"I'm a little b-b-b-etter off nor hur," said the man, stuttering, "for I gets board and lodging--dasht if I doesn't--but I gets bread like a stone, and s-s-sleeps below a hedge--dasht if I doesn't." "But where are your sheep, shepherd?" said Bribri. "Hain't a got none," stuttered the man again, "dasht if I has." "What!" exclaimed Madeleine in despair, "am I not to see the lovely lambkins bleating and skipping in the meadows on the banks of the Lignon, O Celadon?" But Madame Deshoulieres was too much of a poetess to hear or see what was going on. She thought of nothing but the loves of Astrea, and heard nothing but the imaginary songs of contending Damons. On their return to the chateau, Madeleine and Bribri complained that they had seen neither flock nor shepherdess. "And are you anxious to see them?" enquired Madame D'Urtis, with a smile. "Oh, very," exclaimed Bribri; "we expected to live like shepherdesses when we came here. I have brought every thing a rustic wants." "And so have I," continued Madeleine; "I have brought twenty yards of rose-coloured ribands, and twenty yards of blue, to ornament my crook and the handsomest of my ewes." "Well then," said the Duchess d'Urtis, good-naturedly, "there are a dozen of sheep feeding at the end of the park. Take the key of the gate, and drive them into the meadows beyond." Madeleine and Bribri were wild with joy, while their mother was labouring in search of a rhyme, and did not attend to the real eclogue which was about to be commenced. They scarcely took time to breakfast.--"They dressed themselves coquettishly"--so Madame Deshoulieres wrote to Mascaron--"they cut with their own hands a crook a-piece in the park--they beautified them with ribands. Madeleine was for the blue ribands, Bribri for the rose colour. Oh, the gentle shepherdesses! they spent a whole hour in finding a name they liked. At last, Madeleine fixed on Amaranthe, Bribri on Daphnè. I have just seen them gliding among the trees that overshadow the lovely stream.--Poor shepherdesses! be on your guard against the wolves."