-tubs. The dinner service was of white
porcelain, edged with blue, and was in perfect order. The decanters
were of the old-fashioned octagonal kind still in use in the provinces,
though they have disappeared elsewhere. Grotesque figures had been
carved on the horn handles of the knives. These relics of ancient
splendor, which, nevertheless, looked almost new, seemed to those who
scrutinized them to be in keeping with the kindly and open-hearted
nature of the master of the house.

The lid of the soup-tureen drew a momentary glance from Genestas; he
noticed that it was surmounted by a group of vegetables in high relief,
skilfully colored after the manner of Bernard Palissy, the celebrated
sixteenth century craftsman.

There was no lack of character about the group of men thus assembled.
The powerful heads of Genestas and Benassis contrasted admirably with
M. Janvier's apostolic countenance; and in the same fashion the elderly
faces of the justice of the peace and the deputy-mayor brought out the
youthfulness of the notary. Society seemed to be represented by these
various types. The expression of each one indicated contentment with
himself and with the present, and a faith in the future. M. Tonnelet
and M. Janvier, who were still young, loved to make forecasts of coming
events, for they felt that the future was theirs; while the other guests
were fain rather to turn their talk upon the past. All of them faced the
things of life seriously, and their opinions seemed to reflect a double
tinge of soberness, on the one hand, from the twilight hues of well-nigh
forgotten joys that could never more be revived for them; and, on the
other, from the gray dawn which gave promise of a glorious day.

"You must have had a very tiring day, sir?" said M. Cambon, addressing
the cure.

"Yes, sir," answered M. Janvier, "the poor cretin and Pere Pelletier
were buried at different hours."

"Now we can pull down all the hovels of the old village," Benassis
remarked to his deputy. "When the space on which the houses stand has
been grubbed up, it will mean at least another acre of meadow land for
us; and furthermore, there will be a clear saving to the Commune of the
hundred francs that it used to cost to keep Chautard the cretin."

"For the next three years we ought to lay out the hundred francs in
making a single-span bridge to carry the lower road over the main
stream," said M. Cambon. "The townsfolk and the people down the valley
have