whouses
a
name
that
is
mighty
and
full
of
majesty
,
although
familiar
.
“
Always
the
devil
!
”
repeated
Marcellin
.
“
For
the
world
is
always
of
men
.
”
His
meaning
this
time
lay
too
deep
for
her
,
and
passed
her
;
she
stood
leaning
against
the
poplar
,
with
her
head
bent
and
her
form
motionless
in
the
sunlight
like
a
statue
of
bronze
.
“
If
men
be
devils
they
are
my
brethren
,
”
she
said
suddenly
:
“
why
do
they
then
so
hate
me
?
”
The
old
man
stroked
his
beard
.
“
Because
Fraternity
is
Hate
.
Cain
said
so
;
but
God
would
not
believe
him
.
”
She
mused
over
the
saying
;
silent
still
.
The
lark
dropped
down
from
heaven
,
suddenly
falling
through
the
air
,
mute
.
It
had
been
struck
by
a
sparrow‐hawk
,
which
flashed
black
against
the
azure
of
the
skies
and
the
white
haze
of
the
atmosphere
;
and
which
flew
down
in
the
track
of
the
lark
and
seized
it
ere
it
gained
the
shelter
of
the
grass
and
bore
it
away
within
his
talons
.
Marcellin
pointed
to
it
with
his
pipe‐stem
.
“
You
see
there
are
many
forms
of
the
‘possible’
”
—
“
When
it
means
Death
,
”
she
added
.
The
old
man
took
his
pipe
back
and
smoked
.
“
Of‐course
—
Death
is
the
key‐note
of
creation
.
”
Again
she
did
not
comprehend
;
a
puzzled
pain
clouded
the
lustre
of
her
eyes
.
“
But
the
lark
praised
God
—
why
should
it
be
so
dealt
with
?
”
Marcellin
smiled
grimly
.
“
Abel
was
praising
God
;
but
that
did
not
turn
aside
the
steel
.
”
She
was
silent
yet
again
;
he
had
told
her
that
old
story
of
the
sons
born
of
Eve
,
and
the
one
whom
,
hearing
it
,
she
had
understood
and
pitied
had
been
Cain
.
At
that
moment
,
through
the
roadway
that
wound
across
the
meadows
and
through
the
corn
lands
and
the
trees
,
there
came
in
sight
a
gleam
of
scarlet
that
was
not
from
the
poppies
,
a
flash
of
silver
that
was
not
from
the
river
,
a
column
of
smoke
that
was
not
from
the
weeds
that
burned
on
the
hillside
.
There
came
a
cloud
,
with
a
melodious
murmur
softly
rising
from
it
:
a
cloud
that
moved
between
the
high
flowering
hedges
,
the
tall
amber
wheat
,
the
slender
poplars
,
and
the
fruitful
orchards
;
a
cloud
that
grew
larger
and
clearer
as
it
drew
more
near
to
them
,
and
left
the
green
water
meadows
and
winding
field
paths
for
the
great
high
road
.
It
was
a
procession
of
the
Church
.
It
drew
closer
and
closer
by
slow
imperceptible
degrees
,
until
it
approached
them
;
the
old
man
sat
upright
,
not
taking
his
cap
from
his
head
nor
his
pipe
from
his
mouth
;
the
young
girl
cease
to
lean
for
rest
against
the
tree
,
and
stood
with
her
arms
crossed
on
her
breast
.
The
Church
passed
them
;
the
great
gilt
crucifix
held
aloft
,
the
scarlet
and
the
white
of
the
robes
catch‐
ing
the
sunlight
;
the
silver
chains
and
silver
censers
gleaming
;
the
fresh
young
voices
of
the
singing
children
cleaving
the
air
like
a
rush
of
wind
;
the
dark
shorn
faces
of
the
priests
bowed
over
open
books
,
the
tender
sound
of
the
bells
ringing
across
the
low
deep
monotony
of
prayer
.
The
Church
passed
them
;
the
dust
of
the
parched
road
rose
up
in
a
choking
mass
;
the
heavy
mist
of
the
incense
hung
darkly
on
the
sunlit
air
;
the
tramp
of
the
many
feet
startled
the
birds
from
their
rest
,
and
pierced
through
the
noonday
silence
.
It
passed
them
,
and
left
them
behind
it
;
but
the
fresh
leaves
were
choked
and
whitened
;
the
birds
were
fluttered
and
affrightened
;
the
old
man
coughed
,
the
girl
strove
to
brush
the
dust
motes
from
her
smarting
eyelids
.
“
That
is
the
Church
!
”
said
the
stone‐breaker
,
with
a
smile
.
“
Dust
—
terror
—
a
choked
voice
—
and
blinded
eyes
.
”
Now
she
understood
;
and
her
beautiful
curled
lips
laughed
mutely
.
The
old
man
rammed
some
more
tobacco
into
the
bowl
of
his
pipe
.
“
That
is
the
Church
!
”
he
said
.
“
To
burn
incense
and
pray
for
rain
,
and
to
fell
the
forests
that
were
the
rainmakers
.
”
The
procession
passed
away
out
of
sight
,
going
along
the
highway
and
winding
by
the
course
of
the
river
,
calling
to
the
bright
blue
heavens
for
rain
;
whilst
the
little
bells
rang
and
the
incense
curled
and
the
priest
prayed
themselves
hoarse
,
and
the
peasants
toiled
footsore
,
and
the
eager
steps
of
the
choral
children
trod
the
tiny
gnat
dead
in
the
grasses
and
the
bright
butterfly
dead
in
the
dust
.
The
priests
had
cast
a
severer
look
from
out
their
down‐dropped
eyelids
;
the
children
had
huddled
together
,
with
their
voices
faltering
a
little
;
and
the
boy
choristers
had
shot
out
their
lips
in
gestures
of
defiance
and
opprobrium
as
they
had
passed
these
twain
beneath
the
wayside
trees
.
For
the
two
were
both
outcasts
.
“
Didst
thou
see
the
man
that
killed
the
king
?
”
whispered
to
another
one
fair
and
curly‐headed
baby
,
who
was
holding
in
the
sun
her
little
,
white
,
silver‐fringed
banner
,
and
catching
the
rise
and
fall
of
the
sonorous
chaunt
as
well
as
she
could
with
her
little
,
lisping
tones
.
“
Didst
thou
see
the
daughter
of
the
devil
?
”
muttered
to
another
a
handsome
golden
brown
boy
,
who
had
left
his
herd
untended
in
the
meadow
to
don
his
scarlet
robes
and
swing
about
the
censer
of
his
village
chapel
.
And
they
all
sang
louder
,
and
tossed
more
incense
on
high
,
and
marched
more
closely
together
under
the
rays
of
the
gleaming
crucifix
as
they
went
;
feeling
that
they
had
been
beneath
the
shadow
of
the
powers
of
darkness
,
and
that
they
were
purer
and
holier
and
more
exalted
,
because
they
had
thus
passed
by
in
scorn
what
was
accursed
with
psalms
on
their
lips
,
with
the
cross
as
their
symbol
.
So
they
went
their
way
through
the
peaceful
country
with
a
glory
of
sunbeams
about
them
—
through
the
corn
,
past
the
orchards
,
by
the
river
,
into
the
heart
of
the
old
brown
,
quiet
town
,
and
about
the
foot
of
the
great
cathedral
,
where
they
kneeled
down
int
he
dust
and
prayed
,
then
rose
and
sang
the
“
Angelus
.
”
Then
,
the
tall
dark‐visaged
priest
,
who
had
led
them
all
thither
under
the
standard
of
the
golden
crucifix
,
lifted
his
voice
alone
and
implored
God
,
and
exhorted
man
;
implored
for
rain
and
all
the
blessings
of
harvest
,
exhorted
to
patience
and
the
imitation
of
God
.
