In the collection of these and such like particulars, I sauntered for days among the vineyards around; and, utterly unknown and unfriended as I was, I met everywhere the most cordial and pleasant receptions. I would lounge, for example, to the door of a wine-treading shed, to watch the movements of the people. Presently the proprietor, most likely attired in a broad-brimmed straw hat, a strange faded outer garment, half shooting-coat half dressing gown, would come up courteously to the stranger, and, learning that I was an English visitor to the vintage, would busy himself with the most graceful kindness, to make intelligible the _rationale_ of all the operations. Often I was invited into the chateau or farm-house, as the case might be; a bottle of an old vintage produced and comfortably discussed in the coolness of the darkened, thinly-furnished room, with its old-fashioned walnut-tree escrutoires, and beauffets, its quaintly-pannelled walls, and its polished floors, gleaming like mirrors and slippery as ice. On these occasions, the conversation would often turn upon the general rejection, by England, of French wines--a sore point with the growers of all save the first-class vintages, and in which I had, as may be conceived, very little to say in defence either of our taste or our policy. In the evenings, which were getting chill and cold, I occasionally abandoned my room with illustrations from the _Tour de Nesle_ for the general kitchen and parlour of Madame Cadillac, and, ensconcing myself in the chimney corner--a fine old-fashioned ingle, crackling and blazing with hard wood logs--listened to the chat of the people of the village; they were nearly all coopers and vine-dressers, who resorted there after the day's work was over to enjoy an exceedingly modest modicum of very thin wine. I never benefitted very much, however, by these listenings. It was my bad luck to hear recounted neither tale nor legend--to pick up, at the hands of my _compotatores_, neither local trait nor anecdote. The conversation was as small as the wine. The gossip of the place--the prospects of the vintage--elaborate comparisons of it with other vintages--births, marriages, and deaths--a minute list of scandal, more or less intelligible when conveyed in hints and allusions--were the staple topics, mixed up, however, once or twice with general denunciations of the niggardly conduct of certain neighbouring proprietors to their vintagers--giving them for breakfast nothing but coarse bread, lard, and not even piquette to wash it down with, and for dinner not much more tempting dishes.