regular cours de Molière. He read charmingly, with much spirit,
bringing out every touch of humour and fancy, and I was obliged to say
I found it most interesting. We read all sorts of things besides
Molière--Lundis de Ste.-Beuve, Chateaubriand, some splendid pages on
the French Revolution, Taine, Guizot, Mme. de Staël, Lamartine, etc.,
and sometimes rather light memoirs of the Régence and the light ladies
of the eighteenth century, who apparently mixed up politics, religion,
literature, and lovers in the most simple style. These last readings
he always prepared beforehand, and I was often surprised at sudden
transitions and unfinished conversations which meant that he had
suppressed certain passages which he judged too improper for general
reading.

He read, one evening, a charming feuilleton of George Sand. It began:
"Le Baron avait causé politique toute la soirée," which conversation
apparently so exasperated the baronne and a young cousin that they
wandered out into the village, which they immediately set by the ears.
The cousin was an excellent mimic of all animals' noises. He barked so
loud and so viciously that he started all the dogs in the village, who
went nearly mad with excitement, and frightened the inhabitants out of
their wits. Every window was opened, the curé, the garde champêtre,
the school-master, all peering out anxiously into the night, and
asking what was happening. Was it tramps, or a travelling circus, or a
bear escaped from his showman, or perhaps a wolf? I have wished
sometimes since, when I have heard various barons talking politics,
that I, too, could wander out into the night and seek distraction
outside.

It was a serious life in the big château. There was no railway
anywhere near, and very little traffic on the highroad. After