30 THE OBOLUS OF STORY-TELLERS.* FRANCE has a "Société des Gens de Lettres," something after the fashion of our Literary Fund, and yet in its plan and management essentially different. The only point of agreement, and that is the chief, is that both have for object the succour of literary persons labouring under difficulties, only the one has that object solely in view, the other comprises several. Now, when the cotton crisis came, literary men were, by their avocations, which bring them incessantly in contact with all phases of humanity, among the first to sympathise with the numbers of their countrymen and countrywomen who were cast out of employment. They felt that something must be done; they consulted their own resources, but they found that the literary classes had also their wounded and their martyrs; the assistance given to the aged, the afflicted, and the helpless, could not be diverted from its usual channel. Happily, a new idea suggested itself: the society could only give an obolus-the relief prayed for by Belisarius-so the committee resolved upon also offering its "obolus" to the society-l'obole des conteurs-the obolus of the story-tellers. Some twenty-two well-known names contributed to this praiseworthy and charitable undertaking; and we hope that, by extracting a specimen or two, we shall induce many to purchase a work, the sale of which is devoted to the relief of suffering humanity, if, as has been suggested, a still more tasteful alternative is not carried out a gratuitous translation by several hands, and a gratuitous publication for the benefit of our poor neighbours. Our rendering of "Bonhomme Chopine" would, in that case, be entirely at their service. "And Lannurien, what of him?" was the question invariably put upon the conclusion of the story of that famous suit, in which Chopine lost the mill, the two meadows, and the bit of common. And just as invariably also did Chopine shake his long white hair, and reply: "You have said it: l'âne n'eut rien." Lannurien was Chopine's real name. A chopine is simply a pint measure, and he whose name was Lannurien was called Bonhomme Chopine, from his addiction to that measure of cider, whenever he could get it. As to the play upon his name, we regret that it is only translatable so far, that Lannurien and "the ass had nothing" are synonymous in the language of the Franks. "And do they make puns?" our story-teller continues. "Alas, yes! Down there in that austere country where Cæsar encamped, where Sombreuil died; down there where the sea is so vast and the land is so gloomy, close by Quiberon, with its lugubrious strand, still nearer to Carnac, the double city, living and dead; the one happy, and chanting Christian canticles in its gem of a church; the other silent, with its motionless procession of phantoms of stone, all relating an incomprehensible legend of Pagan days in the pale moonlight." * L'Obole des Conteurs. Paris: Libraire de L. Hachette et Cie. Puns, oh Druids! And have I not heard, on that stone causeway which Saint Cado constructed over the ponds of Belz in one night, with the assistance of the devil, a little Celt, who cried when he was called French, and who, nevertheless, intoned that ignoble expression of Parisian imbecility, "Le pied qui r'mue?" Chopine said: "It is the railways!" The railways convey to Paris the big fish captured in the currents of Belle-Ile, and game from the heaths of Plouharnel. They bring back in exchange a little money and le pied qui r'mue. Such is Chopine's opinion, and, according to him, so long as Lower Brittany shall not have taken France to make a precinct of it, things will go on thus in Morbihan degenerated. Chopine is five feet six inches in height, and he will never know how much that is in centimètres. His holly-stick is as long as himself. He is said in the village of Etel to be sixty years of age, but he himself talks of the time when the Ile de Groix was covered with oaks, an island that is as bare in the present day as a felt hat; he avers, that every Christmas night a new upright is added to the raised stones of Carnac ; he describes the countenance of St. Cado, the shape of his nose, the colour of his hair, and the size of the cat, which the good hermit, by a pious fraud, handed over to the devil in lieu of the promised soul. The oldest inhabitants remember to have seen him, from their earliest youth, taking the same walks to and from Plouharnel and Belz, upright on his limbs, which are clothed in linen gaiters, and holding up his thin sharp face, surmounted by an open bald forehead, whilst a forest of long white hair falls around from the temples. You may go here or there throughout the whole of Brittany, and nowhere will you meet with so successful a beggar. The Wandering Jew resembles Chopine a good deal, but he never spends more than five sous at a time; Lannurien would be ashamed to drink more than a moque at one draught, but he is not particular as to the number of draughts. He is said to have imbibed seventy-two at a certain "Pardon" at Carnac, and then to have walked quietly away without singing, or