door while their mothers
are talking with the visitors, standing straight up on their bare legs,
with their little plump bodies protruding, in one hand a small tin
saucepan and in the other an iron spoon, with unwashed mouths, looking
as independent as any child or grown person in the land. They stare
unabashed, but make no answer when spoken to. "I've no call to your
fence, Misser B----." It seems strange that a man should have the right,
unarmed with any legal instrument, of tearing down the dwelling-houses
of a score of families, and driving the inmates forth without a shelter.
Yet B---- undoubtedly has this right; and it is not a little striking to
see how quietly these people contemplate the probability of his
exercising it,--resolving, indeed, to burrow in their holes as long as
may be, yet caring about as little for an ejectment as those who could
find a tenement anywhere, and less. Yet the women, amid all the trials
of their situation, appear to have kept up the distinction between
virtue and vice: those who can claim the former will not associate with
the latter. When the women travel with young children, they carry the
baby slung at their backs, and sleeping quietly. The dresses of the
new-comers are old-fashioned, making them look aged before their time.

Monsieur S---- shaving himself yesterday morning. He was in excellent
spirits, and could not keep his tongue or body still more than long
enough to make two or three consecutive strokes at his beard. Then he
would turn, flourishing his razor and grimacing joyously, enacting droll
antics, breaking out into scraps and verses of drinking-songs, "_A
boire! a boire!_"--then laughing heartily, and crying, "_Vive la
gaite!_"--then resuming his task, looking into the glass with grave
face, on which, however, a grin would soon break out anew, and all his
pranks would be repeated with variations. He turned this foolery to
philosophy, by observing that mirth contributed to goodness of heart,
and to make us love our fellow-creatures. Conversing with him in the
evening, he affirmed, with evident belief in the truth of what he said,
that he would have no objection, except that it would be a very foolish
thing, to expose his whole heart, his whole inner man, to the view of
the world. Not that there would not be much evil discovered there; but,
as he was conscious of being in a state of mental and moral improvement,
working out his progress onward, he would not shrink from