it, and spreads its streamlets like branches through the streets, and
sparkles in the evening light. Like Venice, it has its 'silent
highways;' like Venice, also, on a smaller and humbler scale, it has its
old façades and lintels drooping to the water's edge; like Venice, too,
we must add, that it has its odours here and there--odours not always
proceeding from the tanneries.

In the chief place of the _arrondissement_, and in a rapidly increasing
town, containing about six thousand inhabitants; with a reputation for
healthiness and cheapness of living, and with a railway from Paris, we
must naturally look for changes and modern ways; but Pont Audemer is
still essentially old, and some of its inhabitants wear the caps, as in
our illustration, which were sketched only yesterday in the
market-place.

If we take up our quarters at the old-fashioned inn called the _Pôt
d'Étain_, we shall find much to remind us of the 15th century. If we
take a walk by the beautiful banks of the Rille on a summer's evening,
or in the fields where the peasants are at work, we shall find the
aspect curiously English, and in the intonation of the voices the
resemblance is sometimes startling; we seem hardly amongst
foreigners--both in features and in voice there is a strong family
likeness. There is a close tie of blood relationship no doubt, of
ancient habits and natural tastes; but, in spite of railways and
steamboats, the two peoples know very little of each other.

That young girl with the plain white cap fitting close to her hair--who
tends the flocks on the hill side, and puts all her power and energy
into the little matter of knitting a stocking--is a Norman maiden, a
lineal descendant, it may be, of some ancient house, whose arms we may