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Page 26
Turning her head suddenly towards her mother, Ad�le saw her eyes
filled with tears.
"_Eh! ma ch�re m�re, pardonnez moi_. I have pained you". And she rose
and flung her arms, passionately, around her mother's neck.
"_Pauvre fille!_" said the mother, returning her embrace mournfully,
"you will wander away from the church,--our holy church. It would not
have been thus, had we remained in sunny Picardy. _Eh! oublier je ne
puis_."
"What is it, _ch�re m�re_", said Ad�le, "that you cannot forget? There
is something I have long wished to know. What was there, before you
came here to live? Why do you sometimes sit and look so thoughtful, so
sad and wishful? Tell me;--tell me, that I may comfort you".
"I will tell you all, Ad�le, yes,--all. It is time for you to know,
but--not to-night--not to-night".
"To-morrow then, _ma m�re_?"
"Yes. Yes--to-morrow".
CHAPTER X.
PICARDY.
"Weep ye not for the dead, neither bemoan him: but, weep sore for him
that goeth away: for he shall return no more, nor see his native
country". The prophet, who wrote these words, well knew the exile's
grief. He was himself an exile. He thought of Jerusalem, the city of
his home, his love, and his heart was near to breaking. He hung his
harp upon the willow; he sat down by the streams of Babylon and wept.
The terrible malady of homesickness,--it has eaten out the vigor and
beauty of many a life. The soul, alien to all around, forlorn amid the
most enchanting scenes, filled with ceaseless longing for a renewal of
past delights, can never find a remedy, until it is transplanted back
to its native clime.
Nor was the prophet singular in his experience of the woes of exile.
We have heard of the lofty-spirited Dante, wandering from city to
city, carrying with him, in banishment, irrepressible and unsatisfied
yearnings for his beloved Florence; we have seen the Greek Islander,
borne a captive from home, sighing, in vain, for the dash and roar of
his familiar seas; we have seen the Switzer, transplanted to milder
climes and more radiant sides, yet longing for the stern mountain
forms, the breezes and echoes of his native land. Ah! who does not
remember, with a shudder, the despairing thoughts, choking tears, and
days of silent misery that clouded his own boyhood, and perhaps even
some days of his early manhood?
_Oublier je ne puis_. Poor lady! she had been homesick twenty years.
On the afternoon following the conversation recorded in the last
chapter, Mrs. Dubois was ready to unfold to Ad�le the story of her
past life. They were sitting in the parlor. The golden glory of the
September sun gave an intense hue to the crimson furniture, lighted up
the face of the Madonna with a new radiance, and touched the ivory
keys of the piano with a fresh polish. Ad�le's eyes were fixed with
eager expectation upon her mother.
"You know, _ma ch�re_", Mrs. Dubois began, "we once lived in France.
But you cannot know, I trust you never may, what it cost us to leave
our beautiful Picardy,--what we have suffered in remaining here,
exiled in this rude country. Yet then it seemed our best course.
Indeed, we thought there was no other path for us so good as this. We
were young, and did not enough consider, perhaps, what such a change
in our life involved. I must tell you, my Ad�le, how it came about.
"In the province of Picardy not many miles from the city of Amiens,
there was a fine, but not large estate, bordering on the River Somme.
A long avenue of poplars led from the main road up a gentle slope
until it opened upon a broad, green plateau of grass, studded with
giant trees, the growth of centuries. Here and there were trim little
flower-beds, laid out in a variety of fantastic shapes, with stiff,
glossy, green, closely-clipped borders of box. And, what was my
childish admiration and delight, there was a fountain that poured
itself out in oozing, dripping drops from the flowing hair and finger
tips of a marble Venus, just rising in the immense basin and wringing
out her locks. Then the park,--there was none more beautiful, more
stately, extending far back to the banks of the Somme, where birds sat
on every bough and the nightingale seemed to pour its very heart away,
singing so thrillingly and so long. I hear the liquid notes now, my
Ad�le, so tender, so sweet! At the end of the avenue of poplars of
which I spoke stood the chateau, with the trim flower-beds in front.
It was built of brown stone, not much ornamented externally, with four
round towers, one in each corner. Though not as old as some of those
castles, it had been reared several centuries before, by a Count de
Rossillon, who owned the estate and lived on it.
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