"Adam the Devil," whispered another prisoner, "pick up your knife before it attracts the attention of the soldiers." CHAPTER IV. "JACQUERIE! JACQUERIE!" The marriage of the damosel of Chivry with the seigneur of Nointel took place in the morning. In the afternoon, the large number of guests invited to the brilliant wedding were gathered in the large throne hall, now transformed into a banquet room. The banquet was continued deep into the evening, and was now nearing its end. For the last six hours the noble guests had been doing ample honor to the interminable meal. While Jacques Bonhomme barely preserves existence with decayed beans and water, the seigneurs eat fit to split their stomachs. It was so at the nuptials of the belle Gloriande. The first course, intended to open the appetite, consisted of citrons, fruit cooked in vinegar, sour cherries, salted dishes, salads and other toothsome preparations. The second course was of lobster patties, cream almonds, soups of meat, of rice, of oats, of wheat, of macaroni, of fricandelles, each served in the different colors that expert cooks impart to them and that please the eyes of the gourmands--soups in white, in blue, in yellow, in red, in green or of golden hue were spread in harmonious combinations. The third course had roasts with sauce, and what a variety of sauces!--cinnamon, nutmeg, raisin, jennet, rose, flower--all these sauces likewise colored differently. The fourth course consisted of pastries of all sorts, of boars, of deer, monstrous pastries that held, floating on goose fat, a whole stuffed lamb, finally tarts of rose leaves, of cherries, of chestnuts, and in the middle of all these a monumental fabric of pastry three feet high, representing the donjon-keep, the towers and the ramparts of the noble manor of Chivry. The long table loaded down with costly plate which reflected one another by the light of wax candles presented the aspect of gladsome disorder. The flagons and silver decanters, filled with spiced wines and circulating from hand to hand, redoubled the conviviality of the hour. Some of the guests grew unsteady in their seats, their heads swimming in the fumes of approaching drunkenness. The cheeks and eyes of several of the dames and their daughters, even without having celebrated Gloriande's nuptials to a Bacchic excess, had become purple and inflamed; their breasts heaved, and they laughed boisterously at the licentious stories told by the seigneurs who sat near and drank out of the same cup with them. Outside of the banquet table, the servants, and even the men-at-arms, were sharing the convivial joys of their masters, and celebrated the nuptials of their seigneur's daughter with deep potations of beer, cider, and even wine. Many were asleep in the profound slumbers of inebriety.