That evening, after we had feasted on cabbage-soup and the piece of beef which I had been too stuck-up to dandle on my knees, and clear brown cider, the three of us sat outside the house, in the warm August moonlight. Sinking into an infinitely far horizon stretched the fruitful plain of France, cornland and pasture, and near us the stacked sheaves of Paragot"s corn stood quiet and pregnant symbols of the good earth"s plenty. Here and there dark patches of orchard dreamed in a haze.
Through one distant patch a farmhouse struck a m.u.f.fled note of grey. On the left the ribbon of road glistened white between the sentinel poplars silhouetted against the sky. The hot smell of the earth filled the air like spice. A thousand elfin sounds, the vibration of leaves, the tiny crackling of cornstalks, the fairy whirr of ground insects, melted into a companionable stillness.
Blanquette half dozed, her head against Paragot"s shoulder, as she had done that far-off evening of our return from Chambery. The smoke from his porcelain pipe curled upwards through the still air. I was near enough to him on the other side, for him to lay his hand on my arm.
"My son," he whispered in English, "I was right when I said I had come to the end of my journey. Eventually I am right in everything. I prophesied that I would make little Augustus Smith a scholar and a gentleman. _Te voila._ I knew that my long pilgrimage would ultimately lead me to the Inner Shrine. Isn"t all this," he waved his pipe in a circular gesture, "the Holy of Holies of the Real? Is there any illusion in the unutterable poetry of the night? Is there anything false in this promise of the fruitful earth? My G.o.d! Asticot, I am happy! When the soul laughs tears come into the eyes. I have all that the heart of man can desire--the love of this dear wife of mine--the child asleep within doors--the printed wisdom of the world in a dozen tongues of men, caught up hap-hazard in what I once, in a failing hour, thought was my wildgoose chase after Truth--the pride in you, my little Asticot, the son of my adoption--and the most overpowering sleepiness that ever sat upon mortal eyelid."
He yawned. I protested. It was barely nine o"clock.
"It is bedtime," said Paragot. "We have to get up at five."
"Good Heavens, Master," said I, "why these unearthly hours?"
He laughed and quoted Candide.
"_Il faut cultiver notre jardin._"
"No," said the drowsy Blanquette at last understanding the conversation, "we have to cut the rest of the corn."
"It"s all the same, my dear," said Paragot tenderly. "We were talking philosophy. Philosophy merely means the love of wisdom. And all that the wisdom of all the ages can tell us, is summed up in the last words of one of the wisest books that ever was written: "We must cultivate our garden.""
But how my dear erratic master has managed for years and years to cultivate the farm of La Haye and to bring up my G.o.dson in the fear of the Lord and the practice of land surveying is a proof that the late Mr.
Matthew Arnold was hopelessly wrong in his categorical declaration that miracles do not happen.
THE END
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