When she came she wore a black habit with fresh white gloves, holding her skirt and crop in one hand, and the crowd would separate on either side of her. She did not see the crowd. She was used to crowds, and she would pat the pony's head or rub his ears with the fresh kid gloves, and tighten the buckle or shift a strap with an air quite as knowing as the tiger's, but not quite so serious. Then she would wrap the lap-robe about her, and her maid would take her place at her side with the spaniel in her arms, and she would give the pony the full length of the lash, and he would go off like a hound out of the leash. They always reached the corner before the tiger was able to overtake them, and I believe it was the hope of seeing him some morning left behind forever which led to the general interest in their departure. And when they had gone, the crowd would look at the empty place in the street, and at each other, and up at us in the windows, and then separate, and the street would grow quiet again. One could see her again later, if one wished, in the evening, riding a great horse around the ring, in another habit, but with the same haughty smile; and as the horse reared on his hind-legs, and kicked and plunged as though he would fall back on her, she would smile at him as she did on the children in our street, with the same unconcerned, amused look that she would have given to a kitten playing with its tail. The houses on our street had tall yellow fronts with gray slate roofs, and roof-gardens of flowers and palms in pots. Some of the houses had iron balconies, from which the women leaned and talked across the street to one another in purring nasal voices, with a great rolling of the r's and an occasional disdainful movement of the shoulders. When any other than a French woman shrugs her shoulders she moves the whole upper part of her body, from the hips up; but the French woman's shoulders and arms are all that change when she makes that ineffable gesture that we have settled upon as the characteristic one of her nation. [Illustration: "SHE LOOKED DOWN UPON OUR STREET"]