gilded, it ought to have its confounded bones smashed!"

He then wrenched the cow's head around and decorated her even more
beautifully than her mates. For the animal, having in her pain become
more tractable, now stood perfectly still and permitted the rough artist
to do anything he wanted to with her.

While the preparations for the wedding were being carried on below in
this energetic manner, the Justice was upstairs in the room where he
kept the sword of Charles the Great, putting on his best finery. The
chief factor in the festive attire which the peasants of that region
wear is the number of vests that they put on under their coats. The
richer a peasant is, the more vests he wears on extraordinary occasions.
The Justice had nine, and all of them were destined by him to be
assembled around his body on this day. He kept them hung up in a row on
wooden pegs behind a seed-cloth, which partitioned off one part of the
room from the other like a curtain. First the under ones of silver-gray
or red woolen damask, adorned with flowers, and then the outside ones of
brown, yellow and green cloth. These were all adorned with heavy silver
buttons.

Behind this seed-cloth the Justice was dressing. He had neatly combed
his white hair, and his yellow, freshly-washed face shone forth under it
like a rape-field over which the snow has fallen in May. The expression
of natural dignity, which was peculiar to these features, was today
greatly intensified; he was the father of the bride, and felt it. His
movements were even slower and more measured than on the day when he
bargained with the horse-dealer. He examined each vest carefully before
he removed it from its peg, and then deliberately put them on, one after
the other, without over-hurrying himself in the process of buttoning
them up.

When the Justice was ready he slowly descended the stairs. In the
entrance-hall he surveyed the preparations--the fires, the kettles,
the pots, the green twigs, the ribboned and gilded horns of his cattle.
He seemed to be satisfied with everything, for several times he nodded
his head approvingly. He walked through the entrance-hall to the yard,
then toward the side of the oak grove, looked at the fires which were
burning there, and gave similar signs of approval, although always with
a certain dignity. When the white sand, with which the entire
entrance-hall and the space in front of the house was thickly sprinkled,
grated and crunched in a li