La Teste stands out in my memory as a village of musical streets, though of course in the Gironde it is the exception when one does not hear little melodious sentences set to some street call or other. As we passed up the village street, a woman was coming down carrying a basket of rogans, a little silvery fish with dazzling, gleaming sides, and crying, "Derrr ... verai!" "Derrr ... verai!" with long sustained accent on the final high note. "Marchandise!" was another call which sounded continually, and its variation, "Marchan-dis ... e!"
Passing through Bordeaux, I remember a very curiously sounding street-hawk note: it did not end at all as one expected it to end. I could not distinguish the words, and was not near enough to see the ware.
But the human voice was not the only street music, for as we sat on one of the benches that are so thoughtfully placed under the lee of many of the cottages at La Teste, there fell on our ears a sound from a distance which somehow suggested the approach of a Chinese procession: "Pom-pom-pom-pom-pom-pom!" mixed with the sharp "ting-ting" of brass, and the duller, flatter tone of wood, sweet because of the suggestion of the trickling of water which it conveys.
A procession of cows turned the corner of the long street and moved sedately towards us, their bells keeping time with their footsteps, their conductor, as seems the custom in these parts, leading the detachment. It was followed by a little cart drawn by two dogs, in which sat a countrywoman, much too heavy a weight for the poor animals to drag.
La Teste itself is a picturesque little village, and larger than it looks at first sight. Each cottage has its own well, arched over. Up each frontage, lined with outside shutters, is trained the home vine, while little plantations of vines abound everywhere. The women travel by train with their heads loosely covered with shawls, when not wearing the stiff caps or hats, and it is very usual for them to carry, as a hold-all, a sort of little waistcoat buttoning over a parcel; a waistcoat embroidered with some device or other.
THE GIRONDE SHEPHERDS.
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