led hers, and which
contained her books, her drawings, her musical instruments, with some
favourite birds and plants. Here she usually exercised herself in
elegant arts, cultivated only because they were congenial to her taste,
and in which native genius, assisted by the instructions of Monsieur
and Madame St. Aubert, made her an early proficient. The windows of
this room were particularly pleasant; they descended to the floor, and,
opening upon the little lawn that surrounded the house, the eye was led
between groves of almond, palm-trees, flowering-ash, and myrtle, to the
distant landscape, where the Garonne wandered.

The peasants of this gay climate were often seen on an evening, when
the day's labour was done, dancing in groups on the margin of the river.
Their sprightly melodies, debonnaire steps, the fanciful figure of
their dances, with the tasteful and capricious manner in which the girls
adjusted their simple dress, gave a character to the scene entirely
French.

The front of the chateau, which, having a southern aspect, opened upon
the grandeur of the mountains, was occupied on the ground floor by a
rustic hall, and two excellent sitting rooms. The first floor, for the
cottage had no second story, was laid out in bed-chambers, except one
apartment that opened to a balcony, and which was generally used for a
breakfast-room.

In the surrounding ground, St. Aubert had made very tasteful
improvements; yet, such was his attachment to objects he had remembered
from his boyish days, that he had in some instances sacrificed taste
to sentiment. There were two old larches that shaded the building, and
interrupted the prospect; St. Aubert had sometimes declared that he
believed he should have been weak enough to have wept at their fall. In
addition to these larches he planted a little grove of beech, pine, and
mountain-ash. On a lofty terrace, formed by the swelling bank of the
river, rose a plantation of orange, lemon, and palm-trees, whose fruit,
in the coolness of evening, breathed delicious fragrance. With these
were mingled a few trees of other species. Here, under the ample shade
of a plane-tree, that spread its majestic canopy towards the river, St.
Aubert loved to sit in the fine evenings of summer, with his wife and
children, watching, beneath its foliage, the setting sun, the mild
splendour of its light fading from the distant landscape, till the
shadows of twilight melted its various features into one tint