id to be awake, and we could muster the courage to
listen to their whispered communings, what should we hear? How severely
would this tremendous triumvirate judge some of the so-called great men
of our own time!

But there are more modern edifices in Le Morvan, with far more agreeable
episodes attached to them: take, for example, the Hotel de Bazarne, a
celebrated hostel, built among the green lanes on the borders of a wood
of acacias--a beautiful flowery wood, which, when the merry month of May
has heralded the perfumed pleasures of spring, dispenses them on every
breeze over the adjacent country.

Bazarne, in its healthy situation and splendid environs, boasts the best
of cookery. The last owner of Bazarne was--Reader, the utmost exercise
of your lively imagination will never supply you with the right
name--was an _ancien maitre d'hotel_ of Madame la Marquise de
Pompadour--Madame de Pompadour's steward! What could he have to do in
the wilds of Le Morvan? Grand Jean was a curious little man, lively and
brisk as a bird or a squirrel, powdered, curled, and smelling of rose
and benjamin as if he were still at Versailles or Choisi. Grand Jean
decorated the back of his head with a little pigtail, which much
resembled a head of asparagus, and was always jumping and frisking from
one shoulder to the other. His snuff-box was of rare enamel, his ruffles
of point-lace, and his artistic performances in the culinary art were
all carried on in vessels of solid silver. He was, from the point of his
toe to the tips of his hair, the aristocrat of the saucepan and the
stove.

Grand Jean acquired, in our provincial district, a reputation perfectly
monumental for the richness of his venison pasties, the refined flavour,
the smoothness and the exquisite finish of his _omelettes aux truffes_
and _au sang de chevreuil_. All the world of Le Morvan used to visit
him. And the good _cures_? The good _cures_?--ah! they all went to visit
him by caravans, as the faithful wend their way across the deserts to
Mecca to pray at the tomb of the Prophet. And, when he died, they
mourned indeed; the worthy divines, incredible as it may be, drank water
for three days, in proof of the sincerity of their woe. Who would have
doubted it?

To the north of Bazarne, and on the road to the best district for sport,
is seen at the foot of the gray mountains peeping cheerily, and like a
white flower amidst the sombre foliage of the chestnut-trees, St.
Hibaut, an