The autumnal day has declined, it is evening at present. In the lukewarm air, bats glide. The mountaineers of the surrounding villages depart one by one; a dozen carriages are harnessed, their lanterns are lighted, their bells ring and they disappear in the little shady paths of the valleys. In the middle of the limpid penumbra may be distinguished the women, the pretty girls seated on benches in front of the houses, under the vaults of the plane-trees; they are only clear forms, their Sunday costumes make white spots in the twilight, pink spots--and the pale blue spot which Ramuntcho looks at is the new gown of Gracieuse.--Above all, filling the sky, the gigantic Gizune, confused and sombre, is as if it were the centre and the source of the darkness, little by little scattered over all things. And at the church, suddenly the pious bells ring, recalling to distracted minds the enclosure where the graves are, the cypress trees around the belfry, and the entire grand mystery of the sky, of prayer, of inevitable death. Oh! the sadness of ends of festivals in very isolated villages, when the sun ceases to illuminate, and when it is autumn-- They know very well, these men who were so ardent a moment ago in the humble pleasures of the day, that in the cities there are other festivals more brilliant, more beautiful and less quickly ended; but this is something separate; it is the festival of the country, of their own country, and nothing can replace for them these furtive instants whereof they have thought for so many days in advance--Lovers who will depart toward the scattered houses flanking the Pyrenees, couples who to-morrow will begin over their monotonous and rude life, look at one another before separating, look at one another under the falling night, with regretful eyes that say: “Then, it is finished already? Then, that is all?--” CHAPTER V. Eight o'clock in the evening. They have dined at the cider mill, all the players except the vicar, under the patronage of Itchoua; they have lounged for a long time afterward, languid in the smoke of smuggled cigarettes and listening to the marvellous improvisations of the two Iragola brothers, of the Mendiazpi mountain--while outside, on the street, the girls in small groups holding one another's arms, looked at the windows, found pleasure in observing on the smoky panes the round shadows of the heads of the men covered with similar caps-- Now, on the square, the brass band plays the first measures of the fandango, and the young men, the young girls, all those of the village and several also of the mountain who have remained to dance, arrive in impatient groups. There are some dancing already on the road, not to lose anything.