gave bread to the carp, handed to us by the
butler--small square pieces of bread in a straw basket. It was funny
to see the fish appear as soon as the window was opened--some of them
were enormous and very old. It seems they live to a great age; a
guardian of the Palace at Fontainebleau always shows one to tourists,
who is supposed to have been fed by the Emperor Napoleon. Those of
Pinon knew all about it, lifting their brown heads out of the water
and never missing their piece of bread.

We went back to the drawing-room for coffee, passing through the
billiard room, where there are some good pictures. A fine life-size
portrait of General Moreau (father of Mme. de Courval) in uniform, by
Gerard--near it a trophy of four flags--Austrian, Saxon, Bavarian, and
Hungarian--taken by the General; over the trophy three or four "lames
d'honneur" (presentation swords) with name and inscription. There are
also some pretty women's portraits in pastel--very delicate colours in
old-fashioned oval frames--quite charming.

The drawing-room was a very handsome room also panelled in light gray
carved wood; the furniture rather heavy and massive, curtains and
coverings of thick, bright flowered velvet, but it looked suitable in
that high old-fashioned room--light modern furniture would have been
out of place.

As soon as we had finished our coffee we went for a walk--not the two
old ladies, who settled down at once to their embroidery frames; one
of them showed me her work--really quite beautiful--a church ornament
of some kind, a painted Madonna on a ground of white satin; she was
covering the whole ground with heavy gold embroidery, so thick it
looked like mosaic.

The park is splendid, a real domain, all the paths and alleys
beautifully kept and every description of tree--M. de Courval was
always trying experiments with foreign trees and shrubs and apparently
most successfully. I think the park would have been charming in its
natural state, as there was a pretty little river running through the
grounds and some tangles of bushes and rocks that looked quite
wild--it might have been in the middle of the forest but everything
had been done to assist nature. There were a "piece d'eau," cascades,
little bridges thrown over the river in picturesque spots, and on the
highest point a tower (donjon), which was most effective, looked quite
the old feudal towers of which so few remain now. They were used as
watch towers, as a sentinel poste