That Canning's muse could also strike a deeper and more solemn note must be admitted by all who read the epitaph upon his only son, who died in 1820: Though short thy span, God's unimpeach'd decrees, And since this world was not the world for thee, Oh! mark'd from birth, and nurtured for the skies! Simple as unwean'd infancy, and pure: Pure from all stain, (save that of human clay, 1 With these verses we conclude this brief notice of George Canning, than whom a more brilliant star has scarcely ever shone in the parliamentary heavens. He was one of those instances which show how well the pursuits of literature become a statesman, and how a reputation acquired in such a field may well be looked upon as the Corinthian capital to the column of a statesman's fame. 75 The Village on the Cliff. CHAPTER XVIII. THE ABBAYE AUX DAMES. EANWHILE Catherine, in good Mspirits and in better heart than she had felt for many a day, was picking her way between the stones, and walking up the little village street with her husband. Fontaine nimbly advancing with neatly gaitered feet, bowed right and left to his acquaintance, stopping every now and then to inquire more particularly after this person's health, or that one's interests, as was his custom. The children were at play in the little gardens in front of the cottages, the women were sitting in groups dancing their bobbins, spinning, whirring, twisting, stitching. Their tongues were wagging to the flying of their fingers and the bobbing of their white caps. Some of the men were winding string upon nails fixed to the walls, some were mending their nets, others were talking to the women, who answered, never ceasing their work for an instant. Between the houses a faint, hazy sea showed glittering against the lime walls. Dominique, from the farm, came down the middle of the street with some horses clattering down to the water; Marion and others called out a greeting to him as he passed. "And when does Mademoiselle Chrétien return?" said Madame Potier from the door of her shop. "Who can tell?" said Dominique, clattering away. "To-morrow perhaps." He took off his hat to Monsieur Fontaine, and Madame Potier beamed a recognition as they passed. Catherine asked her husband why so many of the men were at home. She had not been long enough by the sea to read the signs of the times in the south-west wind now blowing gently in their faces-in the haze which hid the dark rocks of the Calvados. Fontaine adjusted his glasses and looked up at the sky, and then at tho 66 faint blue horizontal line. "These fine mornings are often deceptive,' said he, although it is hard to believe in bad weather on such a day as this." Everything was so bright and so still, the wind so gentle, that it seemed as if gales could never blow again, or storms rise. The sun poured down upon the dusty road. Now and then the threads of the women at work stirred in the soft little breeze; the voices sounded unusually distinct, a cheerful echo of life from every door-way. Presently two men and a boy, tramping down towards the sea, passed by, carrying oars and rope-ends. These were Lefebvres, who evidently thought, like Catherine, that no storm need be apprehended when the sun shone so steadily and the sea lay so calm. The boy looked up and grinned, and his bright blue eyes gave a gleam of recognition, for he knew Madame Fontaine; one of the men, Christophe Lefebvre, touched his cap, the other, who was his cousin, tramped on doggedly. Joseph Lefebvre was the most obstinate man in the village, and no one dared remonstrate with him. Christophe and he had words that morning, it was said, about their coming expedition, but it ended in Christophe going too at Isabeau's prayer. He never refused Isabeau anything she asked, poor fellow-that was known to them all. The men went their way, and at some distance, watching them, and muttering to herself, old Nanon followed: her brown old legs trembled as she staggered along under her load of seaweed. "Christophe was a fool," she said. "What did he mean by giving in to that dolt of a Joseph ?" So she passed in her turn, muttering and grumbling. Catherine would have stopped and spoken to her, but the old woman shook her head and trudged "What is it to you?" she was saying. "You have your man dry and safe upon shore, always at your side; he is not driven to go out at the peril of his life to find bread to put into your mouth." on. The old woman's words meant nothing perhaps, but they struck Catherine with a feeling of vivid reality, for which she could hardly account. Poor souls, what a life was theirs, a life of which the sweetest and wholesomest food must be embittered by the thought of the price which they might be called upon to pay for it some day. Yes, she had her "man," as Nanon called Monsieur Fontaine, and she looked at him as he walked beside her, active and brisk, and full of life and good humour. He talked away cheerfully, of storms, and fish, and fishermen, of the Ecole de Natation at Bayeux, which he had attended with much interest, and where he meant Toto to go before long; he talked of the good and bad weather, storms, and of the great piles of seaweed with which the coast was sometimes covered when the tide went down after a boisterous night. "That is a sight you must see, my very dear Catherine," said the maire. "People rise at the earliest dawn and come down with carts and spades, and barrows and baskets. It would amuse you to see the various expedients for carrying away the varech before the evening tide." "But what do they do with it?" said Catherine. "It forms a most valuable manure," said the maire, in his instructive voice. "The odour is not agreeable, but its beneficial properties cannot be |