There are free lectures at the Garden of Plants, the College of France, and the Sorbonne; but the lycées and the college Chaptal are pay-schools, although considered public. There are five classes of inspectors of public schools, the fifth being lowest. The first is occupied with superior instruction, as in the lycées.

I lately saw two youths of about seventeen seated before a restaurant with glasses of black coffee, one of them pouring something from a bottle into his coffee, and the other waiting to pour. Is not our habit of drinking milk in coffee more wholesome than drinking spirits, and quite as cheap?

Victor says that the best mutton-chops cost thirty-two sous the French pound (about one-tenth heavier than ours). Chester cheese, which resembles ours, sells, he says, at fortyeight sous the pound. Sausages sell thus: small ones, of which there are twenty-four in a pound, at twenty-four sous; a larger sausage, at from forty to sixty sous the pound, also at eighty sous; but these last have black truffles and pistachio-nuts mixed with the pork.

At Leblanc's they have a great red cushion, quite light, which sometimes is stowed away in a closet and sometimes rests on their bed-foot. They call it an eiderdown, édredon : such are much used for beds,-I suppose to lay upon the lower part in cold weather.

Monday Morning, May 27th.-The woman who was to come and help in the household has again disappointed Victor, and he will not take in a person unknown to himself; so we shall try to get along without. I can stay in for awhile at hours that he must be away; therefore this morning I take my walk early, before he leaves, and have

an opportunity to see how the streets look at this hour. A blooming young woman, dressed in white and accompanied by one in black, is going, I hear, to be confirmed. A woman illustrates the ceremony for me by giving herself two or three light blows upon the cheek. Women with big brooms are helping sweep the street. Hard-looking but tidy women are standing and waiting on the place St. -waiting for some one to come and hire them to wash; which recalls the scripture, "Why stand ye here all the day idle? Because no man hath hired us."

Passing along, I see a woman who has let down a great basket of bread, and is carrying a loaf into a grocer's. People are overhauling the heaps of refuse from the houses. I see a woman empty the vessels, and a girl overhauling the contents. It is usual to take these down at evening and set them in the court-yard, whence they are taken away. I cannot believe that all this excellent green stuff is to go to waste or to be hauled away and made into manure; but the girl that I have mentioned seems stupid and not to know anything about swine, but to make the gathering of rags and paper her business. Still, none of these people have the horrible, degraded look of ragpickers with us. The streets are so clean, that it is easier for them to be so. Sometimes they have a little donkey-cart. Bits of bread, I see, are sorted from the refuse, and once a woman tells me of rabbits that can be fed, and chickens.

What delightful omnibus-horses I have seen in Paris! but some of the hackney-horses are shabby: doubtless the Exposition is hard upon them. An immense quantity of carriages are employed. Many of the laboringhorses are white, with heavy feet and shaggy ankles, and wear great wooden collars, often with blue sheep-skins upon them.

Tuesday, May 28th.-This morning a woman comes to see me, bringing two shoes from the shoemaker to see which I will have mine made like. She is hired at the shoemaker's, and her husband in a restaurant. She says that they never eat together; he gets home about eleven at night, and she must be at her place at seven. She speaks of having had a child and lost it; and her employer's wife, who is very sweet,-très gentille,-has had three children in about three years, and has been injured by the wise woman, or midwife. Mrs. Leblanc advises a doctor; but the other says, Oh, that costs so much! That costs two hundred francs!" "Oh, not always so much," says Mrs. L.,sometimes sixty." But although she advises a doctor, she tells of her mother's having been injured by one.

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About noon we breakfast, and Victor wishes to treat me; so, after the boiled beef, fried potatoes, and so forth, he brings a dish, which he says is expensive, artichokes stuffed with a little sausage-meat. They are not what we call artichokes, but resemble pine-cones; you break off the scales with your fingers, and suck the base of them. I do not care for them.

A Protestant teacher whom I lately met invited me to come and see her, saying that she is at home on the last Thursday in every month. I have thought of going, for invitations from French women are rare enough. But to-day I receive this note:

PARIS, 26th of May, 1878. "DEAR MADAME,-Thursday the 30th being the day of a religious festival, I shall not receive that day. Be pleased to accept my sincere compliments."

Thursday will be Ascension-day. I think she is of the Reformed Church.

This evening we are speaking of teeth, and Victor says that he does not like people to think a great deal about them: sometimes marriages are broken off in Paris if the young lady wants a tooth, just as they are in the country if the bride's father can only give two cows instead of three, as he had promised.

There are no general directories here. Victor says that you must pay eight francs a year for having your name inserted in one. There is, too, but little advertising in the papers. But there is one kind of notice in them which we do not often have at home. Victor has had two hundred little circulars printed, giving notice of the birth of his little girl. In sending them he puts them into a band, like small circulars. He says that it would take two thousand for all his friends, but that it will be in the papers, and they can see it there.

Wednesday, May 29th.-In my early morning walk I see another young woman in white. How long are these white dresses for religious festivals to continue? I hear military music from the stone barrack; a young man says that it is from the musical school. "At what time," I ask, "must the soldiers get up?" "At five." "To do what?" With a shrug he answers, "Nothing at all."

I enter one of the large churches where the young people are beginning to gather for confirmation. There is a heavy, unpleasant smell like dead flowers. A young woman in white is putting off her black shoes to put on white ones. A nice-looking man of about forty is at his devotions; and I see guardians of the peace, but not at prayer. They are to preserve order. Here comes a troop

of girls in white, escorted by a nun,-a fine-looking person; here is a boy with white cravat and pantaloons, and the white ribbon tied round his arm; one woman in black accompanies a young woman in white, whose hair in front of her veil seems artificially curled, the veil being fastened on top of the head and falling down behind. The elder woman arranges her dress, and smiles as if she were going to the theatre.

I have spoken of Miss Fleutet, teacher in the communal school,—the one who seemed piously inclined. To-day she is so polite as to call upon me. Her salary is seventeen hundred and ten francs a year,-three hundred and forty dollars, and she has taken an orphan-girl to bring up. The mother was a widow and a teacher, and, dying, left five children. At first Miss Fleutet only took the little girl for a limited period, but she began to love her. "She is sweet," she says. "She loves me well, too." I am astonished that a person so situated should assume such a burden. "And suppose you fall sick?" I ask. "I will go to a hospital," she answers with spirit. It was a priest who suggested this course to her. "He knew what I needed," she says, "and my little girl shall never suffer from loneliness as I have done. I cannot have so handsome a dress, but I have the company of my little girl, who is not bright, but she is sweet,-has tact, has heart." Miss Fleutet has received a holiday to-day from her principal, in order to accompany a young girl to confirmation ; and her little girl wanted a cake at déjeuner, because it is a festival. Miss F. subscribes for a small paper for her, called The French Doll, and she allows her to read it to-day, also, because it is a festival. "When she does well, I pay her," she says; "and when she does ill, she