quietly eating walnuts, in the midst of a ring of other children, sat the little delinquent of the tale, as unmoved and unconscious as if she had not caused a perfect hurricane of talk and anxiety in the commune; she turned her large gypsy black eyes on me with an expression almost of contempt, as I asked her a few questions, and recommended her caution in future. As one of the reports we had gathered on our way was, that the child, after being beaten, had run away into the woods and had not since re-appeared, we were not sorry to find her here; but as she looked saucy and careless, and able to bear a good deal of severity, and was besides several years older than had been represented, our sympathy was little excited in her favour. "She has acted in this way often before," said a bystander, "and cannot be made to work or to do anything she is told." She had strangely the appearance of a Bohemian, and her fondness for the dolce far niente increased my suspicions of her parentage. The tenderness of her foster-mother for her was, however, not to be changed by her ill-conduct, for she was said to prefer her to her own children, in spite of her faults: so capricious is affection.
The road from Lusignan to Niort is through a very pleasing country, sometimes bocage, and sometimes gâtine: the latter term being generally applied to a country of rocks, where the soil does not allow of much cultivation. This is, however, not always the case, for on several occasions I have heard, as at Chartres, a little wood called la gâtine; and once at Hastings was surprised, on inquiring my way in the fields, to be directed to pass the gattin hard by; namely a small copse. The word is said to be Celtic, and may be derived either from geat, which means a plot of ground, or geas, a thick branch.
We were much struck with the town of St. Maixant; which is approached by beautiful boulevards, and the environs are very rich and fine; the road does not lead within the walls, but outside; and there was no reason to regret this, as the streets are narrow and ill-built, while the promenades round are charming. The Sèvre Niortaise bathes the foot of the hill on which St. Maixant stands, and beyond rises the forest of Hermitaine, once part of the celebrated Vauclair, where some famous hermits took up their abode, and made the spot holy. Clovis assisted the recluses who had chosen this retreat as their abode, and granted them land and wood; a monastery was soon formed and the town grew round it. There is a fine cascade near La Ceuille, of which, or rather of the stream which flowed from it, we caught a glimpse on approaching St. Maixant; it falls from the cóteau called Puy d'Enfer, and it is one of the wonders of the neighbourhood. The old walls of the town now appear to enclose gardens, and all looks smiling and gay; but they have sustained many a rude siege at different periods, and suffered much during the wars of La Vendée.
At mid-day we reached Niort, a fine, clean, good-looking new town, with scarcely any antiquity left, though of ancient renown: a Celtic city with a Celtic name; a castle whose date cannot be ascertained; a palace inhabited by the great heroine of the country, Elionor; and convents and monasteries of infinite wealth and celebrity. That singular and famous community established by the Troubadour Count of Poitou, Guillaume IX., was at Niort, and was replaced by the holy Capuchin brothers, who must have been sufficiently scandalized at the conduct of the fair devotees who preceded them in their cells.
The Duchess Elionor was married to Henry II. at Niort, and lived here frequently. We hoped to see some remains of her palace, but found only a large square building which might have formed a part of it; though its form, which is an isolated tower, makes it difficult to imagine how it could be in any way connected with the rest of the palace; this tower is now used as the Hôtel de Ville; its lozenge and circle ornaments appear not to be of older date than Francis I.; and we could scarcely persuade ourselves, however ready to believe in antiquities, that the all-powerful lady of Aquitaine, or her warrior husband, ever sat within these walls.
A curious privilege was granted by the pope, in 1461, to the mayor, aldermen, sheriffs, councillors, peers, and citizens of Niort, to be buried in the habit, and with the cord round their waists, of the Cordeliers: it is not recorded that the ladies of the town petitioned to be dressed as well in their coffins as the nuns whose beauty delighted William the Ninth, or they might have gone to their last fête in—
"A charming chintz and Brussels lace."
The most remarkable recollection connected with Niort, is that, in the prison of the town, called La Conciergerie, where her father was confined for the crime of forgery, was born Françoise D'Aubigné, afterwards the wife of Scarron, and by the favour of Louis XIV., Marquise de Maintenon, in whom the triumph of hypocrisy was complete. One of the streets is called by her name; but it is not recorded that she ever did anything for her native town; probably she was not anxious to perpetuate the memory of any part of her early life, not seeing fit to be quite so communicative on the subject as her brother, whose tongue she had so much difficulty in keeping quiet.
Niort is a very pleasant, lively-looking town—that is, for a French town, where the nearest approach to gaiety is the crowd which a weekly market brings, or the groups of laughing, talking women, which the ceaseless occupation of washing collects on the banks of the river. We were much amused here with the latter, and stood some time on the bridge below the frowning round towers, of strange construction, which serve as a prison, to observe the manœuvres of the washerwomen, who, in their enormous, misshapen, towering, square caps, were beating and scrubbing away at their linen. Nothing can appear so inconvenient as this head-dress when its wearer is engaged in domestic duties; yet the women are constantly to be seen with it; rarely, as in Normandy, contenting themselves with the under frame alone, and placing the huge mass of linen or muslin over it when their work is done. On one occasion we travelled with a bourgeoise whose cap was so enormous, that she could scarcely get into the coach, and when once in had to stoop her head the whole time to avoid crushing the transparent
superstructure of lace and muslin, which it is the pleasure of the belles of Poitou to deform themselves with. We were, however, assured that this costume was becoming, and that many a girl passed for pretty who wore it, who would be but ordinary in a plain, round, every-day cap. Sometimes this monstrosity is ornamented with gold pins, or buttons, all up the front, and the variety of arrangement of the muslin folds, both before and behind, is curious enough. It has occasionally frilled drapery depending from its height, hanging about half way down behind, or crossed over and sticking out at the sides, making it as wide as possible; I have seen some that could not be less than a foot and a half wide, and about a foot high; but some are even larger than this, extravagant as the description appears. The pyramidal Cauchoise caps are as high, it is true, or even higher, but there is an approach to grace in them, while those of Poitou are hideous as to form, even when the materials are light; those of the commonest sort are of coarse linen or cotton, and reach the very acme of ugliness.
One of the great articles of commerce here is the preparation of chamois leather, which is said to be brought to great perfection; but, perhaps, like the cutlery so celebrated in so many towns, and boasted of as equal to the English, this famous production might be looked upon by an English tradesman as mere "leather and prunella."
There is an attempt at a passage here—the great ambition of country towns which think to rival Paris; but, as usual, it appears to be a failure, the shops looking common-place and shabby, and the place deserted and dismal. The public library is good, and there are several handsome public buildings; the churches are without interest, except one portal of Notre Dame, where we observed some mutilated, but very beautiful, twisted columns, whose wreaths were continued round a pointed arch in a manner I never recollect to have seen before, and which seems to indicate that the church must once have been extremely elaborate in its ornament.
Niort was a great object of contention during the wars of the Black Prince. The famous Duguesclin is said to have taken the town by stratagem from the English.
At the siege of Chisey, where Duguesclin had been successful, he had killed all the English garrison; and, taking their tunics, had clothed his own
