Our coming is a gala day. The hamlet flies three flags, the
free trader sports his own initials "H.N.," the Hudson's Bay Company
loyally runs the Union Jack to the masthead, over the convent floats the
tri-colour of France. Fort Providence is hot. We walk to the convent and
are hospitably received by the nuns. They call their Red flock together
for us to inspect and show us marvellous handwork of silk embroidery on
white deerskin. The daintiest of dainty slippers calls forth the
question, "Where are you going to find the Cinderella for these?" A
blank look is my answer, for no one in Providence Convent has ever heard
of Cinderella! But then, convents are not supposed to be the
repositories of man-knowledge (although a half-breed, on our passage
across the lake, did whisper a romantic story of a Klondiker who
assailed this very fortress and tried to carry off the prettiest nun of
the north). The garden of the Sisters is a bower of all the
old-fashioned flowers--hollyhocks, wall-flower, Canterbury bells, and
sweet-William--and down in the corner a young girl of the Dog-Ribs
discovers to us a nest of fledgling chipping sparrows.
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