and short in the neck. She wore her own gray hair, which at dinner
was always tidy enough; but during the 'whole day previous to that
hour she might be seen with it escaping from under her cap in extreme
disorder. Her eyebrows were large and bushy, but those alone would
not have given to her face that look of indomitable sternness which
it possessed. Her eyebrows were serious in their effect, but not so
serious as the pair of green spectacles which she always wore under
them. It was thought by those who had analysed the subject that the
great secret of Madame Bauche's power lay in her green spectacles.

Her custom was to move about and through the whole establishment
every day from breakfast till the period came for her to dress for
dinner. She would visit every chamber and every bath, walk once or
twice round the salle a manger, and very repeatedly round the
kitchen; she would go into every hole and corner, and peer into
everything through her green spectacles: and in these walks it was
not always thought pleasant to meet her. Her custom was to move very
slowly, with her hands generally clasped behind her back: she rarely
spoke to the guests unless she was spoken to, and on such occasions
she would not often diverge into general conversation. If any one
had aught to say connected with the business of the establishment,
she would listen, and then she would make her answers,--often not
pleasant in the hearing.

And thus she walked her path through the world, a stern, hard, solemn
old woman, not without gusts of passionate explosion; but honest
withal, and not without some inward benevolence and true tenderness
of heart. Children she had had many, some seven or eight. One or
two had died, others had been married; she had sons settled far away
from home, and at the time of which we are now speaking but one was