orrects however the precipitancy of such a proposal;
for it cannot be, in this my _first_ despatch, that you are to receive any
thing like an adequate notion of the topics thus hastily thrown together on
the first impulse of Parisian inspiration. Wait patiently, therefore: and
at least admire the methodical precision of my narrative. My last letter
left me on the eve of departure from Falaise; and it is precisely from that
place that I take up the thread of my journal. We were to leave it, as I
told you, in the Diligence--on the evening of the Sunday, immediately
following the date of the despatch transmitted. I shall have reason to
remember that journey for many a day to come; but, "post varios casus, &c."
I am thankful to find myself safely settled in my present comfortable
abode. The Sabbath, on the evening of which the Diligence usually starts
for Paris, happened to be a festival. Before dawn of day I heard incessant
juvenile voices beneath the window of my bedroom at the Grand Turc; What
might this mean? Between three and four, as the day began to break, I rose,
and approaching the window, saw, from thence, a number of little boys and
girls busied in making artificial flower-beds and sand-borders, &c. Their
tongues and their bodily movements were equally unintermitting. It was
impossible for a stranger to guess at the meaning of such a proceeding;
but, opening the window, I thought there could be no harm in asking a very
simple question--which I will confess to you was put in rather an irritable
manner on my part ... for I had been annoyed by their labours for more than
the last hour. "What are you about, there?" I exclaimed--"Ha, is it you
Sir?" replied a little arch boy--mistaking me for some one else. "Yes,
(resumed I) tell me what you are about there?" "in truth, we are making
_Reposoirs_ for the FETE-DIEU: the Host will pass this way by and bye. Is
it not a pretty thing, Sir?" exclaimed a sweetly modulated female voice.
All my irritability was softened in a moment; and I was instantly convinced
that Solomon never delivered a wiser sentiment than when he said--"A soft
answer turneth away wrath!" I admitted the prettiness of the thing without
comprehending a particle of it: and telling them to speak in a lower key,
shut the window, and sought my bed. But sleep had ceased to seek me: and
the little urchins, instead of lowering their voices, seemed to break forth
in a more general and incessant vociferation. In conseq