seeing nothing in the service they were rendering to Luigi but a
simple matter of business, they were dressed in their ordinary

clothes, without any luxury, and nothing about them denoted the usual
joy of a marriage procession.

Ginevra herself was dressed simply, as befitted her present fortunes;
and yet her beauty was so noble and so imposing that the words of

greeting died away on the lips of the witnesses, who supposed
themselves obliged to pay her some usual compliments. They bowed to

her with respect, and she returned the bow; but they did so in
silence, looking at her with admiration. This reserve cast a chill

over the whole party. Joy never bursts forth freely except among those
who are equals. Thus chance determined that all should be dull and

grave around the bridal pair; nothing reflected, outwardly, the
happiness that reigned within their hearts.

The church and the mayor's office being near by, Luigi and Ginevra,
followed by the four witnesses required by law, walked the distance,

with a simplicity that deprived of all pomp this greatest event in
social life. They saw a crowd of waiting carriages in the mayor's

court-yard; and when they reached the great hall where the civil
marriages take place, they found two other wedding-parties impatiently

awaiting the mayor's arrival.
Ginevra sat down beside Luigi at the end of a long bench; their

witnesses remained standing, for want of seats. Two brides,
elaborately dressed in white, with ribbons, laces, and pearls, and

crowned with orange-blossoms whose satiny petals nodded beneath their
veils, were surrounded by joyous families, and accompanied by their

mothers, to whom they looked up, now and then, with eyes that were
content and timid both; the faces of all the rest reflected happiness,

and seemed to be invoking blessings on the youthful pairs. Fathers,
witnesses, brothers, and sisters went and came, like a happy swarm of

insects disporting in the sun. Each seemed to be impressed with the
value of this passing moment of life, when the heart finds itself

within two hopes,--the wishes of the past, the promises of the future.
As she watched them, Ginevra's heart swelled within her; she pressed

Luigi's arm, and gave him a look. A tear rolled from the eyes of the
young Corsican; never did he so well understand the joys that his

Ginevra was sacrificing to him. That precious tear caused her to
forget all else but him,--even the abandonment in which she sat there.

Love poured down its treasures of light upon their hearts; they saw
nought else but themselves in the midst of the joyoustumult; they

were there alone, in that crowd, as they were destined to be,
henceforth, in life. Their witnesses, indifferent to what was

happening, conversed quietly on their own affairs.
"Oats are very dear," said the sergeant to the mason.

"But they have not gone up like lime, relatively speaking," replied
the contractor.

Then they walked round the hall.
"How one loses time here," said the mason, replacing a thick silver

watch in his fob.
Luigi and Ginevra, sitting pressed to one another, seemed like one

person. A poet would have admired their two heads, inspired by the
same sentiment, colored in the same tones, silent and saddened in

presence of that humming happiness sparkling in diamonds, gay with
flowers,--a gayety in which there was something fleeting. The joy of

those noisy and splendid groups was visible; that of Ginevra and Luigi
was buried in their bosom. On one side the tumult of common pleasure,

on the other, the delicate silence of happy souls,--earth and heaven!
But Ginevra was not wholly free from the weaknesses of women.

Superstitious as an Italian, she saw an omen in this contrast, and in
her heart there lay a sense of terror, as invincible as her love.

Suddenly the office servant, in the town livery, opened a folding-
door. Silence reigned, and his voice was heard, like the yapping of a

dog, calling Monsieur Luigi da Porta and Mademoiselle Ginevra di
Piombo. This caused some embarrassment to the young pair. The

celebrity of the bride's name attracted attention, and the spectators
seemed to wonder that the wedding was not more sumptuous. Ginevra

rose, took Luigi's arm, and advancedfirmly, followed by the
witnesses. A murmur of surprise, which went on increasing, and a

general whispering reminded Ginevra that all present were wondering at
the absence of her parents; her father's wrath seemed present to her.

"Call in the families," said the mayor to the clerk whose business it
was to read aloud the certificates.

"The father and mother protest," replied the clerk, phlegmatically.
"On both sides?" inquired the mayor.

"The groom is an orphan."
"Where are the witnesses?"

"Here," said the clerk, pointing to the four men, who stood with arms
folded, like so many statues.

"But if the parents protest--" began the mayor.
"The respectful summons has been duly served," replied the clerk,

rising, to lay before the mayor the papers annexed to the marriage
certificate.

This bureaucratic decision had something blighting about it; in a few
words it contained the whole story. The hatred of the Portas and the

Piombos and their terrible passions were inscribed on this page of the
civil law as the annals of a people (contained, it may be, in one word

only,--Napoleon, Robespierre) are engraved on a tombstone. Ginevra
trembled. Like the dove on the face of the waters, having no place to

rest its feet but the ark, so Ginevra could take refuge only in the
eyes of Luigi from the cold and dreary waste around her.

The mayor assumed a stern, disapproving air, and his clerk looked up
at the couple with maliciouscuriosity. No marriage was ever so little

festal. Like other human beings when deprived of their accessories, it
became a simple act in itself, great only in thought.

After a few questions, to which the bride and bridegroom responded,
and a few words mumbled by the mayor, and after signing the registers,

with their witnesses, duly, Luigi and Ginevra were made one. Then the
wedded pair walked back through two lines of joyous relations who did

not belong to them, and whose only interest in their marriage was the
delay caused to their own wedding by this gloomybridal. When, at

last, Ginevra found herself in the mayor's court-yard, under the open
sky, a sigh escaped her breast.

"Can a lifetime of devotion and love suffice to prove my gratitude for
your courage and tenderness, my Ginevra?" said Luigi.

At these words, said with tears of joy, the bride forgot her
sufferings; for she had indeed suffered in presenting herself before

the public to obtain a happiness her parents refused to sanction.
"Why should others come between us?" she said with an artlessness of

feeling that delighted Luigi.
A sense of accomplished happiness now made the step of the young pair

lighter; they saw neither heaven, nor earth, nor houses; they flew, as
it were, on wings to the church. When they reached a dark little

chapel in one corner of the building, and stood before a plain
undecorated altar, an old priest married them. There, as in the

mayor's office, two other marriages were taking place, still pursuing
them with pomp. The church, filled with friends and relations, echoed

with the roll of carriages, and the hum of beadles, sextons, and
priests. Altars were resplendent with sacramental luxury; the wreaths

of orange-flowers that crowned the figures of the Virgin were fresh.
Flowers, incense, gleaming tapers, velvet cushions embroidered with

gold, were everywhere. When the time came to hold above the heads of
Luigi and Ginevra the symbol of eternal union,--that yoke of satin,

white, soft, brilliant, light for some, lead for most,--the priest
looked about him in vain for the acolytes whose place it was to

perform that joyousfunction. Two of the witnesses fulfilled it for
them. The priest addressed a hasty homily to the pair on the perils of

life, on the duties they must, some day, inculcate upon their
children,--throwing in, at this point, an indirectreproach to Ginevra

on the absence of her parents; then, after uniting them before God, as
the mayor had united them before the law, he left the now married

couple.