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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Devil's Pool, by George Sand
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Devil's Pool
+
+Author: George Sand
+
+Illustrator: E. Abot
+
+Translator: Jane Minot Sedgwick And Ellery Sedgwick
+
+Release Date: July 4, 2007 [EBook #21993]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEVIL'S POOL ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+THE DEVIL'S POOL
+
+By George Sand
+
+
+Translated From The French By Jane Minot Sedgwick And Ellery Sedgwick
+
+
+With An Etching By E. Abot
+
+1901
+
+
+
+
+THE DEVIL'S POOL
+
+
+
+THE AUTHOR TO THE READER
+
+     _A la sueur de ton visaige,
+        Tu gagnerais ta pauvre vie.
+     Apres long travail et usaige,
+        Voicy la mort qui te convie._ *
+
+THIS quaint old French verse, written under one of Holbein's pictures,
+is profoundly melancholy. The engraving represents a laborer driving his
+plow through the middle of a field. Beyond him stretches a vast horizon,
+dotted with wretched huts; the sun is sinking behind the hill. It is the
+end of a hard day's work. The peasant is old, bent, and clothed in rags.
+He is urging onward a team of four thin and exhausted horses; the
+plowshare sinks into a stony and ungrateful soil. One being only is
+active and alert in this scene of toil and sorrow. It is a fantastic
+creature. A skeleton armed with a whip, who acts as plowboy to the old
+laborer, and running along through the furrow beside the terrified
+horses, goads them on. This is the specter Death, whom Holbein has
+introduced allegorically into that series of religious and philosophic
+subjects, at once melancholy and grotesque, entitled "The Dance of
+Death."
+
+   * In toil and sorrow thou shalt eat
+     The bitter bread of poverty.
+     After the burden and the heat,
+     Lo! it is Death who calls for thee.
+
+In this collection, or rather this mighty composition, where Death, who
+plays his part on every page, is the connecting link and predominating
+thought, Holbein has called up kings, popes, lovers, gamesters,
+drunkards, nuns, courtesans, thieves, warriors, monks, Jews, and
+travelers,--all the people of his time and our own; and everywhere the
+specter Death is among them, taunting, threatening, and triumphing. He
+is absent from one picture only, where Lazarus, lying on a dunghill at
+the rich man's door, declares that the specter has no terrors for him;
+probably because he has nothing to lose, and his existence is already a
+life in death.
+
+Is there comfort in this stoical thought of the half-pagan Christianity
+of the Renaissance, and does it satisfy religious souls? The upstart,
+the rogue, the tyrant, the rake, and all those haughty sinners who make
+an ill use of life, and whose steps are dogged by Death, will be surely
+punished; but can the reflection that death is no evil make amends for
+the long hardships of the blind man, the beggar, the madman, and the
+poor peasant? No! An inexorable sadness, an appalling fatality brood
+over the artist's work. It is like a bitter curse, hurled against the
+fate of humanity.
+
+Holbein's faithful delineation of the society in which he lived is,
+indeed, painful satire. His attention was engrossed by crime and
+calamity; but what shall we, who are artists of a later date, portray?
+Shall we look to find the reward of the human beings of to-day in
+the contemplation of death, and shall we invoke it as the penalty of
+unrighteousness and the compensation of suffering?
+
+No, henceforth, our business is not with death, but with life. We
+believe no longer in the nothingness of the grave, nor in safety bought
+with the price of a forced renunciation; life must be enjoyed in order
+to be fruitful. Lazarus must leave his dunghill, so that the poor need
+no longer exult in the death of the rich. All must be made happy, that
+the good fortune of a few may not be a crime and a curse. As the laborer
+sows his wheat, he must know that he is helping forward the work of
+life, instead of rejoicing that Death walks at his side. We may
+no longer consider death as the chastisement of prosperity or the
+consolation of distress, for God has decreed it neither as the
+punishment nor the compensation of life. Life has been blessed by Him,
+and it is no longer permissible for us to leave the grave as the only
+refuge for those whom we are unwilling to make happy.
+
+There are some artists of our own day, who, after a serious survey of
+their surroundings, take pleasure in painting misery, the sordidness of
+poverty, and the dunghill of Lazarus. This may belong to the domain of
+art and philosophy; but by depicting poverty as so hideous, so degraded,
+and sometimes so vicious and criminal, do they gain their end, and is
+that end as salutary as they would wish? We dare not pronounce judgment.
+They may answer that they terrify the unjust rich man by pointing out to
+him the yawning pit that lies beneath the frail covering of wealth; just
+as in the time of the Dance of Death, they showed him his gaping grave,
+and Death standing ready to fold him in an impure embrace. Now, they
+show him the thief breaking open his doors, and the murderer stealthily
+watching his sleep. We confess we cannot understand how we can reconcile
+him to the human nature he despises, or make him sensible of the
+sufferings of the poor wretch whom he dreads, by showing him this
+wretch in the guise of the escaped convict or the nocturnal burglar. The
+hideous phantom Death, under the repulsive aspect in which he has been
+represented by Holbein and his predecessors, gnashing his teeth and
+playing the fiddle, has been powerless to convert the wicked and console
+their victims. And does not our literature employ the same means as the
+artists of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance?
+
+The revelers of Holbein fill their glasses in a frenzy to dispel the
+idea of Death, who is their cup-bearer, though they do not see him. The
+unjust rich of our own day demand cannon and barricades to drive out
+the idea of an insurrection of the people which Art shows them as slowly
+working in the dark, getting ready to burst upon the State. The Church
+of the Middle Ages met the terrors of the great of the earth with the
+sale of indulgences. The government of to-day soothes the uneasiness of
+the rich by exacting from them large sums for the support of policemen,
+jailors, bayonets, and prisons.
+
+Albert Durer, Michael Angelo, Holbein, Callot, and Goya have made
+powerful satires on the evils of their times and countries, and their
+immortal works are historical documents of unquestionable value. We
+shall not refuse to artists the right to probe the wounds of society
+and lay them bare to our eyes; but is the only function of art still
+to threaten and appall? In the literature of the mysteries of iniquity,
+which talent and imagination have brought into fashion, we prefer the
+sweet and gentle characters, which can attempt and effect conversions,
+to the melodramatic villains, who inspire terror; for terror never cures
+selfishness, but increases it.
+
+We believe that the mission of art is a mission of sentiment and love,
+that the novel of to-day should take the place of the parable and the
+fable of early times, and that the artist has a larger and more poetic
+task than that of suggesting certain prudential and conciliatory
+measures for the purpose of diminishing the fright caused by his
+pictures. His aim should be to render attractive the objects he has at
+heart, and, if necessary, I have no objection to his embellishing them
+a little. Art is not the study of positive reality, but the search for
+ideal truth, and the "Vicar of Wakefield" was a more useful and healthy
+book than the "Paysan Perverti," or the "Liaisons Dangereuses."
+
+Forgive these reflections of mine, kind reader, and let them stand as
+a preface, for there will be no other to the little story I am going
+to relate to you. My tale is to be so short and so simple, that I felt
+obliged to make you my apologies for it beforehand, by telling you what
+I think of the literature of terror.
+
+I have allowed myself to be drawn into this digression for the sake of a
+laborer; and it is the story of a laborer which I have been meaning to
+tell you, and which I shall now tell you at once.
+
+
+
+
+I -- The Tillage of the Soil
+
+I HAD just been looking long and sadly at Holbein's plowman, and was
+walking through the fields, musing on rustic life and the destiny of
+the husbandman. It is certainly tragic for him to spend his days and his
+strength delving in the jealous earth, that so reluctantly yields up her
+rich treasures when a morsel of coarse black bread, at the end of the
+day's work, is the sole reward and profit to be reaped from such arduous
+toil. The wealth of the soil, the harvests, the fruits, the splendid
+cattle that grow sleek and fat in the luxuriant grass, are the property
+of the few, and but instruments of the drudgery and slavery of the many.
+The man of leisure seldom loves, for their own sake, the fields and
+meadows, the landscape, or the noble animals which are to be converted
+into gold for his use. He comes to the country for his health or for
+change of air, but goes back to town to spend the fruit of his vassal's
+labor.
+
+On the other hand, the peasant is too abject, too wretched, and too
+fearful of the future to enjoy the beauty of the country and the charms
+of pastoral life. To him, also, the yellow harvest-fields, the rich
+meadows, the fine cattle represent bags of gold; but he knows that
+only an infinitesimal part of their contents, insufficient for his daily
+needs, will ever fall to his share. Yet year by year he must fill those
+accursed bags, to please his master and buy the right of living on his
+land in sordid wretchedness. Yet nature is eternally young, beautiful,
+and generous. She pours forth poetry and beauty on all creatures and
+all plants that are allowed free development.
+
+She owns the secret of happiness, of which no one has ever robbed her.
+The happiest of men would be he who, knowing the full meaning of his
+labor, should, while working with his hands, find his happiness and his
+freedom in the exercise of his intelligence, and, having his heart in
+unison with his brain, should at once understand his own work and love
+that of God, The artist has such delights as these in contemplating and
+reproducing the beauties of nature; but if his heart be true and tender,
+his pleasure is disturbed when he sees the miseries of the men who
+people this paradise of earth. True happiness will be theirs when mind,
+heart, and hand shall work in concert in the sight of Heaven, and there
+shall be a sacred harmony between God's goodness and the joys of his
+creatures. Then, instead of the pitiable and frightful figure of Death
+stalking, whip in hand, across the fields, the painter of allegories
+may place beside the peasant a radiant angel, sowing the blessed grain
+broadcast in the smoking furrow. The dream of a serene, free, poetic,
+laborious, and simple life for the tiller of the soil is not so
+impossible that we should banish it as a chimera. The sweet, sad words
+of Virgil: "Oh, happy the peasants of the field, if they knew their own
+blessings!" is a regret, but, like all regrets, it is also a prophecy.
+The day will come when the laborer too may be an artist, and may at
+least feel what is beautiful, if he cannot express it,--a matter of far
+less importance. Do not we know that this mysterious poetic intuition
+is already his, in the form of instinct and vague reverie? Among those
+peasants who possess some of the comforts of life, and whose moral
+and intellectual development is not entirely stifled by extreme
+wretchedness, pure happiness that can be felt and appreciated exists
+in the elementary stage; and, moreover, since poets have already raised
+their voices out of the lap of pain and of weariness, why should we say
+that the labor of the hands excludes the working of the soul? Without
+doubt this exclusion is the common result of excessive toil and of deep
+misery; but let it not be said that when men shall work moderately and
+usefully there will be nothing but bad workers and bad poets. The man
+who draws in noble joy from the poetic feeling is a true poet, though he
+has never written a verse all his life.
+
+My thoughts had flown in this direction, without my perceiving that
+my confidence in the capacity of man for education was strengthened by
+external influences. I was walking along the edge of a field, which some
+peasants were preparing to sow. The space was vast as that in Holbein's
+picture; the landscape, too, was vast and framed in a great sweep of
+green, slightly reddened by the approach of autumn. Here and there in
+the great russet field, slender rivulets of water left in the furrows by
+the late rains sparkled in the sunlight like silver threads. The day was
+clear and mild, and the soil, freshly cleft by the plowshare, sent up
+a light steam. At the other extremity of the field, an old man, whose
+broad shoulders and stern face recalled Holbein's plowman, but whose
+clothes carried no suggestion of poverty, was gravely driving his plow
+of antique shape, drawn by two placid oxen, true patriarchs of the
+meadow, tall and rather thin, with pale yellow coats and long, drooping
+horns. They were those old workers who, through long habit, have grown
+to be _brothers_, as they are called in our country, and who, when one
+loses the other, refuse to work with a new comrade, and pine away with
+grief. People who are unfamiliar with the country call the love of the
+ox for his yoke-fellow a fable. Let them come and see in the corner of
+the stable one of these poor beasts, thin and wasted, restlessly lashing
+his lean flanks with his tail, violently breathing with mingled terror
+and disdain on the food offered him, his eyes always turned toward the
+door, scratching with his hoof the empty place at his side, sniffing the
+yokes and chains which his fellow used to wear, and incessantly calling
+him with melancholy lowings. The ox-herd will say: "There is a pair
+of oxen gone;' this one will work no more, for his brother is dead. We
+ought to fatten him for the market, but he will not eat, and will soon
+starve himself to death." The old laborer worked slowly, silently, and
+without waste of effort His docile team were in no greater haste than
+he; but, thanks to the undistracted steadiness of his toil and the
+judicious expenditure of his strength, his furrow was as soon plowed as
+that of his son, who was driving, at some distance from him, four less
+vigorous oxen through a more stubborn and stony piece of ground.
+
+My attention was next caught by a fine spectacle, a truly noble subject
+for a painter. At the other end of the field a fine-looking youth was
+driving a magnificent team of four pairs of young oxen, through whose
+somber coats glanced a ruddy, glow-like name. They had the short, curry
+heads that belong to the wild bull, the same large, fierce eyes and
+jerky movements; they worked in an abrupt, nervous way that showed how
+they still rebelled against the yoke and goad, and trembled with anger
+as they obeyed the authority so recently imposed. They were what is
+called "newly yoked" oxen. The man who drove them had to clear a corner
+of the field that had formerly been given up to pasture, and was
+filled with old tree-stumps; and his youth and energy, and his eight
+half-broken animals, hardly sufficed for the Herculean task.
+
+A child of six or seven years old, lovely as an angel, wearing round his
+shoulders, over his blouse, a sheepskin that made him look like a little
+Saint John the Baptist out of a Renaissance picture, was running along
+in the furrow beside the plow, pricking the flanks of the oxen with a
+long, light goad but slightly sharpened. The spirited animals quivered
+under the child's light touch, making their yokes and head-bands creak,
+and shaking the pole violently. Whenever a root stopped the advance
+of the plowshare, the laborer would call every animal by name in his
+powerful voice, trying to calm rather than to excite them; for the oxen,
+irritated by the sudden resistance, bounded, pawed the ground with their
+great cloven hoofs, and would have jumped aside and dragged the plow
+across the fields, if the young man had not kept the first four in order
+with his voice and goad, while the child controlled the four others.
+The little fellow shouted too, but the voice which he tried to make of
+terrible effect, was as sweet as his angelic face. The whole scene was
+beautiful in its grace and strength; the landscape, the man, the child,
+the oxen under the yoke; and in spite of the mighty struggle by which
+the earth was subdued, a deep feeling of peace and sweetness reigned
+over all. Each time that an obstacle was surmounted and the plow resumed
+its even, solemn progress, the laborer, whose pretended violence was
+but a trial of his strength, and an outlet for his energy, instantly
+regained that serenity which is the right of simple souls, and looked
+with fatherly pleasure toward his child, who turned to smile back at
+him. Then the young father would raise his manly voice in the solemn
+and melancholy chant that ancient tradition transmits, not indeed to all
+plowmen indiscriminately, but to those who are most perfect in the art
+of exciting and sustaining the spirit of cattle while at work. This
+song, which was probably sacred in its origin, and to which mysterious
+influences must once have been attributed, is still thought to
+possess the virtue of putting animals on their mettle, allaying their
+irritation, and of beguiling the weariness of their long, hard toil.
+It is not enough to guide them skilfully, to trace a perfectly straight
+furrow, and to lighten their labor by raising the plowshare or driving
+it into the earth; no man can be a consummate husbandman who does not
+know how to sing to his oxen, and that is an art that requires taste
+and especial gifts. To tell the truth, this chant is only a recitative,
+broken off and taken up at pleasure. Its irregular form and its
+intonations that violate all the rules of musical art make it impossible
+to describe.
+
+But it is none the less a noble song, and so appropriate is it to the
+nature of the work it accompanies, to the gait of the oxen, to the peace
+of the fields, and to the simplicity of the men who sing it, that no
+genius unfamiliar with the tillage of the earth, and no man except an
+accomplished laborer of our part of the country, could repeat it. At the
+season of the year when there is no work or stir afoot except that of
+the plowman, this strong, sweet refrain rises like the voice of the
+breeze, to which the key it is sung in gives it some resemblance. Each
+phrase ends with a long trill, the final note of which is held with
+incredible strength of breath, and rises a quarter of a tone, sharping
+systematically. It is barbaric, but possesses an unspeakable charm, and
+anybody, once accustomed to hear it, cannot conceive of another song
+taking its place at the same hour and in the same place, without
+striking a discord.
+
+So it was that I had before my eyes a picture the reverse of that of
+Holbein, although the scene was similar. Instead of a wretched old man,
+a young and active one; instead of a team of weary and emaciated horses,
+four yoke of robust and fiery oxen; instead of death, a beautiful
+child; instead of despair and destruction, energy and the possibility of
+happiness.
+
+Then the old French verse, "A la sueur de ton vis-aige," etc., and
+Virgil's "O fortunatos... agricolas," returned to my mind, and seeing
+this lovely child and his father, under such poetic conditions, and with
+so much grace and strength, accomplish a task full of such grand
+and solemn suggestions, I was conscious of deep pity and involuntary
+respect. Happy the peasant of the fields! Yes, and so too should I be
+in his place, if my arm and voice could be endowed with sudden strength,
+and I could help to make Nature fruitful, and sing of her gifts, without
+ceasing to see with my eyes or understand with my brain harmonious
+colors and sounds, delicate shades and graceful outlines; in short, the
+mysterious beauty of all things. And above all, if my heart continued
+to beat in concert with the divine sentiment that presided over the
+immortal sublimity of creation.
+
+But, alas! this man has never understood the mystery of beauty; this
+child will never understand it. God forbid that I should not think them
+superior to the animals which are subject to them, or that they have not
+moments of rapturous insight that soothe their toil and lull their cares
+to sleep. I see the seal of the Lord upon their noble brows, for they
+were born to inherit the earth far more truly than those who have bought
+and paid for it. The proof that they feel this is that they cannot be
+exiled with impunity, that they love the soil they have watered with
+their tears, and that the true peasant dies of homesickness under the
+arms of a soldier far from his native field. But he lacks some of my
+enjoyments, those pure delights which should be his by right, as a
+workman in that immense temple which the sky only is vast enough
+to embrace. He lacks the consciousness of his sentiment. Those who
+condemned him to slavery from his mother's womb, being unable to rob him
+of his vague dreams, took away from him the power of reflection.
+
+Yet, imperfect being that he is, sentenced to eternal childhood, he is
+nobler than the man in whom knowledge has stifled feeling. Do not set
+yourselves above him, you who believe yourselves invested with a lawful
+and inalienable right to rule over him, for your terrible mistake shows
+that your brain has destroyed your heart, and that you are the blindest
+and most incomplete of men! I love the simplicity of his soul more than
+the false lights of yours; and if I had to narrate the story of his
+life, the pleasure I should take in bringing out the tender and touching
+side of it would be greater than your merit in painting the degradation
+and contempt into which he is cast by your social code.
+
+I knew the young man and the beautiful child; I knew their history, for
+they had a history. Everybody has his own, and could make the romance
+of his life interesting, if he could but understand it. Although but a
+peasant and a laborer, Germain had always been aware of his duties and
+affections. He had related them to me clearly and ingenuously, and I had
+listened with interest. After some time spent in watching him plow, it
+occurred to me that I might write his story, though that story were as
+simple, as straightforward, and unadorned as the furrow he was tracing.
+
+Next year that furrow will be filled and covered by a fresh one. Thus
+disappear most of the footprints made by man in the field of human life.
+A little earth obliterates them, and the furrows we have dug succeed one
+another like graves in a cemetery. Is not the furrow of the laborer of
+as much value as that of the idler, even if that idler, by some absurd
+chance, have made a little noise in the world, and left behind him an
+abiding name?
+
+I mean, if possible, to save from oblivion the furrow of Germain,
+the skilled husbandman. He will never know nor care, but I shall take
+pleasure in my talk.
+
+
+
+
+II -- Father Maurice
+
+"GERMAIN," said his father-in-law one day, "you must decide about
+marrying again. It is almost two years now since you lost my daughter,
+and your eldest boy is seven years old! You are almost thirty, my boy,
+and you know that in our country a man is considered too old to go to
+housekeeping again after that age; you have three nice children, and
+thus far they have not proved a burden to us at all. My wife and my
+daughter-in-law have looked after them as well as they could, and loved
+them as they ought. Here is Petit-Pierre almost grown up. He goads the
+oxen very well; he knows how to look after the cattle; and he is strong
+enough to drive the horses to the trough. So it is not he that worries
+us. But the other two, love them though we do, God knows the poor little
+innocents give us trouble enough this year; my daughter-in-law is about
+to lie in, and she has yet another baby to attend to. When the child
+we are expecting comes, she will not be able to look after your little
+Solange, and above all your Sylvain, who is not four years old, and who
+is never quiet day or night. He has a restless disposition like yours;
+that will make a good workman of him, but it makes a dreadful child, and
+my old wife cannot run fast enough to save him when he almost tumbles
+into the ditch, or when he throws himself in front of the tramping
+cattle. And then with this other that my daughter-in-law is going to
+bring into the world, for a month at least her next older child will
+fall on my wife's hands. Besides, your children worry us, and give us
+too much to do; we hate to see children badly looked after, and when we
+think of the accidents that may befall them, for want of care, we cannot
+rest. So you need another wife, and I another daughter-in-law. Think
+this over, my son. I have called it to your mind before. Time flies,
+and the years will not wait a moment for you. It is your duty to your
+children and to the rest of us, who wish all well at home, to marry as
+soon as you can." "Very well, father," answered the son-in-law, "if you
+really wish it, I must do as you say. But I do not wish to hide it from
+you that it will make me very sad, and that I hardly wish tor anything
+but to drown myself. We know who it is we lose, we never know whom we
+find. I had a good wife, a pretty wife, sweet, brave, good to her father
+and mother, good to her husband, good to her children, good to toil in
+the fields and in the house, well fitted to work,--in short, good for
+everything; and when you had given her to me, and I took her, we did
+not place it among our promises that I should go and forget about her if
+I had the misfortune to lose her."
+
+"What you say shows your good heart, Germain," answered Father Maurice.
