Camille Lemonnier

“ Then he hid his face in his big hands and began to sob, without knowing the reason.
"Come, Dolf, be brave," said Tobias, tapping him on the shoulder. "We have all gone through this!"
"Riekje, Riekje, my heart!" said Nelle in tears, "no greater happiness could come to us on Saint Nicholas day. Poor folk rejoice more over a child that is born to them, than over all the treasures in the world, but the child whom God sends on Easter Day or St. Nicholas day is above all welcome."
"Dolf, you can run better than I can," said Tobias. "Run and fetch Madame Puzzel; we will look after Riekje." ”

“ Sometimes the two bushy tufts on his forehead dropped right over his eyes and further confused his vision. But Jack would put them back lightly with the tips of his delicate fingers. Indeed he never left his side, tickling his ears to amuse him, tapping and stroking him, ever on the watch, a tender-hearted nurse of inexhaustible care and foresight.
37
This lowly being had learnt to love like a mother; his little dim soul had emerged from its darkness to answer his dying comrade’s need, and now, shining bright in the light of day, was working deeds of charity. ”

“ Dolf raised his hand solemnly.
"I call God to witness, Riekje, I shall love it as if it were my own flesh and blood."
"Our lad has been lucky," said Nelle to her husband. "Riekje is a dear lass. She brought joy with her when she entered our house, Tobias."
"We are very poor, Nelle," he replied, "but old parents like ourselves can have no greater happiness than to see their children sitting round their fire in love with one another." ”

“ But, alas, it is too late; a whole life of happiness is ruined by a moment’s curiosity. Hardly had the poor fellow plunged his beak in the mass when a string pulled the catch; down comes the trap, and he is a prisoner. Then the shape crouching behind a tree comes out from its hiding-place; it approaches, looms larger and larger, turns into a big bearded man, who opens enormous great hands, seizes the poor bird, and claps it in a cage, grinning a broad grin of satisfaction. Good-bye, little bride! Good-bye, marriage-feast and wedding-march! Good-bye, woods and orchards, gardens and flowers! ”

“ Claire had resumed the cruel slavery of the workroom.
Every morning, at seven o’clock, she set out, a meagre hunch of bread in her basket, and along the sleeping streets where the yawning passers-by were few and far between, half dozing herself, but brave and thinking of Monsieur Friquet, she would make her way to the dismal room where she was to be kept prisoner all day. ”

“ But now the gloomy lights which resembled the taper-bearers seemed to be chasing one another along the quays; their little flames ran in every direction, crossed one another, and looked like big fireflies. "I must see double," he said, "the fireflies can be in my brain only."
Suddenly he heard voices, calling, crying out, lamenting.
Torches moved to and fro on the river bank, their red tongues of flame blown by the wind amid clouds of smoke. In the uncertain light he could at last distinguish figures rushing about, others leaning over the river, black as well. ”

“ It had risen to the top of the pan, and was rich, thick, and fragrant, with here and there little bubbles on its surface. Nelle plunged a big spoon into the beautiful, deep mass, and when she drew it out long threads hung from it on all sides. The frying-pan hissed and bubbled as the batter was poured on to the brown butter around the slices of apple which Nelle had carefully laid in first. When the pancake began to brown at the edges it was tossed into the air by a clever twist of the arm. Dolf and Tobias clapped their hands and Riekje admired Nelle's dexterity. ”

“ Every ten minutes—the same regular interval has been observed in all owls questing for food—he would bring fresh provender to the nest. The darkest night was no hindrance; his shining eyes, with their widely dilated pupils, pierced the blackest shadows as if they were transparent, and there was no hole or corner where the little night prowlers did not go in terror of their lives. ”

“ Nelle, how happy we were in those days when we could clasp hands behind a hedge, and sometimes, too, I stole a kiss when your head was turned away."
"That 's true, Tobias, but afterwards, I did not turn my head away and you kissed me all the same."
"There is no greater happiness on earth, my Dolf," said Riekje, "than to grow old loving one another; the years don't then gloom as life lengthens, and when one dies, the other soon follows." ”

“ Nothing ever distracted him from his part. Wags would amuse themselves sometimes by offering him a lump of sugar, or even pitch a sausage or a cake right between his paws; but Murph was adamant against such temptations. How the crowd cheered and clapped hands and stamped feet when he went bounding from hoop to hoop, so supple and nimble and self-possessed, never losing step or missing a spring, striking the paper with his head fair and square in the middle every time, crashing through and landing again on his feet, gravely and yet so elegantly. ”

“ Has the blue sky no need of his outspread wings, his echoing song, the flutter of his plumage?
What use the pool glittering in the woodland, if he was not there to dip his beak in it and absorb in a drop of water the red of dawn, the gold of noon, the deep shadow of the quivering leaves? Is not a little bird the less a disaster in the forests and orchard-closes, a voice silenced in the symphony of nature, a furrow left barren in the fields of space, a bright point vanished from the azure sky? ”

“ Nelle, they are always kissing days when there are two, and when there is some little spot on earth where they can make a peaceful home."
Tobias kissed his wife's cheeks; then, in her turn, Nelle gave him two big kisses which resounded like the snapping of dry firewood.
"Riekje," Dolf whispered, "I shall always love you."
"Dolf," replied Riekje, "I shall love you till death." ”

