ot
understand the respect due to his father's uncle. I will teach him
better things; he will soon learn that he ought to be grateful for the
care you have taken of his little property."

"No doubt, no doubt," said the uncle, trying hard to smile. "I will give
you a good account of it, for I shall only have to reckon with you two in
future. Come, my dear, believe me, your husband is really dead, and you
have sorrowed quite enough for a good-for-nothing fellow. Think no more
of him."

So saying, he departed, leaving the poor young woman a prey to the
saddest thoughts.

Bertrande de Rolls, naturally gifted with extreme sensibility, on which a
careful education had imposed due restraint, had barely completed her
twelfth year when she was married to Martin Guerre, a boy of about the
same age, such precocious unions being then not uncommon, especially in
the Southern provinces. They were generally settled by considerations of
family interest, assisted by the extremely early development habitual to
the climate. The young couple lived for a long time as brother and
sister, and Bertrande, thus early familiar with the idea of domestic
happiness, bestowed her whole affection on the youth whom she had been
taught to regard as her life's companion. He was the Alpha and Omega of
her existence; all her love, all her thoughts, were given to him, and
when their marriage was at length completed, the birth of a son seemed
only another link in the already long existing bond of union. But, as
many wise men have remarked, a uniform happiness, which only attaches
women more and more, has often upon men a precisely contrary effect, and
so it was with Martin Guerre. Of a lively and excitable temperament, he
wearied of a yoke which had been imposed so early, and, anxious to see
the world and enjoy some freedom, he one day took advantage of a domestic
difference, in which Bertrande owned herself to have been wrong, and left
his house and family. He was sought and awaited in vain. Bertrande
spent the first month in vainly expecting his return, then she betook
herself to prayer; but Heaven appeared deaf to her supplications, the
truant returned not. She wished to go in search of him, but the world is
wide, and no single trace remained to guide her. What torture for a
tender heart! What suffering for a soul thirsting for love! What
sleepless nights! What restless vigils! Years passed thus; her son was
growing up, yet not a word r