+"I know that you loved my daughter and that you made her happy, and
+that had you been able to satisfy Death by going in her place, Catherine
+would be alive today, and you would be in the graveyard. She deserved
+all your love, and if you are not consoled, neither are we. But I do not
+speak to you of forgetting her: God wished her to leave us, and we do
+not let a day go by without telling him in our prayers and thoughts,
+and words and actions, that we keep her memory and still sorrow for her
+loss. But if she could speak to you from the other world, and let you
+know what she wishes, she would tell you to find a mother for her little
+orphans. So the question is to find a woman who will be worthy to take
+her place. It will not be easy, but it is not impossible. And when
+we shall find her for you, you will love her as you used to love my
+daughter, because you are a good man, and because you will be thankful
+to her for helping us and for loving your children."
+
+"Very well, Father Maurice, I shall do as you wish, as I have always
+done."
+
+"It is only justice, my son, to say that you have always listened to the
+friendly advice and good judgment of the head of the house. So let us
+consult about your choice of a new wife. First, I don't advise you to
+take a young girl. That is not what you need. Youth is careless, and, as
+it is hard work to bring up three children, especially when they are of
+another bed, you must have a good soul, wise and gentle, and well used
+to work. If your wife is not about the same age as you, she will have
+no reason to accept such a duty. She will find you too old and your
+children too young. She will be complaining, and your children will
+suffer."
+
+"This is just what makes me uneasy. Suppose the poor little things
+should be badly treated, hated, beaten?"
+
+"God grant not," answered the old man. "But bad women are more rare with
+us than good, and we shall be stupid if we cannot pick out somebody who
+will suit us."
+
+"That is true, father. There are good girls in our village. There is
+Louise, Sylvaine, Claudie, Marguerite--yes, anybody you want."
+
+"Gently, gently, my boy. All these girls are too young, or too poof,
+or too pretty; for surely we must think of that top, my son. A pretty
+woman is not always as well behaved as another!"
+
+"Then you wish me to take an ugly wife?" said Germain, a little uneasy.
+
+"No, not ugly at all, for this woman will bear you other children, and
+there is nothing more miserable than to have children who are ugly and
+weak and sickly. But a woman still fresh and in good health, who is
+neither pretty nor ugly, would suit you exactly."
+
+"I am quite sure," said Germain, smiling rather sadly, "that to get
+such a woman as you wish, you must have her made to order. All the more
+because you don't wish her to be poor, and the rich are not easy to get,
+particularly for a widower."
+
+"And suppose she were a widow herself, Germain? A widow without children
+and with a good portion?"
+
+"For the moment, I cannot think of anybody like this in our parish."
+
+"Nor I either. But there are others elsewhere."
+
+"You have somebody in mind, father. Then tell me, at once, who it is."
+
+
+
+
+III -- Germain, the Skilled Husbandman
+
+"YES, I have somebody in mind," replied Father Maurice. "It is a
+Leonard, the widow of a Guerin. She lives at Fourche."
+
+"I know neither the woman nor the place," answered Germain, resigned,
+but growing more and more melancholy.
+
+"Her name is Catherine, like your dead wife's."
+
+"Catherine? Yes, I shall be glad to have to pronounce that name,
+Catherine; and yet if I cannot love one as much as the other, it will
+pain me all the more. It will bring her to my mind more often."
+
+"I tell you, you will love her. She is a good soul, a woman with a warm
+heart. I have not seen her for a long time. She was not an ugly girl
+then. But she is no longer young. She is thirty-two. She comes of a good
+family, honest people all of them, and for property she has eight or ten
+thousand francs in land which she would sell gladly in order to invest
+in the place where she settles. For she, too, is thinking of marrying
+again, and I know that if your character pleases her, she will not be
+dissatisfied with your situation."
+
+"So you have made all the arrangements?"
+
+"Yes, except that I have not had an opinion from either of you, and that
+is what you must ask each other when you meet. The woman's father is
+a distant connection of mine, and he has been a good friend to me. You
+know Father Leonard well?"
+
+"Yes, I have seen you two talking at the market, and at the last you
+lunched together. Then it was about her that he spoke to you so long?"
+
+"Certainly. He watched you selling your cattle and saw that you drove
+a shrewd bargain, and that you were a good-looking fellow and appeared
+active and intelligent; and when I told him what a good fellow you were
+and how well you have behaved toward us, without one word of vexation or
+anger during the eight years we have been living and working together,
+he took it into his head to marry you to his daughter. This suits me,
+too, I admit, when I think of her good reputation and the honesty of her
+family and the prosperous condition I know her affairs are in."
+
+"I see, Father Maurice, that you have an eye to money."
+
+"Of course I do; you have, too, have you not?"
+
+"I do look toward it, if you wish, for your sake; but you know that,
+for my own part, I don't worry whether I gain or not in what we make. I
+don't understand about profit-sharing; I have no head for that sort
+of thing. I understand the ground; I understand cattle, horses, carts,
+sowing, threshing, and provender. As for sheep, and vineyards, and
+vegetables, petty profits, and fine gardening, you know that is your
+son's business. I don't have much to do with it. As to money, my memory
+is short, and I should rather give up everything than fight about what
+is yours and what is mine. I should be afraid of making some mistake and
+claiming what does not belong to me, and if business were not so clear
+and simple I should never find my way in it."
+
+"So much the worse, my son; and this is the reason I wish you to have a
+wife with a clear head to fill my place when I am gone. You never wished
+to understand our accounts, and this might lead you into a quarrel with
+my son, when you don't have me any longer to keep you in harmony and
+decide what is each one's share."
+
+"May you live long, Father Maurice. But do not worry about what will
+happen when you die. I shall never quarrel with your son. I trust
+Jacques as I do you; and as I have no property of my own, and all that
+might accrue to me comes from your daughter and belongs to our children,
+I can rest easy, and you, too. Jacques would never rob his sister's
+children for the sake of his own, for he loves them all equally."
+
+"You are right, Germain. Jacques is a good son, a good brother, and a
+man who loves the truth. But Jacques may die before you, before your
+children grow up; and in a family we must always remember never to
+leave children without a head to look after them and govern their
+disagreements; otherwise, the lawyer-people mix themselves up in it,
+stir them up to fight, and make them eat up everything in law-suits.
+So we ought not to think of bringing home another person, man or woman,
+without remembering that some day or other that person may have to
+control the behavior and business of twenty or thirty children and
+grandchildren, sons-in-law and daughters-in-law. We never know how big a
+family can grow, and when a hive is so full that the bees must form new
+swarms, each one wishes to carry off her share of the honey. When I took
+you for my son, although my daughter was rich and you were poor, I never
+reproached her for choosing you. I saw that you were a hard worker, and
+I knew very well that the best fortune for people in such a country as
+ours is a pair of arms and a heart like yours. When a man brings these
+into a family, he brings enough. But with a woman it is different. Her
+work indoors saves, but it does not gain. Besides, now that you are
+a father, looking for a second wife, you must remember that your new
+children will have no claim on the property of your children by another
+wife; and if you should happen to die they might suffer very much--at
+least, if your wife had no money in her own right. And then the children
+which you will add to our colony will cost something to bring up. If
+that fell on us alone, we should surely take care of them without a word
+of complaint; but the comfort of everybody would suffer, and your eldest
+children would bear their share of hardship. When families grow too
+large, if money does not keep pace, misery comes, no matter how bravely
+you bear up. This is what I wished to say, Germain; think it over,
+and try to make the widow Guerin like you; for her discretion and her
+dollars will help us now and make us feel easy about the future."
+
+"That is true, Father. I shall try to please her and to like her."
+
+"To do that you must go to find her, and see her."
+
+"At her own place? At Fourche? That is a great way from here, is it not?
+And we scarcely have time to run off at this season of the year."
+
+"When it is a question of a love-match you must make up your mind to
+lose time, but when it is a sensible marriage of two people, who take
+no sudden fancies and know what they want, it is very soon decided.
+To-morrow is Saturday; you will make your day's work a little shorter
+than usual. You must start after dinner about two o'clock. You will be
+at Fourche by nightfall. The moon rises early. The roads are good, and
+it is not more than three leagues distant. It is near Magnier. Besides,
+you will take the mare."
+
+"I had just as lief go afoot in this cool weather."
+
+"Yes, but the mare is pretty, and a suitor looks better when he comes
+well mounted. You must put on your new clothes and carry a nice present
+of game to Father Leonard. You will come from me and talk with him, pass
+all of Sunday with his daughter, and come back Monday morning with a yes
+or no."
+
+"Very well," answered Germain calmly, and yet he did not feel very calm.
+
+Germain had always lived soberly, as industrious peasants do. Married
+at twenty, he had loved but one woman in his life, and after her death,
+impulsive and gay as his nature was, he had never played nor trifled
+with another. He had borne a real sorrow faithfully in his heart, and
+it was not without misgiving nor without sadness that he yielded to his
+father-in-law; but that father had always governed the family wisely,
+and Germain, entirely devoted as he was to the common welfare and so,
+by consequence, to the head of the house, who represented it, could not
+understand that he might have wronged his own good sense and hurt the
+interests of all. Nevertheless, he was sad. Few days went by when he did
+not cry in secret, for his wife, and although loneliness began to weigh
+on him, he was more afraid of entering into a new marriage than desirous
+of finding a support in his sorrow. He had a vague idea that love might
+have consoled him by coming to him of a sudden, for this is the only way
+love can console. We never find it when we seek it; it comes over us
+unawares.
+
+This cold-blooded scheme of marriage that Father Maurice had opened to
+him, this unknown woman he was to take for his bride, perhaps even all
+that had been said to him of her virtue and good sense, made him pause
+to think. And he went away musing as men do whose thoughts are too few
+to divide into hostile factions, not scraping up fine arguments for
+rebellion and selfishness but suffering from a dull grief, submissive to
+ills from which there is no escape.
+
+Meanwhile, Father Maurice had returned to the farm, while Germain,
+between sunset and dark, spent the closing hour of the day in repairing
+gaps the sheep had made in the hedge of a yard near the farm-buildings.
+He lifted up the branches of the thorn-bushes and held them in place
+with clods of earth, whilst the thrushes chattered in the neighboring
+thicket and seemed to call to him to hurry, for they were eager to come
+and see his work as soon as he had gone.
+
+
+
+
+IV -- Mother Guillette
+
+FATHER MAURICE found at his house an old neighbor who had come to talk
+with his wife, seeking at the same time to secure a few embers to light
+her fire. Mother Guillette lived in a wretched hut two gunshots away
+from the farm. Still she was a willing and an orderly woman. Her poor
+dwelling was clean and neat, and the care with which her clothes were
+mended showed that she respected herself in the midst of her penury.
+
+"You have come to fetch your evening fire, Mother Guillette," said the
+old man to her. "Is there anything else you want?"
+
+"No, Father Maurice," answered she; "nothing for the present. I am no
+beggar, as you know, and I take care not to abuse the kindness of my
+friends."
+
+"That is very true. Besides, your friends are always ready to do you a
+service."
+
+"I was just talking to your wife, and I was asking her if Germain had
+finally decided to marry again."
+
+"You are no gossip," replied Father Maurice; "we can talk in your
+presence without having any foolish tale-bearing to fear. So I will tell
+my wife and you that Germain has made up his mind absolutely. To-morrow
+morning he starts for the farm at Fourche."
+
+"Good enough!" cried Mother Maurice; "poor child! God grant he may find
+a woman as good and true as he."
+
+"So he is going to Fourche?" remarked Mother Guillette; "how lucky that
+is! It is exactly what I want. And since you were just asking me
+if there were anything I wished for, I am going to tell you, Father
+Maurice, how you can do me a service."
+
+"Tell me what it is; we like to help you."
+
+"I wish Germain would be so kind as to take my daughter along with him."
+
+"Where? To Fourche?"
+
+"No, not to Fourche, but to Ormeaux. She is to stay there the rest of
+the year."
+
+"What!" exclaimed Mother Maurice, "are you going to separate from your
+daughter?"
+
+"She must go out to work and earn her living. I am sorry enough, and she
+is too, poor soul. We could not make up our minds to part Saint John's
+Day, but now that Saint Martin's is upon us, she finds a good place as
+shepherdess at the farms at Ormeaux. On his way home from the fair the
+other day, the farmer passed by here. He caught sight of my little Marie
+tending her three sheep on the common.
+
+"'You have hardly enough to do, my little girl,' said he; 'three sheep
+are not enough for a shepherdess: would you like to take care of a
+hundred? I will take you along. Our shepherdess has fallen sick. She is
+going back to her family, and if you will be at our farm before a week
+is over, you shall have fifty francs for the rest of the year up to
+Saint John's Day.'
+
+"The child refused, but she could not help thinking it over and telling
+me about it, when she came home in the evening, and found me downhearted
+and worried about the winter, which was sure to be hard and long; for
+this year the cranes and wild ducks were seen crossing the sky a whole
+month before they generally do. We both of us cried, but after a time
+we took heart. We knew that we could not stay together, since it is hard
+enough for one person to get a living from our little patch of ground.
+Then since Marie is old enough,--for she is going on to sixteen,--she
+must do like the rest, earn her own living and help her poor mother."
+
+"Mother Guillette," said the old laborer, "if it were only fifty francs
+you needed to help you out of your trouble, and save you from sending
+away your daughter, I should certainly find them for you, although
+fifty francs is no trifle for people like us. But in everything we must
+consult common sense as well as friendship. To be saved from want this
+year will not keep you from want in the future, and the longer your
+daughter takes to make up her mind, the harder you both will find it
+to part. Little Marie is growing tall and strong. She has not enough at
+home to keep her busy. She might get into lazy habits..."
+
+"Oh, I am not afraid of that!" exclaimed Mother Guillette. "Marie is as
+active as a rich girl at the head of a large family can be. She never
+sits still with her arms folded for an instant, and when we have no work
+to do, she keeps dusting and polishing our old furniture until it shines
+like a mirror. The child is worth her weight in gold, and I should much
+rather have her enter your service as a shepherdess than go so far away
+to people I don't know. You would have taken her at Saint John's Day;
+but now you have hired all your hands, and we cannot think of that till
+Saint John's Day next year."
+
+"Yes, I consent with all my heart, Guillette. I shall be very glad to
+take her. But in the mean time she will do well to learn her work, and
+accustom herself to obey others."
+
+"Yes, that is true, no doubt. The die is cast. The farmer at Ormeaux
+sent to ask about her this morning; we consented, and she must go. But
+the poor child does not know the way, and I should not like to send her
+so far alone. Since your son-in-law goes to Fourche to-morrow, perhaps
+he can take her. It seems that Fourche is close to her journey's end. At
+least, so they tell me, for I have never made the trip myself."
+
+"It is very near indeed, and my son will show her the way. Naturally, he
+might even take her up behind him on the mare. That will save her shoes.
+Here he comes for supper. Tell me, Germain, Mother Guillette's little
+Marie is going to become a shepherdess at Ormeaux. Will you take her
+there on your horse?"
+
+"Certainly," answered Germain, who, troubled as he was, never felt
+indisposed to do a kindness to his neighbor.
+
+In our community a mother would not think of such a thing as to trust
+a girl of sixteen to a man of twenty-eight. For Germain was really
+but twenty-eight, and although according to the notions of the
+country people he was considered rather old to marry, he was still the
+best-looking man in the neighborhood. Toil had not wrinkled and worn him
+as it does most peasants who have passed ten years in till-ing the soil.
+He was strong enough to labor for ten more years without showing signs
+of age, and the prejudices of her time must have weighed heavily on the
+mind of a young girl to prevent her from seeing that Germain had a fresh
+complexion, eyes sparkling and blue as skies in May, ruddy lips, fine
+teeth, and a body well shaped and lithe as a young horse that has never
+yet left his pasture.
+
+But purity of manners is a sacred custom in some districts far distant
+from the corrupted life of great cities, and amongst all the
+households of Belair, the family of Maurice was known to be honest and
+truth-loving. Germain was on his way to find a wife. Marie was a child,
+too young and too poor to be thought of in this light, and unless he
+were a heartless and a bad man he could not entertain one evil thought
+concerning her. Father Maurice felt no uneasiness at seeing him take the
+pretty girl on the crupper. Mother Guillette would have thought herself
+doing him a wrong had she asked him to respect her daughter as his
+sister. Marie embraced her mother and her young friends twenty times,
+and then mounted the mare in tears. Germain, sad on his own account,
+felt all the more sympathy for her sorrow, and rode away with a
+melancholy air, while all the people of the neighborhood waved good-by
+to Marie without a thought of harm.
+
+
+
+
+V -- Petit-Pierre
+
+THE gray was young, good-looking, and strong. She carried her double
+burden with ease, laying back her ears and champing her bit like the
+high-spirited mare she was. Passing in front of the pasture, she caught
+sight of her mother, whose name was the Old Gray as hers was the Young
+Gray, and she whinnied in token of good-by. The Old Gray came nearer
+the hedge, and striking her shoes together she tried to gallop along the
+edge of the field in order to follow her daughter; then seeing her fall
+into a sharp trot, the mare whinnied in her turn and stood in an uneasy
+attitude, her nose in the air and her mouth filled with grass that she
+had no thought of eating.
+
+"That poor beast always knows her offspring," said Germain, trying to
+keep Marie's thoughts from her troubles. "That reminds me, I never kissed
+Petit-Pierre before I started. The naughty boy was not there. Last night
+he wished to make me promise to take him along, and he wept for an hour
+in bed. This morning again, he tried everything to persuade me. Oh, how
+sly and coaxing he is! But when he saw that he could not gain his point,
+the young gentleman got into a temper. He went off to the fields, and I
+have not seen him all day."
+
+"I have seen him," said little Marie, striving to keep back her tears;
+"he was running toward the clearing with Soulas' children, and I felt
+sure that he had been away from home a long time, for he was hungry and
+was eating wild plums and blackberries. I gave him the bread I had for
+lunch, and he said, 'Thank you, dear Marie; when you come to our house,
+I will give you some cake.' He is a dear little child, Germain."
+
+"Yes, he is," answered the laborer; "and there is nothing I would not do
+for him. If his grandmother had not more sense than I, I could not have
+helped taking him with me, when I saw him crying as though his poor
+little heart would burst."
+
+"Then why did you not take him, Germain? He, would have been very little
+trouble. He is so good when you please him."
+
+"He would probably have been in the way in the place where I am going.
+At least Father Maurice thought so. On the other hand, I should have
+thought it well to see how they received him. For no one could help
+being kind to such a nice child. But at home they said that I must not
+begin by showing off all the cares of the household. I don't know why I
+speak of this to you, little Marie; you can't understand."
+
+"Oh, yes, I do; I know that you are going away to marry; my mother spoke
+to me about it, and told me not to mention it to a soul, either at home
+or at my destination, and you need not be afraid; I shall not breathe a
+word about it."
+
+"You are very right. For the deed is n't done yet. Perhaps I shall not
+suit this woman."
+
+"I hope you will, Germain; why should you not suit her?"
+
+"Who knows? I have three children, and that is a heavy burden for a
+woman who is not their mother."
+
+"Very true. But are not your children like other children?"
+
+"Do you think so?"
+
+"They are lovely as little angels, and so well brought up that you can't
+find better children."
+
+"There 's Sylvain. He is none too obedient."
+
+"He is so very little. He can't help being naughty. But he is very
+bright."
+
+"He is bright it is true, and very brave. He is not afraid of cows
+nor bulls, and if he were given his own way, he would be climbing on
+horseback already with his elder brother."
+
+"Had I been in your place, I would have taken the eldest boy along.
+Surely people would have liked you at once for having such a pretty
+child."
+
+"Yes, if a woman is fond of children. But if she is not."
+
+"Are there women who don't love children?"
+
+"Not many, I think, but still there are some, and that is what troubles
+me."
+
+"You don't know this woman at all, then?"
+
+"No more than you, and I fear that I shall not know her better after I
+have seen her. I am not suspicious. When people say nice things to me,
+I believe them, but more than once I have had good reason to repent, for
+words are not deeds."
+
+"They say that she is a very good woman."
+
+"Who says so? Father Maurice?"
+
+"Yes, your father-in-law."
+
+"That is all very well. But he knows her no more than I."
+
+"Well, you will soon see. Pay close attention, and let us hope that you
+will not be deceived."
+
+"I have it. Little Marie, I should be very much obliged if you would
+come into the house for a minute before you go straight on to Ormeaux.
+You are quick-witted; you have always shown that you are not stupid,
+and nothing escapes your notice. Should you see anything to rouse your
+suspicions, you must warn me of it very quietly."
+
+"Oh! no, Germain, I will not do that; I should be too much afraid of
+making a mistake; and, besides, if a word lightly spoken were to turn
+you against this marriage, your family would bear me a grudge, and I
+have plenty of troubles now without bringing any more on my poor dear
+mother."
+
+As they were talking thus, the gray pricked up her ears and shied; then
+returning on her steps, she approached the bushes, where she began to
+recognize something which had frightened her at first. Germain cast
+his eye over the thicket, and in a ditch, beneath the branches of a
+scrub-oak, still thick and green, he saw something which he took for a
+lamb.
+
+"The little creature is strayed or dead, for it does not move. Perhaps
+some one is looking for it; we must see."
+
+"It is not an animal," cried little Marie; "it is a sleeping child. It
+is your Petit-Pierre."
+
+"Heavens!" exclaimed Germain; "see the little scamp asleep so far away
+from home, and in a ditch where a snake might bite him!"
+
+He lifted up the child, who smiled as he opened his eyes and threw his
+arms about his father's neck, saying: "Dear little father, you are going
+to take me with you."
+
+"Oh, yes; always the same tune. What were you doing there, you naughty
+Pierre?"
+
+"I was waiting for my little father to go by. I was watching the road,
+and I watched so hard that I fell asleep."
+
+"And if I had passed by without seeing you, you would have been out of
+doors all night, and a wolf would have eaten you up."
+
+"Oh, I knew very well that you would see me," answered Petit-Pierre,
+confidently.
+
+"Well, kiss me now, bid me good-by, and run back quickly to the house,
+unless you wish them to have supper without you."
