It was found at the last moment that Pete had forgotten to provide himself with a white shirt. He had nothing to be married in except the flannel one in which he came home from Africa. This would never do. It wasn't proper, it wasn't respectable. There was no choice but to borrow a shirt of Cæsar's. Cæsar's shirt was of ancient pattern, and Pete was shy of taking it. “Take it, or you'll have none,” said Nancy, and she pushed him back into his room. When he emerged from it he walked with a stiff neck down the stairs in a collar that reached to his ears at either side, and stood out at his cheeks like the wings of a white bat, with two long sharp points on the level of his eyes, which he seemed to be watching warily to avoid the stab of their ironed starch. At the same moment Cæsar appeared in duck trousers, a flowered waistcoat, a swallow-tail coat, and a tall hat of rough black beaver.
The kitchen was full of men and women by this time, and groups of young fellows were gathered on the road outside, some with horses, saddled and bridled for the bride's race home after the ceremony; others with guns ready loaded for firing as the procession appeared; and others again with lines of print handkerchiefs, which, as substitutes for flags, they were hanging from tree to tree.
At every moment the crowd became greater outside, and the company inside more dense. John the Clerk called on his way to church, and whispered Pete that everything was ready, and they were going to sing a beautiful psalm.
“It isn't many a man's wedding I would be taking the same trouble with,” said John. “When you are coming down the alley give a sight up, sir, and you'll see me.”
“He's only a poor thing,” said Mr. Jelly in Pete's ear as John the Clerk went off. “No more music in the man than my ould sow. Did you hear the horn this morning, sir? Never got up so early for a wedding before. I'll be giving you 'the Black and the Grey' going into the church.”
Grannie came down in a gigantic bonnet like a half-moon, with her white cap visible beneath it; and Nancy Joe appeared behind her, be-ribboned out of all recognition, and taller by many inches for the turret of feathers and flowers on the head that was usually bare.
Then the church bells began to peal, and Cæsar made a prolonged A—hm! and said in a large way, “Has the carriage arrived?”
“It's coming over by the bridge now,” said somebody at the door, and at the next moment a covered wagonette drew up at the porch.
“All ready?” asked Cæsar.
“Stop, sir,” said Pete, and then, turning to Nancy Joe, “Is it glad a man should be on his wedding-day, Nancy?”