"We have really seen so much," said Mrs. Redmond, "that we shall need to think it all over before seeing more, and you have been so good a guide that in our one visit to Church Point we have learned as much as most persons do in two." "We have learned a great deal," murmured Priscilla to Amy, "but I always feel that Madame Bourque paints the Acadians as much more remarkable than they are. But I should like to have seen Father Sigogne baptizing Indian pappooses; they say that he used to wipe their faces with his gown to find a spot where he could kiss them." "Yes, and Madame Bourque says that there are people still living who can remember great crowds of Indians filing through the woods to Church Point that they might receive Abbé Sigogne's blessing on St Anne's Day." CHAPTER VII DIGBY DAYS On the way back to Little Brook Amy had a good chance to talk with little Pierre about his hopes and ambitions. She found that he was extremely fond of reading, and it was almost impossible for him to get books such as a boy loves to read. About half a mile from Madame Bourque's, Pierre pointed out a small cottage which he said was his home. "My mother will be there now," he said, "and I hope you will come in with me to see her. She does not speak so very good English," he added apologetically, "but she can understand it." Though Madame Robichaud greeted Amy warmly and thanked her for her kindness to Pierre, there was something pathetic in her manner and appearance. She was a tall, thin woman, with a delicate, pale face that was made all the paler by her plain black gown and the _couvre-chef_ that covered her hair. Her husband, Pierre explained, was lost at sea when Pierre was five years old, and since that time she had supported them both wholly by her own labor. Madame Robichaud showed Amy with great pride some drawings nailed to the wall that Pierre himself had made,--simple drawings of ships and houses that showed draughtsmanship rather than imagination. These suggested to Amy that Pierre had a talent that might be cultivated to greater advantage than his ambition for school-teaching. She and Pierre parted reluctantly, and Madame Robichaud promised that the little boy should be at the hotel in the morning before Amy left Little Brook. All the travellers slept soundly that night despite the huge feather-beds that Madame Bourque had provided, as she thought, for their comfort. In the morning they wrote their names in her visitors' book, on whose pages were inscribed the names of a number of Americans, some of them fairly well known, who at one time or another had been guests at the Hotel Paris. Pierre arrived very soon after breakfast with a great bunch of hollyhocks or _passe-rose_ for Amy. He had evidently taken a great fancy to his new friend.