A JOURNEY TO NATURE 



could break through. There the mental pro 

 cesses stopped, and the obeisance ran on unevent 

 fully without thenio I managed to let them 

 know by devious explanations that I was an 

 invalid doing a quiet outing with my boy for the 

 sake of his and my health. It was very interest 

 ing to see Griselle s feminine solicitude peep out 

 at times, as if she were wondering when I would 

 have a spell, and she could get hot cloths ready 

 and stew down some burdock, and Gabe could 

 enliven matters by rattling that farm-wagon three 

 or four miles for the country doctor and his 

 bottle of quinine. 



Griselle was a human butter-pat, sweet and 

 fresh from the rural churn, with the family stamp 

 on her face, and ready for the market. She had 

 not as yet been put on the dairy-shelf, where, as 

 you know, all butter-pats begin to absorb what 

 ever is nearest and strongest. 



And then she took to Charlie so ingenuously 

 and easily that I conceived an entirely new order 

 of respect for this rustic handmaiden who, when 

 she was not flitting, was standing on an inacces 

 sible pedestal of youth to which my maturity 

 looked up with admiration, but without ever 

 being able to exactly make out whether it was 

 a fancy of Watteau s or a realistic part of the 

 commonplace life that I had come into. She 

 was always turning toward me an inquiring face 

 of mingled girlhood and womanhood that I had 

 never anywhere encountered. 



The demoiselles of my late life were all delicious 

 48 



