urope that 'the head of Robert Spear had been cut off.' 'Make
haste,' said this gentleman, 'and your papa will give you a silver
dollar, he will be so glad to hear it!'

It was rather instructive to think of the 'sea-green incorruptible' and
his idiotic 'Feast of the Supreme Being' on that beautiful clay of
Pentecost, in the charming rural commune of St.-Quentin, the peace and
happiness of which was for a time so cruelly broken up by his atrocities
and follies a hundred years ago. The fine old church, near by my host's
residence, has been restored with great taste and good sense. It was
crowded at early mass with the farmers and their families, many of the
men wearing their blouses, but all well-to-do, for this region is one of
the richest and best cultivated districts of Northern France. The
service was celebrated with much simplicity, but with no lack of due
ceremony; the singing was excellent; and the priest's homily, a brief
and very good discourse on the spirit of Christian charity, was listened
to with great attention.

The pretty custom prevails here, as in Normandy, of handing about in the
congregation, at a certain point in the service, a basket of bread. Two
gravely courteous old peasants presented the baskets in turn to all the
people. The service over, the farmers stood and chatted together in
groups in the churchyard and about the porch, and I heard much talk of
the outlook for the crops, of the price of cattle, and of certain
properties which had recently changed hands. Of politics next to
nothing.

My host was for many years a notary at Aire. He has transferred this
position now to the husband of his only daughter, and occupies himself
mainly with his agricultural interests. The notary, who is a personage
everywhere in France, is especially a personage in Artois. This has come
about in part through the great changes which have taken place in the
proprietorship of land in this province during the last three centuries.
Towards the end of the seventeenth century, after the province was
substantially united with France by Louis XIV., great numbers of small
proprietors, who had done well enough under the Spanish rule, found
themselves forced, by the pressure of taxation, to part with their
land, and there was a marked increase in the great estates, not only of
the clergy but of the laity. After the First Consul took the country in
hand, and began to reorganise it socially, on the principle laid down by
him