 Section 17 of A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy. The Passport Versailles I found no difficulty in getting admittance to Monsieur le Comte de Baie. The set of Shakespeare's was laid upon the table, and he was tumbling them over. I walked up close to the table, and giving first such a look at the books to make him conceive I knew what they were. I told him I had come without anyone to present me, knowing I should meet with a friend in his apartment, who I trusted would do it for me. It is my countryman, the great Shakespeare, said I, pointing to his works. Eh, y est-il à bon démon cher ami, apostophising his spirit? How did I, de me faire cet honneur-là? The Count smiled at the singularity of the introduction, and seeing I looked a little pale and sickly, insisted upon my taking an arm chair. So I sat down, and to save him conjectures upon a visit so out of all rule, I told him simply of the incident in the bookseller's shop, and how that had impelled me rather to go to him with the story of a little embarrassment I was under, than to any other man in France. And what is your embarrassment? Let me hear it, said the Count. So I told him the story just as I have told it the reader. And the master of my hotel, said I, as I concluded it, will needs have it, M. Le Count, that I shall be sent to the Bastille. But I have no apprehensions, continued I, for in falling into the hands of the most polished people in the world, and being conscious I was a true man, and not come to spy the nakedness of the land, I scarce thought I lay at their mercy. It does not suit the gallantry of the French, M. Le Count, said I, to show it against invalids. An animated blush came into the Count de Bayes' cheeks as I spoke this. Ne craigniez rien, don't fear, said he, indeed I don't, replied I again. Besides, continued I, a little sportingly, I have come laughing all the way from London to Paris, and do not think M. Le Duc de Choiseur is such an enemy to mirth as to send me back crying for my pains. My application to you, M. Le Count de Bayes, making him a low bow, is to desire he will not. The Count heard me with a great good nature, or I had not said half as much, and once or twice said, c'est bien d'y. So I rested my cause there, and determined to say no more about it. The Count led the discourse. We talked of indifferent things, of books, and politics, and men, and then of women. God bless them all, said I, after much discourse about them. There is not a man upon earth who loves them so much as I do. After all the foibles I have seen, and all the satires I have read against them, still I love them. Being firmly persuaded that a man who has not a sort of affection for the whole sex is incapable of ever loving a single one as he ought. Eh bien, M. Langlais, said the Count gaily, you are not come to spy the nakedness of the land. I believe you, ni encore, I dare say, that of our women. But permit me to conjecture, if, par hasard, they fell into your way, that the prospect would not affect you. I have something within me which cannot bear the shock of the least indecent insinuation. In the sportability of chit-chat I have often endeavoured to conquer it, and with infinite pain have hazarded a thousand things to a dozen of the sex together, the least of which I could not venture to a single one, to gain heaven. Excuse me, M. Lacourne, said I, as for the nakedness of your land, if I saw it I should cast my eyes over it with tears in them. And for that of your women, blushing at the idea he had excited in me, I am so evangelical in this, and have such a fellow feeling for whatever is weak about them, that I would cover it with a garment if I knew how to throw it on. But I could wish, continued I, to spy the nakedness of their hearts, and through the different disguises of customs, climates, and religion, find out what is good in them to fashion my own by, and therefore am I calm. It is for this reason, M. Lacourne, continued I, that I have not seen the Palais Royal, nor the Luxembourg, nor the façade of the Louvre, nor have attempted to swell the catalogues we have of pictures, statues, and churches. I conceive every fair being as a temple, and would rather enter in, and see the original drawings and loose sketches hung up in it, than the transfiguration of Raphael itself. The thirst of this, continued I, as impatient as that which inflames the breast of the connoisseur, has led me from my own home into France, and from France will lead me through Italy. It is a quiet journey of the heart, in pursuit of nature, and those affections which arise out of her, which makes us love each other, and the world better than we do. The Count said a great many civil things to me upon the occasion, and added very politely how much he stood obliged to Shakespeare for making me known to him. But apropos, said he, Shakespeare is full of great things. He forgot a small punctilio of announcing your name. It puts you under a necessity of doing it yourself. The Passport Versailles There is not a more perplexing affair in life to me, than to set about telling anyone who I am. For there is scarce anybody I cannot give a better account of than myself, and I have often wished I could do it in a single word, and have an end of it. It was the only time and occasion in my life I could accomplish this to any purpose. For Shakespeare lying upon the table, and recollecting I was in his books, I took up Hamlet, and turning immediately to the gravedigger's scene in the fifth act, I laid my finger upon Yorick, and advancing the book to the Count, with my finger all the way over the name, Movoissy, said I. Now whether the idea of poor Yorick's skull was put out of the Count's mind by the reality of my own, or by what magic he could drop a period of seven or eight hundred years makes nothing in this account, it is certain the French conceive better than they combine. I wonder at nothing in this world, and the less at this, in as much as one of the first of our own church, for whose candour and paternal sentiments I have the highest veneration fell into the same mistake in the very same case. He could not bear, he said, to look into the sermons wrote by the king of Denmark's jester. Good my lord, said I, but there are two Yoricks. The Yorick your lordship thinks of has been dead and buried eight hundred years ago. He flourished in Horwen Dillis's court. The other Yorick is myself, who have flourished my lord in no court. He shook his head. Good God, said I, you might as well confound Alexander the Great with Alexander the Copper Smith, my lord. It was all one, he replied. If Alexander, king of Macedon, could have translated your lordship, said I, I'm sure your lordship would not have said so. The poor Count de Bay fell but into the same error. Eh Monsieur, est-il Yorick? cried the Count. Je le suis, said I. Moi, moi qui est l'honneur de vous parler, Monsieur le Comte. Mon Dieu, said he embracing me, vous êtes Yorick. The Count instantly put the Shakespeare into his pocket and left me alone in his room. The passport Versailles. I could not conceive why the Count de Bay had gone so abruptly out of the room any more than I could conceive why he had put the Shakespeare into his pocket. Mysteries which must explain themselves are not worth the loss of time which a conjecture about them takes up. It was better to read Shakespeare. So taking up much ado about nothing, I transported myself instantly from the chair I sat in to Messina in Sicily, and got so busy with Don Pedro and Benedict and Beatrice that I thought not of Versailles, the Count or the passport. Great pliability of man's spirit that can at once surrender itself to illusions which cheat expectation and sorrow of their weary moments. Long, long since had ye numbered out my days had I not tread so great a part of them upon this enchanted ground. When my way is too rough for my feet or too steep for my strength, I get off it to some smooth velvet path which fancy has scattered over with rose buds of delights, and having taken a few turns in it come back strengthened and refreshed. When evils press sore upon me, and there is no retreat from them in this world, then I take a new course. I leave it, and as I have a clearer idea of the Elysian fields than I have of heaven, I force myself like Ineos into them. I see him meet the pensive shade of his forsaken dido, and wish to recognize it. I see the injured spirit