the cleverest of
them all. I understood this woman had passed a year or two in England,
expressly to fit herself for her present occupation, by learning the
language.

While engaged in taking our passages on board the steam-boat for Rouen,
some one called me by name, in English. The sound of the most familiar
words, in one's own language, soon get to be startling in a foreign
country. I remember, on returning to England, after an absence of five
years, that it was more than a week before I could persuade myself I was
not addressed whenever a passer-by spoke suddenly. On the present
occasion, I was called to by an old schoolboy acquaintance, Mr. H----r,
who was a consul in England, but who had taken a house on what is called
the _Cote_, a hill-side, just above Ingouville, a village at no great
distance from the town. We went out to his pretty little cottage, which
enjoyed a charming view. Indeed I should particularize this spot as the
one which gave me the first idea of one species of distinctive European
scenery. The houses cling to the declivity, rising above each other in a
way that might literally enable one to toss a stone into his neighbour's
chimney-top. They are of stone, but being whitewashed, and very
numerous, they give the whole mountain-side the appearance of a pretty
hamlet, scattered without order in the midst of gardens. Italy abounds
with such little scenes; nor are they unfrequent in France, especially
in the vicinity of towns; though whitened edifices are far from being
the prevailing taste of that country.

That evening we had an infernal clamour of drums in the principal street,
which happened to be our own. There might have been fifty, unaccompanied
by any wind instrument. The French do not use the fife, and when one is
treated to the drum, it is generally in large potions, and nothing but
drum. This is a relic of barbarism, and is quite unworthy of a musical
age. There is more or less of it in all the garrisoned towns of Europe.
You may imagine the satisfaction with which one listens to a hundred or
two of these plaintive instruments, beat between houses six or eight
stories high, in a narrow street, and with desperate perseverance! The
object is to recall the troops to their quarters.

Havre is a tide-harbour. In America, where there is, on an average, not
more than five feet of rise and fall to the water of the sea, such a
haven would, of course, be impracticable for large vessels. But the
ma