look in them than was their wont, he suffered his eyes to wander around, as if to call all the familiar objects to witness that the man had lied; then, stooping down, he resumed his labours.

The sun, already low in the heavens, had nearly reached the row of young elms which bordered the field to the west, their lopped branches that ended in tufts of leaves resembling huge marguerites were bending to the strong sea breeze. It was the beginning of September, the time of evening when a glow of heat seems to traverse the descending chills of night. The farmer worked on as quickly and unremittingly as any younger man; his outstretched hand snapped off the crisp leaves close down to the stem of the cabbages with a noise as of breaking glass, where they lay in heaps along the furrows beneath the over-arching rows of plants. Hidden in the gloom, whence was emitted the warm, moist smell of earth, he was lost amid the huge velvety leaves intersected with their purple veins of colour. In truth he made one with the vegetation, and it would have been difficult to discern which was corduroy and which cabbage in the billowy expanse of the blue-green field.

Withal, close to earth as was his bent body, his soul was agitated and deep in thought; and as he worked, the farmer continued to ponder many things. The irritation caused by the keeper's threats had subsided; it only needed reflection to dismiss all fear of hard treatment from the Marquis. Did they not both come of a good stock; and did they not acknowledge it, one of the other? For the yeoman's ancestor was a Lumineau who had fought in the great war; and although now in these changed times he never mentioned past glories, neither the nobles nor the peasants were ignorant that his ancestor, a giant, surnamed Brin d'Amour, in the war of La Vendée, had taken the generals of the insurrection across the marshes in his own punt, had fought brilliantly, and had received a sword of honour, which now hung, eaten with rust, behind one of the farm presses. The family was one of the most widely connected in the country side. He claimed cousinship with thirty farmers, spread over that district which formed the Marais, extending from Saint Gilles to the Ile de Bouin. No one, himself included, could tell at what period his forefathers had begun to till the fields of La Fromentière. They had been there of right for generations, the Marquis in his Castle, the Lumineaus in their farm, united through long custom, each knowing the land and alike loving it; drinking the vintage of the soil together when they met; never dreaming that one or the other could ever forsake Château or farm bearing one and the same name.

And, in truth, eight years ago, great had been the astonishment when one Christmas morning, amid falling sleet, M. Henri, the present Marquis, a man of forty, a greater hunter, harder drinker, and more boorish mannered than any of his predecessors, had said to Toussaint Lumineau, "My Toussaint, I am going to live in Paris. My wife cannot accustom herself to this place; it is too dull and too cold for her. But do not worry; I shall come back." He had never come back, save on rare occasions for a day or two. But, of course, he had not forgotten the past. He still remained the same uncouth, kindly master known of old, and the keeper had lied when he talked of their being turned out.

No, the more Toussaint Lumineau thought of it the less did he believe that a master so rich, so liberal, so good at heart, could have written such words. Only the rent must be paid. Well, so it should. The farmer himself did not possess two hundred francs ready-money in the walnut wood chest beside his bed; but his children were rich, having inherited over two thousand francs apiece from their mother, La Luminette, dead now these three years past. So he would ask François, his second son, to lend him the sum due to the master. François was not a lad without heart, he would not let his old father be in difficulties. Once again anxiety for the morrow would be dispelled, good harvests would come, prosperous years which should make all hearts light again.

Weary of his stooping posture, the farmer straightened himself, passed his flannel shirt sleeve over his perspiring face, then turned his eyes to the roof of La Fromentière with the expression of one gazing on some well beloved object. To wipe his brow he had taken off his hat; now, in the oblique ray of sunshine which no longer reached the grass or the cabbages, in the soft declining light like that of a happy old age, he raised his firm, square-cut face. His complexion, unlike the cadaverous hue of peasants accustomed to scant living, was clear and healthy; the full cheeks with their narrow line of black whisker, straight nose, broad at the base, square jaw, in fact the whole face and clear grey eyes—eyes that always looked a man full in the face, betokened health, vigour, and the habit of command, while the long lips, refined-looking despite the weather-beaten skin, drooping at the corners, bespoke the ready fluency and somewhat haughty spirit of a son of the Marshes, who looks down upon everyone not belonging to that favoured spot. The perfectly white hair, dishevelled and fine, formed a fitting setting to the head, and shone with a silvery sheen.

Standing thus motionless with head uncovered in the waning light, the farmer of La Fromentière presented an imposing appearance, making it easy to understand the distinction of la Seigneurie commonly given him in the neighbourhood. He was called Lumineau l'Evêque, to single him out from others of the name, Lumineau le Pauvre; Lumineau Barbefine; Lumineau Tournevire.

He was looking at his beloved La Fromentière. Some hundred yards away to the south, among the stems of elms, the pale red tiles stood out like rough enamels. Borne on the evening wind there came the sound of the lowing of cattle going home to their sheds, the smell of the stables, the pungent aroma of camomile and fennel stored up in the barn. Nor was that all that presented itself to the farmer's mind as he gazed on his roof illuminated by the last rays of the declining sun; he called to his mental vision the two sons and two daughters living under that roof, Mathurin, François, Eléonore, and Marie-Rose, the heavy burdens, yet mixed with how much sweetness of his life. The eldest, his splendid eldest, doomed by a terrible misfortune to be a cripple, only to see others work, never to share it himself; Eléonore, who took the place of her dead mother; François, weak of nature, in whom could be seen but the incomplete, uncertain future master of the farm; Rousille, the youngest girl, just twenty.... Had the keeper lied again when speaking of the farm-servant's love-making? Not unlikely. How could a servant, the son of a poor widow in the Bocage, that heavy, unproductive land, how could he dare to pay court to the daughter of a farmer of the Marais? He might feel friendship and respect for the pretty girl, whose smiling face attracted many a remark on the way back from Mass on Sundays at Sallertaine; but anything more?... Well, one must watch.... It was but for a moment that Toussaint Lumineau pondered the man's insinuations; then with a sense of tenderness and comfort his thoughts flew to the absent one, the son next in age to Rousille, André, the Chasseur d'Afrique, now in Algiers as orderly to his Colonel, a brother of the Marquis de la Fromentière. But one month more and that youngest son would be home, his time of service expired. They would see him again, the fair, handsome young fellow, so tall, the living portrait of his father grown young again, full of noble vigour and love for Sallertaine and the farmstead. And all anxieties would be forgotten and merged in the joy of having the son home again, who used to make the