No doubt you will recognize the same faces that you have [p050] seen everywhere else; the same brightly painted caravans, with small muslin curtains in the windows; the same gaufre-seller, mixing the same paste, in the same moulds, with the same gesticulations; and lastly the same horrible trumpery, utterly devoid of any originality: blue-eyed dolls, miniature Zouaves, sixpenny knives, imitation tortoise-shell frames, rabbits playing the drum, reed pipes, and brass trumpets. No one knows why workmen are so entirely bereft of imagination or self-respect as to persevere in the manufacture of these inferior toys for at least a hundred years; yet these “fairings” travel all over the world. You will find them in Algiers as soon as you land; on the threshold of Asia, at Constantinople, shops full of this rubbish are installed side by side with bazaars for Turkish carpets; the ships which bring from Japan the delicious knicknacks which fill our houses, [p051] return to the far East laden with cargoes of plush frames and rabbits playing drums.
But the idiosyncrasy which distinguishes Versailles and its neighbourhood, the chosen retreat of literary men and elderly magistrates, is the presence of the dealer in old books who annually attends this fair. From a little distance the reddish-brown covers of his wares resemble gingerbread paving-stones. Men in spectacles bend lovingly over the stall, the scent of mouldy leather gently tickling their nostrils.
And every year there is one stall at which a woman sells false hair by the pound. Hanging round like horses’ tails, side by side, these poor tresses, collected from the gutter and the hospital, produce a tragic effect. One anxiously wonders where all these dull-looking plaits come from; who will wear them next? One day I lingered about for some time, waiting to see if a customer would appear.
At last a woman drew near.—Ageless, in mourning, basket in hand, unclassable; yet evidently not a happy woman. At first she dared not pause, then she regained courage.
“How much is that?”
“Five francs.”
She hesitated for a moment.
“It is too fair for me. Can you see what I want?” And she raised her veil from her face.
At length she passed on without buying. There was nothing grey enough for her.
The fair at Versailles is a provincial fair, a fair patronized by grandfathers and grandchildren, nursemaids and soldiers.