egroom? Does any one want any more of
him? Can I at length give a thought to my own happiness, think of my dear
little wife who is waiting for me with her head buried in the folds of
her pillow? Who is waiting for me!" That flashes through your mind all at
once like a train of powder. You had not thought of it. During the whole
of the day this luminous side of the question had remained veiled, but
the hour approaches, at this very moment the silken laces of her bodice
are swishing as they are unloosed; she is blushing, agitated, and dare
not look at herself in the glass for fear of noting her own confusion.
Her aunt and her mother, her cousin and her bosom friend, surround and
smile at her, and it is a question of who shall unhook her dress, remove
the orange-blossoms from her hair, and have the last kiss.

Good! now come the tears; they are wiped away and followed by kisses. The
mother whispers something in her ear about a sacrifice, the future,
necessity, obedience, and finds means to mingle with these simple but
carefully prepared words the hope of celestial benedictions and of the
intercession of a dove or two hidden among the curtains.

The poor child does not understand anything about it, except it be that
something unheard-of is about to take place, that the young man--she dare
not call him anything else in her thoughts--is about to appear as a
conqueror and address her in wondrous phrases, the very anticipation of
which makes her quiver with impatience and alarm. The child says not a
word--she trembles, she weeps, she quivers like a partridge in a furrow.
The last words of her mother, the last farewells of her family, ring
confusedly in her ears, but it is in vain that she strives to seize on
their meaning; her mind--where is that poor mind of hers? She really does
not know, but it is no longer under her control.

"Ah! Captain," I said to myself, "what joys are hidden beneath these
alarms, for she loves you. Do you remember that kiss which she let you
snatch coming out of church that evening when the Abbe What's-his-name
preached so well, and those hand-squeezings and those softened glances,
and--happy Captain, floods of love will inundate you; she is awaiting
you!"

Here I gnawed my moustache, I tore my gloves off and then put them on
again, I walked up and down the little drawing-room, I shifted the clock,
which stood on the mantel-shelf; I could not keep still. I had already
experienced such sensations on