46 HOW THE AUTHOR WAS LED TO 
them, we could not make up our minds to eat them. We planted, 
and here we met with quite a distinct kind of inconvenience—our 
plantations were nearly always devoured beforehand. 
This earth, fertile in vegetables, was equally or more prolific of 
destructive animals; enormous capacious snails, devouring insects. 
In the morning we collected a great tubful of snails. The next 
day you would never have thought so. There still seemed to be 
the full complement. 
Our hens did their best. But how much more effective would 
have been the skilful and prudent stork, the admirable scavenger of 
Holland and all marshy districts, which some Western lands ought at 
all costs to adopt. Everybody knows the affectionate respect in which 
this excellent bird is held by the Dutch. In their markets you may 
see him standing peacefully on one foot, dreaming in the midst of 
the crowd, and feeling as safe as in the heart of the deepest deserts. 
It is a fantastic but well-assured fact, that the Dutch peasant who 
has had the misfortune to wound his stork and to break his leg, pro- 
vides him with one of wood. 
To return: our residence near Nantes would have possessed an 
infinite charm for a less absorbed mind. This beautiful spot, this great 
liberty of work, this solitude, so sweet in such society, formed a rare 
harmony, such as one but seldom meets with in life. Its sweetness 
contrasted strongly with the thoughts of the present, with the gloomy 
