The Mothers of Honoré

ek-bones shone apple-red, and his partial blindness had merely the effect of a prolonged wink. Jules was keeping melancholy holiday in his best clothes, the well-preserved coat parting its jaunty tails a little below the middle of his back.

Another old islander paused at the gate in passing, The two men shook their heads at each other.

"I went to your wife's funeral this morning, Jules," said the passer, impressing on the widower's hearing an important fact which might have escaped his one eye.

"You was at de funer'l? Did you see Thérèse?"

"Yes, I saw her."

"Ah, what a fat woman dat was! I make some of de peop' feel her arm. I feed her well."

The other old man smiled, but he was bound to say,

"I'm sorry for you, Jules