miserable café and on what she dined; I fol-
lowed her to the reading-room, and I watched 
her a long while, while she sought in the news-
papers with quick glancing eyes, long since 
burnt out by tears, some news of powerful and 
personal interest. 
At last, in the afternoon, under a charming 
autumn sky, one of those skies whence de-
scend the armies of regret and of remem-
brance, she seated herself in a garden, aside, 
far from the crowd, to listen to one of those 
concerts whose regimental music the people of 
Paris so enjoy. 
That was doubtless the little debauch of this 
innocent old woman, or shall I say of this puri-
fied old woman; the well-earned consolation of 
one of these heavy, friendless days, conversa-
tionless, joyless, bare of intimacy, these days 
which God let fall upon her since many days 
which God let fall upon her since many years 
may-be; three-hundred-and-sixty-five times in 
the year. 
And yet another. I can never prevent myself 
from casting a glance, if not wholly sympa-
thetic, at least curious, upon the crowd of out-
casts who press upon an enclosure of a public 
concert. Across the night the orchestra throws 
festival chants, chants of triumph or of pleas-
ure. The dresses fall glittering, glances are in-