Alphonsine evidently ruled the establishment with a rod of iron. She was a tall, thin, ill-favored looking woman, who was always prepared for a wrangle, and who looked uncommonly sharp after her own interests. However, by paying pretty liberally and in advance, I soon won her heart, and flatter myself that it was by excellent generalship on my part that I contrived very soon to be entirely in her good books. Her hard face used sometimes actually to relax into a grim kind of smile in my presence, and I fancied her harsh voice used almost imperceptibly to soften in addressing me. Beside, she was accustomed to bustle about in a rough kind of way in order to get things straight and comfortable, and I really think tried to do her best to make me feel at home. What more could I want than this? And then she had two delightful children, a boy and a girl, with whom I was very soon especially friendly, and who tended to enliven me up a bit whenever I chanced to be at all dull. The boy was about thirteen years old, and his sister, who looked a year or so younger, was indeed a lovely child. She was as fair as a lily, and had that sweet expression of countenance which is so often found among the peasants in Normandy; her eyes were large and exquisitely blue, and with all this she had a decided will of her own. But then she was the daughter of Alphonsine. It was some little time before I made the acquaintance of the master of the establishment; for he was always busy fishing, and, as I have said before, the fishermen who lived in the village seldom got home before Saturday evening, and had to be off again either on Sunday evening or by daybreak on Monday. However, Saturday soon came round, and with it Pierre Prévost. He was about five-and-thirty years old, very dark and singularly handsome. His hair, which was thick, fell about his head in ringlets; he was short, and had most expressive eyes. I was not long in perceiving that he was in every way a great contrast to Alphonsine. His expression was sad, and he seldom or never smiled; and I noticed he seemed to shrink rather nervously from the piercing look with which he was very frequently favored by "la belle Alphonsine." His sweet and handsome face soon disposed me favorably toward him, notwithstanding that there were circumstances which occurred on our first acquaintance which would otherwise have tended to prejudice me entirely against him. I was smoking a pipe and chatting quietly to Alphonsine in the great chimney-corner on the evening I allude to, when all at once the two children came tearing in from school with their books under their arms. "He is come!" cried they, in their shrill treble voices. "We saw his boat just coming near the shore. He will be on the sand almost in a {112} moment We may go and meet him, may we not, mother?"