LITMIR.BIZ

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he stood there openmouthed. Then his jeering spirit asserted itself: “But, my dear sir — excuse my saying it — you must be mad! Cultivate Chantebled, clear those stony tracts, wade about in those marshes! Why, one might bury millions there without reaping a single bushel of oats! It’s a cursed spot, which my grandfather’s father saw such as it is now, and which my grandson’s son will see just the same. Ah! well, I’m not inquisitive, but it would really amuse me to meet the fool who might attempt such madness.”

      “Mon Dieu, who knows?” Mathieu quietly concluded. “When one only loves strongly one may work miracles.”

      La Lepailleur, after going to fetch a dozen eggs, now stood erect before her husband in admiration at hearing him talk so eloquently to a bourgeois. They agreed very well together in their avaricious rage at being unable to amass money by the handful without any great exertion, and in their ambition to make their son a gentleman, since only a gentleman could become wealthy. And thus, as Marianne was going off after placing the eggs under a cushion in Gervais’ little carriage, the other complacently called her attention to Antonin, who, having made a hole in the ground, was now spitting into it.

      “Oh! he’s smart,” said she; “he knows his alphabet already, and we are going to put him to school. If he takes after his father he will be no fool, I assure you.”

      It was on a Sunday, some ten days later, that the supreme revelation, the great flash of light which was to decide his life and that of those he loved, fell suddenly upon Mathieu during a walk he took with his wife and the children. They had gone out for the whole afternoon, taking a little snack with them in order that they might share it amid the long grass in the fields. And after scouring the paths, crossing the copses, rambling over the moorland, they came back to the verge of the woods and sat down under an oak. Thence the whole expanse spread out before them, from the little pavilion where they dwelt to the distant village of Janville. On their right was the great marshy plateau, from which broad, dry, sterile slopes descended; while lower ground stretched away on their left. Then, behind them, spread the woods with deep thickets parted by clearings, full of herbage which no scythe had ever touched. And not a soul was to be seen around them; there was naught save wild Nature, grandly quiescent under the bright sun of that splendid April day. The earth seemed to be dilating with all the sap amassed within it, and a flood of life could be felt rising and quivering in the vigorous trees, the spreading plants, and the impetuous growth of brambles and nettles which stretched invadingly over the soil. And on all sides a powerful, pungent odor was diffused.

      “Don’t go too far,” Marianne called to the children; “we shall stay under this oak. We will have something to eat by and by.”

      Blaise and Denis were already bounding along, followed by Ambroise, to see who could run the fastest; but Rose pettishly called them back, for she preferred to play at gathering wild flowers. The open air fairly intoxicated the youngsters; the herbage rose, here and there, to their very shoulders. But they came back and gathered flowers; and after a time they set off at a wild run once more, one of the big brothers carrying the little sister on his back.

      Mathieu, however, had remained absent-minded, with his eyes wandering hither and thither, throughout their walk. At times he did not hear Marianne when she spoke to him; he lapsed into reverie before some uncultivated tract, some copse overrun with brushwood, some spring which suddenly bubbled up and was then lost in mire. Nevertheless, she felt that there was no sadness nor feeling of indifference in his heart; for as soon as he returned to her he laughed once more with his soft, loving laugh. It was she who often sent him roaming about the country, even alone, for she felt that it would do him good; and although she had guessed that something very serious was passing through his mind, she retained full confidence, waiting till it should please him to speak to her.

      Now, however, just as he had sunk once more into his reverie, his glance wandering afar, studying the great varied expanse of land, she raised a light cry: “Oh! look, look!”

      Under the big oak tree she had placed Master Gervais in his little carriage, among wild weeds which hid its wheels. And while she handed a little silver mug, from which it was intended they should drink while taking their snack, she had noticed that the child raised his head and followed the movement of her hand, in which the silver sparkled beneath the sunrays. Forthwith she repeated the experiment, and again the child’s eyes followed the starry gleam.

      “Ah! it can’t be said that I’m mistaken, and am simply fancying it!” she exclaimed. “It is certain that he can see quite plainly now. My pretty pet, my little darling!”

      She darted to the child to kiss him in celebration of that first clear glance. And then, too, came the delight of the first smile.

      “Why, look!” in his turn said Mathieu, who was leaning over the child beside her, yielding to the same feeling of rapture, “there he is smiling at you now. But of course, as soon as these little fellows see clearly they begin to laugh.”

      She herself burst into a laugh. “You are right, he is laughing! Ah! how funny he looks, and how happy I am!”

      Both father and mother laughed together with content at the sight of that infantile smile, vague and fleeting, like a faint ripple on the pure water of some spring.

      Amid this joy Marianne called the four others, who were bounding under the young foliage around them: “Come, Rose! come, Ambroise! come, Blaise and Denis! It’s time now; come at once to have something to eat.”

      They hastened up and the snack was set out on a patch of soft grass. Mathieu unhooked the basket which hung in front of the baby’s little vehicle; and Marianne, having drawn some slices of bread-and-butter from it, proceeded to distribute them. Perfect silence ensued while all four children began biting with hearty appetite, which it was a pleasure to see. But all at once a scream arose. It came from Master Gervais, who was vexed at not having been served first.

      “Ah! yes, it’s true I was forgetting you,” said Marianne gayly; “you shall have your share. There, open your mouth, you darling;” and, with an easy, simple gesture, she unfastened her dress-body; and then, under the sunlight which steeped her in golden radiance, in full view of the far-spreading countryside, where all likewise was bare — the soil, the trees, the plants, streaming with sap — having seated herself in the long grass, where she almost disappeared amid the swarming growth of April’s germs, the babe on her breast eagerly sucked in her warm milk, even as all the encompassing verdure was sucking life from the soil.

      “How hungry you are!” she exclaimed. “Don’t pinch me so hard, you little glutton!”

      Meantime Mathieu had remained standing amid the enchantment of the child’s first smile and the gayety born of the hearty hunger around him. Then his dream of creation came back to him, and he at last gave voice to those plans for the future which haunted him, and of which he had so far spoken to nobody: “Ah, well, it is high time that I should set to work and found a kingdom, if these children are to have enough soup to make them grow. Shall I tell you what I’ve thought — shall I tell you?”

      Marianne raised her eyes, smiling and all attention. “Yes, tell me your secret if the time has come. Oh! I could guess that you had some great hope in you. But I did not ask you anything; I preferred to wait.”

      He did not give a direct reply, for at a sudden recollection his feelings rebelled. “That Lepailleur,” said he, “is simply a lazy fellow and a fool in spite of all his cunning airs. Can there be any more sacrilegious folly than to imagine that the earth has lost her fruitfulness and is becoming bankrupt — she, the eternal mother, eternal life? She only shows herself a bad mother to her bad sons, the malicious, the obstinate, and the dull-witted, who do not know how to love and cultivate her. But if an intelligent son comes and devotes himself to her, and works her with the help of experience and all the new systems of science, you will soon see her quicken and yield tremendous harvests unceasingly. Ah! folks say in the district that this estate of Chantebled has never yielded and never will yield anything but nettles. Well, nevertheless, a man will come who will transform it and make it a new land of joy and abundance.”

      Then, suddenly turning round, with outstretched arm, and pointing to the spots to which he

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