THE STUDY OF NATURE. 21 
remote summits of the Pyrenees, which were visible 
in clear weather. The young elm-trees of our own 
France, mingled with American acacias, rose-laurels, and 
young cypresses, interrupted its full flood of light, and > 
transmitted to us a softened radiance. 
“On our right, a thicket of oaks, inclosed with a 
dense hedge, sheltered us from the north, and from the 
keen wind of the Cantal. Far away, on the left, swept 
the green meadows and the corn-fields. Through the 
broom, and in the shade of some tall trees, flowed a 
brooklet—a thin thread of limpid water, defined against 
the evening horizon by a small belt of haze which ran 
along its border. 
“The climate is intermediate. In the valley, which 
is that of the Tarn, and which shares the mildness of 
the Garonne and the severity of Auvergne, we find 
none of those southern products common everywhere 
around Bordeaux. But the mulberry, and the melting 
» perfumed peach, the juicy grape, the sugared fig, and 
the melon, growing in the open air, testify that we are 
in the south. Fruits superabounded with us; one 
portion of the estate was an immense vineyard. 
‘““Memory vividly recalls to me all the charms of 
this locality, and its varied character. It was never 
otherwise than grave and melancholy in itself; and it 
impressed these feelings on all about it. My father, 
though lively and agreeable, was a man already aged 
and of uncertain health. My mother, young, beautiful, 
austere, had the queenly bearing of the North American, 
with a prudence and an active economy very rare in 
Creoles. The estate which we occupied formerly belonged 
