people to say, wanted the cathedral, or at least the cloister, to
whisper to itself, "Here comes Jean Jacques Barbille."

That was all he wanted, and that would have sufficed. He would not have
had them whisper about his philosophy and his intellect, or the mills
and the ash-factory which he meant to build, the lime-kilns he had
started even before he left, and the general store he intended to open
when he returned to St. Saviour's. Not even his modesty was recognized;
and, in his grand tour, no one was impressed by all that he was, except
once. An ancestor, a grandmother of his, had come from the Basque
country; and so down to St. Jean Pied de Port he went; for he came of a
race who set great store by mothers and grandmothers. At St. Jean Pied
de Port he was more at home. He was, in a sense, a foreigner among
foreigners there, and the people were not quizzical, since he was
an outsider in any case and not a native returned, as he had been in
Normandy. He learned to play pelota, the Basque game taken from the
Spaniards, and he even allowed himself a little of that oratory which,
as they say, has its habitat chiefly in Gascony. And because he had
found an audience at last, he became a liberal host, and spent freely
of his dollars, as he had never done either in Normandy, Paris, or
elsewhere. So freely did he spend, that when he again embarked at
Bordeaux for Quebec, he had only enough cash left to see him through the
remainder of his journey in the great world. Yet he left France with
his self-respect restored, and he even waved her a fond adieu, as the
creaking Antoine broke heavily into the waters of the Bay of Biscay,
while he cried:

"My little ship,
It bears me far
From lights of home
To alien star.
O vierge Marie,
Pour moi priez Dieu!
Adieu, dear land,
Provence, adieu."

Then a further wave of sentiment swept over him, and he was vaguely
conscious of a desire to share the pains of parting which he saw in
labour around him--children from parents, lovers from loved. He could
not imagine the parting from a parent, for both of his were in the bosom
of heaven, having followed his five brothers, all of whom had died in
infancy, to his good fortune, for otherwise his estate would now be only
one-sixth of what it was. But he could imagine a parting with some sweet
daughter of France, and he added another verse to t