her 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."

Amazed at the brilliant move by which Dinah thus placed provincial life
at the mercy of her guests, in anticipation of their sarcasms, Gatien
Boirouge nudged Lousteau's elbow, with a glance and a smile, which said:

"Well! did I say too much?"

"But, madame," said Lousteau, "you are proving that we are still in
Paris. I shall steal this gem of description; it will be worth ten
thousand francs to me in an articl