Philip d'Avranche sauntered slowly through the Vier Marchi, nodding right and left to people who greeted him.

It was Saturday and market day in Jersey.

The square was crowded with people.

All was a cheerful babel; there was movement, colour everywhere.

Here were the high and the humble, hardi vlon and hardi biaou--the ugly and the beautiful, the dwarfed and the tall, the dandy and the dowdy, the miser and the spendthrift; young ladies gay in silks, laces, and scarfs from Spain, and gentlemen with powdered wigs from Paris; sailors with red tunics from the Mediterranean, and fishermen with blue and purple blouses from Brazil; man-o'-war's-men with Greek petticoats, Turkish fezzes, and Portuguese espadras.