[Illustration: 225]
IT was to go and see their friend Jean that Roger, Marcel, Bernard,
Jacques, and Etienne set out along the broad highroad that winds like a
handsome yellow riband through the fields and meadows. Now they are off.
They start all abreast; it is the best way. Only there is one defect in
the arrangement this time; Etienne is too little to keep up.
He tries hard and puts his best foot foremost. His short legs stretch
their widest. He swings his arms into the bargain. But he is too little;
he cannot go as fast as his companions. He falls behind because he is
too small; it is no use.
The big boys, who are older, should surely wait for him, you say, and
suit their pace to his. So they should, but they don’t. Forward! cry the
strong ones of this world, and they leave the weaklings in the lurch.
But hear the end of the story. All of a sudden our four tall, strong,
sturdy friends see something jumping on the ground. It jumps because
it is a frog, and it wants to reach the meadow along the roadside. The
meadow is froggy’s home, and he loves it; he has his residence there
beside a brook. He jumps, and jumps.
He is a green frog, and he looks like a leaf that is alive. Now the lads
are in the meadow; very soon they feel their feet sinking in the soft
ground where the rank grass grows. A few steps more, and they are up to
their knees in mud. The grass hid a swamp underneath.
They just manage to struggle out. Shoes, socks, calves are all as black
as ink. The fairy of the green field has put gaiters of mire on the four
bad boys.
Etienne comes up panting for breath. He hardly knows, when he sees them
in this pickle, if he should be glad or sorry. His simple little heart
is filled with a sense of the catastrophes that befall the great and
strong. As for the four muddy urchins, they turn back piteously the way
they came, for how can they, I should like to know, how can they go and
see their friend Jean with their shoes and stockings in this state? When
they get home again, their mothers will know how naughty they have been
by the evidence of their legs, while little Etienne’s innocence will be
legible on his sturdy little stumps.