I was walking one evening by the side of the river Seine, to which the lights on the quays and the bridges gave the aspect of a lake surrounded by a garland of stars.

I had reached the Louvre, when I was stopped by a crowd collected near the parapet; they had gathered round a child of about six, who was crying. And I asked the cause of his tears.

"It seems that he was sent to walk," said a mason, who was returning from his work, with his trowel in his hand; "the servant who took care of him met with some friends, and told the child to wait for him while he went to get a drink. But I suppose the drink made him more thirsty, for he has not come back, and the child cannot find his way home."

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Why do you not ask his name, and where he lives?"

"They have been doing it for the last hour; but all he can say is that he is called Charles, and that

his father is Mr. Duval. There are twelve hundred Duvals in Paris."

"Then he does not know in what part of the town he lives?"

"I should think not, indeed! Don't you see that he is a gentleman's child? He has never gone out except in a carriage or with a servant. He does not know what to do by himself."

Here the mason was interrupted by some of the voices rising above the others.

"We cannot leave him in the street," said some. "The child-stealers would carry him off," continued others.

"We must take him to the overseer." "Or to the police office."

"That's the thing. Come, little one!"

But the child, frightened by these suggestions of danger, and at the names of police and overseer, cried louder, and drew back toward the parapet. In vain they tried to persuade him; his fears made him resist the more. The most eager began to get weary, when the voice of a little boy was heard through the confusion.

"I know him well- I do," said he, looking at the lost child, "he belongs in our part of the town." "What part is it?"

"Yonder, on the other side of the BoulevardsMagazine Street."

"And you have seen him before?"

"Yes, yes! he belongs to the great house at the end of the street, where there is an iron gate with gilt points.'

The child quickly raised his head and stopped crying. The little boy answered all the questions that were put to him, and gave such details as left no room for doubt. The other child understood him, for he went up to him as if to put himself under his protection.

"Then you can take him to his parents?" asked the mason, who had listened with real interest.

"I don't care if I do," replied he; "it's the way I'm going."

"Then you will take charge of him?"

"He has only to come with me."

And, taking up the basket he had put down on the pavement, he set off toward the postern gate of the Louvre. The lost child followed him.

"I hope he will take him all right," said I, when I saw them go away.

"Never fear," replied the mason; "the little one in the blouse is the same age as the other; but, as the saying is, he knows black from white'; poverty, you see, is a famous schoolmistress!"

The crowd dispersed. For my part, I went toward the Louvre. The thought came into my head to follow the two children, so as to guard against any mistake.

Two BOYS OF PARIS, II.

I was not long in overtaking them. They were walking side by side, talking and already quite familiar with one another.

The contrast in their dress struck me. Little Duval wore one of those fanciful dresses which are expensive as well as in good taste; his coat was skillfully fitted to his figure, his trousers came down in plaits from his waist to his polished boots, and his ringlets were half hid by a velvet cap.

The appearance of his guide, on the contrary, was that of the class who dwell on the extreme borders of poverty. His old blouse, patched with pieces of dif ferent shades, indicated the perseverance of an industrious mother struggling against the wear and tear of time. His trousers were become too short, and showed his stockings darned over and over again.

The countenances of the two children were not less different than their dresses. That of the first was delicate and refined; his clear blue eye, his fair skin, and his smiling mouth, gave him a charming look of innocence and happiness.

The features of the other, on the contrary, had something rough in them; his eye was quick and lively, his complexion dark, his smile less merry than shrewd. All showed a mind sharpened by too early experience. He boldly walked through the middle