“Now I must say that the women of the mountain districts have the reputation of being light, lighter than in the plain.  A bachelor who meets them owes them at least a kiss; and if he does not take more he is only a blockhead.  If we consider this fairly, this way of looking at the matter is the only one that is logical and reasonable.  As woman, whether she be of the town or the country, has her natural mission to please man, man should always show her that she pleases him.  If he abstains from every sort of demonstration, this means that he considers her ugly; it is almost an insult to her.  If I were a woman, I would not receive, a second time, a man who failed to show me respect at our first meeting, for I would consider that he had failed in appreciation of my beauty, my charm, and my feminine qualities.

“So the bachelors of the village X often proved to the women of the district that they found them to their taste, and, as the cure was unable to prevent these demonstrations, as gallant as they were natural, he resolved to utilize them for the benefit of the general prosperity.  So he imposed as a penance on every woman who had gone wrong that she should plant a walnut tree on the common.  And every night lanterns were seen moving about like will-o’-the-wisps on the hillock, for the erring ones scarcely like to perform their penance in broad daylight.

“In two years there was no longer any room on the lands belonging to the village, and to-day they calculate that there are more than three thousand trees around the belfry which rings out the services amid their foliage.  These are the Sins of the Cure.

“Since we have been seeking for so many ways of rewooding France, the Administration of Forests might surely enter into some arrangement with the clergy to employ a method so simple as that employed by this humble cure.

“August 7th.—­Treatment.

“August 8th.—­I am packing up my trunks and saying good-by to the charming little district so calm and silent, to the green mountain, to the quiet valleys, to the deserted Casino, from which you can see, almost veiled by its light, bluish mist, the immense plain of the Limagne.

“I shall leave to-morrow.”

Here the manuscript stopped.  I will add nothing to it, my impressions of the country not having been exactly the same as those of my predecessor.  For I did not find the two widows!

“The terror”

You say you cannot possibly understand it, and I believe you.  You think I am losing my mind?  Perhaps I am, but for other reasons than those you imagine, my dear friend.

Yes, I am going to be married, and will tell you what has led me to take that step.

I may add that I know very little of the girl who is going to become my wife to-morrow; I have only seen her four or five times.  I know that there is nothing unpleasing about her, and that is enough for my purpose.  She is small, fair, and stout; so, of course, the day after to-morrow I shall ardently wish for a tall, dark, thin woman.