which we were seated, stretching many feet in the rear of the very small
cart--the most anxious member of the party was the horse, for he had never
carried such a queer load as this before, and the novelty of the sensation
caused by the weight far behind completely upset his notions of propriety.
His conduct was especially strange while going up-hill, for then he would
stop short from time to time and make an effort to look round, as if
uncertain whether it was all a hideous dream, or whether he was really
growing out behind in the form of a crocodile.

The peasants whom we met on the road stood still and gazed with eyes and
mouths wide open until we were out of sight. They had never seen people
travelling in a boat before on dry land. When they heard we were English
all was explained: '_Ces diables d'Anglais sont capables de tout_.'

While crossing the country in this fashion we passed a spot on the highroad
where a man was getting ready to thresh his wheat. He had prepared the
place by spreading over it a layer of cow-dung, and levelling it with his
bare feet until it was quite smooth and hard. It is in this way that the
threshing-floors are usually made.

'You see that _type?_' said the young man who was driving, and who balanced
himself on the edge of a board.

'Yes.'

'Well, he owns more land than any other peasant about here, and is rich,
and yet, rather than turn a bit of his ground into a threshing-floor, he
brings his corn where you see him and threshes it upon the road.'

I said to myself that this man was not the first to discover that one