Led Astray and The Sphinx | Page 2

look terminated her harangue. It seems

evident to me that this worthy lady is the only person in the department
who takes any real interest in that poor old abbey, and that the conscript
fathers of the general council have passed their resolution authorizing
an investigation out of pure gallantry. It is impossible for me, however,
not to concur in their opinion; the abbey has beautiful eyes; she
deserves to be classed--she shall be classed.
My decision was therefore settled, from that moment, but it was still
necessary to write it down and back it with some documentary evidence.
Unfortunately, the local archives and libraries do not abound in
traditions relative to my subject; after two days of conscientious
rummaging, I had collected but a few rare and insignificant documents,
which may be summed up in these two lines; "Rozel Abbey, in Rozel
township, was inhabited from time immemorial by monks, who left it
when it fell in ruins."
That is why I resolved to go, without further delay, and ask their secret
of these mysterious ruins, and to multiply, if need be, the artifices of
my pencil, to make up for the compulsory conciseness of my pen. I left
on Wednesday morning for the town of Vitry, which is only two or
three leagues distant from the abbey. A Norman coach, complemented
with a Norman coachman, jogged me about all day, like an indolent
monarch, along the Norman hedges. When night came, I had traveled
twelve miles and my coachman had taken twelve meals.
The country is fine, though of a character somewhat uniformly rustic.
Under everlasting groves is displayed an opulent and monotonous
verdure, in the thickness of which contented-looking oxen ruminate. I
can understand my coachman's twelve meals; the idea of eating must
occur frequently and almost exclusively to the imagination of any man
who spends his life in the midst of this rich nature, the very grass of
which gives an appetite.
Toward evening, however, the aspect of the landscape changed; we
entered a rolling prairie, quite low, marshy, bare as a Russian steppe,
and extending on both sides of the road; the sound of the wheels on the
causeway assumed a hollow and vibrating sonority; dark-colored reeds
and tall, unhealthy-looking grass covered, as far as the eye could reach,

the blackish surface of the marsh. I noticed in the distance, through the
deepening twilight, and behind a cloud of rain, two or three horsemen
running at full speed, and as if demented, through these boundless
spaces; they disappeared at intervals in the depressions of the meadows,
and suddenly came to sight again, still galloping with the same frenzy. I
could not imagine toward what imaginary goal these equestrian
phantoms were thus madly rushing. I took good care not to inquire;
mystery is a sweet and sacred thing.
The next morning, I started for the abbey, taking with me in my
cabriolet a tall young peasant who had yellow hair, like Ceres. He was
a farm-boy who had lived since his birth within a rod of my monument;
he had heard me in the morning asking for information in the
court-yard of the inn, and had obligingly volunteered to show me the
way to the ruins, which were the first thing he had seen on coming into
the world. I had no need whatever of a guide; I accepted, nevertheless,
the fellow's offer, his officious chattering seeming to promise a
well-sustained conversation, in the course of which I hoped to detect
some interesting legend; but as soon as he had taken his seat by my side,
the rascal became dumb; my questions seemed even, I know not why,
to inspire him with a deep mistrust, almost akin to anger. I had to deal
with the genius of the ruins, the faithful guardian of their treasures. On
the other hand, I had the gratification of taking him home in my
carriage; it was apparently all he wished, and he had every reason to be
satisfied with my accommodating spirit.
After landing this agreeable companion at his own door, it became
necessary for me to alight also; a rocky path, or rather a rude flight of
stone steps, winding down the side of a steep declivity, led me to the
bottom of a narrow valley which spreads and stretches between a
double chain of high wooded hills. A small river flows lazily through it
under the shade of alder-bushes, dividing two strips of meadows as fine
and velvety as the lawns of a park; it is crossed over by an old bridge
with a single arch, which reflects in the placid water the outlines of its
graceful ogive. On the right, the hills stand close together in the form of
a circus, and seemed to join their verdure-clad curves; on