There was not a better dancer in Maillane, nor one more amusing. At the feast of Saint-Eloi or of Sainte-Agathe, when he and Jésette, the wrestler, danced the _contredanse_ on the green together, every one crowded there to see him as he imitated the pigeon’s flight. He played, more or less well, on every sort of instrument, violin, bassoon, horn, clarinette, but it was with the tambour-pipes that he excelled, In his youth Bénoni had not his equal at serenading the village beauties, or for sounding the revel on a May night. And whenever there was a pilgrimage to be made, either to Notre Dame de Lumière, or to Saint-Gent, to Vaucluse or Les Saintes-Maries, Bénoni was invariably the charioteer, and the life and soul of the party, ever willing, nay, delighted, to leave his own work, the daily round of the quiet home, and to be off for a jaunt. Parties of fifteen to twenty young people in every cart would start off at dawn, foremost among them my uncle, seated on the shaft acting as driver, and keeping up a ceaseless flow of chaff, banter and laughter, during the whole journey. There was one strange idea he had somehow got fixed in his head, and that was, when he married, to wed no one save a girl of noble birth. “But such girls wish to marry men of noble birth,” he was warned. “Well,” retorted Bénoni, “are not we noble too, in our family? Do you imagine that we Poulinets are a set of clowns like you folk. Our ancestor was a noble exile, he wore a cloak lined with red velvet, buckles on his shoes, and silk stockings!” At last, by dint of patient inquiries, he really did hear of a family belonging to the old aristocracy, nearly ruined and with seven unmarried, dowerless daughters. The father, a dissipated fellow, was in the habit of selling a portion of his property every year to his creditors, and they ended by acquiring everything, even the château. So my gallant Uncle Bénoni put on his best attire, and one fine day presented himself as a suitor. The eldest of the girls, though daughter of a marquis and Commander of Malta, to escape the inevitable destiny of becoming an old maid, ended by accepting him. It was from such a source that the pretty story entitled “Fin du Marquisat d’Aurel” was taken, written by Henri de la Madeleine, and telling of a noble family fallen to the plebeian class. As I said, my uncle was an idle fellow. Often about the middle of the day, when he should have been digging or forking in the garden, he would fling aside his tools, and retiring to the shade, draw out his flute and start a _rigaudon_. At the sound of music, the girls at work in the neighbouring fields would come running, and forthwith he would play a _sauterelle_ and start them all dancing. In winter he seldom got up before midday. “Where can one be so snug, so warm, as in one’s bed?” he laughed. And when we asked if he did not get bored staying in bed, his reply was: “Not I! When I am sleepy I sleep, and when I am not, I say psalms for the dead.”