Letters of Two Brides

My father and mother entered into their neighbor's idea with an eye to

my interests so soon as they discovered that Renee de Maucombe would

be acceptable without a dowry, and that the money the said Renee ought

to inherit from her parents would be duly acknowledged as hers in the

contract. In a similar way, my younger brother, Jean de Maucombe, as

soon as he came of age, signed a document stating that he had received

from his parents an advance upon the estate equal in amount to

one-third of whole. This is the device by which the nobles of Provence

elude the infamous Civil Code of M. de Bonaparte, a code which will

drive as many girls of good family into convents as it will find

husbands for. The French nobility, from the little I have been able to

gather, seem to be divided on these matters.

The dinner, darling, was a first meeting between your sweetheart and

the exile. The Comte de Maucombe's servants donned their old laced

liveries and hats, the coachman his great top-boots; we sat five in

the antiquated carriage, and arrived in state about two o'clock--the

dinner was for three--at the grange, which is the dwelling of the

Baron de l'Estorade.

My father-in-law to be has, you see, no castle, only a simple country

house, standing beneath one of our hills, at the entrance of that

noble valley, the pride of which is undoubtedly the Castle of

Maucombe. The building is quite unpretentious: four pebble walls

covered with a yellowish wash, and roofed with hollow tiles of a good

red, constitute the grange. The rafters bend under the weight of this

brick-kiln. The windows, inserted casually, without any attempt at

symmetry, have enormous shutters, painted yellow. The garden in which

it stands is a Provencal garden, enclosed by low walls, built of big

round pebbles set in layers, alternately sloping or upright, according

to the artistic taste of the mason, which finds here its only outlet.

The mud in which they are set is falling away in places.

Thanks to an iron railing at the entrance facing the road, this simple

farm has a certain air of being a country-seat. The railing, long

sought with tears, is so emaciated that it recalled Sister Angelique

to me. A flight of stone steps leads to the door, which is protected

by a pent-house roof, such as no peasant on the Loire would tolerate

for his coquettish white stone house, with its blue roof, glittering

in the sun. The garden and surrounding walks are horribly dusty, and

the trees seem burnt up. It is easy to see that for years the Baron's

life has been a mere rising up and going to bed again, day after day,

without a thought beyond that of piling up coppers. He eats the same

food as his two servants, a Provencal lad and the old woman who used

to wait on his wife. The rooms are scantily furnished.