wave her head, and turn off silent from the author of her miseries and dishonors. I lose the feelings for myself in hers, and in those affections which were won't to make me mourn for her when I was at school. Surely this is not walking in a vain shadow, nor does man disquiet himself in vain by it. The oftener does so in trusting the issue of his commotions to reason only. I can safely say for myself I was never able to conquer any one single bad sensation in my heart so decisively as beating up as fast as I could for some kindly and gentle sensation to fight it upon its own ground. When I had got to the end of the third act, the court debate entered, with my passport in his hand. Monsieur le Duke de Sey said the count is as good a prophet, I dare say, as he is a statesman. An homme qui rit, said the Duke, ne sera jamais dangereux. Had it been for any one but the king's jester, added the count, I could not have got it these two hours. Pardonz-moi, Monsieur le Count, said I, I am not the king's jester, but you are yoddique. Yes, et vous plaisantez. I answered indeed I did jest, but was not paid for it, was entirely at my own expense. We have no jester at court, Monsieur le Count, said I, the last we had was in the licentious reign of Charles II, since which time our manners have been so gradually refining that our court at present is so full of patriots who wish for nothing but the honours and wealth of their country, and our ladies are all so chaste, so spotless, so gored, so devout. There is nothing for a jester to make a jest of. Voila, perciflage, cried the Count. The Passport Versailles As the passport was directed to all lieutenant governors, governors and commandants of cities, generals of armies, justiciaries, and all officers of justice, to let Mr. Yoddique, the king's jester, and his baggage, travel quietly along, I own the triumph of obtaining the passport was not a little tarnished by the figure I cut in it. But there is nothing unmixed in this world, and some of the gravest of our divines have carried it so far as to affirm that enjoyment itself was attended even with a sigh, and that the greatest they knew of terminated in a general way in little better than a convulsion. I remember the grave and learned Bevoriscius, in his commentary upon the generations from Adam, very naturally breaks off in the middle of a note to give an account to the world of a couple of sparrows on the out edge of his window, which had incommodated him all the time he wrote, and at last had entirely taken him off from his genealogy. It is strange, writes Bevoriscius, but the facts are certain, for I have had the curiosity to mark them down one by one with my pen, but the cock sparrow, during the little time that I could have finished the other half of this note, has actually interrupted me with the reiteration of his caresses, three and twenty times and a half. How merciful, adds Bevoriscius, is heaven to his creatures! Ill-fated Yorick, that the gravest of thy brethren should be able to write that to the world, which stains thy face with crimson to copy, even in thy study! But this is nothing to my travels, so I twice, twice beg pardon for it. End of Section 17. Recording by Martin Giesen in Hazelmere, Surrey. Section 18 of A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Martin Giesen. A Sentimental Journey through France and Italy. By Lawrence Stern. Section 18. Character Versailles. And how do you find the French? Said the court du be, after he had given me the passport. The reader may suppose that after so obliging a proof of courtesy, I could not be at a loss to say something handsome to the inquiry. Me passe pour cela, speak frankly, said he. Do you find all the urbanity in the French which the world give us the honour of? I had found everything, I said, which confound it. Vraiment, said the count, les Français sont polis. To an excess, replied I. The count took notice of the word excès, and would have it I meant more than I said. I defended myself a long time, as well as I could against it. He insisted I had a reserve, and that I would speak my opinion frankly. I believe, Monsieur Le Comte, said I, that man has a certain compass as well as an instrument, and that the social and other calls have occasion by turns for every key in him, so that if you begin a note too high or too low, there must be a want in either the upper or under part to fill up the system of harmony. The court du be did not understand music, so desired me to explain it in some other way. A polished nation, as my dear count said I, makes everyone its debtor, and besides urbanity itself, like the fair sex, has so many charms, it goes against the heart to say it can do ill. And yet I believe there is but a certain line of perfection, that any man, take him all together, is empowered to arrive at. If he gets beyond, he rather exchanges qualities than gets them. I must not presume to say how far this has affected the French in the subject we are speaking of, but should it ever be the case of the English in the progress of their refinements, to arrive at the same polish which distinguishes the French. If we did not lose the polytestue cur, which inclines men more to humane actions than courteous ones, we should at least lose that distinct variety and originality of character which distinguishes them, not only from each other, but from all the world besides. I had a few of King William's shillings, as smooth as glass in my pocket, and foreseeing they would be of use in the illustration of my hypothesis, I had got them into my hand when I had proceeded so far. See, Monsieur le Comte, said I, rising up, and laying them before him on the table, by jingling and rubbing one against another for seventy years together in one body's pocket or another's, they all become so alike you can scarce distinguish one's shilling from another. The English, like ancient medals, kept more apart, and passing but few people's hands preserved the first sharpnesses which the fine hand of nature has given them. They are not so pleasant to feel, but in return the legend is so visible that at the first look you see whose image and superscription they bear. But the French, Monsieur le Comte, and did I, wishing to soften what I had said, have so many excellences they can the better spare this. They are loyal, a gallant, a generous, an ingenious, and good-tempered people as is under heaven. If they have a fault, they are too serious. Monsieur cried the Count, rising out of his chair. M'a rupes-en-t'e, said he, correcting his exclamation. I laid my hand upon my breast, and with earnest gravity assured him it was my most settled opinion. The Count said he was mortified he could not stay to hear my reasons, being engaged to go that moment to dine with the Duke-de-Sie. But if it is not too far to come to Versailles to eat your soup with me, I beg, before you leave France, I may have the pleasure of knowing you retract your opinion, or in what manner you support it. But if you do support it, M. Anglais said he, you must do it with all your powers, because you have the whole world against you. I promised the Count I would do myself the honour of dining with him before I set out for Italy. So took my leave. The Temptation Paris When I alighted at the hotel, the porter told me a young woman with a bandbox had been that moment inquiring for me. I do not know, said the porter, whether she has gone away or not. I took the key of my chamber of him and went upstairs, and when I had got within ten steps of the top of the landing before my door, I met her coming easily down. It was the fair Fideschandre I had walked along the Cade de Conte with. Madame de Arre had sent her upon some commission to a marchand de mud, within a step or two of the Hotel de Modène, and as I had failed in waiting upon her, had bid her inquire if I had left Paris. And if so, whether I had not left a letter addressed to her. As the fair Fideschandre was so near my door, she returned back and went into the room with me for a moment or two whilst I wrote a card. It was a fine, still evening in the latter end of the month of May. The crimson window-curtains, which were of the same colour as those of the bed, were drawn close. The sun was setting and reflected through them so warm a tint into the fair Fideschandre's face I thought she blushed. The idea of it made me blush myself. We were quite alone, and that super-induced a