sauvage,_
indeed, might have answered for specifications of a griffin, or of a
vampire-bat. At last, one day, when walking about in the market-place
at Quebec, I saw a crowd assembled round a gray-clad countryman, who
presided over a small box on which the words _Chat-Sauvage_ were
painted. Now was my time to set the question at rest. I invested
sixpence in the show. When a good number of sixpences had been paid in,
the proprietor opened his box, out from which crawled a fat, familiar
raccoon, apparently as much at home in the market-place as he could have
been in the middle of his native swamp. And this was the mysterious
"wild-cat" about which I had asked so many questions and heard so many
stories!

It is noticeable that thunder-storms, travelling from the westward
toward Quebec, usually diverge across the valley of the St. Charles in
the direction of Lorette, and coast along the ridge of ground on which
that place is situated to Charlesbourg, a small village lying about four
miles to the east of it, upon the ridge. There the storms appear to
culminate, pouring out the full vials of their wrath upon the devoted
_habitans_ of white-cotted Charlesbourg. The wayfarer who wends through
this rustical district will hardly fail to observe the prevailing taste
for lightning-rods. The smallest cottage has at least two of these
fire-irons, one upon each gable; houses of more pretensions are provided
with an indefinite number; and the big white church has its purple roof
so bristled with them, that the pause which a flash of lightning must
necessarily make before deciding by which of them to come down must
enable any tolerably active person to get out of the way in good time.
And yet, with all these defenders of the faithful, I remember how the
steeple was taken clean off the big white church, in splinters, one wild
night after I had watched a long array of cloud-chariots rolling heavily
away eastward along the ridge: also, how a farmer's handsome daughter,
the belle of the village, sat upright and dead upon a sofa when people
came again to their eyesight after a blinding flash. So much for
lightning-rods!--so much for the mystic iron!

When the day of the _Fete Dieu_ comes round, Quebec and its neighboring
villages are all alive for the celebration of the _fete_, which takes
place on the following Sunday. Then the great suburb of St. Roch is
a sight to see. Every street of it is converted into a green alley,
embowered with y