traveller may avoid the place I write from, by either stopping short, or
going beyond it, as it is the only house of reception for travellers in
the village, and the worst I have met with in my whole journey. We had
been scurvily treated here as we went; but having arrived at it after
dark, and leaving it early, I did not recollect it again, till the
mistress by her sour face and sorry fare betrayed it; for she well
remembered _us_. As a specimen of French auberge cookery, I cannot help
serving up a dish of spinnage to you as it was served to me at this
house. We came in early in the afternoon, and while I was in the
court-yard, I saw a flat basket stand upon the ground, the bottom of
which was covered with boiled spinnage; and as my dog, and several
others in the yard, had often put their noses into it, I concluded it
was put down for _their_ food, not _mine_, till I saw a dirty girl
patting it up into round balls, and two children, the eldest of them not
above three years old, slavering in and playing with it, one of whom,
_to lose no time_, was performing _an office_ that none could _do for
her_. I asked the maid what she was about, and what it was she was so
preparing? for I began to think I had been mistaken, till she told me it
was spinnage;--not for me, I hope, said I,--'_oui, pour vous et le
monde_.' I then forbad her bringing any to my table, and putting the
little girl _off her center_, by an angry push, made her almost as dirty
as the spinnage; and I could perceive her mother, the hostess, and some
French travellers who were near, looked upon me as a brute, for
_disturbing la pauvre enfant_; nevertheless, with my _entree_ came up a
dish of this _delicate spinnage_, with which I made the girl a very
pretty _Chapeau Anglois_, for I turned it, dish and all, upon her head;
this set the house in such an uproar, that, if there had not come in an
old gentleman like _Bourgeois_ of _Paris_, at that instant, I verily
believe I should have been turned out; but he engaged warmly in my
defence, and insisted upon it that I had treated the girl just as he