The social amusements of our ville are few, as must naturally be the case in a provincial town ruled by the Draconian law that a jeune fille a marier must be no more than an animated puppet, while jeunes gens must have their coarse fling before they are fit for refined society.  Occasionally an ambulant theatrical troupe gives an entertainment in our little theatre.  Once a year Talbot comes, during vacation at the Francais, and gives us “L’Avare” or “Le Roi s’amuse;” but such are small events, to our provincial taste, compared with the vaulting and grimacing of the more frequent English and American circus troupes in our Place Thiers.

Perhaps the chief distraction of our young people is going to early mass, whither our young ladies go accompanied by bonnes, Maman having not yet emerged from the French mamma’s chrysalis condition of morning crimping-pins, petticoat and short gown, and list slippers.  The bonnes who thus serve as chaperons are often as young as or even younger than the demoiselles whose virginal modesty they are supposed to protect.  That they are anything more than a mere form of guardian, a figment of the social fiction that a young French girl never leaves her mother’s side till she goes to her husband’s, it is unnecessary to observe.  Human nature, especially French human nature, is human nature all the world over, and Romeo will woo and Juliet be won during early mass or twilight vespers as well as from a balcony, in spite of all the Montagues and Capulets.  Girl-chaperons are oftener in sympathy with ardent daughters than with worldly mothers, while even the oldest and most sedate of French bonnes are malleable to other influences than those of their legitimate employers.  It was across our river, yonder from whence the sound of the Angelus comes across the summer water like the music of dreams, that Balzac’s Modest Mignon carried on her intrigues of hifalutin gush, by means of a facile bonne, with a man whom she had never seen, and who deceived her by personating the poet she wished him to be.  Modest Mignons are not rare in our ville, and the Gothic vaults of Saint-Leonard and the pillared aisles of Sainte-Catherine witness almost as many little intrigues, as many heart-beats and blushes, as does “evenin’ meetin’” in our own bucolic regions.

Desiree, our femme-de-chambre, before she came to us, lived in a wealthy roturier family.

“It was a good place, and I was sorry to lose it when Mademoiselle Eugenie was married,” said she.  “The little gifts the jeunes gens slipped into my panier as I came with mademoiselle from mass almost equalled my wages.  Mademoiselle had a good dot as well as beauty, and ces jeunes gens expected to lose nothing by what they gave me.  Mademoiselle herself often said, ’Desiree, walk a few steps behind me, and, while I keep my eyes upon the pavement, tell me all the young men who turn to look after me.  If you hear any of them say, “Comme elle est jolie!” (How pretty she is!) you shall have my batiste mouchoirs.’”