Little Marie, not having as yet received the wedding-gifts, called livrees, was dressed in the best that her modest wardrobe afforded:  a dress of dark-gray cloth, a white fichu with large bright-colored flowers, an apron of the color called incarnat, an Indian red then much in vogue but despised to-day, a cap of snow-white muslin and of the shape, fortunately preserved, which recalls the head-dress of Anne Boleyn and Agnes Sorel.  She was fresh and smiling, and not at all proud, although she had good reason to be.  Germain was beside her, grave and deeply moved, like the youthful Jacob saluting Rachel at Laban’s well.  Any other girl would have assumed an air of importance and a triumphant bearing; for in all ranks of life it counts for something to be married for one’s beaux yeux.  But the girl’s eyes were moist and beaming with love; you could see that she was deeply smitten, and that she had no time to think about the opinions of other people.  She had not lost her little determined manner; but she was all sincerity and good nature; there was nothing impertinent in her success, nothing personal in her consciousness of her strength.  I never saw such a sweet fiancee as she when she quickly answered some of her young friends who asked her if she was content:  “Bless me! indeed I am!  I don’t complain of the good Lord.”

Pere Maurice was the spokesman; he had come to offer the customary compliments and invitations.  He began by fastening a laurel branch adorned with ribbons to the mantel-piece; that is called the exploit, that is to say, the invitation; then he gave to each of the guests a little cross made of a bit of blue ribbon crossed by another bit of pink ribbon; the pink for the bride, the blue for the groom; and the guests were expected to keep that token to wear on the wedding-day, the women in their caps, the men in their button-holes.  It was the ticket of admission.

Then Pere Maurice delivered his speech.  He invited the master of the house and all his company, that is to say, all his children, all his relations, all his friends, all his servants, to the marriage-ceremony, to the feast, to the sports, to the dancing, and to everything that comes after.  He did not fail to say:—­I come to do you the honor to invite you.  A very proper locution, although it seems a misuse of words to us, as it expresses the idea of rendering honor to those who are deemed worthy thereof.

Despite the general invitation carried thus from house to house throughout the parish, good-breeding, which is extremely conservative among the peasantry, requires that only two persons in each family should take advantage of it,—­one of the heads of the family to represent the household, one of their children to represent the other members.

The invitations being delivered, the fiances and their relations went to the farm and dined together.

Little Marie tended her three sheep on the common land, and Germain turned up the ground as if there were nothing in the air.