"I don't think there is a very tender heart beneath that rough pride of his," replied Brulette. "I feel, just now, like Thérence; a little tenderness is more attractive to me than much talent. But I forgive him; and if my pity is not as great as Joseph wants to make it by his music, it is because I know he has a consolation of which my indifference cannot deprive him,--I mean the admiration which he and others feel for his talents. If Joseph did not care for that more than for love or friendship, his tongue would not now be dumb and his eye dry to the reproof of friendship. He is quite capable of asking for what he wants." "Well," said the Head-Woodsman, returning alone from the park, "did you hear him, my children? He said all he could and would say, and, satisfied to have drawn tears from my old eyes, he has gone away tranquillized." "But you could not keep him to breakfast," said Thérence, smiling. "No," answered her father; "he played too well not to be three parts comforted; and he prefers to go away in that mood, rather than after some folly he might be led into saying or doing at table." TWENTY-EIGHTH EVENING. We ate our meal in peace, feeling relieved of the apprehensions of the night before as to the quarrel between Joseph and Huriel: and, as Thérence plainly showed, both in Joseph's presence and in his absence, that she had no feeling, good or ill, about the past, I indulged, as did Huriel and Fere Bastien, in tranquil and joyous thoughts. Charlot, finding that everybody petted him, began to forget the man who had frightened and bruised him. Every now and then he would start and look behind him at some trifling noise, but Thérence laughingly assured him the man was safely gone and would not return. We seemed like a family party, and I thought to myself, while courting Thérence with the utmost deference, that I would make my love less imperious and more patient than Joseph's. Brulette seemed anxious and overcome, as though cut to the heart by a foul blow. Huriel was uneasy about her, but the Head-Woodsman, who knew the human soul in all its windings, and who was so good that his face and his words poured balm into every wound, took her little hands in his and drew her pretty head to his breast, saying, at the end of the meal:-- "Brulette, we have one thing to ask of you, and though you look so sad and distressed, my son and I will venture to make our request now. Won't you give us a smile of encouragement?" "Tell me what it is, father, and I will obey you," answered Brulette. "Well, my daughter, it is that you will present us to-morrow to your grandfather, so that he may be asked to accept Huriel as a grandson."