"There's Isidoro Pane, the devil take him! if he hasn't got on new clothes too; I wonder if he is also thinking of getting married. Eh, eh! That fresh-looking fellow down there by the door was laughing at me; he saw how happy and prosperous I looked, and thought of course that I must be going to get married. Well, and what if I am? Is it any business of yours, you puppy? Can't I get married if I want to? I have a house of my own, and cattle too.[6] "Eh, eh! my sister will die without heirs--God bless her!--there she is, looking like a pink, shiny, little wax doll. Who would ever suppose that she is older than I? She wants me to get a wife. Well, I am perfectly willing, but whom shall I get? I am not so easy to please, and then I'm afraid--I'm afraid--I'm afraid. With this new law--the devil roast all the lawyers--who in the world is one ever to trust? There's that precious young master of mine; there he is at this very minute, with the stamp of mortal sin on him. What is he doing here? Why don't they horsewhip him? Why don't they drive him out like a dog? And his old bird-of-prey mother too? The old jade, there she is! Why don't they drive both of them out?" "Ah," he thought presently, "that is true, though; if they turned every one out who did wrong, the church would soon be empty. But those two people, I hate them; I'd like to flog them till the blood came. I'm not bad, though; didn't I stay up at the folds only to-day, working to repair the damage made by yesterday's storm? Then, when I came down, there was Giovanna getting dinner all by herself. She was dirty, and ill, and unhappy. No holiday for her! The mother and son go off together, and she, the maid-servant, stays at home and does the work. Well, it serves her right--a bad woman! And yet, I do feel sorry for her sometimes. There, God help me, I do feel sorry for her. When I said something ugly to her just now, she never answered a word. After all, when you come to think of it, she's the mistress, and I'm the servant. But is it my fault if I can't help pitching into you sometimes, little spring bird? I can't bear the sight of you, and all the same I'm sorry for you, and that's the way it is. Now, we must listen to what the priest has to tell us. He's just like a sparrow; that's it, a sparrow singing in its nest." "Brothers, sisters, beloved----" cried the little preacher in the soft Loguedorese dialect, which sounds almost like Spanish, and waving his small white hands in the air--"the faith of Our Lady is the most ideal, the most sublime of all faiths. She, the gentle woman, daughter, wife, and Mother of Our Lord, mounted to heaven all radiant and fragrant as a chaplet of roses, and took her seat in glory amongst the angels and seraphim----"