A FRENCH MARKET.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XII, Issue 93, 21 April 1877, Page 4

A FRENCH MARKET.

'" Oar modern method of housekeeping has done away wiih the picturesque circumstances of the market in England, and the tradespeople who call for orders make bargaining at the stalls, and choosing for oneself from amongst the various vendors, as unnecessary an employment for the ordinary housekeeper as private brewing or the distilling of strong waters. But in France things are different, and the market still holds its place in a country where the butchers boy and tbe baker's cart are unknown at two miles distant from a town. It is still the custom for ladies to market for then" elves here, the. maid takes her place and " catches'.' the {sous which the vendors lose, and her mistress does not gain. If not so many nor so striking as the famous humors of Bartholomew Fair, the humors of a Frenoh market are not yet wholly valueless; and if a cosmopolitan seaside place in Normandy has fewer points of local color than might be found in a quaint old Breton village say,. or even in Normandy itself out of the beaten track of English, Parisians, and Americans, still there are certain specialities which repay us for a hot, dusty walk, under a burning sun and down a road where the twisted trees throw all their shadows the wrong The first thing that strikes as is the extraordinary colors of the umbrellas. We in sober England are generally content with dark brown and sombre purples, with inoffensive greens, or at the best, a modest fawn for the dogdays;, but here in Trouville, we set out an array that makes the market look in. the ; distance like a bed of gigantic mushrooms, where every color is to be found in its order. Huge cotton tents are tbey, where burning red and jaunty apple green, bright yellow, sky blue, brilliant purple, dazzling white, are all in juxtaposition; with here and there tdylike carriage parasols elaborately trimmed with lace and lined with silk to. give the right dash of fashion to the scenes; And ne.xt to the colors of the umbrellas we notice tbe infinite ugliness of the women. For the most part old, and with their heads bound up in kerchiefs, or encased in our men's oldfashioned double-tasselled nightcaps, these French market-women of Trouville have lost every charm, acd almost every trait of womanhood. Their BQapty_grey hair creeps down io rough elf-locks from under their disfiguring head-gear; their polls are bare, and their necks, wrinkled by age and tanned deep brown by the sun, look more like leather than _.human flesh; their ears are dragged down by the weight of their enormous earrings ; and their hideous obesity is not improved by the short,, full petticoat and slovenlylooking casque which is the general costume among them. To be sure, here and there we come to a handsome ' face and noble presence — to oue of those peasant queens who, had fortune planted her in a high place, would have led the world; but these are rare exceptions, and for the most part, the old women at the stalls may each one of them play Hecate or a Macbeth witch without paint or make-up. Fortunately they are not all old and hard; for what cap equal the hardness of an elder Frenchwoman of any degree, accustomed to fight her own pay in the world, and look on life as _ flayingroom where, if you would save your own skin, you must strip off that of others ?— -and every now and then they are refreshed by the sight of a brisk and natty little native fermiere in her pretty frilled cap, or by lhat of a darkeyed, dark-brown melancholy and intense-looking stranger. Evidently froni the far-off sunny south, she sits by her Btolid Norman husband with an expressive look of isolation and strangeness, and as evidently she despises this cold and colorless Normandy —much as the Norman would despise that cold and foggy, end yet more colorless, England lying across tbe Chaonel, could he be transported there on some raw, chil, January day. But if the market women are generally old aod unpersonable, with only a few among tham pleasaDf, maoy of the purchasers are good to look at, all of them are essentially unlike what we see in England. Here we have the neat, smart bonne, with ber becoming cap and trim waist, bargaining for butter end eggs wiih matchless volubility and unquenchable audacity; thqre one more languid, who affects a certain young-ladyisui by being only "iu her hair " — for the jemme de chambre claims for herself exemption

