Page:French life in town and country (1917).djvu/29

 bride was gaudily and hideously attired in yellow and brown satin and silk; the groom in grey, with straw hat and leggings, more appropriately adorned the landscape. He was a heavy-eyed, high-complexioned, silent youth, who seemed at ease and happy only in the society of his most beautiful dogs. To them alone did he sometimes discourse in heavy undertones, while he surveyed me furtively under his lashes in unmistakable awe, but addressed me no word. His father-in-law looked like a farmer or a yeoman, and cracked small jokes. He quizzed his son, who blushed the hues of fire, and his son's mother-in-law, who ingeniously strove to make me believe that she did not understand him, and he nudged his daughter-in-law in a way she must have resented. Without exaggeration, I have never met a more peasant type of country gentleman in my life. His wife was a simple, ill-mannered person, who talked chiefly about the weather. The grounds were lovely, the orchard a splendid dream, but the floors of the "chateau," as every country-house in France is pretentiously called, were mere unvarnished planks; not a rug anywhere, not a hint of beeswax, and even the drawing-room was disfigured with ugly presses. When liquid refreshment was called for—chartreuse and iced water—we were served in coarse glasses, and the iced water was brought in in a kitchen