Whenever we had leave out I used to buy gum-arabic at the druggist's in La Chatre, and break it up with a small hammer at the far end of my room, away from prying eyes.

I used there to distribute it into three bags ticketed respectively: "large pieces," "middle-sized pieces," "small pieces." When I returned to school with the three bags in my pocket, I would draw out one or the other to offer them to my friends, according to the importance of the occasion, or the degrees of friendship.

Larive always had the big bits, and plenty of them.

Yet he was none the more grateful to me, and even did not mind chaffing me about these petty attentions by which he was the gainer.

He used to make fun of everything, and I used to look up to him.