The Schoolboy: Saint-Leons 



water, they need naught but a slight quiver of their 

 tail and of the fin on their back. A leaf falls from 

 the tree. Whoosh! The whole troop has disap- 

 peared. 



On the other side of the brook is a spinney of 

 beeches, with smooth, straight trunks, like pillars. 

 In their majestic, shady branches sit chattering 

 Rooks, drawing from their wings old feathers re- 

 placed by new. The ground is padded with moss. 

 At one's first step on the downy carpet, the eye is 

 caught by a mushroom, not yet full-spread and look- 

 ing like an egg dropped there by some vagrant Hen. 

 It is the first that I have picked, the first that I 

 have turned round and round in my fingers, inquir- 

 ing into its structure with that vague curiosity 

 which is the first awakening of observation. 



Soon I find others, differing in size, shape, and 

 colour. It is a real treat for my prentice eyes. 

 Some are fashioned like bells, like extinguishers, 

 like cups; some are drawn out into spindles, hol- 

 lowed into funnels, rounded into hemispheres. I 

 come upon some that are broken and are weeping 

 milky tears; I step on some that, instantly, be- 

 come tinged with blue; I see some big ones that 

 are crumbling into rot and swarming with worms. 

 Others, shaped like pears, are dry and open at the 

 top with a round hole, a sort of chimney whence 

 a whiff of smoke escapes when I prod their under- 

 side with my finger. These are the most curious. 

 I fill my pockets with them to make them smoke 

 at my leisure, until I exhaust the contents, which 

 are at last reduced to a kind of tinder. 

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