Then Miette gently led him on, and they resumed their walk.

"You dearly love your Republic?" the girl asked, essaying a joke. "Do
you love me as much?"

Her smile was not altogether free from a tinge of bitterness. She was
thinking, perhaps, how easily Silvere abandoned her to go and scour the
country-side. But the lad gravely replied: "You are my wife, to whom I
have given my whole heart. I love the Republic because I love you. When
we are married we shall want plenty of happiness, and it is to procure a
share of that happiness that I'm going way to-morrow morning. You surely
don't want to persuade me to remain at home?"

"Oh, no!" cried the girl eagerly. "A man should be brave! Courage
is beautiful! You must forgive my jealousy. I should like to be as
strong-minded as you are. You would love me all the more, wouldn't you?"

After a moment's silence she added, with charming vivacity and
ingenuousness: "Ah, how willingly I shall kiss you when you come back!"

This outburst of a loving and courageous heart deeply affected Silvere.
He clasped Miette in his arms and printed several kisses on her cheek.
As she laughingly struggled to escape him, her eyes filled with tears of
emotion.

All around the lovers the country still slumbered amid the deep
stillness of the cold. They were now half-way down the hill. On the top
of a rather lofty hillock to the left stood the ruins of a windmill,
blanched by the moon; the tower, which had fallen in on one side, alone
remained. This was the limit which the young people had assigned to