The Life of Jean Henri Fabre 



striving to prepare for himself. Imagine 

 " between four high walls a courtyard, a sort 

 of bear-pit in which the scholars contend for 

 room beneath the boughs of a plane-tree; and 

 opening on to it, on every side, the class- 

 rooms, like so many cages for wild beasts, 

 devoid of daylight or air." This was the 

 Normal College of Vaucluse. 



The description recalls, in some respects, 

 that which was given by a sometime pupil of 

 the Normal College of Paris, M. Rene 

 Doumic, on taking his seat in the Academy, 

 in the place of Gaston Boissier: " I loved the 

 Normal College, and I am still faithful in 

 my attachment to it. I hope my recollec- 

 tions of it will not be thought lacking in piety 

 if I state that the building in which they 

 penned us up, young fellows of twenty, was 

 the most dismal place that I have ever seen 

 anywhere. This extraordinary building, by 

 an architectural prodigy which I will not at- 

 tempt to explain, turned all four sides to 

 the north. In three years I do not think I 

 ever saw a single ray of sunlight enter our 

 lecture-rooms or the cloisters in which we 

 used to wander like so many shades. A 

 mournful daylight expired upon the grey, 

 grimy walls. In short, it was not a cheerful 

 place. But at Boissier's lectures all became 



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