II.
LAVAL.
THE convent of the Ursulines had received and infolded the lambs sent out by Louis XIV. to help stock his wilderness. This convent, though substantially built of stone, was too small for all the purposes of the importation, and a larger structure, not far from it, had been prepared as a bazar in which to sort and arrange the ship-load.
The good nuns, while they waited on their crowd of miscellaneous guests, took no notice of that profane building; and only their superior, Mother Mary of the Incarnation, accompanied and marshaled future brides to the marriage market.
Squads began to cross the court soon after matins. The girls were rested by one night’s sleep upon land, the balsam odor of pines, and the clear air on Quebec heights. They must begin taking husbands at once. The spring sowing was near. Time and the chemistry of nature wait on no woman’s caprices. And in general there was little coyness among these girls. They had come to New France to settle themselves, and naturally wished to make a good bargain of it. Some faces wore the stamp of vice, but these were the exceptions. A stolid herd of peasantry, varying in shape and complexion but little, were there to mother posterity in Canada. Some delicate outlines and auburn tresses offset the monotony of somber black eyes and stout waists. Clucking all the way across the court her gentle instructions and repressions, Mother Mary led squad after squad.
There were hilarious girls, girls staring with large interest at the oddities of this new world while they remarked in provincial French, and girls folding their hands about their crucifixes and looking down. The coquettish had arrayed themselves coquettishly, and the sober had folded their shoulder-collars quite high about their throats.
“But,” dropped Mother Mary into the ear of Madame Bourdon, who stood at the mouth of the matrimonial pen, receiving and placing each squad, “these are mixed goods!” To which frolicsome remark from a strict devotee Madame Bourdon replied with assenting shrug.
The minds of both, however, quite separated the goods on display from one item of the cargo then standing in the convent parlor before the real bishop of Canada. This item was a slim young girl, very high-bred in appearance, richly plain in apparel. She held a long, dull-colored cloak around her with hands so soft and white of flesh that one’s eye traced over and over the flexible curve of wrist and finger. Her eyes were darkly brown, yet they had a tendency towards topaz lights which gave them moments of absolute yellowness; while her hair had a dazzling white quality that the powders of a later period could not impart. Bits of it straying from her high roll of curls suggested a nimbus around the forehead. Her lower face was full, the lips most delicately round. Courage and tears stood forth in her face and encountered the bishop.