staggering, or muttering any more than the hardest drinking farmer. The moque is our word mug; it is made of blue or brown earthenware, and it is never washed, so that it may preserve its precious flavour of cider. Some say that Chopine was once a sailor; others again insinuate that he was a "chouan" (loyalist) of olden times; others again affirm that he was a soldier in distant parts. Why do they say so? No one knows. As far back as can be remembered, he has always been seen walking along the roads, early and late, going and coming, taking off his hat to the crucifixes on the wayside, and removing his wooden shoes when he goes into a chapel. Nevertheless, he is familiar with far-off places; he can tell the names of the churches of Paris, which would be a fine city like Lorient or Vannes, only that there is no cider; he is intimate with sea and land; monseigneur the bishop, who allows the dogs to look at him, gave him his blessing; he has spoken to the king, saying: VOL. LVIII. D "Sire, there are judges in my country who have given to Pierre Jégo, the rich man, the inheritance of my worthy old aunt: the mill, the two meadows, and the bit of common." To which the king replied: " What will you, my good man? It is only in Paradise that one is safe from judges." "Why so, sire ?" "Because they are all in the lower regions." He who comes from afar is privileged to tell stories. Do you think the king can have said such a thing? "Good morning all of you, good Christians, father, mother, boys, and the whole household." "What news, Lannurien, my good old man ?" "The wind is in a bad quarter; I am telling no lies, the bar of the river of Etel murmurs; to-morrow's fishing will not be worth half of Paris, but there is always cider for him who can pay the host; to every hour there is some misfortune, he is very sick who dies of it." Whether at the farm, or in the grey stone house, where the fisherman mends his nets, the chair which is nearest the chimney is always vacated for the good man Chopine, who takes his seat in it with his long stick between his legs. It is his place even if there should be present by some bad chance at the meeting a tax-gathering field-mouse or a brigadier of the customs. The devastating effects of field-mice were familiar of old to others as well as to the Bretons. The mice that mar the land were known to the Israelites (1 Sam. vi. 5). "What news, Lannurien?" Not only do the men ask that question, but women also, and even children. "The news is, my Christian friends, that last year I lost my suit before the bad judges of Quimpfer." And then everybody laughs! For it is in vain that time passes, and that years follow one another; it is always last year that the good man Chopine lost his suit against Pierre Jégo, the rich man, whom no one ever knew. It is never twice continuously the same suit, although the mill, the two meadows, and the bit of common, always figure in it. Sometimes the trial takes place at Lorient, sometimes at Vannes, at others at Saint Brieue. Nay, he even goes at times as far as Nantes, "where are the Nantais Judases," as Chopine has it. And I should like to know how it is that that great handsome city of Nantes has so bad a reputation upon the river and the sea-side! Annaïc, a fair maid with blue eyes, the prettiest of those who are laughing, without knowing why, brings the moque. Chopine very gravely crosses himself, drinks to the health of the company, and asks the little boys: "Guess, young conjurors" (Boyer's version of marmaille is more curious than polite), "why every one in drinking puts his nose into the mug?" It is certain that Robespierre is dead at last. I have seen a street in Paris longer than from here to Fort Penthièvre: all shops. Imagine a thousand millions of fires like that of Loc Malo, one after the other, such are the lanterns in that street. And every one gets into a carriage, just as the fancy takes them, merely to go quicker, and without fatiguing themselves. And this is how it happened: he is a knave who says otherwise! It was when the English came to take Lorient. Do you know who dwelt at the fine château of Penguy, in the parish of Belz, a château which I shall inherit from my aunt who dwells at Landevan, if the judges do not give it, like everything else, to Jégo, the rich man? Do you know? It was monsieur my cousin Volvire,* governor of Lorient. He was fond of a game of cards. He could see the English fleet anchored between Groix and the Talud from the windows of his château, where I shall one day have my bed, but he did not move from his place, contenting himself with saying: "There is a long distance from Locmener to the gate of Ploemeur!" He won that night five hundred pistoles from M. du Quillio, also a cousin of mine, and went to bed with a light heart. What I tell you is truth, and nothing but the truth! Then the people of Lorient asked, Where shall we find M. Volvire, to march against the English? The captain of the port of Ploemeur-I do not remember his name-led three companies of recruits, with half a hundred dragoons, along the road to Quimperlé, and