two later. "They carry thrift to the pitch of avarice and vice. Zola's
'La Terre' is not without foundation on fact."

And excellent as is the principle of forethought, invaluable as is the
habit of laying by for a rainy day, I have at last come to the
conclusion that of the two national weaknesses, French avarice and
English lavishness and love of spending, the latter is more in
accordance with progress and the spirit of the age.

In another part of the village we called upon a hale old body of
seventy-seven, who not only lived alone and did everything for herself
indoors but the entire work of a market garden, every inch of the two
and a half acres being, of course, her own. Piled against an inner wall
we saw a dozen or so faggots each weighing, we were told, half a
hundredweight. Will it be believed that this old woman had picked up and
carried from the forest on her back every one of these faggots? The
poor, or rather those who will, are allowed to glean firewood in all the
State forests of France. Let no tourist bestow a few sous upon aged men
and women bearing home such treasure-trove! Quite possibly the dole may
affront some owner of houses and lands.

As we inspected her garden, walls covered with fine grapes, tomatoes and
melons, of splendid quality, to say nothing of vegetables in profusion,
it seemed all the more difficult to reconcile facts so incongruous. Here
was a market gardener on her own account, mistress of all she surveyed,
glad as a gipsy to pick up sticks for winter use. But the burden of her
story was the same:

"Il faut travailler pour ses enfants" (one must work for one's
children), she said.