186 WINTER SUNSHINE 



It was a bright October morning as we steamed 

 into the little harbor at Dieppe, and the first scene 

 that met my eye was, I suppose, a characteristic 

 one, four or five old men and women towing a 

 vessel into a dock. They bent beneath the rope 

 that passed from shoulder to shoulder, and tugged 

 away doggedly at it, the women apparently more 

 than able to do their part. There is no equalizer 

 of the sexes like poverty and misery, and then it 

 very often happens that the gray mare proves the 

 better horse. Throughout the agricultural regions, 

 as we passed along, the men apparently all wore 

 petticoats; at least, the petticoats were the most ac 

 tive and prominent in the field occupations. Their 

 wearers were digging potatoes, pulling beets, follow 

 ing the harrow (in one instance a thorn-bush drawn 

 by a cow), and stirring the wet, new-mown grass. I 

 believe the pantaloons were doing the mowing. But 

 I looked in vain for any Maud Mullers in the mead 

 ows, and have concluded that these can only be 

 found in Kew England hay-fields! And herein is 

 one of the first surprises that awaits one on visiting 

 the Old World countries, the absence of graceful, 

 girlish figures, and bright girlish faces, among the 

 peasantry or rural population. In France I certainly 

 expected to see female beauty everywhere, but did 

 not get one gleam all that sunny day till I got to 

 Paris. Is it a plant that only flourishes in cities 

 on this side of the Atlantic, or do all the pretty 

 girls, as soon as they are grown, pack their trunks, 

 and leave for the gay metropolis 1 



