The Pomp of the Lavilettes, Complete

river, it was a long stretch of small farmhouses-some painted red, with green shutters, some painted white, with red shutters

houses and the long strips of land were in such regular procession, it might almost have seemed to the eye of the whimsical spectator that the houses and the ribbon were of a piece, and had been set down there, sentinel after sentinel, like so many toy soldiers, along the banks of the great river. There was one important break in the long line

t among trees and shrubbery. They were low set, broad and square, with heavy-studded, old-fashio

nsieur Duhamel; the other was the Manor Casimbault, empty now of all the Casimbaults. For a year it had lain idle, until the only heir of the old family, which was

arge house completed the acute triangle, forming the apex of the solid wedge of settlement drawn about the

e bridge was the parish mill, and between were the Hotel France, the little house of Doctor Montmagny, the Regimental Surgeon (as he was called), the cooper shop, the blacksmith, the tinsmith and the grocery shops. Just beyond the mill, upon the banks of the river, was the most notorious, if not the most celebrated, house in the settlement. Shangois, the travelling notary, lived in it-when he was

e children, had a wholesome fear of the disreputable, shrunken, dishevelled little notary, with the bead-like eyes, yellow stockings, hooked nose and palsied left hand. Also the knapsack and black bag

the social value of every human being in the parish. He was too cunning and acute to be a gossip, but by direct and indirect ways he made every person feel that the Cure and the Lord might forgive their pasts, but he could never forget them, nor wished to do so. For Mons

culty followed, fire consumed the old house in which their dignity had been cherished, and at last they had no longer their seigneurial posi

carious, he had married a girl somewhat older than himself, who was half English and half French, her father having been a Hudson's Bay Company factor on the north coast of the rive

Besides, she had no taste, and her manners were much inferior to those of her husband. What impression he managed to make by virtue of a good deal of nat

e, which, in spite of all misfortune, grew bigger as the years went on. Probably, in spite of everything, Monsieur Lavilette and his family would have succeeded better socially had it

he was greatly surprised to find Monsieur Lavilette ready with ten thousand dollars, to purchase the Manor Casimbault. Before the parish had time to take breath Monsieur Casimbault had handed over the deed, pockete

ime that impertinent peasants

ear my little

w my little go

op your wor

ave your pr

heads before t

le wood, a mile or so to the right of the Lavilettes' farmhouse. Farcinelle's engagement to Sophie had come as a surprise to all, for, so far as people knew, there had been no courting. Madame Lavilette had encouraged, had even tempted, the spontaneous and jovial Farcinelle. Though he had never made a speech in the House

e impression. Her dress was florid and not in excellent taste, and her accent was rather crude. Sophie had gone to school at the convent in the city, but she had no ambition. She had inherited the stolid simplici

n for her father, and she never tired looking at the picture of her great-grandfather in the dress of a chevalier of St. Louis-almost the only thing that had been saved from the old Manor House, destroyed so long before her time. Perhaps it was the importance she a

Baby, "what's all this p

cted his brows, and arranged his loose

as though he had solved the

ney; and they step about Bonaven

neau, corrugating h

os

ously that great billows of excitement raised his waistcoat, and a perspiration broke out upon his mea

! Perhaps when John the Baptist was alive. What is that? Nothing. There is no baron now. All at once somebody die a year ago, and leave them ten thousand dollars; and then-mais, there is the grand difference! They have save and save twenty years

he is the best judge of horses in the province, and he's a Member of P

tineau!" responded Baby. "He's the best in the family. He is a grand sport; yes. It's he that

; then he drew the miller's head down by pul

; that's one good thing," he sai

u, for just then two or three loiterers of the pa

ers their attention was drawn to the stage-coach f

ng about nervously in his excitement. "I knew there was someth

ter entitled him to know; but the furtive droop at the corner of his

thletic, reckless-looking, with a cast in his left eye, which gave him a look of drollery, in k

; waving hair, streaked with grey, black moustache, and a hectic flush on the cheeks, lending to th

ing eyes. "An English nobleman," answere

eplied the postmaster, with cunning care and a to