At first it was amusing; afterward one could not help seeing something affecting in these two gray-haired children, one unable to leave off the habit of obeying, the other that of protecting.
And it was not in that alone that my two companions seemed younger than their years; they knew so little that their wonder never ceased.

We had hardly arrived at Clamart before they involuntarily exclaimed, like the king in the children's game, that they "did not think the world was so great"! It was the first time they had trusted themselves on a railroad, and it was amusing to see their sudden shocks, their alarms, and their courageous determinations: everything was a marvel to them! They had remains of youth within them, which made them sensible to things which usually only strike us in childhood.

Poor creatures! they had still the feelings of another age, though they had lost its charms.
But was there not something holy in this simplicity, which had been preserved to them by abstinence from all the joys of life?
Ah! accursed be he who first had the bad courage to attach ridicule to that name of "old maid," which recalls so many images of grievous deception, of dreariness, and of abandonment! Accursed be he who can find a subject for sarcasm in involuntary misfortune, and who can crown gray hairs with thorns! The two sisters were called Frances and Madeleine.

This day's journey was a feat of courage without example in their lives.

The fever of the times had infected them unawares.