No costume or grandiose outline is here as in Brittany, no
picturesque poverty, no poetic archaisms; all is rustic and pastoral,
but with the rusticity and pastoralness of every day.
We are in the midst of one of the wealthiest and best cultivated regions
of France moreover, and, when we penetrate below the surface, we find
that in manner and customs, as well as dress and outward appearance, the
peasant and agricultural population, generally, differ no little from
their remote country-people, the Bretons. In this famous cheese-making
country, the "Fromage de Brie" being the speciality of these rich dairy
farms, there is no superstition, hardly a trace of poverty, and little
that can be called poetic. The people are wealthy, laborious, and
progressive. The farmers' wives, however hard they may work at home,
wear the smartest of Parisian bonnets and gowns when paying visits. I
was going to say when at church, but nobody does go here!
It is a significant fact that in the fairly well to do educated
district, where newspapers are read by the poorest, where well-being is
the rule, poverty the exception, the church is empty on Sunday, and the
priest's authority is _nil_. The priests may preach against abstinence
from church in the pulpits, and may lecture their congregation in
private, no effect is thereby produced.
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