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Matilda Betham-Edwards - Holidays in Eastern France
accomplished, not only learning singing, drawing and other accomplishments, but are able to take part in
dramatic entertainments. Two performances were given by the boys, two by the girls, a little play being
followed by a recitation; and I must say I never heard anything of the kind in a village-school in England.
These children acquitted themselves of their parts remarkably well, especially the girls, and their
accuracy, pure accent, and delivery generally, spoke volumes for the training they had received; of
awkwardness there was not a trace. Of course there were speeches from the Mayor, M. le Cure, and
others, also music and singing, and a large number of excellent books were distributed, each recipient
being at the same time crowned with a wreath of artificial flowers.
It is to be hoped that ere many years, thanks to the new law enforcing compulsory education, the
excellent education these children receive will be the portion of every boy and girl in France, and that an
adult unable to read and write - the rule, not the exception, among the rural population in Brittany - will
be unheard of. A friend of mine from Nantes recently took with her to Paris a young Breton maidservant,
who had been educated by the "Bonnes Soeurs," that is to say the nuns. What was the poor girl's
astonishment to find that in Paris everybody was so far accomplished as to be able to read and write? Her
surprise would have been greater still, had she witnessed the acquirements of these little Couilly girls,
many of them, like herself, daughters of small peasant farmers.
It must be mentioned, for the satisfaction of those who regard the progress of education with some
concern, that the elegant bonnets and dresses I speak of are laid aside on week days, and that nowhere in
France do people work harder than here. But when not at work they like to wear good clothes and read
the newspapers as well as their neighbours. Take our laundress, for instance, an admirable young woman,
who gets up clothes to perfection, and who on Sunday exchanges her cotton gown and apron for the
smartest of Parisian costumes. The amount of underclothes these countrywomen possess is sometimes
enormous, and they pride themselves upon the largest possible quantity, a great part of which is of course
laid by. They count their garments not by dozens but by scores, and can thus afford to wait for the
quarterly washing-day, as they often do. It must be also mentioned that cleanliness is uniformly found
throughout these flourishing villages, and, in most, hot and cold public baths. Dirt is rare - I might almost
say unknown - also rags, neither of which as yet we have seen throughout our long walks and drives,
except in the case of a company of tramps we encountered one day. Drunkenness is also comparatively
absent, in some places we might say absolutely.
As we make further acquaintance with these favoured regions, we might suppose that here, at least, the
dreams of Utopians had come true, and that poverty, squalor, and wretchedness were banished for ever.
The abundant crops around us are apportioned out to all, and the soil, which, if roughly cultivated
according to English notions, yet bears marvellously, is not the heritage of one or two, but of the people.
The poorest has his bit of land, to which he adds from time to time by the fruit of his industry, and
though tenant-farming is carried on largely, owing to the wealth and enterprize of the agricultural
population, the tenant-farmers almost always possess land of their own, and they hire more in order to
save money for future purchases. Of course they could only make tenant-farming pay by means of
excessive economy and laboriousness, as the rents are high, but in these respects they are not wanting.
The fertility of the soil is not more astonishing than the variety of produce we find here, though pasturage
and cheese-making are their chief occupations, and fruit crops are produced in other parts. We find, as
has been before mentioned, fruit-trees everywhere, corn, fruit, and vegetables all growing with
unimaginable luxuriance. The pastures are also very fine, but we see no cattle out to graze; the harvest
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