NATURE’S SCHOOL
At eight years old I was sent to school with a little blue satchel to
carry my books and my lunch. Not before, thank God, for in all that
touched my inner development and the education and temperament of my
young poet’s soul, I certainly learnt far more through the games and
frolics of my country childhood than by the tiresome repetition of the
school routine.
In our time, the dream of all youngsters who went to school was to play
truant, once at least, in a thoroughly successful manner. To have
accomplished this was to be regarded by the others as on a par with
brigands, pirates, and other heroes.
In Provence it is the custom for such an exploit to be carried out by
running away to a far and unknown country, being careful to confide the
project to no one. The time chosen by the young Provençal for this
adventure is when he has, by some fault, or the sad error of
disobedience, good cause to fear that on his return home he will be
welcomed rather too warmly!
When, therefore, this fate looms over some unlucky fellow, he just gives
school and parents the slip, and defying consequences, off he goes on
his travels with a “Long live liberty!”
Oh, the delight, the joy, at that age to feel complete master of
oneself, and the bridle hanging loose, to roam where fancy beckons, away
into the blue distance, down into the swamp, or may be up to the
mountain heights!
But--after a while comes hunger. Playing truant in the summer time, that
evil is not so serious. There are fields of broad beans, fair orchards
with their crops of apples, pears, and peaches, cherry-trees delighting
the eye, fig-trees offering their ripe fruit, and bulging melons that
cry out “Eat me.” And then those lovely vines, the stock of the golden
grape. Ah!--I fancy I can see them yet!
Of course if the game was played in winter, things were not quite so
smiling. Some young scamps would boldly visit farms where they were
unknown and ask for food, and some again, more unscrupulous rascals,
would steal the eggs and even take the stale nest-egg, drinking and
gulping it down with relish. Others, however, were of prouder stuff;
they had not run away from home and school for any misdemeanour, but
either from pure thirst of independence or because of some injustice
which, having deeply wounded the heart, made the victim flee man and his
habitation. These would pass the nights sleeping amidst the corn, in the
fields of millet, sometimes under a bridge or in some shed or
straw-stack. When hungry they gathered from the hedges and the fields
mulberries, sloes, almonds left on the trees, or little bunches of
grapes from the wild vine. They did not even object to the fruit of the
wych-elm, which they called white bread, nor unearthed onions,
choke-pears, beech-nuts, nor at a pinch to acorns. For to all these
truants each day was a glorious game, and every step a bound of delight.
What need of companions when all the beasts and insects were your
playfellows? You could understand what they were after, what they said,
what they thought, and they appeared to understand you quite as well.
You caught a grasshopper and examined her little shining wings. Very
gently you stroked her with your hand to make her sing, then sent her
away with a straw in her mouth. Or, resting full length on a bank, you
find a lady-bird climbing up your finger, and at once you sing to her:
“Lady-bird, fly,
Be off to the school,” &c.
and as the lady-bird stretches her wings she replies:
“Go home yourself--I am quite happy where I am.”
Then a praying-mantis kneels before you and you ask:
“Praying-mantis, art so wise,
Know you where the sly fox lies?”
The mantis raises a long thin arm and points to the mountains.
A lizard sits warming himself in the sun and you address him with the
correct formula:
“Little lizard, be my friend
’Gainst all snakes that bite and bend,
Then I’ll give you grains of salt
When before my house you halt.”
“Your house! And when will you be back there?” the lizard says as
plainly as you could yourself, and, with a whisk, disappears in his
hole.
Should you meet a snail, you greet him in this fashion:
“Oh, snail with one eye,
Your horns let me spy,
Or the blacksmith I’ll call
To smash house and all.”
It was home, always home, to which every one harked back; till at last,
after having destroyed sufficient nests--and made sufficient holes in
nether garments--being weary of pipes made from barley-straws and of
whistles made of willow twigs, besides having set one’s teeth on edge
with green apples and other sour fruit, suddenly the truant is seized
with home-sickness, a great longing at the heart turns the feet
homewards and lowers the once proud head.
Being of true Provençal stock, I also must needs make my escapade before
I had been three months at school. It happened thus.
Three or four young rascals, who, under pretext of cutting grass or
collecting wood, idled away the livelong day, came to meet me one
morning as I set out for school at Maillane.
“You little simpleton, what do you want to go to school for?” said they.
“Boxed in all day between four walls, punished for this or that, your
fingers rapped with a ruler! Bah! come and play with us----!”
Ah me! how crystal clear the water ran in the brook; how the larks sang
up there in the blue; the cornflowers, the iris, the poppies, the
rose-campions, how fair they bloomed in the sunshine which played on the
green meadows. So I said to myself:
“School! Well, that can wait till to-morrow.” And then, with trousers
turned up, off we went to the water. We paddled, we splashed, we fished
for tadpoles, we made mud pies, and then smeared our bare little legs
with black slime to make ourselves boots! Afterwards, in the dust of
some hollow by the wayside, we played at soldiers:
Rataplan, Rataplan,
I’m a military man, &c.
What fun it was! no king’s children were our equals. And then with the
bread and provisions in my satchel, we had a fine picnic on the grass.
