land "help." A word much used in France is domestic, and my American friend speaks of her woman's husband as being a valet in another family.

At Romilies I breakfast at the same hotel as before, taking the mid-day breakfast, and an afternoon train for Paris, where I arrive at about four in the morning. On my way I observe that all the hay is not yet in. We ride through a delightful country, so that I again recall the line,

"How has kind Heaven adorned the happy land!”

PART III.

THE NORTH.

CHAPTER XXI.

Saturday, July 27th.—It was not a part of my original plan to visit two of the farming districts of France, but Mr. Carpentier, of Paris, to whom I am indebted for kind attentions (I would like to give his true name), suggested my also visiting the north, where he said that farming is dif ferent, and Victor Leblanc writes to an old friend of his, who consents to take me. I am to travel by rail to Cambray, and thence by private conveyance. I am to pay fifty francs for ten days' board, and a certain sum for taking me from the station at Cambray and for my return hither. Indeed, I have already paid, for the whole sum had to be transmitted in advance.

Victor insisted upon my leaving on an early train, which proves to be a very slow one; and there are several changes of cars. Mine is a third-class car, divided into five compartments, but open above, so that we can see all the people. Beside me sits a young woman, and facing us two ecclesiastics, old and young, her companions. How handsomely the robe of the elder is made! but they have not shaved this morning. The clergy are somewhat communicative in talking about my route, and then take out their prayer-books. Men are smoking in the car,-what an abomination!--but I forgot to look for a car for women only.

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A man rises, a man with a box,-and begins a rapid discourse upon his goods, offering for one franc a chain with an attachment, a set of shirt-studs, and a ticket for a dinner in Paris (we are leaving Paris!). He does not apologize to the reverend gentlemen for interrupting them, and they continue to look upon their books, with which they must be familiar. The man makes sales, and offers more goods. Plainly, all the money has not been spent in Paris. After selling a number of cheap trifles he gets out, which is wise. I leave at Creille, and by that car door close to which is seated the younger reverend. The young woman opposite tries to open the door for me, but the young reverend makes no such effort. As the door opens I hear something fall, and I see a tin can like a tall milk-can lying upon its side on the stone pavement. Some one lifts it clear drops are falling from it; the lesser clergy finds a tongue: "It is ours."

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A great difficulty which they have in leaving the Church is the question of subsistence. Ten years in the seminaries, learning what? An unfrocked priest might find it difficult to obtain a place as teacher or book-keeper. Victor told me how his mother and Mr. Carpentier induced a priest to marry a woman with whom he had been long intimate. He became an omnibus conductor, and his wife got work from a tailor; but he would stumble in going upon the top of the omnibus, and would make mistakes in change. Afterwards he got a situation in an omnibus office, and here he could get along better, as he could say that he had been a conductor, instead of being obliged to say that he had been a curé.

In the next car into which I enter, in my unnecessarily

She wears light slippers, linen. As she seems to

prolonged journey, is a young woman, not fair, with a purple necktie, and just below, very conspicuous in the bosom of her black dress, a large, stiff, red-and-white carnation, and what looks like an equally large orange marigold,— leaves not being considered necessary. She gets out at Compiègne to get "a little glass," but does not find a restaurant. She says that she is from Paris. -apparently of blue-and-white apologize for them, I suggest that her feet are tired with. the Exposition; but she says that the Exposition did not tempt her. She went to see that of the free workingmen. She says that I ought to have seen it. The price of admission was ten cents on week-days and five on Sundays. Probably it was here that my democratic dressmaker exhibited something of which she was telling us. I believe that I saw the building-quite a neat one-near the Exposition grounds.

Lately, at Paris, I said to myself, "Pleasant Paris!" but the country is very pleasant too. I see quantities of beets growing. At Compiègne, at a restaurant, I breakfast in haste on plenty of strong coffee, plenty of hot milk, enough nice sugar, and more bread than I can eat, for twelve sous. At Tergnier we have to wait three-quarters of an hour; and the young woman with the carnation tells me that her slippers cost thirty-nine sous. They are nailed or pegged, not sewed. While I am standing here, a woman in black says that I am English. I laugh, and say that I am not. She says I am not German, and insists that I am English. At last I tell her that I am American. From Tergnier to Busigny I ride in a car of "ladies alone." Two women have books,-one seems to be a story-book. The other woman wears a cap instead of a

bonnet. There is dignity in her countenance, and a relig ious expression. She is not reading, however, and I offer her one of my papers,-"The Little French Republic.” She shakes her head, smiles, and holds up her rosary. After her prayers are finished she is very social, and so are others; and we have a lively time talking about the Exposition and boarding-places. We change again at Busigny, and I hear my nice-looking woman with the cap say, "My sister," and a big nun gets in, in a common brown dress with wide sleeves, a white sun-bonnet, or cap, with a black shawl over it; over her forehead a white band, and on her breast a crucifix. I am told that she is a Trappist (they collect for the poor); but she talks more than the Trappist monks do, and my nice-looking woman talks with her. At the station at Cambray I see a woman with a cap, who also sees me. It is Madame Salmier, wife of the ex-teacher with whom I am to board. She has accompanied her red-haired son to meet a person whom neither of them has seen before. As we enter the city of Cambray, we are stopped by an officer of the octroi, who wants to know whether I have any meat, etc. I begin to answer leisurely that I have no meat, when Mrs. Salmier cuts the matter short by declaring that we have nothing. Cambray has about twenty-three thousand inhabitants. Think of Lancaster, in my own State, establishing offices on all roads entering the town, and appointing officers to make the country-people pay a tax before they can sell their produce!

Now I am in the district of which Fénelon was archbishop; and while madame goes to do some errands I enter the cathedral, which has been remodelled, and looks. too new to inspire reverence; but the vaulted roof I suppose to indicate age. There is a handsome seated statue of