Guerande, May 15th.

Up to the present moment, dear mamma, I find marriage a delightful affair, I can spend all my tenderness on the noblest of men whom a foolish woman disdained for a fiddler,—­for that woman evidently was a fool, and a cold fool, the worst kind!  I, in my legitimate love, am charitable; I am curing his wounds while I lay my heart open to incurable ones.  Yes, the more I love Calyste, the more I feel that I should die of grief if our present happiness ever ceased.

I must tell you how the whole family and the circle which meets at the hotel de Guenic adore me.  They are all personages born under tapestries of the highest warp; in fact, they seem to have stepped from those old tapestries as if to prove that the impossible may exist.  Some day, when we are alone together, I will describe to you my Aunt Zephirine, Mademoiselle de Pen-Hoel, the Chevalier du Halga, the Demoiselles de Kergarouet, and others.  They all, even to the two servants, Gasselin and Mariotte (whom I wish they would let me take to Paris), regard me as an angel sent from heaven; they tremble when I speak.  Dear people! they ought to be preserved under glass.

  My mother-in-law has solemnly installed us in the apartments
  formerly occupied by herself and her late husband.  The scene was
  touching.  She said to us,—­

  “I spent my whole married life, a happy woman, in these rooms; may
  the omen be a happy one for you, my children.”

She has taken Calyste’s former room for hers.  Saintly soul! she seems intent on laying off her memories and all her conjugal dignities to invest us with them.  The province of Brittany, this town, this family of ancient morals and ancient customs has, in spite of certain absurdities which strike the eye of a frivolous Parisian girl, something inexplicable, something grandiose even in its trifles, which can only be defined by the word sacred.

All the tenants of the vast domains of the house of Guenic, bought back, as you know, by Mademoiselle des Touches (whom we are going to visit in her convent), have been in a body to pay their respects to us.  These worthy people, in their holiday costumes, expressing their genuine joy in the fact that Calyste has now become really and truly their master, made me understand Brittany, the feudal system and old France.  The whole scene was a festival I can’t describe to you in writing, but I will tell you about it when we meet.  The terms of the leases have been proposed by the gars themselves.  We shall sign them, after making a tour of inspection round the estates, which have been mortgaged away from us for one hundred and fifty years!  Mademoiselle de Pen-Hoel told me that the gars have reckoned up the revenues and estimated the rentals with a veracity and justice Parisians would never believe.

We start in three days on horseback for this trip.  I will write you on my return, dear mother.  I shall have nothing more to tell you about myself, for my happiness is at its height—­and how can that be told?  I shall write you only what you know already, and that is, how I love you.

Nantes, June, 1838.