st?" and of substituting for "Comment cela
va-t-il?" the Provencal Commoun as? I found, too, that it was unusual
elsewhere to address people in our Nyons fashion as "Te, mon bon!"

Those swarthy, amply waistcoated, voluble little men were really very
good fellows in spite of their excitability and torrents of talk.

The Southern Frenchmen divide Europe into the "Nord" and the "Midi."
The "Nord" is hardly worth talking about, the sun never really shines
there, and no garlic or oil is used in cookery in those benighted
regions. The town of Lyons is considered to be in the "Nord," although
we should consider it well in the south of France. To the curious in
such matters, it may be pointed out that the line of demarcation
between "Nord" and "Midi" is perfectly well defined. In travelling from
Paris to Marseilles, between Valence and Montelimar, the observer will
note that quite abruptly the type of house changes. In place of the
high-pitched roof of Northern Europe the farm-houses suddenly assume
flat roofs of fluted tiles, with projecting eaves, after the Italian
fashion; at the same time the grey-green olive trees put in a first
appearance. Then you are in the "Midi," and any black-bearded,
olive-complexioned, stumpy little men in the carriage will give a sigh
of relief, for now, at last, the sun will begin to shine.

Nyons had been for two hundred years a Huguenot stronghold, so for a
French town an unusual proportion of its inhabitants were Protestants,
and there was, oddly enough, a colony of French Wesleyans there.

M. Ducros' father had been the Protestant pasteur of Nyons for
forty-four years. He was eighty-six years old, and on week-days the old
gentleman dozed in the sun all day, and was quite senile and gaga. On
Sundays, no sooner had he ascended the pulpit than his faculties seemed
to return to him, and he would preach interminable but perfectly
coherent sermons with a vigour astonishing in so old a man, only to
relapse into childishness again on returning home, and to remain senile
till the following Sunday.

The Ducros lived in a large farm-house on the outskirts of the town. It
was a farm without any livestock, for there is no grass whatever in
that part of France, and consequently no pasture for cattle or sheep.
Every one in Nyons kept goats for milk, and, quaintly enough, they fed
them on the dried mulberry leaves the silkworms had left over. For
every one reared silkworms too, a most lucrative industry