Pierrette | Page 4

new weather-vane. This modern innovation
represented a hunter in the attitude of shooting a hare. The front door
was reached by three stone steps. On one side of this door a leaden pipe
discharged the sink-water into a small street-gutter, showing the
whereabouts of the kitchen. On the other side were two windows,
carefully closed by gray shutters in which were heart-shaped openings
cut to admit the light; these windows seemed to be those of the
dining-room. In the elevation gained by the three steps were vent- holes
to the cellar, closed by painted iron shutters fantastically cut in
open-work. Everything was new. In this repaired and restored house,
the fresh-colored look of which contrasted with the time-worn exteriors
of all the other houses, an observer would instantly perceive the paltry
taste and perfect self-satisfaction of the retired petty shopkeeper.
The young man looked at these details with an expression of pleasure
that seemed to have something rather sad in it; his eyes roved from the
kitchen to the roof, with a motion that showed a deliberate purpose.

The rosy glow of the rising sun fell on a calico curtain at one of the
garret windows, the others being without that luxury. As he caught
sight of it the young fellow's face brightened gaily. He stepped back a
little way, leaned against a linden, and sang, in the drawling tone
peculiar to the west of France, the following Breton ditty, published by
Bruguiere, a composer to whom we are indebted for many charming
melodies. In Brittany, the young villagers sing this song to all
newly-married couples on their wedding-day:--
"We've come to wish you happiness in marriage, To m'sieur your
husband As well as to you:
"You have just been bound, madam' la mariee, With bonds of gold That
only death unbinds:
"You will go no more to balls or gay assemblies; You must stay at
home While we shall go.
"Have you thought well how you are pledged to be True to your spouse,
And love him like yourself?
"Receive these flowers our hands do now present you; Alas! your
fleeting honors Will fade as they."
This native air (as sweet as that adapted by Chateaubriand to /Ma soeur,
te souvient-il encore/), sung in this little town of the Brie district, must
have been to the ears of a Breton maiden the touchstone of imperious
memories, so faithfully does it picture the manners and customs, the
surroundings and the heartiness of her noble old land, where a sort of
melancholy reigns, hardly to be defined; caused, perhaps, by the aspect
of life in Brittany, which is deeply touching. This power of awakening
a world of grave and sweet and tender memories by a familiar and
sometimes lively ditty, is the privilege of those popular songs which are
the superstitions of music,--if we may use the word "superstition" as
signifying all that remains after the ruin of a people, all that survives
their revolutions.
As he finished the first couple, the singer, who never took his eyes
from the attic curtain, saw no signs of life. While he sang the second,
the curtain stirred. When the words "Receive these flowers" were sung,
a youthful face appeared; a white hand cautiously opened the casement,
and a girl made a sign with her head to the singer as he ended with the
melancholy thought of the simple verses,--"Alas! your fleeting honors
will fade as they."

To her the young workman suddenly showed, drawing it from within
his jacket, a yellow flower, very common in Brittany, and sometimes to
be found in La Brie (where, however, it is rare),--the furze, or broom.
"Is it really you, Brigaut?" said the girl, in a low voice.
"Yes, Pierrette, yes. I am in Paris. I have started to make my way; but
I'm ready to settle here, near you."
Just then the fastening of a window creaked in a room on the first floor,
directly below Pierrette's attic. The girl showed the utmost terror, and
said to Brigaut, quickly:--
"Run away!"
The lad jumped like a frightened frog to a bend in the street caused by
the projection of a mill just where the square opens into the main
thoroughfare; but in spite of his agility his hob-nailed shoes echoed on
the stones with a sound easily distinguished from the music of the mill,
and no doubt heard by the person who opened the window.
That person was a woman. No man would have torn himself from the
comfort of a morning nap to listen to a minstrel in a jacket; none but a
maid awakes to songs of love. Not only was this woman a maid, but
she was an old maid. When she had opened her blinds with the furtive
motion of the bat, she looked