To return to the lower one, the schoolroom: a window faces south, the only window in the house, a long, narrow window whose frame you can touch at the same time with your head and both your shoulders. This sunny aperture is the only lively spot in the dwelling; it overlooks the greater part of the village, which straggles along the slopes of a tapering valley. In the window-recess is the master’s little table. The opposite wall contains a niche in which stands a gleaming copper pail full of water. Here the parched children can relieve their thirst when they please, with a cup left within their reach. At the top of the niche are a few shelves bright with pewter plates, dishes, and drinking-vessels, which are taken down from their sanctuary on great occasions only. More or less everywhere, at any spot which the light touches, are crudely-coloured pictures, pasted on the walls. Here is Our Lady of the Seven Dolours, the disconsolate Mother of God, opening her blue cloak to show her heart pierced with seven daggers. Between the sun and moon, which stare at you with their great, round eyes, is the Eternal Father, Whose robe swells as though puffed out with the storm. To the right of the window, in the embrasure, is the Wandering Jew. He wears a three-cornered hat, a large, white, leather apron, hobnailed shoes, and carries a stout stick. “Never was such a bearded man seen before or after,” says the legend that surrounds the picture. The draughtsman has not forgotten this detail; the old man’s beard spreads in a snowy avalanche over the apron and comes down to his knees. On the left is Geneviève of Brabant, accompanied by the roe; with cruel Golo hiding in the bushes, sword in hand. Above hangs The Death of Mr. Credit, slain by defaulters at the door of his inn; and so on and so on, in every variety of subject, at all the unoccupied spots of the four walls. I was filled with admiration of this picture-gallery, which held one’s eyes with its great patches of red, blue, green, and yellow. The master, however, had not set up his collection with a view to training our minds and hearts. That was the last and least of the worthy man’s ambitions. An artist in his fashion, he had adorned his house according to his taste; and we benefited by the scheme of decoration.