nt-The Pine-woods-The Resin-gatherer-The Wild Horses-The Surf of the Bay

Mary's Loch, floating double, ships and shadows. The scene was very strange. The green meadow had disappeared, and where it had been, a gleaming lake stretched brilliant in the s

ched jetty. A dozen or so of boats floated round it, roughly built, very narrow, and very light, lying upon the very top of the water, and just, in fact, as like canoes as the scene about resembled some still savage country. Three boats were starting for the oyster fishery, manned each by four as buxom, blithe, and debonnaire wenches as you would wish to see. They had short petticoats-your Nereides of all shores have-and straw hats, shaped like a man's. In the stern-sheets of each boat a venerable, ancient mariner held the tiller; and as I approached, the damsels, who were getting their clumsy oars inserted between the thole-pins, clamoured out in a torrent of vociferous gabble, offering me a day's oyster-fishing, if I would go with them. They were evidently quite a

patch of thin white canvass, and straightway the bubbles flew fast and f

t through the air upon the earth from a balloon. Ghost-like fish gleamed in the depths, and their shadows followed them below upon the ribbed sea-sand. Long flowing weeds, like rich green ribbons, waved and streamed in the gently runni

miliar spirit, which came when he blew a horn, and who was able, by his sorceries, to rule the winds that blow. Only, once he raised a storm he could not quell; and it was that storm which made the Bay of Arcachon; for the wind blew the sand of the sea-shore up the country, like

"so be it; he de

of a boat, the pointed tops of the towers of the chateau below you, with the weather-cocks stil

it is not to

only ventured there in calm summer weather and in good daylight; for, in the dark, look you, and when a Biscay wind was blowing, the

o my boatman recounted a rude, disjointed tale, which I

ers. On the table were astrological instruments, and the magic crystal, which his Familiar had given him, and in which-only, however, when the Familiar pleased-the baron could read the future; but, for every reading of the future, the baron was a year older-the Familiar had a year of his life. The baron was clothed in a long f

and sorrowful looking-with a white wand; for he

r from the town of Bordeaux to visit you, and

"she has preparations to make; for, God save the pretty ch

admirer of the saints, being quite, i

grily; "and do not torment me with that shaveling jargon which they ta

back; for he was a prudent man, and, owing to the absence of mind of the baron, who was always experimentalizing

id the baron;

s out of the Garonne. He has got a ship of his own, now-the Sainte V

the maiden's name-your ni

so please

may

ch at the uncommon interest his master seem

haunts me; Toinette's face is ever floating opposite to me. 'Tis an odd feeling; I was never so before. But, since it is so, I must even have the maiden-she will cheer me-I lov

e wrong!" s

close to him, the figure of a very thin dwarf, with a long, unearthly fa

Armand; "you come wi

would have c

king of-of Toinette. I l

l not ha

y s

it is so

believe you. You know the future; b

into the crystal: that can't lie. Come-it's

lready," said the baron, musin

ette, and said he'd have a twelvemonths' worth of knowledge of futurity for her sake. The thin dwarf grinned, and then made a motion of relief, as one who saw be

, with pots on the fire, and poultry roasting before it, and Toinet

ed the baron; "but who

and, Jacq

es on

m round Toinette's waist, and kiss her

harming picture, baron-they're cooking

lung the cr

nd each of his fingers drew a wrinkle. A shudder went over the sorcerer's frame,

nd, leaping to his fee

not," sa

on; "I will alter the future, and giv

mp, coolly, "you will belon

a man to be put out of his way; "you rule th

ng of a strong, gusty wind, and the creaking of the

and the whistle became a roar, and the roar a h

puff there-ha! ha!-as Jacques Fort has found by this

as roughish, when the seneschal rushed into the

d; you would be suffocated outside. The wind is tearing up the pines; and oh, p

her think so. Toinette must take

ursting of a volcano, and screeched and screamed through the sugar-loaf turrets and the lattices, which it

till!" said

riving spray, on to the breakers. Jacques was the only man left on deck-every one of the rest had been washed overboard, and were already sleeping in the sea; and he knew that in

right and left for a moment, and then were left astern. The last grand wave had burst the barrier, and the frail ship and the kneeling mariner were borne onward on the ridge of

losso-stronger!" And every time he used the words, the hurricane burst louder and louder upon the rocking turrets. And still Arm

estics began to rush up t

a storm was n

l is loose, and ri

end of the wor

uted the baro

ower. The serving men and women grovelled in terror on the floor; the baron clung by the window; t

eeper and more awful still. It rapidly increased, and the baron fo

eschal, sinking, as he spoke, at th

h disappeared; and then a shock from below made the chat

burst the sand-banks; the castle stands on lo

rned to Klosso: "Do

you are all dead men; and, Monseigneur le Baron, when you gave m

d by yard; and still the baron stood erect amid the raving of the element

I am yours; and the

iron lamp swingin

on be out,"

blast of the hurricane fell upon the seething flood like iron-heaved up one bristling, foaming sea, which caught the Sainte Vierge upon its crest, and flung the ship almost into the air. The light gleamed for a moment almost beneath him; and Jacques, rushing to the bow, saw