+
+"Are you not going to take me, then?" cried the little boy, beginning to
+rub his eyes to show that he was thinking of tears.
+
+"You know very well that grandpapa and grand-mama do not wish it," said
+Germain, fortifying himself behind the authority of his elders, like a
+man who distrusts his own.
+
+The child would not listen. He began to cry with all his might, saying
+that as long as his father was taking little Marie, he might just as
+well take him too. They replied that they must pass through great woods
+filled with wicked beasts who eat up little children. The gray would not
+carry three people; she had said so when they were starting, and in the
+country where they were going there was no bed and no supper for little
+boys. All these good reasons could not persuade Petit-Pierre; he threw
+himself on the ground, and rolled about, shrieking that his little
+father did not love him any more, and that if he did not take him he
+would never go back to the house at all, day or night.
+
+Germain had a father's heart, as soft and weak as a woman's. His-wife's
+death, and the care which he had been obliged to bestow all alone on his
+little ones, as well as the thought that these poor motherless children
+needed a great deal of love, combined to make him thus. So such a sharp
+struggle went on within him, all the more because he was ashamed of his
+weakness and tried to hide his confusion from little Marie, that the
+sweat started out on his forehead, and his eyes grew red and almost
+ready to weep. At last he tried to get angry, but as he turned toward
+little Marie in order to let her witness his strength of mind, he saw
+that the good girls face was wet with tears; all his courage forsook him
+and he could not keep back his own, scold and threaten as he would.
+
+"Truly your heart is too hard," said little Marie at last, "and for
+myself I know that I never could refuse a child who felt so badly. Come,
+Germain, let 's take him. Your mare is well used to carrying two people
+and a child, for you know that your brother-in-law and his wife, who is
+much heavier than I, go to market every Saturday with their boy on this
+good beast's back. Take him on the horse in front of you. Besides, I
+should rather walk on foot all alone than give this little boy so much
+pain."
+
+"Never mind," answered Germain, who was dying to allow himself to give
+way. "The gray is strong, and could carry two more if there were room on
+her back. But what can we do with this child on the way? He will be cold
+and hungry, and who will take care of him to-night and tomorrow, put
+him to bed, wash him, and dress him? I don't dare give this trouble to
+a woman I don't know, who will think, doubtless, that I am exceedingly
+free and easy with her to begin with."
+
+"Trust me, Germain, you will know her at once by the kindness or the
+impatience that she shows. If she does not care to receive your Pierre,
+I will take charge of him myself. I will go to her house and dress him,
+and I will take him to the fields with me to-morrow. I will amuse him
+all day long, and take good care that he does not want for anything."
+
+"He will tire you, my poor girl, and give you trouble. A whole day is a
+long time."
+
+"Not at all; it will give me pleasure; he will keep me company, and that
+will make me less sad the first day that I must pass in a new place. I
+shall fancy that I am still at home."
+
+Seeing that little Marie was pleading for her, the child seized upon her
+skirt and held it so tight that they must have hurt him in order to
+tear it away. When he perceived that his father was weakening, he took
+Marie's hand in both his tiny sunburned fists and kissed her, leaping
+for joy, and pulling her toward the mare with the burning impatience
+children feel in their desires.
+
+"Come along," said the young girl, lifting him in her arms; "let us try
+to quiet his poor little heart. It is fluttering like a little bird; and
+if you feel the cold when night comes on, tell me, my Pierre, and I will
+wrap you in my cape. Kiss your little father, and beg his pardon for
+being naughty. Tell him that you will never, never be so again. Do you
+hear?"
+
+"Yes, yes, provided that I always do just as he wishes. Is n't it
+so?" said Germain, drying the little boy's eyes with his handkerchief.
+"Marie, you are spoiling the little rascal. But really and truly, you
+are too good, little Marie. I don't know why you did not come to us
+as shepherdess last Saint John's Day. You would have taken care of my
+children, and I should much rather pay a good price for their sake than
+try to find a woman who will think, perhaps, she is doing me a great
+kindness if she does not detest them."
+
+"You must not look on the dark side of things," answered little Marie,
+holding the horse's bridle while Germain placed his son in front of the
+big pack-saddle covered with goatskin. "If your wife does not care for
+children, take me into your service next year, and you may be sure I
+shall amuse them so well that they will not notice anything."
+
+
+
+
+VI -- On the Heath
+
+"DEAR ME," said Germain, after they had gone a few steps farther, "what
+will they think at home when they miss the little man? The family will
+be worried, and will be looking everywhere for him."
+
+"You can tell the man who is mending the road up there that you are
+taking him along, and ask him to speak to your people."
+
+"That is very true, Marie; you don't forget anything. It never occurred
+to me that Jeannie must be there."
+
+"He lives close to the farm, and he will not fail to do your errand."
+
+When they had taken this precaution, Germain put the mare to a trot, and
+Petit-Pierre was so overjoyed that for a time he forgot that he had
+gone without his dinner; but the motion of the horse gave him a hollow
+feeling in his stomach, and at the end of a league, he began to gape and
+grow pale, and confessed that he was dying of hunger.
+
+"This is the way it begins," exclaimed Germain. "I was quite sure that
+we should not go far without this young gentleman crying with hunger or
+thirst."
+
+"I am thirsty, too!" said Petit-Pierre.
+
+"Very well, then, let 's go to Mother Rebec's tavern at Corlay, the
+sign of 'The Dawn'--a pretty sign, but a poor lodging. You will take
+something to drink, too, will you not, Marie?"
+
+"No, no; I don't want anything. I will hold the mare while you go in
+with the child."
+
+"But I remember, my good girl, that this morning you gave the bread from
+your own breakfast to my Pierre. You have had nothing to eat. You would
+not take dinner with us at home; you would do nothing but cry."
+
+"Oh, I was not hungry; I felt too sad, and I give you my word that even
+now I have no desire to eat."
+
+"You must oblige yourself to eat, little girl, else you will fall sick.
+We have a long way to go, and it will not do to arrive half-starved and
+beg for bread before we say how d' ye do. I shall set you a good example
+myself, although I am not very hungry: and I am sure that I can, for,
+after all, I did not eat any dinner. I saw you crying, you and your
+mother, and it made me feel sad. Come along. I am going to tie the gray
+at the door. Get down; I wish you to."
+
+All three entered the inn, and in less than fifteen minutes the fat,
+lame hostess was able to place before them a nice-looking omelette, some
+brown bread, and a bottle of light wine.
+
+Peasants do not eat quickly, and little Pierre had such a good appetite
+that a whole hour passed before Germain could think of starting out
+again. At first little Marie ate in order to be obliging; then little
+by little she grew hungry. For, at sixteen, a girl cannot fast for long,
+and country air is dictatorial.
+
+The kind words with which Germain knew how to comfort her and strengthen
+her courage, produced their effect. She tried hard to persuade herself
+that seven months would soon be over, and to think of the pleasure in
+store for her when she saw once more her family and her hamlet; for
+Father Maurice and Germain had both promised to take her into their
+service. But just as she began to cheer up and play with little Pierre,
+Germain was so unfortunate as to point out to her from the inn window
+the lovely view of the valley which can all be seen from this height,
+and which looks so happy and green and fertile.
+
+Marie looked and asked if the houses of Belair were in sight.
+
+"No doubt," said Germain, "and the farm, too, and even your house--see!
+that tiny gray spot not far from Godard's big poplar, below the belfry."
+
+"Ah, I see it," said the little girl; and then she began to cry.
+
+"I ought not to have made you think of it," said Germain. "I can do
+nothing but stupid things today. Come along, Marie; let 's start, and in
+an hour, when the moon rises, it will not be hot."
+
+They resumed their journey across the great heath, and for fear of
+tiring the young girl and the child by too rapid a trot, Germain did not
+make the gray go very fast. The sun had set when they left the road to
+enter the wood.
+
+Germain knew the way as far as Magnier, but he thought it would be
+shorter to avoid the Chantaloube road and descend by Presles and La
+Sepulture, a route he was not in the habit of taking on his way to the
+fair. He lost his way, and wasted more time before he reached the wood.
+Even then he did not enter it on the right side, although he did not
+perceive his mistake, so that he turned his back on Fourche, and took a
+direction higher up on the way to Ardente.
+
+He was prevented still further from finding his way by a thick mist
+which rose as the night fell; one of those mists which come on autumn
+evenings when the whiteness of the moonlight renders them more undefined
+and more treacherous. The great pools of water scattered through the
+glades gave forth a vapor so dense that when the gray crossed them,
+their presence was known only by a splashing noise, and the difficulty
+with which she drew her feet from the mud.
+
+At last they found a good straight road, and when they came to the end
+of it, and Germain tried to discover where he was, he saw that he was
+lost. For Father Maurice had told him, when he explained the way, that
+on leaving the wood he must descend a very steep hillside, cross a wide
+meadow, and ford the river twice. He had even warned him to cross this
+river carefully; for, early in the season, there had been great rains,
+and the water might still be higher than usual. Seeing neither hillside
+nor meadows, nor river, but a heath, level and white as a mantle of
+snow, Germain stopped, looked about for a house, and waited for a
+passer-by, but could find nothing to set him right. Then he retraced his
+steps and reentered the wood. But the mist thickened yet more, the moon
+was completely hidden, the roads were execrable, and the quagmires deep.
+Twice the gray almost fell. Her heavy load made her lose courage, and
+although she kept enough sagacity to avoid the tree-trunks, she could
+not prevent her riders from striking the great branches which overhung
+the road at the height of their heads and caused them great danger.
+In one of these collisions Germain lost his hat, and only recovered it
+after much difficulty. Petit-Pierre had fallen asleep, and, lying like
+a log in his father's arms, hampered him so that he could no longer hold
+up nor direct the horse.
+
+"I believe we are bewitched," exclaimed Germain, stopping; "for the
+wood is not large enough to get lost in, if a man is not drunk, and here
+we have been turning round and round for two hours at least, without
+finding a way out. The gray has but one idea in her head, and that is to
+get home. It is she who is deceiving me. If we wish to go home, we have
+only to give her the bit. But when we are perhaps but two steps from
+our journey's end, it would be foolish to give up and return such a long
+road; and yet I am at a loss what to do. I cant see sky or earth, and
+I am afraid that the child will catch the fever if we remain in this
+cursed fog, or that he will be crushed beneath our weight if the horse
+falls forward."
+
+"We must not persist longer," said little Marie. "Let 's dismount,
+Germain. Give me the child; I can carry him perfectly well, and I know
+better than you how to keep the cloak from falling open and leaving
+him exposed. You lead the mare by her bridle. Perhaps we shall see more
+clearly when we are nearer the ground."
+
+This precaution was of service only in saving them from a fall, for the
+fog hung low and seemed to stick to the damp earth.
+
+Their advance was painfully slow, and they were soon so weary that they
+halted when they reached a dry spot beneath the great oaks.
+
+Little Marie was in a violent sweat, but she uttered not a word of
+complaint, nor did she worry about anything. Thinking only of the child,
+she sat down on the sand and laid it upon her knees, while Germain
+explored the neighborhood, after having fastened the gray's reins to the
+branch of a tree.
+
+But the gray was very dissatisfied with the journey. She reared
+suddenly, broke the reins loose, burst her girths, and giving, by way of
+receipt, half a dozen kicks higher than her head, she started across the
+clearing, showing very plainly that she needed no one to show her the
+way home.
+
+"Well, here we are afoot," said Germain, after a vain attempt to catch
+the horse, "and it would do us no good now if we were on the good road,
+for we should have to ford the river on foot, and since these paths are
+filled with water, we may be sure that the meadow is wholly submerged.
+We don't know the other routes. We must wait until this fog clears. It
+can't last more than an hour or two; as soon as we can see clearly, we
+shall look about for a house, the first we come to near the edge of the
+wood. But for the present we can't stir from here. There is a ditch
+and a pond over there. Heaven knows what is in front of us, and what is
+behind us is more than I can say now, for I have forgotten which way we
+came."
+
+
+
+
+VII -- Underneath the Big Oaks
+
+"WELL, we must be patient, Germain," said little Marie. "We are not
+badly off on this little hillock. The rain does not pierce the leaves of
+these big oaks, and we can light a fire, for I can feel old stumps which
+stir readily and are dry enough to burn. You have a light, Germain, have
+you not? You were smoking your pipe a few minutes ago."
+
+"I did have; my tinderbox was in my bag on the saddle with the game that
+I was bringing to my bride that is to be, but that devilish mare has run
+away with everything, even with my cloak, which she will lose and tear
+to bits on every branch she comes to." "No, no, Germain; saddle and
+cloak and bag are all there on the ground at your feet. The gray burst
+her girths, and threw off everything as she ran away."
+
+"That's true, thank God," exclaimed the laborer; "if we can grope about
+and find a little dead wood, we shall be able to dry ourselves and get
+warm."
+
+"That 's not difficult," said little Marie; "dead wood always cracks
+when you step on it. But will you give me the saddle?"
+
+"What do you want of it?"
+
+"To make a bed for the child. No, not that way. Upside down. He will
+not roll off into the hollow, and it is still very warm from the horse's
+back. Prop it up all around with the stones that you see there."
+
+"I can't see a stone; you must have cat's eyes."
+
+"There, it is all done, Germain. Hand me your cloak so that you can wrap
+up his little feet, and throw my cape over his body. Just see if he is
+not as comfortable as though he were in his own bed, and feel how warm
+he is."
+
+"You certainly know how to take care of children, Marie."
+
+"I need not be a witch to do that; now get your tinderbox from your bag,
+and I will arrange the wood."
+
+"This wood will never catch fire; it is too damp."
+
+"You are always doubting, Germain. Don't you remember when you were a
+shepherd, and made big fires in the fields right in the midst of the
+rain?"
+
+"Yes, that is a knack that belongs to children who take care of sheep;
+but I was made to drive the oxen as soon as I could walk."
+
+"That is what has made your arms strong and your hands quick! Here, the
+fire is built; you shall see whether it does not burn. Give me the light
+and a handful of dry ferns. That is all right Now blow; you are not
+consumptive, are you?"
+
+"Not that I know of," said Germain, blowing like a smith's bellows. In
+an instant the flame leaped up, and throwing out a red glare, it rose
+finally in pale blue jets under the oak branches, battling with the fog,
+and gradually drying the atmosphere for ten feet around.
+
+"Now I am going to sit by the child, so that the sparks may not fall
+on him," said the young girl. "Pile on the wood and stir up the fire,
+Germain; we shall not catch cold nor fever here, I will answer for it."
+
+"Upon my word, you are a clever girl," said Germain; "and you know how
+to make a fire like a little fairy of the night. I feel quite revived,
+and my courage has come back again; for with my legs drenched up to the
+knees, and with the thought of staying this way till daylight, I was in
+a very bad temper just now."
+
+"And when people are in a bad temper they don't think of anything,"
+answered little Marie.
+
+"And are you never bad-tempered?"
+
+"No, never; what is the good of it?"
+
+"Oh, of course, there is no good; but how can you help it when you have
+troubles? Yet Heaven knows that you have not lacked them, my little
+girl; for you have not always been happy."
+
+"It is true that my mother and I have suffered. We have had sorrows, but
+we have never lost heart."
+
+"I should never lose heart, no matter how hard my work was," said
+Germain, "but poverty would make me very sad; for I have never wanted
+for anything. My wife made me rich, and I am rich still; I shall be
+so as long as I work on the farm; and that will be always, I hope. But
+everybody must suffer his share! I have suffered in another way."
+
+"Yes; you have lost your wife. That is very sad."
+
+"Is n't it?"
+
+"Oh! Germain, I have wept for her many a time. She was so very kind! But
+don't let us talk about her longer, for I shall burst out crying. All my
+troubles are ready to come back to me to-day."
+
+"It is true, she loved you dearly, little Marie. She used to make a
+great deal of you and your mother. Are you crying? Come, my girl, I
+don't want to cry...."
+
+"But you are crying, Germain! You are crying as hard as I. Why should
+a man be ashamed to weep for his wife? Don't let me trouble you. That
+sorrow is mine as well as yours."
+
+"You have a kind heart, Marie, and it does me good to weep with you. Put
+your feet nearer the fire; your skirts are all soaked, too, poor little
+girl. I am going to take your place by the boy. You move nearer the
+fire."
+
+"I am hot enough," said Marie; "and if you wish to sit down, take a
+corner of the cloak. I am perfectly comfortable."
+
+"The truth is that it is not so bad here," said Germain, as he sat down
+beside her. "Only I feel very hungry again. It is almost nine o'clock,
+and I have had such hard work in walking over these vile roads that I
+feel quite tired out. Are you not hungry, too, little Marie?"
+
+"I?--not at all. I am not accustomed like you to four meals a day, and
+I have been to bed so often without my supper that once more does not
+trouble me."
+
+"A woman like you is very convenient; she costs nothing," said Germain,
+smiling.
+
+"I am not a woman," exclaimed Marie, naively, without perceiving the
+direction the husbandman's ideas had taken. "Are you dreaming?"
+
+"Yes, I believe I must be dreaming," answered Germain. "Perhaps hunger
+is making my mind wander."
+
+"How greedy you are," answered she, brightening in her turn. "Well, if
+you can't live five or six hours without eating, have you not game in
+your bag and fire to cook it?"
+
+"By Jove, that's a good idea! But how about the present to my future
+father-in-law?"
+
+"You have six partridges and a hare! I suppose you do not need all of
+them to satisfy your appetite."
+
+"But how can we cook them without a spit or andirons. They will be
+burned to a cinder!"
+
+"Not at all," said little Marie; "I warrant that I can cook them for you
+under the cinders without a taste of smoke. Have you never caught larks
+in the fields, and cooked them between two stones? Oh! that is true--I
+keep forgetting that you have never been a shepherd. Come, pluck the
+partridge. Not so hard! You will tear the skin."
+
+"You might be plucking the other to show me how!"
+
+"Then you wish to eat two? What an ogre you are! They are all plucked. I
+am going to cook them."
+
+"You would make a perfect little sutler's girl, Marie, but unhappily you
+have no canteen, and I shall have to drink water from this pool!"
+
+"You would like some wine, would you not? Possibly you might prefer
+coffee. You imagine yourself under the trees at the fair. Call out the
+host. Some wine for the good husbandman of Belair!"
+
+"You little witch, you are making fun of me! Would not you drink some
+wine if you had it?"
+
+"I? At Mother Rebec's, with you to-night, I drank some for the second
+time in my life. But if you are very good, I shall give you a bottle
+almost full, and excellent too."
+
+"What? Marie, I verily believe you are a witch!"
+
+"Were you not foolish enough to ask for two bottles of wine at the inn?
+You and your boy drank one, and the other you set before me. I hardly
+drank three drops, yet you paid for both without looking."
+
+"What then?"
+
+"Why, I put the full one in my basket, because I thought that you or
+your child would be thirsty on the journey. And here it is."
+
+"You are the most thoughtful girl I have ever met. Although the poor
+child was crying when we left the inn, that did not prevent her from
+thinking of others more than of herself. Little Marie, the man who
+marries you will be no fool."
+
+"I hope not, for I am not fond of fools. Come, eat up your partridges;
+they are done to a turn; and for want of bread, you must be satisfied
+with chestnuts."
+
+"Where the deuce did you find chestnuts, too?"
+
+"It is extraordinary! All along the road I picked them off the branches
+as we went along, and filled my pockets."
+
+"And are they cooked, too?"
+
+"Where would my wits have been had I not had sense enough to put the
+chestnuts in the fire as soon as it was lighted? That is the way we
+always do in the fields."
+
+"So we are going to take supper together, little Marie. I want to
+drink your health and wish you a good husband, just the sort of a man
+that will suit you. Tell me what kind you want."
+
+"I should find that very difficult, Germain, for I have not thought
+about it yet."
+
+"What, not at all? Never?" said Germain, as he began to eat with a
+laborer's appetite, yet stopping to cut off the more tender morsels for
+his companion, who persisted in refusing them and contented herself with
+a few chestnuts.
+
+"Tell me, little Marie," he went on, seeing that she had no intention
+of answering him, "have you never thought of marrying? Yet you are old
+enough?"
+
+"Perhaps," she said, "but I am too poor. I need at least a hundred
+crowns to marry, and I must work five or six years to scrape them
+together."
+
+"Poor girl, I wish Father Maurice were willing to give me a hundred
+crowns to make you a present of."
+
+"Thank you kindly, Germain. What do you suppose people would say of me?"
+
+"What do you wish them to say of you? They know very well that I am too
+old to marry you. They would never believe that I--that you--"
+
+"Look, Germain, your child is waking up," said little Marie.
+
+
+
+
+VIII -- The Evening Prayer
+
+PETIT-PIERRE had raised his head and was looking about him with a
+thoughtful air.
+
+"Oh, that is the way he always does, whenever he hears the sound of
+eating," said Germain. "The explosion of a cannon would not rouse him,
+but if you work your jaws near him, he opens his eyes at once."
+
+"You must have been just like him at his age," said little Marie, with
+a sly smile. "See! my Petit-Pierre, you are looking for your canopy.
+To-night it is made all of green, my child; but your father eats his
+supper none the less. Do you wish to sup with him? I have not eaten your
+share; I thought that you might claim it."
+
+"Marie, I wish you to eat," cried the husbandman; "I shall not touch
+another morsel. I am a greedy glutton. You are depriving yourself for
+our sake. It is not fair. I am ashamed. It takes away all my appetite. I
+will not have my son eat his supper unless you take some too."
+
+"Leave us alone," said little Marie; "you have not the key to our
+appetites. Mine is tight shut to-day, but your Pierre's is as wide open
+as a little wolfs. Just see how he seizes his food. He will be a strong
+workman too, some day!"
+
+In truth, Petit-Pierre showed very soon whose son he was, and though
+scarcely awake and wholly at a loss to know where he was and how he
+had come there, he began to eat ravenously. As soon as his hunger was
+appeased, feeling excited as children do who break loose from their
+wonted habits, he had more wit, more curiosity, and more good sense than
+usual. He made them explain to him where he was, and when he found that
+he was in the midst of a forest, he grew a little frightened.
