Page:George Sand by Bertha Thomas.djvu/51

Rh imagine: three tallow candle-ends by way of illumination, lots of home-made wine for refreshment; the orchestra consisting of a bagpipe and a hurdy-gurdy, the noisiest and, therefore, the best appreciated in the country-side. We invited some friends over from La Châtre, and made fools of ourselves in a hundred thousand ways; as, for instance, dressing up as peasants in the evening and disguising ourselves so well as not to recognise each other. Madame Duplessis was charming in a red petticoat; Ursule, in a blue blouse and a big hat, was a most comical fellow; Casimir, got up as a beggar, had some halfpence given him in all good faith; Stephane, whom I think you know, as a spruce peasant, made believe to have been drinking, stumbled against our sous-préfet and accosted him—he is a nice fellow, and was just going to depart when all of a sudden he recognised us. Well, it was a most farcical evening, and would have amused you I will engage. Perhaps you, too, would have been tempted to put on the country-cap, and I will answer for it that there would not have been a pair of black eyes to compete with yours.

In other letters, written in a vein of charming good-humour, her facility and spirit are shown in her treatment of trivial incidents, or sketches of local characters, as this, for example, of an ancient female servant in her employ :

And elsewhere she has her fling at the little squabbles and absurdities of provincial society, the "sets" and petty distinctions, giving a humorous relation of the collapse of her well-meaning efforts, in conjunction with friends at the sous-préfecture, to do away with