as near envying you, when I saw you with your sister
at Clos-Jallanges: a perfect house on a hill-side, airy rooms,
chimney-corners big enough to get into, oakwoods, cornfields, vineyards,
river; the life of a country gentleman, as it is painted in the novels
of Tolstoi; fishing and shooting, a pleasant library, a neighbourhood
not too dull, the peasants reasonably honest; and to prevent you
from growing callous in the midst of such unbroken satisfaction, your
companion, suffering and smiling, full of life and keenness, poor thing,
in her arm-chair, delighted to listen, when you came in from a ride and
read her a good sonnet, genuine poetry, fresh from nature, which you
had pencilled on your saddle, or lying flat in the grass, as we are
now--only without this horrible din of waggons and trumpets.'

Vedrine stopped perforce. Some heavy drays, loaded with iron, and
shaking ground and houses as they went by, a piercing alarum from the
neighbouring barracks, the harsh screech of a steam-tug's whistle, an
organ, and the bells of Sainte-Clotilde, all united at the moment, as
from time to time the noises of a great town will do, in a thundering
_tutti_; and the outrageous babel, close to the ear, contrasted
strangely with the natural field of grass and weed, overshadowed by tall
trees, in which the two old classmates were enjoying their smoke and
their familiar chat.

[Illustration: At the corner of the Quai d'Orsay 082]

It was at the corner of the Quai d'Orsay and the Rue de Bellechasse, on
the ruined terrace of the old Cour des Comptes, now occupied by sweet
wild plants, like a clearing in the forest at the coming of spring.
Clumps of lilac past the flowering and dense thickets of plane and maple
grew all along the balustrades, which were loaded with ivy and clematis:
and within this verdant screen the pigeons lighted, the bees wandered,
and under a beam of yellow light might be seen the calm and handsome
profile of Madame Vedrine, nursing her youngest, while the eldest threw
stones at the numerous cats, grey, black, yellow, and tabby, which might
be called the tigers of this Parisian jungle.

'And as we are talking of your poetry, you will wish me to speak my
mind, won't you, old boy? Well, I have only just looked into your last
book, but it has not that smell of bluebells and thyme that I found in
the others. Your "God in Nature" has rather a flavour of the Academic
bay; and I am much afraid you have made a sacrifice o