TUPIN [_excitedly_] Oh, and that seems all right to you, that a working man, who hasn’t any vice and does his duty, which is to work and—we’re told, too—have plenty of children, it seems all right to you that that should simply lead to beggary. PRESIDENT. Yes, yes; I recognize the wineshop orator. So you say that a household can’t exist with five children. Thank God, there is more than one in that condition which goes neither to ask for charity nor to an abortionist. MME. TUPIN. You’re wrong. TUPIN. Shall I prove that you’re wrong? PRESIDENT. That doesn’t seem to me to have much to do with the case. MME. TUPIN. Yes, it has. TUPIN. Pardon me. If I prove it, people will understand how I came to do what I did. PRESIDENT. Very well. But be short. TUPIN. I’ve given my counsel my accounts for a month. Let him read it to you. PRESIDENT. Very well. [_The counsel rises_]. COUNSEL. Here it is. PRESIDENT. You are not Tupin’s counsel. COUNSEL. No, President, but my learned friends have done me the honor—for which I thank them—to confide to me the task of dealing in my speech with the case as a whole, reserving to themselves to deal with particular aspects of it as they relate to their clients. PRESIDENT. I will hear you now solely for the purpose of reading these accounts. But this is not the time for you to address the court. You understand: I will hear the accounts and nothing more? COUNSEL. Certainly, President. [_He reads_] The daily nourishment of five children consists of a four-pound loaf, soup of vegetables and dripping, and a stew which costs ninety centimes. Total, 3f. 75c. This is the expenditure of the father: Return ticket for tram, 30c. Tobacco, 15c. Dinner, 1f. 25c. The rent is 300f. Clothing for the whole family, and boots: sixteen pairs of boots for the children at 4f. 50c. each, four for the parents at 8f.: total again, 300f. Total for the year: 2,600f. The expenditure then must be set down at 2,600f. Tupin, who is an exceptional workman, earned 160f. a month, that is to say, 2,100f. a year. There is therefore an annual deficit of 500f. As I have promised, I will not add a word. [_He sits down_]. MME. D’AMERGUEUX [_to her husband_] He might well have saved the three sous a day for tobacco. COUNSEL. Does the Court wish to have this paper put in? PRESIDENT. There is no object in that. [_To Tupin_] I will not quarrel with your figures: I accept them. But I repeat: there are charitable institutions. TUPIN. And I repeat that I don’t want to beg. PRESIDENT. You prefer to commit what is almost infanticide? A man whose daughter is on the streets and whose son is a thief can accept charity without degradation. TUPIN [_excited_] They weren’t then. If they’ve fallen to that, it’s because with so many other children besides, I couldn’t look after my son as rich people look after theirs, and because my daughter was seduced and abandoned—because she was hungry! No, but you must have a heart of stone to bring that up against me!