himself a man of resource, quite ready when
required with either a meal or an answer.

So we started for Cancale.

On the way our courier grew more and more enthusiastic. We were traveling
in a four-seated carriage, Baeader on the box, pointing out to us in
English, after furtive conversations with the driver in French, the
principal points of interest. With many flourishes he led us to Parame,
one of those Normandy cities which consist of a huge hotel with enormous
piazzas, a beach ten miles from the sea, and a small so-called
fishing-village as a sort of marine attachment. To give a realistic touch,
a lone boat is always being tarred somewhere down at the end of one of its
toy streets, two or three donkey-carts and donkeys add an air of
picturesqueness, and the usual number of children with red pails and
shovels dig in the sand of the roadside. All the fish that are sold come
from the next town. It was too early in the season when we reached there
for girls in sabots and white caps, the tide from Paris not having set in.
The governor hailed it with delight. "Why the devil didn't you tell me
about this place before? Here we have been fooling away our time."

"But it is only Parame, monsieur," with an accent on the "only" and a
lifting of the hands. "Cancale speciale will charm you; ze coast it is so
immediately flat, and ze life of ze sea charmante. Nevare at Parame,
always at Cancale." So we drove on. The governor pacified but
anxious--only succumbing at my argument that Baeader knew all Normandy
thoroughly, and that an old courier like him certainly could be trusted to
select a hotel.

* * * * *

You all know the sudden dip from the rich, flat country of Normandy down
the steep cliffs to the sea. Cancale is like the rest of it. The town
itself stands on the brink of a swoop to the sands; the fishing-village
proper, where the sea packs it solid in a great half-moon, with a light
burning on one end that on clear nights can be seen as far as Mme.
Poulard's cozy dining-room at St. Michel.

One glimpse of this sea-burst tumbled me out of the carriage, sketch-trap
in hand. Baeader and the governor kept on. If the latter noticed the
discrepancy between Baeader's description of the country and the actual
topography, no word fell from him at the moment of departure.

From my aerie, as I worked under my white umbrella below the cliff, I
could distinctly make out our traveling-carriage sev