Kneeling by the cradle, the Virgin Mary bent over the Babe her maternal brow, the white veil of the Queen of Angels falling over her feet and hiding half of her azure coloured silk robe.
The paschal lamb, his four feet bound with a rose coloured ribbon, was laid at the foot of the cradle; behind it the kneeling ox thrust his large head, and his eyes of enamel seemed to contemplate the divine Infant.
The ass, on a more distant plane, and half hidden by the posts of the arcade, behind which it stood, also showed his meek and gentle head.
The dog seemed to cringe near the cradle, while the shepherds, clothed in coarse cassocks, and the magi kings, dressed in rich robes of brocatelle, were offering their adoration.
A fourth row of little candles, made of rose-scented wax, burned around the cradle.
An immense amount of work, and really great resources of imagination, had been necessary to perfect such an exquisite picture. For instance, the ass, which was about six thumbs in height, was covered in mouse-skin which imitated his own to perfection. The black and white ox owed his hair to an India pig of the same colour, and his short and polished black horns to the rounded nippers of an enormous beetle.
The robes of the magi kings revealed a fairy-like skill and patience, and their long white hair was really veritable hair, which Dame Dulceline had cut from her own venerable head.
As to the figures of the cherubs, the infant Jesus, and other actors in this holy scene, they had been purchased in Marseilles from one of those master wax-chandlers, who always kept assorted materials necessary in the construction of these cradles.
Doubtless it was not high art, but there was, in this little monument of a laborious and innocent piety, something as simple and as pathetic as the divine scene which they tried to reproduce with such religious conscientiousness.
The good old priest and Dame Dulceline, after having lit the last candles which surrounded the cradle, stood a moment, lost in admiration of their work.