144 STUDIES OF NATURE. 



**= numbed with cold, go within doors and warm 

 ** yourfelf ; fhe repHes : alas ! mother, if I leave 

 *' you, your complaints will be your only com- 

 " panion." 



Another time, being at Marly, I went into that 

 magnificent park, and amufed myfelf in the woods 

 with looking at the charming group of children 

 who are feeding, with vine boughs and grapes, a 

 flie-goat which feems at play with them. At no 

 great diftance is an inclofed pavilion, where Louis 

 XV. in fine weather, fometimes went to enjoy a 

 collation. Being caught in a fudden fhower, I 

 went in for a few moments to ihelter myfelf. I 

 there found three children, who interefted me 

 much more than the children in marble without 

 doors. They were two little girls, uncommonly 

 handfome, employed with fingular adivity, in 

 picking up, round the arbour, the fcattered flicks 

 of dry wood, which they depofited in a baiket that 

 flood on the King's table, while a little boy, all 

 in tatters, and extremely lean, was devouring a 

 morfel of bread in a corner. I alked the talleft^ 

 who might be about eight or nine years old, what 

 fhe intended to do with that wood, which fhe was 

 fo bufily coUeéling. She replied, " Look, Sir, at 

 ** that poor boy, there ; he is very miferable ! He 

 *' is fo unfortunate as to have a flep-mother, who 

 " fends him out, all day long, to pick up wood : 



if 



