Mr. Bouton, a modest carpenter from Faubourg-Saint-Antoine, widower and father of Pinpin, a little boy, marries Mrs. Colombe, mother of Ninette, a little girl. Soon deceived and abandoned, he raises the two children alone. As an adult, Pinpin falls in love with Ninette, but she is in love with Gérard Garnier, whom she soon marries. The children gone, Bouton finds himself alone and one Christmas evening meets Mrs. Marie, a mother who raises her two children alone.