"We will give them a good send-off," said my guardian, as, some days later, we discussed the matter of Eloise's wedding. "Let them be married at Etiolles; have the village en fÊte. I will settle for it all."

The proposition seemed good; nowhere could one find a more suitable spot for such a wedding than the little church of Etiolles; yet it met with opposition.

Franzius was not a man to forget his friends. He had many in the Latin Quarter, and he was a peasant born, with a peasant's instincts. Birth, marriage, and death, those three supreme events in the life of man, are more insistent in their ceremonial amidst the poor than the rich. To Franzius it would have been a strange thing to marry without inviting to the ceremony the people who were his friends; and the journey to Etiolles would be too far for some of these.

Then, it was impossible for the marriage to be solemnised in a church, for the simple reason that he was a Lutheran and Eloise had been born a Catholic. So it was arranged to take place on the 1st of October at the Mairie of the quarter which includes the Rue Dijon.

It was to be quite a simple affair, a wedding such as takes place every day amongst the bourgeoisie, with the additional lustre that the presence of the Vicomte Armand de Chatellan would lend to the proceedings.

It was a lovely day. It had rained during the night, but the morning broke nearly cloudless, and there was that feeling of spring in the air, that freshness which comes sometimes in autumn like the reminiscence of May.

Franzius had slept the night at the Place VendÔme; and I must say, dressed in a brand-new suit of clothes and with a flower in his buttonhole, he never looked worse in his life. Dressed in his old clothes, with his violin under his arm, he was picturesque, but now he looked like a tailor out for a holiday, and I told him so, to keep up his spirits, as we breakfasted hurriedly and without appetite, but with a good deal of gaiety.

Eloise was to come from Saluce in one of the Vicomte's carriages, and he was to accompany her to the Mairie, where we were to wait for them. Noon was the hour of the ceremony; and when we arrived at the Mairie the place was crowded: four other couples, it seemed, were to be united that day, and we were third on the list.

The people whom Franzius had invited were there already: not many, scarcely a dozen, and mostly men, musicians with long hair and German accents; his landlady of the Rue Dijon and her daughter, a cripple dressed for the occasion in a newly starched white frock and blue sash; and a young lady of the sempstress type, pale-faced and modest, and seeming dazed with the grandeur of the officials in their chains and all the paraphernalia of the law.

For a moment a pang went to my heart to think that a daughter of the Felicianis was to be married here amidst these folks like one of them. But it soon passed. The Archbishop of Paris, the choir of Notre Dame, the congregated aristocracy of France, could not have added one whit to the beauty of the marriage or to its sanctity.

I had dreaded that in the fulness of his heart and his simplicity Franzius might have invited undesirable guests. The vision of Changarnier appearing like an evil beast had horrified me. But my fears were set at rest. Leave the simple-hearted alone, and they rarely make mistakes. Franzius' guests, humble though they might be, were of the aristocracy of the poor, good, kind-hearted, and honest people.

At ten minutes to noon the Vicomte arrived, with Eloise on his arm. How charming she looked, in that simple, old-fashioned wedding-gown which she had made for herself! And how charming the Vicomte was, insisting on being introduced to everyone, chatting, laughing, immeasurably above everyone else, yet suffusing the wedding-party with his own grace and greatness so that everyone felt elevated instead of dwarfed!

And I never have been able to determine in my mind whether it was natural goodness, or just gentility polished to its keenest edge, that made this old libertine so lovable.

After the ceremony carriages conveyed the wedding-party to the CafÉ Royale in the Boulevard St. Michel.

The Vicomte had, through Beril, made all arrangements; and in a room flower-decked, and filled with the sunlight and sounds of the boulevard, we sat down to dÉjeÛner.

Scarcely had we begun than the waiters announced two gentlemen, at the same time handing the Vicomte de Chatellan two cards. "Show them up," said my guardian, "and lay two more covers."

It was the great Carvalho, who, hearing indirectly from my guardian of the marriage, had come, bringing with him the director of the Opera.

You may be sure we made room for them. And what a good omen it seemed—better than a flight of white doves—these two well-fed, prosperous, commonplace individuals, who held the music of France in their hands, and the laurel-wreaths!

They did not stay long, just long enough to pay their compliments and drink success to the bride and bridegroom.

Just before departing, Carvalho whispered to me: "His opera is accepted. He will hear officially to-morrow. It will be produced in April, or, at latest, May."