Beside the High Street
there were a few little side alleys, mostly inhabited by locksmiths,
who worked with untiring industry from morning till night, keeping
up a cheerful but far from unpleasing din which, mingled with the
roar of the breakers below, reached the ear as a soft musical ring
of metal. The only prominently ugly features in the charming picture
were the few villas on the neighboring heights, built by retired
Paris grocers and haberdashers; liliputian, pretentious, with
blatant, highly-colored facades, ludicrous imitations of baronial
fortresses, Venetian palaces, or Renaissance chateaux.
The inhabitants of Ault were a peaceable, sober-minded people. No
one was ever drunk, nor was the sound of quarreling ever to be
heard. There were few public-houses; several places, however,
dignified by the name of cafes. The natives were so far accustomed
to summer visitors that they did not take much notice of them, but
happily not so much as to direct their whole thought and energy to
fleecing them. It seemed as if the people of Ault had merely
arranged a bathing place for the purpose of deriving a little
amusement out of the strangers, not in order to make a living out of
them, that being quite unnecessary, as their comfortable figures,
good clothes, and well-filled shops could testify.
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