second blush before the first could get off. There is a sort of pleasing half-guilty blush, where the blood is more in fault than the man. It is sent impetuous from the heart, and virtue flies after it, not to call it back, but to make the sensation of it more delicious to the nerves. It is associated, but I'll not describe it. I felt something at first within me, which was not in strict unison with the lesson of virtue I had given her the night before. I sought five minutes for a card. I knew I had not one. I took up a pen. I laid it down again. My hand trembled. The devil was in me. I know as well as any one he is an adversary, whom if we resist he will fly from us. But I seldom resist him at all. From a terror, though I may conquer, I may still get a hurt in the combat. So I give up the triumph for security, and instead of thinking to make him fly, I generally fly myself. The fair Fia Deschamps came close up to the bureau where I was looking for a card. Took up first the pen I cast down, then offered to hold me the ink. She offered it so sweetly I was going to accept it, but I durst not. I have nothing, my dear, said I, to write upon. Write it, said she, simply, upon anything. I was just going to cry out, then I will write it, fair girl, upon thy lips. If I do, I said, I shall perish. So I took her by the hand, and led her to the door, and begged she would not forget the lesson I had given her. She said indeed she would not, and as she uttered it with some earnestness, she turned about, and gave me both her hands, closed together into mine. It was impossible not to compress them in that situation. I wished to let them go, and all the time I held them, I kept arguing within myself against it. And still I held them on. In two minutes I found I had all the battle to fight over again, and I felt my legs and every limb about me tremble at the idea. The fort of the bed was within a yard and a half of the place where we were standing. I had still hold of her hands. And how it happened I can give no account, but I neither asked her nor drew her, nor did I think of the bed. But so it did happen we both sat down. I'll just show you, said the fair Fiddle-Sharp, the little purse I have been making today to hold your crown. So she put her hand into her right pocket, which was next me, and felt for it some time. Then into the left. She had lost it. I never bore expectation more quietly. It was in her right pocket at last. She pulled it out. It was of green taffeta, lined with a little bit of white quilted satin, and just big enough to hold the crown. She put it into my hand. It was pretty, and I held it ten minutes with the back of my hand resting upon her lap, looking sometimes at the purse, sometimes on one side of it, a stitch or two had broke out in the gathers of my stock. The fair Fiddle-Sharp, without saying a word, took out her little huzziff, threaded a small needle and sewed it up. I foresaw it would hazard the glory of the day, and as she passed her hand in silence across and across my neck in the manoeuvre, I felt the laurels shake which fancy had wreathed about my head. A strap had given way in her walk, and the buckle of her shoe was just falling off. See! said the Fiddle-Sharp, holding up her foot. I could not fore my soul but fasten the buckle in return, and putting in the strap, and lifting up the other foot with it, when I had done to see both were right, in doing it too suddenly, it unavoidably threw the fair Fiddle-Sharp off her centre, and then, the conquest, yes, and then, ye whose clay-cold heads and lukewarm hearts can argue down or mask your passions, tell me what trespass is it that man should have them, or how his spirit stands answerable to the father of spirits but for his conduct under them? If nature has so wove her web of kindness that some threads of love and desire are entangled with the peace, must the whole web be rent in drawing them out? Whip me such stoics, great governor of nature, said I to myself, wherever thy providence shall place me for the trials of my virtue. It is my danger, whatever is my situation, let me feel the movements which rise out of it, and which belong to me as a man, and if I govern them as a good one, I will trust the issues to thy justice, for thou hast made us, and not we ourselves. As I finished my address, I raised the fair Fiddle-Sharp up by the hand and led her out of the run. She stood by me till I locked the door and put the key in my pocket, and then, the victory being quite decisive, and not till then, I pressed my lips to her cheek, and taking her by the hand again, led her safe to the gate of the hotel. End of Section 18 Recording by Martin Giesen in Hazelmeyer Surrey Section 19 of A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Martin Giesen A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy by Lawrence Stern Section 19 The Mystery Paris If a man knows the heart, he will know it was impossible to go back instantly to my chamber. It was touching a cold key with a flat third to it, upon the clothes of a piece of music which had called forth my affections. Therefore, when I let go the hand of the Fiddle-Sharp, I remained at the gate of the hotel for some time, looking at everyone who passed by, and forming conjectures upon them, till my attention got fixed upon a single object which confounded all kind of reasoning upon him. It was a tall figure of a philosophic, serious, a dust look, which passed and repast sedately along the street, making a turn of about sixty paces on each side of the gate of the hotel. The man was about fifty-two, had a small cane under his arm, was dressed in a dark, drab-coloured coat, waistcoat and britches, which seemed to have seen some year's service. They were still clean, and there was a little air of frugal property throughout him. By pulling off his hat, and his attitude of accosting a good many in his way, I saw he was asking charity. So I got a sewer-two out of my pocket ready to give him as he took me in his turn. He passed by me without asking anything. And yet did not go five steps further before he asked charity of a little woman. I was much more likely to have given of the two. He had scarce done with the woman when he pulled off his hat to another who was coming the same way. An ancient gentleman came slowly, and after him a young smart one. He let them both pass and asked nothing. I stood observing him half an hour, in which time he had made a dozen turns backwards and forwards, and found that he invariably pursued the same plan. There were two things very singular in this which set my brain to work, and to no purpose. The first was why the man should only tell his story to the sex, and secondly what kind of story it was, and what species of eloquence it could be, which softened the hearts of the women, which he knew it was to no purpose to practice upon the men. There were two other circumstances which entangled this mystery. The one was he told every woman what he had to say in her ear, and in a way which had much more the air of a secret than a petition. The other was it was always successful. He never stopped a woman, but she pulled out her purse and immediately gave him something. I could form no system to explain the phenomenon. I had got a riddle to amuse me for the rest of the evening, so I walked upstairs to my chamber—the case of conscience, Paris. I was immediately followed up by the master of the hotel, who came into my room to tell me I must provide lodgings elsewhere. "'How so, friend?' said I. He answered, I had had a young woman locked up with me two hours that evening in my bed chamber, and was against the rules of his house. "'Very well,' said I, will all part, friends, then, for the girl is no worse, and I am no worse, and you will be just as I found you.' "'It was enough,' he said, to overthrow the credit of his hotel. "'Royez-vous, monsieur,' said he, pointing to the foot of the bed we had been sitting upon. I own it had something of the appearance of an evidence, but my pride not suffering me to enter into any detail of the case. I exhorted him to let his soul sleep in peace, as I resolved to let mine do that night, and that I would discharge what I owed him at breakfast. "'I should not have minded, monsieur,' said he, if you had had twenty girls. "'Tis a score more,' replied I, interrupting him, than I ever reckoned upon. Provided,' added he, it had been but in a morning. "'And