+
+"Are there wicked beasts in this forest?" he demanded of his father.
+
+"No, none at all. Don't be afraid."
+
+"Then you told a story when you said that if I went with you into the
+great forest, the wolves would carry me off."
+
+"Just see this logician," said Germain, embarrassed.
+
+"He is right," replied little Marie. "That is what you told him. He has
+a good memory, and has not forgotten. But, little Pierre, you must learn
+that your father never tells a story. We passed through the big forest
+whilst you were sleeping, and now we are in the small forest where there
+are no wicked beasts."
+
+"Is the little forest very far away from the big one?"
+
+"Far enough; besides, the wolves never go out of the big forest. And
+then, if some of them should come here, your father would kill them."
+
+"And you too, little Marie?"
+
+"Yes, we, too, for you would help also, my Pierre. You are not
+frightened, are you? You would beat them soundly?"
+
+"Yes, indeed, I would," said the child, proudly, as he struck a heroic
+attitude; "we would kill them."
+
+"There is nobody like you for talking to children and for making them
+listen to reason," said Germain to little Marie. "To be sure, it is
+not long ago since you were a small child yourself, and you have not
+forgotten what your mother used to say to you. I believe that the
+younger one is, the better one gets on with children. I am very much
+afraid that a woman of thirty who does not yet know what it is to be a
+mother, would find it hard to prattle to children and reason with them."
+
+"Why, Germain? I don't know why you have such a bad idea of this woman;
+you will change your mind."
+
+"The devil take the woman!" exclaimed Germain. "I wish I were going away
+from her forever. What do I want of a wife whom I don't know?"
+
+"Little father," said the child, "why is it that you speak so much of
+your wife to-day, since she is dead?"
+
+"Then you have not forgotten your poor, dear mother?"
+
+"No; for I saw her placed in a beautiful box of white wood, and my
+grandmother led me up to her to kiss her and say good-by. She was very
+white and very stiff, and every evening my aunt made me pray God that
+she might go to him in Heaven and be warm. Do you think that she is
+there now?"
+
+"I hope so, my child; but you must always pray. It shows your mother
+that you love her."
+
+"I am going to say my prayers," answered the boy. "I forgot them
+to-night. But I can't say them all alone, for I always forget something.
+Little Marie must help me."
+
+"Yes, my Pierre, I will help you," said the young girl. "Come and kneel
+down in my lap."
+
+The child knelt down on the girl's skirt. He clasped his little hands
+and began to say his prayers, at first with great care and earnestness,
+for he knew the beginning very well, then slowly and with more
+hesitation, and finally repeating word by word after Marie, when he came
+to that place in his prayer where sleep overtook him so invariably that
+he had never been able to learn the end. This time again the effort of
+close attention and the monotony of his own accent produced their wonted
+effect. He pronounced the last syllables with great difficulty, and only
+after they were thrice repeated.
+
+His head grew heavy and fell on Marie's breast; his hands unclasped,
+divided, and fell open on his knees. By the light of the camp-fire,
+Germain watched his little darling hushed at the heart of the young
+girl, who, as she held him in her arms and warmed his fair hair with
+her sweet breath, had herself fallen into a holy reverie, and prayed in
+quiet for the soul of Catherine.
+
+Germain was touched. He tried to express to little Marie the grateful
+esteem which he felt for her, but he could find no fitting words.
+
+He approached her to kiss his son, whom she held close to her breast,
+and he could scarcely raise his lips from little Pierre's brow.
+
+"You kiss too hard," said Marie, gently pushing away the husbandman's
+head. "You will wake him. Let me put him back to bed, for the boy has
+left us already for dreams of paradise."
+
+The child allowed Marie to lay him down, but feeling the goatskin on the
+saddle, he asked if he were on the gray. Then opening his big blue eyes,
+and keeping them fixed on the branches for a minute, he seemed to be
+dreaming, wide-awake as he was, or to be struck with an idea which had
+slipped his mind during the daytime, and only assumed a distinct form at
+the approach of sleep.
+
+"Little father," said he, "if you wish to give me a new mother, I hope
+it will be little Marie."
+
+And without waiting for an answer, he closed his eyes and slept.
+
+
+
+
+
+IX -- Despite the Cold
+
+LITTLE MARIE seemed to give no more heed to the child's odd words than
+to regard them as a proof of friendship. She wrapped him up with care,
+stirred the fire, and as the fog resting on the neighboring pool gave
+no sign of lifting, she advised Germain to lie near the fire and take a
+nap.
+
+"I see that you are sleepy already," said she, "for you don't say a word
+and you gaze into the fire, just as your little boy was doing."
+
+"It is you who must sleep," answered the husbandman, "and I will take
+care of both of you, for I have never felt less sleepy than I do now. I
+have fifty things to think of."
+
+"Fifty is a great many," said the little girl, with a mocking accent.
+"There are lots of people who would be delighted to have one."
+
+"Well, if I am too stupid to have fifty, I have one, at least, which has
+not left me for the past hour."
+
+"And I shall tell it to you as well as I told you those you thought of
+before."
+
+"Yes, do tell me if you know, Marie. Tell me yourself. I shall be glad
+to hear."
+
+"An hour ago," she answered, "your idea was to eat--and now it is to
+sleep."
+
+"Marie, I am only an ox-driver, but, upon my word, you take me for an
+ox. You are very perverse, and it is easy to see that you do not care to
+talk to me, so go to sleep. That will be better than to pick flaws in a
+man who is out of sorts."
+
+"If you wish to talk, let 's talk," said the girl, half reclining
+near the child and resting her head against the saddle. "You torment
+yourself, Germain, and you do not show much courage for a man. What
+would n't I say if I did n't do my best to fight my own troubles?"
+
+"Yes, that's very true, and that 's just what I am thinking of, my
+poor child. You are going to live, away from your friends, in a horrid
+country full of moors and fens, where you will catch the autumn fevers.
+Sheep do not pay well there, and this is always discouraging for a
+shepherdess if she means well. Then you will be surrounded by strangers
+who may not be kind to you and will not know how much you are worth. It
+makes me more sorry than I can tell you, and I have a great desire to
+take you home to your mother instead of going on to Fourche."
+
+"You talk very kindly, but there is no reason for your misgivings, my
+poor Germain. You ought not to lose heart on your friend's account, and
+instead of showing me the dark side of my lot, you should show me the
+bright side, as you did after lunch at Rebec's."
+
+"What can I do? That 's the way it appeared to me then, and now my ideas
+are changed. It is best for you to take a husband."
+
+"That cannot be, Germain, and as it is out of the question, I think no
+more about it."
+
+"Yet such a thing might happen. Perhaps if you told me what kind of a
+man you want, I might imagine somebody."
+
+"Imagining is not finding. For myself, I never imagine, for it does no
+good."
+
+"You are not looking for a rich man?"
+
+"Certainly not, for I am as poor as Job."
+
+"But if he were comfortably off, you would n't be sorry to have a good
+house, and good food, and good clothes, and to live with an honest
+family who would allow you to help your mother."
+
+"Oh, yes indeed! It is my own wish to help my mother."
+
+"And if this man were to turn up, you would not be too hard to please,
+even if he were not so very young."
+
+"Ah! There you must excuse me, Germain. That is just the point I insist
+on. I could never love an old man."
+
+"An old man, of course not; but a man of my age, for example!"
+
+"Your age is too old for me, Germain. I should like Bastien's age,
+though Bastien is not so good-looking as you."
+
+"Should you rather have Bastien, the swineherd?" said Germain,
+indignantly. "A fellow with eyes shaped like those of the pigs he
+drives!"
+
+"I could excuse his eyes, because he is eighteen."
+
+Germain felt terribly jealous.
+
+"Well," said he, "it's clear that you want Bastien, but, none the less,
+it 's a queer idea."
+
+"Yes, that would be a queer idea," answered little Marie, bursting into
+shouts of laughter, "and he would make a queer husband. You could gull
+him to your heart's content. For instance, the other day, I had picked
+up a tomato in the curate's garden. I told him that it was a fine, red
+apple, and he bit into it like a glutton. If you had only seen what a
+face he made. Heavens! how ugly he was!"
+
+"Then you don't love him, since you are making fun of him."
+
+"That would n't be a reason. But I don't like him. He is unkind to his
+little sister, and he is dirty." "Don't you care for anybody else?" "How
+does that concern you, Germain?" "Not at all, except that it gives me
+something to talk about. I see very well, little girl, that you have a
+sweetheart in your mind already."
+
+"No, Germain, you 're wrong. I have no sweetheart yet. Perhaps one may
+come later, but since I cannot marry until I have something laid by, I
+am destined to marry late in life and with an old man." "Then take an
+old man without delay." "No. When I am no longer young, I shall not
+care; for the present, it is different." "I see that I displease you,
+Marie; that's clear enough," said Germain, impatiently, and without
+stopping to weigh his words.
+
+Little Marie did not answer. Germain bent over her. She was sleeping.
+She had fallen back, overcome, stricken down, as it were, by slumber, as
+children are who sleep before they cease to babble.
+
+Germain was glad that she had not caught his last words. He felt that
+they were unwise, and he turned his back to distract his attention and
+change his thoughts.
+
+It was all in vain. He could neither sleep nor think of anything except
+the words he had just spoken. He walked about the fire twenty times; he
+moved away; he came back. At last, feeling himself tremble as though he
+had swallowed gunpowder, he leaned against the tree which sheltered the
+two children, and watched them as they slept.
+
+"I know not how it is," thought he; "I have never noticed that little
+Marie is the prettiest girl in the countryside. She has not much color,
+but her little face is fresh as a wild rose. What a charming mouth she
+has, and how pretty her little nose is! She is not large for her age,
+but she is formed like a little quail and is as light as a bird. I
+cannot understand why they made so much fuss at home over a big, fat
+woman with a bright red face. My wife was rather slender and pale, and
+she pleased me more than any one else. This girl is very frail, but she
+is healthy, and she is pretty to watch as a white kid. And then she has
+such a gentle, frank expression. You can read her good heart in her eyes
+even though they are closed in sleep. As to wit, I must confess she
+has more than ever my dear Catherine had, and she would never become
+wearisome. She is gay, wise, industrious, loving, and she is amusing. I
+don't know what more I could wish for....
+
+"But what is the use of thinking of all this?" Germain went on, trying
+to look in another direction. "My father-in-law would not hear of it,
+and all the family would think me mad! Besides, she would not have
+me herself, poor child! She thinks me too old; she told me so. She is
+unselfish, and does not mind poverty and worry, wearing old clothes, and
+suffering from hunger for two or three months every year, so long as she
+can satisfy her heart some day and give herself to the man she loves.
+She is right. I should do the same in her place, and even now, if I had
+my own way, instead of marrying a wife whom I don't care for, I would
+choose a girl after my own heart."
+
+The more Germain tried to compose himself by reasoning, the further he
+was from succeeding. He walked away a dozen steps, to lose himself in
+the fog; then, all of a sudden, he found himself on his knees beside the
+two sleeping children. Once he wished to kiss Petit-Pierre, who had
+one arm about Marie's neck, and made such a mistake that Marie felt a
+breath, hot as fire, cross her lips, and awaking, looked about her with
+a bewildered expression, totally ignorant of all that was passing within
+his mind.
+
+"I did n't see you, my poor children," said Germain, retreating rapidly.
+"I almost stumbled over you and hurt you."
+
+Little Marie was so innocent that she believed him, and fell asleep
+again. Germain walked to the opposite side of the fire, and swore to God
+that he would not stir until she had waked. He kept his word, but not
+without a struggle. He thought that he would go mad.
+
+At length, toward midnight, the fog lifted, and Germain could see the
+stars shining through the trees. The moon freed herself from the mist
+which had hidden her, and began to sow her diamonds over the damp moss.
+The trunks of the oak-trees remained in impressive darkness, but beyond,
+the white branches of the birch-trees seemed a long line of phantoms in
+their shrouds. The fire cast its reflection in the pool; and the frogs,
+growing accustomed to the light, hazarded a few shrill and uneasy
+notes; the rugged branches of the old trees, bristling with dim-colored
+lichens, crossed and intertwined themselves, like great gaunt arms,
+above the travelers' heads. It was a lovely spot, but so lonely and
+so sad that Germain, unable to endure it more, began to sing and throw
+stones into the water to forget the dread weariness of solitude. He was
+anxious also to wake little Marie, and when he saw her rise and look
+about at the weather, he proposed that they start on their journey.
+
+"In two hours," said he, "the approach of morning will chill the air so
+that we can't stay here in spite of our fire. Now we can see our way,
+and we shall soon find a house which will open its doors to us, or at
+least a barn where we can pass the rest of the night under shelter."
+
+Marie had no will of her own, and although she was longing to sleep, she
+made ready to follow Germain. The husbandman took his boy in his arms
+without awaking him, and beckoned Marie to come nearer, in order to
+cover her with his cloak. For she would not take her own mantle, which
+was wrapped about the child.
+
+When he felt the young girl so close to him, Germain, who for a time had
+succeeded in distracting his mind and raising his spirits, began to lose
+his head once more. Two or three times he strode ahead abruptly, leaving
+her to walk alone. Then seeing how hard it was for her to follow, he
+waited, drew her quickly to his side, and pressed her so tight that she
+was surprised, and even angry, though she dared not say so.
+
+As they knew not the direction whence they had come, they had no idea of
+that in which they were going. So they crossed the wood once more, and
+found themselves afresh before the lonely moor. Then they retraced their
+steps, and after much turning and twisting they spied a light across the
+branches.
+
+"Good enough! Here 's a house," exclaimed Germain. "And the people are
+already astir, for the fire is lighted. It must be very late."
+
+It was no house, but the camp-fire, which they had covered before they
+left, and which had sprung up in the breeze.
+
+They had tramped for two hours, only to find themselves at the very
+place from which they had started.
+
+
+
+
+X -- Beneath the Stars
+
+"THIS time I give up," said Germain, stamping I his foot. "We are
+bewitched, that is certain, and we shall not get away from here before
+broad day. The devil is in this place!"
+
+"Well, it's of no use to get angry," said Marie. "We must take what is
+given us. Let us make a big fire. The child is so well wrapped up that
+he is in no danger, and we shall not die from a single night out of
+doors. Where have you hidden the saddle, Germain? Right in the midst of
+the holly-bushes,--what a goose you are! It 's very convenient to get it
+from there!"
+
+"Stop, child; hold the boy while I pull his bed from the thorns. I did
+n't want you to scratch your hands."
+
+"It 's all done. Here 's the bed, and a few scratches are not
+saber-cuts," replied the brave girl.
+
+She proceeded to put the child to bed again, and Petit-Pierre was so
+sound asleep this time that he knew nothing of his last journey. Germain
+piled so much wood on the fire that the forest all about glowed with the
+light.
+
+Little Marie had come to the end of her powers, and although she did not
+complain, her legs would support her no longer. She was white, and her
+teeth chattered with cold and weakness. Germain took her in his arms to
+warm her. The uneasiness, the compassion, the tenderness of movement he
+could not repress, took possession of his heart and stilled his senses.
+As by a miracle his tongue was loosened, and every feeling of shame
+vanished.
+
+"Marie," said he, "I like you, and I am very sorry that you don't like
+me. If you would take me for your husband, there are no fathers, nor
+family, nor neighbors, nor arguments which could prevent me from giving
+myself to you. I know how happy you would make my children, and that you
+would teach them to love the memory of their mother, and with a quiet
+conscience I could satisfy the wishes of my heart. I have always been
+fond of you, and now I love you so well that were you to ask me to
+spend all my life in doing your pleasure, I would swear to do it on the
+instant. Please think how much I love you, and try to forget my age.
+Think that it is a wrong notion to believe that a man of thirty is old.
+Besides, I am but twenty-eight. A young girl is afraid that people will
+talk about her if she takes a man ten or twelve years older than she,
+simply because that is not the custom in our country, but I have heard
+say that in other countries people don't look at it in this light, and
+that they had rather allow a sensible man of approved courage to support
+a young girl, than trust her to a mere boy, who may go astray, and, from
+the honest fellow they thought him, turn into a good-for-nothing.
+And then years don't always make age. That depends on the health and
+strength a person has. When a man is used up by overwork and poverty,
+or by a bad life, he is old before twenty-five. While I--but Marie,
+you are not listening...." "Yes I am, Germain; I hear you perfectly,"
+answered little Marie, "but I am thinking over what my mother used to
+tell me so often: that a woman of sixty is to be pitied greatly when
+her husband is seventy or seventy-five and can no longer work to support
+her. He grows feeble, and it becomes her duty to nurse him at the very
+age when she begins to feel great need of care and rest herself, and so
+it is that the end comes in a garret."
+
+"Parents do well to say so, I admit," answered Germain, "but then
+they would sacrifice all their youth, the best years of their life,
+to calculating what will become of them at the age when a person is no
+longer good for anything, and when it is a matter of indifference which
+way death comes. But I am in no danger of starving in my old age. I am
+even going to lay by something, since I live with my wife's parents and
+spend nothing. And then, you see, I shall love you so well that I can
+never grow old. They say that when a man is happy he keeps sound, and I
+know well that in love for you, I am younger than Bastien; for he does
+not love you; he is too stupid, too much of a child to understand how
+pretty and how good you are, and how you were made for people to court.
+Do not hate me, Marie. I am not a bad man. I made my Catherine happy,
+and on her death-bed she swore before God that she had had only
+happiness of me, and she asked me to marry again. Her spirit must have
+spoken to her child to-night. Did you not hear the words he said? How
+his little lips quivered as his eyes stared upward, watching something
+that we could not see! He was surely looking at his mother, and it was
+she who made him say that he wished you to take her place."
+
+"Germain," answered Marie, amazed and yet thoughtful, "you speak
+frankly, and everything that you say is true. I am sure that I should do
+well to love you if it did not displease your parents too much. But what
+can I do? My heart does not speak for you. I am very fond of you, but
+though your age does not make you ugly, it makes me afraid. It seems as
+if you were some such relation to me, as an uncle or a godfather, that I
+must be respectful toward you, and that there might be moments when you
+would treat me like a little girl rather than like your wife and your
+equal. And perhaps my friends would make fun of me, and although it
+would be silly to give heed to that, I think that I should be a little
+sad on my wedding-day."
+
+"Those are but childish reasons, Marie; you speak like a child."
+
+"Yes, that is true; I am a child," said she, "and it is on that account
+I am afraid of too sensible a man. You must see that I am too young for
+you, since you just found fault with me for speaking foolishly. I can't
+have more sense than my age allows."
+
+"O Heavens! How unlucky I am to be so clumsy and to express so ill what
+I think!" cried Germain. "Marie, you don't love me. That is the long
+and short of it. You find me too simple and too dull. If you loved me
+at all, you would not see my faults so clearly. But you do not love me.
+That is the whole story."
+
+"That is not my fault," answered she, a little hurt that he was speaking
+with less tenderness. "I am doing my best to hear you, but the more I
+try the less I can get it into my head that we ought to be husband and
+wife."
+
+Germain did not answer. His head dropped into his hands, and little
+Marie could not tell whether he wept or sulked or was fast asleep. She
+felt uneasy when she saw him so cast down, and could not guess what was
+passing in his mind. But she dared not speak to him more, and as she
+was too astonished at what had passed to have any desire to sleep, she
+waited impatiently for dawn, tending the fire with care and watching
+over the child, whose existence Germain appeared to forget. Yet Germain
+was not asleep. He did not mope over his lot. He made no plans to
+encourage himself, nor schemes to entrap the girl. He suffered; he felt
+a great weight of grief at his heart. He wished that he were dead. The
+world seemed to turn against him, and if he could have wept at all, his
+tears would have come in floods. But mingled with his sorrow there was a
+feeling of anger against himself, and he felt choked, without the power
+or the wish to complain.
+
+When morning came, and the sounds of the country brought it to Germain's
+senses, he lifted his head from his hands and rose. He saw that little
+Marie had slept no more than he, but he knew no words in which to tell
+her of his anxiety. He was very discouraged. Hiding the gray's saddle
+once more in the thicket, he slung his sack over his shoulder and took
+his son by the hand.
+
+"Now, Marie," said he, "we are going to try to end our journey. Do you
+wish me to take you to Ormeaux?"
+
+"Let us leave the woods together," answered she, "and when we know where
+we are, we shall separate, and go our different ways."
+
+Germain did not answer. He felt hurt that the girl did not ask him to
+take her as far as Ormeaux, and he did not notice that he had asked her
+in a tone well fitted to provoke a refusal.
+
+After a few hundred steps, they met a wood-cutter, who pointed out the
+highroad, and told them that when they had crossed the plain, one
+must turn to the right, the other to the left, to gain their different
+destinations, which were so near together that the houses of Fourche
+were in plain sight from the farm of Ormeaux, and _vice versa_.
+
+When they had thanked him and passed on, the wood-cutter called them
+back to ask whether they had not lost a horse.
+
+"Yes," he said, "I found a pretty gray mare in my yard, where perhaps a
+wolf had driven her to seek refuge; my dogs barked the whole night long,
+and at daybreak I saw the mare under my shed. She is there now. Come
+along with me, and if you recognize her, you may take her."
+
+When Germain had given a description of the gray, and felt convinced
+that it was really she, he started back to find his saddle. Little Marie
+offered to take his child to Ormeaux, whither he might go to get him
+after he had introduced himself at Fourche.
+
+"He is rather dirty after the night that we have passed," said she. "I
+will brush his clothes, wash his pretty face, and comb his hair, and
+when he looks neat and clean, you can present him to your new family."
+
+"Who told you that I wish to go to Fourche?" answered Germain,
+petulantly. "Perhaps I shall not go."
+
+"But truly, Germain, it is your duty to go there. You will go there,"
+replied the girl.
+
+"You seem very anxious to have me married off, so that you may be quite
+sure that I shall not trouble you again?"
+
+"Germain, you must not think of that any more. It is an idea which came
+to you in the night, because this unfortunate mishap took away your
+spirits. But now you must come to your senses. I promise you to forget
+everything that you said to me, and not to breathe it to a soul."
