guests, unless, which often happens, the host is cook, no piece of
ill-fortune for the traveller! These good people have none of the false
shame often conspicuous among the same class in England. At Remiremont,
our hostess came bustling down at the last moment saying how she had
hurried to change her dress in order to bid us good-bye. Here the
son-in-law, a fine handsome fellow, was the cook, and when dinner was
served he used to emerge from his kitchen and chat with the guests or
play with his children in the cool evening hour. There is none of that
differentiation of labour witnessed in England, and on the whole the
stranger fares none the worse. With regard to French hotels generally
the absence of competition in large towns strikes an English mind. At
St. Die, as in many other places, there was at the time of my visit but
one hotel, which had doubtless been handed down from generation to
generation, simply because no rival aroused a spirit of emulation.

St. Die has a pleasant environment in the valley of the Meurthe, and may
be made the centre of many excursions. Its picturesque old Romanesque
cathedral of red sandstone, about which are grouped noble elms, grows
upon the eye; more interesting and beautiful by far are the Gothic
cloisters leading from within to the smaller church adjoining. These
delicate arcades, in part restored, form a quadrangle. Greenery fills the
open space, and wild antirrhinum and harebell brighten the grey walls.
Springing from one side is an out-of-door pulpit carved in stone, a
striking and suggestive object in the midst of the quiet scene. We should
like to know what was preached from that stone pulpit, and what manner of
man was the preacher. The bright green space, the delicate arcades of
soft grey, the bits of foliage here and there, with the two silent
churches blocking in all, make up an impressive scene.

We wanted the country, however, rather than the towns, so after a few