does a difference of the time of the day at Paris make a difference in the sin?' "'It made a difference,' said he, in the scandal. "'I like a good distinction in my heart, and cannot say I was intolerably out of temper with the man. I own it is necessary,' resumed the master of the hotel, that a stranger at Paris should have the opportunities presented to him of buying lace and silk stockings and ruffles and tousse-la, and it is nothing if a woman comes with a band-box. "'Oh, my conscience,' said I, she had one, but I never looked into it. "'Then, monsieur,' said he, has bought nothing. "'Not one earthly thing,' replied I. "'Because,' said he, I could recommend one to you, who would use you en conscience.' "'But I must see her this night,' said I. He made me a low bow, and walked down. "'Now shall I triumph over this metre d'hôtel,' cried I, and what then?' "'Then I shall let him see I know he is a dirty fellow. And what then? What then?' I was too near myself to say it was for the sake of others. I had no good answer left. There was more of spleen than principle in my project, and I was sick of it before the execution.' In a few minutes the grisette came in with her box of lace. "'I'll buy nothing, however,' said I, within myself. The grisette would show me everything. I was hard to please. She would not seem to see it. She opened her little magazine, and laid all her laces one after another before me. Unfolded and folded them up again one by one, with the most patient sweetness. I might buy or not. She would let me have everything at my own price. The poor creature seemed anxious to get a penny, and laid herself out to win me, and not so much in a manner which seemed artful, as in one I felt simple and caressing. If there is not a fund of honest gullibility in man, so much the worse. My heart relented, and I gave up my second resolution as quietly as the first. Why should I chastise one for the trespass of another? If thou art tributary to this tyrant of an host, thought I, looking up in her face, so much harder is thy bread. If I had not more than four Louis d'Arc in my purse, there was no such thing as rising up, and showing her the door, till I had first laid three of them out in a pair of ruffles. The master of the hotel will share the profit with her. No matter, then I have only paid as many a poor soul has paid before me, for an act he could not do, or think of. The Riddle, Paris When La Fleur came up to wait upon me at supper, he told me how sorry the master of the hotel was for his affront to me, in bidding me change my lodgings. A man who values a good night's rest will not lie down with enmity in his heart, if he can help it. So I bid La Fleur tell the master of the hotel that I was sorry on my side, for the occasion I had given him. And you may tell him, if you will, La Fleur, added I, that if the young woman should call again, I shall not see her. This was a sacrifice, not to him, but myself, having resolved, after so narrow an escape, to run no more risks, but to leave Paris, if it was possible, with all the virtue I entered it. C'est dérogé à nos blesses, monsieur, said La Fleur, making me a bow down to the ground, as he said it. Et encore, monsieur, said he, may change his sentiments, and if, par hasard, he should like to amuse himself, I find no amusements in it, said I, interrupting him. Mon Dieu, said La Fleur, and took away. In an hour's time he came to put me to bed, and was more than commonly officious. Something hung upon his lips to say to me, or ask me, which he could not get off. I could not conceive what it was, and indeed gave myself little trouble to find it out, as I had another riddle so much more interesting upon my mind, which was that of the man's asking charity before the door of the hotel. I would have given anything to have got to the bottom of it, and that not out of curiosity. It is so low a principle of inquiry, in general, I would not purchase the gratification of it with a too-so peace. But a secret, I thought, which so soon and so certainly softened the heart of every woman you came near, was a secret at least equal to the philosopher's stone. Had I both the indies, I would have given up one to have been master of it. I tossed and turned it almost all night long in my brains, to no manner of purpose. And when I awoke in the morning, I found my spirit as much troubled with my dreams, as ever the king of Babylon had been with his. And I will not hesitate to affirm, it would have puzzled all the wise men of Paris, as much as those of Caldea, to have given its interpretation. End of section 19 Recording by Martin Giesen in Hazelmaire Surrey Section 20 of A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Martin Giesen A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy by Lawrence Stern Section 20 Le Dimanche Paris It was Sunday, and when la fleur came in in the morning with my coffee and roll and butter, he had got himself so gallantly arrayed, I scarce knew him. I had covenanted at Montreuil to give him a new hat with a silver button and loop, and four Louis d'Arts pour s'adoniser, when we got to Paris, and the poor fellow to do him justice had done wonders with it. He had bought a bright, clean, good scarlet coat, and a pair of britches of the same. They were not a crown worse, he said, for the wearing. I wished him hanged for telling me. They looked so fresh, that though I knew the thing could not be done, yet I would rather have imposed upon my fancy with thinking I had bought them new for the fellow, than that they had come out of the rue de Friperie. This is a nice city which makes not the heart sore at Paris. He had purchased, moreover, a handsome blue satin waistcoat, fancifully enough embroidered. This was indeed something the worse for the service it had done, but to his clean scoured. The gold had been touched up, and upon the whole was rather showy than otherwise. And as the blue was not violent, it suited with the coat and britches very well. He had squeezed out of the money, moreover, a new bag and a solitaire, and had insisted with the Friperie upon a gold pair of garters to his britches' knees. He had purchased muslin ruffles, bien brodés, with four livres of his own money, and a pair of white silk stockings for five more, and to top all, nature had given him a handsome figure without costing him a sue. He entered the room thus set off, with his hair dressed in the first style, and with a handsome bouquet in his breast. In a word there was that look of festivity in everything about him which had once put me in mind it was Sunday, and by combining both together it instantly struck me that the favour he wished to ask of me the night before was to spend the day as everybody in Paris spent it besides. I had scarce made the conjecture, when la fleur, with infinite humility, but with a look of trust, as if I should not refuse him, begged I would grant him the day pour faire le galant vis-à-vis de sa maîtresse. Now it was the very thing I intended to do myself vis-à-vis, madame de R. I had retained the remise on purpose for it, and it would not have mortified my vanity to have had a servant so well dressed as la fleur was to have got up behind it. I never could have worse spared him. But we must feel, not argue in these embarrassments, the sons and daughters of surface, part with liberty, but not with nature in their contracts. They are flesh and blood, and have their little vanities and wishes in the midst of the house of bondage, as well as their taskmasters. No doubt they have set their self-denials at a price, and their expectations are so unreasonable that I would often disappoint them, but that their condition puts it so much in my power to do it. Behold, behold, I am thy servant, disarms me at once of the powers of a master. Thou shalt go, la fleur, said I. And what mistress, la fleur, said I, canst thou have picked up in so little a time at Paris? La fleur laid his hand upon his breast, and said it was a petite demoiselle at M. Lecourt de Bays. La fleur had a heart made for society, and to speak the truth of him, let as few occasions slip him as his master, so that somehow or other, but how heaven knows, he had connected himself with the demoiselle upon the landing of the staircase, during the time I was taken up with my passport. And as there was time enough for me to win the count to my interest, la fleur had contrived to make it due to win the maid