+
+"Oh, say what you wish. It is not my custom to deny what I have spoken.
+What I told you was true and honest, and I shall not blush for it before
+anybody."
+
+"Yes, but if your wife were to know that just before you came you were
+thinking of another woman, it would prejudice her against you. So take
+care how you speak now. Don't look at me before everybody with such a
+rapt expression. Think of Father Maurice, who relies on your obedience,
+and who would be enraged at me if I were to turn you from his will.
+Good-by, Germain. I take Petit-Pierre in order to force you to go to
+Fourche. He is a pledge which I keep on your behalf."
+
+"So you want to go with her?" said the husbandman to his son, seeing
+that the boy had clasped Marie's hands and was following her resolutely.
+
+"Yes, father," answered the child, who had heard the conversation and
+understood after his own fashion the words spoken so unguardedly before
+him. "I am going away with my dearest little Marie. You shall come to
+find me when you have done marrying, but I wish Marie to be my little
+mother."
+
+"You see how much he wishes it," said Germain to the girl. "Listen to
+me, Petit-Pierre," he added. "I wish her to be your mother and to stay
+with you always. It is she who does not wish to. Try to make her grant
+you what she has denied me."
+
+"Don't be afraid, father, I shall make her say yes. Little Marie does
+everything that I wish."
+
+He walked away with the young girl. Germain stood alone, sadder and more
+irresolute than ever.
+
+
+
+
+XI -- The Belle of the Village
+
+AND after all, when he had brushed the dust of travel from his clothes
+and from his horse's harness, when he had mounted the gray, and when he
+had learned the road, he felt that there was no retreat and that he must
+forget that anxious night as though it had been a dangerous dream.
+
+He found Father Leonard seated on a trim bench of spinach-green. The six
+stone steps leading up to the door showed that the house had a cellar.
+The walls of the garden and of the hemp-field were plastered with lime
+and sand. It was a handsome house, and might almost have been mistaken
+for the dwelling of a bourgeois.
+
+Germain's future father-in-law came forward to meet him, and having
+plied him, for five minutes, with questions concerning his entire
+family, he added that conventional phrase with which one passer-by
+addresses another concerning the object of his journey: "So you are
+taking a little trip in this part of the country?"
+
+"I have come to see you," replied the husbandman, "to give you this
+little present of game with my father's compliments, and to tell you
+from him that you ought to know with what intentions I come to your
+house."
+
+"Oh, ho!" said Father Leonard, laughing and tapping his capacious
+stomach, "I see, I understand, I am with you, and," he added with a
+wink, "you will not be the only one to pay your court, young man. There
+are three already in the house dancing attendance like you. I never turn
+anybody away, and I should find it hard to say yes or no to any of them,
+for they are all good matches. Yet, on account of Father Maurice and for
+the sake of the rich fields you till, I hope that it may be you. But my
+daughter is of age and mistress of her own affairs. She will do as
+she likes. Go in and introduce yourself. I hope that you will draw the
+prize."
+
+"I beg your pardon," answered Germain, amazed to find himself an extra
+when he had counted on being alone in the field. "I was not aware that
+your daughter was supplied already with suitors, and I did not come to
+quarrel over her."
+
+"If you supposed that because you were slow in coming, my daughter would
+be left unprovided for, you were greatly mistaken, my son," replied
+Father Leonard with unshaken good humor. "Catherine has the wherewithal
+to attract suitors, and her only difficulty lies in choosing. But come
+in; don't lose heart. The woman is worth, a struggle."
+
+And pushing in Germain by the shoulders with boisterous gaiety, he
+called to his daughter as they entered the house:
+
+"So, Catherine, here is another!"
+
+This cordial but unmannerly method of introduction to the widow, in
+the presence of her other devotees, completed Germain's distress and
+embarrassment. He felt the awkwardness of his position, and stood for a
+few moments without daring to look upon the beauty and her court.
+
+The Widow Guerin had a good figure and did not lack freshness, but her
+expression and her dress displeased Germain the instant he saw her.
+She had a bold, self-satisfied look, and her cap, edged with three lace
+flounces, her silk apron, and her fichu of fine black lace were little
+in accord with the staid and sober widow he had pictured to himself.
+
+Her elaborate dress and forward manners inclined Germain to judge the
+widow old and ugly, although she was certainly not either. He thought
+that such finery and playful manners might well suit little Marie's
+years and wit, but that the widow's fun was labored and over bold, and
+that she wore her fine clothes in bad taste.
+
+The three suitors were seated at a table loaded with wines and meats
+which were spread out for their use throughout the Sunday morning; for
+Father Leonard liked to show off his wealth, and the widow was not sorry
+to display her pretty china and keep a table like a rich lady. Germain,
+simple and unsuspecting as he was, watched everything with a penetrating
+glance, and for the first time in his life he kept on the defensive when
+he drank. Father Leonard obliged him to sit down with his rivals, and
+taking a chair opposite he treated him with great politeness, and talked
+to him rather than to the others.
+
+The present of game, despite the breach Germain had made on his own
+account, was still plenteous enough to produce its effect. The widow
+did not look unaware of its presence, and the suitors cast disdainful
+glances in its direction.
+
+Germain felt ill at ease in this company, and did not eat heartily.
+Father Leonard poked fun at him.
+
+"You look very melancholy," said he, "and you are ill-using your glass.
+You must not allow love to spoil your appetite, for a fasting lover can
+make no such pretty speeches as he whose ideas are brightened with a
+drop of wine."
+
+Germain was mortified at being thought already in love, and the
+artificial manner of the widow, who kept lowering her eyes with a
+smile as a woman does who is sure of her calculations, made him long to
+protest against his pretended surrender; but fearing to appear uncivil,
+he smiled and held his peace.
+
+He thought the widow's beaus, three bumpkins. They must have been rich
+for her to admit of their pretensions. One was over forty, and fat as
+Father Leonard; another had lost an eye, and drank like a sot. The
+third was a young fellow, and nice-looking too; but he kept insisting on
+displaying his wit, and would say things so silly that they were
+painful to hear. Yet the widow laughed as though she admired all his
+foolishness, and made small proof of her good taste thereby. At first
+Germain thought her infatuated with him, but soon he perceived that
+he himself was especially encouraged, and that they wished him to make
+fresh advances. For this reason he felt an increasing stiffness and
+severity which he took no pains to conceal.
+
+The time came for mass, and they rose from table to go thither in
+company. It was necessary to walk as far as Mers, a good half-league
+away, and Germain was so tired that he longed to take a nap before they
+went; but he was not in the habit of missing mass, and he started with
+the others.
+
+The roads were filled with people, and the widow marched proudly along,
+escorted by her three suitors, taking an arm, first of one and then of
+another, and carrying her head high with an air of importance. She was
+eager to display the fourth to the eyes of the passers-by; but Germain
+felt so ridiculous to be dragged along in the train of a petticoat
+where all the world might see, that he kept at a respectable distance,
+chatting with Father Leonard, and succeeded in occupying his attention
+so well that they did not look at all as if they belonged to the party.
+
+
+
+
+XII -- The Master
+
+WHEN they reached the village, the widow halted to allow them to catch
+up. She was bent upon making her entry with all her train; but Germain,
+denying her this pleasure, deserted Father Leonard, and after conversing
+with several acquaintances, he entered the church by another door. The
+widow was vexed.
+
+When mass was over, she made her appearance in triumph on the lawn,
+where dancing was going on, and she began her dance with her three
+lovers in turn. Germain watched her and saw that she danced well, but
+with affectation.
+
+"So, you don't ask my daughter?" said Leonard, tapping him on the
+shoulder. "You are too easily frightened."
+
+"I have not danced since I lost my wife," answered the husbandman.
+
+"But now that you are looking for another, mourning 's over in heart as
+well as in clothes."
+
+"That 's no reason, Father Leonard. Besides, I am too old and I don't
+care for dancing."
+
+"Listen," said Father Leonard, drawing him toward a retired corner,
+"when you entered my house you were vexed to see the place already
+besieged, and I see that you are very proud. But that is not reasonable,
+my boy. My daughter is used to a great deal of attention, particularly
+since she left off her mourning two years ago, and it is not her place
+to lead you on."
+
+"Has your daughter been thinking of marrying for two years already
+without making her choice?" asked Germain.
+
+"She does n't wish to hurry, and she is right. Although she has lively
+manners, and although you may not think that she reflects a great deal,
+she is a woman of excellent common sense, and knows very well what she
+is about."
+
+"It does not appear to me so," said Germain ingenuously, "for she has
+three suitors in her train, and if she knew her own mind, there are two
+of them, at least, whom she would find superfluous and request to stay
+at home."
+
+"Why, Germain, you don't understand at all. She does n't wish the old
+man, nor the blind man, nor the young man, I am quite certain; yet if
+she were to turn them off, people would think that she wished to remain
+a widow, and nobody else would come."
+
+"Oh, I see. These three are used for a guide-post."
+
+"As you like. What is the harm if they are satisfied?"
+
+"Every man to his taste," said Germain.
+
+"I see that yours is different. Now supposing that you are chosen, then
+they would leave the coast clear."
+
+"Yes, supposing! and meanwhile how much time should I have to whistle?"
+
+"That depends on your persuasive tongue, I suppose. Until now, my
+daughter has always thought that she would pass the best part of her
+life while she was being courted, and she is in no hurry to become the
+servant of one man when she can order so many others about. So she will
+please herself as long as the game amuses her; but if you please her
+more than the game, the game will cease. Only you must not lose courage.
+Come back every Sunday, dance with her, let her know that you are
+amongst her followers, and if she finds you more agreeable and better
+bred than the others, some fine day she will tell you so, no doubt."
+
+"Excuse me, Father Leonard. Your daughter has the right to do as she
+pleases, and it is not my business to blame her. If I were in her place,
+I should do differently. I should be more frank, and should not waste
+the time of men who have, doubtless, something better to do than dancing
+attendance on a woman who makes fun of them. Still, if that is what
+amuses her and makes her happy, it is no affair of mine. Only there is
+one thing I must tell you which is a little embarrassing, since you have
+mistaken my intentions from the start, for you are so sure of what is
+not so, that you have given me no chance to explain. You must know,
+then, that I did not come here to ask for your daughter in marriage, but
+merely to buy a pair of oxen which you are going to take to market next
+week, and which my father-in-law thinks will suit him."
+
+"I understand, Germain," answered Leonard very calmly; "you changed your
+plans when you saw my daughter with her admirers. It is as you please.
+It seems that what attracts some people repels others, and you
+are perfectly welcome to withdraw, for you have not declared your
+intentions. If you wish seriously to buy my cattle, come and see them in
+the pasture, and whether we make a bargain or not, you will come back to
+dinner with us before you return."
+
+"I don't wish to trouble you," answered Germain. "Perhaps you have
+something to do here. I myself am tired of watching the dancing and
+standing idle. I will go to see your cattle, and I will soon join you at
+your house."
+
+Then Germain made his escape, and walked away toward the meadows where
+Leonard had pointed out to him some of his cattle. It was true that
+Father Maurice intended to buy, and Germain thought that if he were
+to bring home a fine pair of oxen at a reasonable price, he might more
+easily receive a pardon for wilfully relinquishing the purpose of his
+journey. He walked rapidly, and soon found himself at some distance from
+Ormeaux. Then of a sudden, he felt a desire to kiss his son and to see
+little Marie once again, although he had lost all hope and even had
+chased away the thought that he might some day owe his happiness to her.
+Everything that he had heard and seen: this woman, flirtatious and vain;
+this father, at once shrewd and short-sighted, encouraging his daughter
+in habits of pride and untruth; this city luxury, which seemed to him a
+transgression against the dignity of country manners; this time wasted
+in foolish, empty words; this home so different from his own; and above
+all, that deep uneasiness which comes to a laborer of the fields when
+he leaves his accustomed toil: all the trouble and annoyance of the past
+few hours made Germain long to be with his child and with his little
+neighbor. Even had he not been in love, he would have sought her to
+divert his mind and raise his spirits to their wonted level.
+
+But he looked in vain over the neighboring meadows. He saw neither
+little Marie nor little Pierre, and yet it was the hour when shepherds
+are in the fields. There was a large flock in a pasture. He asked of
+a young boy who tended them whether the sheep belonged to the farm of
+Ormeaux.
+
+"Yes," said the child.
+
+"Are you the shepherd? Do boys tend the flocks of the farm, amongst
+you?"
+
+"No, I am taking care of them to-day, because the shepherdess went away.
+She was ill."
+
+"But have you not a new shepherdess, who came this morning?"
+
+"Yes, surely; but she, too, has gone already."
+
+"What! gone? Did she not have a child with her?"
+
+"Yes, a little boy who cried. They both went away after they had been
+here two hours."
+
+"Went away! Where?"
+
+"Where they came from, I suppose. I did n't ask them."
+
+"But why did they go away?" asked Germain, growing more and more uneasy.
+
+"How the deuce do I know?"
+
+"Did they not agree about wages? Yet that must have been settled
+before."
+
+"I can tell you nothing about it I saw them come and go, nothing more."
+
+Germain walked toward the farm and questioned the farmer. Nobody could
+give him an explanation; but after speaking with the farmer, he felt
+sure that the girl had gone without saying a word, and had taken the
+weeping child with her.
+
+"Can they have been ill-treating my son?" cried Germain.
+
+"It was your son, then? How did he happen to be with the little girl?
+Where do you come from, and what is your name?"
+
+Germain, seeing that after the fashion of the country they were
+answering him with questions, stamped his foot impatiently, and asked to
+speak with the master.
+
+The master was away. Usually, he did not spend the whole day when he
+came to the farm. He was on horseback, and he had ridden off to one of
+his other farms.
+
+"But, honestly," said Germain, growing very anxious, "can't you tell me
+why this girl left?"
+
+The farmer and his wife exchanged an odd smile. Then the former answered
+that he knew nothing, and that it was no business of his. All that
+Germain could learn was that both girl and child had started off toward
+Fourche. He rushed back to Fourche. The widow and her lovers were still
+away; so was Father Leonard. The maid told him that a girl and a child
+had come to ask for him, but that as she did not know them, she did not
+wish to let them in, and had advised them to go to Mers.
+
+"And why did you refuse to let them in?" said Germain, angrily. "People
+are very suspicious in this country, where nobody opens the door to a
+neighbor."
+
+"But you see," answered the maid, "in a house as rich as this, I
+must keep my eyes open. When the master is away, I am responsible for
+everything, and I cannot open the door to the first person that comes
+along."
+
+"It is a bad custom," said Germain, "and I had rather be poor than
+to live in constant fear like that. Good-by to you, young woman, and
+good-by to your vile country."
+
+He made inquiries at the neighboring house. The shepherdess and child
+had been seen. As the boy had left Belair suddenly, carelessly dressed,
+with his blouse torn, and his little lambskin over his shoulders, and
+as little Marie was necessarily poorly clad at all times, they had been
+taken for beggars. People had offered them bread. The girl had accepted
+a crust for the child, who was hungry, then she had walked away with him
+very quickly, and had entered the forest.
+
+Germain thought a minute, then he asked whether the farmer of Ormeaux
+had not been at Fourche.
+
+"Yes," they answered, "he passed on horseback a few seconds after the
+girl."
+
+"Was he chasing her?"
+
+"Oh, so you understand?" answered the village publican, with a laugh.
+"Certain it is that he is the devil of a fellow for running after girls.
+But I don't believe that he caught her; though, after all, if he had
+seen her--"
+
+"That is enough, thank you!" And he flew rather than ran to Leonard's
+stable. Throwing the saddle on the gray's back, he leaped upon it, and
+set off at full gallop toward the wood of Chanteloube.
+
+His heart beat hard with fear and anger; the sweat poured down his
+forehead; he spurred the mare till the blood came, though the gray
+needed no pressing when she felt herself on the road to her stable.
+
+
+
+
+XIII -- The Old Woman
+
+GERMAIN came soon to the spot where he had passed the night on the
+border of the pool. The fire was smoking still. An old woman was
+gathering the remnants of the wood little Marie had piled there. Germain
+stopped to question her. She was deaf and mistook his inquiries.
+
+"Yes, my son," said she, "this is the Devil's Pool. It is an evil spot,
+and you must not approach it without throwing in three stones with your
+left hand, while you cross yourself with the right. That drives away the
+spirits. Otherwise trouble comes to those who go around it."
+
+"I am not asking about that," said Germain, moving nearer her, and
+screaming at the top of his lungs. "Have you seen a girl and a child
+walking through the wood?"
+
+"Yes," said the old woman, "a little child was drowned there."
+
+Germain shook from head to foot; but happily the hag added:
+
+"That happened a long time ago. In memory of the accident they raised
+a handsome cross there. But one stormy night, the bad spirits threw it
+into the water. You can still see one end of it. If anybody were unlucky
+enough to pass the night here, he could never find his way out before
+daylight. He must walk and walk, and though he went two hundred leagues
+into the forest, he must always return to the same place."
+
+The peasant's imagination was aroused in spite of himself, and the
+thought of the evils that must come in order that the old woman's
+assertions might be vindicated, took so firm a hold of his mind that he
+felt chilled through and through. Hopeless of obtaining more news, he
+remounted, and traversed the woods afresh, calling Pierre with all his
+might, whistling, cracking his whip, and snapping the branches that the
+whole forest might reecho with the noise of his coming; then he
+listened for an answering voice, but he heard no sound save the cowbells
+scattered through the glades, and the wild cries of the swine as they
+fought over the acorns.
+
+At length Germain heard behind him the noise of a horse following in
+his traces, and a man of middle age, dark, sturdy, and dressed after the
+city fashion, called to him to stop. Germain had never seen the farmer
+of Ormeaux, but his instinctive rage told him at once that this was
+the man. He turned, and eyeing him from head to foot, waited for him to
+speak.
+
+"Have not you seen a young girl of fifteen or sixteen go by with a small
+boy?" asked the farmer, with an assumed air of indifference, although he
+was evidently ill at ease.
+
+"What do you want of her?" answered Germain, taking no pains to conceal
+his anger.
+
+"I might tell you that that is none of your business, my friend. But
+as I have no reasons for secrecy, I shall tell you that she is a
+shepherdess whom I engaged for a year, before I knew her. When I saw
+her, she looked too young and frail to work on the farm. I thanked her,
+but I wished to pay the expenses of her short journey, and while my back
+was turned, she went off in a huff. She was in such a hurry that she
+forgot even some of her belongings and her purse, which has certainly
+not much in it, probably but a few pennies; but since I was going in
+this direction, I hoped to meet her, and give her back the things which
+she left behind, as well as what I owe her."
+
+Germain had too honest a heart not to pause at hearing a story which,
+however unlikely, was not impossible. He fastened his penetrating gaze
+on the farmer, who submitted to the examination with a plentiful supply
+of impudence or of good faith.
+
+"I wish to get at the bottom of this matter," said Germain; "and,"
+continued he, suppressing his indignation, "the girl lives in my
+village. I know her. She can't be far away. Let 's ride on together; we
+shall find her, no doubt."
+
+"You are right," said the farmer; "let's move on; but if we do not find
+her before we reach the end of this road, I shall give up, for I must
+turn off toward Ardentes."
+
+"Oh, oh!" thought the peasant, "I shall not part with you, even if I
+have to follow you around the 'Devil's Pool for twenty-four hours."
+
+"Stop," said Germain suddenly, fixing his eyes on a clump of broom which
+waved in a peculiar manner. "Halloa! halloa! Petit Pierre, is that you,
+my child?"
+
+The boy recognized his father's voice, and came out from the broom
+leaping like a young deer; but when he saw Germain in company with the
+farmer, he stopped dismayed, and stood irresolute. "Come, my Pierre,
+come. It is I," cried the husbandman, as he leaped from his horse and
+ran toward his boy to take him in his arms; "and where is little Marie?"
+
+"She is hiding there, because she is afraid of that dreadful black man,
+and so am I."
+
+"You need n't be afraid. I am here. Marie, Marie. It is I."
+
+Marie crept toward them, but the moment she saw Germain with the farmer
+close behind, she sprang forward, and throwing herself into his arms,
+clung to him as a daughter to her father.
+
+"Oh, my brave Germain!" she cried, "you will defend me. I am not afraid
+when you are near."
+
+Germain shuddered. He looked at Marie. She was pale; her clothes were
+torn by the thorns which had scratched her as she passed, rushing toward
+the brake like a stag chased by the hunters. But neither shame nor
+despair were in her face.
+
+"Your master wishes to speak to you," said he, his eyes fixed on her
+features.
+
+"My master!" she exclaimed fiercely; "that man is no master of mine, and
+he never shall be. You, Germain, you are my master. I want you to take
+me home with you. I will be your servant for nothing."
+
+The farmer advanced, feigning impatience. "Little girl," said he, "you
+left something behind at the farm, which I am bringing back to you."
+
+"No, you are not, sir," answered little Marie. "I did n't forget
+anything, and I have nothing to ask of you."
+
+"Listen a moment," returned the farmer. "It 's I who have something to
+tell you. Come with me. Don't be afraid. It's only a word or two."
+
+"You may say them aloud. I have no secrets with you."
+
+"At any rate, do take your money."
+
+"My money? You owe me nothing, thank God!"
+
+"I suspected as much," said Germain under his breath, "but I don't care,
+Marie. Listen to what he has to say to you, for--I am curious to know.
+You can tell me afterward. Go up to his horse. I shall not lose sight of
+you."
+
+Marie took three steps toward the farmer. He bent over the pommel of his
+saddle, and lowering his voice he said:
+
+"Little girl, here is a bright golden louis for you. Don't say anything
+about it; do you hear? I shall say that I found you too frail to work
+on my farm. There will be no more talk about that. I shall be passing by
+your house one of these days; and if you have not said anything, I will
+give you something more; and then if you are more sensible, you have
+only to speak. I will take you home with me, or I will come at dusk and
+talk with you in the meadows. What present would you like me to bring
+you?"
