th yellow oil;
overhead, through the open windows of the darkened vault, came broad
rays of white light and the sound of the wind rustling in the tree-tops.
A man came in to put the chairs in order, and placed two candles in an
iron chandelier riveted to the stone pillar; then he pulled into the
middle of the aisle a sort of stretcher with a pedestal, its black wood
stained with large white spots. Other people entered the church, and a
priest clad in his surplice passed us. There was the intermittent
tinkling of a bell and then the door of the church opened wide. The
jangling sound of the little bell mingled with the tones of another and
their sharp, clear tones swelled louder as they came nearer and nearer
to us.

A cart drawn by oxen appeared and halted in front of the church. It held
a corpse, whose dull white feet protruded from under the winding-sheet
like bits of washed alabaster, while the body itself had the uncertain
form peculiar to dressed corpses. The crowd around was silent. The men
bared their heads; the priest shook his holy-water sprinkler and mumbled
orisons, and the pair of oxen swung their heads to and fro under the
heavy, creaking yoke. The church, in the background of which gleamed a
star, formed one huge shadow in the greenish outdoor atmosphere of a
rainy twilight, and the child who held a light on the threshold had to
keep his hand in front of it to prevent the wind from blowing it out.

They lifted the body from the cart, and in doing so struck its head
against the pole. They carried it into the church and placed it on the
stretcher. A crowd of men and women followed. They knelt on the floor,
the men near the corpse, and the women a little farther away, near the
door; then the service began.

It did not last very long, at least it impressed us that way, for the
low psalmodies were recited rapidly and drowned now and then by a
stifled sob which came from under the black hoods near the door. A hand
touched me and I drew aside to let a bent woman pass. With her clenched
fists on her breast, and face averted, she advanced without appearing to
move her feet, eager to see, yet trembling to behold, and reached the
row of lights which burned beside the bier. Slowly, very slowly, lifting
up her arm as if to hide herself under it, she turned her head on her
shoulder and sank in a heap on a chair, as limp as her garments.

By the light of the candles, I could see her staring eyes, framed by
lids that l