The language, in
particular, filled them with surprise.
'Do they speak patois in England?' I was once asked; and when I
told them not, 'Ah, then, French?' said they.
'No, no,' I said, 'not French.'
'Then,' they concluded, 'they speak patois.'
You must obviously either speak French or patios. Talk of the
force of logic--here it was in all its weakness. I gave up the
point, but proceeding to give illustrations of my native jargon, I
was met with a new mortification. Of all patios they declared that
mine was the most preposterous and the most jocose in sound. At
each new word there was a new explosion of laughter, and some of
the younger ones were glad to rise from their chairs and stamp
about the street in ecstasy; and I looked on upon their mirth in a
faint and slightly disagreeable bewilderment. 'Bread,' which
sounds a commonplace, plain-sailing monosyllable in England, was
the word that most delighted these good ladies of Monastier; it
seemed to them frolicsome and racy, like a page of Pickwick; and
they all got it carefully by heart, as a stand-by, I presume, for
winter evenings. I have tried it since then with every sort of
accent and inflection, but I seem to lack the sense of humour.
They were of all ages: children at their first web of lace, a
stripling girl with a bashful but encouraging play of eyes, solid
married women, and grandmothers, some on the top of their age and
some falling towards decrepitude.
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