The Life of Jean Henri Fabre 



did homage to Jules in the second volume: 



To my Sox Jules. — Beloved child, my zealous 

 collaborator in the study of insects, my perspicacious 

 assistant in the study of plants, it was for your 

 sake that I began this volume; I have continued 

 it for the sake of your memory, and I shall con- 

 tinue it in the bitterness of my mourning. Ah ! 

 how hateful is death when it reaps the flower in all 

 the radiance of its blossoming! Your mother and 

 your sisters bring to your tomb wreaths gathered 

 in the rustic flower-bed that you delighted in. To 

 these wreaths, faded by a day's sunshine, I add this 

 book, which, I hope, will have a to-morrow. It 

 seems to me that it thus prolongs our common stud- 

 ies, fortified as I am by my indomitable faith in 

 a reawakening in the Beyond. 1 



When the separation from loved ones 

 wounds the heart so grievously and wrings 

 from the soul such accents of hope and faith, 

 we need seek no other standard to judge a 

 man's moral worth. 



The spectacle of a man, thus moved by the 

 death of his dear ones, who yet welcomes his 

 own death with serenity, is admirable. Such 

 was the case with Fabre, as proved by the 

 following episode of the same date — i.e. 



1879. 



1 Souvenirs, II., p. 1. 



206 