+
+"Here, sir, is the present I have for you," answered little Marie,
+aloud, as she threw the golden louis in his face with all her might. "I
+thank you heartily, and I beg that if you come anywhere near our house,
+you will be good enough to let me know. All the boys in the neighborhood
+will go out to welcome you, because, where I live, we are very fond of
+gentlemen who try to make love to poor girls. You shall see. They will
+be on the lookout for you."
+
+"You lie with your dirty tongue," cried the farmer, raising his stick
+with a dangerous air. "You wish to make people believe what is not so,
+but you shall never get a penny out of me. We know what kind of a girl
+you are."
+
+Marie drew back, frightened, and Germain sprang to the bridle of the
+farmer's horse and shook it violently.
+
+"I understand now," said he; "it is easy to see what is going on. Get
+down, my man, get down; I want to talk to you."
+
+The farmer was not eager to take up the quarrel. Anxious to escape,
+he set spurs to his horse and tried to loosen the peasant's grasp by
+striking down his hands with a cane; but Germain dodged the blow, and
+seizing hold of his antagonist's leg, he unseated him and flung him
+to the earth. The farmer regained his feet, but although he defended
+himself vigorously, he was knocked down once more. Germain held him to
+the ground. Then he said:
+
+"Poor coward, I could thrash you if I wished. But I don't want to do
+you an injury, and, besides, no amount of punishment would help your
+conscience--but you shall not stir from this spot until you beg the
+girl's pardon, on your knees."
+
+The farmer understood this sort of thing, and wished to take it all as a
+joke. He made believe that his offense was not serious, since it lay
+in words alone, and protested that he was perfectly willing to ask her
+pardon, provided he might kiss the girl afterward. Finally, he proposed
+that they go and drink a pint of wine at the nearest tavern, and so part
+good friends.
+
+"You are disgusting!" answered Germain, rubbing his victim's head in the
+dirt, "and I never wish to see your nasty face again. So blush, if you
+are able, and when you come to our village, you had better slink along
+Sneak's Alley."*
+
+He picked up the farmer's holly-stick, broke it over his knee to show
+the strength of his wrists, and threw away the pieces with disgust Then
+giving one hand to his son and the other to little Marie, he walked
+away, still trembling with anger.
+
+* This is the road, which, diverging from the principal street at the
+entrance of villages, makes a circuit about them.. Persons who are in
+dread off receiving some well deserved insult, are supposed to take this
+route to escape attention.
+
+
+
+
+XIV -- The Return to the Farm
+
+AT the end of fifteen minutes they had left the heath behind them.
+They trotted along the highroad, and the gray whinnied at each familiar
+object. Petit-Pierre told his father as much as he could understand of
+what had passed.
+
+"When we reached the farm," said he, "that man came to speak to my Marie
+in the fold where we had gone to see the pretty sheep. I had climbed
+into the manger to play, and that man did not see me. Then he said good
+morning to Marie, and he kissed her."
+
+"You allowed him to kiss you, Marie?" said Germain, trembling with
+anger.
+
+"I thought it was a civility, a custom of the place to new-comers, just
+as at your farm the grandmother kisses the young girls who enter her
+service to show that she adopts them and will be a mother to them."
+
+"And next," went on little Pierre, who was proud to have an adventure to
+tell of, "_that man_ told you something wicked, which you have told me
+never to repeat and not even remember; so I forgot it right away. Still,
+if father wishes, I will tell him what it was--"
+
+"No, Pierre, I don't wish to hear, and I don't wish you ever to think of
+it again."
+
+"Then I will forget it all over again," replied the child. "Next, _that
+man_ seemed to be growing angry because Marie told him that she was
+going away. He told her he would give her whatever she wanted,--a
+hundred francs! And my Marie grew angry too. Then he came toward her as
+if he wished to hurt her. I was afraid, and I ran to Marie and cried.
+Then _that man_ said: 'What 's that? Where did that child come from? Put
+it out,' and he raised his cane to beat me. But my Marie prevented him,
+and she spoke to him this way: 'We will talk later, sir; now I must take
+this child back to Fourche, and then I shall return.' And as soon as
+he had left the fold, my Marie spoke to me this way: 'We must run, my
+Pierre; we must get away as quickly as we can, for this is a wicked
+man and he is trying to do us harm.' Then when we had gone back of the
+farm-houses, we crossed a little meadow, and we went to Fourche to find
+you. But you were not there, and they would n't let us wait. And then
+_that man_, riding his black horse, came behind us, and we ran on as
+fast as we could and hid in the woods. And then he followed us, and
+when we heard him coming, we hid again. And then, when he had passed,
+we began to run toward home, and then you came and found us, and that is
+how it all happened. I have n't forgotten anything, have I, my Marie?"
+
+"No, my Pierre, that is the whole truth. Now, Germain, you must be my
+witness, and tell everybody in the village that if I did not stay there
+it was not from want of courage and industry."
+
+"And, Marie, I want to ask of you whether a man of twenty-eight is too
+old when there is a woman to be defended and an insult to be revenged.
+I should like to know whether Bastien or any other pretty boy, ten years
+better off than I, would not have been knocked to pieces by _that man_,
+as Petit-Pierre says. What do you think?"
+
+"I think, Germain, that you have done me a great service, and that I
+shall be grateful all my life."
+
+"Is that all?"
+
+"Little father," said the child, "I forgot to ask little Marie what I
+promised. I have not had time yet, but I will speak to her at home, and I
+will speak to my grandmother too."
+
+The child's promise set Germain to thinking He must explain his conduct
+to his family and give his objections to the widow Guam, and all the
+while conceal the true reasons which had made him so judicious and so
+decided. When a man is proud and happy, it seems an easy task to thrust
+his happiness upon others, but to be repulsed on one side and blamed on
+the other is not a very pleasant position.
+
+Fortunately, Petit-Pierre was fast asleep when they reached the farm,
+and Germain put him to bed undisturbed. Then he began upon all sorts of
+explanations, Father Maurice, seated on a three-legged stool before the
+door, listened with gravity; and, although he was ill-content with
+the result of the journey, when Germain told him about the widow's
+systematic coquetry, and demanded of his father-in-law whether he had
+the time to go and pay his court fifty-two Sundays in the year at the
+risk of being dismissed in the end, the old man nodded his head in
+assent and answered: "You were not wrong, Germain; that could never be."
+And then, when Germain described how he had been obliged to bring back
+little Marie, with the utmost haste, in order to protect her from the
+insults or perhaps from the violence of a wicked master, Father Maurice
+nodded approvingly again and said: "You were not wrong, Germain; that
+was right."
+
+When Germain had told his story, and had set forth all his reasons, the
+old farmer and his wife heaved deep, simultaneous sighs of resignation,
+and looked at each other. Then the head of the house rose and said:
+"God's will be done. Love can't be made to order."
+
+"Come to supper, Germain," said his mother-in-law. "It is unfortunate
+that this did not come to a better end, but, after all, it seems that
+God did not wish it. We must look elsewhere."
+
+"Yes," added the old man, "as my wife says, we must look elsewhere."
+
+There was no more noise at the house, and on the morrow, when
+Petit-Pierre rose with the larks at dawn, he was no longer excited
+by the extraordinary events of the preceding days. Like other little
+peasants of his age, he became indifferent, forgot everything that had
+been running in his head, and thought only of playing with his brothers,
+and of pretending to drive the horses and oxen like a man. Germain
+plunged into his work, and tried to forget, too; but he became so
+absent-minded and so sad that everybody noticed it. He never spoke to
+little Marie, he never even looked at her, and yet had anybody asked him
+in what meadow she was, or by what road she had passed, there was not a
+moment in the day when he could not have answered if he would. He dared
+not ask his family to take her in at the farm during the winter, and yet
+he knew well how she must suffer from want. But she did not suffer; and
+Mother Guillette could not understand how her little store of wood never
+grew less, and how her shed was full in the morning, although she
+had left it almost empty at night It was the same with the wheat and
+potatoes. Somebody entered by the garret window, and emptied a sack on
+the floor without awaking a soul or leaving a trace of his coming. The
+widow was at once uneasy and delighted. She made her daughter promise to
+tell nobody, and said that were people to know of the miracle performed
+at her house they would take her for a witch. She felt confident that
+the devil had a share in it, but she was in no hurry to pick a quarrel
+with him by calling down the priest's exorcisms on the house. It would
+be time enough, she said, when Satan should come to demand her soul in
+return for his gifts.
+
+Little Marie understood the truth better, but she dared not speak to
+Germain, for fear of seeing him return to his dreams of marriage, and,
+before him, she pretended to perceive nothing.
+
+
+
+
+XV -- Mother Maurice
+
+ONE day, Mother Maurice was alone in the orchard with Germain, and spoke
+to him kindly:
+
+"My poor son, I believe you are not well. You don't eat as well as
+usual; you never laugh; you talk less and less. Perhaps one of us, or
+all of us, have hurt your feelings, without knowing and without wishing
+it."
+
+"No, my mother," answered Germain, "you have always been as kind to
+me as the mother who brought me into the world, and I should be very
+ungrateful if I were to complain of you or your husband, or of anybody
+in the household."
+
+"Then, my child, it is the sorrow for your wife's death which comes back
+to you. Instead of growing lighter with time, your grief becomes worse,
+and as your father has said very wisely, it is absolutely necessary for
+you to marry again."
+
+"Yes, my mother, that is my opinion, but the women whom you advised
+me to ask don't suit me. Whenever I see them, instead of forgetting my
+Catherine, I think of her all the more."
+
+"Apparently that 's because we have n't been able to understand your
+taste. You must help us by telling us the truth. There must be a woman
+somewhere who is made for you, for God does n't make anybody without
+placing his happiness in somebody else. So if you know where to find
+this woman whom you need, take her, and be she pretty or ugly, young or
+old, rich or poor, we have made up our minds, my husband and I, to give
+our consent, for we are tired of seeing you so sad, and we can never be
+happy while you are sorrowful."
+
+"My mother, you are as kind as the kind Lord, and so is my father,"
+answered Germain; "but your compassion brings small help to my troubles,
+for the girl I love does n't care for me."
+
+"She is too young, then? It's foolish for you to love a young girl."
+
+"Yes, mother dear, I have been foolish enough to love a young girl, and
+it 's my fault. I do my best to stop thinking of it, but, working or
+sleeping, at mass or in bed, with my children or with you, I can think
+of nothing else."
+
+"Then it 's like a fate cast over you, Germain. There 's but one remedy,
+and it is that this girl must change her mind and listen to you. It's my
+duty to look into this, and see whether it 's practicable. Tell me where
+she lives, and what 's her name."
+
+"Oh, my dear mother, I dare not," said Germain, "because you will make
+fun of me."
+
+"I shall not make fun of you, Germain, because you are in trouble, and I
+don't wish to make it harder for you. Is it Fanchette?"
+
+"No, mother, of course not."
+
+"Or Rosette?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Tell me, then, for I shall never finish if I must name every girl in
+the country-side."
+
+Germain bowed his head, and could not bring himself to answer.
+
+"Very good," said Mother Maurice, "I shall let you alone for to-day;
+to-morrow, perhaps, you will be more confidential with me, or possibly
+your sister-in-law will question you more cleverly." And she picked up
+her basket to go and spread her linen on the bushes.
+
+Germain acted like children who make up their minds when they see that
+they are no longer attracting attention. He followed his mother, and at
+length, trembling, he named Marie of Guillette.
+
+Great was the surprise of Mother Maurice. Marie was the last person she
+would have dreamed of. But she had the delicacy not to cry out, and made
+her comments to herself. Then seeing that her silence hurt Germain, she
+stretched out her basket toward him and said:
+
+"Is there any reason for not helping me at my work. Carry this load, and
+come and talk with me. Have you reflected well, Germain? Are you fully
+decided?"
+
+"Alas, dear mother, you must n't speak in that way. I should be decided
+if I had a chance of success, but as I could never be heard, I have only
+made up my mind to cure myself, if I can."
+
+"And if you can't."
+
+"There is an end to everything, Mother Maurice: when the horse is laden
+too heavily, he falls, and when the cow has nothing to eat, she dies."
+
+"Do you mean to say that you will die, if you do not succeed. God grant
+not, Germain. I don't like to hear a man like you talk of those things;
+for what he says, he thinks. You are very brave, and weakness
+is dangerous for strong men. Take heart; I can't conceive that a
+poverty-stricken girl, whom you have honored so much as to ask her to
+marry you, will refuse you."
+
+"Yet it 's the truth: she does refuse me."
+
+"And what reasons does she give you?"
+
+"That you have always been kind to her, and that her family owes a great
+deal to yours, and that she does n't wish to displease you by turning me
+away from a rich marriage."
+
+"If she says that, she proves her good sense, and shows what an honest
+girl she is. But, Germain, she does n't cure you; for of course she
+tells you that she loves you and would marry you if we were willing?"
+
+"That's the worst part of all. She says that her heart can never be
+mine."
+
+"If she says what she does n't think in order to keep you at a safer
+distance, the child deserves our love, and we should pass over her youth
+on account of her great good sense."
+
+"Yes," said Germain, struck by a hope he had never held before; "that
+would be very wise and right of her! But if she is so sensible, I am
+sure it is because I displease her."
+
+"Germain," said Mother Maurice, "you must promise me not to worry for a
+whole week. Keep from tormenting yourself, eat, sleep, and be as gay as
+you used to be. For my part, I 'll speak to my husband, and if I gain
+his consent, you shall know the girl's real feelings toward you."
+
+Germain promised, and the week passed without a single word in private
+from Father Maurice, who seemed to suspect nothing. The husbandman did
+his best to look calm, but he grew ever paler and more troubled.
+
+
+
+
+XVI -- Little Marie
+
+AT length, on Sunday morning, when mass was over, his mother-in-law
+asked Germain what encouragement he had had from his sweetheart since
+the conversation in the orchard.
+
+"Why, none at all," answered he; "I have n't spoken to her."
+
+"How can you expect to win her if you don't speak to her?"
+
+"I have spoken to her but once," replied Germain. "That was when we were
+together at Fourche, and since then I have n't said a single word. Her
+refusal gave me so much pain that I had rather not hear her begin again
+to tell me that she does n't love me."
+
+"But, my son, you must speak to her now; your father gives his approval.
+So make up your mind. I tell you to do it, and, if need be, I shall
+order you to do it, for you can't rest in this uncertainty."
+
+Germain obeyed. He reached Mother Guillette's house, hanging his
+head with a hopeless air. Little Marie sat alone before the hearth so
+thoughtful that she did not hear Germain's step. When she saw him before
+her, she started from her chair in surprise and grew very red.
+
+"Little Marie," said he, sitting down near her, "I come to trouble you
+and to give you pain. I know it very well, but the man and his wife at
+home [it was thus after the peasant fashion that he designated the heads
+of the house] wish me to speak to you, and beg you to marry me. You
+don't care for me. I am prepared for it."
+
+"Germain," answered little Marie, "are you sure that you love me?"
+
+"It pains you, I know, but it is n't my fault. If you could change your
+mind, I should be so very happy, and certain it is that I don't deserve
+it. Look at me, Marie; am I very terrible?"
+
+"No, Germain," she answered, with a smile, "you are better looking than
+I."
+
+"Don't make fun of me; look at me charitably; as yet, I have never lost
+a single hair nor a single tooth. My eyes tell you plainly how much I
+love you. Look straight into my eyes. It is written there, and every
+girl knows how to read that writing."
+
+Marie looked into Germain's eyes with playful boldness; then of a sudden
+she turned away her head and trembled.
+
+"Good God," exclaimed Germain, "I make you afraid; you look at me as
+though I were the farmer of Ormeaux. Don't be afraid of me, please
+don't; that hurts me too much. I shall not say any bad words to you, I
+shall not kiss you if you will not have me, and when you wish me to go
+away, you have only to show me the door. Must I go in order to stop your
+trembling?"
+
+Marie held out her hand toward the husbandman, but without turning her
+head, which was bent on the fireplace, and without saying a word.
+
+"I understand," said Germain. "You pity me, for you are kind; you are
+sorry to make me unhappy; but you cant love me."
+
+"Why do you say these things to me, Germain?" answered little Marie,
+after a pause. "Do you wish to make me cry?"
+
+"Poor little girl, you have a kind heart, I know; but you don't love me,
+and you are hiding your face for fear of letting me see your dislike and
+your repugnance. And I? I dare not even clasp your hand! In the forest,
+when my boy was asleep and you were sleeping too, I almost kissed you
+very gently. But I would have died of shame rather than ask it of you,
+and that night I suffered as a man burning over a slow fire. Since
+that time I have dreamed of you every night. Ah! how I have kissed you,
+Marie! Yet during all that time you have slept without a dream. And now,
+do you know what I think? I think that were you to turn and look at me
+with the eyes I have for you, and were you to move your face close to
+mine, I believe I should fall dead for joy. And you, you think that if
+such a thing were to happen, you would die of anger and shame!"
+
+Germain spoke as in a dream, not hearing the words he said. Little Marie
+was trembling all the time, but he was shaking yet more and did not
+notice it. Of a sudden, she turned. Her eyes were filled with tears, and
+she looked at him reproachfully. The poor husbandman thought that this
+was the last blow, and without waiting for his sentence, he rose to go,
+but the girl stopped him, and throwing both her arms about him, she hid
+her face in his breast.
+
+"Oh, Germain," she sobbed, "did n't you feel that I loved you?"
+
+Then Germain had gone mad, if his son, who came galloping into the
+cottage on a stick, with his little sister on the crupper, scourging the
+imaginary steed with a willow branch, had not brought him to his senses.
+He lifted the boy and placed him in the girl's arms.
+
+"See," said he, "by loving me, you have made more than one person
+happy."
+
+
+
+
+
+APPENDIX
+
+I -- A Country Wedding
+
+HERE ends the history of Germain's marriage as he told it to me himself,
+good husbandman that he is. I ask your forgiveness, kind reader, that I
+know not how to translate it better; for it is a real translation that
+is needed by this old-fashioned and artless language of the peasants
+of the country "that I sing," as they used to say. These people speak
+French that is too true for us, and since Rabelais and Montaigne, the
+advance of the language has lost for us many of its old riches. Thus
+it is with every advance, and we must make the best of it. Yet it is
+a pleasure still to hear those picturesque idioms used in the old
+districts in the center of France; all the more because it is the
+genuine expression of the laughing, quiet, and delightfully talkative
+character of the people who make use of it. Touraine has preserved
+a certain precious number of patriarchal phrases. But Touraine was
+civilized greatly during the Renaissance, and since its decline she
+is filled with fine houses and highroads, with foreigners and traffic.
+Berry remained as she was, and I think that after Brittany and a few
+provinces in the far south of France, it is the best preserved district
+to be found at the present day. Some of the costumes are so strange and
+so curious that I hope to amuse you a few minutes more, kind reader,
+if you will allow me to describe to you in detail a country
+wedding--Germain's, for example--at which I had the pleasure of
+assisting several years ago.
+
+For, alas! everything passes. During my life alone, more change has
+taken place in the ideas and in the customs of my village than had
+been seen in the centuries before the Revolution. Already half the
+ceremonies, Celtic, Pagan, or of the Middle Ages, that in my childhood I
+have seen in their full vigor, have disappeared. In a year or two more,
+perhaps, the railroads will lay their level tracks across our deep
+valleys, and will carry away, with the swiftness of lightning, all our
+old traditions and our wonderful legends.
+
+It was in winter about the carnival season, the time of year when, in
+our country, it is fitting and proper to have weddings. In summer the
+time can hardly be spared, and the work of the farm cannot suffer three
+days' delay, not to speak of the additional days impaired to a greater
+or to a less degree by the moral and physical drunkenness which
+follows a gala-day. I was seated beneath the great mantelpiece of the
+old-fashioned kitchen fireplace when shots of pistols, barking of dogs,
+and the piercing notes of the bagpipe told me that the bridal pair were
+approaching. Very soon Father and Mother Maurice, Germain, and little
+Marie, followed by Jacques and his wife, the closer relatives, and the
+godfathers and godmothers of the bride and groom, all made their entry
+into the yard.
+
+Little Marie had not yet received her wedding-gifts,--favors, as they
+call them,--and was dressed in the best of her simple clothes, a dress
+of dark, heavy cloth, a white fichu with great spots of brilliant color,
+an apron of carnation,--an Indian red much in vogue at the time, but
+despised nowadays,--a cap of very white muslin after that pattern,
+happily still preserved, which calls to mind the head-dress of Anne
+Boleyn and of Agnes Sorrel. She was fresh and laughing, but not at
+all vain, though she had good reason to be so. Beside her was Germain,
+serious and tender, like young Jacob greeting Rebecca at the wells of
+Laban. Another girl would have assumed an important air and struck an
+attitude of triumph, for in every rank it is something to be married
+for a fair face alone. Yet the girl's eyes were moist and shone with
+tenderness. It was plain that she was deep in love and had no time to
+think of the opinions of others. Her little air of determination was not
+absent, but everything about her denoted frankness and good-will. There
+was nothing impertinent in her success, nothing selfish in her sense
+of power. Never have I seen so lovely a bride, when she answered with
+frankness her young friends who asked if she were happy:
+
+"Surely I have nothing to complain of the good Lord."
+
+Father Maurice was spokesman. He came forward to pay his compliments,
+and give the customary invitations. First he fastened to the mantelpiece
+a branch of laurel decked out with ribbons; this is known as the
+_writ_--that is to say, the letter of announcement. Next he gave
+to every guest a tiny cross made of a bit of blue ribbon sewn to a
+transverse bit of pink ribbon--pink for the bride, blue for the groom.
+The guests of both sexes were expected to keep this badge to adorn their
+caps or their button-holes on the wedding-day. This is the letter of
+invitation, the admission ticket.
+
+Then Father Maurice paid his congratulations. He invited the head of the
+house and all his _company_,--that is to say, all his children, all his
+friends, and all his servants,--to the benediction, _to the feast, to
+the sports, to the dance, and to everything that follows_. He did not
+fail to say, "I have come _to do you the honor of inviting you_"; a very
+right manner of speech, even though it appears to us to convey the wrong
+meaning, for it expresses the idea of doing honor to those who seem
+worthy of it.
