arier_ must be no more than an animated puppet, while
_jeunes gens_ must have their coarse fling before they are fit for
refined society. Occasionally an ambulant theatrical troupe gives an
entertainment in our little theatre. Once a year Talbot comes, during
vacation at the Francais, and gives us "L'Avare" or "Le Roi s'amuse;"
but such are small events, to our provincial taste, compared with the
vaulting and grimacing of the more frequent English and American circus
troupes in our Place Thiers.

Perhaps the chief distraction of our young people is going to early
mass, whither our young ladies go accompanied by _bonnes_, Maman
having not yet emerged from the French mamma's chrysalis condition of
morning crimping-pins, petticoat and short gown, and list slippers. The
_bonnes_ who thus serve as chaperons are often as young as or even
younger than the demoiselles whose virginal modesty they are supposed to
protect. That they are anything more than a mere form of guardian, a
figment of the social fiction that a young French girl never leaves her
mother's side till she goes to her husband's, it is unnecessary to
observe. Human nature, especially French human nature, is human nature
all the world over, and Romeo will woo and Juliet be won during early
mass or twilight vespers as well as from a balcony, in spite of all the
Montagues and Capulets. Girl-chaperons are oftener in sympathy with
ardent daughters than with worldly mothers, while even the oldest and
most sedate of French _bonnes_ are malleable to other influences
than those of their legitimate employers. It was across our river,
yonder from whence the sound of the Angelus comes across the summer
water like the music of dreams, that Balzac's Modest Mignon carried on
her intrigues of hifalutin gush, by means of a facile _bonne_, with
a man whom she had never seen, and who deceived her by personating the
poet she wished him to be. Modest Mignons are not rare in our ville, and
the Gothic vaults of Saint-Leonard and the pillared aisles of
Sainte-Catherine witness almost as many little intrigues, as many
heart-beats and blushes, as does "evenin' meetin'" in our own bucolic
regions.

Desiree, our _femme-de-chambre,_ before she came to us, lived in a
wealthy _roturier_ family.

"It was a good place, and I was sorry to lose it when Mademoiselle
Eugenie was married," said she. "The little gifts the _jeunes gens_
slipped into my panier as I came with mademoiselle from mass al