From 'The Massacre of the Innocents, and Other Tales by Belgian
Writers': copyright 1895, by Stone & Kimball
The country I know and love best does not exist for the tourist, and
neither guide nor doctor ever dreams of recommending it. This
reassures me, for I love my country selfishly, exclusively. The land
is ancient, flat, the home of fogs. With the exception of the Polder
_schorres_, the district fertilized by the overflowing of the river,
few districts are cultivated. A single canal from the Scheldt
irrigates its fields and plains, and occasional railways connect its
unfrequented towns.
The politician execrates it, the merchant despises it, it intimidates
and baffles legions of bad painters.
Poets of the boudoir! virtuosi! This flat country will always elude
your descriptions! For you, landscape painters, there is no
inspiration to be gained here. O chosen land, neither thou nor thy
secret can be seen at a glance! The degenerate folk who pass through
this country feel nothing of its healthy, intoxicating charm, or are
only wearied in the midst of this gray peaceful nature, unrelieved by
hill or torrent; and still less sympathy have they with the country
louts who stare at them with placid bovine eyes.
The people remain robust, uncouth, obstinate, and ignorant. No music
stirs me like the Flemish from their lips. They mouth it, drawl it,
linger lovingly over the guttural syllables, while the harsh
consonants fall heavily as their fists. They move slowly, swingingly,
bent-shouldered and heavy-jawed; like bulls, they are at once fierce
and taciturn. Never shall I meet more comely, firm-bosomed lassies,
never see eyes more appealing, than those of this dear land of mine.
Under their blue _kiel_ the brawny lads swagger well content; though
when in drink, if dispute arises, rivalry may drive them into fatal
conflicts. The _tierendar_ ends many a quarrel without further ado;
and as the combatants cut and hack, their faces preserve that dogged
smile of the old Germans who fought in the Roman arenas. During the
kermesses they over-eat themselves, they get drunk, dance with a kind
of _gauche_ solemnity, embrace their sweethearts without much
ceremony, and when the dance is over, gratify themselves with all
manner of excesses.
One and all, they are slow to give themselves away; but once gained,
their affection is unalterable.
Those who depict them thick-set, laughter-loving, misshapen boors, do
not know this race. The Campine peasantry recall rather the brown
shepherd folk of Jordaens than the pot-house scenes by Teniers, a
great man who slandered his Perck rustics.
They preserve the faith of past centuries, undertake pilgrim-ages,
respect their _pastoor_, believe in the Devil, in the wizard, in the
evil eye, that _jettatura_ of the North. So much the better. These
yokels fascinate me. I prefer their poetic traditions, the legends
drawled out by an old _pachteresse_ in the evening hours, to the
liveliest tale of Voltaire, and their clan-narrowness and religious
fanaticism stir me more than the patriotic declamations and the
insipid civic rhodomontade of the journalist. Splendid and glorious
rebels, these Vendeans of ours; may philosophy and civilization long
forget them. When the day of equality, dreamed of by geometric minds,
comes, they will disappear also, my superb brutes; hunted down,
crushed by invasion, but to the end unyielding to Positivist
influences. My brothers, utilitarianism will do away with you, you and
your rude remote country!
Meanwhile, I who have your hot rebel blood coursing in my veins, I who
shall not survive you, am fain to steep my spirit in yours, to be at
one with you in all that is rude and savage in you, to stupefy myself
at great casks of brown ale at the fairs, with you to raise up my
voice when the clouds of incense rise like smoke above your sacred
processions, to seat myself in silence beside your smoky hearths or to
wander alone across the desolate sand-dunes at the hour when the frogs
croak, and when the distraught shepherd, become an incendiary and a
lost man, grazes his flock of fire across the heaths....
At the beginning of the June of 1865, I had just reached my eleventh
birthday and made my first communion with the Freres de la Misericorde
at M----. One morning I was called into the parlor; there I found the
father superior and my uncle, who told me that he would take me to
Antwerp to see my father. At the idea of this unexpected holiday and
the prospect of embracing my kind parent, who had been a widower for
five years and to whom I was now everything, I did not notice my
uncle's serious looks nor the pitying glances of the monk.
We set off. The train did not go fast enough for my liking. However,
we arrived at last. To ring the door-bell of the simple little house;
to embrace Yana the servant; to submit to the caresses of good
Lion, a splendid brown spaniel, to race up-stairs with him four
steps at a time, to bound into the familiar bedroom, then two
words:--"Father!--George!"--to feel myself lifted up and pressed
against his heart; to be devoured with kisses, my lips seeking his in
the big fair beard: these actions followed one another rapidly; but
transient as they were, they are forever graven on my memory. What a
long time the dear man held me in his arms! He looked at me with
tender admiration, repeating, "What a big boy you have grown, my
Jurgen, my Krapouteki!" and he repeated a whole string of impossible
but adorable pet names he had invented for me, and among which he
interspersed caresses. It was still early in the morning.
When I entered, followed by Lion, Yana, and finally by my uncle, the
least member of the four, my father was in his dressing-gown, but was
about to dress.
He looked splendid to me. His color was fresh, but too flushed about
the cheek-bones, I was told afterwards; his eyes sparkled--sparkled
too much; his voice was a little hoarse, but sweet, caressing, despite
its grave tone,--a tone never to be forgotten by me.
He was then forty-six. I see his tall figure rise before me now, with
his well-set limbs; and his kind face still smiles on me in my dreams.
My uncle clasped his hand.
"You see that I keep my word, Ferdinand. Here's the little scamp
himself!"
"Thank you, Henry. Pardon the trouble I have caused you.... You will
laugh at me; but if you had not brought him, I should have gone to the
convent myself to-day.... I should have scorned the doctor's regime
and prescriptions.... You do not know, Georgie.... I have not been
very well.... Oh, a mere nothing; a small ailment, a neglected
cold.... A slight cold, was it not, Yana? ... I have lost it, as you
see.... Ah! my boy, what good it does me to see you! ... What fun we
shall have! We are going out into the country at once.... I have
prepared a surprise for you."
I listened enchanted--oh the selfishness of childhood! The promise of
this expedition made me deaf to his cough--a dry, convulsive cough
which he tried to stifle by holding his silk handkerchief to his
mouth. Neither did I notice--or rather I did notice but attached no
importance to--the bottles of medicine and pill-boxes which stood on
the chimney-piece and on the bed-table. A bottle of syrup had just
been opened, and a drop remained in the silver spoon. Yana held a
prescription in her hand, which had been written that morning. A heavy
odor of opiates and other drugs filled the room. These details only
recurred to me afterwards.
My uncle took leave.
"Above all, no imprudence!" he said to my father. "You promise me? Be
back in town before the dew falls.... I will take George to school
again to-morrow morning."
"Set your mind at rest; we will be wise!" replied my father, excited
and preoccupied, thinking only of his child.
I believe that he was not sorry to find himself alone with me, and as
the prospect of returning to M----, evoked by the old officer, had
saddened me, he took me on his knee.
"Courage! little one," he said. "It is not for long. I feel too lonely
since the death of your poor mother. I have told my family that in the
future I do not intend to be separated from you ... You have made your
first communion, ... you are big, ... you shall go back to school for
a week, just time to pack up and to settle in our new quarters....
Come, there, I am betraying the secret ... Never mind, after all, I
may as well tell you everything now. I have bought a pretty little
house, almost a farmstead, three miles from here.... We are going to
live in the country, like peasants, to wear sabots and smocks. Hey?
That will make you grow.... What do you say to it?... We shall be
always together."