“ Murph had never seen an ape more alert and clever, more intelligent and active than Jack; he would gladly have stood for hours watching him performing his tricks, clinging to the cords with his delicate, dry little hands, then hurling himself into space to alight again on his feet, or else holding on by his tail and swinging from earth to heaven on the trapeze. ”

“ If Jack was a-cold—and he was always shivering, blow the wind from what quarter it might—quick he would slip between Murph’s paws and cuddle against his breast in the warm, cosy place. Murph was Jack’s special providence.
22
Thus they had been living for nearly half-a-dozen years. Never a cloud had dimmed their good accord; never an angry snap of the teeth—never a pettish fit; mankind might have taken a lesson in the art of friendship from them. ”

“ Silent and awe-struck, the two outcasts felt the kindly beneficence of nature moving on the face of the world. At times louder sounds would mingle with the whisperings of the night, telling them of the fawns pushing through the matted undergrowth, of companies of woodland creatures sallying out to feed, lovers like themselves of the darkness—badgers, polecats, wild-cats, weasels, and rabbits, of a vast stir of life and activity down in the dim, intricate forest tracks. ”

“ Think of the horrid carnage there will be in the woods every night! Not one of you will be safe in his nest any more. From time immemorial the owl tribe has been the scourge of the whole bird nation. Their heads are full of nothing but wile and wickedness, and the better to shed blood, they go to work like murderers in the dark! ”

“ But it was not the sort of jaunt the sparrows indulge in, sailing away into the blue, so high, so high they seem as if they would never come back again; they lighted sedately on the bough of an old oak, and, finding it a good place, stopped there for good. Besides, the oak, being decrepit with years, had not, as a younger tree would, a whole host of impudent little cock-sparrows for its denizens; a blackbird lodged on the first floor, and a magpie had selected the trunk as his residence, and though both were great chatterers, the owls did not find their company disagreeable. ”

“ But he was a wise and far-seeing parent, who dreaded what their fate would be, should he and his mate one day meet the doom all owls are liable to. Perhaps one morning a yokel would climb to their hiding-hole and carry them off to kill them. True, the good Curé, whose house sheltered them, had forbidden their being molested; but he was an old man now, and nobody cared much what he said; then, with a ladder, it was so easy to reach the nest! The old owl always spoke like a philosopher; the future did not terrify him, and he seemed quite resigned to the cruel lot men mete out to his species. ”

“ You are grown up now, and the time is come when we must part. The nest would be too small to hold both you and those who will come after you. Moreover, no owl is ever happy save as head of a household. All sorts of trials and tribulations await us; men feel nothing but anger and contempt for our race. No matter for the watch and ward we keep over the orchards, the war of extermination we wage on the prolific broods that devastate the wheat, for all our well-meant efforts to aid the harvests to grow and the fruit-trees to bloom, our only guerdon is to be shot at with guns. ”

“ Life was slowly dying down in the old body. He would lie torpid for hours and doze away the time in dark corners, under tables, where nothing would wake him, neither the yapping of the other dogs nor the chattering of the monkeys, neither the noise of footsteps coming and going nor the shrill trumpetings of the clown’s cornet-à-piston playing “Malbrouck s’en va-t-en guerre!” ”

“ The nightingales lulled him to sleep with the melody of their concerts, the cock woke him with the shrill clarion-call of his crowing; all the day long he flitted and flew amid the endless twittering and warbling of linnets, tomtits, bullfinches, sparrows, and chaffinches, taking his part too in the orchestra, and near bursting his little throat to produce his finest notes, with that vanity that makes us one, and believe Nature has implanted in us the soul of an artist—a great, mysterious, unappreciated artist. ”

“ How much better to sit soft and warm over a good feed of bird-seed, to sleep away his afternoons in slothful ease, never to soil his feathers scratching for doles in a dungheap, but to live like a gentleman on his means, among his own belongings, without even a thought of work or worry!
Monsieur Friquet, you see, was a philosopher of an accommodating temper.
125
Thank God! everybody does not think alike; for what would become of the sky and the woodland if all the race of sparrows forsook them like him for cosy quarters and a free table? ”

“ From the very first Jack had taken a fancy to the big woolly-coated dog, as woolly as a sheep, who never barked or growled or grumbled or showed his teeth—so unlike the other dogs in the menagerie; in the same way Murph, the big dog, had formed an affection for the well-behaved, sad-faced little ape, who never pulled his tail and never tried to scratch out his eyes. ”

“ A wild spasm of merriment seized the vast concourse at sight of the grotesque creature, and tomtits, linnets, birds of every sort and kind, broke into a frantic peal of mirth.
“Silence in the Court!” shrieked the magpie.
But laughter is infectious. Quickly it extended to the lower ledges of the rock, where the spectators sat half hidden from each other in the semi-darkness, and the mighty cliff shook as if lashed by a hurricane. ”

“ There is no villainy they do not impute to us, no crime they do not charge us with, and when we have the misfortune to show ourselves, the howl of hate rises as high about us as a tower. But are we criminals? Do we lurk in the woods to rob our fellow-birds by night or day? ”

“ He preferred to lurk alone in dark corners, where he would spend long hours, squatted on his tail, almost motionless, dreaming sadly of some mysterious, unattainable future. But, for all his unlikeness to his colleagues and their comicality, his queer little crumpled, wrinkled face never failed to produce its effect on the spectators. Jack was perfectly irresistible; no one could look at him for any length of time without bursting out laughing. ”