she
received a bow and look of recognition from a dark, acute-looking visage
which she remembered to belong to the pedlar she had met at Charente.

The Duchess, at the head of her table, was not in the best of humours.
Her son had sent home letters by a courier whom he had picked up for
himself and she never liked nor trusted, and he required an immediate
reply when she particularly resented being hurried. It was a
_galimafre_, literally a hash, she said; for indeed most matters where
she was not consulted did become a _galimafre_ with her. Moreover, under
favour of the courier, her porters had admitted this pedlar, and the
Duchess greatly disliked pedlars. All her household stores were
bought at shops of good repute in Montauban, and no one ought to be so
improvident as to require dealings with these mountebank vagabonds, who
dangled vanities before the eyes of silly girls, and filled their heads
with Paris fashion, if they did not do still worse, and excite them to
the purchase of cosmetics and love-charms.

Yet the excitement caused by the approach of a pedlar was invincible,
even by Madame la Duchess. It was inevitable that the crying need of
glove, kerchief, needle, or the like, should be discovered as soon as
he came within ken, and, once in the hall, there was no being rid of
him except by a flagrant act of inhospitality. This time it was worst of
all, for M. le Marquis himself must needs be the first to spy him, bring
him in, and be in want of a silver chain for his hawk; and his brother
the Vicomte must follow him up with all manner of wants inspired by the
mere sight of the pack.

Every one with the smallest sum of money must buy, every one without
inspect and assist in bargaining; and all dinner-time, eyes, thoughts,
and words were wandering to the gay pile in the corner, or reckoning up
needs and means. The pedlar, too, knew what a Calvinist household was,
and had been extremely discreet, producing nothing that could reasonably
be objected to; and the Duchess, seeing that the stream was too strong
for her, wisely tried to steer her bark through it safely instead of
directly opposing it.

As soon as grace was over, she called her maitre d'hotel, and bade
him look after that _galimafre_, and see that none of these fools were
unreasonably cheated, and that there was no attempt at gulling the young
ones with charms or fortune-telling, as well as to conclude the matter
so as to give no excuse for the Italian