e pointed out Villerville, Trouville, Houlgate, Luc,
Arromanches, the little river of Caen, and the rocks of Calvados which
make the coast unsafe as far as Cherbourg. Then he enlarged on the
question of the sand banks in the Seine, which shift at every tide so
that the pilots of Quilleboeuf are at fault if they do not survey
the channel every day. He bid them notice how the town of Havre
divided Upper from Lower Normandy. In Lower Normandy the shore sloped
down to the sea in pasture-lands, fields, and meadows. The coast of
Upper Normandy, on the contrary, was steep, a high cliff, ravined,
cleft and towering, forming an immense white rampart all the way to
Dunkirk, while in each hollow a village or a port lay hidden: Etretat,
Fecamp, Saint-Valery, Treport, Dieppe, and the rest.

The two women did not listen. Torpid with comfort and impressed by the
sight of the ocean covered with vessels rushing to and fro like wild
beasts about their den, they sat speechless, somewhat awed by the
soothing and gorgeous sunset. Roland alone talked on without end; he
was one of those whom nothing can disturb. Women, whose nerves are
more sensitive, sometimes feel, without knowing why, that the sound of
useless speech is as irritating as an insult.

Pierre and Jean, who had calmed down, were rowing slowly, and the
_Pearl_ was making for the harbor, a tiny thing among those huge
vessels.

When they came alongside of the quay, Papagris, who was waiting there,
gave his hand to the ladies to help them out, and they took the way
into the town. A large crowd--the crowd which haunts the pier every
day at high tide--was also drifting homeward. Mme. Roland and Mme.
Rosemilly led the way, followed by the three men. As they went up the
rue de Paris they stopped now and then in front of a milliner's or
jeweler's shop, to look at a bonnet or an ornament; then after making
their comments they went on again. In front of the Place de la Bourse
Roland paused, as he did every day, to gaze at the docks full of
vessels--the _Bassin du Commerce_, with other docks beyond, where the
huge hulls lay side by side, closely packed in rows, four or five
deep. And masts innumerable; along several kilometers of quays the
endless masts, with their yards, poles, and rigging, gave this great
gap in the heart of the town the look of a dead forest. Above this
leafless forest the gulls were wheeling, and watching to pounce, like
a falling stone, on any scraps flung overboar