“What! is our society not enough for Monsieur?” asked Nita, in affected surprise.
“More than enough,” replied Lewis, with affected enthusiasm.
“Then you can be happy without your cigars,” returned Nita.
“Perfectly happy,” replied Lewis, taking a small case from his pocket, from which he extracted a neat little meerschaum pipe, and began to fill it with tobacco.
Again Emma had occasion to open the safety-valve of another little explosive laugh; but before anything further could be said, they came in sight of Antoine Grennon’s cottage.
It was prettily situated beneath a clump of pines. A small stream, spanned by a rustic bridge, danced past it. Under the shadow of the bridge they saw Madame engaged in washing linen. She had a washing-tub, of course, but instead of putting the linen into this she put herself in it, after having made an island of it by placing it a few inches deep in the stream. Thus she could kneel and get at the water conveniently without wetting her knees or skirts. On a sloping slab of wood she manipulated the linen with such instrumentality as cold water, soap, a wooden mallet and a hard brush. Beside her, in a miniature tub, her little daughter conducted a miniature washing.
The three travellers, looking over the bridge, could witness the operation without being themselves observed.
“It is a lively process,” remarked Lewis, as Madame seized a mass of linen with great vigour, and caused it to fall on the sloping plank with a sounding slap.
Madame was an exceedingly handsome and well-made woman, turned thirty, and much inclined to embonpoint. Her daughter was turned three, and still more inclined to the same condition. Their rounded, well-shaped, and muscular arms, acted very much in the same way, only Madame’s vigour was a good deal more intense and persistent—too much so, perhaps, for the fabrics with which she had to deal; but if the said fabrics possessed the smallest degree of consciousness, they could not have had the heart to complain of rough treatment from such neat though strong hands, while being smiled upon by such a pretty, though decisive countenance.
“It is dreadfully rough treatment,” said Emma, whose domestic-economical spirit was rather shocked.