godmother wished the nuptials to be solemnized at Montreux, in the pretty
little church in that town. The miller was very anxious that this arrangement
should be agreed to. He alone knew what the newly-married couple would
receive from Babette’s godmother, and he knew also that it was a wedding
present well worth a concession. The day was fixed, and they were to travel
as far as Villeneuve the evening before, to be in time for the steamer which
sailed in the morning for Montreux, and the godmother’s daughters were to
dress and adorn the bride.
“Here in this house there ought to be a wedding-day kept,” said the
parlor-cat, “or else I would not give a mew for the whole affair.”
“There is going to be great feasting,” replied the kitchen-cat. “Ducks and
pigeons have been killed, and a whole roebuck hangs on the wall. It makes
me lick my lips when I think of it.”
“To-morrow morning they will begin the journey.”
Yes, to-morrow! And this evening, for the last time, Rudy and Babette sat
in the miller’s house as an engaged couple. Outside, the Alps glowed in the
evening sunset, the evening bells chimed, and the children of the sunbeam
sang, “Whatever happens is best.”
XIV. Night Visions
The sun had gone down, and the clouds lay low on the valley of the
Rhone. The wind blew from the south across the mountains; it was an
African wind, a wind which scattered the clouds for a moment, and then
suddenly fell. The broken clouds hung in fantastic forms upon the wood-
covered hills by the rapid Rhone. They assumed the shapes of antediluvian
animals, of eagles hovering in the air, of frogs leaping over a marsh, and
then sunk down upon the rushing stream and appeared to sail upon it,
although floating in the air. An uprooted fir-tree was being carried away by
the current, and marking out its path by eddying circles on the water.
Vertigo and his sisters were dancing upon it, and raising these circles on the
foaming river. The moon lighted up the snow on the mountain-tops, shone
on the dark woods, and on the drifting clouds those fantastic forms which at