to his. The family, it seems, was to be at Paris that day, and he had made a party with her, and two or three more of the count's household upon the boulevards. Happy people, that once a week at least, are sure to lay down all your cares together, and dance, and sing, and sport away the weights of grievance, which bow down the spirit of other nations to the earth. The fragment, Paris. La fleur had left me something to amuse myself with for the day, more than I had bargained for, or could have entered either into his head or mine. He had brought the little print of butter upon a current leaf, and as the morning was warm, and he had a good step to bring it, he had begged a sheet of waste paper to put betwixt the current leaf and his hand. As that was plate sufficient, I bade him lay it upon the table as it was, and as I resolved to stay within all day, I ordered him to call upon the traiteur to bespeak my dinner, and leave me to breakfast by myself. When I had finished the butter, I threw the current leaf out of the window, and was going to do the same by the waste paper, but stopping to read a line first, and that drawing me on to a second and third, I thought it better worth, so I shut the window, and drawing a chair up to it, I sat down to read it. It was in the old French of Rabelay's time, and for all I know might have been wrote by him. It was, moreover, in a gothic letter, and that so faded and gone off by damps and length of time, it cost me infinite trouble to make anything of it. I threw it down, and then wrote a letter to Eugenius. Then I took it up again, and embroiled my patience with it afresh, and then to cure that I wrote a letter to Eliza. Still it kept hold of me, and the difficulty of understanding it increased but the desire. I got my dinner, and after I had enlightened my mind with a bottle of burgundy, I went at it again, and after two or three hours pouring upon it, with almost as deep a tension as ever Grutter or Jacob Spahn did upon a nonsensical inscription, I thought I made sense of it. But to make sure of it, the best way I imagined was to turn it into English, and see how it would look then. So I went on leisurely, as a trifling man does, sometimes writing a sentence, then taking a turn or two, and then looking how the world went out of the window, so that it was nine o'clock at night before I had done it. I then began and read it as follows. End of section 20. Recording by Martin Giesen in Hazelmere Surrey. Section 21 of A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Martin Giesen. A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy. By Lawrence Stern. Section 21. The Fragment, Paris. Now, as the notary's wife disputed the point with the notary, with too much heat, I wish, said the notary, throwing down the parchment, that there was another notary here, only to set down and attest all this. And what would you do then, monsieur? said she, rising hastily up. The notary's wife was a little fume of a woman, and the notary thought it well to avoid a hurricane by a mild reply. I would go, answered he, to bed. You may go to the devil, answered the notary's wife. Now they're happening to be but one bed in the house, the other two rooms being unfurnished, as is the custom at Paris, and the notary not caring to lie in the same bed with a woman who had, but that moment sent him pel-mel to the devil, went forth with his hat and cane and short cloak, the night being very windy, and walked out ill at ease towards the poor nerf. Of all the bridges which ever were built, the whole world who have passed over the poor nerf must own that it is the noblest, the finest, the grandest, the lightest, the longest, the broadest, that ever conjoined land and land together, upon the face of the terracuous globe. By this it seems as if the author of the fragment had not been a Frenchman. The worst fault which divines and doctors of the Sarbonne can allege against it is, that if there is but a cap full of wind in or about Paris, it is more blasphemously saccharideurred there than in any other aperture of the whole city. And with reason, good and cogent, monsieur, for it comes against you without crying and with such unpremeditable puffs, that of the few who cross it with their hats on, not one in fifty but hazards to leave as in the half, which is its full worth. The poor notary, just as he was passing by the sentry, instinctively clapped his cane to the side of it, but in raising it up, the point of his cane catching hold of the loop of the sentinels hat hoisted it over the spikes of the balustrade clear into the sen. "'Tis an el wind,' said a boatman, who catched it, which blows nobody any good. The sentry, being a gas-con, incontinently twirled up his whiskers and levelled his aquibus. Aquibuses in those days went off with matches, and an old woman's paper lantern at the end of the bridge happening to be blown out. She had borrowed the sentry's match to light it. It gave a moment's time for the gas-con's blood to run cool and turn the accident better to his advantage. "'Tis an el wind,' said he, catching off the notary's caster, reader's note, far-hat, and legitimating the capture with the boatman's adage. The poor notary crossed the bridge, and passing along the Rue de Dauphine into the Faubourgs of Saint-Germain lamented himself as he walked along in this manner. "'Luckless man that I am,' said the notary, "'to be the sport of Hurricans all my days, to be born to have the storm of ill language levelled against me and my profession wherever I go, to be forced into marriage by the thunder of the church, to a tempest of a woman, to be driven forth out of my house by domestic winds, and despoiled of my caster by pontific ones, to be here bare-headed in a windy night at the mercy of the ebbs and flows of accidents. Where am I to lay my head? Miserable man, what wind in the two and thirty points of the whole compass can blow unto thee, as it does to the rest of thy fellow-creatures, good!' As the notary was passing on by a dark passage complaining in this sort, a voice called out to a girl to bid her run for the next notary. Now the notary being the next, and availing himself of his situation, walked up the passage to the door, and passing through an old sort of a saloon, was ushered into a large chamber, dismantled of everything but a long military pike, a breastplate, a rusty old sword and bandolier, hung up equidistant in four different places along the wall. An old parsley-true had here to forb in a gentleman, and unless decay of fortune taints the blood, along with it, was a gentleman at that time, lay supporting his head upon his hand in his bed. A little table with a taper-burning was set close beside it, and close by the table was placed a chair. The notary sat him down in it, and pulling out his ink-horn, and a sheet or two of paper which he had in his pocket, he placed them before him, and dipping his pen in his ink, and leaning his breast over the table, he disposed everything to make the gentleman's last will and testament. Alas, Monsieur le Notaire, said the gentleman, raising himself up a little, I have nothing to bequeath, which will pay the expense of bequeathing, except the history of myself, which I could not die in peace, unless I left it as a legacy to the world. The profits arising out of it, I bequeath to you for the pains of taking it from me. It is a story so uncommon. It must be read by all mankind. It will make the fortunes of your house. The notary dipped his pen into his ink-horn. Almighty director of every event in my life, said the old gentleman, looking up earnestly and raising his hands towards heaven. Thou, whose hand has led me on through such a labyrinth of strange passages down into this scene of desolation, assist the decaying memory of an old, infirm and broken-hearted man. Direct my tongue by the spirit of thy eternal truth, that this stranger may set down naught but what is written in that book, from whose records, said he, clasping his hands together, I am to be condemned or acquitted. The notary held up the point of his pen, betwixt the taper and his eye. It is a story, Monsieur le Notaire, said the gentleman, which will rouse up every affection in nature. It will kill the humane and touch the heart of cruelty herself with pity. The notary was inflamed with a desire to begin and put his pen a third time into his ink-horn, and the old gentleman, turning a little more