As he still dreamed of the things which he had most admired, his thought,
his remembrance, his will, descended into his fingers, where--without his
knowing how--they communicated to the clay that mysterious principle of
life which the wisest man is unable to define. The humble works of Jean
the potter had marvellous graces. In such a curve, in such a tint, he put
some memory of youth, or of an opening blossom, or the very color of the
weather, and of joy or sorrow.
In his hours of repose he walked with his eyes fixed upon the ground,
studying the variations in the color of the soil on the cliffs, on the
plains, on the sides of the hills.
And the wish came to him to model a unique vase, a marvellous vase, in
which should live through all eternity something of all the fragile
beauties which his eyes had gazed upon; something even of all the brief
joys which his heart had known, and even a little of his divine sorrows of
hope, regret and love.
He was then in the full strength and vigor of manhood.
Yet, that he might the better meditate upon his desire he forsook the
well-paid work, which, it is true, had allowed him to lay aside a little
hoard. No longer, as of old, his wheel turned from morning until night. He
permitted other potters to manufacture raspberry pots by the thousand. The
merchants forgot the way to Jean's field.
The young girls still came there for pleasure, because of the cold water,
the roses, and the raspberries; but the ill-cultivated raspberries
perished, the rose-vines ran wild, climbed to the tops of the high walls,
and offered their dusty blossoms to the travellers on the road.
The water in the well alone remained the same, cold and plenteous, and
that sufficed to draw about Jean eternal youth and eternal gaiety.
Only youth had grown mocking for Jean. For him gaiety had now become
scoffing.
"Ah, Master Jean! Does not your furnace burn any more? Your wheel, Master
Jean, does it scarcely ever turn? When shall we see your amazing pot which
will be as beautiful as everything which is beautiful, blooming like the
rose, beaded like the raspberry, and speaking--if we must believe what you
say about it--like our lips?"
Now Jean is ageing; Jean is old. He sits upon his stone seat beside the
well, under the lace-like shade of the olive tree, in front of his empty
field, all the soil of which is good clay but which no longer produces
either raspberries or roses.