I want to take you with me to Brittany, not without having first warned you against myself, however. You must not take me too literally when I describe the customs of that country. My descriptions are absolutely faithful, but they represent Brittany as it was from 1815 to 1830. I went back there this summer after an absence of half a century, and I recognized nothing but the scenery. The men are all civilized, and far more Parisian than I. In order to re-classify them I should have been compelled to drive them back to their national dress, that they so foolishly gave up. I will take you back, therefore, to the year 1822; and you would not doubt it for an instant if you could follow me into my father's study. The walls were papered with Republican money. He had obtained it in exchange for cash; and when it turned out to be as worthless as waste paper, he determined that it should be of some use to him anyway. I fancy that its usefulness consisted in reminding him of the fragility of human things. The walls were also decorated with portraits of the royal family, from the King down to M. de Villèle, all tacked on with pins. But these portraits were not to be relied upon, for when they were turned upside down, they represented, by some ingenious combination, the Ogre of Corsica, the King of Rome, and the Empress Marie Louise. They were suited to all tastes and all opinions. This extraordinary study was situated on the first floor,--for our house had a first floor, differing thus from the other houses of the borough, which had nothing but a ground floor. It also had a slate roof, which filled me with legitimate pride. It looked out upon the street which circled the graveyard; and I will say at once, to be sincere, that there was no other street in St. Jean Brévelay. This view and this neighborhood will not strike you, with your modern ideas, as very attractive; but in Brittany we like graveyards,--I might even say that we like sadness. And then in this graveyard stood the church,--an imposing church, I can assure you, with a vault upon which hell was faithfully represented on one side and heaven on the other. Near our window there was also a great fir, which was worth a whole forest in itself, and which sheltered a formidable number of crows. If, however, in spite of this double attraction one found no pleasure in contemplating the view from that side, we had another façade to resort to,--a façade opening upon an immense and magnificent garden. There you might have looked down upon a patch of cabbage, a patch of French beans, of peas, of carrots, and of potatoes. We had flowers too,--so many flowers, so many vegetables, and so much fruit, that we made gratuitous distributions of them every Sunday. Besides our apple-trees, the branches of which bent under the weight of the fruit, we had pear-trees, cherry-trees, and plum-trees. My father, who had travelled considerably, particularly through the South, prided himself upon his enterprising spirit.