Page:Costello - A pilgrimage to Auvergne from Picardy to Velay - A 30154 1.pdf/23

Rh mented; but the tower has been rebuilt in bad taste, and is surmounted by a crown, which has a strange, incongruous appearance. We met here with an instance of French familiarity and vanity, combined with a certain wish to oblige, which, though we afterwards became sufliciently acquainted with similar traits in our rambles, struck us from the contrast with English manners. We were seeking for one of the streets, and inquired our way of a onne, who was following her mistress through one of the squares: she instantly left her charge and her lady to enter into conversation with us, inquiring our reasons for leaving England and our motives for seeking Arras, obliged us with an account of her own position, informed us of her station in life, which was inferior to her birth, her godmother being the wife of the mayor of Peronne, and her desire for change having induced her to condescend to fill the office she now held. After talking a great deal, and leaving the information we asked to the last, she left us and rejoined her mistress, to whom she evidently recounted her adventure with the foreigners who had accosted her, with such embellishments to the narrative as might best suit her hearer.

Unsuccessful in discovering any object of interest, we wandered about Arras, disappointed in