the back of the hollow stood the church, with its three steeples and
its clock; and, a little higher, the village square, where a spring,
fashioned into a fountain, gurgled from one basin into another, under a
wide arched roof. I could hear from my window the chatter of the women
washing their clothes, the strokes of their beaters, the rasping of the
pots scoured with sand and vinegar. Sprinkled over the slopes are little
houses with their garden patches in terraces banked up by tottering
walls, which bulge under the thrust of the earth. Here and there are
very steep lanes, with the dents of the rock forming a natural pavement.
The mule, sure-footed though he be, would hesitate to enter these
dangerous passes with his load of branches.

Further on, beyond the village, half-way up the hills, stood the great
ever-so-old lime tree, the Tel, as we used to call it, whose sides,
hollowed out by the ages, were the favorite hiding places of us children
at play. On fair days, its immense, spreading foliage cast a wide shadow
over the herds of oxen and sheep. Those solemn days, which only came
once a year, brought me a few ideas from without: I learnt that the
world did not end with my amphitheater of hills. I saw the inn keeper's
wine arrive on mule back and in goat skin bottles. I hung about the
market place and watched the opening of jars full of stewed pears, the
setting out of baskets of grapes, an almost unknown fruit, the object
of eager covetousness. I stood and gazed in admiration at the roulette
board on which, for a sou, according to the spot at which its needle
stopped on a circular row of nails, you won a pink poodle made of barley
sugar, or a round jar of aniseed sweets, or, much oftener, nothing at
all. On a piece of canvas on the ground, rolls of printed calico with
red flowers, were displayed to tempt the girls. Close by rose a pile of
beechwood clogs, tops and boxwood flutes. Here the shepherds chose their
instruments, trying them by blowing a note or two. How new it all was
to me! What a lot of things there were to see in this world! Alas,
that wonderful time was of but short duration! At night, after a little
brawling at the inn, it was all over; and the village returned to
silence for a year.

But I must not linger over these memories of the dawn of life. We were
speaking of the memorable picture brought from town. Where shall I keep
it, to make the best use of it? Why, of course, it must be pasted on
the em