love me?"
"That offends you, I know, but it isn't my fault; if you could change
your mind, I should be too happy, and I suppose I don't deserve to have
it so. Come, look at me, Marie, am I so very frightful?"
"No, Germain," she replied, with a smile, "you're better looking than I
am."
"Don't laugh at me; look at me indulgently; I haven't lost a hair or a
tooth yet. My eyes tell you that I love you. Look into my eyes, it's
written there, and every girl knows how to read that writing."
Marie looked into Germain's eyes with an air of playful assurance; then
she suddenly turned her head away and began to tremble.
"Ah! _mon Dieu!_ I frighten you," said Germain; "you look at me as if I
were the farmer of Ormeaux. Don't be afraid of me, I beg of you, that
hurts me too much. I won't say bad words to you, I won't kiss you
against your will, and when you want me to go away, you have only to
show me the door. Tell me, must I go out so that you can stop
trembling?"
Marie held out her hand to the ploughman, but without turning her head,
which was bent toward the fire-place, and without speaking.
"I understand," said Germain; "you pity me, for you are kind-hearted;
you are sorry to make me unhappy; but still you can't love me, can you?"
"Why do you say such things to me, Germain?" little Marie replied at
last, "do you want to make me cry?"
"Poor little girl, you have a kind heart, I know; but you don't love me,
and you hide your face from me because you're afraid to let me see your
displeasure and your repugnance. And for my part, I don't dare do so
much as press your hand! In the woods, when my son was asleep, and you
were asleep too, I came near kissing you softly. But I should have died
of shame rather than ask you for a kiss, and I suffered as much that
night as a man roasting over a slow fire. Since then, I've dreamed of
you every night. Ah! how I have kissed you, Marie! But you slept without
dreaming all the time. And now do you know what I think? that if you
should turn and look at me with such eyes as I have for you, and if you
should put your face to mine, I believe I should fall dead with joy. And
as for you, you are thinking that if such a thing should happen to you,
you would die of anger and shame!"
Germain talked as if he were dreaming, and did not know what he said.
Little Marie was still trembling; but as he was trembling even more than
she, he did not notice it. Suddenly she turned; she was all in tears,
and looked at him with a reproachful expression.
The poor ploughman thought that that was the last stroke, and rose to
go, without awaiting his sentence, but the girl detained him by throwing
her arms about him, and hid her face against his breast.
"Ah! Germain," she said, sobbing, "haven't you guessed that I love you?"
Germain would have gone mad, had not his son, who was looking for him
and who entered the cottage galloping on a stick, with his little sister
_en croupe_, lashing the imaginary steed with a willow switch, recalled
him to himself. He lifted him up, and said, as he put him in his
fiancée's arms:
"You have made more than one person happy by loving me!"
APPENDIX
I
THE COUNTRY WEDDING
Here ends the story of Germain's courtship, as he told it to me himself,
cunning ploughman that he is! I ask your pardon, dear reader, for having
been unable to translate it better; for the old-fashioned, artless
language of the peasants of the district that _I sing_--as they used to
say--really has to be translated. Those people speak too much French for
us, and the development of the language since Rabelais and Montaigne has
deprived us of much of the old wealth. It is so with all progress, and
we must make up our minds to it. But it is pleasant still to hear those
picturesque idioms in general use on the old soil of the centre of
France; especially as they are the genuine expressions of the mockingly
tranquil and pleasantly loquacious character of the people who use them.
Touraine has preserved a considerable number of precious patriarchal
locutions. But Touraine has progressed rapidly in civilization during
and since the Renaissance. It is covered with châteaux, roads,
activity, and foreigners. Berry has remained stationary, and I think
that, next to Bretagne and some provinces in the extreme south of
France, it is the most _conservative_ province to be found at the
present moment. Certain customs are so strange, so curious, that I hope
to be able to entertain you a moment longer, dear reader, if you will
permit me to describe in detail a country wedding, Germain's for
instance, which I had the pleasure of attending a few years ago.
For everything passes away, alas! In the short time that I have lived,
there has been more change in the ideas and customs of my village than
there was for centuries before the Revolution. Half of the Celtic,
pagan, or Middle-Age ceremonials that I saw in full vigor in my
childhood, have already been done away with. Another year or two,
perhaps, and the railroads will run their levels through our deep
valleys, carrying away, with the swiftness of lightning, our ancient
traditions and our wonderful legends.
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
when she quickly answered some of her young friends who asked her if she
was content: "Bless me! indeed I am! I don't complain of the good Lord."
