CHAPTER X.THE SADNESS OF A HAPPY WOMAN.
At the moment when the general was getting into his caleche to go to the Prefecture, the countess and the two gentlemen reached the gate of the Avonne, where, for the last eighteen months, Michaud and his wife Olympe had made their home.
Whose remembered the pavilion in the state in which we lately described it would have supposed it had been rebuilt.

The bricks fallen or broken by time, and the cement lacking to their edges, were replaced; the slate roof had been cleaned, and the effect of the white balustrade against its bluish background restored the gay character of the architecture.
The approaches to the building, formerly choked up and sandy, were now cared for by the man whose duty it was to keep the park roadways in order.

The poultry-yard, stables, and cow-shed, relegated to the buildings near the pheasantry and hidden by clumps of trees, instead of afflicting the eye with their foul details, now blended those soft murmurs and cooings and the sound of flapping wings, which are among the most delightful accompaniments of Nature's eternal harmony, with the peculiar rustling sounds of the forest.

The whole scene possessed the double charm of a natural, untouched forest and the elegance of an English park.

The surroundings of the pavilion, in keeping with its own exterior, presented a certain noble, dignified, and cordial effect; while the hand of a young and happy woman gave to its interior a very different look from what it wore under the coarse neglect of Courtecuisse.
Just now the rich season of the year was putting forth its natural splendors.