We had an additional adjunct to the general picturesqueness in a long procession of priests, some wearing birettas, some sombreros, accompanied by serried ranks of country-women in the long-backed white caps peculiar to the district, with long, stiff white strings hanging loose over the shoulder. It was evidently the end of some pilgrimage. Poitiers is a city of many priests and religious orders, both of men and women; of monasteries and nunneries.
When the procession had wended its way out of the station, the platform was appropriated by men carrying baskets of eggs, coloured with cochineal. Now, as everyone who has travelled much in this part of France is aware, really new-laid eggs, and matches, are apparently not indigenous, so to speak, for neither can be procured without enormous difficulty. I could have made quite a fortune over a few little boxes of English safety matches I possessed! Nevertheless, sufficiently ill-advised as to buy some of these eggs, we found that the colour was distinctly appropriate; for the red of the eggs' autumn was upon them, both materially and metaphorically.
This information was conveyed to us promptly on "taking their caps off" (as a child once happily expressed it to me). Their "autumn" tints were very much "turned" indeed, and, in consequence, they speedily made their "last appearance on any stage" on the road far beneath! I remember on one occasion when remonstrating with the proprietor of a hotel, regarding the flavour of much keeping that hung about his new-laid eggs, he remarked that he only "took them as the poulets laid them down!"
Directly after quitting Poitiers the air began to feel sensibly warmer, until, when near Bordeaux, it became quite soft and balmy. At Libourne, opposite our carriage was a cattle truck with this label upon it—"Un cheval, trois chèvres, deux chiens, non accompagnées" and, while reading it, from the dark interior—for oral information—there came two or three pathetic little bleats! Were they, we wondered, from one of the three goats, who were no longer unaccompanied, but too closely in company with one of the dogs? Before we had time for more than momentary speculation, the double blast of the guard's tin trumpet blared; there sounded his regulation short whistle, his hoarse cry of "En voiture," the final wave, then the tip-tap of his sabots along the platform; a final glimpse of his flat white cap, swinging hooded cloak, and swaying, four-sided lantern, while he turned to grasp the handle of his van, as the engine, started at last by reiterated suggestion, moved slowly out of the station.
As the train had a prolonged wait at the first of the two Bordeaux stations, eventually we did not reach our end of Bordeaux till between ten and eleven o'clock at night, and far nearer to eleven than ten. Then ensued a long search for our possessions, sunk deep in the nether regions of the luggage van. When at length they were unearthed we started through darkened, noisy streets for our destination, which it seemed to take an eternity of jolting over rough cobbled stones to reach. However, we did reach it in course of time, and found the proprietor, a sleepy chambermaid, and a concierge in the hall of the hotel to receive us.
As one steps over the threshold of any hotel, whether it be at morning, noon or night, one is conscious I think, at once, of being greeted by a whiff of the hotel's own local spiritual atmosphere: its personal note of individuality, so to speak; and, as it reaches one, there is an immediate instinct of self-congratulation (if the atmosphere be a pleasant one), or of regret at one's choice, if the reverse be the case. In this case it was the latter, but we had gone too far (and too late!) to retreat now.
Nearly all French hotel bedrooms that I have ever been in seem to have a surplusage of doors; it may be due to the same idea as when, in the case of a theatre, numerous exits are provided to ensure the safety of the audience; but, whatever the reason, the fact remains that the doors are largely in excess of what we consider necessary in England. Sometimes, indeed, one can hardly see the room for the doors! Sometimes, again, besides having a few dozen doors on each side of the bedroom, the windows open on to a balcony which is connected with all the other bedrooms on that side of the hotel, and, to give as much insecurity as possible, the windows decline to shut! It is thus indeed brought home to me that the French are pre-eminently a sociable people!
A man told me that once he slept in a bedroom abroad which had eleven doors. Three or four of them opened into large salons.