ranged that
the marriage of his daughter and Gabriel was to take place.

They waited for evening at the farmhouse. A little before sunset
the ship was signaled as in sight; and then Pere Bonan and his wife,
followed by Gabriel and Perrine, set forth over the heath to the beach.
With the solitary exception of Francois Sarzeau, the whole population
of the neighborhood was already assembled there, Gabriel's brother and
sisters being among the number.

It was the calmest evening that had been known for months. There was not
a cloud in the lustrous sky--not a ripple on the still surface of the
sea. The smallest children were suffered by their mothers to stray down
on the beach as they pleased; for the waves of the great ocean slept as
tenderly and noiselessly on their sandy bed as if they had been changed
into the waters of an inland lake. Slow, almost imperceptible, was the
approach of the ship--there was hardly a breath of wind to carry her
on--she was just drifting gently with the landward set of the tide at
that hour, while her sails hung idly against the masts. Long after the
sun had gone down, the congregation still waited and watched on the
beach. The moon and stars were arrayed in their glory of the night
before the ship dropped anchor. Then the muffled tolling of a bell came
solemnly across the quiet waters; and then, from every creek along the
shore, as far as the eye could reach, the black forms of the fishermen's
boats shot out swift and stealthy into the shining sea.

By the time the boats had arrived alongside of the ship, the lamp had
been kindled before the altar, and its flame was gleaming red and dull
in the radiant moonlight. Two of the priests on board were clothed in
their robes of office, and were waiting in their appointed places to
begin the service. But there was a third, dressed only in the ordinary
attire of his calling, who mingled with the congregation, and spoke
a few words to each of the persons composing it, as, one by one, they
mounted the sides of the ship. Those who had never seen him before knew
by the famous ivory crucifix in his hand that the priest who received
them was Father Paul. Gabriel looked at this man, whom he now beheld for
the first time, with a mixture of astonishment and awe; for he saw that
the renowned chief of the Christians of Brittany was, to all appearance,
but little older than himself.

The expression on the pale, calm face of the priest was so gentle and
kind, t