The national anthem becomes no
longer a natural refrain--anything would sound more appropriate than
'partant pour la Syrie' (there is no time for _that_ work)--to our
little friend in fluttering blouse, who sits in the grass and 'minds'
fifty head of cattle by moral force alone; we should rather sing:--
'Little boy blue, come blow me your horn,
The orchards are laden, the cow 's in the corn!'
* * * * *
We cannot leave this pastoral scene, at least until the evening; when
the sun goes down behind the sea--leaving a glow upon the hill-side and
upon the crowd of gleaners who have just come up, and casts long shadows
across the stubble and on the sheaves of corn; when the harvest moon
shines out, and the picture is completed--the corn--sheaves lighted on
one side by the western glow, on the other by the moon; like the famous
shield over which knights did battle,--one side silver, the other gold.
All this time we are within sight, and nearly within sound, of the
'happy hunting grounds' of Trouville and Deauville, but the country
people are singularly unaffected by the proximity of those pretty
towns, invented by Dumas and peopled by his following.[52] It is true
that on the walls of a little village inn, there is something paraded
about a 'Trouville Association, Limited,' and a company for 'the passage
of the Simplon,' with twenty-franc shares; but these things do not seem
to find much favour amongst the thrifty peasantry.
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