A well-bred French girl, of course, expects one day to be wedded, but chiefly looks forward to the event as an opportunity of displaying her presents and trousseau, and is supposed to have no preference in the matter. To Célandine it seemed only natural that she should accept her father's choice, just as he had done the choice of _his_ parents in espousing her mother. Yet in her heart of hearts, the girl--though very young--had grown fond of Charlie Pierrepont, her helpless charge, who was always so gentle and grateful, so sad, too, and who looked, withal, so manly and soldier-like. And with this sentiment in her heart, the girl was to contract what we must call a French marriage. So full of cross-purposes, hidden currents of thought, and secret springs of action, is this work-a-day world of ours! She knew that it is understood and accepted in her native country that unions cannot, as in England, be contracted on the impulse of love or romantic notions, but upon principles of cold and practical utility, as mere transactions between parents; but they are sometimes equally so on this side of the Straits of Dover. So, on the day referred to, M. de Caillé said to his daughter, with his eyebrows elevated as if he had quite made a discovery, while kissing her on the forehead, 'I have found you a husband, my love.' 'Merci, mon père--who is he?' asked Célandine, as if she had not the slightest guess on the subject. 'The time will come anon--but here he is,' and he led in Adolphe, who approached Célandine, whose eyes were fixed on Charlie, pale, wan, and propping himself on a cane of M. de Caillé's. At such a crisis, Adolphe Guerrand had vague ideas--from what he had read in novels and seen at the theatre of the Porte St. Martin, when he was a student in Paris, at the Ecole de Medicin--that he should drop on his knees, or at least on one knee; but the floor was very slippery, and Célandine not being much in love with him, and very much inclined to laugh, he didn't attempt a melodramatic posé at this betrothal, which Charlie saw as in a dream; for his thoughts were at Burtscheid, and the heart-stirring parting words of Ernestine were lingering in his ear. CHAPTER XX. ERNESTINE. As the reader may suppose, some time elapsed ere the quiet little household at Frankfort realized--they could not for long recover from--the catastrophe recorded by the German papers; but when it was actually stated that a prisoner taken in a skirmish, a captain, was roasted alive, nothing seemed too horrible to happen now. That Heinrich might be wounded unto death, or slain outright in battle, seemed but a too probable contingency; but that he should be taken prisoner, and suffer an end of such enforced ignominy, was beyond the category of all their speculations.