Mounted upon his horse, he trotted along the embankment thinking no more
of his phrases than an actor thinks of his part which he has played for
a hundred times. It was thus that the illustrious Gaudissart went his
cheerful way, admiring the landscape, and little dreaming that in the
happy valleys of Vouvray his commercial infallibility was about to
perish.

Here a few remarks upon the public mind of Touraine are essential to our
story. The subtle, satirical, epigrammatic tale-telling spirit stamped
on every page of Rabelais is the faithful expression of the Tourangian
mind,--a mind polished and refined as it should be in a land where
the kings of France long held their court; ardent, artistic, poetic,
voluptuous, yet whose first impulses subside quickly. The softness of
the atmosphere, the beauty of the climate, a certain ease of life and
joviality of manners, smother before long the sentiment of art, narrow
the widest heart, and enervate the strongest will. Transplant the
Tourangian, and his fine qualities develop and lead to great results, as
we may see in many spheres of action: look at Rabelais and Semblancay,
Plantin the printer and Descartes, Boucicault, the Napoleon of his day,
and Pinaigrier, who painted most of the colored glass in our cathedrals;
also Verville and Courier. But the Tourangian, distinguished though he
may be in other regions, sits in his own home like an Indian on his mat
or a Turk on his divan. He employs his wit in laughing at his neighbor
and in making merry all his days; and when at last he reaches the end
of his life, he is still a happy man. Touraine is like the Abbaye of
Theleme, so vaunted in the history of Gargantua. There we may find the
complying sisterhoods of that famous tale, and there the good cheer
celebrated by Rabelais reigns in glory.

As to the do-nothingness of that blessed land it is sublime and well
expressed in a certain popular legend: "Tourangian, are you hungry,
do you want some soup?" "Yes." "Bring your porringer." "Then I am not
hungry." Is it to the joys of the vineyard and the harmonious loveliness
of this garden land of France, is it to the peace and tranquillity of a
region where the step of an invader has never trodden, that we owe
the soft compliance of these unconstrained and easy manners? To such
questions no answer. Enter this Turkey of sunny France, and you will
stay there,--lazy, idle, happy. You may be as ambitious as Napoleon, as
poetic as Lord Byron