" He was commissioned at Fontainebleau, and proceededto superintend the building of ships at St. Malo.Marguerite Roberval, his fair-haired and black-eyed niece, was to go withhim on the voyage, with other ladies of high birth, and also with thewidowed Madame de Noailles, her _gouvernante_. Roberval himselfremained at St. Malo to superintend the building of the ships, andMarguerite and her _gouvernante_ would sit for hours in a beautifulnook by the shipyards, where they could overlook the vessels in rapidconstruction, or else watch the wondrous swirl of the tide as it swept inand out, leaving the harbor bare at low tide, but with eight fathoms ofwater when the tide was full. The designer of the ships often came, cap inhand, to ask or answer questions--one of those frank and manly Frenchfishermen and pilots, whom the French novelists describe as "_un solidegaillard_," or such as Victor Hugo paints in his "Les Travailleurs dela Mer." The son of a notary, Etienne Gosselin was better educated thanmost of the young noblemen whom Marguerite knew, and only his passion forthe sea and for nautical construction had kept him a shipbuilder. Nowonder that the young Marguerite, who had led the sheltered life of theFrench maiden, was attracted by his manly look, his open face, his merryblue eyes, and curly hair.
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