But all such joys must end. The schoolmaster informed against me, and
behold me arraigned before my sire’s judgment-seat:
“Now hear me, Frédéric, the next time you miss school to go off paddling
in the brook, I will break a stick over your back--do not forget.”
In spite of this, three days after, through sheer thoughtlessness, I
again cut school and went off to the brook.
Did he spy on me, or was it mere chance that brought him that way? Just
as I and my boon companions were splashing about with naked legs, at a
few paces from us suddenly I behold my sire. My heart gave one bound.
He stood still and called to me:
“So that is it!.... You know what I promised you? Very well, I shall be
ready for you this evening.”
Nothing more, and he went on his way.
My good father, good as the Blessed Bread, had never given me even a
slap, but he had a loud voice and a rough way of speaking, and I feared
him as I did fire.
“Ha!” I said to myself, “this time, but _this_ time, he will kill you.
Assuredly he has gone to prepare the rod.”
My companions, little scamps, snapped their fingers with glee, and
cried:
“Aha! aha! what a drubbing you’ll get! Aha! aha! on your bare back too!”
“All is up,” I said to myself. “I must be off--I must run away.”
So I went. As well as I remember I took a road that led right up to the
Crau d’Eyragues. But at that time, poor little wretch, I hardly knew
where I was going, and after walking for an hour or so, it seemed to me
that I had gone far enough to have arrived in America.
The sun began to go down. I was tired, and frightened too. “It is
getting late,” I thought, “and where shall I find my supper? I must go
and beg at some farm.”
So, turning out of the road, I discreetly approached a little white
farm-house. It had almost a welcoming air, with its pig-sties,
manure-heap, well, and vine arbour, all protected from the east wind by
a cypress hedge.
Very timidly I approached the doorstep, and, looking in, saw an old body
stirring some soup. She was dirty and dishevelled; to eat what she
cooked one required indeed the sauce of hunger. Unhooking the pot from
the chain on which it swung, the old woman placed it on the kitchen
floor, and with a long spoon she poured the soup over some slices of
bread.
“I see, granny, you are making some soup,” I remarked pleasantly.
“Yes,” she answered curtly; “and where do you come from, young one?”
“I come from Maillane. I have run away, and--I should be much obliged if
you would give me something to eat.”
“Oh, indeed,” replied the ugly old dame in growling tones. “Then just
sit you down on the doorstep and not on my chairs!”
I obeyed by winding myself up into a ball on the lowest step.
“If you please, what is this place called?” I asked meekly.
“Papeligosse.”
“Papeligosse?” I repeated in dismay.
For in Provence when they wish, in joke, to convey to children the idea
of a far distant land, they call it Papeligosse. At that age I believed
in Papeligosse, in Zibe-Zoube, in Gafe-l’Ase, and other visionary
regions as firmly as in my Paternoster. So when the old woman uttered
that magic word, a cold shiver went down my back, realising myself so
far from home.
“Ah yes,” she continued as she finished her cooking, “and you must know
that in this country the lazy ones get nothing to eat--so if you want
any soup, my boy, you must work for it.”
“Oh, I will--what shall I do?” I inquired eagerly.
“This is what we will do, you and I, both of us. We will stand at the
foot of the stairs and have a jumping match. The one who jumps farthest
shall have a good bowl of soup--the other shall eat with his eyes
only--understand, eh?”
I agreed readily, not only proud that I should earn my supper and amuse
myself into the bargain, but also feeling no doubts as to the result of
the match; it was a pity indeed if I could not jump farther than a
rickety old body.
So, feet together, we placed ourselves at the foot of the staircase,
which in all farm-houses stands opposite the front door, close to the
threshold.
“Now,” cried the old woman, “one,” and she swung her arms as though to
get a good start.
“Two--three,” I added, and then sprang with all my might, triumphantly
clearing the threshold. But that cunning old body had only pretended to
spring; quick as light she shut the door, and drawing the bolt cried out
to me:
“Little rascal--go back to your parents--they will be getting
anxious--come, off with you!”
There I stood, unlucky urchin, feeling like a basket with the bottom
knocked out. What was I to do? Go home? Not for a kingdom. I could
picture my father ready to receive me, the menacing rod in his hand. To
add to my trouble, it was getting dark, and I no longer knew the road by
which I had come. I resolved to trust in God.
Behind the farm, a path led up the hill between two high banks. I
started off, regardless of risks. “Onward, Frédéric,” said I.
After clambering up the steep path, then down and up again, I felt tired
out. It was hardly surprising at eight years old, and with an empty
stomach since midday. At last I came on a broken-down cottage in a
neglected vineyard. They must have set it on fire at one time, for the
cracked walls were black with smoke. There were no doors or windows, and
the beams only held up half the roof, which had fallen in on one side.
It might have been the abode of a nightmare!
But--“needs must” as they say when there is no choice. So, worn out, and
half dead with sleep, I climbed on to one of the beams, laid down, and
in a twinkling fell sound asleep.
I don’t know how long I lay there, but in the middle of a leaden slumber
I became aware of three men sitting round a charcoal fire, laughing and
talking.
