Little did the Bazins know how much they served us. We were
charged for candles, for food and drink, and for the beds we slept

in. But there was nothing in the bill for the husband's pleasant
talk; nor for the pretty spectacle of their married life. And

there was yet another item unchanged. For these people's
politeness really set us up again in our own esteem. We had a

thirst for consideration; the sense of insult was still hot in our
spirits; and civil usage seemed to restore us to our position in

the world.
How little we pay our way in life! Although we have our purses

continually in our hand, the better part of service goes still
unrewarded. But I like to fancy that a grateful spirit gives as

good as it gets. Perhaps the Bazins knew how much I liked them?
perhaps they also were healed of some slights by the thanks that I

gave them in my manner?
DOWN THE OISE

THROUGH THE GOLDEN VALLEY
BELOW La Fere the river runs through a piece of open pastoral

country; green, opulent, loved by breeders; called the Golden
Valley. In wide sweeps, and with a swift and equable gallop, the

ceaseless stream of water visits and makes green the fields. Kine,
and horses, and little humorousdonkeys, browse together in the

meadows, and come down in troops to the river-side to drink. They
make a strange feature in the landscape; above all when they are

startled, and you see them galloping to and fro with their
incongruous forms and faces. It gives a feeling as of great,

unfenced pampas, and the herds of wandering nations. There were
hills in the distance upon either hand; and on one side, the river

sometimes bordered on the wooded spurs of Coucy and St. Gobain.
The artillery were practising at La Fere; and soon the cannon of

heaven joined in that loud play. Two continents of cloud met and
exchanged salvos overhead; while all round the horizon we could see

sunshine and clear air upon the hills. What with the guns and the
thunder, the herds were all frightened in the Golden Valley. We

could see them tossing their heads, and running to and fro in
timorous indecision; and when they had made up their minds, and the

donkey followed the horse, and the cow was after the donkey, we
could hear their hooves thundering abroad over the meadows. It had

a martial sound, like cavalry charges. And altogether, as far as
the ears are concerned, we had a very rousing battle-piece

performed for our amusement.
At last the guns and the thunder dropped off; the sun shone on the

wet meadows; the air was scented with the breath of rejoicing trees
and grass; and the river kept unweariedly carrying us on at its

best pace. There was a manufacturing district about Chauny; and
after that the banks grew so high that they hid the adjacent

country, and we could see nothing but clay sides, and one willow
after another. Only, here and there, we passed by a village or a

ferry, and some wondering child upon the bank would stare after us
until we turned the corner. I daresay we continued to paddle in

that child's dreams for many a night after.
Sun and shower alternated like day and night, making the hours

longer by their variety. When the showers were heavy, I could feel
each drop striking through my jersey to my warm skin; and the

accumulation of small shocks put me nearly beside myself. I
decided I should buy a mackintosh at Noyon. It is nothing to get

wet; but the misery of these individual pricks of cold all over my
body at the same instant of time made me flail the water with my

paddle like a madman. The CIGARETTE was greatly amused by these
ebullitions. It gave him something else to look at besides clay

banks and willows.
All the time, the river stole away like a thief in straight places,

or swung round corners with an eddy; the willows nodded, and were
undermined all day long; the clay banks tumbled in; the Oise, which

had been so many centuries making the Golden Valley, seemed to have
changed its fancy, and be bent upon undoing its performance. What

a number of things a river does, by simply following Gravity in the
innocence of its heart!

NOYON CATHEDRAL
NOYON stands about a mile from the river, in a little plain

surrounded by wooded hills, and entirely covers an eminence with
its tile roofs, surmounted by a long, straight-backed cathedral

with two stiff towers. As we got into the town, the tile roofs
seemed to tumble uphill one upon another, in the oddest disorder;

but for all their scrambling, they did not attain above the knees
of the cathedral, which stood, upright and solemn, over all. As

the streets drew near to this presiding genius, through the market-
place under the Hotel de Ville, they grew emptier and more

composed. Blank walls and shuttered windows were turned to the
great edifice, and grass grew on the white causeway. 'Put off thy

shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is
holy ground.' The Hotel du Nord, nevertheless, lights its secular

tapers within a stone-cast of the church; and we had the superb
east-end before our eyes all morning from the window of our

bedroom. I have seldom looked on the east-end of a church with
more complete sympathy. As it flanges out in three wide terraces

and settles down broadly on the earth, it looks like the poop of
some great old battle-ship. Hollow-backed buttresses carry vases,

which figure for the stern lanterns. There is a roll in the
ground, and the towers just appear above the pitch of the roof, as

though the good ship were bowing lazily over an Atlantic swell. At
any moment it might be a hundred feet away from you, climbing the

next billow. At any moment a window might open, and some old
admiral thrust forth a cocked hat, and proceed to take an

observation. The old admirals sail the sea no longer; the old
ships of battle are all broken up, and live only in pictures; but

this, that was a church before ever they were thought upon, is
still a church, and makes as brave an appearance by the Oise. The

cathedral and the river are probably the two oldest things for
miles around; and certainly they have both a grand old age.

The Sacristan took us to the top of one of the towers, and showed
us the five bells hanging in their loft. From above, the town was

a tesselated pavement of roofs and gardens; the old line of rampart
was plainly traceable; and the Sacristan pointed out to us, far

across the plain, in a bit of gleaming sky between two clouds, the
towers of Chateau Coucy.

I find I never weary of great churches. It is my favourite kind of
mountain scenery. Mankind was never so happily inspired as when it

made a cathedral: a thing as single and specious as a statue to
the first glance, and yet, on examination, as lively and

interesting as a forest in detail. The height of spires cannot be
taken by trigonometry; they measure absurdly short, but how tall

they are to the admiring eye! And where we have so many elegant
proportions, growing one out of the other, and all together into

one, it seems as if proportion transcended itself, and became
something different and more imposing. I could never fathom how a

man dares to lift up his voice to preach in a cathedral. What is
he to say that will not be an anti-climax? For though I have heard

a considerablevariety of sermons, I never yet heard one that was
so expressive as a cathedral. 'Tis the best preacher itself, and

preaches day and night; not only telling you of man's art and
aspirations in the past, but convicting your own soul of ardent

sympathies; or rather, like all good preachers, it sets you
preaching to yourself; - and every man is his own doctor of

divinity in the last resort.
As I sat outside of the hotel in the course of the afternoon, the

sweet groaning thunder of the organ floated out of the church like
a summons. I was not averse, liking the theatre so well, to sit

out an act or two of the play, but I could never rightly make out
the nature of the service I beheld. Four or five priests and as

many choristers were singing MISERERE before the high altar when I
went in. There was no congregation but a few old women on chairs

and old men kneeling on the pavement. After a while a long train
of young girls, walking two and two, each with a lighted taper in

her hand, and all dressed in black with a white veil, came from
behind the altar, and began to descend the nave; the four first