The
people
were
moved
and
saddened
,
and
listened
,
smiting
their
breasts
;
and
after
a
while
rising
from
their
knees
,
many
of
them
in
tears
,
dispersed
and
went
their
ways
,
muttering
to
one
another
:
—
“
We
have
had
no
such
harvests
as
those
of
old
since
the
men
that
slew
a
saint
came
to
dwell
here
;
”
and
answering
to
one
another
:
—
“
We
had
never
such
droughts
as
these
in
the
sweet
cool
weather
of
old
,
before
the
offspring
of
hell
was
amongst
us
.
”
For
the
priests
had
not
said
to
them
,
“
Lo
!
your
mercy
is
parched
as
the
earth
,
and
your
hearts
as
the
heavens
are
brazen
.
”
CHAPTER
II
.
IN
the
days
of
his
youngest
youth
,
in
the
old
drunken
days
that
were
dead
,
this
old
stone‐breaker
Marcellin
had
known
such
life
as
it
is
given
to
few
men
to
know
—
a
life
of
the
soul
and
the
senses
;
a
life
of
storm
and
delight
;
a
life
mad
with
blood
and
wine
;
a
life
of
divinest
dreams
;
a
life
when
women
kissed
them
,
and
bade
them
slay
;
a
life
when
mothers
blessed
them
and
bade
them
die
;
a
life
,
strong
,
awful
,
splendid
,
unutterable
;
a
life
seized
at
its
fullest
and
fiercest
and
fairest
,
out
of
an
air
that
was
death
,
off
an
earth
that
was
hell
.
When
his
cheeks
had
had
a
boy’s
bloom
and
his
curls
a
boy’s
gold
he
had
seen
a
nation
in
delirium
;
he
had
been
one
of
the
elect
of
a
people
;
he
had
uttered
the
words
that
burn
,
and
wrought
the
acts
that
live
;
he
had
been
of
the
Thousand
of
Marsala
;
and
he
had
been
of
the
avengers
in
Thermidor
:
he
had
raised
his
flute‐like
voice
from
the
tribune
,
and
he
had
cast
in
his
vote
for
the
death
of
a
king
;
passions
had
been
his
playthings
,
and
he
had
toyed
with
life
as
a
child
with
a
match
;
he
had
beheld
the
despised
enthroned
in
power
,
and
desolation
left
within
kings’
palaces
;
he
too
had
been
fierce
,
and
glad
,
and
cruel
,
and
gay
,
and
drunken
,
and
proud
,
as
the
whole
land
was
;
he
had
seen
the
white
beauty
of
the
royal
women
bare
in
the
hands
of
the
mob
,
and
the
throats
that
princes
had
caressed
kissed
by
the
broad
steel
knife
;
he
had
had
his
youth
in
a
wondrous
time
,
when
all
men
had
been
gods
or
devils
,
and
all
women
martyrs
or
furies
.
And
now
,
—
he
broke
stones
to
get
daily
bread
,
and
those
who
passed
him
by
cursed
him
,
saying
:
“
This
man
slew
a
king
.
”
For
he
had
outlived
his
time
,
and
the
life
that
had
been
golden
and
red
at
its
dawn
was
now
grey
and
pale
as
the
ashes
of
a
fire
grown
cold
;
for
in
all
the
list
of
the
world’s
weary
errors
there
is
no
mistake
so
deadly
as
age
.
Years
before
,
in
such
hot
summer
weather
as
this
,
against
which
the
Church
had
prayed
,
the
old
man
,
going
homewards
to
his
little
cabin
amidst
the
fields
,
had
met
a
little
child
coming
straight
towards
him
in
the
full
crimson
glow
of
the
setting
sun
,
and
with
the
flame
of
the
poppies
all
around
her
.
He
hardly
knew
why
he
looked
at
her
,
but
when
he
had
once
looked
his
eyes
rested
there
.
She
had
the
hues
of
his
youth
about
her
;
in
that
blood‐red
light
,
amongst
the
blood‐red
flowers
,
she
made
him
think
of
women’s
forms
that
he
had
seen
in
all
their
grace
and
their
voluptuous
loveliness
clothed
in
the
red
garment
of
death
,
and
standing
on
the
dusky
red
of
the
scaffold
as
the
burning
mornings
of
the
summers
of
slaughter
had
risen
over
the
land
.
The
child
was
all
alone
before
him
in
that
intense
glow
as
of
fire
;
above
her
there
was
a
tawny
sky
,
flushed
here
and
there
with
purple
;
around
her
stretched
the
solitary
level
of
the
fields
burnt
yellow
as
gold
by
the
long
mouths
of
heat
.
There
were
stripes
on
her
shoulders
blue
and
black
from
the
marks
of
a
thong
.
He
looked
at
her
,
and
stopped
her
,
why
he
hardly
knew
,
except
that
a
look
about
her
,
beaten
but
yet
unsubdued
,
attracted
him
.
He
had
seen
the
look
of
yore
in
the
years
of
his
youth
,
on
the
faces
of
the
nobles
he
hated
.
“
Have
you
been
hurt
?
”
he
asked
her
in
his
harsh
,
strong
voice
.
She
put
her
heavy
load
of
faggots
down
and
stared
at
him
.
“
Hurt
?
”
She
echoed
the
word
stupidly
.
No
one
ever
thought
she
could
be
hurt
;
what
was
done
to
her
was
punishment
and
justice
.
“
Yes
.
Those
stripes
—
they
must
be
painful
?
”
She
gave
a
gesture
of
assent
with
her
head
,
but
she
did
not
answer
.
“
Who
beat
you
?
”
he
pursued
.
A
cloud
of
passion
swept
over
her
beat
face
.
“
Flamma
.
”
“
You
were
wicked
?
”
“
They
said
so
.
”
“
And
what
do
you
do
when
you
are
beaten
?
”
“
I
shut
my
mouth
.
”
“
For
what
?
”
“
For
fear
they
should
know
it
hurt
me
—
and
be
glad
.
”
Marcellin
leaned
on
his
elm
stick
,
and
fastened
on
her
his
keen
passionless
eyes
with
a
look
which
,
for
him
who
shunned
and
was
shunned
by
all
his
kind
,
was
almost
sympathy
.
“
Come
to
my
hut
,
”
he
said
to
her
.
“
I
know
a
herb
that
will
take
the
fret
and
the
ache
out
of
your
bruises
.
”
The
child
followed
him
passively
,
half
stupidly
;
he
was
the
first
creature
that
had
ever
bidden
her
go
with
him
,
and
this
rough
pity
of
his
was
sweet
to
her
,
with
an
amazing
incredible
balm
in
it
which
only
those
can
know
who
see
raised
against
them
every
man’s
hand
,
and
hear
on
their
ears
the
mockery
of
all
the
voices
of
their
world
.
Under
reviling
,
and
contempt
,
and
constant
rejection
,
she
had
become
savage
as
a
trapped
hawk
,
wild
as
an
escaped
panther
;
but
to
him
she
was
obedient
and
passive
,
because
he
had
spoken
to
her
without
a
taunt
and
without
a
curse
,
which
until
now
had
been
the
sole
two
forms
of
human
speech
that
she
had
heard
.
His
little
hut
was
in
the
midst
of
those
spreading
cornfields
,
set
where
two
pathways
crossed
each
other
,
and
stretched
down
the
gentle
slope
of
the
cultured
lands
to
join
the
great
highway
—
a
hut
of
stones
and
plaited
rushes
,
with
of
roof
of
thatch
,
where
the
old
republican
,
hardy
of
frame
and
born
of
a
toiling
race
,
dwelt
in
solitude
,
and
broke
his
scanty
bitter
bread
without
lament
,
if
without
content
.
He
took
some
leaves
of
a
simple
herb
that
he
knew
,
soaked
them
with
water
,
and
bound
them
on
her
shoulders
,
not
ungently
,
though
his
hand
was
so
rough
with
labour
,
and
,
as
men
said
,
had
been
so
often
red
with
carnage
.
Then
he
gave
her
a
draught
of
goat’s
milk
,
sweet
and
fresh
,
from
a
wooden
bowl
;
shared
with
her
the
dry
black
crusts
that
formed
his
only
evening
meal
;
bestowed
on
her
a
gift
of
a
rare
old
scarlet
scarf
of
woven
wools
and
eastern
broideries
,
one
of
the
few
relics
of
his
buried
life
;
lifted
the
faggots
on
her
back
,
so
that
she
could
carry
them
with
greater
ease
;
and
set
her
on
her
homeward
way
.
“
Come
to
me
again
,
”
he
said
,
briefly
,
as
she
went
across
the
threshold
.
The
child
bent
her
head
in
silence
,
and
kissed
his
hand
quickly
and
timidly
,
like
a
grateful
dog
that
is
amazed
to
have
a
caress
,
and
not
a
blow
.
“
After
a
forty
years’
vow
I
have
broken
it
;
I
have
pitied
a
human
thing
,
”
the
old
man
muttered
as
he
stood
in
his
doorway
looking
after
her
shadow
as
it
passed
small
and
dark
across
the
scarlet
light
of
the
poppies
.
“
They
call
him
vile
,
and
they
say
that
he
slew
men
,
”
thought
the
child
,
who
had
long
known
his
face
,
though
he
had
never
noted
hers
;
and
it
seemed
to
her
that
all
mercy
lay
in
her
father’s
kingdom
—
which
they
called
the
kingdom
of
evil
.
The
cool
moist
herbs
slaked
the
heat
of
her
bruises
;
and
the
draught
of
milk
had
slaked
the
thirst
of
her
throat
.
“
Is
evil
good
?
”
she
asked
in
her
heart
as
she
went
through
the
tall
red
poppies
.
And
from
that
evening
thenceforward
Folle‐Farine
and
Marcellin
cleaved
to
one
another
,
being
outcasts
from
all
others
.
CHAPTER
III
.
AS
the
religious
gathering
broke
up
and
split
in
divers
streams
to
divers
ways
,
the
little
town
returned
to
its
accustomed
stillness
—
a
stillness
that
seemed
to
have
in
it
the
calm
of
a
thousand
sleeping
years
,
and
the
legends
and
the
dreams
of
half
a
score
of
old
dead
centuries
.
On
market‐days
and
saint‐days
,
days
of
high
feast
or
of
perpetual
chaffering
,
the
town
was
full
of
colour
,
movement
,
noise
,
and
population
.
The
country
people
crowded
in
,
filling
it
with
the
jingling
of
mule‐bells
;
the
fisher
people
came
,
bringing
with
them
the
crisp
salt
smell
of
the
sea
and
the
blue
of
the
sea
on
their
garments
;
its
own
tanners
and
ivory
carvers
,
and
fruiterers
,
and
lacemakers
turned
out
by
the
hundred
in
all
the
quaint
variety
of
costumes
which
their
forefathers
had
bequeathed
to
them
,
and
to
which
they
were
still
wise
enough
to
adhere
.
But
at
other
times
when
the
fishers
were
in
their
hamlets
,
and
the
peasantry
on
their
lands
and
in
their
orchards
,
and
the
townsfolk
at
their
labours
in
the
old
renaissance
mansions
,
which
they
had
turned
into
tanneries
,
and
granaries
,
and
wool‐sheds
,
and
workshops
,
the
place
was
profoundly
still
;
scarcely
a
child
at
play
in
the
streets
,
scarcely
a
dog
asleep
in
the
sun
.
When
the
crowds
had
gone
the
priests
laid
aside
their
vestments
,
and
donned
the
black
serge
of
their
daily
habit
,
and
went
to
their
daily
avocations
in
their
humble
dwellings
.
The
crosses
and
the
censers
were
put
back
upon
their
altars
,
and
hung
up
upon
their
pillars
.
The
boy
choristers
and
the
little
children
put
their
white
linen
and
their
scarlet
robes
back
in
cupboards
and
presses
,
with
heads
of
lavender
and
sprigs
of
rosemary
to
keep
the
moth
and
the
devil
away
,
and
went
to
their
fields
,
to
their
homes
,
to
their
herds
,
to
their
paper
kites
,
to
their
daisy
chains
,
to
the
poor
rabbits
they
pent
in
a
hutch
,
to
the
poor
flies
they
killed
in
the
sun
.
The
town
became
quite
still
,
the
market
place
quite
empty
;
the
drowsy
silence
of
a
burning
,
cloudless
afternoon
was
over
all
the
quiet
places
about
the
cathedral
walls
,
where
of
old
the
bishops
and
the
canons
dwelt
;
grey
shady
courts
;
dim
open
cloisters
;
houses
covered
with
oaken
carvings
,
and
shadowed
with
the
spreading
branches
of
chestnuts
and
of
lime‐trees
that
were
as
aged
as
themselves
.
Under
the
shelter
of
one
of
the
lindens
,
after
the
populace
had
gone
,
there
was
seated
on
a
broad
stone
bench
the
girl
who
had
stood
by
the
wayside
erect
and
unbending
as
the
procession
had
moved
before
her
.
She
had
flung
herself
down
in
dreamy
restfulness
.
She
had
delivered
her
burden
of
vegetables
and
fruit
at
a
shop
near
by
,
whose
awning
stretched
out
into
the
street
like
a
toadstool
yellow
with
the
sun
.
The
heat
was
intense
;
she
had
been
on
foot
all
day
;
she
sat
to
rest
a
moment
,
and
put
her
burning
hands
under
a
little
rill
of
water
that
spouted
into
a
basin
in
a
niche
in
the
wall
.
An
ancient
well
,
with
a
stone
image
of
the
Madonna
sculptured
above
,
and
a
wreath
of
vine‐leaves
in
stone
running
around
,
in
the
lavish
ornamentation
of
an
age
when
men
loved
loveliness
for
its
own
sake
,
and
begrudged
neither
time
nor
labour
in
its
service
.
She
leaned
over
the
fountain
,
kept
so
cool
by
the
roofing
of
the
thick
green
leaves
;
there
was
a
metal
cup
attached
to
the
basin
by
a
chain
,
and
she
filled
it
at
the
running
thread
of
water
,
and
stooped
her
lips
to
it
again
and
again
thirstily
.
The
day
was
sultry
;
the
ways
were
long
and
white
with
powdered
limestone
;
her
throat
was
still
parched
with
the
dust
raised
by
the
many
feet
of
the
multitude
;
and
although
she
had
borne
in
the
great
basket
which
now
stood
empty
at
her
side
,
cherries
,
peaches
,
mulberries
,
melons
,
full
of
juice
and
lusciousness
,
this
daughter
of
the
devil
had
not
taken
even
one
to
freshen
her
dry
mouth
.
Folle‐Farine
stooped
to
the
water
and
played
with
it
,
and
drank
it
,
and
steeped
her
lips
and
her
arms
in
it
;
lying
there
on
the
stone
bench
,
with
her
bare
feet
curled
one
in
another
,
and
her
slender
round
limbs
full
of
the
voluptuous
repose
of
a
resting
panther
.
The
coolness
,
the
murmur
,
the
clearness
,
the
peace
,
the
soft
flowing
movement
of
water
,
possess
an
ineffable
charm
for
natures
that
are
passion‐tossed
,
feverish
,
and
full
of
storm
.
There
was
a
dreary
peace
about
the
place
,
too
,
which
had
charms
likewise
for
her
;
in
the
dusky
arch
of
the
long
cloisters
,
in
the
grey
lichen‐grown
walls
,
in
the
broad
pamments
of
the
paven
court
,
in
the
clusters
of
strange
delicate
carving
beneath
and
below
;
in
the
sculptured
friezes
where
little
nests
that
the
birds
had
made
in
the
spring
still
rested
,
and
in
the
dense
brooding
thickness
of
the
boughs
which
brought
the
sweetness
and
the
shadows
of
the
woods
into
the
heart
of
the
peopled
town
.
She
stayed
there
,
loath
to
move
;
loath
to
return
where
a
jeer
,
a
bruise
,
a
lifted
stick
,
a
muttered
curse
,
were
all
her
greeting
and
her
guerdon
.
As
she
lay
thus
,
one
of
the
doors
in
the
old
houses
in
the
cloisters
opened
;
the
head
of
an
old
woman
was
thrust
out
,
crowned
with
the
high
fan‐shaped
comb
,
and
the
towering
white
linen
cap
,
that
are
the
female
note
of
that
especial
town
.
The
old
woman
wa
the
mother
of
the
sacristan
,
and
she
,
looking
out
,
shrieked
shrilly
to
her
son
:
“
Georges
,
Georges
!
come
hither
.
The
devil’s
daughter
is
drinking
the
blest
water
!
”
The
sacristan
was
hoeing
amongst
his
cabbages
in
the
garden
behind
his
house
,
surrounded
with
clipt
yew
,
and
damp
from
the
deep
shade
of
the
cathedral
,
that
overshadowed
it
.
He
ran
out
at
his
mother’s
call
,
hoe
in
hand
,
himself
an
old
man
,
though
stout
and
strong
.
The
well
in
the
wall
was
his
especial
charge
and
pride
;
immeasurable
sanctity
attached
to
it
.
According
to
tradition
,
the
water
had
spouted
from
the
stone
itself
,
at
the
touch
of
a
branch
of
blossoming
pear
,
held
in
the
hand
of
St.
Jerome
,
who
had
returned
to
earth
in
the
middle
of
the
fourteenth
century
,
and
dwelt
for
a
while
near
the
cathedral
,
working
at
the
honourable
trade
of
a
cordwainer
,
and
accomplishing
mighty
miracles
throughout
the
district
.
It
was
said
that
some
of
his
miraculous
power
still
remained
in
the
fountain
,
and
that
even
yet
,
those
who
drank
on
St.
Jerome’s
day
,
in
full
faith
and
with
believing
hearts
,
were
,
oftentimes
,
cleansed
of
sin
,
and
purified
of
bodily
diseases
.
Wherefore
on
that
day
,
throngs
of
peasantry
flocked
in
from
all
sides
,
and
crowded
round
it
,
and
drank
;
to
the
benefit
of
the
sacristan
in
charge
,
if
not
to
that
of
their
souls
and
bodies
.
Summoned
by
his
mother
,
he
flew
to
the
rescue
of
the
sanctified
spring
.
“
Get
you
gone
!
”
he
shouted
.
“
Get
you
gone
,
you
child
of
hell
!
How
durst
you
touch
the
blessed
basin
?
Do
you
think
that
God
struck
water
from
the
stone
for
such
as
you
?
”
Folle‐Farine
lifted
her
head
and
looked
him
in
the
face
with
her
audacious
eyes
,
and
laughed
;
then
tossed
her
head
again
,
and
plunged
it
into
the
bright
living
water
,
till
her
lips
,
and
her
cheeks
,
and
all
the
rippling
hair
about
her
temples
sparkled
with
its
silvery
drops
.
The
sacristan
,
infuriated
at
once
by
the
impiety
and
the
defiance
,
shrieked
aloud
.
“
Insolent
animal
!
Daughter
of
Satan
!
I
will
teach
you
to
taint
the
gift
of
a
saint
with
the
lips
of
the
devil
!
”
And
he
seized
her
roughly
with
one
hand
upon
her
shoulder
,
and
with
the
other
raised
the
hoe
and
brandished
the
wooden
staff
of
it
above
her
head
in
threat
to
strike
her
;
whilst
his
old
mother
,
still
thrusting
her
lofty
head‐gear
and
her
wrinkled
face
from
out
of
the
door
,
screamed
to
him
to
show
he
was
a
man
,
and
have
no
mercy
.
As
his
grasp
touched
her
,
and
the
staff
cast
its
shadow
across
her
,
Folle‐Farine
sprang
up
,
defiance
and
fury
breathing
from
all
her
beautiful
fierce
face
.
She
seized
the
staff
in
her
right
hand
,
wrenched
it
with
a
swift
movement
from
his
hold
,
and
catching
his
head
under
her
left
arm
,
rained
blows
on
him
from
his
own
weapon
with
a
sudden
gust
of
breathless
rage
which
blinded
him
,
and
lent
to
her
slender
muscular
limbs
,
the
strength
and
force
of
man
.
Then
,
as
rapidly
as
she
had
seized
and
struck
him
,
she
flung
him
from
her
with
such
violence
that
he
fell
prostrate
on
the
pavement
of
the
court
;
caught
up
the
metal
pail
which
stood
by
ready
filled
,
dashed
the
water
over
him
where
he
lay
,
and
turning
from
him
without
a
word
,
walked
across
the
courtyard
slowly
,
and
with
a
haughty
grace
in
all
the
carriage
of
her
bare
limbs
,
and
the
folds
of
her
ragged
garments
;
bearing
the
empty
osier‐basket
on
her
head
,
deaf
as
the
stones
around
to
the
screams
of
the
sacristan
and
his
mother
.
In
these
secluded
cloisters
,
and
in
the
high
noontide
,
when
all
were
sleeping
or
eating
in
the
cool
shelter
of
their
darkened
houses
,
the
old
woman’s
voice
remained
unheard
.
The
saints
heard
,
no
doubt
,
but
they
were
too
lazy
to
stir
from
their
niches
in
that
sultry
noontide
;
except
the
baying
of
a
chained
dog
aroused
,
there
was
no
answer
to
the
outcry
,
and
Folle‐Farine
passed
out
into
the
market
place
unarrested
,
and
not
meeting
another
living
creature
.
As
she
turned
into
one
of
the
squares
that
led
to
the
open
country
,
she
saw
in
the
distance
one
of
the
guardians
of
the
peace
of
the
town
moving
quickly
towards
the
cloisters
,
with
his
glittering
lace
shining
in
the
sun
,
and
his
long
scabbard
clattering
upon
the
stones
.
She
laughed
a
little
as
she
saw
.
“
They
will
not
come
after
me
,
”
she
said
to
herself
.
“
Thy
are
too
afraid
of
the
devil
.
”
She
judged
rightly
;
they
did
not
come
.
She
crossed
the
wide
scorching
square
,
whose
white
stones
blazed
in
the
glare
of
the
sun
.
There
was
nothing
in
sight
except
a
stray
cat
prowling
in
a
corner
,
and
three
sparrows
quarrelling
over
a
foul‐smelling
heap
of
refuse
.
The
quaint
old
houses
round
seemed
all
asleep
,
with
the
shutters
closed
like
tired
eyelids
over
their
little
dim
,
aged
,
orbs
of
windows
.
The
gilded
vanes
on
their
twisted
chimneys
,
and
carved
parapets
,
pointed
motionless
to
the
warm
south
.
There
was
not
a
sound
except
for
the
cawing
of
some
rooks
,
who
built
their
nests
high
aloft
in
the
fretted
pinnacles
of
the
cathedral
.
Undisturbed
she
crossed
the
square
,
and
took
her
way
down
the
crooked
street
that
led
her
homeward
to
the
outlying
country
.
It
was
an
old
,
twisting
,
dusky
place
,
with
the
water
flowing
through
its
centre
as
its
only
roadway
;
and
in
there
were
the
oldest
houses
of
the
town
,
all
of
timber
,
black
with
age
,
and
carved
with
the
wonderful
florid
fantasies
and
grotesque
conceits
of
the
years
when
a
house
was
to
its
master
a
thing
beloved
and
beautiful
,
a
bulwark
,
an
altar
,
a
heritage
,
an
heirloom
to
be
dwelt
in
all
the
days
of
a
long
life
,
and
bequeathed
in
all
honour
and
honesty
to
a
noble
offspring
.
The
street
was
very
silent
,
the
ripple
of
the
water
was
the
chief
sound
that
filled
it
.
Its
tenants
were
very
poor
,
in
many
of
its
antique
mansions
the
beggars
shared
shelter
with
the
rats
and
the
owls
.
In
one
of
these
dwellings
,
however
,
there
were
still
some
warmth
and
colour
.
The
orange
and
scarlet
flowers
of
a
nasturtium
curled
up
its
twisted
pilasters
;
the
big
,
fair
clusters
of
hydrangea
filled
up
its
narrow
casements
;
a
breadth
of
many‐coloured
saxifrage
,
with
leaves
of
green
and
rose
,
and
blossoms
of
purple
and
white
,
hung
over
the
balcony
rail
,
which
five
centuries
earlier
had
been
draped
with
cloth
of
gold
;
and
a
little
yellow
song
bird
made
music
in
the
empty
niche
from
which
the
sculptured
flower‐de‐luce
had
been
so
long
torn
down
.
From
the
window
a
woman
looked
,
leaning
with
folded
arms
above
the
rose‐tipped
saxifrage
,
and
beneath
the
green‐leaved
vine
.
She
was
a
fair
woman
,
white
as
the
lilies
,
and
she
had
silver
pins
in
her
amber
hair
,
and
a
mouth
that
laughed
sweetly
.
She
called
to
Folle‐Farine
,
“
You
brown
thing
;
why
do
you
stare
at
me
?
”
Folle‐Farine
started
and
withdrew
the
fixed
gaze
of
her
lustrous
eyes
.
“
Because
you
are
beautiful
,
”
she
answered
curtly
.
All
beautiful
things
head
a
fascination
for
her
.
This
woman
above
was
very
fair
to
see
,
and
she
looked
at
her
as
she
looked
at
the
purple
butterflies
in
the
sun
;
at
the
stars
shining
down
through
the
leaves
;
at
the
vast
,
dim
,
gorgeous
figures
in
the
cathedral
windows
;
at
the
happy
children
running
to
their
mothers
with
their
hands
full
of
primroses
,
as
she
saw
them
in
the
woods
at
spring‐time
;
at
the
laughing
groups
round
the
wood‐fires
in
the
new
year
time
when
she
passed
a
lattice
pane
that
the
snow‐drift
had
not
blocked
;
at
all
the
things
that
were
so
often
in
her
sight
,
and
yet
with
which
her
life
had
no
part
or
likeness
.
She
stood
there
on
the
rough
flints
,
in
the
darkness
cast
from
the
jutting
beams
of
the
house
;
and
the
other
happier
creature
leaned
above
there
in
the
light
,
white
and
rose‐hued
,
and
with
the
silver
bells
of
the
pins
shaking
in
her
yellow
tresses
.
“
You
are
old
Flamma’s
grand‐daughter
,
”
cried
the
other
from
her
leafy
nest
above
.
“
You
work
for
him
all
day
long
at
the
mill
?
”
“
Yes
.
”
“
And
your
feet
are
bare
,
and
your
clothes
are
rags
,
and
you
go
to
and
fro
like
a
packhorse
,
and
the
people
hate
you
?
You
must
be
a
fool
.
Your
father
was
the
devil
,
they
say
;
why
do
you
not
make
him
give
you
good
things
?
”
“
He
will
not
hear
,
”
the
child
muttered
wearily
;
had
she
not
besought
him
endlessly
with
breathless
prayers
?
“
Will
he
not
?
Wait
a
year
—
wait
a
year
.
”
“
What
then
?
”
asked
Folle‐Farine
,
with
a
quick
startled
breath
.
“
In
a
year
you
will
be
a
woman
,
and
he
always
hears
women
,
they
say
.
”
“
He
hears
you
?
”
The
fair
woman
above
laughed
:
“
Perhaps
;
in
his
fashion
.
But
he
pays
me
ill
as
yet
,
”
and
she
plucked
one
of
the
silver
pins
from
her
hair
,
and
stabbed
the
rosy
foam
of
the
saxifrage
through
and
through
with
it
;
for
she
was
but
a
gardener’s
wife
,
and
was
restless
and
full
of
discontent
.
“
Get
you
gone
,
”
she
added
quickly
,
“
or
I
will
thrown
a
stone
at
you
,
you
witch
;
you
have
the
evil
eye
,
they
say
,
and
you
may
strike
me
blind
if
you
stare
so
.
”
Folle‐Farine
went
on
her
way
over
the
sharp
stones
with
a
heavy
heart
.
That
picture
in
the
casement
head
had
made
that
passage
bright
to
her
many
a
time
;
and
when
at
last
that
picture
had
moved
and
spoken
,
it
had
only
mocked
her
and
reviled
her
as
the
rest
did
.
The
street
was
dark
for
her
like
all
the
others
now
.
The
gardener’s
wife
,
leaning
there
,
with
the
green
and
gold
of
the
vineleaves
brushing
her
hair
,
looked
after
her
down
the
crooked
way
.
“
That
young
wretch
will
be
more
beautiful
than
I
,
”
she
thought
;
and
the
thought
was
bitter
to
her
,
as
such
a
one
is
to
a
fair
woman
.
Folle‐Farine
went
slowly
and
sadly
through
the
street
with
her
head
dropped
,
and
the
large
osier
basket
trailing
behind
her
over
the
stones
.
She
was
well
used
to
be
pelted
with
words
hard
as
hailstones
,
and
usually
heeded
them
little
,
or
gave
them
back
with
sullen
,
fierce
defiance
.
But
from
this
woman
they
had
wounded
her
;
for
that
bright
bower
of
golden
leaves
and
scarlet
flowers
she
had
faintly
fancied
some
stray
beam
of
light
might
wander
even
to
her
.
She
was
soon
outside
the
gates
of
the
town
,
and
beyond
the
old
walls
,
where
the
bramble
and
the
lichen
grew
over
the
huge
stones
of
ramparts
and
fortifications
,
useless
and
decayed
from
age
.
The
country
roads
and
paths
,
the
silver
streams
and
the
wooden
bridges
,
the
lanes
through
which
the
market
mules
picked
their
careful
way
,
the
fields
in
which
the
white‐capped
peasant
women
and
the
brindled
oxen
were
at
work
,
stretched
all
before
her
in
a
radiant
air
,
sweet
with
the
scent
of
ripening
fruits
from
many
orchards
.
Here
and
there
a
wayside
crucifix
rose
dark
against
the
sun
;
here
and
there
a
chapel
bell
sounded
from
under
some
little
peaked
red
roof
.
The
cattle
dozed
beside
meadow
ditches
that
were
choked
with
wild
flowers
;
the
dogs
lay
down
beside
their
sheep
and
slept
.
At
the
first
cottage
which
she
passed
,
the
housewife
sat
out
under
a
spreading
chestnut
tree
,
weaving
lace
upon
her
knee
.
Folle‐Farine
looked
wistfully
at
the
woman
,
who
was
young
and
pretty
,
and
who
darted
her
swift
skilled
hand
in
and
out
around
the
bobbins
,
keeping
time
meanwhile
with
a
mirthful
burden
that
she
sang
.
The
woman
looked
up
and
frowned
as
the
girl
passed
by
her
.
A
little
way
farther
on
there
was
winehouse
by
the
roadside
,
built
of
wood
,
vine‐wreathed
,
and
half
hidden
in
the
tall
flowering
briars
of
its
garden
.
Out
of
the
lattice
there
was
leaning
a
maiden
with
the
silver
cross
on
her
bosom
shining
in
the
sun
,
and
her
meek
blue
eyes
smiling
down
from
under
the
tower
of
her
white
cap.
She
was
reaching
a
carnation
to
a
student
who
stood
below
,
with
long
fair
locks
and
ruddy
cheeks
,
and
a
beard
yellow
with
the
amber
down
of
twenty
years
;
and
who
kissed
her
white
wrist
as
he
caught
the
red
flower
.
Folle‐Farine
glanced
at
the
pretty
picture
with
a
dull
wonder
and
a
nameless
pain
:
what
could
it
mean
to
be
happy
like
that
?
Half
a
league
onward
she
passed
another
cottage
shadowed
by
a
sycamore‐tree
,
and
with
the
swallows
whirling
around
its
tall
twisted
stone
chimneys
,
and
a
beurré
pear
covering
with
branch
and
bloom
its
old
grey
walls
.
An
aged
woman
sat
sipping
coffee
in
the
sun
,
and
a
young
one
was
sweeping
the
blue
and
white
tiles
with
a
broom
,
singing
gaily
as
she
swept
.
“
Art
thou
well
placed
,
my
mother
?
”
she
asked
,
pausing
to
look
tenderly
at
the
withered
brown
face
,
on
which
the
shadows
of
the
sycamore
leaves
were
playing
.
The
old
mother
smiled
,
steeping
her
bread
in
the
coffee
bowl
.
“
Surely
,
child
;
I
can
feel
the
sun
and
hear
you
sing
.
”
She
was
happy
though
she
was
blind
.
Folle‐Farine
stood
a
moment
and
looked
at
them
across
a
hedge
of
honeysuckle
.
“
How
odd
it
must
be
to
have
anyone
to
care
to
hear
your
voice
like
that
!
”
she
thought
;
and
she
went
on
her
way
through
the
poppies
and
corn
,
half
softened
,
half
enraged
.
Was
she
lower
than
they
because
she
could
find
no
one
to
care
for
her
or
take
gladness
in
her
life
?
or
was
she
greater
than
they
because
all
human
delights
were
to
her
as
the
dead
letters
of
an
unknown
tongue
?
Down
a
pathway
fronting
her
,
which
ran
midway
between
the
yellowing
seas
of
wheat
and
a
belt
of
lilac
clover
,
and
over
which
a
swarm
of
bees
was
murmuring
,
there
came
a
country‐woman
,
crushing
the
herbage
under
her
heavy
shoes
,
ragged
,
picturesque
,
sunbrowned
,
swinging
deep
brass
pails
as
she
went
to
the
herds
on
the
hillside
.
She
carried
a
child
twisted
into
the
folds
of
her
dress
;
a
boy
,
half
asleep
,
with
his
curly
head
against
her
breast
.
As
she
passed
,
the
woman
drew
her
kerchief
over
her
bosom
,
and
over
the
brown
rosy
face
of
the
child
.
“
She
shall
not
look
at
thee
,
my
darling
,
”
she
muttered
.
“
Her
look
withered
Rémy’s
little
limb
.
”
And
she
covered
the
child
jealously
,
and
turned
aside
,
so
that
she
should
tread
a
separate
pathway
through
the
clover
,
and
needed
not
to
brush
the
garments
of
the
one
she
was
compelled
to
pass
.
Folle‐Farine
heard
,
and
laughed
aloud
.
She
knew
of
what
the
woman
was
thinking
.
In
the
summer
of
the
previous
year
,
as
she
had
passed
the
tanyard
on
the
western
bank
of
the
river
,
the
tanner’s
little
son
,
rushing
out
in
haste
,
had
curled
his
mouth
in
insult
at
her
,
and
clapping
his
hands
,
hissed
in
a
child’s
love
of
cruelty
the
mocking
words
which
he
had
heard
his
elders
use
of
her
.
In
answer
,
she
had
only
turned
her
head
and
looked
down
at
him
with
calm
eyes
of
scorn
.
But
the
child
,
running
out
fast
,
and
startled
by
that
regard
,
had
slipped
upon
a
shred
of
leather
and
had
fallen
heavily
,
breaking
his
left
leg
at
the
knee
.
The
limb
,
unskilfully
dealt
with
,
and
enfeebled
by
a
tendency
to
disease
,
had
never
been
restored
,
but
hung
limp
,
crooked
,
useless
,
withered
from
below
the
knee
.
Through
all
the
country
side
the
little
cripple
,
Rémy
,
creeping
out
into
the
sun
upon
his
crutches
,
was
pointed
out
in
a
passionate
pity
as
the
object
of
her
sorcery
,
the
victim
of
her
vengeance
.
When
she
had
heard
what
they
said
she
had
laughed
as
she
laughed
now
,
drawing
together
her
straight
brows
and
showing
her
glistening
teeth
.
All
the
momentary
softness
died
in
her
now
as
the
peasant
covered
the
boy’s
face
and
turned
aside
into
the
clover
.
She
laughed
aloud
,
and
swept
on
through
the
half‐ripe
corn
with
that
swift
,
harmonious
,
majestic
movement
which
was
inborn
in
her
,
as
it
is
inborn
in
the
deer
or
the
antelope
;
singing
again
as
she
went
those
strange
wild
airs
,
like
the
sigh
of
the
wind
,
which
were
all
the
language
which
lingered
in
her
memory
from
the
land
that
had
seen
her
birth
.
To
such
aversion
as
this
she
was
too
well
used
for
it
to
be
a
matter
of
even
notice
to
her
.
She
knew
that
she
was
marked
and
shunned
by
the
community
amidst
which
her
lot
was
cast
;
and
she
accepted
proscription
without
wonder
and
without
resistance
.
Folle‐Farine
:
the
Dust
.
What
lower
thing
did
earth
hold
?
In
this
old‐world
district
,
amidst
the
pastures
and
cornlands
of
Normandy
,
superstition
had
taken
a
hold
which
the
passage
of
centuries
and
the
advent
of
revolution
had
done
very
little
to
lessen
.
Few
of
the
people
could
read
,
and
fewer
still
could
write
.
They
knew
nothing
but
what
their
priests
and
their
politicians
told
them
to
believe
.
They
went
to
their
beds
with
the
poultry
,
and
rose
as
the
cock
crew
:
they
went
to
mass
,
as
their
ducks
to
the
osier
and
weed
ponds
;
and
to
the
conscription
as
their
lambs
to
the
slaughter
.
They
understood
that
there
was
a
world
beyond
them
,
but
they
remembered
it
only
as
the
best
market
for
their
fruit
,
their
fowls
,
their
lace
,
their
skins
.
Their
brains
were
as
dim
as
were
their
oil‐lit
streets
at
night
;
though
their
lives
were
content
and
mirthful
,
and
for
the
most
part
pious
.
They
went
out
into
the
summer
meadows
chaunting
aves
,
in
seasons
of
drought
to
pray
for
rain
on
their
parching
orchards
,
in
the
same
credulity
with
which
they
groped
through
the
winter
fog
,
bearing
torches
and
chaunting
dirges
to
gain
a
blessing
at
seed
time
on
their
bleak
black
fallows
.
The
beauty
and
the
faith
of
the
old
Mediæval
life
were
with
them
still
;
and
its
faith
were
its
bigotry
and
its
cruelty
likewise
.
They
led
simple
and
contented
lives
;
for
the
most
part
honest
,
and
amongst
themselves
cheerful
and
kindly
;
preserving
much
grace
of
colour
,
of
costume
,
of
idiosyncracy
,
because
apart
from
the
hueless
communism
and
characterless
monotony
of
modern
cities
.
But
they
believed
in
sorcery
and
in
devilry
;
they
were
brutal
to
their
beasts
,
and
could
be
as
brutal
to
their
foes
;
they
were
steeped
in
legend
and
tradition
from
their
cradles
;
and
all
the
darkest
superstitions
of
dead
ages
still
found
home
and
treasury
in
their
hearts
and
at
their
hearths
.
Therefore
,
believing
her
a
creature
of
evil
,
they
were
inexorable
against
her
;
and
thought
that
in
being
so
they
did
their
duty
.
They
had
always
been
a
religious
people
in
this
birth
country
of
the
Flamma
race
;
the
strong
poetic
reverence
of
their
forefathers
,
which
had
symbolised
itself
in
the
carving
of
every
lintel
,
corbel
,
or
buttress
in
their
streets
,
and
in
the
fashion
of
every
spire
on
which
a
weather‐vane
could
gleam
against
the
sun
,
was
still
in
their
blood
;
the
poetry
had
departed
,
but
the
bigotry
remained
.
Their
ancestors
had
burned
wizards
and
witches
by
the
score
in
the
open
square
of
the
cathedral
place
,
and
their
grandsires
and
grandams
had
in
brave
,
dumb
,
ignorant
peasant
fashion
held
fast
to
the
lily
and
the
cross
,
and
gone
by
hundreds
to
the
salutation
of
the
axe
and
the
baptism
of
the
sword
in
the
red
days
of
revolution
.
They
were
the
same
people
still
;
industrious
,
frugal
,
peaceful
,
loyal
,
wedded
to
old
ways
and
to
old
relics
,
content
on
little
,
and
serene
of
heart
;
yet
,
withal
,
where
they
feared
or
where
they
hated
,
brutal
with
the
brutality
begotten
of
abject
ignorance
.
And
they
had
been
so
to
this
outcast
whom
they
all
called
Folle‐Farine
.
When
she
had
first
come
amidst
them
,
a
little
desolate
foreign
child
,
mute
with
the
dumbness
of
an
unknown
tongue
,
and
cast
adrift
amongst
strange
people
,
unfamiliar
ways
,
and
chill
blank
glances
,
she
had
shyly
tried
in
a
child’s
vague
instincts
of
appeal
and
trust
to
make
friends
with
the
other
children
that
she
saw
,
and
to
share
a
little
in
the
mothers’
smiles
and
the
babies’
pastimes
that
were
all
around
her
in
the
glad
green
world
of
summer
.
But
she
had
been
denied
and
rejected
with
hard
words
and
harder
blows
;
at
her
coming
the
smiles
had
changed
to
frowns
,
and
the
pastime
into
terror
.
She
was
proud
,
she
was
shy
,
she
was
savage
;
she
felt
rather
than
understood
that
she
was
suspected
and
reviled
;
she
ceased
to
seek
her
own
kind
,
and
only
went
for
companionship
and
sympathy
to
the
creatures
of
the
fields
an
the
woods
,
to
the
things
of
the
earth
and
the
sky
and
the
water
.
“
Thou
art
the
devil’s
daughter
!
”
half
in
sport
hissed
the
youths
in
the
market‐place
against
her
as
the
little
child
went
amongst
them
,
carrying
a
load
for
her
grandsire
,
heavier
than
her
arms
knew
how
to
bear
.
“
Thou
wert
plague‐spotted
from
thy
birth
,
”
said
the
old
man
himself
,
as
she
strained
her
small
limbs
to
and
fro
the
floors
of
his
storehouses
,
carrying
wood
or
flour
or
tiles
or
rushes
,
or
whatever
there
chanced
to
need
such
convoy
.
“
Get
thee
away
,
we
are
not
to
touch
thee
!
”
hissed
the
six‐year
old
infants
at
play
by
the
river
when
she
waded
in
amidst
them
to
reach
with
her
lither
arms
the
far‐off
water‐flower
which
they
were
too
timorous
to
pluck
,
and
tendered
it
to
the
one
who
had
desired
it
.
“
The
devil
begot
thee
,
and
my
cow
fell
ill
yesterday
after
thou
hadst
laid
hands
upon
her
!
”
muttered
the
old
women
,
lifting
a
stick
as
she
went
near
to
their
cattle
in
the
meadows
to
brush
off
with
a
broad
dockleaf
the
flies
that
were
teasing
the
poor
,
meek
,
patient
beasts
.
So
,
cursed
when
she
did
her
duty
and
driven
away
when
she
tried
to
do
good
,
her
young
soul
had
hardened
itself
and
grown
fierce
,
mute
,
callous
,
isolated
.
There
were
only
the
four‐footed
things
,
so
wise
,
so
silent
,
so
tender
of
heart
,
so
bruised
of
body
,
so
innocent
,
and
so
agonised
,
that
had
compassion
for
her
,
and
saved
her
from
utter
desolation
.
In
the
mild
sad
gaze
of
the
cow
,
in
the
lustrous
suffering
eyes
of
the
horse
,
in
the
noble
frank
faith
of
the
dog
,
in
the
soft
bounding
glee
of
the
lamb
,
in
the
unwearied
toil
of
the
ass
,
in
the
tender
industry
of
the
bird
,
she
had
sympathy
and
she
had
example
.
She
loved
them
and
they
loved
her
.
She
saw
that
they
were
sinless
,
diligent
,
faithful
,
devoted
,
loyal
servers
of
base
masters
;
loving
greatly
,
and
for
their
love
goaded
,
beaten
,
overtasked
,
slaughtered
.
She
took
the
lesson
to
heart
;
and
hated
men
and
women
with
a
bitter
hatred
.
So
she
had
grown
up
for
ten
years
,
caring
for
no
human
thing
,
except
in
a
manner
for
the
old
man
Marcellin
,
who
was
,
like
her
,
proscribed
.
The
priest
had
striven
to
turn
her
soul
what
they
had
termed
heavenward
;
but
their
weapons
had
been
wrath
and
intimidation
.
She
would
have
none
of
them
.
No
efforts
that
they
or
her
grandsire
made
had
availed
;
she
would
be
starved
,
thrashed
,
cursed
,
maltreated
as
they
would
;
she
could
not
understand
their
meaning
,
or
would
not
submit
herself
to
their
religion
.
As
years
went
on
they
found
the
contest
hopeless
,
so
had
abandoned
her
to
the
devil
,
who
had
made
her
;
and
the
daughter
of
one
whom
the
whole
province
had
called
saint
had
never
passed
within
church‐doors
or
known
the
touch
of
holy
water
save
when
they
had
cast
it
on
her
as
an
exorcism
.
And
when
she
met
a
priest
in
the
open
roads
or
on
the
byepaths
of
the
fields
,
she
always
sang
in
loud
defiance
her
wildest
melodies
.
Where
had
she
learnt
these
?
They
had
been
sung
to
her
by
Phratos
,
and
taught
by
him
.
Who
had
he
been
?
Her
old
life
was
obscure
to
her
memory
,
and
yet
glorious
even
in
that
dimness
.
She
did
not
know
who
those
people
had
been
with
whom
she
had
wandered
,
nor
in
what
land
they
had
dwelt
.
But
that
wondrous
free
life
remained
on
her
remembrance
as
a
thing
never
to
be
forgotten
or
to
be
known
again
;
a
life
odorous
with
bursting
fruits
and
budding
flowers
;
full
of
strangest
and
of
sweetest
music
;
spent
for
ever
under
green
leaves
and
suns
that
had
no
setting
;
for
ever
beside
fathomless
waters
and
winding
forests
;
for
ever
rhymed
to
melody
and
soothed
to
the
measure
of
deep
winds
and
drifting
clouds
.
For
she
had
forgotten
all
except
its
liberty
and
its
loveliness
;
and
the
old
gypsy
life
of
the
Liébana
remained
with
her
only
as
some
stray
fragment
of
an
existence
passed
in
another
world
from
which
she
was
now
an
exile
,
and
revived
in
her
only
in
the
fierce
passion
of
her
nature
,
in
her
bitter
,
vague
rebellion
,
in
her
longing
to
be
free
,
in
her
anguish
of
vain
desires
for
richer
hues
and
bluer
skies
and
wilder
winds
than
those
amidst
which
she
toiled
.
At
times
she
remembered
likewise
the
songs
and
the
melodies
of
Phratos
;
remembered
them
when
the
moon
rays
swept
across
the
white
breadth
of
water
lilies
,
or
the
breath
of
the
spring
stole
through
the
awakening
woods
;
and
when
she
remembered
them
she
wept
—
wept
bitterly
,
where
none
could
look
on
her
.
She
never
thought
of
Phratos
as
a
man
;
as
of
one
who
had
lived
in
a
human
form
,
and
was
now
lying
dead
in
an
earthly
grave
.
Her
memory
of
him
was
as
of
some
nameless
creature
half
divine
,
whose
footsteps
brought
laughter
and
music
,
with
eyes
bright
as
a
bird’s
,
yet
sad
as
a
dog’s
,
and
a
voice
for
ever
singing
;
clad
in
goat’s
hair
,
gigantic
and
gay
:
a
creature
that
had
spoken
tenderly
to
her
,
that
had
bidden
her
laugh
and
rejoice
,
that
had
carried
her
when
she
was
weary
;
that
had
taught
her
to
sleep
under
the
dewy
leaves
,
and
to
greet
the
things
of
the
night
as
soft
sisters
,
and
to
fear
nothing
in
the
whole
living
world
,
in
the
earth
,
or
the
air
,
or
the
sky
,
and
to
tell
the
truth
though
a
falsehood
were
to
save
the
bare
feet
from
flintstones
,
and
naked
shoulders
from
the
stick
,
and
an
empty
body
from
hunger
and
thirst
.
A
creature
that
seemed
to
her
in
her
memories
even
as
the
faun
seemed
to
the
fancies
of
the
children
of
the
Piræus
;
a
creature
half
man
and
half
animal
,
glad
and
grotesque
,
full
of
mirth
and
of
music
,
belonging
to
the
forest
,
to
the
brook
,
to
the
stars
,
to
the
leaves
,
wandering
like
the
wind
,
and
,
like
the
wind
,
homeless
.
This
was
all
her
memory
;
but
she
cherished
it
;
in
the
face
of
the
priests
she
bent
her
straight
black
brows
and
curled
her
scornful
scarlet
lips
,
but
for
the
sake
of
Phratos
she
held
one
religion
;
though
she
hated
men
she
told
them
never
a
lie
,
and
asked
of
them
never
alms
.
She
went
now
along
the
white
level
roads
,
the
empty
basket
balanced
on
her
head
,
her
form
moving
with
the
free
harmonious
grace
of
desert
women
,
and
she
sang
as
she
went
the
old
sweet
songs
of
the
broken
viol
.
She
was
friendless
and
desolate
;
she
was
ill‐fed
,
she
was
heavily
tasked
;
she
toiled
without
thanks
;
she
was
ignorant
of
even
so
much
knowledge
as
the
peasants
about
her
had
;
she
was
without
a
past
or
a
future
,
and
her
present
had
in
it
but
daily
toil
and
bitter
words
;
hunger
,
and
thirst
,
and
chastisement
.
Yet
for
all
that
she
sang
;
—
sang
because
the
vitality
in
her
made
her
dauntless
of
all
evil
;
because
the
abundant
life
opening
in
her
made
her
glad
in
despite
of
fate
;
because
the
youth
,
and
the
strength
,
and
the
soul
that
were
in
her
could
not
utterly
be
brutalised
,
could
not
wholly
cease
from
feeling
the
gladness
of
the
sun
,
the
coursing
of
the
breeze
,
the
liberty
of
nature
,
the
sweet
quick
sense
of
living
.
Before
long
she
reached
the
spot
where
the
old
man
Marcellin
was
breaking
his
stones
.
His
pile
was
raised
much
higher
;
he
sat
astride
on
a
log
of
timber
and
hammered
the
flints
on
and
on
,
on
and
on
,
without
looking
up
;
the
dust
,
where
the
tramp
of
the
people
had
raised
it
,
was
still
thick
on
the
leaves
and
the
herbage
;
and
the
prayers
and
the
chaunts
had
failed
as
yet
to
bring
the
slightest
cloud
,
the
faintest
rain
mist
,
across
the
hot
unbroken
azure
of
the
skies
.
Marcellin
was
her
only
friend
;
the
proscribed
always
adhere
to
one
another
;
when
they
are
few
they
can
only
brood
and
suffer
,
harmlessly
;
when
they
are
many
they
rise
as
with
one
foot
and
strike
as
with
one
hand
.
Therefore
,
it
is
always
perilous
to
make
the
lists
of
any
proscription
over
long
.
The
child
,
who
was
also
an
outcast
,
went
to
him
and
paused
;
in
a
curious
,
lifeless
,
bitter
way
they
cared
for
one
another
;
this
girl
who
had
grown
to
believe
herself
born
of
hell
,
and
this
man
who
had
grown
to
believe
that
he
had
served
hell
.
With
the
bastard
Folle‐Farine
and
with
the
regicide
Marcellin
the
people
had
no
association
,
and
for
them
no
pity
;
therefore
they
had
found
each
other
by
the
kinship
of
proscription
;
and
in
a
way
there
was
love
between
them
.
“
You
are
glad
,
since
you
sing
!
”
said
the
old
man
to
her
as
she
passed
him
again
on
her
homeward
way
,
and
paused
again
beside
him
.
“
The
birds
in
cages
sing
,
”
she
answered
him
.
“
But
,
think
you
they
are
glad
?
”
“
Are
they
not
?
”
She
sat
down
a
moment
beside
him
,
on
the
bank
which
was
soft
with
moss
,
and
odorous
with
wild
flowers
curling
up
the
stems
of
the
poplars
and
straying
over
into
the
corn
beyond
.
“
Are
they
?
Look
.
Yesterday
I
passed
a
cottage
,
it
is
on
the
great
south
road
;
far
away
from
her
.
The
house
was
empty
;
the
people
,
no
doubt
,
were
gone
to
labour
in
the
fields
;
there
was
a
wicker
cage
hanging
to
the
wall
,
and
in
the
cage
there
was
a
blackbird
.
The
sun
beat
on
his
head
;
his
square
of
sod
was
a
dry
clod
of
bare
earth
;
the
heat
had
dried
every
drop
of
water
in
his
pan
;
and
yet
the
bird
was
singing
.
Singing
how
?
In
torment
,
beating
his
breast
against
the
bars
till
the
blood
started
,
crying
to
the
skies
to
have
mercy
on
him
and
to
let
rain
fall
.
His
song
was
shrill
;
it
had
a
scream
in
it
;
still
he
sang
.
Do
you
say
the
merle
was
glad
?
”
“
What
did
you
do
?
”
asked
the
old
man
,
still
breaking
his
stones
with
a
monotonous
rise
and
fall
of
his
hammer
.
“
I
took
the
cage
down
and
opened
the
door
.
”
“
And
he
?
”
“
He
shot
up
in
the
air
first
,
then
dropped
down
amidst
the
grasses
,
where
a
little
brook
which
the
drought
had
not
dried
was
still
running
;
and
he
bathed
and
drank
and
bathed
again
,
seeming
mad
with
the
joy
of
the
water
.
When
I
lost
him
from
sight
he
was
swaying
among
the
leaves
on
a
bough
over
the
river
;
but
then
he
was
silent
.
”
“
And
what
do
you
mean
by
that
?
”
Her
eyes
clouded
;
she
was
mute
.
She
vaguely
knew
the
meaning
it
bore
to
herself
,
but
it
was
beyond
her
to
express
it
.
All
things
of
nature
had
voices
and
parables
for
her
,
because
her
fancy
was
vivid
and
her
mind
was
dreamy
;
but
that
mind
was
still
too
dark
,
and
too
profoundly
ignorant
,
for
her
to
be
able
to
shape
her
thoughts
into
metaphor
or
deduction
.
The
bird
had
spoken
to
her
;
by
his
silence
as
by
his
song
;
but
what
he
had
uttered
she
could
not
well
utter
again
.
Save
,
indeed
,
that
song
was
not
gladness
,
and
neither
was
silence
pain