towards the notary, began to dictate his story in these words. And where is the rest of it, la fleur, said I, as he just then entered the room, the fragment and the bouquet, Paris. When la fleur came up close to the table, and was made to comprehend what I wanted, he told me there were only two other sheets of it, which he had wrapped round the stalks of a bouquet to keep it together, which he had presented to the demoiselle upon the boulevards. Then prithee, la fleur, said I, step back to her to the corned-de-bays hotel, and see if thou canst get it. There is no doubt of it, said la fleur, and away he flew. In a very little time, the poor fellow came back quite out of breath, with deeper marks of disappointment in his looks, than could arise from the simple irreparability of the fragment. Juste ciel, in less than two minutes, that the poor fellow had taken his last tender farewell of her. His faithless mistress had given his gage d'amour to one of the Count's fortmen. The fortmen to a young seamstress, and the seamstress to a fiddler, with my fragment at the end of it. Our misfortunes were involved together. I gave a sigh, and la fleur echoed it back again to my ear. Ah! our perfidious cried la fleur. How unlucky, said I! I should not have been mortified, monsieur, coothed la fleur, if she had lost it. Nor I, la fleur, said I, had I found it. Whether I did or know, will be seen hereafter. End of section 21 Recording by Martin Giesen, in Hazelmayer Surrey. Section 22 of A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Martin Giesen. A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy. By Laurence Stern. Section 22 The Act of Charity. Paris. The man who either disdains or fears to walk up a dark entry may be an excellent good man and fit for a hundred things, but he will not do to make a good Sentimental Traveller. I count little of the many things I see pass at broad noonday in large and open streets. Nature is shy and hates to act before spectators, but in such an unobserved corner you sometimes see a single short scene of hers worth all the sentiments of a dozen French plays compounded together. And yet they are absolutely fine, and whenever I have a more brilliant affair upon my hands than common, as they suit a preacher just as well as a hero, I generally make my sermon out of them. And for the text, Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Frigia and Pamphylia is as good as anyone in the Bible. There is a long dark passage is suing out from the Opéracomique into a narrow street. It is trod by a few who humbly wait for a fiac, or wish to get off quietly a foot when the opera is done. At the end of it, towards the theatre, it is lighted by a small candle, the light of which is almost lost before you get half way down, but near the door. It is more for ornament than use. You see it as a fixed star of the least magnitude. It burns, but does little good to the world that we know of. In returning along this passage, I discerned as I approached within five or six paces of the door two ladies standing arm in arm with their backs against the wall waiting as I imagined for a fiac. As they were next to the door, I thought they had a prior right, so edged myself up within a yard or little more of them, and quietly took my stand. I was in black and scarce seen. The lady next to me was a tall, lean figure of a woman of about thirty-six, the other of the same size and make of about forty. There was no mark of wife or widow in any one part of either of them. They seemed to be two upright, vestal sisters, unsapped by caresses, unbroken upon by tender salutations. I could have wished to have made them happy. Their happiness was destined that night to come from another quarter. A low voice, with a good turn of expression and sweet cadence at the end of it, begged for a twelve-sew piece betwixt them for the love of heaven. I thought it singular that a beggar should fix the quota of an arms, and that the sum should be twelve times as much as what is usually given in the dark. They both seemed astonished at it as much as myself. Twelve sews, said one. A twelve-sew piece, said the other, and made no reply. The poor man said he knew not how to ask less of ladies of their rank, and bowed down his head to the ground. Said they, we have no money. The beggar remained silent for a moment or two, and renewed his supplication. Do not, my fair young ladies, said he, stop your good ears against me. Upon my word, honest man, said the younger, we have no change. Then God bless you, said the poor man, and multiply those joys which you can give to others without change. I observed the elder sister put her hand into her pocket. I'll see, said she, if I have a sew. A sew, give twelve, said the supplicant. Nature has been bountiful to you, be bountiful to a poor man. I would, my friend, with all my heart, said the younger, if I had it. My fair charitable, said he, addressing himself to the elder, what is it but your goodness and humanity which makes your bright eyes so sweet, that they outshine the morning, even in this dark passage? And what was it which made the Marquis de Saint-Tère and his brother say so much of you both as they just passed by? The two ladies seemed much affected, and impulsively, at the same time, they both put their hands into their pocket, and each took out a twelve-sew piece. The contest betwixt them, and the poor supplicant was no more. It was continued betwixt themselves, which of the two should give the twelve-sew piece in charity, and to end the dispute, they both gave it together, and the man went away. The riddle explained Paris. I stepped hastily after him. It was the very man whose success in asking charity of the women before the door of the hotel had so puzzled me, and I found at once his secret, or at least the basis of it, to his flattery. Delicious essence! How refreshing art thou to nature! How strongly are all its powers, and all its weaknesses on thy side! How sweetly dust thou mix with the blood, and help it through the most difficult and tortuous passages to the heart! The poor man, as he was not straightened for time, had given it here in a larger dose. It is certain he had a way of bringing it into a less form, for the many sudden cases he had to do with in the streets. But how he contrived to correct, sweeten, consenter, and qualify it! I vex not my spirit with the inquiry. It is enough the beggar gained two twelve-sew pieces, and they can best tell the rest who have gained much greater matters by it. Paris We get forwards in the world, not so much by doing services, as receiving them. You take a withering twig, and put it in the ground, and then you water it, because you have planted it. Monsieur le court de baie, merely because he had done me one kindness in the affair of the passport, would go on and do me another, the few days he was at Paris, in making me known to a few people of rank. And they were to present me to others, and so on. I had got master of my secret, just in time to turn these honours to some little account. Otherwise, as is commonly the case, I should have dined or supp'd a single time or two round, and then, by translating French looks and attitudes into plain English, I should presently have seen that I had hold of the couvert of some more entertaining guest. And in course should have resigned all my places one after another, merely upon the principle that I could not keep them. As it was, things did not go much amiss. I had the honour of being introduced to the old Marquis de Baie. In days of yore, he had signalised himself by some small feats of chivalry in the Cour d'amour, and addressed himself out to the idea of tilts and tournaments ever since. The Marquis de Baie wished to have it thought the affair was somewhere else than in his brain. He could like to take a trip to England, and asked much of the English ladies, Stay where you are, I beseech you, M. le Marquis, said I. Les messieurs anglais can scarce get a kind look from them as it is. The Marquis invited me to supper. M. P., the farmer general, was just as inquisitive about our taxes. They were very considerable, he heard. If we knew but how to collect them, said I, making him a low bow. I could never have been invited to M. P.'s concerts upon any other terms. I had been misrepresented to M. de Q. as an esprit. M. de Q. was an esprit herself. She burnt with impatience to see me and hear me talk. I