But
That Is Neither Here Nor There; The Story Is As Follows, And The Moral
Is That The Commercial Mind Is Illogical.
When we had gone some way, clattering through the dust, and were well
on on the Commercy road, there
Was a short halt, and during this halt
there passed us the largest Tun or Barrel that ever went on wheels.
You talk of the Great Tun of Heidelburg, or of those monstrous Vats
that stand in cool sheds in the Napa Valley, or of the vast barrels in
the Catacombs of Rheims; but all these are built _in situ_ and meant
to remain steady, and there is no limit to the size of a Barrel that
has not to travel. The point about this enormous Receptacle of Bacchus
and cavernous huge Prison of Laughter, was that it could move, though
cumbrously, and it was drawn very slowly by stupid, patient oxen, who
would not be hurried. On the top of it sat a strong peasant, with a
face of determination, as though he were at war with his kind, and he
kept on calling to his oxen, 'Han', and 'Hu', in the tones of a sullen
challenge, as he went creaking past. Then the soldiers began calling
out to him singly, 'Where are you off to, Father, with that battery?'
and 'Why carry cold water to Commercy? They have only too much as it
is;' and 'What have you got in the little barrelkin, the barrellet,
the cantiniere's brandy-flask, the gourd, the firkin?' He stopped his
oxen fiercely and turned round to us and said: 'I will tell you what I
have here. I have so many hectolitres of Brule wine which I made
myself, and which I know to be the best wine there is, and I am taking
it about to see if I cannot tame and break these proud fellows who are
for ever beating down prices and mocking me. It is worth eight
'scutcheons the hectolitre, that is, eight sols the litre; what do I
say? it is worth a Louis a cup: but I will sell it at the price I
name, and not a penny less. But whenever I come to a village the
innkeeper begins bargaining and chaffering and offering six sols and
seven sols, and I answer, "Eight sols, take it or leave it", and when
he seems for haggling again I get up and drive away. I know the worth
of my wine, and I will not be beaten down though I have to go out of
Lorraine into the Barrois to sell it.'
So when we caught him up again, as we did shortly after on the road, a
sergeant cried as we passed, 'I will give you seven, seven and a
quarter, seven and a half', and we went on laughing and forgot all
about him.
For many days we marched from this place to that place, and fired and
played a confused game in the hot sun till the train of sick horses
was a mile long, and till the recruits were all as deaf as so many
posts; and at last, one evening, we came to a place called Heiltz le
Maurupt, which was like heaven after the hot plain and the dust, and
whose inhabitants are as good and hospitable as Angels; it is just
where the Champagne begins.
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