The Hermit of Serignan 



serve to let me watch some wretched animals kick- 

 ing about in the water? 1 



The delight of my earliest childhood, the pond, 

 is still a spectacle of which my old age can never 

 tire. 



But even with all the visions which it 

 evokes, how far inferior is the " pond " of 

 Serignan to the pond of Saint-Leons, " the 

 pond with the little ducks on it, so rich in 

 illusions ! Such a pond is not met with twice 

 in a lifetime. One needs to be equipped with 

 one's first pair of breeches and one's earliest 

 ideas in order to have such luck! " 2 



In spring, with the hawthorn in flower and the 

 Crickets at their concerts, a second wish often came 

 to me. Beside the road I light upon a dead Mole, 

 a Snake killed with a stone, victims both of human 

 folly. The two corpses, already decomposing, have 

 begun to smell. Whoso approaches with eyes that 

 do not see turns away his head and passes on. 

 The observer stops and lifts the remains with his 

 foot; he looks. A world is swarming underneath; 

 life is eagerly consuming the dead. Let us replace 

 matters as they were and leave death's artisans to 

 their task. They are engaged in a most deserv- 

 ing work. 



1 Souvenirs, vii., pp. 270-273. The Life of the Fly, chap, 

 vii., "The Pond." 



2 Ibid., VII., 260-270. 



219 