“Am I dreaming?” I asked myself in my sleep. “Am I dreaming, or is this
real?”
But the heavy sense of well-being, into which drowsiness plunges one,
prevented any feeling of fear, and I continued to sleep placidly.
I suppose that at last the smoke began to suffocate me, and on a sudden
I started up with a cry of fright. Since I did not die then and there of
sheer horror, I am convinced I shall never die.
Imagine three wild gypsy faces, all turned on you at the same
moment--and with oh, such eyes! such awful eyes!
“Don’t kill me! don’t kill me!” I shrieked.
The gypsies, who had been almost as startled as I, burst out laughing,
and one of them said:
“You young scamp, you can boast that you gave us a nice scare!”
When I found they could laugh and talk like myself, I took courage, and
noticed at the same time what a good smell came from their pot.
They made me get down from my perch and demanded where I came from, to
whom I belonged, why I was there, and a string of other questions.
Satisfied at length of my identity, one of the robbers--for they were
robbers--said to me:
“Since you are playing truant, I suppose you are hungry. Here, eat
this.”
And he threw me a shoulder of lamb, half cooked, as though I were a dog.
I then noticed they had just been roasting a young lamb, stolen probably
from some fold.
After we had, in this primitive fashion, all made a good meal, the three
men rose, collected their traps and in low tones took counsel together;
then one of them turned to me:
“Look here, youngster, since you are a bit of a brick we don’t want to
harm you, but all the same, we can’t have you spying which way we go, so
we are going to pop you into that barrel there. When the day comes you
can call out and the first passer-by can release you--if he likes!”
“All right,” I said submissively. “Put me into the barrel.” To tell the
truth I was very glad to get off so cheaply.
In the corner of the hovel stood a battered cask, used, doubtless, at
the time of the vintage for fermenting the grape.
They caught hold of me by the seat of my trousers, and pop! into the
cask I went. So there I found myself, in the middle of the night, in a
cask, on the floor of a cottage in ruins.
I crouched down, poor little wretch, rolling myself up like a ball, and
while waiting for the dawn I said my prayers in low tones to scare the
evil spirits.
But--imagine my dismay when suddenly I heard, in the dark, something
prowling and snorting, round my cask! I held my breath as though I were
dead, and committed myself to God and the sainted Virgin. Still I heard
it, that dread something going round and round me, sniffing and
pushing--what the devil was it? My heart thumped and knocked like a
hammer.
But to finish my tale: at last the day commenced to dawn, and the
pattering that caused me such fear seemed to me to be growing a little
more distant. Very cautiously I peeped out by means of the bunghole, and
there, not far off, I beheld--a wolf, my good friends--nothing short of
a wolf the size of a donkey! An enormous wolf with eyes that glared like
two lamps.
Attracted by the odour of the cooked lamb he had come there, and finding
nothing but bones, the close proximity of a Christian child’s tender
flesh filled him with hungry longing. But the curious thing was that,
far from feeling fear at the sight of this beast, I experienced a great
relief. The fact was, I had so dreaded some nocturnal apparition that
the sight of even such a wolf gave me courage.
“All very fine,” I thought, “but I’ve not done with him yet. If that
beast finds out that the cask is open at the top, he will jump in also
and crunch me up with one bite of those teeth. I must think of a plan to
outwit him!”
Some movement I made caught the sharp ear of the wolf, and with one
bound he was back at the cask, prowling round and lashing the sides with
his long tail. Promptly I passed my small hand through the bunghole,
seized hold of that tail, and pulling it inside, grasped it tightly with
both hands. The wolf, as though he had five hundred devils after him,
started off, dragging the cask over rocks and stones, through fields and
vineyards. We must have rolled together over all the ups and downs of
Eyragues, of Lagoy, and of Bourbourel.
“Oh mercy! pity! dear Virgin, dear Saint Joseph,” I cried out. “Where is
this wolf taking me? And if the cask breaks he will gobble me up in a
moment.”
Then all of a sudden, crash went the cask--the tail escaped from my
hands, and--far off, quite in the distance, I saw my wolf escaping at a
gallop. On looking round, what was my astonishment to find myself close
to the New Bridge, on the road that leads to Maillane from Saint-Rémy,
not more than a quarter of an hour from our farm. The barrel must have
knocked up against the parapet of the bridge and come to pieces in that
way.
It is hardly necessary to say that after such adventures the thought of
the rod in my father’s hand no longer possessed any terrors for me, and
running as though the wolf were after me I soon found myself at home.
At the back of the farm-house I saw in the field my father ploughing a
long furrow. He leant against the handle and called to me laughing:
“Ha, ha, my fine fellow, run in quick to your mother--she has not slept
a wink all night!”
And I ran in to my mother.
Omitting nothing, I related to my parents all my thrilling adventures,
but when I came to the story of the robbers and the cask and the
enormous wolf:
“Ah, little simpleton,” they cried, “why it was fright made you dream
all that!”
It was useless my assuring them again and again that it was true as the
Gospel; I could never get any one to believe me.
[Illustration: MISTRAL IN 1864.]