beat the English close by the Château de Coëtdor. I would rather die than tell an untruth. Then M. de Volvire, who had slept well after his game of cards, came to see which way the wind blew. The wind came from the king, my Christian brethren, and the king had not time to look everywhere at the same moment. M. Volvire my cousin was made a marshal, and all the rest of it, and all that for having won five hundred pistoles from Du Quillio. Heaven bless you! I have seen the time when they chanted the Oremus of the dead over those who sneezed three times; but all that is changed since the railroads. And as to the captain? Well, as to him, I tell you that I do not even remember his name. He remained captain of the port of Ploemeur. And as to the English, they are still running. To all which you will say: It is not the fault of the judges. I lost my suit at Rennes, against Jégo, the rich man, and the judges knew well enough that I had rights enough to have gained over all Brittany as witnesses. When my aunt shall die, my aunt of Landevan, who is as old as the stones in the steeple of Larmor, I shall sleep on a couette (feather bed). The dining-hall is vast at my château of Penguy. All those who have given me a chair by the fireside, shall have a seat at my table, morning, mid-day, and evening. He is a knave who does not believe what I say ! Then, after the lapse of time-I cannot say how long a time-the daughter of the daughter of monsieur my cousin Marshal Volvire had to beg her bread from the parish of Riantec. The château of Penguy already at that time belonged to my aunt who dwells at Landevan, but she has not a tender heart. Ah! ah! my dear friends, five hundred pistoles were no longer to be gained in one game of cards! * Marshal Count de Volvire, commanding for the king in Brittany, at the time of the English expedition against Lorient, in 1746, under Admiral Lestock and General Sinclair. Houses go and come. The pebbles of the shore have been rocks. At this hour the daughter of the daughter of the captain of the port of Ploemeur is possibly a princess. Rosaïte, that was her name (I mean the descendant of the Volvires), had neither father nor mother, nor brother nor sister, nor uncle nor aunt, nor anything but her poor eyes to weep out of, and by dint of weeping, her poor eyes could no longer see anything. She was blind, and except her little dog, she had no one but God to whom to relate her griefs. As for being pretty, wasn't she pretty, with her sad, innocent face, and her great black eyes that seemed to look into your very heart! There was a sailor of Magoër who wished to carry her off one evening that thirty thousand sardines had been caught, and that the master had given thirty pots. One pot for every thousand. It would be well if the world did not die of it in the times as they now are. But it is not the fault of the sardine, is it? It was near the spot where there is now a bridge of iron-wire over the river of Etel. Rosaïte screamed, poor soul. The youth Kergriz, who supported his mother by gathering cockles, happened to be passing by. He heard Rosaïte's screams, and as true as that Our Saviour died on the cross, my beloved ones, for all our sins, he broke the drunken man's head with a blow of his wooden clog. Amen! Ah! it amuses you, Annaïc? before the end of the year. Look face to dye your marriage dress. became a pair air of lovers. Well, girl, we will go to your wedding at Vincent; there is enough red on his Then Rosaïte and the youth Kergriz "Misery and company," she said. The mother would not have it. The priest of Riantec married them nevertheless, and gave them three crowns of six livres to pay for the cider. The mother partook of it like a good Christian. After which they were both seen, Rosaïte and Kergriz, going together to the bank to dig up cockles. They were so happy that the king would have envied their happiness. I tell no untruths. But Rosaïte had a little child, and Kergriz caught a fever from remaining too long in the wet. Only one of the five hundred pistoles that monsieur my cousin Marshal Volvire won at cards instead of going out to fight the English, would have brought balm to their hearts. They lived in a hut that belonged to Jégo, the rich man. One Sunday evening he drove them out of it, and there they were, homeless, both sick, with a baby that was a love of a baby, and that on a dark and stormy night. The bar murmurs to-night, my Christian friends, the bar of Etel; there will be a heavy sea to-morrow. There are many boats lost, and many ships too, when the bar murmurs, and who knows what treasures are at the bottom of the water? No one. He who could remain under the waves for only a quarter of an hour would come back with his fortune made. It is the actual truth, and you shall see! As they were going down the hill, on their way Heaven knows whither, the little dog, Rosaïte's first friend, stopped short and died. Only the month before the mother of Kergriz had been laid in the cemetery. Rosaïte said, "I would give a year of my life for a bit of black bread. It requires bread to make milk." |