from the cap which here, as with as, is the " flag" whereat the excitable vanities of womanhood revolt — gives what she is asked without an attempt at beating down. The day is hot, she was up late last night, it is ber mistress's money, not hers, and indolence prompts to generosity as she shrugs her shoulders and says, when remonstrated with, Dame, ilfaut que chacun vive! There a widow, with her black veil over her white cap to m*rk her state, walks witb a stately step and disapproving glance past two young girls in flashy bonnets and vulgarly fine costumes, who ought to havt been in white caps and ungainly casaques. The gaily dressed children of the faahiouable Visitors trot, with their sand baskets in their hands, at the heels of their nurses glad of an opportunity for a little flirting in their vocation; a French mother and daughter in capuchons go from stall lo stall bargaining with true French hardness, offering ten sous when asked twelve, and spending half-an-hour on the reduction; French gentlemen, whose wives and bonnes alike are at home, do the week's marketing with exemplary docility, bnt mostly buy at the stalls of the best looking sellers ; beggars, with naked feet walk in and about, whining out tbeir pretended sorrows, or offering trays full of rubbish under guise of honest dealing; here is M. le Cure buying the carrots for his pot-au feu like any old wife; here a douce and quiet-looking piou-piou has his long loaf under his arm and a bunch pf onions in his hand; while the inevitable gendarme stands apart and Watchful, with folded arms and restless eyes, like (he incarnation of social order and military dominion. But it does the heart good to see one of them, perhaps off duty, carrying in bis hand a bunch of Jeeks and a cabbage like any other Christian body. — Queen.

" *-* ~* The following remarks from the Ballarat correspondent of the Melbourne. Argus deserve the careful attention ot our volunteers: — I have been to-day put in posseesion of a secret in connexion with the use of the Martini-Henry rifle, a knowledge of which, I am told, the authorities desires to suppress, but with what object I cannot divine. What has led up to my getting this information was the discharge of Sergeant Dubberliu's rifle some time ago after he had laid it down in apparent safely on. the ground. These rifles are supposed to have a trigger pull of from 61b. to 81b., but it was shown to me to-day that by a clever art in cocking the gun, the trigger pull becomes as light as that of those known as hair-triggers, and in this state it affords great facilities to maiksmen ov-t those who are not in the secret. It setting the rifle on cock, the operator manages to bring the tumbler round in such a way that the edge of it just reßtß on the triggerlever, aud though the rifle I was asked to try was an 81b. pull, the force required to disconnect it was the very slightest touch of the little finger. I don't wish to insinuate that Sergeant Dubberlin's rifle was in this state with his knowledge, at the time he was about io Bhoot and laid the weapon down; but it is certain that any of these rifles can be put in that state by those in the secret, and there is no remedy for it but to Are it off. When set as hair-triggers the gun is extremely dangerous in any one's hands, as the slightest shake or concussion might cause an explosion. Nearly all the members of the volunteers to whom I have spoken oo the subject admit the extreme danger of the practice, and express a hope that the authorities will for ever disqualify and punish any man who is found resorting to such an expedient, whether to gain an advantage or noi. Referring to Ihe the prosperity of the colony, the Fiji Times saye: — The present year young as it yet is, has, nevertheless, witnessed in our commerce the : bright dawn of a change which promises to speedily give us the full, light of prosperous day. It is a transition from the most circuiluous to the direct — from drowßy sluggishness to unfettered energy. The old eemihaphazard mode of business, via the e'der colones, was an incubus under which the producer labored fruitlessly and which compelled the storekeper to aid in a system wh ch he mu tjluve felt to have been suicidal. The consequence was loss to every one, anil particularly to the unfortunate producer and local trader. Instead of a regular and healthful circulation of the commercial life-currents, there are only spasms, alternate fever and ex-

haustion, resulting in general debility. The business circumlocution offices in Sydney and New Zealand put large prices to their red tape, and in the roundabout process by which goods arrived here aud produce went to England, the growth of charges appeared to be copied from one of nature's favorite ratios, increasing as the squares of the distances. Double freight, quadruple dues, and exactions of all sorts, commission upon commission, comraißßßion on the commission for paying a commission, huge expense upon expense, bleeding upon bleeding, and when the producer obtainod the attenuated return for his crop he probably found himself in debt. Then in, purchasing, he had to pay profit upou profit up to half-a-dozan times, before he could get a hoe or a fathom of cloth. We have need to rejoice tbat the extortionate depotism of Sydney and New Zealand over Fiji is now fast drawing to a close by the estabtablisbment of a line of vessels sailing direct from Fiji to London, and back again direcf.