With that she kissed and embraced him, and he really did seem a little more cheerful after all these tokens of motherly love.
Very soon, however, his face was as long as ever.
Dame Sarah's remedies were inexhaustible. The best thing for such moping, woebegone fellows, is certainly wedlock. An unmarried man is like a widower and a widower has cause to be miserable.
She choose for him a virtuous, discreet damsel, the sister of the above-mentioned young Fürmender, Catherine by name, who was by no means indisposed toward the stately Valentine Kalondai. Beautiful, indeed, you could scarcely call her; but her mother had not been a whit prettier, and yet she had managed to do very well.
Then she took her son Valentine to the social gatherings, where the young lads and lasses, beneath the eyes of their parents, made merry with one another in all meekness and sobriety.
But Valentine led neither blonde nor brunette out to dance. There he stood leaning against the wall as if he had been put there for the express purpose of propping it up, and kept as still as if he was afraid of missing a single word of the conversation that was going on around him.
And when the bolster dance followed, during which it is the amiable custom for the lads and lasses to alternately carry round a silken bolster, deposit it in front of the person whom he or she likes best, kneel down upon it, and so remain till the favored one tenderly raises the suppliant and dances with her, whereupon it is his turn to carry the bolster round—then, I say, Valentine behaved very badly. For when Kitty Fürmender brought the bolster to him, and sank down on her knees before him, Valentine would not dance with her, and did not even raise her up, but rudely told her that he had made a vow never to dance again. Then Kitty naturally burst out crying, for how could an honest girl be insulted more grossly?
When they got home Dame Sarah said to her son:
"I say, Valentine, young Fürmender says you are possessed by evil spirits."
"I don't much care if I am."