Père Maurice was the spokesman; he had come to offer the customary
compliments and invitations. He began by fastening a laurel branch
adorned with ribbons to the mantel-piece; that is called the _exploit_,
that is to say, the invitation; then he gave to each of the guests a
little cross made of a bit of blue ribbon crossed by another bit of pink
ribbon; the pink for the bride, the blue for the groom; and the guests
were expected to keep that token to wear on the wedding-day, the women
in their caps, the men in their button-holes. It was the ticket of
admission.
Then Père Maurice delivered his speech. He invited the master of the
house and all _his company_, that is to say, all his children, all his
relations, all his friends, all his servants, to the marriage-ceremony,
_to the feast, to the sports, to the dancing, and to everything that
comes after_. He did not fail to say:--I come _to do you the honor_ to
_invite_ you. A very proper locution, although it seems a misuse of
words to us, as it expresses the idea of rendering honor to those who
are deemed worthy thereof.
Despite the general invitation carried thus from house to house
throughout the parish, good-breeding, which is extremely conservative
among the peasantry, requires that only two persons in each family
should take advantage of it,--one of the heads of the family to
represent the household, one of their children to represent the other
members.
The invitations being delivered, the fiancés and their relations went to
the farm and dined together.
Little Marie tended her three sheep on the common land, and Germain
turned up the ground as if there were nothing in the air.
On the day before that fixed for the marriage, about two o'clock in the
afternoon, the musicians arrived, that is to say, the bagpipers and
viol-players, with their instruments decorated with long floating
ribbons, and playing a march written for the occasion, in a measure
somewhat slow for the feet of any but natives, but perfectly adapted to
the nature of the heavy ground and the hilly roads of that region.
Pistol-shots, fired by youths and children, announced the beginning of
the ceremony. The guests assembled one by one and danced on the
greensward in front of the house, for practice. When night had come,
they began to make strange preparations: they separated into two
parties, and when it was quite dark, they proceeded to the ceremony of
the _livrées_.
That ceremony was performed at the home of the fiancée, La Guillette's
cabin. La Guillette took with her her daughter, a dozen or more young
and pretty shepherdesses, her daughter's friends or relations, two or
three respectable matrons, neighbors with well-oiled tongues, quick at
retort, and unyielding observers of the ancient customs. Then she
selected a dozen sturdy champions, her relations and friends; and,
lastly, the old _hemp-beater_ of the parish, a fine and fluent talker,
if ever there was one.
The rôle played in Bretagne by the _bazvalan_, or village tailor, is
assumed in our country districts by the hemp-beater or the wool-carder,
the two professions being often united in a single person. He attends
all solemnities, sad or gay, because he is essentially erudite and a
fine speaker, and on such occasions it is always his part to act as
spokesman in order that certain formalities that have been observed from
time immemorial may be worthily performed. The wandering trades which
take men into the bosoms of other families and do not permit them to
concentrate their attention upon their own, are well calculated to make
them loquacious, entertaining, good talkers, and good singers.
The hemp-beater is peculiarly sceptical. He and another rustic
functionary, of whom we shall speak anon, the grave-digger, are always
the strong-minded men of the neighborhood. They have talked so much
about ghosts, and are so familiar with all the tricks of which those
mischievous spirits are capable, that they fear them hardly at all.
Night is the time when all three, hemp-beaters, grave-diggers, and
ghosts, principally exercise their callings. At night, too, the
hemp-beater tells his harrowing tales. May I be pardoned for a slight
digression.
When the hemp has reached the proper point, that is to say, when it has
been sufficiently soaked in running water and half dried on the bank,
it is carried to the yards of the different houses; there they stand it
up in little sheaves, which, with their stalks spread apart at the
bottom and their heads tied together in balls, greatly resemble, in the
dark, a long procession of little white phantoms, planted on their slim
legs and walking noiselessly along the walls.
At the end of September, when the nights are still warm, they begin the
process of beating, by the pale moonlight. During the day, the hemp has
been heated in the oven; it is taken out at night to be beaten hot. For
that purpose, they use a sort of wooden horse, surmounted by a wooden
lever, which, falling upon the grooves, breaks the plant without cutting
it. Then it is that you hear at night, in the country, the sharp,
clean-cut sound of three blows struck in rapid succession. Then there is
silence for a moment; that means that the arm is moving the handful of
hemp, in order to break it in another place. And the three blows are
repeated; it is the other arm acting on the lever, and so it goes on
until the moon is dimmed by the first rays of dawn. As this work is done
only a few days in the year, the dogs do not become accustomed to it,
and howl plaintively at every point of the compass.
