siness piously.

Farther away is the road, which April's illumination adorns all along
the lines of trees with embroidery of shadow and of gold, where
bicycles tinkle and carriages rumble echoingly; and the shining
river,--those long-drawn sheets of water, whereon the sun spreads
sheets of light and scatters blinding points. Looking along the road,
on either side of its stone-hard surface, one sees the pleasant,
cultivated earth, the bits of land sewn to each other, and many-hued,
brown or green as the billiard cloth, then paling in the distance.
Here and there, on this map in colors, copses bulge forth. The
by-roads are pricked out with trees, which follow each other artlessly
and divide the infantile littleness of orchards.

This landscape holds us by the soul. It is a watercolor now (for it
rained a little last night), with its washed stones, its tiles
varnished anew, its roofs that are half slate and half light, its
shining pavements, water-jeweled in places, its delicately blue sky,
with clouds like silky paper; and between two house-fronts of yellow
ocher and tan, against the purple velvet of distant forests, there is
the neighboring steeple, which is like ours and yet different. Roundly
one's gaze embraces all the panorama, which is delightful as the
rainbow.

From the Place, then, where one feels himself so abundantly at home, we
enter the church. From the depths of this thicket of lights, the good
priest murmurs the great infinite speech to us, blesses us, embraces us
severally and altogether, like father and mother both. In the manorial
pew, the foremost of all, one glimpses the Marquis of Monthyon, who has
the air of an officer, and his mother-in-law, Baroness Grille, who is
dressed like an ordinary lady.

Emerging from church, the men go away; the women swarm out more
grudgingly and come to a standstill together; then all the buzzing
groups scatter.

At noon the shops close. The fine ones do it unassisted; the others
close by the antics of some good man who exerts himself to carry and
fit the shutters. Then there is a great void.

After lunch I wander in the streets. In the house I am bored, and yet
outside I do not know what to do. I have no friend and no calls to
pay. I am already too big to mingle with some, and too little yet to
associate with others. The cafes and licensed shops hum, jingle and
smoke already. I do not go to cafes, on principle, and because of that
fondness for spend