Father says he misses me sadly, and that mother is ailing as usual." She smiled, and Jefferson smiled too.

They both knew by experience that nothing really serious ailed Mrs.Rossmore, who was a good deal of a hypochondriac, and always so filled with aches and pains that, on the few occasions when she really felt well, she was genuinely alarmed.
The _fiacre_ by this time had emerged from the Rue de Rivoli and was rolling smoothly along the fine wooden pavement in front of the historic Conciergerie prison where Marie Antoinette was confined before her execution.

Presently they recrossed the Seine, and the cab, dodging the tram car rails, proceeded at a smart pace up the "Boul' Mich'," which is the familiar diminutive bestowed by the students upon that broad avenue which traverses the very heart of their beloved _Quartier Latin_.

On the left frowned the scholastic walls of the learned Sorbonne, in the distance towered the majestic dome of the Pantheon where Rousseau, Voltaire and Hugo lay buried.
Like most of the principal arteries of the French capital, the boulevard was generously lined with trees, now in full bloom, and the sidewalks fairly seethed with a picturesque throng in which mingled promiscuously frivolous students, dapper shop clerks, sober citizens, and frisky, flirtatious little _ouvrieres_, these last being all hatless, as is characteristic of the workgirl class, but singularly attractive in their neat black dresses and dainty low-cut shoes.

There was also much in evidence another type of female whose extravagance of costume and boldness of manner loudly proclaimed her ancient profession.
On either side of the boulevard were shops and cafes, mostly cafes, with every now and then a _brasserie_, or beer hall.