He had an affable and haughty air, and a mouth which was always smiling, since it did not shut. This mechanical smile, produced by too much jaw and too little skin, shows the teeth rather than the soul.
The child, with his brioche, which he had bitten into but had not finished eating, seemed satiated. The child was dressed as a National Guardsman, owing to the insurrection, and the father had remained clad as a bourgeois out of prudence.
Father and son halted near the fountain where two swans were sporting. This bourgeois appeared to cherish a special admiration for the swans. He resembled them in this sense, that he walked like them.
For the moment, the swans were swimming, which is their principal talent, and they were superb.
If the two poor little beings had listened and if they had been of an age to understand, they might have gathered the words of this grave man.
The father was saying to his son:
"The sage lives content with little.
Look at me, my son.
I do not love pomp.
I am never seen in clothes decked with gold lace and stones; I leave that false splendor to badly organized souls."
Here the deep shouts which proceeded from the direction of the Halles burst out with fresh force of bell and uproar.
"What is that?" inquired the child.
The father replied: