L*.

UBRARt

OF CALIFORNIA

THE WORKS OF ANATOLE FRANCE IN AN ENGLISH TRANSLATION EDITED BY FREDERIC CHAPMAN

MOTHER OF PEARL

MOTHER OF PEARL BY ANATOLE FRANCE

A TRANSLATION BY FREDERIC CHAPMAN

LONDON : JOHN LANE, THE BODLEY HEAD NEW YORK : JOHN LANE COMPANY : MCMXVII

Second Edition

WILLIAM BRENDON AND SON, LTD., PRINTERS, PLVMOBTU, ENGLAND

CONTENTS

PACK

THE PROCURATOR OF JUDAEA ... 3 AMYCUS AND CELESTINE .... 29 THE LEGEND OF SAINTS OLIVERIA AND

LlBERETTA ...... 39

ST. EUPHROSINE ..... 55

SCHOLASTICA ...... 75

OUR LADY'S JUGGLER .... 83

THE MASS OF SHADOWS . . • 97

LESLIE WOOD . . . . . .109

GESTAS . . . . . . .129

THE MANUSCRIPT OF A VILLAGE DOCTOR . 143 MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER . . .161

DAWN ....... 225

MADAME DE LUZY ..... 243

THE BOON OF DEATH BESTOWED . . 257

A TALE OF THE MONTH OF FLOR!AL IN THE

YEAR II 265

THE LITTLE LEADEN SOLDIER . . . 277

THE PROCURATOR OF JUDAEA

MOTHER OF PEARL

THE PROCURATOR OF JUDAEA

.jELIUS LAMIA, born in Italy of illustrious parents, had not yet discarded the toga pr<gtcxta when he set out for the schools of Athens to study philosophy. Subsequently he took up his residence at Rome, and in his house on the Esquiline, amid a circle of youthful wastrels, abandoned himself to licentious courses. But being accused of engaging in criminal relations with Lepida, the wife of Sulpicius Quirinus, a man of consular rank, and being found guilty, he was exiled by Tiberius Caesar. At that time he was just entering his twenty-fourth year. During the eighteen years that his exile lasted he traversed Syria, Palestine, Cappadocia, and Armenia, and made prolonged visits to Antioch, Caesarea, and Jerusalem. When, after the death of Tiberius, Caius was raised to the purple, Lamia obtained permission to return to Rome. He even regained

3

4 MOTHER OF PEARL

a portion of his possessions. Adversity had taught him wisdom.

He avoided all intercourse with the wives and daughters of Roman citizens, made no efforts towards obtaining office, held aloof from public honours, and lived a secluded life in his house on the Esquiline. Occupying himself with the task of recording all the remarkable things he had seen during his distant travels, he turned, as he said, the vicissitudes of his years of expiation into a diversion for his hours of rest. In the midst of these calm employments, alternating with assiduous study of the works of Epicurus, he recognized with a mixture of surprise and vexation that age was stealing upon him. In his sixty-second year, being afflicted with an illness which proved in no slight degree troublesome, he decided to have recourse to the waters at Baiae. The coast at that point, once frequented by the halcyon, was at this date the resort of the wealthy Roman, greedy of pleasure. For a week Lamia lived alone, without a friend in the brilliant crowd. Then one day, after dinner, an inclination to which he yielded urged him to ascend the incline, which, covered with vines that resembled bacchantes, looked out upon the waves.

Having reached the summit he seated himself by the side of a path beneath a terebinth, and let

THE PROCURATOR OF JUDAEA 5

his glances wander over the lovely landscape. To his left, livid and bare, the Phlegraean plain stretched out towards the ruins of Cumae. On his right, Cape Misenum plunged its abrupt spur beneath the Tyrrhenian sea. Beneath his feet luxurious Baias, following the graceful outline of the coast, displayed its gardens, its villas thronged with statues, its porticos, its marble terraces along the shores of the blue ocean where the dolphins sported. Before him, on the other side of the bay, on the Campanian coast, gilded by the already sinking sun, gleamed the temples which far away rose above the laurels of Posilippo, whilst on the extreme horizon Vesuvius looked forth smiling.

Lamia drew from a fold of his toga a scroll con- taining the Treatise upon Nature, extended himself upon the ground, and began to read. But the warning cries of a slave necessitated his rising to allow of the passage of a litter which was being carried along the narrow pathway through the vine- yards. The litter being uncurtained, permitted Lamia to see stretched upon the cushions as it was borne nearer to him the figure of an elderly man of immense bulk, who, supporting his head on his hand, gazed out with a gloomy and disdainful expression. His nose, which was aquiline, and his chin, which was prominent, seemed desirous of meeting across his lips, and his jaws were powerful.

6 MOTHER OF PEARL

From the first moment Lamia was convinced that the face was familiar to him. He hesitated a moment before the name came to him. Then suddenly hastening towards the litter with a display of surprise and delight —

" Pontius Pilate ! " he cried. " The gods be praised who have permitted me to see you once again ! "

The old man gave a signal to the slaves to stop, and cast a keen glance upon the stranger who had addressed him.

" Pontius, my dear host," resumed the latter, " have twenty years so far whitened my hair and hollowed my cheeks that you no longer recognize your friend ^Elius Lamia ? "

At this name Pontius Pilate dismounted from the litter as actively as the weight of his years and the heaviness of his gait permitted him, and em- braced ./Elius Lamia again and again.

" Gods ! what a treat it is to me to see you once more ! But, alas, you call up memories of those long- vanished days when I was Procurator of Judaea in the province of Syria. Why, it must be thirty years ago that I first met you. It was at Caesarea, whither you came to drag out your weary term of exile. I was fortunate enough to alleviate it a little, and out of friendship, Lamia, you followed me to that depressing place Jerusalem, where the Jews filled me with bitterness and dis-

THE PROCURATOR OF JUD^A 7

gust. You remained for more than ten years my guest and my companion, and in converse about Rome and things Roman we both of us managed to find consolation — you for your misfortunes, and I for my burdens of State."

Lamia embraced him afresh.

" You forget two things, Pontius ; you are over- looking the facts that you used your influence on my behalf with Herod Antipas, and that your purse was freely open to me."

" Let us not talk of that," replied Pontius, " since after your return to Rome you sent me by one of your freedmen a sum of money which repaid me with usury."

" Pontius, I could never consider myself out of your debt by the mere payment of money. But tell me, have the gods fulfilled your desires ? 4 Are you in the enjoyment of all the happiness you deserve ? Tell me about your family, your for- tunes, your health."

"I have withdrawn to Sicily, where I possess estates, and where I cultivate wheat for the market. My eldest daughter, my best-beloved Pontia, who has been left a widow, lives with me, and directs my household. The gods be praised, I have pre- served my mental vigour ; my memory is not in the least degree enfeebled. But old age always brings in its train a long procession of griefs and

8 MOTHER OR PEARL

infirmities. I am cruelly tormented with gout. And at this very moment you find me on my way to the Phlegrasan plain in search of a remedy for my sufferings. From that burning soil, whence at night flames burst forth, proceed aqrid exhalations of sulphur, which, so they say, ease the pains and restore suppleness to the stiffened joints. At least, the physicians assure me that it is so."

" May you find it so in your case, Pontius ! But, despite the gout and its burning torments, you scarcely look as old as myself, although in reality you must be my senior by ten years. Un- mistakably you have retained a greater degree of vigour than I ever possessed, and I am overjoyed to find you looking so hale. Why, dear friend, did you retire from the public service before the customary age ? Why, on resigning your governor- ship in Judaea, did you withdraw to a voluntary exile on your Sicilian estates ? Give me an 'account of your doings from the moment that I ceased to be a witness of them. You were preparing to suppress a Samaritan rising when I set out for Cappadocia, where I hoped to draw some profit from the breeding of horses and mules. I have not seen you since then. How did that expedition succeed ? Pray tell me. Everything interests me that concerns you in any way."

Pontius Pilate sadly shook his head.

THE PROCURATOR OF JUD^A 9

" My natural disposition," he said, " as well as a sense of duty, impelled me to fulfil my public responsibilities, not merely with diligence, but even with ardour. But I was pursued by unrelenting hatred. Intrigues and calumnies cut short my career in its prime, and the fruit it should have looked to bear has withered away. You ask me about the Samaritan insurrection. Let us sit down on this hillock. I shall be able to give you an answer in few words. Those occur- rences are as vividly present to me as if they had happened yesterday.

" A man of the people, of persuasive speech — there are many such to be met with in Syria — induced the Samaritans to gather together in arms on Mount Gerizim (which in that country is looked upon as a holy place) under the promise that he would disclose to their sight the sacred vessels which in the ancient days of Evander and our father, jEneas, had been hidden away by an eponymous hero, or rather a tribal deity, named Moses. Upon this assurance the Samaritans rose in rebellion ; but having been warned in time to forestall them, I dispatched detachments of infantry to occupy the mountain, and stationed cavalry to keep the approaches to it under observation.

"These measures of prudence were urgent. The rebels were already laying siege to the town

10

of Tyrathaba, situated at the foot of Mount Gerizim. I easily dispersed them, and stifled the as yet scarcely organized revolt. Then, in order to give a forcible example with as few victims as possible, I handed over to execution the leaders of the rebellion. But you are aware, Lamia, in what strait dependence I was kept by the proconsul Vitellius, who governed Syria not in, but against the interests of Rome, and looked upon the provinces of the empire as territories which could be farmed out to tetrarchs. The head-men among the Samaritans, in their resentment against me, came and fell at his feet lamenting. To listen to them, nothing had been further from their thoughts than to disobey Csesar. It was I who had provoked the rising, and it was purely in order to withstand my violence that they had gathered together round Tyrathaba. Vitellius listened to their complaints, and handing over the affairs of Judaea to his friend Marcellus, com- manded me to go and justify my proceedings before the Emperor himself. With a heart over- flowing with grief and resentment I took ship. Just as I approached the shores of Italy, Tiberius, worn out with age and the cares of empire, died suddenly on the selfsame Cape Misenum, whose peak we see from this very spot magnified in the mists of evening. I demanded justice of Caius, his

THE PROCURATOR OF JUDAEA n

successor, whose perception was naturally acute, and who was acquainted with Syrian affairs. But marvel with me, Lamia, at the maliciousness of fortune, resolved on my discomfiture. Cams then had in his suite at Rome the Jew Agrippa, his companion, the friend of his childhood, whom he cherished as his own eyes. Now Agrippa favoured Vitellius, inasmuch as Vitellius was the enemy of Antipas, whom Agrippa pursued with his hatred. The Emperor adopted the prejudices of his beloved Asiatic, and refused even to listen to me. There was nothing for me to do but bow beneath the stroke of unmerited misfortune. With tears for my meat and gall for my portion, I withdrew to my estates in Sicily, where I should have died of grief if my sweet Pontia had not come to console her father. I have cultivated wheat, and succeeded in producing the fullest ears in the whole province. But now my life is ended ; the future will judge between Vitellius and me."

" Pontius," replied Lamia, " I am persuaded that you acted towards the Samaritans according to the rectitude of your character, and solely in the interests of Rome. But were you not perchance on that occasion a trifle too much influenced by that impetuous courage which has always swayed you ? You will remember that in Judaea it often

12 MOTHER OF PEARL

happened that I who, younger than you, should naturally have been more impetuous than you, was obliged to urge you to clemency and suavity."

"Suavity towards the Jews ! " cried Pontius Pilate. " Although you have lived amongst them, it seems clear that you ill understand those enemies of the human race. Haughty and at the same time base, combining an invincible obstinacy with a despicably mean spirit, they weary alike your love and your hatred. My character, Lamia, was formed upon the maxims of the divine Augustus. When I was appointed Procurator of Judaea, the world was already penetrated with the majestic ideal of the pax romana. No longer, as in the days of our internecine strife, were we witnesses to the sack of a province for the aggrandisement of a proconsul. I knew where my duty lay. I was careful that my actions should be governed by prudence and modera- tion. The gods are my witnesses that I was re- solved upon mildness, and upon mildness only. Yet what did my benevolent intentions avail me ? You were at my side, Lamia, when, at the outset of my career as ruler, the first rebellion came to a head. Is there any need for me to recall the details to you ? The garrison had been transferred from Caesarea to take up its winter quarters at Jerusalem. Upon the ensigns of the legionaries ap- peared the presentment of Caesar. The inhabitants

THE PROCURATOR OF JUD^A 13

of Jerusalem, who did not recognize the indwelling divinity of the Emperor, were scandalized at this, as though, when obedience is compulsory, it were not less abject to obey a god than a man. The priests of their nation appeared before my tribunal imploring me with supercilious humility to have the ensigns removed from within the holy city. Out of reverence for the divine nature of Caesar and the majesty of the empire, 1 refused to comply. Then the rabble made common cause with the priests, and all around the pretonum portentous cries of supplication arose. 1 ordered the soldiers to stack their spears in front of the tower of Antonia, and to proceed, armed only with sticks like lictors, to disperse the insolent crowd. But, heedless of blows, the Jews continued their entreaties, and the more obstinate amongst them threw themselves on the ground and, exposing their throats to the rods, deliberately courted death. You were a witness of my humiliation on that occasion, Lamia. By the order of Vitellius I was forced to send the insignia back to Caesarea. That disgrace I had certainly not merited. Before the immortal gods I swear that never once during my term of office did I flout justice and the laws. But I am grown old. My enemies and detractors are dead. I shall die unavenged. Who will now retrieve my character ? "

i4 MOTHER OF PEARL

He moaned and lapsed into silence. Lamia replied —

" That man is prudent who neither hopes nor fears anything from the uncertain events of the future. Does it matter in the least what estimate men may form of us hereafter ? We ourselves are after all our own witnesses, and our own judges. You must rely, Pontius Pilate, on the testimony you yourself bear to your own rectitude. Be content with your own personal respect and that of your friends. For the rest, we know that mild- ness by itself will not suffice for the work of government. There is but little room in the actions of public men for that indulgence of human frailty which the philosophers recommend."

" We'll say no more at present," said Pontius. "The sulphureous fumes which rise from the Phlegraean plain are more powerful when the ground which exhales them is still warm beneath the sun's rays. I must hasten on. Adieu ! But now that I have rediscovered a friend, I should wish to take advantage of my good fortune. Do me the favour, ./Elius Lamia, to give me your company at supper at my house to-morrow. My house stands on the seashore, at the extreme end of the town in the direction of Misenum. You will easily recognize it by the porch which bears a painting representing Orpheus surrounded by

THE PROCURATOR OF JUD^A 15

tigers and lions, whom he is charming with the strains from his lyre.

" Till to-morrow, Lamia," he repeated, as he climbed once more into his litter. " To-morrow we will talk about Judaea."

The following day at the supper hour Lamia presented himself at the house of Pontius Pilate. Two couches only were in readiness for occupants. Creditably but simply equipped, the table held a silver service in which were set out beccaficos in honey, thrushes, oysters from the Lucrine lake, and lampreys from Sicily. As they proceeded with their repast, Pontius and Lamia interchanged in- quiries with one another about their ailments, the symptoms of which they described at considerable length, mutually emulous of communicating the various remedies which had been recommended to them. Then, congratulating themselves on being thrown together once more at Baiae, they vied with one another in praise of the beauty of that enchant- ing coast and the mildness of the climate they enjoyed. Lamia was enthusiastic about the charms of the courtesans who frequented the seashore laden with golden ornaments and trailing draperies of barbaric broidery. But the aged Procurator deplored the ostentation with which by means of

1 6 MOTHER OF PEARL

trumpery jewels and filmy garments foreigners and even enemies of the empire beguiled the Romans of their gold. After a time they turned to the subject of the great engineering feats that had been accomplished in the country ; the prodigious bridge constructed by Caius between Puteoli and Baiae, and the canals which Augustus excavated to convey the waters of the ocean to Lake Avernus and the Lucrine lake.

" I also," said Pontius, with a sigh, " I also wished to set afoot public works of great utility. When, for my sins, I was appointed Governor of Judaea, I conceived the idea of furnishing Jeru- salem with an abundant supply of pure water by means of an aqueduct. The elevation of the levels, the proportionate capacity of the various parts, the gradient for the brazen reservoirs to which the distribution pipes were to be fixed — I had gone into every detail, and decided everything for myself with the assistance of mechanical experts. I had drawn up regulations for the superintendents so as to prevent individuals from making unauthorized depredations. The architects and the workmen had their instructions. I gave orders for the com- mencement of operations. But far from viewing with satisfaction the construction of that conduit, which was intended to carry to their town upon its massive arches not only water but health, the

THE PROCURATOR OF JVDJEA 17

inhabitants of Jerusalem gave vent to lamentable outcries. They gathered tumultuously together, exclaiming against the sacrilege and impiousness, and, hurling themselves upon the workmen, scat- tered the very foundation stones. Can you picture to yourself, Lamia, a filthier set of barbarians ? Nevertheless, Vitellius decided in their favour, and I received orders to put a stop to the work."

" It is a knotty point," said Lamia, " how far one is justified in devising things for the common- weal against the will of the populace."

Pontius Pilate continued as though he had not heard this interruption.

" Refuse an aqueduct ! What madness ! But whatever is of Roman origin is distasteful to the Jews. In their eyes we are an unclean race, and our very presence appears a profanation to them. You will remember that they would never venture to enter the pretorium for fear of defiling them- selves, and that I was consequently obliged to dis- charge my magisterial functions in an open-air tribunal on that marble pavement your feet so often trod.

" They fear us and they despise us. Yet is not Rome the mother and warden of all those peoples who nestle smiling upon her venerable bosom ? With her eagles in the van, peace and liberty have

been carried to the very confines of the universe, c

1 8 MOTHER OF PEARL

Those whom we have subdued we look on as our friends, and we leave those conquered races, nay, we secure to them the permanence of their customs and their laws. Did Syria, aforetime rent asunder by its rabble of petty kings, ever even begin to taste of peace and prosperity until it submitted to the armies of Pompey ? And when Rome might have reaped a golden harvest as the price of her goodwill, did she lay hands on the hoards that swell the treasuries of barbaric temples ? Did she despoil the shrine of Cybele at Pessinus, or the Morimene and Cilician sanctuaries of Jupiter, or the temple of the Jewish god at Jerusalem ? Antioch, Palmyra, and Apa- mea, secure despite their wealth, and no longer in dread of the wandering Arab of the desert, have erected temples to the genius of Rome and the divine Caesar. The Jews alone hate and withstand us. They withhold their tribute till it is wrested from them, and obstinately rebel against military service." " The Jews," replied Lamia, " are profoundly attached to their ancient customs. They suspected you, unreasonably I admit, of a desire to abolish their laws and change their usages. Do not resent it, Pontius, if I say that you did not always act in such a way as to disperse their unfortunate illusion. It gratified you, despite your habitual self-restraint, to play upon their fears, and more than once have I seen you betray in their presence the contempt

THE PROCURATOR OF JUD^A 19

with which their beliefs and religious ceremonies inspired you. You irritated them particularly by giving instructions for the sacerdotal garments and ornaments of their high priest to be kept in ward by your legionaries in the Antonine tower. One must admit that though they have never risen like us to an appreciation of things divine, the Jews celebrate rites which their very antiquity renders venerable."

Pontius Pilate shrugged his shoulders.

"They have very little exact knowledge of the nature of the gods," he said. "They worship Jupiter, yet they abstain from naming him or erect- ing a statue of him. They do not even adore him under the semblance of a rude stone, as certain of the Asiatic peoples are wont to do. They know nothing of Apollo, of Neptune, of Mars, nor of Pluto, nor of any goddess. At the same time, I am convinced that in days gone by they wor- shipped Venus. For even to this day their women bring doves to the altar as victims ; and you know as well as I that the dealers who trade beneath the arcades of their temple supply those birds in couples for sacrifice. I have even been told that on one occasion some madman proceeded to over- turn the stalls bearing these offerings, and their owners with them. The priests raised an outcry about it, and looked on it as a case of sacrilege. I am of opinion that their custom of sacrificing turtle-

20 MOTHER OF PEARL

doves was instituted in honour of Venus. Why are you laughing, Lamia ? "

" I was laughing," said Lamia, " at an amusing idea which, I hardly know how, just occurred to me. I was thinking that perchance some day the Jupiter of the Jews might come to Rome and vent his fury upon you. Why should he not ? Asia and Africa have already enriched us with a con- siderable number of gods. We have seen temples in honour of Isis and the dog-faced Anubis erected in Rome. In the public squares, and even on the race-courses, you may run across the Bona Dea of the Syrians mounted on an ass. And did you never hear how, in the reign of Tiberius, a young patrician passed himself off as the horned Jupiter of the Egyptians, Jupiter Ammon, and in this dis- guise procured the favours of an illustrious lady who was too virtuous to deny anything to a god ? Beware, Pontius, lest the invisible Jupiter of the Jews disembark some day on the quay at Ostia ! "

At the idea of a god coming out of Judaea, a fleeting smile played over the severe countenance of the Procurator. Then he replied gravely —

" How would the Jews manage to impose their sacred law on outside peoples when they are in a perpetual state of tumult amongst themselves as to the interpretation of that law ? You have seen them yourself, Lamia, in the public squares, split

THE PROCURATOR OF JUDAEA 21

up into twenty rival parties, with staves in their hands, abusing each other and clutching one another by the beard. You have seen them on the steps of the temple, tearing their filthy garments as a symbol of lamentation, with some wretched creature in a frenzy of prophetic exaltation in their midst. They have never realized that it is possible to dis- cuss peacefully and with an even mind those matters concerning the divine which yet are hidden from the profane and wrapped in uncertainty. For the nature of the immortal gods remains hidden from us, and we cannot arrive at a knowledge of it. Though I am of opinion, none the less, that it is a prudent thing to believe in the providence of the gods. But the Jews are devoid of philosophy, and cannot tolerate any diversity of opinions. On the contrary, they judge worthy of the extreme penalty all those who on divine subjects profess opinions opposed to their law. And as, since the genius of Rome has towered over them, capital sentences pronounced by their own tribunals can only be carried out with the sanction of the proconsul or the procurator, they harry the Roman magistrate at any hour to procure his signature to their bale- ful decrees, they besiege the pretorium with their cries of * Death ! ' A hundred times, at least, have I known them, mustered, rich and poor together, all united under their priests, make a furious on-

22 MOTHER OF PEARL

slaught on my ivory chair, seizing me by the skirts of my robe, by the thongs of my sandals, and all to demand of me — nay, to exact from me — the death sentence on some unfortunate whose guilt I failed to perceive, and as to whom I could only pronounce that he was as mad as his accusers. A hundred times, do I say ! Not a hundred, but every day and all day. Yet it was my duty to execute their law as if it were ours, since I was appointed by Rome not for the destruction, but for the uphold- ing of their customs, and over them I had the power of the rod and the axe. At the outset or my term of office I endeavoured to persuade them to hear reason ; I attempted to snatch their miser- able victims from death. But this show of mild- ness only irritated them the more ; they demanded their prey, fighting around me like a horde of vultures with wing and beak. Their priests re- ported to Caesar that I was violating their law, and their appeals, supported by Vitellius, drew down upon me a severe reprimand. How many times did I long, as the Greeks used to say, to dispatch accusers and accused in one convoy to the crows !

"Do not imagine, Lamia, that I nourish the rancour of the discomfited, the wrath of the super- annuated, against a people which in my person has prevailed against both Rome and tranquillity. But I foresee the extremity to which sooner or later

THE PROCURATOR OF JUD^A 23

they will reduce us. Since we cannot govern them, we shall be driven to destroy them. Never doubt it. Always in a state of insubordination, brewing rebellion in their inflammatory minds, they will one day burst forth upon us with a fury beside which the wrath of the Numidians and the mutterings of the Parthians are mere child's play. They are secretly nourishing preposterous hopes, and madly premeditating our ruin. How can it be otherwise, when, on the strength of an oracle, they are living in expectation of the coming of a prince of their own blood whose kingdom shall extend over the whole earth ? There are no half measures with such a people. They must be exterminated. Jeru- salem must be laid waste to the very foundation. Perchance, old as I am, it may be granted me to behold the day when her walls shall fall and the flames shall envelop her houses, when her in- habitants shall pass under the edge of the sword, when salt shall be strown on the place where once the temple stood. And in that day I shall at length be justified."

Lamia exerted himself to lead the conversation back to a less acrimonious note.

" Pontius," he said, " it is not difficult for me to understand both your long-standing resentment and your sinister forebodings. Truly, what you have experienced of the character of the Jews is nothing

24 MOTHER OF PEARL

to their advantage. But I lived in Jerusalem as an interested onlooker, and mingled freely with the people, and I succeeded in detecting certain obscure virtues in these rude folk which were alto- gether hidden from you. I have met Jews who were all mildness, whose simple manners and faith- fulness of heart recalled to me what our poets have related concerning the Spartan lawgiver. And you yourself, Pontius, have seen perish be- neath the cudgels of your legionaries simple- minded men who have died for a cause they believed to be just without revealing their names. Such men do not deserve our contempt. I am saying this because it is desirable in all things to preserve moderation and an even mind. But I own that I never experienced any lively sympathy for the Jews. The Jewesses, on the contrary, I found extremely pleasing. I was young then, and the Syrian women stirred all my senses to response. Their ruddy lips, their liquid eyes that shone in the shade, their sleepy gaze pierced me to the very marrow. Painted and stained, smelling of nard and myrrh, steeped in odours, their physical attrac- tions are both rare and delightful."

Pontius listened impatiently to these praises.

" I was not the kind of man to fall into the snares of the Jewish women," he said ; " and since you have opened the subject yourself, Lamia, I

THE PROCURATOR OF JUD^A 25

was never able to approve of your laxity. If I did not express with sufficient emphasis formerly how culpable I held you for having intrigued at Rome with the wife of a man of consular rank, it was because you were then enduring heavy penance for your misdoings. Marriage from the patrician point of view is a sacred tie ; it is one of the institutions which are the support of Rome. As to foreign women and slaves, such relations as one may enter into with them would be of little account were it not that they habituate the body to a humiliating effeminacy. Let me tell you that you have been too liberal in your offerings to the Venus of the Market-place ; and what, above all, I blame in you is that you have not married in compliance with the law and given children to the Republic, as every good citizen is bound to do."

But the man who had suffered exile under Tiberius was no longer listening to the venerable magistrate. Having tossed off his cup of Falernian, he was smiling at some image visible to his eye alone.

After a moment's silence he resumed in a very deep voice, which rose in pitch by little and little —

" With what languorous grace they dance, those Syrian women ! I knew a Jewess at Jerusalem who used to dance in a poky little room, on a thread- bare carpet, by the light of one smoky little lamp, waving her arms as she clanged her cymbals. Her

26 MOTHER OF PEARL

loins arched, her head thrown back, and, as it were, dragged down by the weight of her heavy red hair, her eyes swimming with voluptuousness, eager, lan- guishing, compliant, she would have made Cleo- patra herself grow pale with envy. I was in love with her barbaric dances, her voice — a little raucous and yet so sweet — her atmosphere of incense, the semi-somnolescent state in which she seemed to live. I followed her everywhere. I mixed with the vile rabble of soldiers, conjurers, and extortioners with which she was surrounded. One day, however, she disappeared, and I saw her no more. Long did I seek her in disreputable alleys and taverns. It was more difficult to learn to do without her than to lose the taste for Greek wine. Some months after I lost sight of her, I learned by chance that she had attached herself to a small company of men and women who were followers of a young Galilean thaumaturgist. His name was Jesus ; he came from Nazareth, and he was crucified for some crime, I don't quite know what. Pontius, do you remember anything about the man ? "

Pontius Pilate contracted his brows, and his hand rose to his forehead in the attitude of one who probes the deeps of memory. Then after a silence of some seconds —

" Jesus ? " he murmured, " Jesus — of Nazareth ? I cannot call him to mind."

AMYCUS AND CELESTINE

TO GEORGES DE PORTO-RICHE

AMYCUS AND CELESTINE

RONE upon the threshold of his rude cavern the hermit Celestine passed in prayer the eve of the Easter Festival, that unearthly night upon which the shuddering demons are hurled into the abyss. And whilst the shades still enveloped the earth, at the moment when the exterminating angel winged his flight across Egypt, Celestine shivered, for he was seized with anguish and unease. He heard from afar in the forest the cries of the wild cats and the shrill voices of the frogs. Immersed in the unholy darkness, he even doubted whether the glorious mystery could come to pass. But when he saw the first signals of the day, gladness entered into his heart together with the dawn ; he realized that Christ was risen from the dead, and cried —

"Jesus is arisen from the grave. Love has conquered death. Alleluia ! He is risen all glorious from the foot of the hill. Alleluia ! The whole creation is restored and made anew. Dark-

29

30 MOTHER OF PEARL

ness and evil are put to flight. Light and pardon encompass the world. Alleluia ! "

A lark, awakened amidst the wheat, answered him with song.

" He is risen again. I have dreamed of nests and eggs — white eggs, flecked with brown. Alleluia ! He is risen again."

Then the hermit Celestine left his cavern to go to the neighbouring chapel and celebrate the holy Easter Feast.

As he passed through the forest he saw in the midst of a glade a splendid beech, whose bursting buds already gave passage to tiny leaves of a tender green. Garlands of ivy and fillets of wool were hung upon its branches, which spread out groundwards. Votive tablets fastened to its gnarled trunk spoke of youth and love, and here and there some Eros, fashioned in clay, shorn of garments and with outspread wings, balanced himself lightly upon a branch. At this sight the hermit Celestine knitted his whitened brows.

" It is the fairies' tree," he said, " and the country maidens, according to ancient custom, have laden it with offerings. My life is passed in struggling against these fairies, and no one could conceive the annoyance these tiny creatures cause me. They do not openly rebel against me. Each year at harvest time I exorcise the tree with the

AMYCUS AND CELESTINE 31

customary rites, and sing the Gospel of St. John to them.

"There is nothing better to be done. Holy water and the Gospel of St. John have power to put them to flight, and there is nothing more heard of the little damsels throughout the winter ; but in the spring back they come once more, and each year one must begin all over again.

"And they are subtle ; a single bush of hawthorn is large enough to shelter a whole swarm. And they cast their spells upon the young folks, both the youths and the maidens.

"As I have grown older my sight has become dim and now I can scarcely perceive their presence. They make a mock of me, sport under my nose and laugh in my beard. But when I was only twenty, I often saw them in the clearings dancing in circles beneath the light of the moon like garlands of flowers. Oh, Lord God, Thou who madest the heaven and the dew, praised be Thou in Thy works. But why didst Thou create unholy trees and fairy springs ? Why hast Thou planted beneath the hazel the screaming mandrake ? These things of nature seduce the young to sin, and arc the cause of unnumbered labours to anchorites who, like myself, have undertaken the sanctification of Thy creatures. If only the Gospel of St. John still availed to put the demons to flight ! But it is

32 MOTHER OF PEARL

no longer enough, and I am perplexed to know what to do."

And as the good hermit went sighing on his way, the tree — for it was a fairy tree — called to him with a fresh rustling.

" Celestine ! Celestine ! My buds are eggs — true Easter eggs. Alleluia ! Alleluia ! "

Celestine plunged into the wood without turning his head. He made his way with difficulty by a narrow path through the midst of thorns which tore his gown, when suddenly the road was barred to him by a young lad who came bounding out of a thicket. He was half-clothed in the skin of some beast, and was indeed rather a faun than a boy. His glance was penetrating, his nose flattened, his countenance laughing. His curly hair concealed the two little horns upon his stubborn forehead ; his lips disclosed white pointed teeth; a fair forked beard descended from his chin. Upon his chest a golden down shone. He was agile and slender, and his cloven feet were hidden in the grass.

Celestine, who had made himself possessor of all the wisdom to be won by meditation, saw at once with whom he had to do, and raised his arm to make the sign of the cross. But the faun, seizing his hand, prevented him from completing the mighty spell.

" Good hermit," said he, " do not exorcise me.

AMYCUS AND CELESTINE 33

For me, as for you, this day is a day of festival. You would be wanting in charity if you should plunge me in grief during the Easter Feast. If you are willing, we will stroll along together, and you will see that I am not malicious."

By good fortune Celestine was well versed in the sacred sciences. He recalled to himself in these circumstances that St. Jerome in the desert had had for fellow-travellers both satyrs and centaurs who had confessed the Truth.

He said to the faun —

" Faun raise a hymn to God. Declare : He is risen."

" He is indeed arisen," replied the faun. " And behold me all gladness thereupon."

Here the path widened, so that they walked side by side. The hermit became pensive, and re- flected—

" He cannot be a demon since he has witnessed to the Truth. It is well that I refrained from grieving him. The example of the great St. Jerome has not been lost upon me."

Then,turningtowards his goat-footed companion, he asked him —

" What is your name ? "

" I am called Amycus," replied the faun. " I dwell in this wood, where I was born. I came to you, good father, because behind your long white

34 MOTHER OF PEARL

beard your countenance was kindly. It seems to me that hermits must be fauns borne down by the years. When I am grown old I shall be like unto you."

" He is risen," said the hermit.

" He is indeed arisen," said Amycus.

And thus conversing they climbed the hill on which arose a chapel consecrated to the true God. It was small and of homely construction. Celestine had built it with his own hands with the fragments of a temple of Venus. Within, the table of the Lord stood forth shapeless and uncovered.

" Let us fall down," said the hermit, " and sing Alleluia, for He is arisen. And do you, mysterious being, remain kneeling whilst 1 offer the holy sacrifice."

But the faun drew near to the hermit, and stroked his beard, and said —

" Venerable old man, you are wiser than I, and you can discern that which is invisible. But the woods and the springs are better known to me than to you. I will bring to God leafage and blossoms. I know the banks where the cress half opens its lilac clusters, the meadows where the cowslip blossoms in yellow bunches. I detect by its faint odour the mistletoe upon the wild apple tree. Already the blackthorn bushes are decked with a snowy crown of flowers. Wait for me, good father."

AMYCUS AND CELESTINE 35

With three goat-like leaps he was back in the woods, and when he returned Celestine fancied he beheld a walking hawthorn tree. Amycus had disappeared beneath his odorous harvest. He hung garlands of flowers about the rustic altar; he sprinkled it with violets, and said solemnly —

" I dedicate these flowers to the God who gave them being."

And whilst Celestine celebrated the sacrifice of the mass, the goat-footed one bowed his horned head down to the very ground and worshipped the sun, and said —

" The earth is a vast egg which thou, O Sun, most holy Sun, dost render fruitful."

From that day forward Celestine and Amycus lived together in fellowship. The hermit never succeeded, despite all his endeavours, in making the half-human creature understand the ineffable mysteries ; but as through the exertions of Amycus the chapel of the true God was constantly hung with garlands, and more gaily decked than the fairies' tree, the holy priest said—

" The faun is himself a hymn to God."

And it was for this reason that he bestowed on him the rite of holy baptism.

Upon the hill where Celestine once raised the meagre chapel which Amycus garlanded with flowers from the hills, the woods, and the streams, there

36 MOTHER OF PEARL

stands at the present day a church the nave of which goes back to the eleventh century, whilst the porch dates from the period of Henry II, when it was rebuilt in the style of the Renaissance. It is a place of pilgrimage, and the faithful assemble there to hold in pious memory the saints Amycus and Celestine.

THE LEGEND OF SAINTS OLIVERIA AND LIBERETTA

TO MADEMOISELLE JEANNE POUQUET

THE LEGEND OF SAINTS OLIVERIA AND LIBERETTA

CHAPTER I

How Mess ire St. Berthold, son of Theodulus, King of Scotland, came over to the Ardennes to preach to the inhabitants of the Pays Porcin.

HE forest of the Ardennes extended at that time as far as the waters of the Aisne, and covered the Pays Porcin, in which now rises the town of

Rethel. Its ravines swarmed with

innumerable wild boars, stags of immense height of a species now extinct thronged in the impenetrable thickets, and wolves of prodigious strength were encountered in winter on the skirts of the woods. The basilisk and the unicorn had their quarters in that forest, as well as a frightful dragon, which later on, by the grace of God, met with destruction at the prayers of a holy hermit. And because in those days the mysteries of nature were revealed to men, and for the glory of the Creator things

39

40 MOTHER OF PEARL

which were naturally invisible became visible, it was common to meet in the clearings nymphs, satyrs, centaurs, and aigypans.

Now it is in no respect doubtful that these male- volent beings have indeed been seen just as they have been described in the fables of the pagans. But it must be remembered that they are devils, as is apparent by their feet, which are cloven. Un- happily the fairies are not so easy to detect ; these have all the appearance of damsels, and at times the resemblance is so pronounced that one must possess all the prudence of a hermit if one would avoid being deceived. The fairies also are demons, and there were in the forest of the Ardennes great numbers of them. It was for this very reason that that forest so abounded in mystery and horror.

The Romans in the time of Caesar had con- secrated it to Diana, and the inhabitants of the Pays Porcin on the shores of the Aisne worshipped an idol in the form of a woman. They made offerings to her of cakes, milk, and honey, and sang hymns in her honour.

Now Berthold, the son of Theodulus, King of Scotland, having received holy baptism, lived in the palace of his father, more after the fashion of a hermit than of a prince. Close shut in his apart- ment, he spent the livelong day in reciting prayers and meditating upon the Holy Scriptures, and the

OLIVERIA AND LIBERETTA 41

desire kindled in him to imitate the labours of the apostles. Having learned through a miraculous source the abominations of the Pays Porcin, he straightway loathed and resolved to put an end to them.

He crossed the sea in a ship which had neither sail nor rudder, and which was drawn by a swan. Happily arrived in the Pays Porcin, he wandered through the villages, the walled towns, and the castles, announcing the glad tidings.

" The God whom I preach to you," he said, " is the only true God. He is one God in three Per- sons, and His Son was born of a Virgin."

But these rude men answered him —

" Youthful stranger, it is very simple on your part to imagine that there is but one God. For the gods are countless. They dwell in the woods, the mountains, and the streams. There are even gods so intimate that they do not disdain a place by the hearths of pious men. Others, again, take up their station in the stables and byres, and so the race of the gods fills the whole universe. But what you have to say about a Divine Virgin is not without warrant. We know of a Virgin with a threefold countenance to whom we sing canticles, and say, * Hail most benign ! Hail most terrible ! * She is called Diana, and beneath her silvery tread under the pale beams of the moon the mountain thyme

42 MOTHER OF PEARL

bursts into blossom. She has not disdained to receive upon her couch blossoming hyacinths, the offering of shepherds and huntsmen like ourselves. Nevertheless, she remains ever virgin."

Thus spake these ignorant men whilst they drove the apostle to the confines of the village, and pursued him with mocking words.

CHAPTER II

Of the meeting between Messire St. Eerthold and the two sisters Oliveria and Liberetta.

OW one day as he pursued his journey, overcome with weariness and grief, he fell in with two young girls, who were setting forth from their castle for a jaunt in the woods. He made several steps towards them, and then stood off at a distance for fear of alarming them, and said —

" Give ear, young virgins. I am Berthold, son of Theodulus, King of Scotland. But I have dis- dained perishable crowns that I might be worthy at last to receive at the hand of the angels the Crown that fadeth not away. And I journeyed hither in a ship, drawn by a swan, to bring you the glad tidings."

" Sir Berthold," replied the elder, " my name is Oliveria, and that of my sister is Liberetta. Our father, Thierry, who is also called Porphyro- dimus, is the wealthiest lord in the country. Willingly will we listen to your good tidings.

43

44 MOTHER OF PEARL

But you appear overcome with fatigue. I counsel you to go and await us in the hall of our father, who is at this moment drinking the good ale with his friends. When he learns that you are a Scottish prince, he will without question assign you a place at his table. Farewell, till we meet again, Sir Berthold. We are going, my sister and I, to gather flowers as an offering to Diana."

But the apostle Berthold replied —

" It is not for me to go and seat myself at a pagan's table. This Diana whom you imagine to be a heavenly virgin is in very truth a demon out of hell. The true God is one God in three Persons, and Jesus Christ His Son became Man and died upon the cross for the salvation of all men. And verily I tell you, Oliveria and Liberetta, a drop of His blood flowed on behalf of each one of you."

Then he discoursed to them with so much ardour of the holy mysteries, that the hearts of the two sisters were moved thereby. The elder sister took up the discourse anew.

" Sir Berthold," she said, " you disclose unheard- of mysteries. But it is not always an easy matter to distinguish truth from error. It would be pain- ful to us to abandon our devotion to Diana. Nevertheless, let but a sign of the truth of your words appear to us, and we will believe in Jesus crucified."

OLIVERIA AND LIBERETTA 45

But the younger sister said to the apostle —

"My sister Oliveria has asked for a sign be- cause she is of a prudent nature and full of wisdom. But if your God is the true God, Sir Berthold, would that I might know and love Him without being impelled by a sign."

The man of God understood by these words that Liberetta was born to become a great saint. And on this account he replied —

" Sister Liberetta and Sister Oliveria, I have re- solved to retire into that forest, there to lead the ere- mitical life which is both desirable and rare. I shall dwell in a hut of interlaced boughs, and support life upon roots. I shall pray unceasingly to God to change the hearts of the men of this country, and I shall bestow my benediction on the springs, so that the fairy folk may cease to come thither for the beguiling of sinners. Nevertheless, my sister Oliveria shall receive the sign for which she has asked. And a messenger sent by the Lord himself shall guide you both to my hermitage in order that 1 may instruct you in the faith of Jesus Christ."

Having spoken after this fashion, St. Berthold gave his blessing to the two sisters with the im- position of hands. After which he fared forth into the forest, from which he never afterwards emerged.

CHAPTER III

How the unicorn came to the hall of Thierry, otherwise called Porphyrodimus, and conducted the two sisters Oliveria and Liberetta to the retreat of Messire St. Berthold, and of divers marvels that ensued.

OW one day, being alone in the kitchen, Oliveria was spinning wool beneath the chimney canopy when she saw approach her a beast of a perfect whiteness which had the body of a goat and the head of a horse, and which bore on its forehead a shining spear. Oliveria im- mediately recognized what animal it was, and as she had maintained her innocence she was not in the least afraid, being aware that the unicorn never does any harm to discreet maidens. And indeed the unicorn did but place his head gently upon Oliveria's knees. Then turning again to- wards the door, by the direction of its eyes it invited the young girl to follow it without.

Oliveria immediately called her sister, but when Liberetta entered the room the unicorn had dis- appeared ; and so it came about that Liberetta, in

46

OLIVERIA AND LIBERETTA 47

accordance with her desire, acknowledged the true God without having been constrained by a sign.

The two sisters set forth in the direction of the forest, and the unicorn, who had once more become visible, walked ahead of them. They pursued throughout their journey the trail of the wild beasts. And it came to pass that when they had reached the depths of the wood, they saw the unicorn take to the water and swim across a torrent. Now when they came to the water's edge they were aware that it was both wide and deep. They leaned over it to see if perchance there might be any stepping-stones by means of which they could cross, but none such could they discover. Now whilst they were leaning upon a willow and gazing upon the foaming waters, the tree bent down suddenly and bore them without effort to the opposite shore.

Thus, then, they arrived at the hermitage, where St. Berthold imparted unto them the words of life. Upon their return, the willow uprearing itself again bore them back to the other side.

Each day they betook themselves to the dwelling of the holy man, and when they returned to their own home they found that all the thread on their distaffs had been spun by invisible hands. For these reasons, then, having received baptism, they believed in Jesus Christ.

48 MOTHER OF PEARL

For more than a year they received instruction from St. Berthold, when Thierry their father, who was also called Porphyrodimus, was seized with a cruel malady. Being aware that the end of their father was drawing nigh, his daughters instructed him in the Christian faith. He acknowledged the truth. And so it came about that his death was most meritorious. He was ensepulchred near to his mortal home in a place known as the Giant's Mountain, and in after days his tomb was venerated throughout the Pays Porcin.

Meanwhile the two sisters repaired daily to the dwelling of the holy hermit Berthold, and they gathered from his lips the words of life. But on a certain day when the rivers were greatly swollen by the melted snows, Oliveria, as she went through the vineyards, took a prop that she might with greater security cross the torrent whose much widened stream sped along riotously.

Liberetta, disdaining all human aid, declined to follow her example. She was the first to reach the torrent, her hands armed solely with the sign of the cross. And the willow bent down in its customary way. Then it rose erect once more, and when Oliveria in her turn desired to pass over it remained motionless. And the current broke her prop as if it had been a wisp of straw and carried it away. And Oliveria remained still on

OLIVERIA AND LIBERETTA 49

the hither side. But since she was discreet she recognized that she was justly punished for having doubted the heavenly powers, and for not having committed herself to the grace of God after the manner of her sister Liberetta. Thereafter she had no other thought but to win pardon for herself" by works of penitence and self-denial. So being resolved, after the example of St. Berthold, to lead the eremitical life which is both desirable and rare, she remained in the forest on this side of the torrent, and built herself a hut of boughs inter- laced at a spot where a spring gushed forth, which has since received the name of St. Olive's well.

CHAPTER IV

How Messire St. Berthold, and Mesdames Saints Liberetta and Otiveria came to their blissful con- summation.

IBERETTA having arrived at the dwelling of the blessed Berthold alone, found him in a contempla- tive attitude quite dead. His body, attenuated by fasting, exhaled a delicious fragrance. With her own hands she buried him. From this day forward the virgin Liberetta, having taken leave of the world, led the eremitical life on the other side of the torrent, in a hut by the edge of a spring, which has since been known as the well of St. Liberetta, or Liberia, whose miraculous waters cure fevers as well as divers maladies with which cattle are afflicted.

The two sisters never saw one another again in this world. But, by the intercession of the blessed Berthold, God sent into the Ardennes from the country of the Lombards the deacon VulfaY, or Valfroy, who overturned the idol of Diana and converted the inhabitants of the Pays Porcin to

50

OLIVERIA AND LIBERETTA 51

the Christian faith. Thereupon Oliveria and Libcretta were overwhelmed with joy.

But a little time after this the Lord called to Himself his servant Liberetta, and sent the unicorn to dig a grave and bury the body of the saint. Oliveria was aware, through a revelation, of the blissful death of her sister, Liberetta, and a voice said to her —

" Because you asked for a sign before you would believe, and took a prop to lean upon, the hour of your blissful death will be delayed and the day of your consummation postponed."

And Oliveria replied to the voice —

" May the will of the Lord be done on earth as it is in heaven."

She lived ten years longer in expectation of eternal beatitude, which commenced for her in the month of October, in the year of Our Lord 364.

ST. EUPHROSINE

TO GASTON-ARMAN DE CAILLAVET

ST. EUPHROSINE

The acts of St. Euphrosine of Alexandria, in religion Brother Smaragdus, as they were set forth in the Laura on Mount Athos by George the Deacon.

UPHROSINE was the only daughter of a rich citizen of Alexandria, named Romulus, who was careful to have her instructed in music, dancing, and arithmetic in such fashion that at the close of her childhood she displayed a subtle and unusually adorned intelligence. She had not yet completed her eleventh year when the magis- trates of Alexandria caused to be announced in the streets that a golden cup would be awarded as a prize to whomsoever should produce an exact reply to the three following questions.

First Question : I am the dusky child of a luminous sire ; a wingless bird, yet I rise to the clouds. With no spark of malice, I yet draw tears from the eyes I encounter. Scarcely am I born when I vanish into air. Tell me, friend, what is my name ?

Second Question : I beget my mother, yet am

55

56 MOTHER OF PEARL

by her brought forth, and sometimes I am longer and sometimes shorter. Tell me, friend, what is my name ?

Third Question : Antipater possesses as much as Nicomedes and a third of the share of Themistius. Nicomedes possesses as much as Themistius and a third of what Antipater owns. Themistius possesses ten minas and a third of what Nicomedes owns. What is the sum which belongs to each ?

Now, on the day set apart for the gathering, a number of young men presented themselves before the judges in the hope of winning the golden cup, but not one of them gave correct replies. The president was about to bring the sitting to an end when the youthful Euphrosine, in her turn drawing near to the tribunal, asked to be heard. Every one admired the modesty of her bearing and the win- some shamefacedness which lent a blush to her cheeks.

" Most illustrious judges," she said, lowering her eyes, "after having given the glory to our Lord Jesus Christ, the beginning and the end of all wisdom, I will endeavour to reply to the ques- tions which your worships have propounded, and I will begin with the first. The dusky child is smoke, which is born of fire, rises in the air, and by its pungency draws tears from our eyes. So much for the first question.

ST. EUPHROSINE 57

" Now to reply to the second. That which begets its mother and is by her brought forth is nothing other than the day, which is sometimes long and sometimes short, according to the season. So much for the second question.

"And now to answer the third. Antipater possesses forty-five minas, Nicomedes has but thirty-seven and a half, whilst Themistius has twenty-two and a half. That is my third answer." The judges, marvelling at the correctness of these replies, awarded the prize to the youthful Euphrosine. Thereupon the most venerable among them, having risen, presented her with the golden cup, and encircled her forehead with a garland of papyrus by way of honouring the keen intelligence she had displayed. Then the virgin was conducted home to her father's house to the sound of flutes amidst a great concourse of people.

But as she was a Christian and pious in no ordinary degree, far from being puffed up with these honours, she recognized their emptiness, and resolved that in the future she would apply the keenness of her intelligence to the solution of problems more worthy of attention — as, for example, the computation of the sum of the numbers repre- sented by the letters of the name of Jesus, and the consideration of the wonderful properties of these numbers.

58 MOTHER OF PEARL

Meanwhile she grew in wisdom and in beauty, and was sought in marriage by very many young men. Amongst these was the Count Longinus, who possessed great wealth. Romulus received this suitor favourably, hoping that an alliance with this powerful man might assist him in the re- habilitation of his own affairs, which had got into disorder through his vast expenditure upon his palace, his plate, and his gardens. Romulus, who was one of the most lavish amongst the inhabi- tants of Alexandria, had above all squandered considerable sums in gathering together in his mansion, beneath a vast cupola, the most wonderful examples of mechanism, such as a globe as brilliant as a sapphire, bearing on it the heavenly constella- tions set out with exactitude in precious stones. There were also to be seen in this chamber a fountain, constructed by Hero, which distributed perfumed waters, and two mirrors so cunningly contrived that they converted the gazer, the one into a person of extreme height and slenderness, and the other into a person equally short and stout. But the most marvellous sight in this mansion was a hawthorn bush all covered with birds, which by ingenious mechanism both sang and fluttered their wings as if they had been alive. Romulus had expended the remains of his wealth in the acquisition of these mechanical toys, which

ST. EUPHROSINE 59

fascinated him. This, then, was the reason for his favourable reception of the Count Longinus, the possessor of great wealth. xHe urged forward by all means in his power the consummation of a marriage from which he anticipated both happiness for his daughter and relief from anxiety in his old age. But each time that he recounted to Euphrosine the claims of Count Longinus, she turned her glance aside without making any reply. One day he said to her —

"Will you not admit, my daughter, that he is the handsomest, the wealthiest, and the noblest citizen in all Alexandria ? "

Euphrosine replied discreetly —

" Willingly do I admit it, dear father. Indeed, I am convinced that Count Longinus surpasses all the citizens of this town in noble birth, worldly possessions, and personal beauty. Consequently, if I refuse to accept him as a husband there is little likelihood that any other will succeed where he has failed, and induce me to change my resolution, which is to consecrate my virginity to Jesus Christ."

When he heard of this determination Romulus fell into a violent passion, and swore that he knew well enough how to force Euphrosine to espouse Count Longinus ; and without breaking forth into idle threats, he added that this marriage was re-

60 MOTHER OF PEARL

solved upon in his mind, and that it would be carried through without delay, whilst if his paternal authority did not suffice he would add to it that of the Emperor, who being divine, would not allow a daughter to disobey her father in a matter which was of so much public and State importance as the marriage of a woman of patrician rank.

Euphrosine was aware that her father had great influence with the Emperor, who at that time lived at Constantinople. She perceived that in this perilous situation she had no hope of assistance except from Count Longinus himself. On this account she entreated him to come to her in the basilica for a private interview.

Impelled by hope as well as curiosity, Count Longinus betook himself to the basilica all bedecked with gold and precious stones. The maiden did not make him wait. But when he saw her appear with dishevelled hair, wrapped in a black veil like a suppliant, he drew an evil augury from the sight, and his heart was disturbed.

Euphrosine was the first to speak.

" Most illustrious Longinus," she said to him, " if you love me as much as you declare, you will fear to do aught displeasing to me ; and, indeed, it would be giving me a mortal blow were you to lead me away to your house to have your pleasure of this body, which, with my soul, I have dedicated to

ST. EUPHROSINE 61

Our Lord Jesus Christ, the beginning and the end of all love."

But Count Longinus answered her —

"Most illustrious Euphrosine, love is stronger even than our wills ; that is why it behoves us to bow before him as before a jealous master. I shall act towards you after the fashion he ordains, which is to take you for my wife."

" Is it becoming that a man — an illustrious man, too — should rob the Lord of His be- trothed?"

" As to that, I shall take counsel from the bishops rather than from you."

These plans threw the young girl into the most lively consternation. She realized that she had no compassion to expect from this man of violence, governed altogether by his senses, and that the bishops could not enforce recognition of secret vows made by her to God in solitude. And in the excess of her uneasiness she had recourse to an artifice so singular that it is more to be marvelled at than held up as an example.

Her resolution being taken, she feigned to yield to the wishes of her father and the entreaties of her lover. She even suffered them to fix a day for the ceremony of betrothal. Count Longinus had already caused the jewels and ornaments destined for his bride to be placed in the marriage coffers ; he had

62 MOTHER OF PEARL

ordered for her twelve gowns, upon which were embroidered scenes from the Old and the New Testament, the legends of the Greeks, the history of animals, as well as the divine presentments of the Emperor and Empress, with their retinue of lords and ladies. One of these coffers, moreover, con- tained books upon theology and arithmetic written in letters of gold upon sheets of parchment, purple tinctured, and preserved between plates of ivory and gold.

Euphrosine, however, remained the day long shut up alone in her chamber, and the reason she gave for her withdrawal was that it behoved her to make ready her wedding garments.

" It would be most unfitting," she said, " if certain portions of my vesture should be shaped and sewn by any other hands than mine."

And in very truth she wielded her needle from morning till night. But that which she made ready secretly in this fashion was neither the symbolical veil of the virgin nor the white robe of the betrothed. What she prepared was the rough hood, short tunic, and loose breeches which the young artisans in towns are accustomed to wear while engaged in their labours. And whilst she fulfilled this undertaking she constantly invoked Jesus Christ, the beginning and the end of all the achievements of the upright. For this cause, then,

ST. EUPHROSINE 63

she happily completed her clandestine task on the eighth day before that which had been fixed for the solemnization of the marriage. She remained all that day in prayer ; then, after having presented herself, according to her custom, to receive her father's kiss, she returned to her chamber and cut off her hair, which fell to her feet like skeins of gold, donned her short tunic, fastened the breeches about her waist with woollen straps, drew the hood down over her eyes, and, night having fallen, noise- lessly left the house whilst all, masters and ser- vants alike, were sleeping. Only the dog was still awake, but as he knew her he followed her for a short time in silence, and then returned to his kennel.

With rapid steps she made her way through the deserted city, where the only sounds audible were the occasional cries of drunken sailors and the heavy tread of the watchmen on duty in pursuit of robbers. And since God was with her she suffered no insult from man. Then, having passed through one of the gates of Alexandria, she set out towards the desert, following the course of the canals covered with papyrus and blue lotus. At the break of day she passed through a wretched village of working people. An old man was singing in front of his door whilst he polished a coffin made of sycamore wood. When she came abreast of him,

64 MOTHER OF PEARL

he raised his hairy and featureless face, and cried out —

" By Jupiter ! here comes the infant Eros, carry- ing a little pot of ointment to his mother! How delicate and pretty he is. In truth, he sparkles with attractiveness. They are liars who say that the gods have departed. For this youth is a veri- table little god."

Then the prudent Euphrosine, informed by this speech that the old man was a pagan, had pity upon his ignorance, and prayed to God for his salvation. That prayer was granted. The old man, who was a coffin-maker, bearing the name of Porou, was in course of time converted, and took the name of Philotheos.

Now, after a journey of a whole day, Euphro- sine arrived at a monastery where, under the governance of the abbot Onophrius, six hundred monks observed the admirable rule of St. Paco- mius. She asked to be led before Onophrius, and said to him —

" My father, I am called Smaragdus, and I am an orphan. I beg you to receive me into your holy habitation, to the end that I may there enjoy the delights of fasting and repentance."

The abbot Onophrius, who had then attained the age of one hundred and six years, replied —

" Smaragdus, my child, beautiful are your feet,

ST. EUPHROSINE 6$

for they have guided you to this dwelling ; beauti- ful are your hands, for they have knocked at this door. You hunger and thirst after fasting and abstinence. Come, and you shall be satisfied. Happy the child who flics from the world whilst yet he wears his robe of innocence. The souls of men are exposed to deadly perils in the towns, and particularly in Alexandria, on account of the women who flock there in great numbers. Woman is to man so great a danger that even at my age the thought alone sends a shudder through all my frame. If one with sufficient effrontery should pre- sume to enter into this holy house, my arm would suddenly recover its strength to hale her hence with heavy blows from this pastoral cross. It is our duty, my son, to worship God in all His works ; but it is a profound mystery of His providence that He should have created woman. Stay with us, Smaragdus, my child ; for it is cer- tainly God who has led you hither."

After having been received in this fashion into the family of the holy man Onophrius, Euphrosine donned the monastic habit.

In her cell she praised the Lord, and rejoiced in her pious fraud upon this consideration, that her father and her lover would not fail to make search for her in all the convents for women in order to apprehend her by order of the Emperor, but that

66 MOTHER OF PEARL

they would never succeed in finding her in this refuge where Jesus Christ Himself had lovingly hidden her.

For three years she led the most edifying life in her cell, and the virtues of the youthful Smaragdus perfumed the monastery. For this cause the abbot Onophrius entrusted her with the duties of guest-master or porter, counting upon the prudence of the young monk as to the reception of strangers, and above all the exclusion of any women who might attempt to enter the monastery. For, said the holy man, woman is impure, and the mere mark of her footsteps is an infectious pollution.

Now Smaragdus had been guest-master for five years, when a stranger knocked at the door of the monastery. It was a man who was still young ; his habiliments were magnificent, and he retained a remnant of pride ; but he was pale and emaciated, and his eyes were inflamed with a restless melan- choly.

"Brother guest-master," said this man, "con- duct me into the presence of the holy abbot Onophrius, that he may assoil me, for, I am a prey to a mortal ill."

Smaragdus, having begged the stranger to seat himself upon a stool, informed him that Onophrius, having reached his hundred and fourteenth year,

ST. EUPHROSINE 67

had, in view of his approaching end, gone to visit the caves of the Holy Anchorites, Amon and Orcisus.

At this news the visitor sank down upon the stool and hid his head in his hands.

" I can no longer hope for healing, then," he murmured.

And raising his head again, he added —

" It is the love of a woman that has reduced me to this miserable state."

Not till then did Euphrosine recognize Count Longinus. She feared that he likewise might recog- nize her. But she soon reassured herself, and was seized with pity to see him looking so cast down and discomfited.

After a long silence, Count Longinus exclaimed —

" I would fain become a monk to escape from my despair."

Then he told the story of his love, and how his betrothed, Euphrosine, had suddenly disappeared ; how for eight years he had sought her and failed to find her, and how he was consumed and wasted with love and grief.

She answered him with a gentleness that was heavenly.

" My lord, this Euphrosine, whose love you so bitterly deplore, was not worthy of so much love. Her beauty was not so precious, except in the ideal

68 MOTHER OF PEARL

you yourself have formed of it ; in truth, it is vile and contemptible. It was perishable, and what remains of it is not worth a regret. You believe yourself unable to live without Euphrosine, and yet, if you should happen to meet her, you might even fail to recognize her."

Count Longinus answered not a word, but this speech, or possibly the voice in which it was pro- nounced, made a happy impression on his soul. He departed in a more tranquil mood, and promised to return.

And indeed he did return, and being desirous of embracing the monastic life, he asked the holy abbot Onophrius for a cell, and made a gift to the monastery of all his possessions, which were im- mense. This was a source of great satisfaction to Euphrosine. But some time after this her heart was overwhelmed with a still greater joy.

It was in this way. A beggar, bending beneath the weight of his satchel and having only sordid rags to cover his nakedness, came to ask a morsel of bread from the charitable monks. In him Euphrosine recognized Romulus, her father; but pretending not to know who he was, she made him sit down, washed his feet, and set food before him.

" Child of God," said the beggar, " I was not always a penniless wanderer such as now you see me. Once I possessed great wealth and a very

ST. EUPHROSINE 69

beautiful daughter, who was also very prudent and very learned. She unravelled the enigmas pro- pounded in the public competitions, and on one occasion even received from the magistrates the papyrus crown. I lost her — I lost all my posses- sions. I am consumed with regret for my daughter and my wealth. I had above all things a bush full of birds which, by a marvellous contrivance, sang as though naturally. And now I have not even a mantle to cover me. Nevertheless, I should be comforted if before I die I might see once again my well-beloved daughter."

As he concluded these words Euphrosine threw herself at his feet, and said through her tears —

" My father, I am Euphrosine, your daughter, who one night fled from your house. And the dog did not bark. Your pardon, my father. For I have not accomplished these things except by the permission of our Lord Jesus Christ."

And after she had recounted to the old man the manner of her flight, disguised as a workman, to that very house where she had since passed eight peaceful years in hiding, she showed him a mark she had upon her neck. And by this sign Romulus recognized his daughter. He embraced her tenderly and bathed her in his tears, marvelling at the mysterious workings of the Lord.

And for this reason he resolved to become a

70 MOTHER OF PEARL

monk and to take up his abode in the monastery of the holy abbot Onophrius. With his own hands he built himself a cell of reeds next to that of Count Longinus. They chanted the psalms and cultivated the ground. During the hours of rest they conversed upon the vanity of earthly affec- tions and the riches of this world. But Romulus never disclosed anything to anybody concerning his wonderful recognition of his daughter Euphro- sine, thinking it much for the best that Count Longinus and the abbot Onophrius should learn the details of her adventures in Paradise, when they would have attained a full understanding of the ways of God. Longinus never knew that his betrothed was close beside him. All three lived for several years longer in the practice of all the virtues, and by the special favour of Providence they all three fell asleep in the Lord almost at the same time. Count Longinus passed away first. Romulus died two months later, and St. Euphrosine, after she had closed his eyes, was during the same week called to heaven by Jesus Christ with the words : " Come, my dove." St. Onophrius followed them to the tomb, to which he descended full of merits in the hundred and thirty-second year of his age, on the holy day of Easter, in the year 395 after the incarnation of the Son of God. May the Archangel St. Michael make intercession

ST. EUPHROSINE 71

for us ! Here end the acts of St. Euphrosine. Amen.

Such is the narrative of George the Deacon, written in the Laura on Mount Athos at a period which may vary from the seventh to the fourteenth century of the Christian era. As to this I waver, since it is a matter of great uncertainty. This narrative is now for the first time published ; I have the best of reasons for being sure on this point. I should be glad to have equally good reasons for thinking that it deserved to be put forth. I have translated with a fidelity which has doubtless been only too perceptible since it has infected my own style with a Byzantine stiffness the inconvenience of which seems to myself almost intolerable. George the Deacon told his tale with less graceful- ness than Herodotus, or Plutarch even. So that one may perceive by his example that periods of decadence are sometimes less impregnated with charm and daintiness than is the common opinion nowadays. This demonstration is perhaps the principal merit my work can claim. That work will be criticized vigorously, and no doubt questions may be put to me to which I may find it difficult to reply. The text which I have followed is not in the hand of George the Deacon. I do not know if it is complete. I foresee that lacunae and inter- polations will be pointed out. Monsieur Schlum-

72 MOTHER OF PEARL

bergcr will hold in suspicion various formularies employed in the course of the narrative, and Mon- sieur Alfred Rambaud will question the episode of the old man Porou. I reply beforehand that, having but a single text, I could do no other than follow it. It is in very bad condition and hardly legible. But one is bound to declare that all the master- pieces of classical antiquity in which we take such delight have come down to us in the same condi- tion. I have excellent reasons for believing that in transcribing the text of my Deacon I have made tremendous blunders, and that my translation teems with misconceptions. Possibly even it is nothing but a misconception from beginning to end. If this should not appear so patently as one might fear, it is because invariably the most unintelligible text has some sort of meaning to him who trans- lates it. Were this not the case, erudition would cease to have any reason for continued existence. I have compared the narrative of George the Deacon with the passages in Rufinus and St. Jerome relat- ing to St. Euphrosine. I am bound to say that it does not altogether agree with them. It is doubt- less for this reason that my publisher has inserted this learned work in a light collection of tales.

SCHOLASTICA

TO MAURICE SPRONCK

SCHOLASTICA

T the time of which we speak, which was the fourth century of the Chris- tian era, the youthful Injuriosus, only son of a senator of Auvergne (so the municipal officers were called), sought in marriage a young girl named Scholastica, who, like himself, was the only child of a senator. His suit was favourably received. And the marriage ceremony having been celebrated, he conducted her to his house, and led her into the bridal chamber. Whereupon, with a mournful countenance, she turned herself to the wall and wept bitterly.

"What is the cause of your distress? Tell me, I beg of you."

Then, as she maintained silence, he added — " I entreat you by our Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, to show me plainly the reason for your lamentations."

Then she turned towards him and said — " If I were to weep every day of life that re- mains to me, I should not shed tears enough to express the profound grief with which my heart is

75

76 MOTHER OF PEARL

filled. This feeble body I had determined to pre- serve in all purity, and to present my virginity as an offering to Jesus Christ. Alas, and woe is me ! that I am in such a fashion forsaken as to be unable to fulfil what I had resolved upon ! Oh, day which never should have dawned upon me ! Behold me severed from the heavenly spouse who had pro- mised me paradise for a marriage portion,and become the bride of a mortal man, whilst that head which should have been crowned with the roses of im- mortality, is decked, or rather disfigured, with roses which already begin to wither. Alas ! that body which upon the margin of the fourfold stream of the Lamb should have been endued with the gar- ment of purity, bears instead the vile burden of the nuptial veil. Ah ! why was not the first day of my life even also the last ? Happy had I been had I entered the gates of death ere a single drop of milk had passed my lips ! Oh, that the kisses of my gentle nurses had been bestowed upon my bier ! When you hold out your hands towards me, I recall the hands which for the salvation of the world were pierced with nails."

And as she finished these words she wept bitterly.

The young man answered her persuasively — " Scholastica, our parents are of the rich and noble amongst the dwellers in Auvergne, nor have

SCHOLASTICA 77

yours more than a single daughter nor mine than an only son. They wished for our union as a means of continuing their families, lest after their death a stranger should enter into possession of their belongings."

But Scholastica replied —

"This world is nothing, and riches are nothing, and this life itself is nothing. Is that life which is nothing but a waiting upon death ? They alone live who, in unending blessedness, bathe in the Light, and know the joy of angels in the possession of God."

At this moment Injuriosus, touched by grace, exclaimed —

" Ah, sweet and simple words, the light of life eternal glances upon my eyes ! Scholastica, if you wish to hold fast to that you have resolved, I also at your side will lead a virgin life."

More than half reassured, and already smiling through her tears, she said —

" Injuriosus, for a man to grant to a woman a boon such as this is a difficult matter. But if you should procure that we keep ourselves unspotted from the world, a part of the marriage portion which my spouse and Lord Jesus Christ has pro- mised to me will I give unto you."

Then, fortified by the sign of the cross, he said —

" I shall do that which you desire."

78 MOTHER OF PEARL

And clasping one another's hands, they fell asleep.

And from that time forward, sharing the same nuptial couch, they passed their days in un- exampled chastity. After ten years of trial Scho- lastica died.

According to the customs of the day, her body was borne into the basilica, in gala dress, and with uncovered face, to the chant of psalms, and followed by the whole populace.

Kneeling down beside her, in a loud voice In- juriosus uttered these words —

" I give Thee hearty thanks, Lord Jesus, that Thou hast bestowed upon me strength to preserve Thy treasure uninjured."

Upon these words, she that was dead rose up upon her funeral couch and smiled, and murmured softly —

" My friend, why do you declare that which no man has asked of you ? "

Whereupon she resumed her everlasting rest.

Injuriosus soon followed her to the tomb. They buried him not far from her in the basilica of Saint Allire. The first night after he was laid there a miraculous rose tree sprang from the grave of the virgin bride and enwrapped both tombs in its flower-besprent embraces. So that on the morrow the folk beheld them bound fast one to the other

SCHOLASTICA 79

by chains of roses. Recognizing by this sign the sanctity of the blessed Injuriosus and the blessed Scholastica, the priests of Auvergne held up these shrines to the veneration of the faithful. But in this province, which had been evangelized by Saints Allire and Nepotian, pagans still dwelt. One of these, by name Sylvan us, still held sacred the springs dedicated to the nymphs, hung votive pictures upon the branches of an ancient oak, and cherished by his fireside little images in clay representing the sun and the goddesses of fruitful- ness. Half hidden amid the foliage, the garden god watched over his orchard. Sylvanus passed his declining years in the writing of verse. He composed eclogues and elegies in a style a little stiff perhaps, but not wanting in skill, and into these poems, whenever he could manage to do so, he introduced verses from the bards of old. With the general populace he too visited the spot where the Christian spouses were laid, and the good man marvelled at the rose tree which decked the two tombs. And as, after his fashion, he was pious, he recognized therein a heavenly sign. But he attri- buted the prodigy to his own gods, and doubted nothing that the rose tree flourished by the will of Eros.

Said he : " Now that she is nothing but a vain shadow, the tristful Scholastica regrets the hours

80 MOTHER OF PEARL

when love was timely and the pleasures she re- nounced. These roses, which come forth from her body and express her thoughts, say to us who still survive : Love while ye may. This prodigy indeed instructs us to taste the joys of life while it is yet time."

Thus reflected this simple pagan. Upon this subject he composed an elegy which by the greatest of chances I unearthed in the public library at Tarascony on the binding of a Bible of the eleventh century, catalogued Michel Chasles Collection F n 7439, i"]* bis. The precious leaf which had so far escaped the notice of the learned, contains not fewer than eighty-four lines in a fairly legible Merovingian script probably dating from the seventh century. The text begins with these words —

Nunc piget ; et quaeris, quod non aut ista volontas Tune fuit. . . .*

and finishes in this fashion —

Stringamus maesti carminis obsequio.8

1 shall not fail to publish the complete text so soon as I have finished deciphering it. And I do not doubt that Monsieur Leopold Delislc himself will undertake to present this invaluable document to the Academy of Inscriptions.

1 Now regret rankles, and thou crayest that

Thou didst reject. . . .

2 Weave we the tribute of a mournful song.

OUR LADY'S JUGGLER

TO GASTON PARIS

OUR LADY'S JUGGLER

N the days of King Louis there was a poor juggler in France, a native of Compiegne, Barnaby by name, who went about from town to town per- forming feats of skill and strength. On fair days he would unfold an old worn-out carpet in the public square, and when by means of a jovial address, which he had learned of a very ancient juggler, and which he never varied in the least, he had drawn together the children and loafers, he assumed extraordinary attitudes, and balanced a tin plate on the tip of his nose. At first the crowd would feign indifference.

But when, supporting himself on his hands face downwards, he threw into the air six copper balls, which glittered in the sunshine, and caught them again with his feet; or when throwing himself back- wards until his heels and the nape of the neck met, giving his body the form of a perfect wheel, he would juggle in this posture with a dozen knives, a murmur of admiration would escape the spectators, and pieces of money rain down upon the carpet.

83

84 MOTHER OF PEARL

Nevertheless, like the majority of those who live by their wits, Barnaby of Compiegne had a great struggle to make a living.

Earning his bread in the sweat of his brow, he bore rather more than his share of the penalties consequent upon the misdoings of our father Adam.

Again, he was unable to work as constantly as he would have been willing to do. The warmth of the sun and the broad daylight were as necessary to enable him to display his brilliant parts as to the trees if flower and fruit should be expected of them. In winter time he was nothing more than a tree stripped of its leaves, and as it were dead. The frozen ground was hard to the juggler, and, like the grasshopper of which Marie de France tells us, the inclement season caused him to suffer both cold and hunger. But as he was simple- natured he bore his ills patiently.

He had never meditated on the origin of wealth, nor upon the inequality of human conditions. He believed firmly that if this life should prove hard, the life to come could not fail to redress the balance, and this hope upheld him. He did not re- semble those thievish and miscreant Merry Andrews who sell their souls to the devil. He never blas- phemed God's name ; he lived uprightly, and although he had no wife of his own, he did not

OUR LADY'S JUGGLER 85

covet his neighbour's, since woman is ever the enemy of the strong man, as it appears by the history of Samson recorded in the Scriptures.

In truth, his was not a nature much disposed to carnal delights, and it was a greater deprivation to him to forsake the tankard than the Hebe who bore it. For whilst not wanting in sobriety, he was fond of a drink when the weather waxed hot. He was a worthy man who feared God, and was very devoted to the Blessed Virgin.

Never did he fail on entering a church to fall upon his knees before the image of the Mother of God, and offer up this prayer to her :

" Blessed Lady, keep watch over my life until it shall please God that I die, and when I am dead, ensure to me the possession of the joys of paradise."

II

OW on a certain evening after a dreary wet day, as Barnaby pursued his road, sad and bent, carrying under his arm his balls and knives wrapped up in his old carpet, on the watch for some barn where, though he might not sup, he might sleep, he perceived on the road, going in the same direction as himself, a monk, whom he saluted courteously. And as they walked at the same rate they fell into conversation with one another.

" Fellow traveller," said the monk, " how comes it about that you are clothed all in green ? Is it perhaps in order to take the part of a jester in some mystery play ? "

" Not at all, good father," replied Barnaby. " Such as you see me, I am called Barnaby, and for my calling 1 am a juggler. There would be no pleasanter calling in the world if it would always provide one with daily bread."

" Friend Barnaby," returned the monk, " be careful what you say. There is no calling more pleasant than the monastic life. Those who lead it

86

OUR LADY'S JUGGLER 87

are occupied with the praises of God, the Blessed Virgin, and the saints ; and, indeed, the religious life is one ceaseless hymn to the Lord."

Barnaby replied —

" Good father, I own that I spoke like an ignorant man. Your calling cannot be in any respect compared to mine, and although there may be some merit in dancing with a penny balanced on a stick on the tip of one's nose, it is not a merit which comes within hail of your own. Gladly would I, like you, good father, sing my office day by day, and especially the office of the most Holy Virgin, to whom I have vowed a singular devotion. In order to embrace the monastic life I would willingly abandon the art by which from Soissons to Bcauvais I am well known in upwards of six hundred towns and villages."

The monk was touched by the juggler's sim- plicity, and as he was not lacking in discernment, he at once recognized in Barnaby one of those men of whom it is said in the Scriptures : Peace on earth to men of good will. And for this reason he replied —

" Friend Barnaby, come with me, and I will have you admitted into the monastery of which I am Prior. He who guided St. Mary of Egypt in the desert set me upon your path to lead you into the way of salvation."

88 MOTHER OF PEARL

It was in this manner, then, that Barnaby became a monk. In the monastery into which he was re- ceived the religious vied with one another in the worship of the Blessed Virgin, and in her honour each employed all the knowledge and all the skill which God had given him.

The prior on his part wrote books dealing according to the rules of scholarship with the virtues of the Mother of God.

Brother Maurice, with a cleft hand copied out these treatises upon sheets of vellum.

Brother Alexander adorned the leaves with delicate miniature paintings. Here were displayed the Queen of Heaven seated upon Solomon's throne, and while four lions were on guard at her feet, around the nimbus which encircled her head hovered seven doves, which are the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit, the gifts, namely, of Fear, Piety, Knowledge, Strength, Counsel, Understanding, and Wisdom. For her companions she had six virgins with hair of gold, namely, Humility, Prudence, Seclusion, Submission, Virginity, and Obedience.

At her feet were two little naked figures, per- fectly white, in an attitude of supplication. These were souls imploring her all-powerful intercession for their soul's health, and we may be sure not imploring in vain.

OUR LADY'S JUGGLER 89

Upon another page facing this, Brother Alexander represented Eve, so that the Fall and the Redemp- tion could be perceived at one and the same time — Eve the Wife abased, and Mary the Virgin exalted.

Furthermore, to the marvel of the beholder, this book contained presentments of the Well of Living Waters, the Fountain, the Lily, the Moon, the Sun, and the Garden Enclosed of which the Song of Songs tells us, the Gate of Heaven and the City of God, and all these things were symbols of the Blessed Virgin.

Brother Marbode was likewise one of the most loving children of Mary.

He spent all his days carving images in stone, so that his beard, his eyebrows, and his hair were white with dust, and his eyes continually swollen and weeping ; but his strength and cheerfulness were not diminished, although he was now well gone in years, and it was clear that the Queen of Paradise still cherished her servant in his old age. Marbode represented her seated upon a throne, her brow encircled with an orb - shaped nimbus set with pearls. And he took care that the folds of her dress should cover the feet of her, concerning whom the prophet declared : My beloved is as a garden enclosed.

Sometimes, too, he depicted her in the sem-

90 MOTHER OF PEARL

blance of a child full of grace, and appearing to say, "Thou art my God, even from my mother's womb."

In the priory, moreover, were poets who com- posed hymns in Latin, both in prose and verse, in honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary, and amongst the company was even a brother from Picardy who sang the miracles of Our Lady in rhymed verse and in the vulgar tongue.

Ill

EING a witness of this emulation in praise and the glorious harvest of their labours, Barnaby mourned his own ignorance and simplicity.

" Alas ! " he sighed, as he took his solitary walk in the little shelterless garden of the monastery, "wretched wight that I am, to be unable, like my brothers, worthily to praise the Holy Mother of God, to whom I have vowed my whole heart's affection. Alas ! alas ! I am but a rough man and unskilled in the arts, and I can render you in service, blessed Lady, neither edifying sermons, nor treatises set out in order according to rule, nor ingenious paintings, nor statues truthfully sculptured, nor verses whose march is measured to the beat of feet. No gift have I, alas ! "

After this fashion he groaned and gave himself up to sorrow. But one evening, when the monks were spending their hour of liberty in conversation, he heard one of them tell the tale of a religious man who could repeat nothing other than the Ave

91

92 MOTHER OF PEARL

Maria. This poor man was despised for his igno- rance ; but after his death there issued forth from his mouth five roses in honour of the five letters of the name Mary (Marie), and thus his sanctity was made manifest.

Whilst he listened to this narrative Barnaby marvelled yet once again at the loving kindness of the Virgin ; but the lesson of that blessed death did not avail to console him, for his heart over- flowed with zeal, and he longed to advance the glory of his Lady, who is in heaven.

How to compass this he sought but could find no way, and day by day he became the more cast down, when one morning he awakened filled full with joy, hastened to the chapel, and remained there alone for more than an hour. After dinner he returned to the chapel once more.

And, starting from that moment, he repaired daily to the chapel at such hours as it was deserted, and spent within it a good part of the time which the other monks devoted to the liberal and mechanical arts. His sadness vanished, nor did he any longer groan.

A demeanour so strange awakened the curiosity of the monks.

These began to ask one another for what purpose

OUR LADY'S JUGGLER 93

Brother Barnaby could be indulging so persistently in retreat.

The prior, whose duty it is to let nothing escape him in the behaviour of his children in religion, resolved to keep a watch over Barnaby during his withdrawals to the chapel. One day, then, when he was shut up there after his custom, the prior, accom- panied by two of the older monks, went to discover through the chinks in the door what was going on within the chapel.

They saw Barnaby before the altar of the Blessed Virgin, head downwards, with his feet in the air, and he was juggling with six balls of copper and a dozen knives. In honour of the Holy Mother of God he was performing those feats, which afore- time had won him most renown. Not recog- nizing that the simple fellow was thus placing at the service of the Blessed Virgin his knowledge and skill, the two old monks exclaimed against the sacrilege.

The prior was aware how stainless was Barnaby's soul, but he concluded that he had been seized with madness. They were all three preparing to lead him swiftly from the chapel, when they saw the Blessed Virgin descend the steps of the altar and advance to wipe away with a fold of her azure robe the sweat which was dropping from her juggler's forehead.

TO MONSIEUR JEAN FRANCOIS BLADE, OF AGEN,

THE "PIOUS CHRONICLER" WHO HAS COLLECTED THE POPULAR TALES OF GASCONY

THE MASS OF SHADOWS

HIS tale the sacristan of the church of St. Eulalie at Neuville d'Aumont told me, as we sat under the arbour of the White Horse, one fine summer evening, drinking a bottle of old wine to the health of the dead man, now very much at his ease, whom that very morning her had borne to the grave with full honours, beneath a pall powdered with smart silver tears.

"My poor father, who is dead" (it is the sacristan who is speaking), " was in his lifetime a gravedigger. He was of an agreeable disposition, the result, no doubt, of the calling he followed, for it has often been pointed out that people who work in ceme- teries are of a jovial turn. Death has no terrors for them : they never give it a thought. I, for instance, Monsieur, enter a cemetery at night as little per- turbed as though it were the arbour of the White Horse. And if by chance I meet with a ghost, I don't disturb myself in the least about it, for I reflect that he may just as likely have business of his own to attend to as I. I know the habits of the H 97

TO MONSIEUR JEAN FRANCOIS BLADE, OF AGEN,

THE " PIOUS CHRONICLER " WHO HAS COLLECTED THE POPULAR TALES OF GASCONY

THE MASS OF SHADOWS

HIS tale the sacristan of the church of St. Eulalie at Neuville d'Aumont told me, as we sat under the arbour of the White Horse, one fine summer evening, drinking a bottle of old wine to the health of the dead man, now very much at his ease, whom that very morning her had borne to the grave with full honours, beneath a pall powdered with smart silver tears.

" My poor father, who is dead " (it is the sacristan who is speaking), " was in his lifetime a gravedigger. He was of an agreeable disposition, the result, no doubt, of the calling he followed, for it has often been pointed out that people who work in ceme- teries are of a jovial turn. Death has no terrors for them : they never give it a thought. I, for instance, Monsieur, enter a cemetery at night as little per- turbed as though it were the arbour of the White Horse. And if by chance I meet with a ghost, I don't disturb myself in the least about it, for I reflect that he may just as likely have business of his own to attend to as I. I know the habits of the H 97

98 MOTHER OF PEARL

dead, and I know their character. Indeed, so far as that goes, I know things of which the priests them- selves are ignorant. If I were to tell you all I have seen you would be astounded. But a still tongue makes a wise head, and my father, who, all the same, delighted in spinning a yarn, did not disclose a twentieth part of what he knew. To make up for this he often repeated the same stories, and to my knowledge he told the story of Catherine Fon- taine at least a hundred times.

" Catherine Fontaine was an old maid whom he well remembered having seen when he was a mere child. I should not be surprised if there were still, perhaps, three old fellows in the district who could remember having heard folks speak of her, for she was very well known and of excellent reputation, although poor enough. She lived at the corner of the Rue aux Nonnes, in the turret which is still to be seen there, and which formed part of an old half-ruined mansion looking on to the garden of the Ursuline nuns. On that turret can still be traced certain figures and half-obliterated inscrip- tions. The late Cur6 of St. Eulalie, Monsieur Levasseur, asserted that there are the words in Latin, Love is stronger than death, * which is to be understood,' so he would add, ' of divine love.'

" Catherine Fontaine lived by herself in this tiny apartment. She was a lacemaker. You know, of

THE MASS OF SHADOWS 99

course, that the lace made in our part of the world was formerly held in high esteem. No one knew anything of her relatives or friends. It was re- ported that when she was eighteen years of age she had loved the young Chevalier d'Aumont-Clery, and been secretly affianced to him. But decent folk didn't believe a word of it, and said it was nothing but a tale which had been concocted because Catherine Fontaine's demeanour was that of a lady rather than of a working woman, and because, moreover, she possessed beneath her white locks the remains of great beauty. Her expression was sorrowful, and on one finger she wore one of those rings fashioned by the goldsmith into the semblance of two tiny hands clasped together. In former days folks were accustomed to exchange such rings at their betrothal ceremony. I am sure you know the sort of thing I mean.

"Catherine Fontaine lived a saintly life. She spent a great deal of time in the churches, and every morning, whatever might be the weather, she went to assist at the six o'clock Mass at St. Eulalie.

" Now one December night, whilst she was abed in her little chamber, she was awakened by the sound of bells, and nothing doubting that they were ringing for the first Mass, the pious woman dressed herself and came downstairs and out into

ioo MOTHER OF PEARL

the street. The night was so obscure that not even the walls of the houses were visible, and not a ray of light shone from the murky sky. And such was the silence amid this black darkness, that there was not even the sound of a distant dog barking, and a feeling of aloofness from every living creature was perceptible. But Catherine Fontaine knew well every single stone she stepped on, and as she could have found her way to the church with her eyes shut, she reached without difficulty the corner of the Rue aux Nonnes and the Rue de la Paroisse, where the timbered house stands with the tree of Jesse carved on one of its massive beams. When she reached this spot she perceived that the church doors were open, and that a great light was stream- ing out from the wax tapers. She resumed her journey, and when she had passed through the porch she found herself in the midst of a vast con- gregation which entirely filled the church. But she did not recognize any of the worshippers, and was surprised to observe that all these people were dressed in velvets and brocades, with feathers in their hats, and that they wore swords in the fashion of days gone by. Here were gentlemen who carried tall canes with gold knobs, and ladies with lace caps fastened with coronet-shaped combs. Cheva- liers of the Order of St. Louis extended their hands to these ladies, who concealed behind their

THE MASS OF SHADOWS 101

fans painted faces, of which only the powdered brow and the patch at the corner of the eye were visible ! And all of them proceeded to take up their places without the slightest sound, and as they moved neither the sound of their footsteps on the pavement nor the rustle of their garments could be heard. The lower places were filled with a crowd of young artisans in brown jackets, dimity breeches, and blue stockings, with their arms round the waists of very pretty blushing girls who lowered their eyes. Near the holy water stoups peasant women, in scarlet petticoats and laced bodices, sat upon the ground as immovable as domestic animals, whilst young lads, standing up behind them, stared out from wide-open eyes and twirled their hats round and round on their fingers, and all these silent countenances seemed centred irremovably on one and the same thought, at once sweet and sorrowful. On her knees, in her accustomed place, Catherine Fontaine saw the priest advance towards the altar, preceded by two servers. She recognized neither priest nor clerks. The Mass began. It was a silent Mass, during which neither the sound of the moving lips nor the tinkle of the bell, vainly swung to and fro, was audible. Catherine Fontaine felt that she was under the observation and the influence also of her mysterious neighbour, and when, scarcely turning her head, she stole a glance

102 MOTHER OF PEARL

at him, she recognized the young Chevalier d'Aumont-C16ry who had once loved her, and who had been dead for five-and-forty years. She recog- nized him by a small mark which he had over the left ear, and, above all, by the shadow which his long black eyelashes cast upon his cheeks. He was dressed in his hunting clothes, scarlet with gold lace, the very clothes he wore that day when he met her in St. Leonard's Wood, begged her for a drink, and stole a kiss. He had preserved his youth and his good looks. When he smiled he still displayed magnificent teeth. Catherine said to him in an undertone —

" * Monseigneur, you who were my friend, and to whom in days gone by I gave all that a girl holds most dear, may God keep you in His grace ! O, that he would at length inspire me with regret for the sin I committed in yielding to you ; for it is a fact that, though my hair is white and I approach my end, I have not yet repented of having loved you. But, dear dead friend and noble seigneur, tell me, who are these folk, habited after the antique fashion, who are here assisting at this silent Mass ? '

" The Chevalier d'Aumont-Clery replied in a voice feebler than a breath, but none the less crystal clear —

" ' Catherine, these men and women are souls

THE MASS OF SHADOWS 103

from purgatory who have grieved God by sinning as we ourselves sinned through love of the crea- ture, but who are not on that account cast off by God, inasmuch as their sin, like ours, was not deliberate.

" * Whilst, separated from those they loved upon earth, they are purified in the cleansing fires of purgatory, they suffer the pangs of absence, which is for them the most cruel of tortures. They are so unhappy that an angel from heaven takes pity upon their love-torment. By the per- mission of the Most High, for one hour in the night, he reunites each year lover to loved in their parish church, where they are permitted to assist at the Mass of Shadows, hand clasped in hand. These are the facts. If it has been granted to me to see thee here before thy death, Catherine, it is a boon which has been bestowed by God's special permis- sion.'

" And Catherine Fontaine answered him —

" * I would die gladly enough, dear, dead lord, if I might recover the beauty that was mine when I gave you to drink in the forest.'

" Whilst they conversed thus under their breath, a very old canon was taking the collection and proffering to the worshippers a great copper dish, wherein they let fall, each in his turn, ancient coins which have long since ceased to pass current : icus

io4 MOTHER OF PEARL

of six livres, florins, ducats and ducatoons, jaco- buses and rose-nobles, and the pieces fell silently into the dish. When at length it was placed before the Chevalier, he dropped into it a louis which made no more sound than had the other pieces of gold and silver.

"Then the old canon stopped before Catherine Fontaine, who fumbled in her pocket without being able to find a farthing. Then, being unwilling to allow the dish to pass without an offering from her- self, she slipped from her finger the ring which the Chevalier had given her the day before his death, and cast it into the copper bowl. As the golden ring fell, a sound like the heavy clang of a bell rang out, and on the stroke of this reverberation the Chevalier, the canon, the celebrant, the servers, the ladies and their cavaliers, the whole assembly vanished utterly ; the candles guttered out, and Catherine Fontaine was left alone in the dark- ness."

Having concluded his narrative after this fashion, the sacristan drank a long draught of wine, remained pensive a moment, and then resumed his talk in these words : —

" I have told you this tale exactly as my father has told it to me over and over again, and I believe

THE MASS OF SHADOWS 105

that it is authentic, because it agrees in all respects with what I have myself observed of the manners and customs peculiar to those who have passed away. I have associated a good deal with the dead ever since my childhood, and I know that they are accustomed to return to what they have loved.

" It is on this account that the miserly dead wander at night in the neighbourhood of the trea- sures they concealed during their lifetime. They keep a strict watch over their gold ; but the trouble they give themselves, far from being of service to them, turns to their disadvantage ; and it is not at all a rare thing to come upon money buried in the ground on digging in a place haunted by a ghost. In the same way deceased husbands come by night to harass their wives who have made a second matrimonial venture, and I could easily name several who have kept a better watch over their wives since death than ever they did while living.

" That sort of thing is blameworthy, for in all fairness the dead have no business to stir up jealousies. Still I do but tell you what I have observed myself. It is a matter to take into account if one marries a widow. Besides, the tale I have told you is vouched for in the manner following :

"The morning after that extraordinary night Catherine Fontaine was discovered dead in her

io6 MOTHER OF PEARL

chamber. And the beadle attached to St. Eulalie found in the copper bowl used for the collection a gold ring with two clasped hands. Besides, I'm not the kind of man to make jokes. Suppose we order another bottle of wine ? . ."

LESLIE WOOD

TO THE COMTESSE DE MARTEL-JANVILLE

LESLIE WOOD

HERE was music and private theatri- cals at Madame N 's reception in

the Boulevard Malesherbes.

Whilst on the outskirts of a display of bare shoulders the younger men at the doorway were suffocating in the stifling, scented air, we older guests, not without grumbling, were keeping ourselves cool in a little salon from which we could see nothing, and to which the voice of Made- moiselle Rejane only penetrated like the slightly metallic sound of a dragon-fly's flight. From time to time we could hear the laughter and applause burst forth in the sweltering room, and we were disposed to extend a mild tolerance to the entertainment we did not share. We were exchanging fairly amus- ing trivialities, when one of the company, a genial

deputy, Monsieur B , remarked —

" Did you know that Wood was here ? " At this statement each in turn exclaimed— " Wood ? Leslie Wood ? It's impossible. It is ten years since he was seen in Paris. Nobody knows what's become of him."

109

no MOTHER OF PEARL

" The story goes that he has established a black republic on the shores of the Victoria Nyanza."

" What a tale ! You know, of course, that he is fabulously wealthy, and that he is a past master in achieving the impossible. Well, he is living in Ceylon, in a fairy palace, in the midst of enchanted gardens, where the bayaderes never cease dancing night and day."

" How can any one believe such balderdash ? The truth is, that Leslie Wood has gone off with a Bible and a carbine to convert the Zulus."

Monsieur B interrupted in an undertone —

" There he is ; there, do you see ? "

And he drew our attention by a slight movement of the head and eyes to a man leaning against the doorway, dominating by his lofty stature the heads of the crowd huddled in front of him. He seemed engrossed in the performance.

That athletic carriage, the ruddy face with the white whiskers, the penetrating eyes and calm gaze, they could belong to no one else but Leslie Wood.

Recalling the inimitable letters which for ten years he contributed to the World, I said to Monsieur B

" That man is the foremost journalist of our time."

" You may possibly be right," replied B .

" At any rate, I am ready to assert that for twenty

LESLIE WOOD in

years past no one has known Europe as thoroughly as Leslie Wood."

Baron Mo'lse, who was following our talk, shook his head.

" You don't know the real Wood. I know him myself, though. He was before all things a financier. He had a better grasp of the money market than any one I know. What are you laughing at, Princess ? "

Lolling expansively on the sofa, and in gloomy depression at being unable to smoke a cigarette, the Princess Zevorine had smiled.

" You neither of you understand Mr. Wood — neither of you," she said. " He was always a mystic and a lover, never anything else."

" 1 can't agree to that," replied Baron MoYse. " But I should be very glad to know where this devil of a fellow has been spending the best ten years of his life."

" And at what period do you place those best ten years of life ? "

" Between the fiftieth and sixtieth years ; a man's position is made by then, and he has nothing to do but enjoy his existence."

"Baron, you can question Wood himself. He is coming towards us."

The applause, this time rising to a furious pitch like the fall of a heavy body or the banging of

MOTHER OF PEARL

doors, announced the close of the performance. The black-coated contingent leaving the doorways clear overflowed into the smaller salony and as the company made their way in couples in the direction of the buffet, Leslie Wood approached us.

He shook hands with undemonstrative cordiality.

" An apparition ! an apparition ! " exclaimed Baron Mo'fse.

"Oh ! " rejoined Wood, "one can't reappear from any very remote quarter. The world is small."

" Do you know what the Princess is saying about you, my dear Wood ? She declares that you are nothing but a mystic. Now is that true ?"

" Well it depends on what you mean by mystic."

" The word is self-explanatory. A mystic is one who is preoccupied with the concerns of the next world. Now you are too well acquainted with the affairs of this world to trouble yourself about the next."

At these words Wood slightly contracted his eyebrows.

"You are quite in the wrong, Mofse. The affairs of the other world arc of far, far greater import- ance than those of the world we live in, MoYse."

" What a man he is, this good Wood of ours ! " exclaimed the Baron, with a sneer. " He is positively witty ! "

The Princess replied very seriously —

LESLIE WOOD 113

" Mr. Wood, tell me that you are not witty. I thoroughly detest witty men."

Upon this she rose, and said —

" Mr. Wood, will you take me to the buffet ? "

An hour later, when Monsieur G was

holding both men and women spell-bound with his songs, I came across Leslie Wood and the Princess Zevorine again, alone in front of the deserted buffet.

The Princess was speaking with almost vehement enthusiasm of Count Tolstoi, whose friend she was. She described this great man who had descended to the lowliest life, donning the dress, and with it the spirit, of the moujik, and using the hands which had indited literary masterpieces in the manufacture of shoes for the poor.

To my great surprise, Wood was expressing approbation of a kind of life so completely opposed to common sense. In his slightly panting voice, to which the beginnings of asthma had given a singular sweetness, he said —

" Yes, Tolstoi is right. The whole of philosophy is contained in that phrase : * May the will of God be done!' He has realized that all the woes of humanity are the outcome of the exercise of human will as distinct from the will divine. My only fear is that he may impair so noble a doctrine by fan- tastic and extravagant additions." i

n4 MOTHER OF PEARL

" Oh ! " returned the Princess in a subdued voice, and hesitating a little, " the Count's teaching is only extravagant upon one point ; that is, in incul- cating the extension of the rights and duties of husbands to an extremely advanced period of their lives, and imposing on the saints of these latter days the fruitful old age of the patriarchs."

Wood, himself elderly, replied with a restrained exaltation —

"And that again is excellent, very saintly even. Physical and natural love is becoming to all God's creatures, and so long as it does not involve either dissejision or restlessness, it maintains that divine simplicity, that saintly fleshliness without which there is no salvation. Asceticism is nothing but pride and rebellion. We must always bear in mind the example of that holy man Boaz, and let us remember that the Bible calls love the bread of old age."

Then, all of a sudden, transported, illuminated, transfigured, ecstatic, and invoking with eyes and arms and his whole soul some invisible presence, he murmured —

" Annie ! Annie ! Annie, my best beloved, it is true, is it not, that our Lord desires his saints, whilst they are men and women, to love one another humbly, even as the beasts of the field ? "

Upon this he fell exhausted into an arm-chair.

LESLIE WOOD 115

A terrific inhalation shook his broad chest, and in this condition his appearance was fuller of vitality than ever, like those machines that appear more formidable when they are out of gear. The Prin- cess ZeVorine, without any show of astonishment, wiped his forehead with her handkerchief and gave him a glass of water, which he drank.

For my part I was dumfounded. In this clairvoyant I was unable to recognize the man who in his study, littered with blue-books, had so many times conversed with me with the utmost clear- headedness upon Oriental affairs, the Treaty of Frankfort, and critical situations on the money market. As I allowed the Princess to observe my uneasiness, she said, with a shrug of the shoulders —

" It is easy to see you are French ! You look upon every one as a madman who does not think exactly what you think yourself. You need not be uneasy ; our friend Mr. Wood is level- headed enough, perfectly level-headed. Let us go and listen to G .

When I had conducted the Princess to the prin- cipal sa/on, I prepared to leave. In the ante-chamber 1 found Wood putting on his overcoat. He did not appear to feel any ill effects from his attack.

" My dear fellow," he said, " I think we are neighbours. I suppose you are still living on the Quai Malaquais, and I have taken up my quarters

n6 MOTHER OF PEARL

in a hotel in the Rue des Saints Peres. In dry weather like this it is a pleasure to go on foot. If you are willing we will stroll along together and chat."

I agreed readily. On the doorstep he offered me a cigar, and held out a pocket electric torch for me to light it by.

" 1 find it very convenient," he said, and pro- ceeded to explain the principle of it very lucidly.

I recognized the Wood of old times again. We moved on perhaps a hundred paces along the street chatting on indifferent subjects. Then suddenly my companion put his hand quietly on my shoulder.

"My dear friend," he began, " some of the things I said this evening cannot have failed to surprise you. You would probably like me to explain them."

" I was intensely interested, my dear Wood, pray do."

" I will do so willingly. I have the greatest admiration of your character. We may not regard life from the same point of view. But you are not one of those who repel an idea because it is new, and that is a disposition sufficiently rare, in France especially."

" I fancy, however, my dear Wood, that for liberty of thought "

LESLIE WOOD 117

" Oh ! no, you are not, like the English, a race of theologians. But enough of that. I want to tell you in as few words as possible the history of my convictions. When you knew me fifteen years ago 1 was the correspondent of the London World. With us journalism is a more lucrative profession, and is held in higher esteem than with you. My appointment was a good one, and I fancy I reaped the greatest possible advantages from it. I am familiar with business transactions, and I carried through some very profitable ones, and in a few years I achieved two very desirable things : in- fluence and fortune. You are aware that I am a practical man.

" I have never worked without a goal in view. And, above all things, I aimed at attaining the supreme goal of life. Fairly exhaustive theological studies undertaken in my youth had convinced me that that goal lay outside the sphere of this terres- trial life. But I was yet in doubt as to the practical means of attaining it. As a result, I suffered cruelly. Uncertainty is absolutely insupportable to a man of my temperament.

"In this state of mind I turned my attention seriously to the psychical researches of Sir William Crookes, one of the most distinguished members of our Royal Society. I knew him personally, and needed no assurance that he was both a man

u8 MOTHER OF PEARL

of learning and a gentleman. He was at that time giving his attention to the case of a young woman endowed with psychic powers of an altogether un- common nature, and, like Saul of old, he was fortunate enough to evoke the presence of an in- disputable disembodied spirit.

"A charming woman, who had passed through the experience of earthly life and was now living the life beyond the tomb, lent herself to the experi- ments of the eminent spiritualist, and submitted to every test he could exact from her within the limits of decorum. I considered that investigations such as this, bearing on the point at which terres- trial existence borders on extra-terrestrial existence, would lead me, if I followed them step by step, to the discovery of that which it is above all necessary to know, that is to say, the true aim of life. But it was not long before I was disappointed in my hopes. The researches of my respected friend, although conducted with a precision which left nothing to be desired, did not result in a theological and moral conviction sufficiently un- equivocal.

" Moreover, Sir William was suddenly deprived of the co-operation of the incomparable dead lady who had so graciously attended several of his spiritualistic seances.

" Discouraged by the incredulity of the public,

LESLIE WOOD 119

and irritated by the sallies of his colleagues, he ceased to give any information relative to his psychic experiences. I communicated my discom- fiture to the Reverend Mr. B , with whom I had

been on friendly terms from the time of his return from South Africa, where he had laboured as an evangelist in a devoted and systematic fashion truly worthy of old England.

" Mr. B is, of all men, the one who has at

all times exercised the most powerful and decisive influence over me."

" He is very intellectual, then ? " I asked.

" His knowledge of doctrine is profound," re- plied Wood. "But better than all else he has a strong character, and you are aware, my dear fellow, that it is by force of character that men are swayed. My mischances occasioned no surprise to him ; he attributed them to my lack of method, and, above all, to the pitiable moral infirmity I had shown on this occasion.

" ' Scientific experiments,' he declared, ' can never lead to discoveries in any other domain than that of science. How is it you did not understand this ? Leslie Wood, you have been strangely heedless and frivolous. The Apostle Paul has told us that the Spirit searcheth all things. If we would discover spiritual truths we must set our feet on the spiritual path.'

120 MOTHER OF PEARL

" These words produced a profound impression on me.

" * How then,' I asked, ' shall I enter on the spiritual path ? '

" * Poverty and simplicity must be your guides ! '

Mr. B replied. * Sell your goods and give

the purchase money to the poor. You are re- nowned. Conceal yourself. Pray, and devote yourself to works of charity. Put on a spirit of simplicity and a pure soul and you will attain truth.'

" I resolved to follow out these precepts to the letter. I sent in my resignation as correspondent to the World. I realized my investments, which were in great part in commercial enterprises, and, fearing to repeat the sin of Ananias and Sapphira, I conducted this delicate operation in such a way as not to risk the loss of a penny of the capital which was no longer my own. Baron Mo'fse, who kept an eye on my negotiations, conceived an almost religious reverence for my financial genius.

By direction of Mr. B , I handed over to the

treasurer of the Evangelical Society the sums I had realized, and when I expressed to that eminent theologian my delight at being poor —

" * Have a care,' said he, * that in your poverty you do not indulge in exaltation at your prowess. It will serve you but ill to strip yourself outwardly

LESLIE WOOD 121

if within your own breast you cherish a golden idol. Be humble ! ' "

Leslie Wood had reached this point in his narra- tive when we arrived at the Pont Royal. The Seine, upon whose surface the lights threw flickering reflections, flowed beneath the arches with a dull moan.

"I shall have to cut my story short," Wood began once more. " Each episode of my new life

would occupy a whole night to recount. Mr. B ,

to whom I was as obedient as a child, sent me to the Basutos, commissioned to fight against the slave trade. There I lived under a tent alone with that hardy bedfellow whose name is danger, and through fever and drought became aware of the presence of God.

"At the end of five years Mr. B recalled

me to England. On the steamer I met a young girl. What a haunting face she had ! She was a vision a thousand times more radiant than the phantom presence which appeared to Sir William Crookes !

" She was the orphan daughter of a colonel in the Indian army and she was poor. She had no particular beauty of features. Her pale complexion and emaciated face indicated suffering ; but her eyes expressed all that one can imagine of heaven ; her body seemed to glow gently with an inward

122 MOTHER OF PEARL

light. How I loved her ! At sight of her fathomed the hidden meaning of all creation ! That simple young girl with one glance revealed to me the secret of the harmony of the spheres !

"Ah ! she was simple, very simple, my monitress, my well-loved lady, sweet Annie Fraser ! In her translucent soul I could read the sympathy she felt for me. One night, one serene night, when we were alone together on the deck of the ship in the presence of the seraphic company of the stars, which throbbed in chorus in the sky, I took her hand and said —

"' Annie Fraser, I love you. I believe that it would be good for us both for you to become my wife, but I am debarred from planning my own future in order that God may dispose of it as He sees fit. May it be His will to unite us ! I have surrendered my own will into the hands of

Mr. B . When we reach England we will go

together in search of him ; will you, Annie Fraser ? And if he gives his sanction we will marry.'

" She gave her consent. For the remainder of the voyage we read the Bible together.

" Immediately on our arrival in London I

accompanied my fellow passenger to Mr. B 's,

and told him what the love of this young girl meant to me, and with what clear insight it in- spired me.

LESLIE WOOD 123

" Mr. B gazed for a long time on her with

kindliness.

" * You may marry,' he said at length. * The Apostle Paul has declared that the husband is sanctified by the wife, and the wife by the husband. But let your union resemble those held in honour amongst Christians in the primitive Church ! Let it remain purely spiritual, and see that the angel's sword lies between you in your bed. Go, now, and remain humble and secluded, and let not the world hear your name.'

" I married Annie Eraser, and I need scarcely tell you that we complied rigidly with the condition

imposed on us by Mr. B . For four years I

delighted in that brotherly and sisterly union.

"By grace of simple little Annie Eraser I advanced in the knowledge of God. There was nothing now that could cause us suffering.

" Annie was ill, and her strength declined, and we repeated joyfully in union, * May the will of God be done on earth as it is in heaven ! *

"After four years of this life together, there

came a day, a Christmas day, when Mr. B

summoned me to him.

" * Leslie Wood,' he said, * I have put you to the proof for your soul's sake. But it would be to fall into papistical error to believe that the union of His creatures after the flesh is dis-

i24 MOTHER OF PEARL

pleasing to God. Twice He blessed both animals and mankind in pairs, in the earthly Paradise, and in the ark of Noah. Go, and live henceforth with your wife, Annie Fraser, as a husband with his wife.'

"When I arrived home, Annie, my well-loved Annie, was dead. . . .

" I own my weakness. It was with my lips and not with my heart that I pronounced the words, ' O God, Thy will be done ! * and thinking upon

Mr. B 's tardy removal of the restrictions

upon our love, I felt my mouth full of bitterness, and as it were ashes in my heart.

" So it was with a forlorn soul that I knelt down at the foot of the bed where, beneath a cross or roses, silent and white and with the faint violets of death on her cheeks, my Annie slept her last sleep.

" O thou of little faith ! thou didst bid her adieu and remain a whole week plunged in barren sorrow that approached despair. How much rather shouldst thou, on the contrary, have re- joiced, both in body and soul ! . . .

" On the night of the eighth day, as I was weep- ing, my forehead bowed upon the cold and empty bed, I had a sudden conviction that the beloved was near me in my chamber.

" Nor was I deceived. When I raised my head

LESLIE WOOD 125

I saw Annie, smiling and radiant, holding out her arms to me. But how find words for what re- mains to tell ? How express the ineffable ? And is it permissible to reveal such mysteries of love ?

"Clearly when Mr. B said to me, 'Live

with Annie as a husband with his wife ! ' he knew that love is stronger than death.

" Learn, then, my friend, that from that hour of forgiveness and joy my Annie has returned nightly to my side distilling celestial odours."

He spoke with appalling exaltation.

We had slackened our pace. He stopped in front of a hotel of Moorish exterior.

" This is where I live," he said. " Do you see that window on the second floor with the light in it ? She is waiting for me."

He left me abruptly.

Eight days later I learned from the newspapers of the sudden death of Leslie Wood, former corre- spondent of the World.

GESTAS

TO CHARLES MAURRAS

GESTAS

" ' Gestas,' dixt li Signer, ' entrez en Paradis.' " "Gestas, dans nos anciens myst^res, c'est le nom du larron crucifie a la droite de Jesus-Christ " ( Augustin Thierry, la Ridemp- tion de Larmor).1

OLKS say that we have amongst us at this very day a sad rogue named Gestas, who writes the sweetest songs in the world. It was written on his flat-featured face that he would be a sinner after the flesh, and towards evening evil exultation shines in his green eyes. He is no longer young. The protuberances on his skull have taken on the lustre of copper ; the long hair falling about his neck has taken a greenish tinge. Never- theless he is ingenuous, and has kept fast hold on the naive faith of his childhood. When he is not in hospital he occupies a little room in some squalid hotel between the Pantheon and the Jardin dcs

1 " ' Gestas,' said the Lord, « enter into Paradise.' " " Gestas, in our ancient mystery plays, was the name of the thief who was crucified on the right hand of Jesus Christ" (Augustin Thierry, The Redemption of Larmor). K 129

130 MOTHER OF PEARL

Plantes. There, in the old impoverished quarter, every stone is familiar with his tread, the gloomy byways are tolerant of him, and one of these narrow lanes is entirely after his own heart ; for, lined though it is with dram shops and boosing kens, it boasts on the corner of one of the houses an image of the Virgin in a blue niche behind bars. Of an evening he progresses from caf£ to caf£, and at station after station, with pious orderliness, he takes his beer or his spirits : the exacting duties of the devotee of debauchery call for method and regu- larity. The night is far gone when, without know- ing how, he once more reaches his den, and by a daily miracle discovers the sacking bed, upon which he falls fully dressed. There with clenched fists he sleeps the sleep of the vagabond and the child. But that sleep is brief.

As soon as dawn casts its pale radiance upon the window, and between the curtains darts its lumi- nous shafts into the attic, Gestas opens his eyes, rises, shakes himself like an ownerless dog awakened by a kick, hurries down the long, spiral staircase, and once more sets his eyes delightedly on the street, the kind street which is so indulgent to the vices of the lowly and the poor. His eyelids wink at the clear light of the early morning ; the nos- trils, which recall Silenus, inhale the clean air. Vigorous and upright, one leg stiffened by rheuma-

GESTAS 131

tism of long standing, he goes on his way leaning on his dog-wood stick, the ferrule of which he has worn out with twenty years of wandering. But in his nocturnal adventures he has never lost either his pipe or his stick. And at the beginning of the day his appearance is that of a man perfectly simple and perfectly happy. Which is what he actually is. His greatest joy in life, which he buys at the sacrifice of sleep, is to go from bar to bar in the morning drinking white wine with the workmen. It is an innocent sort of tippling : the trans- parent wine, in the pale light of early morning, amongst the white blouses of the masons ; there you have a symphony in whites which enchants this soul, of which vice has not yet subdued the candour.

Now one spring morning when he had sauntered in this fashion from his lodging as far as The Little Moor, Gestas had the satisfaction of seeing the door, over which appeared a Saracen's head in cast iron, gay with paint, thrown open as he came up, and so he reached the tin counter in the company of friends with whom he had no acquaintance : a gang of workmen from La Creuse, who clinked their glasses, talked of their own part of the country, and indulged in boasting after the manner of the twelve peers of Charlemagne. They drank a glass and cracked a crust ; when one of them thought of a good thing

132 MOTHER OF PEARL

he laughed very loudly at it, and so that his com- rades might understand it the better gave them a good thump or two on the back with his fist. The older men, however, dispatched their potations slowly and silently. When these had all departed to their work, Gestas, the last left, quitted The Little Moor and made his way to The Juicy Quince^ with the lance-headed railings of which he was familiar. Here, again, in excellent company, he had a drink, and even offered a glass to two mistrustful but mild guardians of the peace. After this he visited a third bar, the ancient wrought-iron sign of which represents two little men staggering under an enormous bunch of grapes, and there he was served by the lovely Madame Trubert, famous all the quarter through for her prudence, her strength, and her jollity. Then as he neared the fortifications he had yet another drink at the distillery where, in the shadow, the gleaming copper taps of the barrels attract the eye ; and still another at the general shop where the green shutters were still fast closed between the two boxes of laurels ; after which he returned to the most populous districts and ordered 'vermouth and the brandy known as marc in various cafes. Eight o'clock struck. He walked very erect, with a steady, rigid, solemn gait ; he was astonished when women, running to buy provisions, with bare head and their hair twisted in a knot low

GESTAS 133

on the neck, ran against him with their heavy baskets, or when he came into collision with some small girl grasping an enormous loaf in her arms. Still, at times, if he crossed the road the milkman's cart, with its clinking, rattling tin cans, would pull up so close to him that he could feel the horse's warm breath on his cheek. But he continued his way unhasting and careless of the imprecations of the rustic milk-vendor. His gait, secure of sup- port from his dog-wood stick, was calm and haughty. But internally the old man was staggering. Noth- ing was left of his early morning gaiety. The lark, whose joyous trills had thrilled through him with his earliest sips of the pale-hued wine, had sped away at a single flight, and now his soul was a murky rookery, where crows croaked hoarsely upon inky trees. He was mortally sad. A great dis- gust of himself welled up in his heart. The voice of his repentance, his shame, cried out in him : " Hog, hog ! What a hog you are ! " And he marvelled at that clear, angry voice, that superb angel's voice, which spoke mysteriously within himself, repeating : " Hog ! hog ! What a hog you are ! " A yearning desire for innocence and purity woke in him. He wept ; great tears fell down on his goat-like beard. He wept over him- self. Obedient to the words of his Master, who said, " Weep for yourselves and for your children,

134 MOTHER OF PEARL

O daughters of Jerusalem," he shed the bitter dew from his downcast eyes upon the body he had delivered up to the seven deadly sins, and upon the obscene fancies born of his drunkenness. The faith of his childhood revived in him, and spread out fresh vigorous tendrils. From his lips pathetic prayers flowed forth. He said under his breath : "O God, grant me to become once more even as the little child which once was I ! " At the moment he offered up this simple petition he realized that he was standing under a church porch.

It was an old church, once white and comely beneath its lacework of stone, which time and the hand of man had marred. Now it had become as black as the Shulamite, and its beauty could only appeal to the hearts of poets ; it was a church "little and poor and old," like the mother of Fran9ois Villon, who perchance in her day came to kneel in its precincts, and saw on the walls, nowa- days whitewashed, that painted paradise, the harps of which she believed she could hear, and that inferno where the damned suffered fiery torment, which caused the worthy soul to be much afraid. Gestas entered into the House of God. He saw no one within, not even any one to offer him holy water, not even a poor woman like the mother 6f Fran£ois Villon. Ranged in seemly order in the nave, a congregation of chairs alone bore witness to

GESTAS 135

the faith of the parishioners, and seemed to sustain public worship.

In the cool, moist shade afforded by the vaulting Gestas turned to his right towards the aisle where, close to the porch, before a statue of the Virgin, a pyramidal frame of iron displayed its pointed teeth, on which, however, not a single taper now burned. Then as he gazed on the image, white, pink, and blue in colour, smiling from the midst of little gold and silver hearts hung up as votive offerings, he bent his stiff old legs, wept tears like St. Peter, and sobbed out tender, disconnected words : " Holy Virgin, Mother, Mary, Mary, your child, your child, Mother ! " But very speedily he rose up again, took several rapid steps, and stopped in front of a confessional. Framed of oak, darkened by the passage of time, oiled as are the beams of an olive press, this confessional had the irreproachable, homely, intimate appearance of an old linen cupboard. On its panels religious symbols carved in shell-like lozenges and rusticated work called up the memory of the townswomen of the olden time, who had come hither to bow their caps with lofty erections of lace and lave their house- wifely souls in this type of the cleansing piscina. Where they had set their knees Gestas set his, and with lips close up to the wooden grating called in a hushed voice: "Father! father!" As no one

136 MOTHER OF PEARL

answered his call he knocked very gently with his finger on the wicket.

"Father! father!"

He wiped his eyes so as to see better through the holes in the grating, and thought he could make out through the dimness the white surplice of a priest.

He repeated —

" Father ! father ! pray listen to me. I am in need of confession, I must cleanse my soul ; it is black and dirty ; it disgusts me ; it turns my stomach. Quick, father, the bath of repentance, the bath of pardon, the bath of Jesus. At the thought of my impurities my heart comes into my mouth, and I am ready to spew with disgust at my uncleanness. The bath, the bath of cleansing!"

Then he waited. Now fancying he perceived a hand, which made a sign to him from the depths of the confessional, now failing to discover in the alcove anything more than an empty seat, a long time passed. He remained motionless, his knees glued to the wooden step, his gaze intent on the wicket, whence he awaited the outpouring of pardon, peace, refreshment, health, innocence, re- conciliation with God and himself, heavenly joy, submission to the divine love, the sovereign good. At intervals he murmured tender supplications —

" Monsieur le cure, father, monsieur le cure !

GESTAS 137

I thirst ! give me to drink, give me that which is yours to give, the water of innocence, a white robe, and wings for my poor soul. Give me penitence and pardon ! "

Receiving no reply, he knocked still harder at the grating, and said aloud —

" Confession, I beg of you ! "

At last he lost patience, and rising, showered heavy blows with his dog-wood stick on the walls of the confessional, shouting —

" Ho, there, monsieur le cure ! Ho, there, monsieur le vicaire 1 "

And in proportion as he raised his voice he knocked more loudly. The blows fell furiously on the confessional, causing clouds of dust to arise from it, and only evoking in reply to his violence the vibration of its worm-eaten old planks.

The verger, who was sweeping out the sacristy, ran forward with his sleeves turned up on hearing the noise. When he saw the man with the stick he stopped short for a moment, and then advanced towards him with the cautious reserve common to the officials who have grown white in the service of this lowliest of police. Arrived within earshot he demanded —

" What is it you want ? "

" I want to confess."

138 MOTHER OF PEARL

"Folks don't come to confess at an hour like this."

" I want to confess."

" Be off with you ! "

" I want to see the cure."

" For what purpose ? "

"To make my confession."

"The cure can't be seen just now."

" The senior vicaire, then."

" Nor he either. Now off you go."

"The second vicaire, the third vicaire, the fourth vicaire, the youngest vicaire."

"Be off with you."

"Ah, then! would you let me die unshriven? It's worse than it was in '93, it seems ! . . . Any little vicaire. How will it hurt you if I make my confession to some little vicaire not any taller than my arm ? Take word to some priest that he must come to hear my confession. I'll undertake to dis- close to him a batch of sins rarer, more extraordi- nary, more interesting, you may take my word for it, than all those his chattering women penitents can trot out before him. You can tell him that he is wanted for a really fine confession."

" Get away now ! "

"But won't you understand, you old Barabbas, you ? I tell you that I wish to reconcile myself with the good God — by God, I do 1 "

GESTAS 139

Although he did not rejoice in the majestic stat- ure of the verger of a rich parish, this official staff- bearer was vigorous enough. He took our poor Gestas by the shoulders and hurled him outside the doors.

Gestas, once in the street, had only one idea in his brain, which was to get back into the church by one of the side doors, so as, if possible, to steal a march on the verger from behind, and perhaps lay hands on some underling vicaire who would con- sent to hear his confession.

Unhappily for the success of this manoeuvre, the church was surrounded on all sides by old houses, and Gestas was soon hopelessly entangled, without hope of delivery, in an inextricable maze of streets, lanes, courts, and alleys.

Amongst them, however, he discovered a wine merchant's, and there the poor penitent tried to find consolation in absinthe. He managed to do so. But a fresh fit of repentance soon overtook him. And it is this which supports his friends in the hope that he will win salvation. He has faith — simple, firm, childlike faith. It is works alone which he is lacking in. Nevertheless there is no need to despair of him, since he himself never despairs.

Without entering on the difficulties as to pre- destination— and they are not inconsiderable — nor

1 40 MOTHER OF PEARL

weighing the opinions expressed on this subject by St. Augustine, Gottschalk, the Albigenses, the Wyc- liffites, the Hussites, Luther, Calvin, Jansenius, and the great Arnaud, one may venture to believe that Gestas is predestined to eternal felicity.

"Gestas," said the Lord, "enter into Paradise."

THE MANUSCRIPT OF A VILLAGE DOCTOR

TO MARCEL SCHWOB

OCTOR H , who recently died at

Scrvigny (Aisne), where he had prac- tised medicine for more than forty years, left behind him a journal never intended for the public eye. I should not feel justified in publishing the manuscript in extensOy nor even in printing fragments of any considerable length, although, like Monsieur Taine, there is a large number of persons nowa- days of the opinion that it is above all things desirable to print and circulate what was never planned for publication. Whatever these worthy folk may say, the fact that a writer is an amateur does not afford any guarantee that what he has to say will be interesting. The memoirs of Doctor

H would be wearisome from their mere

monotonously moral note. And yet the man who wrote them, in his lowly environment, possessed an intellect quite out of the ordinary. This village doctor was philosopher as well as physician. Per- haps the closing pages of his journal might be

i44 MOTHER OF PEARL

perused without any exceptional distaste. I venture to transcribe them here : —

Extract from the Journal of the late Doctor H ,

Physician at Servigny (Aisne).

"It is an axiom of philosophy that nothing in this world is either altogether bad or altogether good. Pity, the tenderest, the most natural, the most useful of the virtues, is not at all times in place either with the soldier or the priest ; both with priest and soldier there are occasions when it must be held in restraint — when confronted by the enemy, for instance. Officers do not make a practice of recommending it on the eve of battle, and in some old book I have read that Monsieur Nicole held it in distrust as the motive principle of concupiscence. There is nothing of the priest about me, and still less of the soldier. I am a doctor, and amongst the most insignificant of that profession, a country doctor. I have practised my art for long years and in obscurity, and I would assert that if pity alone can be a worthy stimulus to the adoption of our profession, we must lay it aside finally when we encounter those miseries which it has inspired us with the desire to alleviate. A doctor whom pity accompanies to the bedside of his patients will find his observation not sufficiently acute, his hands not sufficiently steady. We go

MS. OF A VILLAGE DOCTOR 14$

wherever compassion for the human race calls, but we must leave pity behind us. Moreover, doctors for the most part find it an easy task to attain the callousness which is so necessary to them. That is a mental condition which cannot long elude them, and there are moral reasons for this. Pity speedily becomes blunted when brought into contact with suffering ; there is less disposition to deplore those misfortunes for which alleviation can be procured ; finally, to the physician an illness offers a succession of interesting phenomena.

" From the time when I began the practice of medicine I flung myself into it with ardour. In the bodily ills disclosed to me I saw only oppor- tunities for the practical application of my art. When a complaint developed without complica- tions, I was able to see beauty in its conformity to the normal type. Those phenomena of disease, which offered apparent anomalies, awakened curi- osity in my mind ; so that I was enamoured of disease. What am I saying ? From the point of view I espoused disease and health were possessed of indisputable personality. As an enthusiastic observer of the human mechanism, I found as much to admire in its more baleful affections as in its most healthy compliance with law. Willingly should I have exclaimed with Pinel : * What a magnificent cancer ! ' That was a fine attitude of

L

146 MOTHER OF PEARL

mind, and I was on my way to become a philo- sopher-physician. I only needed to have a genius for my art in order to enjoy completely, and enter into possession of, the full beauty of the theory of disease classification. It is the privilege of genius to unveil the splendour of things. Where the ordinary man would see only a disgusting wound, the naturalist worthy of the name stands en- raptured before a battlefield on which the mys- terious forces of life struggle for supremacy, in an encounter more inexorable, more terrifying than any that the strenuous abandon of Salvator Rosa ever depicted. I only caught glimpses of that spectacle of which the Magendies and Claude Bernards were familiar witnesses, and it was a distinction for me to do so ; but though resigned to the career of a humble practitioner, I fortified myself, as a professional duty, in the habit of con- fronting grievous situations unemotionally. I gave my patients my energies and my intellect, i did not give them pity. God forbid that I should place any gift, howsoever precious, above His gift of pity ! Pity is the widow's mite ; it is the in- comparable offering of the poor man, who with generosity outstripping that of all the wealthy in this world of ours, gives with the gift of his tears a piece torn from his heart. For that very reason it is that pity must be dissociated from the carry-

MS. OF A VILLAGE DOCTOR 147

ing out of a professional duty, how noble soe'er that profession may be.

"To enter upon more particular considerations, I would say that the folk in whose midst I am living evoke in their misfortunes a sentiment which is not pity. There is something of truth in the theory that a man cannot inspire in another an emotion which he is incapable of experiencing himself. Now the peasantry in our part of the country are not tender-hearted. Harsh to others as to themselves, they drag out an existence morose in its gravity. That gravity, too, is contagious, and in their company sadness and dejection affect one's mind. What is fine about their moral out- look is that they preserve unscathed the nobler features of humanity. As they are not accustomed to think with any frequency or profundity, their thoughts assume naturally in certain circumstances a solemn tone. I have heard some of them give utterance at the point of death to brief, forcible speeches worthy of the patriarchs of the Old Testament. They can call forth one's admiration, but do not awaken one's sympathies. With them everything is quite simple, even their illnesses. Their sufferings are not accentuated by their im- agination. They are not like those over-sensitive creatures who construct from their ills a monster more harassing than the ills themselves. They

I48 MOTHER OF PEARL

meet death so much as a matter of course that it is impossible to be greatly disturbed. To sum up, I might say that they are all so much alike that no shred of individuality vanishes as each one passes away.

" For the reasons which I have just set down it follows that I practise my profession of village doctor very peacefully. I never regret having chosen it. I sometimes think I am a little above it ; but if it is vexatious to a man to feel himself above his position, the annoyance would certainly be greater if he felt unequal to it. I am not rich, and never shall be so long as I live. But of what use would money be to one who leads a solitary village life ? My little grey mare, Jenny, is as yet only fifteen years old, and she still trots as easily as in the days of her first youth, especially when we are going in the direction of the stable. I do not, like my illustrious fellow-physicians in Paris, possess a gallery of pictures for the entertainment of my visitors, but I can show pear trees which the towns- men have nothing like. My orchard is famous for twenty leagues round, and the owners of the neigh- bouring chateaux come to beg cuttings from me.

" Now on a certain Monday — it will be a year ago this very day — as I was busy in my garden inspecting my espaliers, a farm servant came to beg me to call as soon as possible at Les Alies.

MS. OF A VILLAGE DOCTOR 149

" I asked him whether Jean Blin, the farmer at Les Alies, had sustained a fall the previous day as he came home in the evening. For in my part of the country a sprain is a common Sunday occur- rence, and it is not at all rare for a man to break two or three ribs that day on leaving the public- house. Jean Blin is not exactly a bad sort, but he likes drinking in company, and more than once he has known what it is like to wait for Monday's dawn at the bottom of a miry ditch.

"The farm servant replied that there was nothing the matter with Jean Blin, but that Eloi, Jean's little son, was seized with fever.

" Without another thought for my espaliers, I went in search of my hat and stick, and set out on foot for Les Alies, which is only twenty minutes' walk from my house. As I walked, my thoughts were on ahead with Jean Blin's little boy in the grip of a fever. His father was a peasant much like every other peasant, with this peculiar differ- ence, that the Intelligence which created him forgot to provide him with a brain. This great hulking Jean Blin has a head as thick as his fist. Divine wisdom has only furnished that particular skull with what was strictly indispensable, there's no getting over that. His wife, the best-looking woman in the place, is a noisy, bustling housewife, stolidly virtuous. Well, well ! To this worthy couple a child

150 MOTHER OF PEARL

had been given, who was easily the most delicate, the most spiritual little being that ever adorned this old world of ours. Heredity is responsible for some of the surprises in nature, and it has been well said that nobody knows what he is about when he fathers a child. Heredity, according to our hon- oured Nysten, is the biological phenomenon which is responsible for the fact that, in addition to the normal type of the species, ancestors transmit to their descendants certain peculiarities of organization and of aptitude. I admit it. But what peculiarities are transmitted and what are not, that is what is not very clear, even after a perusal of the learned works of Doctor Lucas and Monsieur Ribot. My neighbour, the notary, lent me last year a volume by Monsieur Emile Zola, and I observe that that author takes credit for particular discernment in this respect. * Here,' he says, in substance, * is an ancestor afflicted with neurosis ; his descendants will show neuropathic tendencies, that is to say, when they do not do so ; amongst them will be found some foolish and some intelligent individuals ; one of them may even be a genius.' He has gone to the trouble of drawing up a genealogical chart to make his idea more easily apprehended. Well and good ! The discovery is not particularly novel, and its expounder would unquestionably be ill- advised to vaunt himself upon it; it is none the less

MS. OF A VILLAGE DOCTOR 151

true, however, that it embraces practically all we know on the subject of heredity. And this is how it came about that Eloi, Jean Blin's little son, was an embodied intellect. He had the creative imagina- tion. Many a time, when he was no higher than my walking-stick, I have come across him playing truant with the village urchins. Whilst they were reaching after nests, I have watched the little fellow constructing model mills and miniature syphons with pipes of straw. Inventive and un- sociable he turned to nature. His schoolmaster despaired of ever making anything of so inatten- tive a child ; and, to tell the truth, at eight years old Eloi was still ignorant of his letters. But at that age he learned to read and write with astonishing rapidity, and in six months became the best scholar in the village.

" He was the most affectionate and the most clinging child. I gave him a few lessons in mathe- matics, and was astounded at the fertility that his mind displayed at this early age. In fact — I own it without any fear of being ridiculed, for in an old man cut off from civilization some exaggeration is pardonable — I rejoiced to have detected in this little peasant the premonitions of one of those enlightened spirits which at long intervals shine forth in the midst of our purblind race, and, impelled alike by the need of lavishing their affection and the desire

152 MOTHER OF PEARL

for knowledge, are bound to effect something useful or beautiful wherever fate may assign them a place.

" My mind was occupied with musings of this kind as far as Les Alies. Entering the low-ceiled room, I found little Eloi ensconced in the big bed with cotton hangings, to which no doubt his parents had removed him on account of the gravity of his condition. He was lethargic ; his head, though small and delicate, nevertheless made as great a dent in the pillow as if it had been of enormous weight. I stole near. His forehead was on fire ; there was a disquieting redness about the conjunctive mem- brane ; the temperature of the body was altogether too high. His mother and grandmother kept close to him, anxiously. Jean Blin, whose uneasiness prevented him from working, not knowing what to do, and being afraid to go away, stood with his hands in his pockets looking inquiringly first at one and then at another. The child turned his drawn face towards me, and scrutinizing me with an affectionate but heartbreaking glance, said in reply to my questions that his forehead and his eyes were both very painful, that he could hear noises which he knew were imaginary, and that he knew per- fectly well who I was, his dear old friend.

" * First he has shivering fits, and then he is feverishly hot/ said his mother.

MS. OF A VILLAGE DOCTOR 153

"Jean Blin, after ruminating for several minutes, remarked —

"* My belief is that what ails him is his inside.'

" Then he relapsed into silence.

" It had been only too easy for me to diagnose the symptoms of acute meningitis. I prescribed revulsive applications to the feet, and leeches behind the ears. I drew near to my little friend a second time, and tried to say something cheerful to him, more cheerful, alas ! than facts warranted. But I was suddenly aware of an entirely new personal experi- ence. Although I was completely self-possessed I seemed to see the sick child through a veil, and at such a distance that he appeared quite, quite small. This upsetting of my ideas of space was speedily followed by an analogous upheaval of my ideas of time. Although my visit had not lasted above five minutes, I received the impression that I had been in that low-ceiled room, in front of that bed with its white cotton hangings, for a long time, for a very long time, and that months and even years had rolled by whilst I was held motionless.

" By a mental effort which is perfectly natural to me, I there and then put these singular impressions under analysis, and the cause of them became quite clear to me. It was simple enough. Eloi was dear to me. At the sight of him so unexpectedly and so seriously ill I could not 'get my bearings.'

154 MOTHER OF PEARL

It is the popular phrase, and it is appropriate. Moments of anguish appear to us unnaturally long. That is why I received the impression that the five or six minutes I had passed beside Eloi had something interminable about them. As to the fancy that the child was at a distance from me, that came from the idea that I was about to lose him. This idea, impressed on me against my will, had from the first moment assumed a character of absolute certainty.

"The following day Eloi was in a less alarming condition. The improvement continued for several days. I had sent into the town to procure ice, and this had had a good effect. But on the fifth day I recognized that he was in violent delirium. He talked a great deal, and amongst the discon- nected words I heard him pouring out I could distinguish these —

" * The balloon ! the balloon ! I have hold of the helm of the balloon. It rises. The sky is inky. Mamma, mamma ! why won't you come with me ? I am steering my balloon to a place where it will be so beautiful ! Come, it is stifling here.'

"That day Jean Blin followed me up the road. He slouched along with that air of embarrassment a man has who wants to say something and is yet afraid to say it. At last, after walking some twenty

MS. OF A VILLAGE DOCTOR 155

paces with me in silence, he stopped, and laying his hand on my arm said —

" ' See here, Doctor, it's my belief that what ails the little chap is his inside.'

" I continued my way sorrowfully, and for the first time in my life my eagerness to see once more my pears and apricots did not avail to mend my pace. For the first time in forty years of practice I found the plight of one of my patients heart- rending, and in my inmost self 1 bewailed the child I was powerless to save.

" Distracting pangs soon came to magnify my grief. I feared that my treatment had contributed to the development of the disease. I caught myself forgetting in the morning what I had prescribed the night before, uncertain in my diagnosis, nervous, and worried. I called in one of my fellow-prac- titioners, a clever young fellow, who had a practice in the next village. When he arrived, the poor little fellow, whose sight was already gone, was plunged in a profound coma.

" The following day he died.

" A year having elapsed after this misfortune, it happened that I was called in consultation to the county town. The fact is singular. The causes which led up to it are extraordinary ; but as they have no connection with what I am relating, I do not record them here. After the consultation. Dr.

156 MOTHER OF PEARL

C , physician to the prefecture, did me the

honour to invite me to lunch with him and two other members of the profession. After lunch, where I found refreshment in conversation at once erudite and diversified, coffee was served to us in the doctor's sanctum. As I approached the mantel- piece to put down my empty cup, I saw hanging upon the mirror-frame a portrait which aroused in me so profound an emotion that it was with diffi- culty I refrained from crying out. It was a minia- ture, the portrait of a child. This child resembled in so striking a fashion the one I had been unable to cure — the child of whom I had been constantly thinking for a year past — that for a moment I could not avoid the thought that it was he himself. That supposition, however, was of course absurd. The black wooden frame, with the circlet of gold sur- rounding the miniature, proclaimed the taste of the end of the eighteenth century, and the child was depicted in a vest of pink and white striped mate- rial such as the little Louis XVII might have worn ; but the face was out-and-out the face of my little Eloi. The same forehead, imperious and powerful — the forehead of a man beneath the curls of a cherub ; the same fire in the eyes, the same suffer- ing grace on the lips ! Indeed, to the very same features was joined the identical expression !

"I had probably been examining this portrait for

MS. OF A VILLAGE DOCTOR 157

quite a long while when Dr. C , clapping me on

the shoulder, said —

" ' Ah, my friend, you have before you a family relic which I am proud to possess. My maternal grandfather was the friend of the illustrious man whom you see painted there in the days of his early boyhood, and it was from my grandfather that that miniature came into my possession.'

" I asked him to be good enough to tell me the name of his grandfather's illustrious friend. Upon this he unhooked the miniature and held it out to me :

"'See,' he said, 'on the exergue . . . Lyon, 1787. Doesn't that recall anything to you ? No ? Well, that child of twelve was the great Ampere.'

" Then, in a flash, I had an exact perception, an unequivocal estimate of what death had swept away one year previously in the farmhouse of Les Alies."

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER

TO PAUL ARENE

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER1 I

WAS born in seventeen hundred and seventy in the rural outskirts of a small town in the Langres district, where my father, half townsman and half peasant, dealt in cutlery and tended his orchards. In this place certain nuns, although they only educated girls, consented to teach me to read since I was but a child, and they were good friends of my mother. On leaving their hands I took lessons in Latin from a priest in the town, a shoemaker's son, well grounded in the humanities. In the summer the shade of some old chestnut-trees served as a schoolroom, and close beside his hives the Abbe Lamadou inter- preted Virgil's Georgics to me. I never dreamed that any one could be happier than I, and between my master and Mile. Rose, the farrier's daughter,

1 All the incidents in these memoirs are authentic, and may be traced to various documents of the eighteenth century. Not a single detail, however apparently insignificant, is made use of for which indubitable authority cannot be produced. (AUTHOR.) M 161

162 MOTHER OF PEARL

I lived in great contentment. But in this world no happiness is enduring. One morning, as my mother embraced me, she slipped an ecu of six livres into my coat pocket. My luggage was packed. My father leaped on his horse and, taking me up behind him, carried me off to the college at Langres. All the time the journey lasted I was dreaming of my own little room, scented towards autumn time with the perfume of the fruit stored up in the loft ; or of the close where my father took me on Sunday to gather apples from the trees he had grafted with his own hand ; of Rose, of my sisters, of my mother ; even of myself, unhappy exile ! I could feel my heart thump, and it was with difficulty that I held back the tears which filled my eyelids. At length, after five hours' journey, we reached the town and set foot to ground in front of a huge door, on which I read with a shudder the word College. The principal, Father Feval, of the Oratory, received us in a big saloon with whitewashed walls. He was still a young man, of impressive appearance, and I found his smile reassuring. On all such occasions my father had displayed a naturalness, vivacity, and candour which never deserted him.

" Reverend Father," he said, placing his hand on me, " I bring you here my only son. His name is Pierre, after his godfather, and Aubier, his father's name, which I have handed on to him as stainless

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER 163

as I received it from my late dear father. Pierre is my only boy ; his mother, Madeleine Ordalu, having presented me with one son and three daughters, whom I am bringing up to the best of my ability. To my daughters will fall the lot which it shall please God in the first place, and later on their husbands, to assign to them. They are said to be pretty, and I can't help believing it myself. But beauty is only a gay deceiver which it is best not to take into account. They will be handsome enough if they are only good enough. As to my son Pierre here before you (as he pro- nounced these words my father put his hand so heavily on my shoulder that he made me flinch), provided that he fears God and knows enough Latin, he is to be a priest. Very humbly then, reverend father, I beg you to examine him at your leisure, so as to ascertain his genuine capacities. If you find any merit in him, let him remain with you. I will willingly pay whatever is needful. If, on the contrary, you consider that you can make nothing of him, send me word, and I will come and fetch him away at once, and teach him how to make knives like his father. For I am a cutler, at your service, reverend sir."

Father Feval agreed to undertake what was asked of him. And upon this assurance, my father took leave of the principal and of me also. As he

164 MOTHER OF PEARL

was very moved, and had some trouble to restrain his sobs, he assumed a stiff and harsh expression, and under the semblance of a farewell embrace be- stowed a terrific thump. When he was gone, Father Feval drew me away from the parlour into a garden surrounded by a thick hedge. Then, as we passed beneath the shade of the trees, he said

to me —

" O silvai dulces umbras frondosai ! " x

I was fortunate enough to recognize in these archaic inflexions and ponderous prosody a line from old Ennius, and I replied glibly to Father Feval that Virgil was even more worthy than his antique predecessor to celebrate the beauty of these cool shades, frigus opacum. The principal seemed quite gratified at this compliment. He questioned me benevolently upon some rudimentary points, and when he had heard my replies —

" That will do," he said. " If you work hard, very hard indeed, you will be able to keep up with the fourth class. Come with me. I should like to introduce you myself to your master and your fellow-pupils."

Whilst our little walk lasted, my forlornness had somewhat abated, and I was conscious of feeling supported in my distress. But no sooner did I

O leafy woods diffusing grateful shade !

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER 165

find myself surrounded by my class-feliows and in the presence of Monsieur Joursanvault, my master, than I sank back into abject despair. Monsieur Joursanvault was neither easy of access nor the possessor of the principal's fine simplicity. He appeared to me very much more impressed with his own importance, and also more harsh and re- served. He was a little man with a big head, and his words found egress with a whistling noise between two white lips and four yellow teeth. I decided immediately that such a mouth as his was never intended to pronounce the name Lavinia, a name which I loved even better than that of Rose. For I may as well own it, the idyllic and royal fiancee of the unfortunate Turnus had been decked by my imagination with the most august charms. The ideal image I had formed of her sufficed to eclipse the more everyday beauty of the farrier's daughter. Monsieur Joursanvault then, the master of the fourth class, pleased me little enough. My class-fellows inspired me with fear : they had every appearance of being unspeakably venturesome, and it was not without reason that I dreaded that my simplicity might goad them to ridicule. I was very much inclined to cry.

Self-respect, a more powerful emotion than my grief, alone enabled me to restrain my tears.

When evening came, I left the college and went

1 66 MOTHER OF PEARL

off into the town in search of the quarters which my father had bespoken for me. I was to lodge with five other scholars at the house of an artisan, whose wife would do our cooking. Every month each of us paid him twenty-five sous.

At the outset my schoolfellows tried to tease me about my ill-cut clothes and my rustic appearance, but they gave up their efforts when they saw that they did not vex me. One of their number alone, the consumptive son of a lawyer, continued in- solently to imitate my lumpish, awkward carriage, but I punished him with a fist so unexpectedly weighty that he was not disposed to resume his performance. Monsieur Joursanvault did not take very kindly to me, but as I fulfilled my tasks with regularity, I provided him with no occasion for punishment. As he displayed his authority in a violent, uncertain, and irritating fashion, he invited rebellion, and, as a matter of fact, there were several mutinous episodes in his class in which I, however, took no part. One day, as I was walking in the garden with the principal, who showed himself very kindly disposed to me^ unluckily it came into my head to boast to him of my good conduct.

" Father," said I, " I took no part in the last escapade."

"There's nothing to boast about in that," re-

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER 167

plied Father Feval, with a touch of contempt which rent my heart.

He hated meanness above everything in the world. I made up my mind as he spoke never again to say or do anything despicable. And if from that day forward I have managed to keep free from lying and mean-spiritedness, I owe it entirely to that excellent man.

Monsieur Feval was in no respect a philosopher- priest ; he exercised the virtues, but not the doc- trines, of Rousseau's Vicaire Savoyard. He believed everything a priest ought to believe. But he had a horror of mummery, and could not endure the idea of demanding the interposition of God in trifling affairs. This appeared clearly enough on the Christmas Day when Monsieur Joursanvault came to him with a complaint against the impious jesters who, on the eve of the festival, had put ink in the holy water stoups.

The scandalized Joursanvault mumbled anathe- mas, and murmured—

"There is no disputing the fact, it is a black deed ! "

" By reason of the ink," replied our good princi- pal calmly.

That upright man regarded weakness as the direct source of all ills. He often said : "Lucifer and the rebellious angels erred through pride, it

168 MOTHER OF PEARL

is on that account that even in hell they have not ceased to hold rank as princes and kings, and to maintain an awful supremacy over the souls of the damned. If they had fallen through pettiness, in the midst of the flames they would now be the laughing-stock and sport of sinners, and the em- pery of evil would have slipped from their dis- honoured hands."

When the holidays came round it was a great joy to me to see my home once more. But I found it unaccountably shrunken. As I entered, my mother, bending over the hearth, was skim- ming the soup-kettle. She, too, my dear mother, seemed strangely diminutive to me, and I sobbed as I flung my arms round her.

With the skimmer in her hand she told me how age and trouble had rendered my father inactive, so that he was no longer able to look after his orchard ; how my eldest sister was promised in marriage to the cooper's son ; how the sacristan of the parish had been found dead in his chamber, with a bottle in his hand, which his stark fingers clutched so firmly by the neck that it was thought at first that it could never be loosened from his hold. Yet it was scarcely decent to bear the sacristan's body to the church still grasping his bottle of wish-wash. As I listened to my mother a clear realization of the flight of time and the

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER 169

passing of things temporal for the first time reached my brain. I fell into a sort of reverie.

"Well, well, my boy," said my mother, "you look flourishing. Why, with your dimity jacket, you are already the very spit of a little curt"

At this moment Mademoiselle Rose came into the room, blushing and feigning to be completely surprised at the sight of me. 1 saw that she was interested in me, and felt secretly flattered. But in her presence I assumed the grave and reserved demeanour of the ecclesiastic. The greater part of these holidays I spent in walks with Monsieur Lamadou.

It had been agreed between us that we should talk nothing but Latin. So we went our ways through the midst of the lowly tasks of the tillers of the soil, with nature riotous around us, side by side, straight before us, grave, serious, guileless, disdainful of such utterly vain and common pleasures as we had knowledge of.

I returned to the college with the firm deter- mination to take Holy Orders. Already I could see myself, like Monsieur Lamadou, wearing a great three-cornered hat and a cassock, with black breeches, woollen stockings, and buckled shoes, occupied now with the eloquence of Cicero, now with the doctrine of St. Augustine, and gravely acknowledging the salutes of the women and the

i yo MOTHER OF PEARL

poor folk who bowed to me as I threaded my way through the crowd. Alas ! a woman's shadow began to disturb this peaceful dream. Up to that time I had known nothing of women, except Lavinia in the Mneld and Mademoiselle Rose. Then I realized Dido, and flames seemed to rush through my veins. The image of the unhappy Queen, who, tortured by an irremediable wound, wandered in the forest of myrtles, bent at night over my troubled couch.

Moreover, if I walked out in the evening, I seemed to be aware of her dead white figure glid- ing between the bushes in the woods as the moon passes through the midst of the clouds. Obsessed by this dazzling image, I began to waver about taking Orders. Nevertheless, I assumed the dress of the ecclesiastic, which suited me admirably. When I visited my home for the first time thus attired, my mother curtsied to me, and Rose hid her face in her apron and wept. Then turning on me her lovely eyes, as pellucid as her tears, she said —

" I can't think what I am crying about, Monsieur Pierre ! "

In this mood she was touching. But she did not in the least resemble the moon seen through the clouds. I did not love her ; it was Dido I loved.

That year was signalized to me by a dreadful

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER 171

calamity. I lost my father, who sank very suddenly under an attack of water on the chest.

In his last moments he adjured his children to live honestly and piously, and blessed them. He died with a degree of resignation which was not in the least consonant with his character. It appeared to be without regret, with cheerfulness even, that he quitted a life to which he was strongly attached by all the bonds of a nature essentially vivacious. From him I learnt that it is easier to die than one would think, if one is but a good man.

I resolved that I, in my turn, would act a father's part to those elder sisters already marriageable, and to that tearful mother who, year by year, seemed to grow smaller, weaker, and more appealing.

Thus, then, in one moment, from a child I became a man. I finished my studies at the Oratory under excellent masters — Fathers Lance, Porriquet, and Marion, who had buried themselves in a wild and remote province to devote their brilliant facul- ties and a profound erudition which would have done honour to the Academy of Inscriptions to the education of a few poor children. The principal surpassed them all in loftiness of intellect and beauty of soul.

Whilst I was finishing my philosophical studies under those eminent teachers, a widespread rumour was conveyed to our distant province, and even

1 72 MOTHER OF PEARL

penetrated the cloistral walls of the college. There was gossip about a convocation of the States General, and reforms were clamoured for, and great changes expected. Some of the new publications which our masters permitted us to read proclaimed the approaching return of the Golden Age.

When the moment came for me to leave the college, I wept as I embraced Father FeVal.

He held me clasped in his arms with profound emotion. Then he led me to the hedge-sheltered path where six years previously I had had my first conversation with him.

There, taking me by the hand, he bent over me, and looked into my eyes and said —

" Remember, dear child, that without principle intellect goes for nothing. You will perhaps live long enough to see the dawn of a new regime in this land of ours. These great changes cannot be brought about without disturbances. May you bear in mind in the midst of them what I am tell- ing you now : in difficult situations intellect is but a sorry shield : virtue alone can suffice to safe- guard him who merits safety."

Whilst he discoursed in this vein we emerged from the arbour, and the sun, already low on the horizon, bathed him in its warm crimson rays and lit up his handsome, thoughtful countenance. I was fortunate enough to retain a vivid impression

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER 173

of his words, which struck me forcibly, although at the time they were a little above my head. At that date I was only a schoolboy, and not a very brilliant one. Since then my eyes have been opened to the profundity and truth of his maxims by the terrible object-lesson of subsequent events.

II

HAD abandoned the idea of taking Orders. It was necessary to earn a livelihood. I had not learnt Latin with the idea of making cutlery in the suburbs of a small town. 1 indulged in ambitious dreams. Our little holding, our cows, our garden, were far from equal to the fulfilment of my ambitions. I dis- covered rusticity in Mademoiselle Rose. My mother conceived that a town such as Paris was necessary to the full development of my abilities. Without much difficulty I myself came to a similar conclusion. I ordered a coat from the best tailor in Langres. With this coat went a steel-hilted sword, which threw back the skirts and invested one with so smart an air that I doubted nothing I was on the road to fortune. Father Feval gave me a letter of recommendation to the Due de Puybonne, and on the I2th of July, in the year of grace 1789, I climbed into the coach, not without tears, laden with Latin books, cakes, bacon, and kisses. I entered Paris by the Faubourg St.

*74

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER 175

Antoine, which appeared to me more hideous than the most squalid hamlets in my own province. With all my heart I bewailed both the unhappy folk who had their dwelling there and myself who had forsaken my father's house and orchard land to seek advancement amidst such a tatterdemalion crew. A wine merchant who had been my fellow- traveller explained, however, that these people were all in ecstasies over the destruction of an old prison known as the Bastille-St. -Antoine. He assured me that Monsieur Necker would soon bring back the Golden Age. But a wigmaker, who overheard our conversation, declared that, on the contrary, unless the King speedily dismissed him, Monsieur Necker would ruin the country.

"The Revolution," he added, "is a terrible misfortune. Nobody now dresses his hair. And people who neglect that duty are below the level of the beasts."

These words angered the wine merchant.

" Know, master barber," he interposed, " that a rejuvenescent race disdains idle trappings. I would punish you for your impertinence, if I had time to do so ; but I am on my way to supply wine to Monsieur Bailly, the Mayor of Paris, who honours me with his friendship."

In this fashion they parted ; and as for me, I betook myself on foot, with my Latin books, my

1 76 MOTHER OF PEARL

bacon, and the memory of my mother's kisses to the house of the Due de Puybonne, to present my letter of recommendation. His mansion was situated at the other end of the city in the Rue de Crenelle. The passers-by vied with one another in supplying me with directions, for the Duke was celebrated for his benevolence.

He received me cordially. Everything in his dress and in his manners was of the utmost sim- plicity. He had that contented demeanour which one only meets with in men who labour assiduously without being compelled.

He read Father Feval's letter, and remarked —

" This is a satisfactory letter of recommendation, but what are your acquirements ? "

I replied that I was acquainted with Latin, a little Greek, ancient history, rhetoric, and poetry.

" What a list of accomplishments ! " he rejoined, smiling. "But it would have been more to the point if you had had some notion of agriculture, the mechanical arts, commerce, banking, and in- dustry. You are acquainted with the laws of Solon, now, I'll wager ?"

I signified that I was.

"Very good, very good. But you know nothing about the English constitution. But no matter. You are young, and of an age to acquire knowledge. I will give you a place about my person, with an

iMEMOlRS OF A VOLUNTEER 177

allowance of five hundred ecus. Monsieur Mille, my secretary, will instruct you as to the duties I shall expect you to perform. Au revoir, mon- sieur."

A lackey conducted me to Monsieur Mille, who was writing at a table in the middle of a spacious white apartment. He signalled to me to wait. He was a little roundabout man, and his appear- ance was pleasant, but he rolled his eyes about ferociously, and seemed to be scolding under his breath as he wrote.

1 heard him give utterance to the following words : " Tyrants, fetters, hell, man, Rome, slavery, liberty."1 I concluded he was mad. But when he had laid his pen aside he nodded his head to me and smiled.

"Well?" he said. "You are examining the apartment. It is as severe as that of an ancient Roman. No gilding on the panels, no fal-lals on the mantelpiece ; nothing is left to remind us of the detestable times of the late king, nothing remains that is derogatory to the dignity of a free man («» homme libre]. Libre ^ Tibre. I must jot that rhyme down. It's a good one, now, isn't it ? 'Are you fond of verse, Monsieur Pierre Aubier ? "

I replied that I was only too much devoted to it,

1 " Tyrans, fers, enfers^ homme, Rome, esclavage, liberte" Mon- sieur Mille is, of course, engaged in a search for rhymes. (Ta^xs.)

178 MOTHER OF PEARL

and that it would have served me better when I presented myself before the Duke if I had pre- ferred Mr. Burke to Virgil.

" Virgil is a great man," replied Monsieur Mille. " But what is your opinion of Monsieur Chenier ? For my part I know nothing finer than his Charles IX. I will not attempt to conceal from you that I am myself experimenting in tragedy, and at the very moment you entered I was finish- ing a scene with which I am not a little pleased. You appear to me to be a very trustworthy person. I am quite willing to confide in you so far as to tell you what my tragedy is about, but you mustn't breathe a word. You realize how far-reaching the least indiscretion might be. I am composing a tragedy upon the subject of Lucretia."

Then taking up a large manuscript book he read out : " Lucretia, a tragedy in five acts, dedicated to Louis the Well Beloved, the restorer of liberty to France"

He spouted some two hundred lines to me and then broke off, saying in excuse that the remainder was as yet uncorrected.

"The Duke's post-bag," he said with a sigh, "robs me of the best hours of the day. We are in correspondence with all the enlightened men in England, Switzerland, and America. And talking of this, I may tell you, Monsieur Aubier, that

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER 179

your employment will consist of copying and classifying letters. If you would like to be in- formed without delay as to the matters which are occupying our attention at this very moment, I will tell you. At Puybonne we are superintending a farm where certain English experts have been engaged to introduce into France such agricultural improvements as have been attained in Great Britain. We are importing from Spain a number of those silky-fleeced sheep the flocks of which have enriched Segovia with their wool. This is so arduous an undertaking that we have been compelled to enlist the co-operation of the King himself. Lastly, we are buying cows in Switzerland to present to our dependents.

" I can say nothing on the subject of our corre- spondence upon public affairs. Entire secrecy is preserved as to that. But you are, of course, aware that the efforts of the Due de Puybonne are directed towards the introduction into France of the English constitutional system. Pardon my leaving you, Monsieur Aubier. I am due at the Comedie Fran^aise. Alzire is to be performed."

That night I slept in fine linen sheets, and I did not sleep well. 1 dreamed that my mother's bees were flying over the ruins of the Bastille and around the Due dc Puybonne, who smiled graciously, and was enveloped in an unearthly radiance.

180 MOTHER OF PEARL

The following morning at an early hour I betook myself to Monsieur Mille's room, and asked him if he had enjoyed himself at the theatre. He replied ihat he ventured to believe that the performance of Ahdre had given him a clue to some of the methods by which Monsieur de Voltaire stirred the emotions of his audience. Then he set me to work copying letters referring to the purchase of the Swiss cows, which the generous magnate was bestowing on his dependents. Whilst I occupied myself with this task, Monsieur Mille said to me —

"The Duke is kind-hearted. I have recorded his benevolent disposition in certain verses with which I am not ill-pleased. Are you acquainted with the Puybonne estate ? No ! It is a domain of enchantment. My lines may open your eyes to its charms. I will recite them to you —

Delightful valley, haven of repose,

Groves ever verdant, where the limpid stream

Peacefully onward flows,

Whose dulcet murmurings seem

Like note of birds, chanting their amorous woes ;

How my heart thrills your rural charms to view,

And longings seize me, 'neath your sheltering boughs

Her cherished name i' the beech's bark to hew.

In this fair spot our Puybonne reigns,

And uprightness and charity

Silently bear him company,

His spirit our happiness sustains.

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER 181

The frolic shepherds, at his call, Under the elms together come, Who to his bounty, one and all, Owe flocks, and herds, and home." l

I was astounded. At Langres I had never heard anything so courtly, and I was impressed with the fact that the air of Paris contained a something inexpressible, which it was useless to seek else- where.

After dinner I set out to inspect the principal edifices of the town. The genius of art has spent two centuries in distributing his treasures on the glorious banks of the Seine. Hitherto I had only been acquainted with Gothic castles and churches, and their melancholy character, tinged with un-

1 Vallon delicieux, asile du repos, Bocages toujours verts, oft 1'onde la plus pure

Roule paisiblement ses flots,

Et vient meler son doux murmure

Aux tendres concerts des oiseaux, Que mon cceur est emu de vos beautes champctres ! Que j'aime a confier, sous ces riants berceaux, Le doux nom d'une nymphe a 1'ecorce des hetres.

De ces beaux lieux Puybonne est possesscur ; Avec lui la bonte, la douce bienfaisancc, Dans ce palais habite en silence : Le sentiment y retient le bonheur. Puybonne enseigne aux folatres bergeres

A s'assembler sous les ormeaux, II se mele parfois a leurs danses legeres, Puis il leur donne des troupeaux.

182 MOTHER OF PEARL

couthness, only awakens displeasing thoughts in the mind. Paris, it is true, still contains a certain number of these barbaric structures. The cathedral itself, which rises in that quarter of the town to which the term City is specially assigned, bears witness by the irregularity and confusion of its plan to the ignorance of the age in which it was erected. Parisians overlook its hideousness on the score of its antiquity. Father Feval was accus- tomed to say that everything antique is worthy of respect.

But what a different aspect do the buildings of the more cultured ages present ! A regularity in plan, an exact proportion between the component parts, an uncrowded arrangement in the grouping, and then the charm of the various orders copied from the antique — all these qualities dazzle one in the creations of modern architects, and all unite to render the colonnade of the Louvre a master- piece worthy of France and its kings. Ah, what a town is Paris ! Monsieur Mille showed me the theatre where the finest actresses in the world ally their voices and their charms to the inspired com- positions of Mozart and Gluck. And in addition, he even took me to the gardens of the Luxem- bourg, where beneath the shade of venerable trees I saw Raynal walking side by side with Dussaulx. Ah, my honoured principal, my master, my father,

MEMOIRS OF A VOLUNTEER 183

my beloved Monsieur Feval ! Would that you were witness to the joy, the rapture of your pupil, your son !

For six weeks I led the pleasantest of lives. All around me I heard talk of the return of the Golden Age, and I began to believe in the approach of the car bearing Saturn and Rhea within it. In the mornings, under Monsieur Mille's direction, I made copies of letters.

Monsieur Mille was a boon companion, always smiling, always uttering flowery speeches, always volatile as a zephyr.

After dinner I would read a few pages of the Encyclopaedia to our worthy employer, and then I was free till the following morning. One night I went with Monsieur Mille to supper at the Porcherons. At the entrance of this place of amuse- ment stood a group of women wearing the national colours in their caps, and carrying flowers in a basket. One of them, approaching me, took me by the arm and said, " See, little master, I make you a present of this bunch of roses."

I blushed, and was at a loss what to say in reply. But Monsieur Mille, who knew the ways of the town, said to me —

" You must give a