had not taken my seat before I saw she did not care as soo whether I had any wit or no. I was let in to be convinced she had. I call heaven to witness I never once opened the door of my lips. M. de V. vowed to every creature she met. She had never had a more improving conversation with a man in her life. There are three a P. in the empire of a French woman. She is coquette, then daist, then divot. The empire during these is never lost. She only changes her subjects when 35 years and more have unpeopled her dominion of the slaves of love. She re-peoples it with slaves of infidelity, and then with the slaves of the church. M. de V. was vibrating we twixt the first of those epoch. The colour of the rose was fading fast away. She ought to have been a daist five years before the time I had the honour to pay my first visit. She placed me upon the same sofa with her, for the sake of disputing the point of religion more closely. In short, M. de V. told me she believed nothing. I told M. de V. it might be her principle, but I was sure it could not be her interest to level the outworks, without which I could not conceive how such a citadel as hers could be defended. That there was not a more dangerous thing in the world than for a beauty to be a daist. That it was a debt I owed my creed not to conceal it from her. That I had not been five minutes sat upon the sofa beside her, but I had begun to form designs. And what is it but the sentiments of religion, and the persuasion they had excited in her breast, which could have checked them as they rose up? We are not adamant, said I, taking hold of her hand. And there is no need of all restraints, till age in her own time steals in and lays them on us. But my dear lady, said I, kissing her hand, it is too, too soon. I declare I had the credit all over Paris of unperverting M. de Vee. She affirmed to M. de Vee and the Abbe M. that in one half hour I had said more for revealed religion than all their encyclopedia had said against it. I was listed directly into M. de Vee's coterie. And she put off the epoch of deism for two years. I remember it was in this coterie, in the middle of a discourse, in which I was showing the necessity of a first cause, when the young court de Finnaire took me by the hand to the farthest corner of the room, to tell me my solitaire was pinned too straight about my neck. It should be plus bad enough, said the Count, looking down upon his own. But a word, M. Yorick, to the wise. And from the wise, M. de Caught replied I, making him a bow, is enough. The Count de Finnaire embraced me with more ardour than ever I was embraced by mortal man. For three weeks together I was of every man's opinion I met. And at this price I could have eaten and drank and been merry all the days of my life at Paris. But it was a dishonest reckoning. I grew ashamed of it. It was the gain of a slave. Every sentiment of honour revolted against it. The higher I got, the more I was forced upon my beggarly system. The better the coterie, the more children of art. I languished for those of nature. And one night, after a most vile prostitution of myself to half a dozen different people, I grew sick, went to bed, ordered la fleur to get me horses in the morning to set out for Italy. End of section 22. Recording by Martin Giesen in Hazelmeyer Surrey. Section 23 of A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Martin Giesen. A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy. By Lawrence Stern. Section 23. Mariah. Moulin. I never felt what the distress of plenty was in any one shape till now. To travel it through the Bourbonnet, the sweetest part of France. In the heyday of the vintage, when nature is pouring her abundance into everyone's lap, and every eye is lifted up. A journey through each step of which music beats time to labour, and all her children are rejoicing as they carry in their clusters. To pass through this with my affections flying out, and kindling at every group before me, and every one of them was pregnant with adventures. Just heaven it would fill up twenty volumes, and alas I have but a few small pages left of this to crowd it into, and half of these must be taken up with the poor Mariah, my friend Mr. Shandy met with near Moulin. The story he had told of that disordered maid affected me not a little in the reading. But when I got within the neighbourhood where she lived, it returned so strong into the mind that I could not resist an impulse which prompted me to go half a league out of the road to the village where her parents dwelt to inquire after her. It is going I own like the night of the woeful countenance in quest of melancholy adventures. But I know not how it is, but I am never so perfectly conscious of the existence of a soul within me as when I am entangled in them. The old mother came to the door. Her looks told me the story before she opened her mouth. She had lost her husband. He had died, she said, of anguish for the loss of Mariah's senses about a month before. She had feared at first, she added, that it would have plundered her poor girl of what little understanding was left. But on the contrary, it had brought her more to herself. Still she could not rest. Her poor daughter, she said, crying, was wondering somewhere about the road. Why does my pulse beat languid as I write this? And what made Lafleur, whose heart seemed only to be tuned to joy, to pass the back of his hand twice across his eyes as the woman stood and told it? I beckoned to the postillian to turn back into the road. When we had got within half a league of moulin, at a little opening in the road leading to a thicket, I discovered poor Mariah sitting under a poplar. She was sitting with her elbow in her lap, and her head leaning on one side within her hand. A small brook ran at the foot of the tree. I bid the postillian go on with the sheyes to moulin and Lafleur to bespeak my supper, and that I would walk after him. She was dressed in white, and much as my friend described her, except that her hair hung loose, which before was twisted within a silk net. She had super-added likewise to her jacket a pale green ribbon which fell across her shoulder to the waist, at the end of which hung her pipe. Her goat had been as faithless as her lover, and she had got a little dog in lieu of him, which she had kept tied by a string to her girdle. As I looked at her dog, she drew him towards her with the string. Thou shalt not leave me, Silvio, said she. I looked in Mariah's eyes, and saw she was thinking more of her father than of her lover, or her little goat, for as she uttered them, the tears trickled down her cheeks. I sat down close by her, and Mariah let me wipe them away as they fell with my handkerchief. I then steeped it in my own, and then in hers, and then in mine. And then I wiped hers again, and as I did it I felt such undescribable emotions within me, as I am sure could not be accounted for from any combinations of matter and motion. I am positive I have a soul, nor can all the books with which materialists have pestered the world ever convince me to the contrary. Mariah When Mariah had come a little to herself, I asked her if she remembered a pale, thin person of a man who had sat down betwixt her and her goat about two years before. She said she was unsettled much at that time, but remembered it upon two accounts, that ill as she was, she saw the person pitied her, and next that her goat had stolen his handkerchief, and she had beat him for the theft. She had washed it, she said, in the brook, and kept it ever since in her pocket, to restore it to him in case she should ever see him again, which she added he had half promised her. As she told me this, she took the handkerchief out of her pocket to let me see it. She had folded it up neatly in a couple of vine leaves, tied round with a tendril. On opening it I saw an S marked in one of the corners. She had since that, she told me, strayed as far as Rome, and walked around St. Peter's once, and returned back, that she found her way alone across the Apernines, had travelled all over Lombardy without money, and through the flinty roads of Savoy without shoes, how she had borne it, and how she had got supported, she could not tell. But God tempers the wind, said Mariah, to the shorn lamb. Shorn indeed, and to the quick, said I, and wasst thou in my own land, where I have a cottage, I would take thee to it, and shelter thee. Thou