Here Is A House Entirely Covered With Diamond Shaped Shingles, Having
Also Double And Triple Windows, Which Are Long, Narrow, And Pointed At
The Top, Yet Not Suggestive Of The Gothic.
Next we pass a point where an old post inn once stood, and where the
curiously curved, twisted, and strangely complicated iron frame which
once held the swinging sign still remains.
Many a bleak ride did that mounted carrier have, no doubt, in days of
yore; and we can imagine him saying: -
"The night is late, I dare not wait, the winds begin to blow,
And ere I gain the rocky plain there'll be a storm, I know!"
At our final halting place all is bustle, in preparation for a two days'
fête, which commences next day; nevertheless, had we been princes of the
realm, we could not have been shown truer hospitality. Père Basil Armand
himself waits upon us, while his wife is cooking dainties for the coming
festival; and the pretty Monica, giving up her neat apartment to one of
our party, lodges at a neighbor's.
Monsieur R., though seventy-eight years of age, retains all his
faculties perfectly, is straight as an Indian, his luxuriant hair
unstreaked with gray, and he is over six feet in height. He reminds us
of the description of Benedict Bellefontaine: -
"Stalwart and stately in form was the man of seventy winters,
Hearty and hale was he, an oak that is covered with snow flakes,"
but our host is even a finer specimen of vigorous age.
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