e highest turret of the chateau, her keel a fathom good above

e on the anniversary of the day which saw the chatea

out of the forests and the sand, he said; the fishermen often went to Bordeaux, and sometimes to Rochelle, and sometimes even to Nantes. They (the boatmen) never used stilts; but as soon as the peasant's children were able to toddle, they were clapped upon a pair of sticks, and many a tumble, and many a broken face they caught, before they could use them easily. "They are a good set of people, but very ignorant, and they believe whatever you tell them. They are frightened out of th

liar resinous smell of the rich sap of the tree fermenting and distilling down the gashes. In our ramble, we encountered two of the peasants, whose dreary work it is to hack the pines and ladle up the flowing proceeds. We heard the blows of the axe echoing in the hot silence of the mid-day, and made our way to whence the sound proceeded, speedily descrying the workman, perched upon a slight bending ladder, gashing the tree. This man, and, indeed, all his brethren whom I saw, were miserable-looking creatures-their features sunken and animal-like-their hair matted in masses over their brows-their feet bare, and their clothing painfully wretched. Their calling is as laborious as it is monotonous. Starting with the dawn, they plunge-a ladder in one hand, and an adze in the other-into t

, "I would rather reef topsails in a gal

actice to acquire the knack of using it. I wondered that the gashing did not kill the trees, as some of the largest were marked with half-a-dozen cuts from the groun

ne in these perpendicular stripes, and yet it looked strong and stately "That tree i

en we crossed what I cannot describe better than by calling it a perfectly bald spot in the woods-a circular patch of pure white sand-in certain lights, you might have taken it for snow. All around were the black pines

view of the first of these singular lit

rcerers and witches, and warlocks in France-ay, and I have heard, in the whole world-meet to sing, and dance, and frolic; a

o you

women-but whether they come flying out here to dance round the devil

hope you

that no doctor can set you to rights again; and they can curse a place, and keep the grass

ny young wom

t pas bien fortes. It is only the old ones make g

they ever do a

little Marie," he said, "has fits; and my wife does say-" Here he

w and then, in the bright sunlight, and with

ing was excessive. I longed for the stilts I had seen the day before. Every puff of breeze sent the sand, like dry pungent powder, into our faces, and sometimes we could see it reft from the peaks of the ridges, and blown like clouds of dust far out into the air. All at once my guide touched my arm, "Voila! donc, voila! des chevaux sauvages!" It certainly only required a breed of wild horses to make the country an exact counterpart of Arabia; and I eagerly turned to see the steeds of the desert, just succeeding in catching a glimpse of a ruck of lean, brown, shaggy ponies,

peculiar hiss of the agitated sea, far up and down the level banks. The full force of the great heaving swells was expended in breakers, roaring half a mile from the land; and from their uttermost verge to the tangled heaps of seaweed washed high and dry upon the beach, was a vast belt of foaming water, extending away on either hand in a perfectly straight line as far as the eye could reach, and dividing the shipless expanse of water from the houseless expanse of land. The scene was very

perfect delicacy of the mouth-all told of intellect in no common development; while the meek sweetness of the noble face had something in it perfectly heavenly. Fling in imagination an aureole round that head, and you had the head of a youthful martyr, or a saint canonized for early virtues. There was devotion and aspiration in every line of the countenance-a meek, mild gentleness, beautifully in keeping with every word he uttered, and every movement he made. I was the more struck with all this, inasmuch as there is not an uglier, meaner, nor, I will add, dirtier, set of worthy folks in all the world, than the priests of France. Nine times out of ten, they are big-jowled, coarse, animal-looking men, with mottled faces, and skins which do not take kindly to the razor. The ar

beds. The sand, indeed, he said, was more dangerous than the water. Often and often the coast-guard stations had to be dug out after a gale; and he believed that, on one occasion, a small church near the mouth of the Gironde had been overwhelmed to such a height that only a few feet of the spire and the weathercock were left apparent. The story put me forcibly in mind of the remarkably heavy fall of snow exp

rhaps. The boys and girls we get to come to school are taught to laugh at the notion of their

" I asked. "As ours in England

incantations, and are greatly skilled in the magic power of herbs. The worst of it is, that a year seldom passes without an outrage on some poor old woman. A l

had, other queer notions,

, which, they said, gave them apoplexy, and t

ople, they ought to be gr

se-grease instead. Indeed, for centuries and centuries,

the experimen

. 'Landes cows give no milk,' would be the answer. 'Will you let me try?' would, perhaps, be rep

that would c

, perhaps; but it's not worth the trouble of taking. Our fathers never milked their cows, and they were as wi

the people. When in regular herding dress, the shepherd of the Landes appears one uncouth mass of dirty wool. On his body he wears a fleece, cut in the fashion of a rude paletot, and sometimes flung over one shoulder, like a hussar's jacket. His thighs and legs are defended on the outside by cuisses and grea

food, sixty francs a-year. From the rising to the setting of the sun, he never touches the ground, shuffling backwards and forwards on his stilts, or leaning against a pine, plying the never-pausing knitting-needle. Sometimes he drives his flock home at eventide; sometimes he bivouacs in the wild. Unbuckling his stilts, and producing his flint and steel, he

pine for his heath, and sand, and woods, like a Swiss for his hills. But they seldom leave their home here in the forests. They live and die in the district where they were born, ignorant and careless of all that happens beyond their own lonely bounds. Fran