d to tie up for the day; munching fruit and
fogging the hood with pipe-smoke had grown monotonous; I could not
have the hood furled, because the floods of rain fell unceasingly.
The tavern was on the river bank, as is the custom. It was dull
there, and melancholy--nothing to do but look out of the window into
the drenching rain, and shiver; one could do that, for it was bleak
and cold and windy, and country France furnishes no fire. Winter
overcoats did not help me much; they had to be supplemented with
rugs. The raindrops were so large and struck the river with such
force that they knocked up the water like pebble-splashes.

"With the exception of a very occasional woodenshod peasant, nobody
was abroad in this bitter weather--I mean nobody of our sex. But
all weathers are alike to the women in these continental countries.
To them and the other animals, life is serious; nothing interrupts
their slavery. Three of them were washing clothes in the river
under the window when I arrived, and they continued at it as long as
there was light to work by. One was apparently thirty; another--the
mother!--above fifty; the third--grandmother!--so old and worn and
gray she could have passed for eighty; I took her to be that old.
They had no waterproofs nor rubbers, of course; over their shoulders
they wore gunnysacks--simply conductors for rivers of water; some of
the volume reached the ground; the rest soaked in on the way.

"At last a vigorous fellow of thirty-five arrived, dry and
comfortable, smoking his pipe under his big umbrella in an open
donkey-cart-husband, son, and grandson of those women! He stood up
in the cart, sheltering himself, and began to superintend, issuing
his orders in a masterly tone of command, and showing temper when
they were not obeyed swiftly enough.

"Without complaint or murmur the drowned women patiently carried out
the orders, lifting the immense baskets of soggy, wrung-out clothing
into the cart and stowing them to the man's satisfaction. There
were six of the great baskets, and a man of mere ordinary strength
could not have lifted any one of them. The cart being full now, the
Frenchman descended, still sheltered by his umbrella, entered the
tavern, and the women went drooping homeward, trudging in the wake
of the cart