By a strange fancy I then fell to thinking of the pitiful ceremony of the day before.  I compared—­God forgive me for doing so!—­the ex-dealer in iron bedsteads, ill at ease in his dress-coat, to the priest; the trivial and commonplace words of the mayor, with the eloquent outbursts of the venerable prelate.  What a lesson!  There earth, here heaven; there the coarse prose of the man of business, here celestial poesy.

Georges, to whom I lately spoke about this, said: 

“But, my dear, perhaps you don’t know that marriage at the Town Hall before the registrar is gratis, while—­” I put my hand over his mouth to prevent him from finishing; it seemed to me that he was about to utter some impiety.

Gratis, gratis.  That is exactly what I find so very unseemly.

CHAPTER XI

A WEDDING NIGHT

Thanks to country manners and the solemnity of the occasion, the guests had left fairly early.  Almost every one had shaken hands with me, some with a cunning smile and others with a foolish one, some with an officious gravity that suggested condolence, and others with a stupid cordiality verging on indiscretion.

General de S. and the prefect, two old friends of the family, were lingering over a game of ecarte, and frankly, in spite of all the good-will I bore toward them, I should have liked to see them at the devil, so irritable did I feel that evening.

All this took place, I had forgotten to tell you, the very day of my marriage, and I was really rather tired.  Since morning I had been overwhelmed by an average of about two hundred people, all actuated by the best intentions, but as oppressive as the atmosphere before a storm.  Since morning I had kept up a perpetual smile for all, and then the good village priest who had married us had thought it his duty, in a very neat sermon so far as the rest of it went, to compare me to Saint Joseph, and that sort of thing is annoying when one is Captain in a lancer regiment.  The Mayor, who had been good enough to bring his register to the chateau, had for his part not been able, on catching sight of the prefect, to resist the pleasure of crying, “Long live the Emperor!” On quitting the church they had fired off guns close to my ears and presented me with an immense bouquet.  Finally—­I tell you this between ourselves—­since eight o’clock in the morning I had had on a pair of boots rather too tight for me, and at the moment this narrative begins it was about half an hour after midnight.

I had spoken to every one except my dear little wife, whom they seemed to take pleasure in keeping away from me.  Once, however, on ascending the steps, I had squeezed her hand on the sly.  Even then this rash act had cost me a look, half sharp and half sour, from my mother-in-law, which had recalled me to a true sense of the situation.  If, Monsieur, you happen to have gone through a similar day of violent effusion and general expansion, you will agree with me that during no other moment of your life were you more inclined to irritability.