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The excerpt represents the core issue or deciding factor on which you must meditate, and is drawn from La Grenadiere by Honore de Balzac: francs to our old Annette, and ask her to take care of them, and to
look after Marie. Then, with the remaining two thousand francs, I will
go to Brest, and go to sea as an apprentice. While Marie is at school,
I will rise to be a lieutenant on board a man-of-war. There, after
all, die in peace, my mother; I shall come back again a rich man, and
our little one shall go to the Ecole polytechnique, and I will find a
career to suit his bent."
A gleam of joy shone in the dying woman's eyes. Two tears brimmed
over, and fell over her fevered cheeks; then a deep sigh escaped
between her lips. The sudden joy of finding the father's spirit in the
son, who had grown all at once to be a man, almost killed her.
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