new-laid eggs for breakfast, and a chicken for
dinner to-day. Madame was out, but soon
came back; she drove into the yard a one-
horse cart, laden with wheat sheaves, which
she had herself piled thereon: on the top of
all was riding her little daughter, by way of
make-weight. Madame unharnessed the horse,
took it out, put it into the stable, and then
filled our basket with eggs. The chicken had
no mind to be caught, and Madame was
obliged to run it down; it would be tenderer,
she said, after being well fatiguée'd. It was
then put somewhere out of the way to be
killed and unfeathered as soon as she had
milked the cow, and fed the horse, and got
the wheat into the barn. And where was
the Sieur Hauttot all this while? He was out
for a "month of August," earning harvest
wages of other people; and his own little
farm at home seemed to be going on just as
well without him, under Madame's
industrious superintendence.

When you have read my gossip thus far,
you will think to yourself, and perhaps you
will say, "It is all very well for Frenchwomen
to busy themselves about those sort of things,
but you will never get Englishwomen to do
them. They have neither the tact nor the
courage for it. It wouldn't come naturally
to them."

I beg your pardon, and will instantly prove
the contrary. I want to change a ten-pound
Bank of England note, and must have French
money for it—gold, silver, and, I hope, a few
copper extras by way of premium. There
are several exchanges of money at hand, but
of course I shall go to Madame Lacroix. And
why do I go to Madame Lacroix? Because
she is an Englishwoman; and because it is
right that English people abroad should try
and help each other to get a living; and
because the slightest additional item of custom
must conduce to that highly desirable end.
Madame Lacroix is married to a Frenchman—
I am not positive that I have spelt their name
correctly—who is a goldsmith and a dealer in
money; but I have not seen him in the shop
more than once, and that appeared very like
an unusual accident.

I enter; the place glitters and glows with
treasure. On the right, behind a counter,
sits Madame Lacroix in a certain degree of
state. The salutation made, I present my
bank-note. It is looked at; but, though cut
in halves, it is subjected to what seems a
very short and slight inspection. Madame,
however, is too quick and too practised not
to have seen that all was right in half the
time. She addresses her cashier, a neatly-
dressed young woman, who turns out to be
her daughter, and who steps behind the
opposite counter on the left, and gives me
what I want, according to the maternal
orders of the lady superior. [By the way, I
have to buy my French gold rather dear, in
spite of Californian importations; but who on
earth can carry about with him on his travels
a great sack full of five-franc pieces? To be
sure, French notes are to be had instead.]
The bank from which my change is drawn
lies exposed to the public (behind plate-glass
and brass wire netting), and is enriched
by contributions from all sorts of nations,
and coinages, and paper monies—assignats
excepted, which might injure Madame's credit.
There are golden dollar pieces from America,
big and little, Spanish caroli, French billets de
banque, and English sovereigns: offering
Victoria to our admiration alongside of bran-
new five-franc pieces resplendent with the
profile of the Prince President. The
Republics, both of the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries, here seem equally to belong
to the past, when they take their places so
quietly in the money-changer's window.

Well; with the respective values of all
these, and more, Madame Lacroix, an English-
woman, is perfectly acquainted. She would
probably give you, if required, a lecture on
Swiss coins, and display a tolerably competent
knowledge of the currency of the cantons—
an effort of the mind of which I must confess
myself utterly incapable. She will immediately
convert any one sort of marketable
specie and notes into any other, subtracting
or adding the little differences that have to
be given, or received, or withheld, according
to the state of the money-market, and the
direction in which gold, silver, or paper, pass
to or from her treasury. And all is done
quietly, with some dignity of manner, and
with not an atom of the offensive priggishness
which is now and then seen behind a
banker's counter.

Now, suppose that M. Lacroix one morning
were to come in, and say: "My dear wife,
you have been kept at this sort of work quite
long enough; you were never brought up to
it in England, and your head must require a
little rest after all those puzzles about sous,
and centimes, and colonnati, and dollars,
and zwanzigers, and groschen, and écus, and
florins, and batzen, and the deuce knows
what. They must break your rest at night,
though I haven't discovered it; so I have felt
it my duty to think about your future ease
and comfort. We are rich enough to give
Mademoiselle Lacroix a decent little marriage
portion; neither she nor you shall be
confined to the shop any longer. I have ordered
our salon on the first floor to be re-furnished
for you to sit in, and read novels, and do
berlin work, and crochet; and I have engaged
a couple of nice young men with pretty
moustaches—excellent testimonials,
unquestionable securities, and the genteelest of
manners, to take your places here to-morrow
morning."

Fancy Madame's astonishment at the
promulgation of such an act of deposition as
this! Would she faint and abdicate quietly,
or would she really think that her husband
was acting the part of a kind and considerate
friend, to take so much trouble off her hands