shouldst eat of my own bread, and drink of my own cup. I would be kind to thy sylvio. In all thy weaknesses and wanderings I would seek after thee, and bring thee back. When the sun went down I would say my prayers, and when I had done, thou shouldst play thy evening song upon thy pipe, nor would the incense of my sacrifice be worse accepted for entering heaven along with that of a broken heart. Nature melted within me as I uttered this, and Mariah observing as I took out my handkerchief, that it was steeped too much already to be of use, would needs go wash it in the stream. And where will you dry it, Mariah? said I. I'll dry it in my bosom, said she. Twildoomey good! And is your heart still so warm, Mariah? said I. I touched upon the string on which hung all her sorrows. She looked with wistful disorder for some time in my face, and then, without saying anything, she took her pipe and played her service to the virgin. The string I had touched ceased to vibrate. In a moment or two, Mariah returned to herself, let her pipe fall, and rose up. And where are you going, Mariah? said I. She said to Muleen. Let us go, said I, together. Mariah put her arm within mine, and lengthening the string to let the dog follow, in that order we entered Muleen. Mariah, Muleen. Though I hate salutations and greetings in the marketplace, yet when we got into the middle of this, I stopped to take my last look, and last farewell of Mariah. Mariah, though not tall, was nevertheless of the first order of fine forms. Affliction had touched her looks with something that was scarce earthly. Still she was feminine, and so much was there about her of all that the heart wishes, or the eye looks for in woman. But could the traces be ever worn out of her brain, or those of Eliza out of mine? She should not only eat of my bread and drink of my own cup, but Mariah should lie in my bosom, and be unto me as a daughter. Adieu, poor luckless maiden, imbibe the oil and wine which the compassion of a stranger, as he journeyeth on his way, now pours into thy wounds. The being who has twice bruised thee can only bind them up for ever. End of section 23. Recording by Martin Giesen in Hazelmere, Surrey. Section 24 of a Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Recording by Martin Giesen. A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy. By Lawrence Stern. Section 24. There was nothing from which I had painted out for myself so joyous a riot of the affections, as in this journey in the vintage through this part of France. But pressing through this gate of sorrow to it, my sufferings have totally unfitted me. In every scene of festivity I saw Mariah in the background of the piece, sitting pensive under her poplar, and I had got almost to Lyon before I was able to cast a shade across her. Dear Sensibility! Source inexhausted of all that's precious in our joys, or costly in our sorrows. Thou chainest thy martyr down upon his bed of straw, and is thou who lifts him up to heaven. Eternal fountain of our feelings. It is here I trace thee, and this is thy divinity which stirs within me. Not that in some sad and sickening moments my soul shrinks back upon herself and startles at destruction, mere pomp of words, but that I feel some generous joys and generous cares beyond myself. All comes from thee, great, great sensorium of the world, which vibrates if a hair of our heads but falls upon the ground in the remotest desert of thy creation. Touched with thee, Eugenius draws my curtain when I languish. Here's my tale of symptoms, and blames the weather for the disorder of his nerves. Thou givest a portion of it sometimes to the roughest peasant who traverses the bleakest mountains. He finds the lacerated lamb of another's flock. This moment I behold him leaning with his head against his crook, with piteous inclination looking down upon it. Oh, had I come one moment sooner, it bleeds to death. His gentle heart bleeds with it. Peace to thee, generous swain, I see thou walkest off with anguish, but thy joys shall balance it, for happy is thy cottage, and happy is the sharer of it, and happy are the lambs which sport about to you. The supper. A shoe coming loose from the forefoot of the thill-horse at the beginning of the ascent of Mount Torera. The postillian dismounted, twisted the shoe off, and put it in his pocket. As the ascent was of five or six miles, and that horse our main dependence, I made a point of having the shoe fastened on again as well as we could. But the postillian had thrown away the nails, and the hammer in the shears-box being of no great use without them, I submitted to go on. He had not mounted half a mile higher, when coming to a flinty piece of road, the poor devil lost a second shoe, and from off his other forefoot. I then got out of the shears in good earnest, and seeing a house about a quarter of a mile to the left hand, with a great deal to do, I prevailed upon the postillian to turn up to it. The look of the house, and of everything about it, as we drew nearer, soon reconciled me to the disaster. It was a little farmhouse surrounded with about twenty acres of vineyard, about as much corn, and close to the house, on one side, was a potagerie of an acre and a half, full of everything which could make plenty in a French peasant's house. And on the other side was a little wood, which furnished wear with all to dress it. It was about eight in the evening when I got to the house, so I left the postillian to manage his point as he could, and for mine I walked directly into the house. The family consisted of an old grey-headed man and his wife, with five or six sons and sons in law, and their several wives, and a joyous genealogy out of them. They were all sitting down together to their lentil soup. A large wheat and loaf was in the middle of the table, and a flag and of wine at each end of it, promised joy through the stages of the repast. It was a feast of love. The old man rose up to meet me, and with a respectful cordiality would have me sit down at the table. My heart was sat down the moment I entered the room, so I sat down at once like a son of the family, and to invest myself in the character as speedily as I could, I instantly borrowed the old man's knife, and taking up the loaf cut myself a hearty luncheon. And as I did it, I saw a testimony in every eye, not only of an honest welcome, but of a welcome mixed with thanks that I had not seemed to doubt it. Was it this, or tell me nature, what else it was that made this morsel so sweet, and to what magic I owe it that the draught I took of their flagon was so delicious with it that they remain upon my palate to this hour? If the supper was to my taste, the grace which followed it was much more so. The Grace When supper was over, the old man gave a knock upon the table with the haft of his knife to bid them prepare for the dance. The moment the signal was given, the women and girls ran altogether into a back apartment to tie up their hair, and the young men to the door to wash their faces and change their sabbous, and in three minutes every soul was ready upon a little esplanade before the house to begin. The old man and his wife came out last, and placing me betwixt them, sat down upon a sofa of turf by the door. The old man had some fifty years ago been no mean performer upon the Vielle, and at the age he was then of touched it well enough for the purpose. His wife sung now and then a little to the tune, then intermitted and joined her old man again as their children and grandchildren danced before them. It was not till the middle of the second dance when from some pauses in the movements wherein they all seemed to look up. I fancied I could distinguish an elevation of spirit different from that which is the cause or the effect of simple jollity. In a word I thought I beheld religion mixing in the dance. But as I had never seen her so engaged, I should have looked upon it now as one of the illusions of an imagination which is eternally misleading me. Had not the old man, as soon as the dance ended, said that this was their constant way, and that all his life long he had made it a rule after supper was over to call out his family to dance and rejoice. Believing, he said, that a cheerful and contented mind was the best sort of thanks to heaven that an illiterate peasant could pay. Or a learned prelate either, said I. End of section 24. Recording by Martin Gheeson in Hazelmere Surrey