these tiny French peasants; they say nothing worth noting; they are clothed in rags; they are alone all day; they are mischievous, healthy, and natural. They hang enchanted, all three, over a wood-louse, their curls touching, their breath suspended, their eyes fixed on the embarrassed insect: and we watch them with a joy and wonder equal to their own. "It is a she-creature," announces René Jean, and Georgette laughs, Georgette who, at twenty months, has not yet acquired the art of conversation. She utters a single word from time to time, but sentences lie beyond her scope. She is occupied with grave thoughts, and when she breathes a soft monosyllable, her brothers pause encouragingly to listen. A belated bee comes buzzing in the window and departs.
"'She is going home,' said René Jean.
"'It is a beast,' said Gros Alain. 'No,' said René Jean, 'it is a fly.' 'A f'y,' said Georgette."
This is the extent of their conversational powers, and how very limited it seems. They do not talk, these babies; they act. They lay their destructive hands on the rare old folio of
