Chateau and Country Life in France

by Mary King Waddington

A most interesting operation that very cold year was taking ice out of the big pond at the foot of the hill. The ice was several inches thick, and beautifully clear in the middle of the pond; toward the edges the reeds and long grass had all got frozen into it, and it was rather difficult to get the big blocks out. We had one of the farm carts with a pair of strong horses, and three or four men with axes and a long pointed stick. It was so solid that we all stood on the pond while the men were cutting their first square hole in the middle. It was funny to see the fish swimming about under the ice.

The whole village of course looked on, and the children were much excited, and wanted to come and slide on the ice, but I got nervous as the hole got bigger and the ice at the edges thinner, so we all adjourned to the road and watched operations from there.

There were plenty of fish in the pond, and once a year it was thoroughly drained and cleaned—the water drawn off, and the bottom of the pond, which got choked up with mud and weeds, cleared out. They made a fine haul of fish on those occasions from the small pools that were left on each side while the cleaning was going on.

Our ice-house was a godsend to all the countryside. Whenever any one was ill, and ice was wanted, they always came to the château. Our good old doctor was not at all in the movement as regarded fresh air and cold water, but ice he often wanted. He was a rough, kindly old man, quite the type of the country practitioner—a type that is also disappearing, like everything else. Everybody knew his cabriolet (with a box at the back where he kept his medicine chest and instruments), with a strong brown horse that trotted all day and all night up and down the steep hills in all weathers. A very small boy was always with him to hold the horse while he made his visits.

Our doctor was very kind to the poor, and never refused to go out at night. It was funny to see him arrive on a cold day, enveloped in so many cloaks and woollen comforters that it took him some time to get out of his wraps. He had a gruff voice, and heavy black overhanging eyebrows which frightened people at first, but they soon found out what a kind heart there was beneath such a rough exterior, and the children loved him. He had always a box of liquorice lozenges in his waistcoat pocket which he distributed freely to the small ones.

The country doctors about us now are a very different type—much younger men, many foreigners. There are two Russians and a Greek in some of the small villages near us. I believe they are very good. I met the Greek one day at the keeper's cottage. He was looking after the keeper's wife, who was very ill. It seemed funny to see a Greek, with one of those long Greek names ending in "popolo," in a poor little French village almost lost in the woods; but he made a very good impression on me—was very quiet, didn't give too much medicine (apothecaries' bills are always such a terror to the poor), and spoke kindly to the woman. He comes still in a cabriolet, but his Russian colleague has an automobile—indeed so have now many of the young French doctors. I think there is a little rivalry between the Frenchmen and the foreigners, but the latter certainly make their way.

What is very serious now is the open warfare between the curé and the school-master. When I first married, the school-masters and mistresses took their children to church, always sat with them and kept them in order. The school-mistress sometimes played the organ. Now they not only don't go to church themselves, but they try to prevent the children from going. The result is that half the children don't go either to the church or to the catechism.

I had a really annoying instance of this state of things one year when we wanted to make a Christmas tree and distribution of warm clothes at Montigny, a lonely little village not far from us. We talked it over with the curé and the school-master. They gave us the names and ages of all the children, and were both much pleased to have a fête in their quiet little corner. I didn't suggest a service in the church, as I thought that might perhaps be a difficulty for the school-master.

Two days before the fête I had a visit from the curé of Montigny, who looked embarrassed and awkward; had evidently something on his mind, and finally blurted out that he was very sorry he couldn't be present at the Christmas tree, as he was obliged to go to Reims that day. I, much surprised and decidedly put out: "You are going to Reims the one day in the year when we come and make a fête in your village? It is most extraordinary, and surprises me extremely. The date has been fixed for weeks, and I hold very much to your being there."

He still persisted, looking very miserable and uncomfortable, and finally said he was going away on purpose, so as not to be at the school-house. He liked the school-master very much, got on with him perfectly; he was intelligent and taught the children very well; but all school-masters who had anything to do with the Church or the curé were "malnotés." The mayor of Montigny was a violent radical; and surely if he heard that the curé was present at our fête in the school-house, the school-master would be dismissed the next day. The man was over thirty, with wife and children; it would be difficult for him to find any other employment; and he himself would regret him, as his successor might be much worse and fill the children's heads with impossible ideas.