ing the numbers of the paragraphs; and I was given
confusedly to understand that I was threatened with the police if I did
not blindly obey all the orders and crotchets of my husband, and if I did
not follow wherever he might choose to take me, even if it should be to a
sixth floor in the Rue-Saint-Victor. A score of times I was on the point
of interrupting the Mayor, and saying, "Excuse me, Monsieur, but those
remarks are hardly polite as regards myself, and you yourself must know
that they are devoid of meaning."

But I restrained myself for fear I might frighten the magistrate, who
seemed to me to be in a hurry to finish. He added, however, a few words
on the mutual duties of husband and wife--copartnership--paternity, etc.,
etc.; but all these things, which would perhaps have made me weep
anywhere else, seemed grotesque to me, and I could not forget that dozen
of soldiers playing piquet round the stove, and that row of doors on
which I had read "Public Health," "Burials," "Deaths," "Expropriations,"
etc. I should have been aggrieved at this dealer in iron bedsteads
touching on my cherished dreams if the comic side of the situation had
not absorbed my whole attention, and if a mad wish to laugh outright had
not seized me.

"Monsieur Georges--------, do you swear to take for your wife
Mademoiselle-----------," said the Mayor, bending forward.

My husband bowed and answered "Yes" in a very low voice. He has since
acknowledged to me that he never felt more emotion in his life than in
uttering that "Yes."

"Mademoiselle Berthe--------," continued the magistrate, turning to me,
"do you swear to take for your husband-----------"

I bowed, with a smile, and said to myself: "Certainly; that is plain
enough; I came here for that express purpose."

That was all. I was married!

My father and my husband shook hands like men who had not met for twenty
years; the eyes of both were moist. As for myself, it was impossible for
me to share their emotion. I was very hungry, and mamma and I had the
carriage pulled up at the pastry-cook's before going on to the
dressmaker's.

The next morning was the great event, and when I awoke it was hardly
daylight. I opened the door leading into the drawing-room; there my dress
was spread out on the sofa, the veil folded beside it, my shoes, my
wreath in a large white box, nothing was lacking. I drank a glass of
water. I was nervous, uneasy, happy, trembling. It seemed like the
morning of