Before I returned home I made two or three half-professional calls upon patients whom my father had visited during my absence.  Everywhere I had to submit to numerous questions as to my adventures and pursuits during my week’s exile.  At each place curiosity seemed to be quite satisfied with the information that the young woman who had been hurt by a fall from the cliffs was an Ollivier.  With that freedom and familiarity which exists among us, I was rallied for my evident absence and preoccupation of mind, which were pleasantly ascribed to the well-known fact that a large quantity of furniture for our new house had arrived from England while I was away.  These friends of mine could tell me the colors of the curtains, and the patterns of the carpets, and the style of my chairs and tables; so engrossingly interesting to all our circle was our approaching marriage.

In the mean time, I had no leisure to study and ponder over the advertisement, which by so odd a chance had come into my hands.  That must be reserved till I was alone at night.

CHAPTER THE TENTH.

JULIA’S WEDDING-DRESS.

Yet I found my attention wandering, and my wits wool-gathering, even in the afternoon, when I had gone down with Julia and my mother to the new house, to see after the unpacking of that load of furniture.  I can imagine circumstances in which nothing could be more delightful than the care with which a man prepares a home for his future wife.  The very tint of the walls, and the way the light falls in through the windows, would become matters of grave importance.  In what pleasant spot shall her favorite chair be placed?  And what picture shall hang opposite it to catch her eye the oftenest?  Where is her piano to stand?  What china, and glass, and silver, is she to use?  Where are the softest carpets to be found for her feet to tread?  In short, where is the very best and daintiest of every thing to be had, for the best and daintiest little bride the sun ever shone on?

There was not the slightest flavor of this sentiment in our furnishing of our new house.  It was really more Julia’s business than mine.  We had had dozens of furnishing lists to peruse from the principal houses in London and Paris, as if even there it was a well-understood thing that Julia and I were going to be married.  We had toiled through these catalogues, making pencil-marks in them, as though they were catalogues of an art exhibition.  We had prudently settled the precise sum (of Julia’s money) which we were to lay out.  Julia’s taste did not often agree with mine, as she had no eye for the harmonies of color—­a singular deficiency among us, as most of the Guernsey women are born artists.  We were constantly compelled to come to a compromise, each yielding some point; not without a secret misgiving on my part that the new house would have many an eyesore about it for me.  But then it was Julia’s money that was doing it, and after all she was more anxious to please me than I deserved.