It is the time for unusual and mysterious noises in the country. The
migrating cranes fly southward at such a height that the eye can hardly
distinguish them in broad daylight. At night, you can only hear them;
and their hoarse, complaining voices, lost among the clouds, seem like
the salutation and the farewell of souls in torment, striving to find
the road to heaven and compelled by an irresistible fatality to hover
about the abodes of men, not far from earth; for these migratory birds
exhibit strange uncertainty and mysterious anxiety in their aerial
wanderings. It sometimes happens that they lose the wind, when fitful
breezes struggle for the mastery or succeed one another in the upper
regions. Thereupon, when one of those reverses happens during the day,
we see the leader of the line soar at random through the air, then turn
sharply about, fly back, and take his place at the rear of the
triangular phalanx, while a skilful manoeuvre on the part of his
companions soon brings them into line behind him. Often, after vain
efforts, the exhausted leader abandons the command of the caravan;
another comes forward, takes his turn at the task, and gives place to a
third, who finds the current and leads the host forward in triumph. But
what shrieks, what reproaches, what remonstrances, what fierce
maledictions or anxious questions are exchanged by those winged pilgrims
in an unfamiliar tongue!
In the resonant darkness you hear the dismal uproar circling above the
houses sometimes for a long while; and as you can see nothing, you feel,
in spite of yourself, a sort of dread and a sympathetic uneasiness until
the sobbing flock has passed out of hearing in space.
There are other sounds that are peculiar to that time of year, and are
heard principally in the orchards. The fruit is not yet gathered, and a
thousand unaccustomed snappings and crackings make the trees resemble
animate beings. A branch creaks as it bends under a weight that has
suddenly reached the last stage of development; or an apple detaches
itself and falls at your feet with a dull thud on the damp ground. Then
you hear a creature whom you cannot see, brushing against the branches
and bushes as he runs away; it is the peasant's dog, the restless,
inquisitive prowler, impudent and cowardly as well, who insinuates
himself everywhere, never sleeps, is always hunting for nobody knows
what, watches you from his hiding-place in the bushes and runs away at
the noise made by a falling apple, thinking that you are throwing a
stone at him.
On such nights as those--gray, cloudy nights--the hemp-beater narrates
his strange adventures with will-o'-the-wisps and white hares, souls in
torment and witches transformed into wolves, the witches' dance at the
cross-roads and prophetic night-owls in the grave-yard. I remember
passing the early hours of the night thus around the moving flails,
whose pitiless blow, interrupting the beater's tale at the most exciting
point, caused a cold shiver to run through our veins. Often, too, the
goodman went on talking as he worked; and four or five words would be
lost: awful words, of course, which we dared not ask him to repeat, and
the omission of which imparted a more awe-inspiring mystery to the
mysteries, sufficiently harrowing before, of his narrative. In vain did
the servants warn us that it was very late to remain out-of-doors, and
that the hour for slumber had long since struck for us; they themselves
were dying with longing to hear more. And with what terror did we
afterward walk through the hamlet on our homeward way! how deep the
church porch seemed, and how dense and black the shadow of the old
trees! As for the grave-yard, that we did not see; we closed our eyes as
we passed it.
But the hemp-beater does not devote himself exclusively to frightening
his hearers any more than the sacristan does; he likes to make them
laugh, he is jocose and sentimental at need, when love and marriage are
to be sung; he it is who collects and retains in his memory the most
ancient ballads and transmits them to posterity. He it is, therefore,
who, at wedding-festivals, is entrusted with the character which we are
to see him enact at the presentation of the _livrées_ to little Marie.
II
THE LIVRÉES
When everybody was assembled in the house, the doors and windows were
closed and fastened with the greatest care; they even barricaded the
loop-hole in the attic; they placed boards, trestles, stumps, and tables
across all the issues as if they were preparing to sustain a siege; and
there was the solemn silence of suspense in that fortified interior
until they heard in the distance singing and laughing, and the notes of
the rustic instruments. It was the bridegroom's contingent, Germain at
the head, accompanied by his stoutest comrades, by his relations,
friends, and servants and the grave-digger,--a substantial, joyous
procession.
But, as they approached the house, they slackened their pace, took
counsel together, and became silent. The maidens, shut up in the house,
had arranged little cracks at the windows, through which they watched
them march up and form in battle-array. A fine, cold rain was falling,
and added to the interest of the occasion, while a huge fire was
crackling on the hearth inside. Marie would have liked to abridge the
inevitable tedious length of this formal siege; she did not like to see
her lover catching cold, but she had no voice in the council under the
circumstances, and, indeed, she was expected to join, ostensibly, in the
mischievous cruelty of her companions.
