stories had served for similar occasions,
and, although every one knew them, they still hit the mark and made both
rows of guests roar with laughter.

At one end of the table four young fellows, who were neighbors, were
preparing some practical jokes for the newly married couple, and they
seemed to have got hold of a good one by the way they whispered and
laughed, and suddenly one of them, profiting by a moment of silence,
exclaimed: "The poachers will have a good time to-night, with this moon!
I say, Jean, you will not be looking at the moon, will you?" The
bridegroom turned to him quickly and replied: "Only let them come, that's
all!" But the other young fellow began to laugh, and said: "I do not
think you will pay much attention to them!"

The whole table was convulsed with laughter, so that the glasses shook,
but the bridegroom became furious at the thought that anybody would
profit by his wedding to come and poach on his land, and repeated: "I
only say-just let them come!"

Then there was a flood of talk with a double meaning which made the bride
blush somewhat, although she was trembling with expectation; and when
they had emptied the kegs of brandy they all went to bed. The young
couple went into their own room, which was on the ground floor, as most
rooms in farmhouses are. As it was very warm, they opened the window and
closed the shutters. A small lamp in bad taste, a present from the
bride's father, was burning on the chest of drawers, and the bed stood
ready to receive the young people.

The young woman had already taken off her wreath and her dress, and she
was in her petticoat, unlacing her boots, while Jean was finishing his
cigar and looking at her out of the corners of his eyes. Suddenly, with a
brusque movement, like a man who is about to set to work, he took off his
coat. She had already taken off her boots, and was now pulling off her
stockings, and then she said to him: "Go and hide yourself behind the
curtains while I get into bed."

He seemed as if he were about to refuse; but at last he did as she asked
him, and in a moment she unfastened her petticoat, which slipped down,
fell at her feet and lay on the ground. She left it there, stepped over
it in her loose chemise and slipped into the bed, whose springs creaked
beneath her weight. He immediately went up to the bed, and, stooping over
his wife, he sought her lips, which she hid beneath the pillow, when a
shot was heard in the distance, in