Frances Hodgson Burnett

“ But here she stopped,—Laure checked her with a swift, impassioned movement.
"He is what we cannot understand," she said in a hushed, strained voice. "He is a saint. He has no thought for himself. His whole life is a sacrifice. It is not I you should adore—it is Valentin."
"Valentin!" echoed Mère Giraud. ”

“ Croix, as we shall call it for want of a better name,—a little village of one street, and of many vines, and roses, and orchards, and of much gossip. Simple people inhabited it,—simple, ignorant folk, who knew one another, and discussed one another's faults and grape-crops with equal frankness, worked hard, lived frugally, confessed regularly, and slept well. Devout people, and ignorant, who believed that the little shrines they erected in their vineyards brought blessings upon their grapes, and who knew nothing of the great world beyond, and spoke of Paris with awe, and even a shade of doubt. ”

“ No wonder that Mère Giraud fretted at the difference between the two. And Valentin was her first, and what mother does not look for great things in her first? We cannot help feeling that something must come of one's own charms if one has any, and Mère Giraud was a handsome bride. An ugly bantling seems to offer one a sort of insult, particularly at first, when one is young and vain."
"There was no more beautiful young girl than Laure Giraud at sixteen," said Jeanne Tallot. ”

“ She will not see the sun set again. She may not see it rise."
Mère Giraud fell upon her knees beside the bed, crossing herself and weeping.
"She will die," she said, "a blessed martyr. She will die the death of a saint."
That very night—only a few hours later—there came to them a friend,—one they had not for one moment even hoped to see,—a gentle, grave old man, in a thin, well-worn black robe,—the Curé of St. Croix.
Him Valentin met also, and when the two saw each other, there were barriers that fell away in their first interchange of looks. ”

“ There is a son who is past his youth, and who has evidently seen the world. He is aristocratic and fair, and slightly bald, but extremely handsome still. He sat holding a newspaper in his long, white fingers, and when we entered, he raised his eyes above it and looked at Laure, and I heard him exclaim under his breath, 'Mon Dieu! as if her beauty fairly startled him."
When the Curé, to whom the proud mother showed the letter, read this part, he did not seem as rejoiced as Mère Giraud had expected. ”

“ Her heart has grown to the old place she bore her children in, and she has herself said to me most sensibly: 'Laure is young, and will learn easily the ways of the great world; I am old, and cannot; I am better at home among my neighbors.' Doubtless, however, In course of time she will pay Madame Legrand a visit at her home in Paris, or at the château which Monsieur Legrand of course possesses, as the rich and aristocratic always do. ”

“ It is not Paris I care for, or the great sights; it is that I must see my child."
St. Croix was fairly bewildered at the news it heard the next day. Mère Giraud had gone to Paris to visit Madame Legrand—had actually gone, sending her little servant home, and shutting up her small, trim cottage.
"Let us hope that Madame Legrand will receive her as she expects to be received," said Annot. "For my part I should have preferred to remain in St. Croix. Only yesterday Jeanne Tallot told us that she had no intention of going."
"She will see wonderful things," said the more simple and amiable. ”

“ MÈRE GIRAUDS LITTLE DAUGHTER By Frances Hodgson Burnett Copyright, 1877
"Prut!" said Annot, her sabots clattering loudly on the brick floor as she moved more rapidly in her wrath. "Prut! Madame Giraud, indeed! There was a time, and it was but two years ago, that she was but plain Mere Giraud, and no better than the rest of us; and it seems to me, neighbors, that it is not well to show pride because one has the luck to be favored by fortune. Where, forsooth, would our 'Madame' Giraud stand if luck had not given her a daughter pretty enough to win a rich husband?" ”

“ They came very regularly for six or seven months, and then there was a gap of a few weeks, and then came a strange, almost incomprehensible, letter from Valentin, containing news which almost caused Mère Giraud's heart to burst with joy and gratitude. Laure was married, and had made such a marriage as could scarcely have been dreamed of. A rich aristocrat, who had visited her employers, had fallen in love with her, and married her. He had no family to restrain him, and her beauty had won him completely from the first hour. ”

“ He was always ready to serve her; always affectionate, always faithful; and Mère Giraud, who was blind to, or careless of, all his loving, constant labor for her own comfort, deigned to see that he did his duty toward Laure.
"He has at least the sense to appreciate her as far as he is able," she said.
So when Valentin, who had a talent for engraving, was discovered by some one who understood his genius, and could make use of it, and was offered a place in the great, gay city, Mère Giraud formed an ambitious plan. He should take Laure and find her a position also ”

“ She has too much work to do. She is not a tall, white, swaying creature who is too good to churn and tend the creatures who give her food. I have heard it said that Laure would have worked if her mother had permitted it, but I don't believe it. She had not a working look. Mademoiselle Laure was too good for the labor of humble people; she must go to Paris and learn a fine, delicate trade."
"But good came of it," put in Jeanne Tallot, "It proved all the better for her." ”

“ She must drive out in her equipage, and she must dress and receive great people, and I am not so blind a mother as not to see that she will have many things to learn. She has not time to write long letters,—and see how she cares for me,—money, see you, by every letter, and a silk dress and lace cap she herself has chosen in the Boulevard Capucines. ”

“ Living the same lives generation after generation, tilling the same crops, and praying before the same stone altar in the small, quaint church, it is not to be wondered at that when a change occurred to any one of their number, it was regarded as a sort of social era. ”

“ But then we know that the rich and aristocratic are always somewhat reserved. It is only the peasantry and provincials who are talkative and florid. It is natural that Laure should have gained the manner of the great world. ”

“ But the third, a comely, fresh-skinned matron, who leaned against the door, and knitted a stout gray stocking with fast-clashing needles, did not acquiesce so readily.
"Well, well, neighbors," she said, "for my part, I do not see so much to complain of. ”