Page:The grandmother; a story of country life in Bohemia.pdf/345

Rh die than not try to find out what is hidden from them, and when the cover is raised, they catch nothing after all."

The young people remained together till late at night, for dancing followed the feasting. The groom and the bridesman escorted the wedding matron home, reminding her at parting, that they were to meet early the next morning.

The whole neighborhood of Zernov was up early the next day. Some were to accompany the bride to church, some only to attend the wedding at the house, and those who were not invited could not overcome their curiosity to see the procession about which everybody had talked for several weeks, It was to be so grand; the bride was to ride in a carriage drawn by horses from the manor; she was to wear a costly garnet necklace, a white embroidered apron, a rose-colored taffety jacket, and a sky-blue skirt; the Zernov gossips knew all this, probably before Christina herself had thought of it. They knew all the details as to the quantity and kinds of food that would be prepared for the wedding feast, and in what order the guests were to come to the table; what kind of furniture the bride was to have for her outfit, how many feather beds and how many pieces of underwear. They knew all as well as if she had given them a written statement of it. Not to go to look at such a wedding, not to see how becoming the wreath was to the bride, how much she wept, how the guests were dressed, would have been so great a negligence that it could never be pardoned. This was an epoch in the history of Zernov, this furnished material for conver-