th wind and the heavy snows,
and another year we will take a place further down in the allotment. I
will lay in a store of things, and we will be as happy as the squirrels
in their hollow tree."

Marie and her mother cleared it up a bit. The floor was of rough planks
filled in with mortar, and skins were laid down for carpet. There was
but one window looking toward the south, and the door was on that side
also. Then a few steps and a sort of plateau. Inside there was a box
bunk, where the household goods were piled away inside. A few shelves
with dishes, a table, and several stools completed the furnishing.

So on Sunday they went up to the unfinished chapel on the St. Charles,
where a Mass was said, and the young couple were united. It was a lovely
day, and they rowed down in the canoes to the Gaudrions, where a feast
was given and healths drank to the newly-wedded couple, in which they
were wished much happiness and many children. The table was spread
luxuriously; the Mere had been two days cooking. Roasts and broils, game
and fish, and many of the early fruits in preserve and just ripened.
Sunday was a day for gorging in this primitive land, while summer
lasted. No one need starve then.

Afterward the young couple were escorted home.

Rose sat out in the moonlight thinking of the strangeness of it all. How
could Marie like it? Mere Gaudrion had said, "Jules will make a good
husband, if he is clumsy and not handsome. He will never beat Marie, and
now he will settle to work again, and make a good living, since courting
days are over."

The child wondered what courting days were. Several strange ideas came
into her mind. It was as if it grew suddenly and there were things in
the world she would like to know about. Perhaps M. Ralph could tell her.
Miladi said she was tiresome when she asked questions, and there was
always a headache. Would her head ache when she was grown up? And she
stood in curious awe of Madame de Champlain, who would only talk of the
saints and martyrs, and repeat prayers. She was very attractive to the
children, and gathered them about her, letting them gaze in her little
mirror she carried at her belt, as was the fashion in France. They liked
the touch of her soft hand on their heads, they were sometimes allowed
to press their tawny cheeks against it. Then she would try to instruct
them in the Catechism. They learned the sentences by rote, in an eager
sort of way, but she could see the real un