passed in weighing difficulties, and canvassing plans, upon donning the
blue and yellow, and setting out for my own room without delay, hoping
sincerely, that with proper precaution, I should be able to reach it
unseen and unobserved.

As I laid but little stress upon the figure I should make in my new
habiliments, it did not cause me much mortification to find that the
clothes were considerably too small, the jacket scarcely coming beneath
my arms, and the sleeves being so short that my hands and wrists
projected beyond the cuffs like two enormous claws; the leathers were
also limited in their length, and when drawn up to a proper height,
permitted my knees to be seen beneath, like the short costume of a
Spanish Tauridor, but scarcely as graceful; not wishing to encumber
myself in the heavy and noisy masses of wood, iron, and leather, they
call "les bottes forts," I slipped my feet into my slippers, and stole
gently from the room. How I must have looked at the moment I leave my
reader to guess, as with anxious and stealthy pace I crept along the low
gallery that led to the narrow staircase, down which I proceeded, step by
step; but just as I reached the bottom, perceived a little distance from
me, with her back turned towards me, a short, squat peasant on her knees,
belabouring with a brush the well waxed floor; to pass therefore,
unobserved was impossible, so that I did not hesitate to address her, and
endeavour to interest her in my behalf, and enlist her as my guide.

"Bon jour, ma chere," said I in a soft insinuating tone; she did not hear
me, so I repeated,

"Bon jour, ma chere, bon jour."

Upon this she turned round, and looking fixedly at me for a second,