"Ah, but wait till you see the grinding! That is the grand time of the year on a plantation! Some night, soon, a frost will come; in the gray daylight it will look like flour sprinkled all over the cane; then, when it gets lighter, it looks like silver; when the sun gets on it, it is diamonds, diamonds scattered everywhere. Then you hear the cane-knives, cling! clang! cling! clang! and the cane falling, fron! fron! fron! fron! One cut at the top, one cut at the roots, over it goes! Each hand takes a row; I tell you the women are not behind the men then! I have seen them keep up, step by step, twenty rows at a time! A field soon gets flat and bare at that rate; then the carts coming and going, dumping their loads in the shed, the sugar-mill with all steam up; and the cane-carrier,—you will hear them sing at the cane-carrier! You never heard singing like that, all day, all night."
Did Marie hear or not?
"That will be fine, eh, bébé?"
She only shook her head.
"The river ran in front of the old plantation, just as it does here," Marcélite continued coura-