+
+Despite the generosity of the invitation carried from house to house
+throughout the parish, politeness, which is very cautious amongst
+peasants, demands that only two persons from each family take advantage
+of it--one of the heads of the house, and one from the number of their
+children.
+
+After the invitations were made, the betrothed couple and their families
+took dinner together at the farm.
+
+Little Marie kept her three sheep on the common, and Germain tilled the
+soil as though nothing had happened.
+
+About two in the afternoon before the day set for the wedding, the music
+came. The music means the players of the bagpipe and hurdy-gurdy,
+their instruments decorated with long streaming ribbons, playing an
+appropriate march to a measure which would have been rather slow for
+feet foreign to the soil, but admirably adapted to the heavy ground and
+hilly roads of the country.
+
+Pistol-shots, fired by the young people and the children, announced
+the beginning of the wedding ceremonies. Little by little the guests
+assembled, and danced on the grass-plot before the house in order to
+enter into the spirit of the occasion. When evening was come they began
+strange preparations; they divided into two bands, and when night had
+settled down they proceeded to the ceremony of the _favors_.
+
+All this passed at the dwelling of the bride, Mother Guillette's
+cottage. Mother Guillette took with her her daughter, a dozen pretty
+shepherdesses, friends and relatives of her daughter, two or three
+respectable housewives, talkative neighbors, quick of wit and strict
+guardians of ancient customs. Next she chose a dozen stout fellows,
+her relatives and friends; and last of all the parish hemp-dresser, a
+garrulous old man, and as good a talker as ever there was.
+
+The part which, in Brittany, is played by the bazvalon, the village
+tailor, is taken in our part of the country by the hemp-dresser and the
+wool-carder, two professions which are unusually combined in one. He
+is present at all ceremonies, sad or gay, for he is very learned and
+a fluent talker, and on these occasions he must always figure as
+spokesman, in order to fulfil with exactitude certain formalities used
+from time immemorial. Traveling occupations, which bring a man into the
+midst of other families, without allowing him to shut himself up within
+his own, are well fitted to make him talker, wit, storyteller, and
+singer.
+
+The hemp-dresser is peculiarly skeptical. He and another village
+functionary, of whom we have spoken before, the grave-digger, are always
+the daring spirits of the neighborhood. They have talked so much about
+ghosts, and they know so well all the tricks of which these malicious
+spirits are capable, that they fear them scarcely at all. It is
+especially at night that all of them--grave-diggers, hemp-dressers, and
+ghosts--do their work. It is also at night when the hemp-dresser tells
+his melancholy stories. Permit me to make a digression.
+
+When the hemp has reached the right stage, that is to say, when it has
+been steeped sufficiently in running water, and half dried on the bank,
+it is brought into the yard and arranged in little upright sheaves,
+which, with their stalks divided at the base, and their heads bound in
+balls, bear in the dusk some small resemblance to a long procession
+of little white phantoms, standing on their slender legs, and moving
+noiselessly along the wall.
+
+It is at the end of September, when the nights are still warm, that they
+begin to beat it by the pale light of the moon. By day the hemp has been
+heated in the oven; at night they take it out to beat it while it is
+still hot. For this they use a kind of horse surmounted by a wooden
+lever which falls into grooves and breaks the plant without cutting it.
+It is then that you hear in the night that sudden, sharp noise of three
+blows in quick succession. Then there is silence; it is the movement of
+the arm drawing out the handful of hemp to break it in a fresh spot. The
+three blows begin again; the other arm works the lever, and thus it goes
+on until the moon is hidden by the early streaks of dawn. As the work
+continues but a few days in the year, the dogs are not accustomed to it,
+and yelp their plaintive howls toward every point of the horizon.
+
+It is the time of unwonted and mysterious sounds in the country. The
+migrating cranes fly so high that by day they are scarcely visible. By
+night they are only heard, and their hoarse wailing voices, lost in the
+clouds, sound like the parting cry of souls in torment, striving to find
+the road to heaven, yet forced by an unconquerable fate to wander near
+the earth about the haunts of men; for these errant birds have strange
+uncertainties, and many a mysterious anxiety in the course of their airy
+flight. Sometimes they lose the wind when the capricious gusts battle,
+or come and go in the upper regions. When this confusion comes by day,
+you can see the leader of the file fluttering aimlessly in the air, then
+turn about and take his place at the tail of the triangular phalanx,
+while a skilful manoeuver of his companions forms them soon in good
+order behind him. Often, after vain efforts, the exhausted leader
+relinquishes the guidance of the caravan; another comes forward, tries
+in his turn, and yields his place to a third, who finds the breeze, and
+continues the march in triumph. But what cries, what reproaches, what
+protests, what wild curses or anxious questionings are exchanged in an
+unknown tongue amongst these winged pilgrims!
+
+Sometimes, in the resonant night, you can hear these sinister noises
+whirling for a long time above the housetops, and as you can see
+nothing, you feel, despite your efforts, a kind of dread and kindred
+discomfort, until the sobbing multitude is lost in boundless space.
+
+There are other noises too which belong to this time of year, and which
+sound usually in the orchards. Gathering the fruit is not yet over, and
+the thousand unaccustomed cracklings make the tree seem alive. A branch
+groans as it bends beneath a burden which has reached, of a sudden,
+the last stage of growth; or perhaps an apple breaks from the twig, and
+falls on the damp earth at your feet with a dull sound. Then you hear
+rush by, brushing the branches and the grass, a creature you cannot
+see; it is the peasant's dog, that prowling and uneasy rover, at once
+impudent and cowardly, always wandering, never sleeping, ever seeking
+you know not what, spying upon you, hiding in the brush, and taking
+flight at the sound of a falling apple, which he thinks a stone that you
+are throwing at him.
+
+It is during those nights, nights misty and gray, that the hemp-dresser
+tells his weird stories of will-o'-the-wisps and milk-white hares, of
+souls in torment and wizards changed to wolves, of witches' vigils at
+the cross-roads, and screech-owls, prophetesses of the graveyard. I
+remember passing the early hours of such a night while the hemp-dressing
+was going on, and the pitiless strokes, interrupting the dresser's story
+at its most awful place, sent icy shivers through our veins. And often
+too the good man continued his story as he worked, and four or five
+words were lost, terrible words, no doubt, which we dared not make him
+repeat, and whose omission added a mystery yet more fearful to the
+dark mysteries of the story which had gone before. It was in vain the
+servants warned us that it was too late to stay without doors, and that
+bedtime had sounded for us long since; they too were dying to hear more;
+and then with what terror we crossed the hamlet on our way home! How
+deep did the church porch appear to us, and how thick and black the
+shadows of the old trees! The graveyard we dared not see; we shut our
+eyes tight as we passed it.
+
+But no more than the sacristan is the hemp-dresser gifted solely
+with the desire of frightening; he loves to make people laugh; he is
+sarcastic and sentimental at need, when love and marriage are to be
+sung. It is he who collects and keeps stored in his memory the oldest
+songs, and who transmits them to posterity. And so it is he who acts at
+weddings the part we shall see him play at the presentation of little
+Marie's favors.
+
+
+
+
+II -- The Wedding Favors
+
+WHEN all the guests were met together in the house, the doors and
+windows were closed with the utmost care; even the garret window was
+barricaded; boards and benches, logs and tables were placed behind every
+entrance, just as if the inhabitants were making ready to sustain a
+siege; and within these fortifications solemn stillness prevailed until
+at a distance were heard songs and laughter and the sounds of rustic
+music. It was the band of the bridegroom, Germain at the head, followed
+by his most trusty companions and by the grave-digger, relatives,
+friends, and servants, who formed a compact and merry train. Meanwhile,
+as they came nearer the house they slackened their pace, held a council
+of war, and became silent. The girls, shut up in the house, had arranged
+little loop-holes at the windows by which they could see the enemy
+approach and deploy in battle array. A fine, cold rain was falling,
+which added zest to the situation, while a great tire blazed on the
+hearth within. Marie wished to cut short the inevitable slowness of this
+well-ordered siege; she had no desire to see her lover catch cold,
+but not being in authority she had to take an ostensible share in the
+mischievous cruelty of her companions.
+
+When the two armies met, a discharge of firearms on the part of the
+besiegers set all the dogs in the neighborhood to barking. Those within
+the house dashed at the door with loud yelps, thinking that the attack
+was in earnest, and the children, little reassured by the efforts of
+their mothers, began to weep and to tremble. The whole scene was played
+so well that a stranger would have been deceived, and would have made
+his preparations to tight a band of brigands. Then the grave-digger,
+bard and orator of the groom, took his stand before the door, and with
+a rueful voice, exchanged the following dialogue with the hemp-dresser,
+who was stationed above the same door:
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "Ah, my good people, my fellow-townsmen, for the
+love of Heaven, open the door."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "Who are you, and what right have you to call us
+your dear fellow-townsmen? We don't know you."
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "We are worthy folk in great distress. Don't be
+afraid of us, my friends. Extend us your hospitality. Sleet is falling;
+our poor feet are frozen, and our journey home has been so long that our
+sabots are split."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "If your sabots are split, you can look on
+the ground; you will find very soon a sprig of willow to make some
+_arcelets_ [small curved blades of iron which are fastened on split
+sabots to hold them together]."
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "Willow _arcelets_ are scarcely strong enough. You
+are making fun of us, good people, and you would do better to open your
+doors. We can see a splendid fire blazing in your dwelling. The spit
+must be turning, and we can make merry with you, heart and belly. So
+open your doors to poor pilgrims who will die on the threshold if you
+are not merciful."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "Ah ha! so you are pilgrims? You never told us that.
+And what pilgrimage do you come from, may I ask?"
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "We shall tell you that when you open the door, for
+we come from so far that you would never believe it."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "Open the door to you? I rather think not. We can't
+trust you. Tell us, is it from Saint Sylvain of Pouligny that you come?"
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "We have been at Saint Sylvain of Pouligny, but we
+have been farther still."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "Then you have been as far as Saint Solange?"
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "At Saint Solange we have been, sure enough, but we
+have been farther yet."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "You are lying. You have never been as far as Saint
+Solange."
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "We have been farther, for now we are come from
+Saint Jacques of Compostelle."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "What absurdity are you telling us? We don't know
+that parish. We can easily see that you are bad people, brigands,
+nobodies, and liars. Go away with your nonsense. We are on our guard.
+You can't come in."
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "Ah, my poor fellow, take pity on us. We are not
+pilgrims, as you have guessed, but we are unlucky poachers pursued by
+the keepers. Even the police are after us, and if you don't hide us in
+your hay-loft, we shall be taken and led off to prison."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "And who will prove you are what you say you
+are, this time? For you have told us one lie already that you can't
+maintain."
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "If you will let us in, we shall show you a pretty
+piece of game we have killed."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "Show it right away, for we have our suspicions."
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "All right, open the door or a window to let us pass
+the creature in."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "Oh, no, not quite so foolish. I am looking at you
+through a little chink, and I can see neither hunters nor game amongst
+you."
+
+Here an ox-driver, a thick-set fellow of herculean strength, detached
+himself from a group where he had stood unperceived, and raised toward
+the window a plucked goose, spitted on a strong iron bar decorated with
+tufts of straw and ribbons.
+
+"Ho, ho!" cried the hemp-dresser, after cautiously extending an arm to
+feel the roast. "That is n't a quail nor a partridge; it is n't a hare
+nor a rabbit; it 's something like a goose or a turkey. Upon my word,
+you 're clever hunters, and that game did n't make you run very far.
+Move on, you rogues; we know all your lies, and you had best go home and
+cook your supper. You are not going to eat ours."
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "O Heavens, where can we go to cook our game? It is
+very little for so many as we, and, besides, we have neither place nor
+fire. At this time every door is closed, and every soul asleep. You are
+the only people who are celebrating a wedding at home, and you must he
+hardhearted indeed to let us freeze outside. Once again, good people,
+open the door; we shall not cost you anything. You can see that we bring
+our own meat; only a little room at your hearth, a little blaze to cook
+with, and we shall go on our way rejoicing."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "Do you suppose that we have too much room here, and
+that wood is bought tor nothing?"
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "We have here a small bundle of hay to make the
+fire. We shall be satisfied with that; only grant us leave to place the
+spit across your fireplace."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "That will never do. We are disgusted, and don't
+pity you at all. It is my opinion that you are drunk, that you need
+nothing, and that you only wish to come in and steal away our fire and
+our daughters."
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "Since you won't listen to reason, we shall make our
+way in by force."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "Try, if you want; we are shut in well enough to
+have no fear of you, and since you are impudent fellows, we shall not
+answer you again."
+
+Thereupon the hemp-dresser shut the garret window with a bang, and came
+down into the room below by a step-ladder. Then he took the bride by
+the hand, the young people of both sexes followed, and they all began to
+sing and chatter merrily, while the matrons sang in piercing voices, and
+shrieked with laughter in derision and bravado at those without who were
+attempting an attack.
+
+The besiegers, on their side, made a great hubbub. They discharged their
+pistols at the doors, made the dogs growl, whacked the walls, shook
+the blinds, and uttered frightful shrieks. In short, there was such a
+pandemonium that nobody could hear, and such a cloud of dust that nobody
+could see.
+
+And yet this attack was all a sham. The time had not come for breaking
+through the etiquette. If, in prowling about, anybody were to find an
+unguarded aperture, or any opening whatsoever, he might try to slip in
+unobserved, and then, if the carrier of the spit succeeded in placing
+his roast before the fire, and thus prove the capture of the hearth, the
+comedy was over and the bridegroom had conquered.
+
+The entrances of the house, however, were not numerous enough for any to
+be neglected in the customary precautions, and nobody might use violence
+before the moment fixed for the struggle.
+
+When they were weary of dancing and screams, the hemp-dresser began
+to think of capitulation. He went up to his window, opened it with
+precaution, and greeted the baffled assailants with a burst of laughter.
+
+"Well, my boys," said he, "you look very sheep-faced. You thought there
+was nothing easier than to come in, and you see that our defense is
+good. But we are beginning to have pity on you, if you will submit and
+accept our conditions."
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "Speak, good people. Tell us what we must do to
+approach your hearth."
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_: "You must sing, my friends; but sing a song we don't
+know,--one that we can't answer by a better."
+
+"That 's not hard to do," answered the grave-digger, and he thundered in
+a powerful voice: "'Six months ago, 'twas in the spring...'"
+
+"'I wandered through the sprouting grass,'" answered the hemp-dresser
+in a slightly hoarse but terrible voice. "You must be jesting, my poor
+friends, singing us such time-worn songs. You see very well that we can
+stop you at the first word."
+
+     "'She was a prince's daughter...'"
+
+"'Right gladly would she wed,'" answered the hemp-dresser. "Come, move
+on to the next; we know that a little too well."
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "How do you like this one?--
+
+     "'As I was journeying home from Nantes.'"
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_:
+
+     "'Weary, oh, weary, was I, was I.'"
+
+"That dates from my grandmother's time. Let's have another."
+
+ _The Grave-digger_:
+
+     "'One day I went a-walking...'"
+
+_The Hemp-dresser_:
+
+     "'Along a lovely wood!'"
+
+"That one is too stupid! Our little children would n't take the trouble
+to answer you. What! Are these all you know?"
+
+_The Grave-digger_: "Oh, we shall sing you so many that you will never
+be able to hear them all."
+
+In this way a full hour passed. As the two antagonists were champions
+of the country round in the matter of songs, and as their store seemed
+inexhaustible, the contest might last all night with ease, all the
+more because the hemp-dresser, with a touch of malice, allowed several
+ballads of ten, twenty, or thirty couplets to be sung through, feigning
+by his silence to admit his defeat. Then the bridegroom's camp rejoiced
+and sang aloud in chorus, and thought that this time the foe was
+worsted; but at the first line of the last couplet, they heard the
+hoarse croaking of the old hemp-dresser bellow forth the second rhyme.
+Then he cried:
+
+"You need not tire yourselves by singing such a long one, my
+children--we know that one to our finger-tips."
+
+Once or twice, however, the hemp-dresser made a wry face, contracted his
+brow, and turned toward the expectant housewives with a baffled air.
+The grave-digger was singing something so old that his adversary had
+forgotten it, or perhaps had never even heard it; but instantly the good
+gossips chanted the victorious refrain through their noses with voices
+shrill as a sea-mew's, and the grave-digger, forced to surrender, went
+on to fresh attempts.
+
+It would have taken too long to wait for a decision of the victory. The
+bride's party declared itself disposed to be merciful, provided that the
+bride were given a present worthy of her.
+
+Then began the song of the favors to a tune solemn as a church chant.
+
+The men without sang together in bass voices:
+
+     "'Open the door, true love,
+     Open the door; I have presents for you, love,
+     Oh, say not adieu, love.'"
+
+To this the women answered from within in falsetto, with mournful
+voices:
+
+     "'My father is sorry, my mother is sad,
+     And I am a maiden too kind by far
+     At such an hour my gate to unbar.'"
+
+The men took up the first verse as far as the fourth line and modified
+it thus:
+
+     "'And a handkerchief new, love.'"
+
+But, on behalf of the bride, the women answered in the same way as at
+first.
+
+For twenty couplets, at least, the men enumerated all the
+wedding-presents, always mentioning something new in the last line: a
+handsome apron, pretty ribbons, a cloth dress, laces, a golden cross,
+and even a hundred pins to complete the modest list of wedding-presents.
+The refusal of the women could not be shaken, but at length the men
+decided to speak of
+
+     "A good husband, too, love."
+
+And the women answered, turning toward the bride and singing in unison
+with the men:
+
+     "'Open the door, true love,
+     Open the door;
+     Here's a sweetheart for you, love,
+     Pray let us enter, too, love.'"
+
+
+
+
+III -- The Wedding
+
+IMMEDIATELY the hemp-dresser drew back the wooden bolt which barred the
+door within. At this time it was still the only fastening known in most
+of the dwellings of our hamlet. The groom's band burst into the bride's
+house, but not without a struggle; for the young men quartered within,
+and even the old hemp-dresser and the gossips, made it their duty to
+defend the hearth. The spit-bearer, upheld by his supporters, had to
+plant the roast before the fireplace. It was a regular battle, although
+people abstained from striking, and there was no anger shown in this
+struggle. But everybody was pushing and shoving so hard, and there was
+so much playful pride in this display of muscular strength, that the
+results might well have been serious, although they did not appear so
+across the laughs and songs. The poor old hemp-dresser, fighting like a
+lion, was pinned to the wall and squeezed by the crowd until his breath
+almost left him. More than one champion was upset and trodden under foot
+involuntarily; more than one hand, jammed against the spit, was covered
+with blood. These games are dangerous, and latterly the accidents have
+been so severe that our peasants have determined to allow the ceremony
+of the favors to fall into disuse; I believe we saw the last at the
+marriage of Francois Meillant, although there was no real struggle on
+that occasion.
+
+The battle was earnest enough, however, at Germain's wedding. It was
+a point of honor on one side to invade, on the other to defend, Mother
+Guillette's hearth. The great spit was twisted like a screw beneath
+the strong fists which fought for it A pistol-shot set fire to a small
+quantity of hemp arranged in sheaves and laid on a wicker shelf near
+the ceiling. This incident created a diversion, and while some of the
+company crowded about to extinguish the sparks, the grave-digger, who
+had climbed unbeknown into the garret, came down the chimney and seized
+the spit, at the very moment when the ox-driver, who was defending it
+near the hearth, raised it above his head to prevent it from being torn
+away. Some time before the attack, the women had taken the precaution
+to put out the fire lest in the struggle somebody should fall in and get
+burned. The jocular grave-digger, in league with the ox-driver, grasped
+the trophy and tossed it easily across the andirons. It was done! Nobody
+might interfere. The grave-digger sprang to the middle of the room
+and lighted a few wisps of straw, which he placed about the spit under
+pretense of cooking the roast, for the goose was in pieces and the floor
+was strewn with its scattered fragments.
+
+Then there was a great deal of laughter and much boastful dispute.
+Everybody showed the marks of the blows he had received, and as it
+was often a friend's hand that had struck them, there was no word of
+complaint nor of quarreling. The hemp-dresser, half flattened out, kept
+rubbing the small of his back and saying that, although it made small
+difference to him, he protested against the ruse of his friend, the
+grave-digger, and that if he had not been half dead, the hearth had
+never been captured so easily. The women swept the floor and order
+was restored. The table was covered with jugs of new wine. When the
+contestants had drunk together and taken breath, the bridegroom was led
+to the middle of the chamber, and, armed with a wand, he was obliged to
+submit to a fresh trial.
+
+During the struggle, the bride and three of her companions had been
+hidden by her mother, godmother, and aunts, who had made the four girls
+sit down in a remote corner of the room while they covered them with
+a large white cloth. Three friends of Marie's height, with caps of a
+uniform size, were chosen, so that when they were enveloped from head to
+toe by the cloth it was impossible to tell them apart.
+
+The bridegroom might not touch them, except with the tip of his staff,
+and then merely to designate which he thought to be his wife. They
+allowed him time enough to make an examination with no other help than
+his eyes afforded, and the women, placed on either side, kept zealous
+watch lest cheating should occur. Should he guess wrong, he might not
+dance, with his bride, but only with her he had chosen by mistake.
+
+When Germain stood in front of these ghosts wrapped in the same shroud,
+he feared he should make a wrong choice; and, in truth, that had
+happened to many another, so carefully and conscientiously were the
+precautions made. His heart beat loud. Little Marie did her best to
+breathe hard and shake the cloth a little, but her malicious companions
+followed her example, and kept poking the cloth with their fingers, so
+that there were as many mysterious signals as there were girls beneath
+the canopy. The square head-dresses upheld the cloth so evenly that it
+was impossible to discern the contour of a brow outlined by its folds.
+
+After ten minutes' hesitation, Germain shut his eyes, commended his soul
+to God, and stretched out the wand at random. It touched the forehead
+of little Marie, who cast the cloth from her, and shouted with triumph.