When the two camps were thus confronted, a discharge of fire-arms
without created great excitement among all the dogs in the neighborhood.
Those of the household rushed to the door barking vociferously, thinking
that a real attack was in progress, and the small children, whom their
mothers tried in vain to reassure, began to tremble and cry. The whole
scene was so well played that a stranger might well have been deceived
by it and have considered the advisability of preparing to defend
himself against a band of brigands.
Thereupon, the grave-digger, the bridegroom's bard and orator, took his
place in front of the door, and, in a lugubrious voice, began the
following dialogue with the hemp-beater, who was stationed at the small
round window above the same door:
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
Alas! my good people, my dear parishioners, for the love of God open the
door.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
Who are you, pray, and why do you presume to call us your dear
parishioners? We do not know you.
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
We are honest folk in sore distress. Be not afraid of us, my friends!
receive us hospitably. The rain freezes as it falls, our poor feet are
frozen, and we have come such a long distance that our shoes are split.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
If your shoes are split, you can look on the ground; you will surely
find osier withes to make _arcelets_ [little strips of iron in the shape
of bows, with which shoes (wooden) were mended].
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
Osier _arcelets_ are not very strong. You are making sport of us, good
people, and you would do better to open the door to us. We can see the
gleam of a noble blaze within your house; doubtless the spit is in
place, and your hearts and your stomachs are rejoicing together. Open,
then, to poor pilgrims, who will die at your door if you do not have
mercy on them.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
Aha! you are pilgrims? you did not tell us that. From what pilgrimage
are you returning, by your leave?
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
We will tell you that when you have opened the door, for we come from so
far away that you would not believe it.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
Open the door to you? indeed! we should not dare trust you. Let us see:
are you from Saint-Sylvain de Pouligny?
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
We have been to Saint-Sylvain de Pouligny, but we have been farther than
that.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
Then you have been as far as Sainte-Solange?
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
We have been to Sainte-Solange, for sure; but we have been farther
still.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
You lie; you have never been as far as Sainte-Solange.
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
We have been farther, for we have just returned from Saint-Jacques de
Compostelle.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
What foolish tale are you telling us? We don't know that parish. We see
plainly enough that you are bad men, brigands, _nobodies_, liars. Go
somewhere else and sing your silly songs; we are on our guard, and you
won't get in here.
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
Alas! my dear man, have pity on us! We are not pilgrims, as you have
rightly guessed; but we are unfortunate poachers pursued by the keepers.
The gendarmes are after us, too, and, if you don't let us hide in your
hay-loft, we shall be caught and taken to prison.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
But what proof have we this time that you are what you say? for here is
one falsehood already that you could not follow up.
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
If you will open the door, we will show you a fine piece of game we have
killed.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
Show it now, for we are suspicious.
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
Well, open a door or a window, so that we can pass in the creature.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
Oh! nay, nay! not such fools! I'm looking at you through a little hole,
and I see neither hunters nor game.
At that point, a drover's boy, a thick-set youth of herculean strength,
came forth from the group in which he had been standing unnoticed, and
held up toward the window a goose all plucked and impaled on a stout
iron spit, decorated with bunches of straw and ribbons.
"Hoity-toity!" cried the hemp-beater, after he had cautiously put out an
arm to feel the bird; "that's not a quail or a partridge, a hare or a
rabbit; it looks like a goose or a turkey. Upon my word, you are noble
hunters! and that game did not make you ride very fast. Go elsewhere,
my knaves! all your falsehoods are detected, and you may as well go home
and cook your supper. You won't eat ours."
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
Alas! _mon Dieu_! where shall we go to have our game cooked? it's very
little among so many of us; and, besides, we have no fire nor place to
go to. At this time of night, every door is closed, everybody has gone
to bed; you are the only ones who are having a wedding-feast in your
house, and you must be very hardhearted to leave us to freeze outside.
Once more, good people, let us in; we won't cause you any expense. You
see we bring our own food; only a little space at your fireside, a
little fire to cook it, and we will go hence satisfied.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
Do you think that we have any too much room, and that wood costs
nothing?
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
We have a little bundle of straw to make a fire with, we will be
satisfied with it; only give us leave to place the spit across your
fire-place.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
We will not do it; you arouse disgust, not pity, in us. It's my opinion
that you are drank, that you need nothing, and that you simply want to
get into our house to steal our fire and our daughters.
THE GRAVE-DIGGER.
As you refuse to listen to any good reason, we propose to force our way
into your house.
THE HEMP-BEATER.
Try it, if you choose. We are so well protected that we need not fear
you. You are insolent knaves, too, and we won't answer you any more.