right direction. I passed through two wretched hamlets, in neither of which
was there an auberge where I could relieve my thirst. At the second one a
cottage was pointed out to me where I was told a woman sold wine. When,
after sinking deep in mud, I found her amidst a group of hovels, and the
preliminary salutation was given, the following conversation passed between
us:

'They tell me you sell wine.'

'They tell you wrong--I don't.'

'Do you sell milk, then?'

'No; I have no beasts.'

As I was going away she kindly explained that she only kept enough wine for
herself. I had evidently not impressed her favourably. Although I think
water a dangerous drink in France, except where it can be received directly
from the hand of Nature, far from human dwellings, I was obliged to beg
some in this place, and run the risk of carrying away unfriendly microbes.

Having left the hovels behind me, the country became less barren or more
cultivated. There were fields of rye, buckwheat, and potatoes, but always
near them lay the undulating moor, gilded over with the flowers of a dwarf
broom. It was evening when I descended into a wide valley from which came
the chime of cattle-bells, mingled with the barking of dogs and the voices
of children, who were driving the animals slowly homeward. There were green
meadows below me, over which was a yellow gleam from the fading afterglow
of sunset, and in the air was that odour which, rising from grassy valleys
at the close of day, even in regions burnt by the southern summer, makes