+Then it was his right to kiss her, and lifting her in his strong arms,
+he bore her to the middle of the room, where together they opened the
+dance, which lasted until two in the morning. The company separated to
+meet again at eight. As many people had come from the country round, and
+as there were not beds enough for everybody, each of the village
+maidens took to her bed two or three other girls, while the men spread
+themselves pell-mell on the hay in the barn-loft. You can imagine well
+that they had little sleep, for they did nothing but wrestle and joke,
+and tell foolish stories. Properly, there were three sleepless nights at
+weddings, and these we cannot regret.
+
+At the time appointed for departure, when they had partaken of
+milk-soup, seasoned with a strong dose of pepper to stimulate the
+appetite,--for the wedding-feast gave promise of great bounty,--the
+guests assembled in the farm-yard. Since our parish had been abolished,
+we had to go half a league from home to receive the marriage blessing.
+It was cool and pleasant weather, but the roads were in such wretched
+condition that everybody was on horseback, and each man took a companion
+on his crupper, whether she were young or old. Germain started on the
+gray, and the mare, well-groomed, freshly shod, and decked out
+with ribbons, pranced about and snorted fire from her nostrils. The
+husbandman went to the cottage for his bride in company with his
+brother-in-law, Jacques, who rode the old gray, and carried Mother
+Guillette on the crupper, while Germain returned to the farm-yard in
+triumph, holding his dear little wife before him.
+
+Then the merry cavalcade set out, escorted by the children, who ran
+ahead and fired off their pistols to make the horses jump. Mother
+Maurice was seated in a small cart, with Germain's three children and
+the fiddlers. They led the march to the sound of their instruments.
+Petit-Pierre was so handsome that his old grandmother was pride itself.
+But the eager child did not stay long at her side. During a moment's
+halt made on the journey, before passing through a difficult piece of
+road, he slipped away and ran to beg his father to carry him in front on
+the gray.
+
+"No, no," replied Germain, "that will call forth some disagreeable joke;
+we must n't do it."
+
+"It's little that I care what the people of Saint Chartier say," said
+little Marie. "Take him up, Germain, please do; I shall be prouder of
+him than I am of my wedding-gown."
+
+Germain yielded, and the pretty trio darted into the crowd borne by the
+triumphant gallop of the gray.
+
+And so it was; the people of Saint Chartier, although they were very
+sarcastic, and somewhat disdainful of the neighboring parishes which had
+been annexed to theirs, never thought of laughing when they saw such
+a handsome husband, such a lovely wife, and a child that a king's wife
+might court. Petit-Pierre was all dressed in light blue cloth, with a
+smart red waistcoat so short that it descended scarcely below his chin.
+The village tailor had fitted his armholes so tight that he could not
+bring his two little hands together. But, oh, how proud he was! He wore
+a round hat, with a black-and-gold cord, and a peacock's plume which
+stuck out proudly from a tuft of guinea feathers. A bunch of flowers,
+bigger than his head, covered his shoulder, and ribbons fluttered to his
+feet The hemp-dresser, who was also the barber and hair-dresser of the
+district, had cut his hair evenly, by covering his head with a bowl, and
+clipping off the protruding locks, an infallible method for guiding the
+shears. Thus arrayed, the poor child was less poetic, certainly, than
+with his curls streaming in the wind, and his Saint John Baptist's
+sheepskin about him; but he knew nothing of this, and everybody admired
+him and said that he had quite the air of a little man. His beauty
+triumphed over everything, for what is there over which the exceeding
+beauty of childhood could not triumph?
+
+His little sister, Solange, had, for the first time in her life, a
+peasant's cap in place of the calico hood which little girls wear until
+they are two or three years old. And what a cap it was! Longer and
+larger than the poor little thing's whole body. How beautiful she
+thought it! She dared not even turn her head; so she kept quite still
+and thought the people would take her for the bride.
+
+As for little Sylvain, he was still in long clothes, and, fast asleep on
+his grandmother's knees, he did not even know what a wedding was.
+
+Germain looked at his children tenderly, and when they reached the town
+hall, he said to his bride:
+
+"Marie, I have come here with a happier heart than I had the day when I
+brought you home from the forest of Chanteloube, thinking that you could
+never love me. I took you in my arms to put you on the ground as I do
+here; but I thought that never again should we be mounted on the good
+gray with the child on our knees. I love you so dearly, I love these
+little creatures so dearly, I am so happy that you love me and that you
+love them, and that my family love you, and I love your mother so well
+and all my friends so well, and everybody else so well today, that I
+wish I had three or four hearts to fill all of them; for surely one is
+too small to hold so much love and so much happiness. It almost makes my
+stomach ache."
+
+There was a crowd at the door of the town hall and another at the church
+to see the pretty bride. Why should we not tell about her dress? it
+became her so well. Her muslin cap, without spot and covered with
+embroidery, had lappets trimmed with lace. At that time peasant women
+never allowed a single lock to be seen, and, although they conceal
+beneath their caps splendid coils of hair tied up with tape to hold the
+coif in place, even to-day it would be thought a scandal and a shame for
+them to show themselves bareheaded to men. Nowadays, however, they allow
+a slender braid to appear over their foreheads, and this improves their
+appearance very much. Yet I regret the classic head-dress of my time;
+its spotless laces next the bare skin gave an effect of pristine purity
+which seemed to me very solemn; and when a face looked beautiful thus it
+was with a beauty of which nothing can express the charm and unaffected
+majesty.
+
+Little Marie wore her cap thus, and her forehead was so white and so
+pure that it defied the whiteness of linen to cast it in the shade.
+Although she had not closed an eye the night before, the morning air
+and, yet more, the joy within of a soul pure as the heaven, and, more
+than all, a small secret flame guarded with the modesty of girlhood,
+caused a bloom to mount to her cheeks delicate as the peach-blossom in
+the first beams of an April sun.
+
+Her white scarf, modestly crossed over her breast, left visible only the
+soft curves of a neck rounded like a turtle-dove's; her home-made cloth
+gown of myrtle-green outlined her pretty figure, which looked already
+perfect, yet which must still grow and develop, for she was but
+seventeen. She wore an apron of violet silk with the bib our peasant
+women were so foolish as to suppress, which added so much elegance and
+decency to the breast. Nowadays they display their scarfs more proudly,
+but there is no longer in their dress that delicate flower of the purity
+of long ago, which made them look like Holbein's virgins. They are more
+forward and more profuse in their courtesies. The good old custom used
+to be a kind of staid reserve which made their rare smile deeper and
+more ideal.
+
+During the offertory, after the fashion of the day, Germain placed the
+"thirteen"--that is to say, thirteen pieces of silver--in his bride's
+hand. He slipped over her finger a silver ring of a form unchanged
+for centuries, but which is replaced for henceforth by the golden
+wedding-ring. As they walked out of church, Marie said in a low voice:
+
+"Is this really the ring I wanted? Is it the one I asked you for,
+Germain?"
+
+"Yes," answered he, "my Catherine wore it on her finger when she died.
+There is but one ring for both my weddings."
+
+"Thank you, Germain," said the young woman, in a serious and impressive
+tone. "I shall die with it on, and if I go before you, you must keep it
+for the marriage of your little Solange."
+
+
+
+
+IV -- The Cabbage
+
+THEY mounted and returned very quickly to Belair. The feast was
+bountiful, and, mingled with songs and dances, it lasted until
+midnight. For fourteen hours the old people did not leave the table. The
+grave-digger did the cooking, and did it very well. He was celebrated
+for this, and he would leave his fire to come in and dance and sing
+before and after every course. And yet this poor Father Bontemps was
+epileptic. Who would have thought it? He was fresh and strong, and merry
+as a young man. One day we found him in a ditch, struck down by his
+malady at nightfall. We carried him home with us, in a wheelbarrow, and
+we spent all night in caring for him. Three days afterward, he was at a
+wedding, singing like a thrush, jumping like a kid, and bustling about
+after his old fashion. When he left a marriage, he would go to dig a
+grave, and nail up a coffin. Then he would become very grave, and
+though nothing of this appeared in his gay humor, it left a melancholy
+impression which hastened the return of his attacks. His wife was
+paralyzed, and had not stirred from her chair for twenty years. His
+mother is living yet, at a hundred and forty, but he, poor man, so happy
+and good and amusing, was killed last year by falling from his loft
+to the sidewalk. Doubtless he died a victim to a fatal attack of his
+disease, and, as was his habit, had hidden in the hay, so as not to
+frighten and distress his family. In this tragic manner he ended a life
+strange as his disposition--a medley of things sad and mad, awful and
+gay; and, in the midst of all, his heart was ever good and his nature
+kind.
+
+Now we come to the third day of the wedding, the most curious of all,
+which is kept to-day in all its vigor. We shall not speak of the roast
+which they carry to the bridal bed; it is a very silly custom, and hurts
+the self-respect of the bride, while it tends to ruin the modesty of
+the attendant girls. Besides, I believe that it is practised in all the
+provinces, and does not belong peculiarly to our own.
+
+Just as the ceremony of the wedding favors is a symbol that the heart
+and home of the bride are won, that of the cabbage is a symbol of the
+fruit-fulness of marriage. When breakfast is over on the day after the
+wedding, this fantastic representation begins. Originally of Gallic
+derivation, it has passed through primitive Christianity, and little by
+little it has become a kind of mystery, or droll morality-play of the
+Middle Ages.
+
+Two boys, the merriest and most intelligent of the company, disappear
+from breakfast, and after costuming themselves, return escorted by dogs,
+children, and pistol-shots. They represent a pair of beggars--husband
+and wife--dressed in rags. The husband is the filthier of the two; it is
+vice which has brought him so low; the wife is unhappy and degraded only
+through the misdeeds of her husband.
+
+They are called the gardener and the gardener's wife, and they pretend
+it is their duty to guard and care for the sacred cabbage. The husband
+has several names, each with a meaning. Sometimes they call him the
+"scarecrow," because his head is covered with straw or hemp, and because
+his legs and a portion of his body are surrounded with straw to hide
+his nakedness, ill concealed by his rags. He has also a great belly,
+or hump, constructed of straw or hay underneath his blouse. Then he is
+known as the "ragamuffin," on account of his covering of rags. Lastly he
+is termed the "infidel," and this is most significant of all, because by
+his cynicism and his debauchery he is supposed to typify the opposite of
+every Christian virtue.
+
+He comes with his face all smeared with soot and the lees of wine, and
+sometimes made yet more hideous by a grotesque mask. An earthenware cup,
+notched and broken, or an old sabot attached to his girdle by a cord,
+shows that he has come to beg for alms of wine. Nobody refuses him, and
+he pretends to drink; then he pours the wine on the ground by way of
+libation. At every step he falls, rolls in the mud, and feigns to be
+a prey to the most shameful drunkenness. His poor wife runs after him,
+picks him up, calls for help, arranges his hempen locks, which straggle
+forth in unkempt wisps from beneath his filthy hat, sheds tears over her
+husband's degradation, and pours forth pathetic reproaches.
+
+"Wretched man," she cries, "see the misery to which your wickedness
+has brought us. I have to spend all my time sewing and working for you,
+mending your clothes. You tear and bedraggle yourself incessantly. You
+have eaten up all my little property; our six children lie on straw, and
+we are living in a stable with the beasts. Here we are forced to beg for
+alms, and, besides, you are so ugly and vile and despicable that very
+soon they will be tossing us bread as if we were dogs. Ah, my poor
+people, take pity on us! Take pity on me! I have n't deserved my lot,
+and never had woman a more dirty and detestable husband. Help me to
+pick him up, else the wagons will run over him as they run over broken
+bottles, and I shall be a widow, and that will end by killing me with
+grief, though all the world says it would be an excellent riddance
+for me." Such is the part of the gardener's wife, and her continued
+lamentations last during the entire play. For it is a genuine
+spontaneous comedy acted on the spur of the moment in the open air,
+along the roads and across the fields, aided by every chance occurrence
+that presents itself. Everybody shares in the acting, people within the
+wedding-party and people without, wayfarers and dwellers in houses, for
+three or four hours of the day, as we shall see. The theme is always the
+same, but the variations are infinite; and it is here that we can see
+the instinct of mimicry, the abundance of droll ideas, the fluency, the
+wit at repartee, and even the natural eloquence of our peasants.
+
+The role of gardener's wife is intrusted commonly to a slender man,
+beardless and fresh of face, who can give a great appearance of truth to
+his personification and plays the burlesque despair naturally enough to
+make people sad and glad at once, as they are in real life. These thin,
+beardless men are not rare among us, and, strangely enough, they are
+sometimes most remarkable for their muscular strength.
+
+When the wife's misfortunes have been explained, the young men of the
+company try to persuade her to leave her drunken husband and to amuse
+herself with them. They offer her their arms and drag her away. Little
+by little she gives way; her spirits rise, and she begins to run about,
+first with one and then with another, and grows more scandalous in her
+behavior: a fresh "morality"; the ill-conduct of the husband excites and
+aggravates the evil in the wife.
+
+Then the "infidel" wakes from his drunkenness. He looks about for his
+companion, arms himself with a rope and a stick and rushes after her.
+They make him run, they hide, they pass the wife from one to another,
+they try to divert her attention and to deceive her jealous spouse. His
+friends try to get him drunk. At length he catches his unfaithful wife,
+and wishes to beat her. What is truest and most carefully portrayed in
+this play is that the jealous husband never attacks the men who carry
+off his wife. He is very polite and prudent with them, and wishes only
+to take vengeance on the sinning woman, because she is supposed to be
+too feeble to offer resistance.
+
+At the moment, however, when he raises his stick and prepares his cord
+to strike the delinquent, all the men in the party interpose and throw
+themselves between husband and wife.
+
+"Don't strike her! Never strike your wife," is the formula repeated to
+satiety during these scenes. They disarm the husband, and force him to
+pardon and to kiss his wife, and soon he pretends to love her better
+than ever. He walks along, his arm linked in hers, singing and dancing
+until, in a new access of drunkenness, he rolls upon the ground,
+and then begin all over again the lamentations of the wife, her
+discouragements, her pretended unfaithfulness, her husband's jealousy,
+the interference of the neighbors, and the reconciliation. In all
+this there is a simple and even coarse lesson, which, though it savors
+strongly of its Middle-Age origin, does not fail to fix its impression
+if not on the married folk, who are too loving or too sensible to
+have need of it, at least upon the children and the young people. The
+"infidel," racing after young girls and pretending to wish to kiss them,
+frightens and disgusts them to such a degree that they fly in unaffected
+terror. His dirty face and his great stick, harmless as it is, make
+the children shriek aloud. It is the comedy of customs in their most
+elementary but their most striking state.
+
+When this farce is well under way, people make ready to hunt for the
+cabbage. They bring a stretcher and place upon it the "infidel," armed
+with a spade, a cord, and a large basket. Four powerful men raise him
+on their shoulders. His wife follows on foot, and after her come
+the "elders" in a body with serious and thoughtful looks; then the
+wedding-march begins by couples to a step tuned to music. Pistol-shots
+begin anew, and dogs bark louder than ever at the sight of the filthy
+"infidel" borne aloft in triumph. The children swing incense in derision
+with sabots fastened at the end of a cord.
+
+But why this ovation to an object so repulsive? They are marching to the
+capture of the sacred cabbage, emblem of the fruitfulness of marriage,
+and it is this drunkard alone who can bear the symbolic plant in his
+hand. Doubtless, there is in it a pre-Christian mystery which recalls
+the Saturnalian feasts or some rout of the Bacchanals. Perhaps this
+"infidel," who is, at the same time, preeminently a gardener, is
+none other than Priapus himself, god of gardens and of drunkenness, a
+divinity who must have been pure and serious in his origin as is the
+mystery of birth, but who has been degraded bit by bit through license
+of manners and distraction of thought.
+
+However this may be, the triumphal procession arrives at the bride's
+house, and enters the garden. Then they select the choicest cabbage, and
+this is not done very quickly, for the old people keep consulting and
+disputing interminably, each one pleading for the cabbage he thinks most
+suitable. They put it to vote, and when the choice is made the gardener
+fastens his cord to the stalk, and moves away as far as the size of the
+garden permits. The gardener's wife takes care that the sacred
+vegetable shall not be hurt in its fall. The wits of the wedding, the
+hemp-dresser, the grave-digger, the carpenter, and the sabot-maker, form
+a ring about the cabbage, for men who do not till the soil, but pass
+their lives in other people's houses, are thought to be, and are really,
+wittier and more talkative than simple farmhands. One digs, with a
+spade, a ditch deep enough to uproot an oak. Another places on his
+nose a pair of wooden or cardboard spectacles. He fulfils the duties of
+"engineer," walks up and down, constructs a plan, stares at the workmen
+through his glasses, plays the pedant, cries out that everything will be
+spoiled, has the work stopped and begun afresh as his fancy directs, and
+makes the whole performance as long and ridiculous as he can. This is
+an addition to the formula of an ancient ceremony held in mockery of
+theorists in general, for peasants despise them royally, or from hatred
+of the surveyors who decide boundaries and regulate taxes, or of the
+workmen employed on bridges and causeways, who transform commons into
+highways, and suppress old abuses which the peasants love. Be this as it
+may, this character in the comedy is called the "geometrician," and
+does his best to make himself unbearable to those who are toiling with
+pickaxe and shovel.
+
+After a quarter of an hour spent in mummery, and difficulties raised in
+order to avoid cutting the roots, and to transplant the cabbage without
+injury, while shovelfuls of dirt are tossed into the faces of the
+onlookers,--so much the worse for him who does not retreat in time,
+for were he bishop or prince he must receive the baptism of earth,--the
+"infidel" pulls the rope, the "infidel's wife" holds her apron, and the
+cabbage falls majestically amidst the applause of the spectators. Then a
+basket is brought, and the "infidel" pair plant the cabbage therein
+with every care and precaution. They surround it with fresh earth, and
+support it with sticks and strings, such as city florists use for their
+splendid potted camellias; they fix red apples to the points of the
+sticks, and twist sprigs of thyme, sage, and laurel all about them; they
+bedeck the whole with ribbons and streamers; they place the trophy
+upon the stretcher with the "infidel," whose duty it is to maintain its
+equilibrium and preserve it from harm; and, at length, they move away
+from the garden in good order and in marching step.
+
+But when they are about to pass the gate, and again when they enter the
+yard of the bridegroom's house, an imaginary obstacle blocks the way.
+The bearers of the burden stagger, utter loud cries, retreat, advance
+once more, and, as though crushed by a resistless force, they pretend
+to sink beneath its weight. While this is going on, the bystanders shout
+loudly, exciting and steadying this human team.
+
+"Slowly, slowly, my child. There, there, courage! Look out! Be patient!
+Lower your head; the door is too low! Close up; it's too narrow! A little
+more to the left; now to the right; on with you; don't be afraid; you
+'re almost there."
+
+Thus it is that in years of plentiful harvest, the ox-cart, loaded to
+overflowing with hay or corn, is too broad or too high to enter the
+barn door. Thus it is that the driver shouts at the strong beasts, to
+restrain them or to urge them on; thus it is that with skill and mighty
+efforts they force this mountain of riches beneath the rustic arch of
+triumph. It is, above all, the last load, called "the cart of sheaves,"
+which requires these precautions, for this is a rural festival, and
+the last sheaf lifted from the last furrow is placed on the top of the
+cart-load ornamented with ribbons and flowers, while the foreheads of
+the oxen and the whip of the driver are decorated also. The triumphant
+and toilsome entry of the cabbage into the house is a symbol of the
+prosperity and fruitfulness it represents.
+
+Safe within the bridegroom's yard, the cabbage is taken from its
+stretcher and borne to the topmost peak of the house or barn. Whether it
+be a chimney, a gable, or a dove-cote that crowns the roof, the burden
+must, at any risk, be carried to the very highest point of the building.
+The "infidel" accompanies it as far as this, sets it down securely, and
+waters it with a great pitcher of wine, while a salvo of pistol-shots
+and demonstrations of joy from the "infidel's wife" proclaim its
+inauguration.
+
+Without delay, the same ceremony is repeated all over again. Another
+cabbage is dug from the garden of the husband and is carried with the
+same formalities and laid upon the roof which his wife has deserted to
+follow him. These trophies remain in their places until the wind and the
+rain destroy the baskets and carry away the cabbage. Yet their lives are
+long enough to give some chance of fulfilment to the prophecies which
+the old men and women make with bows and courtesies.
+
+"Beautiful cabbage," they say, "live and flourish that our young bride
+may have a fine baby before a year is over; for if you die too quickly
+it is a sign of barrenness, and you will stick up there like an ill
+omen."
+
+The day is already far gone when all these things are accomplished. All
+that remains undone is to take home the godfathers and godmothers of the
+newly married couple. When the so-called parents dwell at a distance,
+they are accompanied by the music and the whole wedding procession as
+far as the limits of the parish; there they dance anew on the highroad,
+and everybody kisses them good-by. The "infidel" and his wife are then
+washed and dressed decently, if the fatigue of their parts has not
+already driven them away to take a nap.
+
+Everybody was still dancing and singing and eating in the Town Hall of
+Belair at midnight on this third day of the wedding when Germain was
+married. The old men at table could not stir, and for good reason. They
+recovered neither their legs nor their wits until dawn on the morrow.
+While they were regaining their dwellings, silently and with uncertain
+steps, Germain, proud and active, went out to hitch his oxen, leaving
+his young wife to slumber until daylight. The lark, caroling as it
+mounted to the skies, seemed to him the voice of his heart returning
+thanks to Providence. The hoar-frost, sparkling on the leafless bushes,
+seemed to him the whiteness of April flowers that comes before the
+budding leaves. Everything in nature was laughing and happy for him.
+Little Pierre had laughed and jumped so much the evening before that he
+did not come to help lead his oxen; but Germain was glad to be alone.
+He fell on his knees in the furrow he was about to plow afresh, and said
+his morning prayer with such a burst of feeling that two tears rolled
+down his cheeks, still moist with sweat.
+
+Afar off he heard the songs of the boys from neighboring villages, who
+were starting on their return home, singing again in their hoarse voices
+the happy tunes of the night before.
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Devil's Pool, by George Sand
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