opéra would have been content. The gardener continued to gather fruit while Auguste patted her calf. "On my word!" he thought, "here's a peasant who knows what's what, who is learned in the ways of the world. She is not precisely one of Florian's shepherdesses. This leg reminds me rather of Teniers's Flemish women; but at all events, it doesn't scratch, and that's very lucky, for with such calves as these, the scar would be lasting." "When I heard someone coming behind me," said the girl, "I thought at first 'twas monsieur." "Monsieur! what monsieur?" inquired Auguste. "Pardi! monsieur le bourgeois, my master." "Ah! Monsieur de la Thomassinière?" "Why, yes." "So he comes into his orchard sometimes, does he?" "Oh, yes! he comes here." "Does he like apricots?" "Oh, yes! apricots, and something else." "Does he take hold of your leg too, my child?" "Does he! pardi! rather! Catch him holding back!" The stout girl chuckled, and Auguste said to himself: