C.--even at eighty years of age: possibly with a sigh to
their lost youth.
Then we turned where the walls bend round and came in sight of the boat,
steaming alongside the small stone landing-place and preparing for
departure.
The passengers were not numerous. A few men and women; the latter with
white caps and large baskets, who had evidently been over to St. Malo
for household purposes, and were returning with the resigned air--it is
very pathetic--that country women are so fond of wearing when they have
been spending money and lessening the weight of the stocking which
contains their treasured hoard.
We mounted the bridge, which, being first-class and an extra two or
three sous, was deserted. These thrifty people would as soon think of
burning down their cottages, as of wasting two sous in a useless
luxury--all honour to them for the principle. But we, surveying human
nature from an elevation, felt privileged to philosophise.
And if this human nature was interesting, what about the natural world
around us? The boat loosed its moorings when time was up, and the grey
walls of St. Malo receded; the innumerable roofs, towers and steeples
grew dreamy and indistinct, dissolved and disappeared. The water was
still blue and calm and flashing with sunlight. To the right lay the
sleeping ocean; ahead of us, Dinard. Land rose on all sides; bays and
creeks ran upwards, out of sight; headlands, rich in verdure,
magnificently wooded; houses standing out, here lonely and solitary,
there clustering almost into towns and villages; the mouth of the Rance,
leading up to Dol and Dinan, which some have called the Rhine of France,
and everyone must think a stream lovely and romantic.
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