Luckily, Pierre was asleep when they reached the farm, and Germain put him down on his bed without waking him. Then he entered upon such explanations as he was able to give. Père Maurice, sitting upon his three-legged stool in the doorway, listened gravely to him, and, although he was ill pleased with the result of the expedition, when Germain, after describing the widow's system of coquetry, asked his father in-law if he had time to go and pay court to her fifty-two Sundays in the year with the chance of being dismissed at the end of the year, the old man replied, nodding his head in token of assent: "You are not wrong, Germain; that couldn't be." And again, when Germain told how he had been compelled to bring little Marie home again without loss of time to save her from the insults, perhaps from the violence, of an unworthy master, Père Maurice again nodded assent, saying: "You are not wrong, Germain; that's as it should be." When Germain had finished his story and given all his reasons, his father-in-law and mother-in-law simultaneously uttered a heavy sigh of resignation as they exchanged glances. Then the head of the family rose, saying: "Well! God's will be done! affection isn't made to order!" "Come to supper, Germain," said the mother-in-law. "It's a pity that couldn't be arranged better; however, it wasn't God's will, it seems. We must look somewhere else." "Yes," the old man added, "as my wife says, we must look somewhere else." There was no further sound in the house, and when Petit-Pierre rose the next morning with the larks, at dawn, being no longer excited by the extraordinary events of the last two days, he relapsed into the normal apathy of little peasants of his age, forgot all that had filled his little head, and thought of nothing but playing with his brothers, and _being a man_ with the horses and oxen.