llent cook and washer, and, what we still more prized, a
lady's maid and hairdresser of the first order. My sister and I were glad
to see her, and overwhelmed her with questions about Carlo, their
children, their plans, and our traveling companions.

"Ah! Momzelle Suzanne, the little Madame Carpentier seems to me a fine
lady, ever so genteel; but the Irish woman! Ah! _grand Dieu!_ she puts me
in mind of a soldier. I'm afraid of her. She smokes--she swears--she
carries a pistol, like a man."

At last the 15th of May came, and papa took us on board the flatboat and
helped us to find our way to our apartment. If my father had allowed
Carlo, he would have ruined himself in furnishing our room; but papa
stopped him and directed it himself. The flatboat had been divided into
four chambers. These were covered by a slightly arching deck, on which the
boat was managed by the moving of immense sweeps that sent her forward.
The room in the stern, surrounded by a sort of balcony, which Monsieur
Carpentier himself had made, belonged to him and his wife; then came ours,
then that of Celeste and her family, and the one at the bow was the
Irishwoman's. Carlo and Gordon had crammed the provisions, tools, carts,
and plows into the corners of their respective apartments. In the room
which our father was to share with us he had had Mario make two wooden
frames mounted on feet. These were our beds, but they were supplied with
good bedding and very white sheets. A large cypress table, on which we saw
a pile of books and our workboxes; a washstand, also of cypress, but well
furnished and surmounted by a mirror; our trunks in a corner; three
rocking-chairs--this was all our furniture. There was neither carpet nor
curtain.

All were on board except the Carpentier couple. Suzanne was all anxiety to
see the Irishwoman. Poor Suzanne! how distressed she was not to be able to
speak English! So, while I was taking off my _capotte_--as the sun-bonnet
of that day was called--and smoothing my hair at the glass, she had
already tossed her capotte upon papa's bed and sprung up the ladder that
led to the deck. (Each room had one.) I followed a little later and had
the satisfaction of seeing Madame Margaretto Gordon, commonly called
"Maggie" by her husband and "Maw" by her son Patrick. She was seated on a
coil of rope, her son on the boards at her feet. An enormous dog crouched
beside them, with his head against Maggie's knee. The mother and son were
surp