"Not much fear of that in this part of the world. There may be a shower, but the salt is so hard and compacted, that it will do little more than wash the dirt off." [Illustration: THRASHING CORN.] Presently we came to the salt-making basins--great shallow lakes, divided by dykes into squares somewhat in the style of a chess-board; and here the solitude of the expanse was broken by the figures of the workmen clambering along the narrow dykes to watch and superintend the progress of evaporation. By the side of these lakes, rows of ugly rectangular cottages were erected, and slight carts drawn by two horses, one ahead of the other, moved the loads of salt from the pans, or pools, to the heaps in which it was stored. Here and there, where the ground rose a little, a thin crop of maize, or barley, appeared to have been cultivated; and it was probably some such harvest that I saw being thrashed by the peculiar process in use all through Provence and southern Languedoc. There are very few thrashing mills, even in the best cultivated parts of France. Over the vast proportion of the kingdom, the orthodox old flail bears undisturbed sway; but the farmer of the far South chooses rather to employ horse than human muscles in the work. He lays down, therefore, in a handy spot, a circular pavement, generally of brick, a little larger than the ring at Astley's. All along the swampy shores of the Mediterranean, traversed by the delta of the Rhone, and stretching westward towards Spain, there feed upon the scanty herbage great herds of semi-wild horses, said to have been originally of Arabian descent. These creatures are caught, when needed, much in the style of the Landes desert steeds, and every farmer has a right to a certain number corresponding with the size of his farm. When, then, the harvest has been cut, and the thrashing time comes on, you may see, approaching the steeding, an unruly flock of lean, lanky, leggy horses, most of them grey, driven by three or four mounted peasants--capital cavaliers--each with a long lance like a trident held erect, and a lasso coiled at the saddle-bow. Then work commences: the wild steeds are tolerably docile, although shy and skittish. A heavy bit is forced into the mouth of each, with a long bridle attached. The creatures are arranged in a circle on the edge of the brick flooring, exactly as when Mr. Widdicombe or M. Franconi prepare for an unrivalled feat of horsemanship upon eight bare-backed steeds by the "Whirlwind Rider," surnamed the "Pet of the Ring," or the famous artiste, "Herr Bridleinski, the Hungarian Tamer of the Flying Steeds." The sheaves of corn are placed just where the active grooms at Astley's rake the sawdust thickest; and then, in answer to the thundering exhortations of Mr. Widdicombe and his coadjutors in the centre of the ring, and the cracking of the whips, the horses, held by their long bridles, go plunging and rearing round the arena, and, after