Waterloo by Erckmann-Chatrian

So it was that Monseigneur the Duke de Berry, visited the departments of the East. Every word he uttered was taken up and repeated again and again. Some praised his exceeding graciousness, and others kept silence. From that time I suspected that all these emigres and officers on half-pay, these preachers with their processions and their expiations, would overturn everything again, and about the beginning of winter we heard that not only with us, but all over Alsace affairs were growing worse and worse in just the same way.

One morning between eleven and twelve Father Goulden and I were both at work, each one thinking after his own fashion, and Catherine was laying the cloth. I started to go out to wash my hands at the pump, as I always did before dinner, when I saw an old woman wiping her feet on the straw mat at the foot of the stairs and shaking her skirts which were covered with mud. She had a stout staff, and a large rosary hung from her neck. As I looked at her from the top of the stairs, she began to come up and I recognized her immediately by the folds about her eyes and the innumerable wrinkles round her little mouth, as Anna-Marie, the pilgrim of St. Witt. The poor old woman often brought us watches to mend, from pious people who had confidence in her, and Mr. Goulden was always delighted to see her.