“Madame trouve que c’est bien de tourmenter une pauvre bete qui ne fait de mal a personne, pour s’amuser?” Madame found that rather difficult to answer, and turned the conversation to her life on the barge.  The minute little cabin looked clean, with several pots of red geraniums, clean muslin curtains, a canary bird, and a nondescript sort of dog, who, she told me, was very useful, taking care of the children and keeping them from falling into the water when she was obliged to leave them on the boat while she went on shore to get her provisions.  I asked:  “How does he keep them from falling into the water—­does he take hold of their clothes?” “No, I leave them in the cabin, when I am obliged to go ashore, and he stands at the door and barks and won’t let them come out.”  While I was talking to her I heard a shot, and realised that the poor stag had been finished at last.  It was early in the afternoon—­three o’clock, and I suggested that the whole chasse should adjourn to the chateau for gouter.  This they promptly accepted, and started off to find their horses.  Then I had some misgivings as to what I could give them for gouter.  We were a small party, mostly women and children.  W. was away, and I thought that probably the chef, who was a sportsman as well as a cook, was shooting (he had hired a small chasse not far from us); I had told him there was nothing until dinner.  I had visions of twenty or thirty hungry men and an ordinary tea-table, with some thin bread and butter, a pot of damson jam, and some sables, so I sent off Francis’s tutor, the stable-boy, and the gardener’s boy to the chateau as fast as their legs could carry them, to find somebody, anybody, to prepare us as much food as they could, and to sacrifice the dinner at once, to make sandwiches—­tea and chocolate, of course, were easily provided.

We all started back to the house up the steep, muddy path, some of the men with us leading their horses, some riding round by Marolles to give orders to the breaks and various carriages to come to the chateau.  The big gates were open, Hubert there to arrange at once for the accommodation of so many horses and equipages, and the billiard and dining-rooms, with great wood-fires, looking most comfortable.  The chasseurs begged not to come into the drawing-room, as they were covered with mud, so they brushed off what they could in the hall, and we went at once to the gouter.  It was funny to see our quiet dining-room invaded by such a crowd of men, some red-coated, some green, all with breeches and high muddy boots.  The master of hounds, M. Menier, proposed to make the curee on the lawn after tea, which I was delighted to accept.  We had an English cousin staying with us who knew all about hunting in her own country, but had never seen a French chasse a courre, and she was most keen about it.  The gouter was very creditable.  It seems that they had just caught the chef, who had been attracted by the unusual sounds and bustle on the hillside, and