On seeing the affectations of their too amiable hostess—­which were, indeed, affectations of soul and mind—­the friends glanced at each other, and put on a deeply serious expression to listen to Madame de la Baudraye, who made them a set speech of thanks for coming to cheer the monotony of her days.  Dinah walked her guests round and round the lawn, ornamented with large vases of flowers, which lay in front of the Chateau d’Anzy.

“How is it,” said Lousteau, the practical joker, “that so handsome a woman as you, and apparently so superior, should have remained buried in the country?  What do you do to make life endurable?”

“Ah! that is the crux,” said the lady.  “It is unendurable.  Utter despair or dull resignation—­there is no third alternative; that is the arid soil in which our existence is rooted, and on which a thousand stagnant ideas fall; they cannot fertilize the ground, but they supply food for the etiolated flowers of our desert souls.  Never believe in indifference!  Indifference is either despair or resignation.  Then each woman takes up the pursuit which, according to her character, seems to promise some amusement.  Some rush into jam-making and washing, household management, the rural joys of the vintage or the harvest, bottling fruit, embroidering handkerchiefs, the cares of motherhood, the intrigues of a country town.  Others torment a much-enduring piano, which, at the end of seven years, sounds like an old kettle, and ends its asthmatic life at the Chateau d’Anzy.  Some pious dames talk over the different brands of the Word of God—­the Abbe Fritaud as compared with the Abbe Guinard.  They play cards in the evening, dance with the same partners for twelve years running, in the same rooms, at the same dates.  This delightful life is varied by solemn walks on the Mall, visits of politeness among the women, who ask each other where they bought their gowns.

“Conversation is bounded on the south by remarks on the intrigues lying hidden under the stagnant water of provincial life, on the north by proposed marriages, on the west by jealousies, and on the east by sour remarks.

“And so,” she went on, striking an attitude, “you see a woman wrinkled at nine-and-twenty, ten years before the time fixed by the rules of Doctor Bianchon, a woman whose skin is ruined at an early age, who turns as yellow as a quince when she is yellow at all—­we have seen some turn green.  When we have reached that point, we try to justify our normal condition; then we turn and rend the terrible passion of Paris with teeth as sharp as rat’s teeth.  We have Puritan women here, sour enough to tear the laces of Parisian finery, and eat out all the poetry of your Parisian beauties, who undermine the happiness of others while they cry up their walnuts and rancid bacon, glorify this squalid mouse-hole, and the dingy color and conventual small of our delightful life at Sancerre.”

“I admire such courage, madame,” said Bianchon.  “When we have to endure such misfortunes, it is well to have the wit to make a virtue of necessity.”