When That Hour Came To Me Among The Pines, I Wakened Thirsty.
My tin was
standing by me half full of water.
I emptied it at a draught; and
feeling broad awake after this internal cold aspersion, sat upright to
make a cigarette. The stars were clear, coloured, and jewel-like, but
not frosty. A faint silvery vapour stood for the Milky Way. All around
me the black fir-points stood upright and stock-still. By the whiteness
of the pack-saddle, I could see Modestine walking round and round at the
length of her tether; I could hear her steadily munching at the sward;
but there was not another sound, save the indescribable quiet talk of the
runnel over the stones. I lay lazily smoking and studying the colour of
the sky, as we call the void of space, from where it showed a reddish
grey behind the pines to where it showed a glossy blue-black between the
stars. As if to be more like a pedlar, I wear a silver ring. This I
could see faintly shining as I raised or lowered the cigarette; and at
each whiff the inside of my hand was illuminated, and became for a second
the highest light in the landscape.
A faint wind, more like a moving coolness than a stream of air, passed
down the glade from time to time; so that even in my great chamber the
air was being renewed all night long. I thought with horror of the inn
at Chasserades and the congregated nightcaps; with horror of the
nocturnal prowesses of clerks and students, of hot theatres and pass-keys
and close rooms. I have not often enjoyed a more serene possession of
myself, nor felt more independent of material aids. The outer world,
from which we cower into our houses, seemed after all a gentle habitable
place; and night after night a man's bed, it seemed, was laid and waiting
for him in the fields, where God keeps an open house. I thought I had
rediscovered one of those truths which are revealed to savages and hid
from political economists: at the least, I had discovered a new pleasure
for myself. And yet even while I was exulting in my solitude I became
aware of a strange lack. I wished a companion to lie near me in the
starlight, silent and not moving, but ever within touch. For there is a
fellowship more quiet even than solitude, and which, rightly understood,
is solitude made perfect. And to live out of doors with the woman a man
loves is of all lives the most complete and free.
As I thus lay, between content and longing, a faint noise stole towards
me through the pines. I thought, at first, it was the crowing of cocks
or the barking of dogs at some very distant farm; but steadily and
gradually it took articulate shape in my ears, until I became aware that
a passenger was going by upon the high-road in the valley, and singing
loudly as he went.
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