It was in winter, not far from the Carnival, the time of year when it is
considered becoming and proper, among us, to be married. In the summer,
we hardly have time, and the work on a farm cannot be postponed three
days, to say nothing of the extra days required for the more or less
laborious digestion attending the moral and physical intoxication that
follows such a festivity.--I was sitting under the huge mantel-piece of
an old-fashioned kitchen fire-place, when pistol-shots, the howling of
dogs, and the shrill notes of the bagpipe announced the approach of the
fiancés. Soon Père and Mère Maurice, Germain, and little Marie, followed
by Jacques and his wife, the nearest relations of the bride and groom,
and their godfathers and godmothers, entered the court-yard.

Little Marie, not having as yet received the wedding-gifts, called
_livrées_, was dressed in the best that her modest wardrobe afforded: a
dress of dark-gray cloth, a white fichu with large bright-colored
flowers, an apron of the color called _incarnat_, an Indian red then
much in vogue but despised to-day, a cap of snow-white muslin and of the
shape, fortunately preserved, which recalls the head-dress of Anne
Boleyn and Agnès Sorel. She was fresh and smiling, and not at all proud,
although she had good reason to be. Germain was beside her, grave and
deeply moved, like the youthful Jacob saluting Rachel at Laban's well.
Any other girl would have assumed an air of importance and a triumphant
bearing; for in all ranks of life it counts for something to be married
for one's _beaux yeux_. But the girl's eyes were moist and beaming with
love; you could see that she was deeply smitten, and that she had no
time to think about the opinions of other people. She had not lost her
little determined manner; but she was all sincerity and good nature;
there was nothing impertinent in her success, nothing personal in her
consciousness of her strength. I never saw such a sweet fiancée as she