She gave me, after an _omelette au cerfeuil_, a _fricassee_ of
chicken, with very fair wine of the district, red and white. Dessert and
coffee followed, and the charge was not much over a shilling.
As I left the village, I noticed upon a low building these words in large
letters, '_Depot de Sangsues_,' and concluded that catching leeches in the
pools about here was a local industry. On inquiring, however, I was told
that such was not the case, but that a man here had had a quantity of
leeches sent from Bordeaux to supply the district.
'But what is the meaning of this great liking for leeches?' I asked.
'Well,' replied my informant, 'I should tell you that the people about here
always used to be bled when they had anything the matter with them. But the
doctors will do it no longer, consequently we do it ourselves.'
The sad-looking peasants, with pale dark faces, whom I saw reaping their
meagre wheat on the outskirts of the village, seemed, like many more I had
met since I left Riberac, to be in much greater need of blood than leeches.
Women, wearing straw-bonnets of the coal-scuttle shape, were reaping with
men in the noonday heat. Upon all the burden of life appeared to press very
heavily.
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