THE GREEN GRASSHOPPER 23 



first string of a violin; and the Green Grasshopper, who 

 seems to beat a tiny steel triangle. 



We are celebrating to-day, with greater uproar than 

 conviction, the new era, dating politically from the fall 

 of the Bastille ; they, with glorious indifference to human 

 things, are celebrating the festival of the sun, singing the 

 happiness of existence, sounding the loud hosanna of the 

 July heats. 



What care they for man and his fickle rejoicings ! For 

 whom or for what will our squibs be spluttering a few 

 years hence? Far-seeing indeed would he be who could 

 answer the question. Fashions change and bring us the 

 unexpected. The time-serving rocket spreads its sheaf 

 of sparks for the public enemy of yesterday, who has 

 become the idol of to-day. To-morrow it will go up for 

 somebody else. 



In a century or two, will any one, outside the histori- 

 ans, give a thought to the taking of the Bastille? It is 

 very doubtful. We shall have other joys and also other 

 cares. 



Let us look a little farther ahead. A day will come, 

 so everything seems to tell us, when, after making prog- 

 ress upon progress, man will succumb, destroyed by the 

 excess of what he calls civilization. Too eager to play 

 the god, he cannot hope for the animal's placid longevity ; 

 he will have disappeared when the little Toad is still 

 saying his litany, in company with the Grasshopper, the 

 Scops-owl and the others. They were singing on this 

 planet before us ; they will sing after us, celebrating what 

 can never change, the fiery glory of the sun. 



