astonished him that he could hardly explain that it was all stone, and that no big houses (nor small, either) in France were built of wood.  I, having been born in a large white wooden house in America, couldn’t understand why he was so horrified at my ignorance of French architecture.  It was a fine old house, high in the centre, with a lower wing on each side.  There were three drawing-rooms, a library, billiard-room, and dining-room on the ground floor.  The large drawing-room, where we always sat, ran straight through the house, with glass doors opening out on the lawn on the entrance side and on the other into a long gallery which ran almost the whole length of the house.  It was always filled with plants and flowers, open in summer, with awnings to keep out the sun; shut in winter with glass windows, and warmed by one of the three caloriferes of the house.  In front of the gallery the lawn sloped down to the wall, which separated the place from the highroad.  A belt of fine trees marked the path along the wall and shut out the road completely, except in certain places where an opening had been made for the view.

We were a small party for such a big house:  only the proprietor and his wife (old people), my husband and myself.  The life was very simple, almost austere.  The old people lived in the centre of the chateau, W.[1] and I in one of the wings.  It had been all fitted up for us, and was a charming little house.  W. had the ground-floor—­a bedroom, dressing-room, cabinet de travail, dining-room, and a small room, half reception-room, half library, where he had a large bookcase filled with books, which he gave away as prizes or to school libraries.  The choice of the books always interested me.  They were principally translations, English and American—­Walter Scott, Marryat, Fenimore Cooper, etc.  The bedroom and cabinet de travail had glass doors opening on the park.  I had the same rooms upstairs, giving one to my maid, for I was nervous at being so far away from anyone.  M. and Mme. A. and all the servants were at the other end of the house, and there were no bells in our wing (nor anywhere else in the house except in the dining-room).  When I wanted a work-woman who was sewing in the lingerie I had to go up a steep little winding staircase, which connected our wing with the main building, and walk the whole length of the gallery to the lingerie, which was at the extreme end of the other wing.  I was very fond of my rooms.  The bedroom and sitting-room opened on a balcony with a lovely view over wood and park.  When I sat there in the morning with my petit dejeuner—­cup of tea and roll—­I could see all that went on in the place.  First the keeper would appear, a tall, handsome man, rather the northern type, with fair hair and blue eyes, his gun always over his shoulder, sacoche at his side, swinging along with the free, vigorous step of a man accustomed to walk all day.  Then Hubert, the coachman, would come for orders, two little fox-terriers