uss
the matter at interminable length, each pleading for the cabbage which
seems to him the best adapted for the occasion. The question is put to a
vote, and when the choice is made, the _gardener_ fastens his rope
around the stalk and goes as far away as the size of the garden permits.
The gardener's wife looks out to see that the sacred vegetable is not
injured in its fall. The _Jesters_ of the wedding-party, the
hemp-beater, the grave-digger, the carpenter, or the cobbler,--in a
word, all those who do not work on the land, and who, as they pass
their lives in other people's houses, are reputed to have and do really
have more wit and a readier tongue than the simple agricultural
laborers,--take their places around the cabbage. One digs a trench with
the spade, so deep that you would say he was preparing to dig up an
oak-tree. Another puts on his nose a _drogue_, made of wood or
pasteboard, in imitation of a pair of spectacles: he performs the duties
of _engineer_, comes forward, walks away, prepares a plan, overlooks the
workmen, draws lines, plays the pedant, cries out that they are spoiling
the whole thing, orders the work to be abandoned and resumed according
to his fancy, and makes the performance as long and as absurd as he can.
Is this an addition to the former programme of the ceremony, in mockery
of theorists in general, for whom the ordinary peasant has the most
sovereign contempt, or in detestation of land-surveyors, who control the
register of lands and assess the taxes, or of the employees of the
Department of Roads and Bridges, who convert common lands into highways
and cause the suppression of time-worn abuses dear to the peasant heart?
Certain it is that this character in the comedy is called the
_geometrician_, and that he does his utmost to make himself unbearable
to those who handle the pick and shovel.

At last, after quarter of an hour of mummery and remonstrances, so that
the roots of the cabbage may not be cut and it can be transplanted
without injury, while spadefuls of earth are thrown into the faces of
the bystanders,--woe to him who does not step aside quickly enough;
though he were a bishop or a prince, he must receive the baptism of
earth,--the _paien_ pulls the rope, the _paienne_ holds her apron, and
the cabbage falls majestically amid the cheers of the spectators. Then
the basket is brought, and the pagan couple proceed to plant the cabbage
therein with all imaginable care and precaution