Now and then you will hear one woman
clattering off prayers for the edification of the others at their
work. They wear gaudy shawls, white caps with a gay ribbon about
the head, and sometimes a black felt brigand hat above the cap; and
so they give the street colour and brightness and a foreign air. A
while ago, when England largely supplied herself from this district
with the lace called torchon, it was not unusual to earn five
francs a day; and five francs in Monastier is worth a pound in
London. Now, from a change in the market, it takes a clever and
industrious work-woman to earn from three to four in the week, or
less than an eighth of what she made easily a few years ago. The
tide of prosperity came and went, as with our northern pitmen, and
left nobody the richer. The women bravely squandered their gains,
kept the men in idleness, and gave themselves up, as I was told, to
sweethearting and a merry life. From week's end to week's end it
was one continuous gala in Monastier; people spent the day in the
wine-shops, and the drum or the bagpipes led on the bourrees up to
ten at night. Now these dancing days are over. 'Il n'y a plus de
jeunesse,' said Victor the garcon. I hear of no great advance in
what are thought the essentials of morality; but the bourree, with
its rambling, sweet, interminable music, and alert and rustic
figures, has fallen into disuse, and is mostly remembered as a
custom of the past.
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