nations but only a pitiful suffering whole rushing on
to destruction because of its blindness. Even love
itself seemed to resent such compassion, the deep love
that he felt for his native Provence; he would think
that the very soil cried out, raising its voice in protest
against him.
'Cannot you understand?3 he would mutter, *I love
you—but cannot you understand?5 And yet as he spoke
them, the words would sound vague and unconvincing
because he himself lacked not only conviction but
understanding.
He had now little work to occupy his mind since
orders were growing scarcer and scarcer, and so he
would wander alone for hours through the country
that he had known from his childhood, through the
olive orchards climbing the hills, through the thickets
of maquis and out beyond to Mireio's grave and
Eusebe's vineyards. And wandering thus he must
often indulge in imaginings that were becoming
fantastic: he would hear his own name in the songs of
the birds and would fancy that like the soil they
reproached him.
'You are right/ he would tell them, cit is I who am
wrong. I will tear this great foolishness out of my
heart — I will tear it out and trample upon it.'
Perhaps a stray mongrel would follow in his foot-
steps, for although he himself went short of food yet he
could not endure that a beast should go hungry, and
this the poor starvelings had come to know, so that one
or another would slink at his heels hoping that once
he had left the town he would fling it a crust of bread
from his pocket. The mongrel would always be
covered with sores, yes and with that dreadful humility
which incites the world to persecute its outcasts, and
seeing this Christophe would sit for awhile and fondle
its head, and make it lie down in order to ease the
pain of its limping.
354