"A gray-haired spinner with her ancient distaff."
On the Rue Porte Neuve and near the Halle Neuve, in the centre of the town, the venders of agricultural implements, kitchen hardware, locks and keys, second-hand books, handkerchiefs, collars, cuffs, hats, bracelets, rings, baskets, brooms, bottles, mouse-traps, and other miscellaneous articles, display their goods, and a sudden shower makes bad work in this busy community.
By the Halle Neuve is the fruit and vegetable market also, and farther on, in the Rue de la Préfecture, we suddenly come upon a hollow square inclosed on three sides by ancient looking buildings, one of which is the Nieille Halle; and here are fish, poultry and game, and the queerest-looking market-people in the whole town, it seems to me.
There is a flower market on the Place Royal, and you will see the Spanish women there, with their foulards and trinkets, to catch a few sous from the rustics.
We cannot confine our interest to the market-folk, however, for everybody is more or less picturesque in this strange land, and we are never tired of saying, "See here," and "See there." Sometimes it is a gray-haired spinner with her ancient distaff that attracts our notice, as she sits in a sunny door-way or totters along the sidewalk; and then there are the antics of these foreign children! Béarnais boys are as fond of standing on their heads as their American brethren are, but their large and heavy sabots are a great inconvenience.
Just look at those wooden shoes ranged along the sidewalk over there, while the owners thereof are flourishing their emancipated heels in fine style.
These are some of the sights of a market-day at Pau; but how can you ever get a notion of the sounds? For when we add to the market-day hub-bub the various every-day street cries that mingle with it we have a strange orchestra.
As fond of standing on their heads as their American brethren."