'There was once a dog called Mirdio/he would say,
cshe also was lame and had sores, like you. Her body
is buried not far from here, but the real Mireio is
safe — very safe/ And then he would tell the mongrel
about God, and about the Little Poor Man of God
who had spent his life in preaching God's mercy.
And if he had brought his midday meal with him he
would give it to the purulent, cringing creature, and
because he was able to lighten its burden by even so
much, his own burden would lighten.
Then something, perhaps the expression in its eyes
as the dog looked up, still hungry but humble, would
remind him of all that was pitiful: of Mireio who had
learnt to fear life more than death: of the harmless and
persecuted couleuvres; of his father who lay on the
massive oak bed; of his mother who toiled without
rest or hope; of le tout petit Loup with his labouring
lungs; of Anfos who carved mad, unearthly dreams
as he strove to conjure beauty from madness. And
the vision must widen until it embraced those unknown
millions who struggled and suffered; until he perceived
but one suffering through perceiving the anxious,
bewildered soul that looked out of the eyes of a starving
mongrel. Groaning, Christophe would cover his face,
conscious that his moment of respite was over.
There were days when he mustered all the strength
of his will to strangle, compassion beneath feelings of
hatred, when he flung his imagination into space and
pictured the ruin wrought by the invaders: pictured
the blasted and blackened orchards, the pastures
whose greenness was torn arid trampled, the cornfields
ploughed by the harrow of death, the streams whose
waters were polluted by carnage. He would suddenly
cry out and shake his clenched fists, for the deep and
enduring anger of the earth, thus outraged, would
seem to leap forth and possess him.
Then his hands would drop again to his sides:
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