ball of thread, and a small stool, on which she seated herself in the
recess of a window and began as usual to spin. Gasselin was still busy
about the offices; he looked to the horses of the baron and Calyste,
saw that the stable was in order for the night, and gave the two fine
hunting-dogs their daily meal. The joyful barking of the animals was
the last noise that awakened the echoes slumbering among the darksome
walls of the ancient house. The two dogs and the two horses were the
only remaining vestiges of the splendors of its chivalry. An
imaginative man seated on the steps of the portico and letting himself
fall into the poesy of the still living images of that dwelling, might
have quivered as he heard the baying of the hounds and the trampling
of the neighing horses.

Gasselin was one of those short, thick, squat little Bretons, with
black hair and sun-browned faces, silent, slow, and obstinate as
mules, but always following steadily the path marked out for them. He
was forty-two years old, and had been twenty-five years in the
household. Mademoiselle had hired him when he was fifteen, on hearing
of the marriage and probable return of the baron. This retainer
considered himself as part of the family; he had played with Calyste,
he loved the horses and dogs of the house, and talked to them and
petted them as though they were his own. He wore a blue linen jacket
with little pockets flapping about his hips, waistcoat and trousers of
the same material at all seasons, blue stockings, and stout hob-nailed
shoes. When it was cold or rainy he put on a goat's-skin, after the
fashion of his country.

Mariotte, who was also over forty, was as a woman what Gasselin was as
a man. No team could be better matched,--same complexion, same figure,
same little eyes that were lively and black. It is difficult to