Page:An account of a savage girl.djvu/44

16 While she continued at the castle of Songi, and for the two first years that she staidstayed [sic] in the hospital of St. Maur at Chalons, M. d'Epinoy, who took care of her, gave orders to carry her, from time to time, the raw fruits and roots of which she was fondest; but in the hospital she was entirely deprived of raw flesh, and raw fishes, which she had found in great plenty about the castle of Songi. She appeared particularly fond of fish, either from her natural taste, or from her having acquired, by constant custom from her childhood, the faculty of catching them in the water with more ease, than she could the wild game by speed of foot. M. de L. remembers that she retained this inclination for catching fish in the water, two years after her capture: And the same gentleman informed me, that the little savage having been one day brought by order of the Viscount d'Epinoy, to the castle of Songi, where M. de L then happened to be, no sooner perceived a door open which led to a large pond, than she immediately ran and threw herself into it, drest as she was, swam round all the sides of it, and landing on a small island, went in search of frogs, which she eatate [sic] at her leisure. This circumstance puts me in mind of a comical adventure which she told me herself.