“What you say shows a good heart, Germain,” rejoined Pere Maurice; “I know you loved my daughter, that you made her happy, and that if you could have satisfied Death by going in her place, Catherine would be alive at this moment and you in the cemetery.  She well deserved to have you love her like that, and if you don’t get over her loss, no more do we.  But I’m not talking about forgetting her.  The good God willed that she should leave us, and we don’t let a day pass without showing Him, by our prayers, our thoughts, our words, our acts, that we respect her memory and are grieved at her departure.  But if she could speak to you from the other world and tell you her will, she would bid you seek a mother for her little orphans.  The question, then, is to find a woman worthy to take her place.  It won’t be very easy; but it isn’t impossible; and when we have found her for you, you will love her as you loved my daughter, because you are an honest man and because you will be grateful to her for doing us a service and loving your children.”

“Very good, Pere Maurice,” said Germain, “I will do what you wish, as I always have done.”

“I must do you the justice to say, my son, that you have always listened to the friendship and sound arguments of the head of your family.  So let us talk over the matter of your choice of a new wife.  In the first place, I don’t advise you to take a young woman.  That isn’t what you need.  Youth is fickle; and as it’s a burden to bring up three children, especially when they’re the children of another marriage, what you must have is a kind-hearted soul, wise and gentle, and used to hard work.  If your wife isn’t about as old as yourself, she won’t have sense enough to accept such a duty.  She will think you too old and your children too young.  She will complain, and your children will suffer.”

“That is just what disturbs me,” said Germain.  “Suppose she should hate the poor little ones, and they should be maltreated and beaten?”

“God forbid!” said the old man.  “But evil-minded women are rarer in these parts than good ones, and a man must be a fool not to be able to put his hand on the one that suits him.”

“True, father:  there are some good girls in our village.  There’s Louise and Sylvaine and Claudie and Marguerite—­any one you please, in fact.”

“Softly, softly, my boy, all those girls are too young or too poor—­or too pretty; for we must think of that, too, my son.  A pretty woman isn’t always as steady as a plainer one.”

“Do you want me to take an ugly one, pray?” said Germain, a little disturbed.

“No, not ugly, for you will have other children by her, and there’s nothing so sad as to have ugly, puny, unhealthy children.  But a woman still in her prime, in good health and neither ugly nor pretty, would do your business nicely.”

“It is easy to see,” said Germain, smiling rather sadly, “that to get such a one as you want we must have her made to order; especially as you don’t want her to be poor, and rich wives aren’t easy to get, especially for a widower.”