第2章

A vinedresser's cottage also leans against the western gable,and is in some sort a continuation of the kitchen.Stone walls or espaliers surround the property,and all sorts of fruit-trees are planted among the vines;in short,not an inch of this precious soil is wasted.If by chance man overlooks some dry cranny in the rocks,Nature puts in a fig-tree,or sows wildflowers or strawberries in sheltered nooks among the stones.

Nowhere else in all the world will you find a human dwelling so humble and yet so imposing,so rich in fruit,and fragrant scents,and wide views of country.Here is a miniature Touraine in the heart of Touraine--all its flowers and fruits and all the characteristic beauty of the land are fully represented.Here are grapes of every district,figs and peaches and pears of every kind;melons are grown out of doors as easily as licorice plants,Spanish broom,Italian oleanders,and jessamines from the Azores.The Loire lies at your feet.You look down from the terrace upon the ever-changing river nearly two hundred feet below;and in the evening the breeze brings a fresh scent of the sea,with the fragrance of far-off flowers gathered upon its way.Some cloud wandering in space,changing its color and form at every moment as it crosses the pure blue of the sky,can alter every detail in the widespread wonderful landscape in a thousand ways,from every point of view.The eye embraces first of all the south bank of the Loire,stretching away as far as Amboise,then Tours with its suburbs and buildings,and the Plessis rising out of the fertile plain;further away,between Vouvray and Saint-Symphorien,you see a sort of crescent of gray cliff full of sunny vineyards;the only limits to your view are the low,rich hills along the Cher,a bluish line of horizon broken by many a chateau and the wooded masses of many a park.Out to the west you lose yourself in the immense river,where vessels come and go,spreading their white sails to the winds which seldom fail them in the wide Loire basin.A prince might build a summer palace at La Grenadiere,but certainly it will always be the home of a poet's desire,and the sweetest of retreats for two young lovers--for this vintage house,which belongs to a substantial burgess of Tours,has charms for every imagination,for the humblest and dullest as well as for the most impassioned and lofty.No one can dwell there without feeling that happiness is in the air,without a glimpse of all that is meant by a peaceful life without care or ambition.There is that in the air and the sound of the river that sets you dreaming;the sands have a language,and are joyous or dreary,golden or wan;and the owner of the vineyard may sit motionless amid perennial flowers and tempting fruit,and feel all the stir of the world about him.

If an Englishman takes the house for the summer,he is asked a thousand francs for six months,the produce of the vineyard not included.If the tenant wishes for the orchard fruit,the rent is doubled;for the vintage,it is doubled again.What can La Grenadiere be worth,you wonder;La Grenadiere,with its stone staircase,its beaten path and triple terrace,its two acres of vineyard,its flowering roses about the balustrades,its worn steps,well-head,rampant clematis,and cosmopolitan trees?It is idle to make a bid!La Grenadiere will never be in the market;it was brought once and sold,but that was in 1690;and the owner parted with it for forty thousand francs,reluctant as any Arab of the desert to relinquish a favorite horse.Since then it has remained in the same family,its pride,its patrimonial jewel,its Regent diamond."While you behold,you have and hold,"says the bard.And from La Grenadiere you behold three valleys of Touraine and the cathedral towers aloft in air like a bit of filigree work.How can one pay for such treasures?Could one ever pay for the health recovered there under the linden-trees?

In the spring of one of the brightest years of the Restoration,a lady with her housekeeper and her two children (the oldest a boy thirteen years old,the youngest apparently about eight)came to Tours to look for a house.She saw La Grenadiere and took it.Perhaps the distance from the town was an inducement to live there.

She made a bedroom of the drawing-room,gave the children the two rooms above,and the housekeeper slept in a closet behind the kitchen.

The dining-room was sitting-room and drawing-room all in one for the little family.The house was furnished very simply but tastefully;there was nothing superfluous in it,and no trace of luxury.The walnut-wood furniture chosen by the stranger lady was perfectly plain,and the whole charm of the house consisted in its neatness and harmony with its surroundings.

It was rather difficult,therefore,to say whether the strange lady (Mme.Willemsens,as she styled herself)belonged to the upper middle or higher classes,or to an equivocal,unclassified feminine species.

Her plain dress gave rise to the most contradictory suppositions,but her manners might be held to confirm those favorable to her.She had not lived at Saint-Cyr,moreover,for very long before her reserve excited the curiosity of idle people,who always,and especially in the country,watch anybody or anything that promises to bring some interest into their narrow lives.