his Monsieur David cure Mlle. Marie from the long illness
with which she suffered when she first came here?" inquired the old man.

"Yes, Father Chatelain, he certainly did."

"Well?"

"Ah! but for all that, Father Chatelain, a doctor with a black face is
enough to terrify any one--I should scream myself into fits if he were
to come rolling up the great whites of his eyes at me."

"But is not this M. David the same person who cured Dame Anica of that
dreadful wound in her leg, which had confined her to her bed for upwards
of three years?"

"Yes, exactly so, Father Chatelain; he certainly did set old Dame Anica
up again."

"Well, then, my child?"

"Nay, but only think!--a black man! and when one is ill, too! when one
can so ill bear up against such horrid things. If he were only a little
dark, or even deep brown, but quite, quite a black--all black--oh,
Father Chatelain, I really cannot bring myself to think of it!"

"Tell me, my child, what colour is your favourite heifer Musette?"

"Oh, white--white as a swan, Father Chatelain; and such a milcher! I can
say that for the poor thing without the least falsehood, a better cow we
have not got on the farm."

"And your other favourite, Rosette?"

"Rosette? Oh, she is as black as a raven, not one white hair about her I
should say; and, indeed, to do her justice, she is a first-rate milcher
also. I hardly know which is the best, she or my pretty Musette."

"And what coloured milk does she give?"

"Why, white, of course, Father Chatelain; I really thought you knew
that."

"Is her milk as white and as good as the milk of your snowy pet,
Musette?"

"Every bit as good in colour and quality."

"Although Rosette is a black cow?"

"To be sure! why, Father Chatelain, what difference can it possibly make
to the milk whether the cow that gives it is black, white, red, or
brown?"

"How, then, my good girl, can it in any way signify whether a doctor has
a black or white skin, or what his complexion may be?"

"Well," answered Claudine, fairly hunted into a corner from which no
argument could rescue her,--"well, as regards what makes a black doctor
not so good as a white one, it is--it is, because a black skin is so
very ugly to look at, and a white one is so much more agreeable to one's
eyes; I'm sure I can't think of any other reason, Father Chatelain, if I
try for ever; but with cows the colour of the skin makes not the very
least difference, of that you may be as