Marie and Jacques spoke to all round, and
to each other with their eyes. Each look
was a whole hour's talk.

"'Tis a sight," I said to Monsieur
Bontiquet, " I would not have missed for a
thousand francs, 'Twill do me good for the next
twelvemonth."

"You do us honour," said he, with a bow,
"but you have reason, Monsieur. My old
heart has got young again within the last
half-hour. Ah! Jacques,'' he added, turning
to him, "thou must take care of her!"

Marie looked at her husband, and answered
for him with her beaming eyes.

"Thou art in gentle hands, Marie," I said.
"I will be his bail to thee."

"We shall not want you, Monsieur," said
Marie, a little wickedly.

I whispered to Bontiquet. He shook his
head. "But it must be—it shall be," quoth I.
He gave way at last, a little reluctantly.
With that he got up and tapped for silence
on his table. "Our good stranger and guest
here to-night, desires to present the company
with some choice Burgundy."

"Send for it at once, Monsieur Bontiquet,
without more ado," I said, standing up, "and
let us drink the health of our bride in that
noble fluid, à la mode Anglaise!"

Rapturous applause and satisfaction at this
speech of the noble stranger. Corbeau
positively turned a somersault with those
grotesque cheeks and nose of his.

The fine old Burgundy was brought in,
and we drank it à la mode Anglaise, to
the bride's health, to the bridegroom's health,
to my health, to everybody's health. That
mode Anglaise grew so popular. More
Burgundy—more healths and happiness.

"I would have walked," I said to Bontiquet,
"again from Calais to Marseilles, for
this."

"'Tis the happiest day of my life," said
Bontiquet. "If we only had the poor canon
here."

"He promised to come," said Monsieur
le Curé. "He must have taken one of his
long walks."

"He would have enjoyed this," said
Bontiquet.

I thought of the strange Abbé I had met at
the fountain.

"Messieurs," I said, "I fell in with an
Abbé outside the town, at the fountain; who
talked curiously concerning clock-work and
wheels."

"Ah! the poor gentle soul!" said
Bontiquet. "You must have touched on his
weak point. He is all astray on such
matters."

"'Tis his misfortune. Heaven help him!"
said the good Curé. "He was for years
inventing clocks, and it turned his brain at
last. God keep us our wits, when so gentle
a man has lost his!"

"'Tis the sweetest nature in the world,"
said the Flax-carding Chin.

"And so wise and sensible in all things
but clocks," said Monsieur le Curé.

"Curious phenomenon," I struck in with.

"So it is," said the Curé; "but he is the
most amiable and charitable soul alive.
Gives all his little means away: for which
Heaven reward him!"

"See how he stopped his niece's marringe
with a rascally spendthrift cousin, which
would have ruined her. There was wit in
that, I fancy, and no madness."

"The match is off, then," said the Curé".
"Well, I am glad of it; such stories as there
were through his parish concerning him!
An utter ne'er-do-well."

"A very desperate fellow, they say," added
Bontiquet. "The good Abbé's money would
have helped him prodigiously. He had
sooner he had the fingering of it than the
poor."

It had now got to be between nine and
ten o'clock. Bontiquet hammered on the
table. "Messieurs et mesdames! lads and
lasses! out on the green with you! Vive
la danse! Let each one fit himself with the
partner he loves best, and lead out on the
grass. Under the vine-trees there shall be
plenty of cooling drinks; I will look to that!
So go forth—and vive la joie!"

That cry was in every one's heart, if not
upon their lips. Handsome Corydons were
all a-foot in an instant, and trooped out,
holding Phyllis' fingers in theirs. Such a
pretty procession as it defiled past Bontiquet
and me!

There was the music all ready; a fiddle
and a tambourine, played with delightful
vigour! The little cymbals of the
tambourine rattled musically. Shut your eyes,
and it seemed to be the Spanish dance,
bolero, or fandango. Such circling round
and round again; such motion of many
twinkling feet; such flashing of colours;
such fall of leaves from roses under daintiest
caps. This night Sir John Suckling had
seen a whole legion of those mice (full-grown
ones, though) to which he had so fancifully
likened his mistress's feet when dancing,
running in and out. The green was alive with
skittering mice. Thrum the tambourine
lustily; join hands, and round and round in
a ring; scatter again, like a shower of falling
leaves, and be mated in pairs!

I had walked thirty miles that day;
enough to stiffen the limbs of any stout man.
Said Bontiquet to me: " Here is a lively
demoiselle that will give you her hand for a
dance. Yet, Monsieur, rather, may go about
and choose for himself; the stranger is as his
majesty the king." There was the most
roguish cap yonder I had ever seen; the
neatest, daintiest thing in the world. "I
will have Cap," I said; and Mademoiselle
Rosalie was fetched for me at once. Corydon
stood by a little jealously. " Why trouble so
much as one honest heart on this glad
night? " I said to myself. (The ghost of