; she
brings with her a bowl of new milk, just warm, which she prays you to
drink, as she fancies you are delicate about the lungs, poor dear child!
Well, you do as she wishes you; then rise, and take a walk around the
farm; pay a visit to Musette, the poultry, your pets the pigeons, the
flowers in the garden, till nine o'clock, when your writing-master
arrives--"

"My writing-master?"

"Why, you know, unless you learned such necessary things as reading,
writing, and accounts, you would not be able to assist your aunt to keep
her books relative to the produce of the farm."

"Oh, to be sure! How very stupid of me not to recollect that I must
learn to write well, if I wished to help my aunt!" cried the young girl,
so thoroughly absorbed in the picture of this peaceful life as to
believe for the moment in its reality.

"After your lesson is concluded, you will occupy yourself in household
matters, or embroider some pretty little article of dress for yourself;
then you will practise your writing for an hour or two, and, when that
is done, join your aunt in her round of visits to the different
operations of the farm; in the summer, to see how the reapers get on in
the hay field; in harvest-time, to observe the reapers, and afterwards
to enjoy the delight with which the gleaners pick up the scattered ears
of grain; by this time you will have almost tired yourself, and
gathering a large handful of wild herbs, carefully selected by you as
the known favourites of your dear Musette, you turn your steps
homewards--"

"But we go back through the meadow, dear M. Rodolph, do we not?"
inquired La Goualeuse, as earnestly as though every syllable her ears
drank in was to be effectually brought to pass.

"Oh, yes! by all means; and there happens, fortunately, to be a nice
little bridge, by which the river separating the farm-land from the
meadow may be crossed. By the time you reach home, upon my word, it is
seven o'clock; and, as the evenings begin to be a little chill, a
bright, cheerful fire is blazing in the large farm kitchen; you go in
there for a few minutes, just to warm yourself and to speak a few kind
words to the honest labourers, who are enjoying a hearty meal after the
day's toil is over. Then you sit down to dinner with your aunt;
sometimes the cure, or a neighbouring farmer, is invited to share the
meal. After dinner you read or work, while your aunt and her guest have
a friendly game at piquet. At ten o'clock she