Читать книгу The Peasant and the Prince - Harriet Martineau - Страница 4

Marie’s mother received her with a look almost of reproach; so overpowered was the poor woman with the business of providing lodging, food, fire, and washing for three strangers, when she had no money, and few other means of making them comfortable. The men seemed to behave well. One of them was absent, helping his host to bring in his share of the forage, to be provided by the village, for the cavalry now awaiting the arrival of the Dauphiness. The other two guests were sitting before the door, one smoking, and the other every now and then looking in, and addressing some civil word to the hostess, who was plucking her fowls with a heavy heart.

“I thought you were lost,” said she to her children as they entered. “Robin, fill the boiler; and Marc, blow the fire under it. Your sister and I shall have to be at the wash-tub and ironing-board all night.”

The soldiers were very sorry this trouble should be caused by them. Was there no one in the village who could relieve them of this part of their work? That the linen should be ready by the morning was indeed indispensable, as the Dauphiness might arrive at any hour of the next day: but to stand at the wash-tub at midnight!—it was terrible to think of. However terrible, there was no help for it. Every housewife in Saint Menehould had soldiers quartered upon her house, and her hands therefore full, instead of being able to wash for another. Besides this, the Randolphes could not pay for such service. Moreover, the family had to give up their beds (which were but poor cribs in the wall) to the strangers; and as they had to be up, they had better be employed than idle.

As soon as Robin and Marc had done all they could for their sister in the washing-shed, they hastened to the soldiers, and made the acquaintance which boys like to make with strangers who have travelled and seen wonderful things. First they found out that one soldier was called Jérome, and that the other, who never ceased smoking, pretended to have so many names, that they saw he either meant to make a joke of them, or did not choose to say what his real name was. Then the boys told their own names and ages, and those of all the family: but they did not mention Charles, having learned that much prudence from the distress they saw in the faces of their sister and mother. Then it appeared that the soldiers could tell a great deal about the Dauphiness.

“Will she be here to-morrow?” asked Marc.

“That depends upon where she is to-night,” replied Jérome. “The last I heard of her was at Strasburg. You know she is a German, and comes from Germany.”

The boys had never heard of Germany, near as they were to it, and did not know where Strasburg was. So they asked about something that they could understand; what the great lady’s name was, and how old she looked.

“Her name is Marie-Antoinette-Joseph-Jeanne de Lorraine: and her age is—Let us see. Comrade, how old is she, exactly? I heard tell, I think, that she is fifteen.”

“Oh, that can’t be!” exclaimed the boys. “Married at fifteen! And our Marie is—”

Here Robin remembered that he must not allude to Charles, and stopped.

“She was born on the day of the great earthquake at Lisbon—”

“Is that where she lives?”

“No, I think not. Whether Lisbon is in Germany, I am not certain; but I don’t think she and her mother were in the earthquake; but I know that it happened the day she was born, and that it hurts her spirits to think of it. She takes it for a sign that she will live unhappy, or die in some dreadful way.”

“You have not served out of France,” observed Randolphe, as he came up, with the third soldier, and seated himself on the bench. “You have not seen either Lisbon or Germany, I suppose; for I can tell you that Lisbon is a good way off from any place where this princess has been. Well, I am sorry to hear anything hurts her spirits; but, to be sure, the great earthquake was an awful thing.”

“I am thinking,” said Jérome, “that a good many thousand people must have been born that same day; I hope they are not all troubled with bad spirits. It would be a curious sight to see so many people of fifteen all low about the manner of their lives and deaths.”

“She is very low sometimes, however,” observed his comrade. “When she was leaving the city she lived in, she wept so that nothing was ever seen like it. She covered her eyes sometimes with her handkerchief, and sometimes with her hands; and looked out many times from the coach-window, to see her mother’s palace once more.”

Everyone thought there was no great wonder in this. A young girl leaving her own country for ever, to be the wife of a foreign prince whom she had never seen, and could not tell whether she should like, might well be in tears, Randolphe said. Had she cheered up yet?

“Yes, indeed,” said Jérome, “that she has. When she saw the fine pavilion on the frontier, she was pleased enough.”

The boys wanted to hear about the pavilion.

“It was there,” said Jérome, “that she was to be made a French princess of. It was a very grand sort of tent, that cost more money than I can reckon.”

Randolphe sighed.

“There were three rooms,” continued Jérome; “a large one in the middle, and a smaller one at each end. In one of these smaller rooms she left everything she had worn, even to her very stockings, and all her German attendants; and then she went through to the other, where she found her French attendants, and her fine French wardrobe.”

“And shall we see her in some of her new clothes?” asked Marc.

“Certainly.” And Jérome went on describing the princess’s dress, and told all he had heard of her jewels, and furs, and laces, till the soldiers observed that their host had sighed very often. One of the soldiers then said that it was enough to make poor men like themselves sad to hear of such luxury, when they were hungry in the long summer days, and cold all the long winter nights.

“What need you care?” said the host, somewhat bitterly. “You are provided for by law, when we country people are ground down by it. You come upon us, and must be served with the best, when we have not enough for ourselves.”

The third soldier declared that he thought this a very uncivil speech. Jérome said that he, for his part, could dispense with civility in such a case, when he happened to know where the truth lay. He assured Randolphe that soldiers like himself were as little pleased with the state of things as any countryman. They themselves were the sons of peasants; and many had led a cottage life, and knew how to pity it. But he must say, a soldier’s life was very little better. The army could not get its pay. Glad enough would soldiers be to save trouble to their hosts, if they had a little money in their pockets; but pay was not to be got, in these days, by soldiers, any more than if none was due to them.

His smoking comrade thought there must be an earthquake somewhere in France, swallowing up all the money: for nobody could tell where it all went to.

“How can you say that,” said Randolphe, “when you think of the numbers of idle people that are feeding upon those who work?—I hear you, wife,” he said, in answer to a warning cough from his wife within. “It is no treason to say that in this land there are swarms of idle folk, living upon the toil of us who work.”

The guests declared that they were men of honour, who would be ashamed to repay hospitality by reporting the conversation of their host. Besides, nobody in France could question the feet. To say nothing of the old king, languishing in the midst of costly pleasures, so vicious that by every indulgence he purchased the curses of virtuous families, and the hatred of the poor—besides all the extravagances in that quarter, there were the nobility, sitting heavy upon the people throughout the land, like the nightmare upon the sleep of a wearied man. These nobles must all be rich—must all be pampered in luxury, though not one of them would work with his head or hands. If a nobleman had five sons, they must all be pampered alike; and the sons of five hundred peasants must be oppressed, to supply the means.

Randolphe said he had little thought to see the day when he should hear soldiers say these things openly at his own door. His face brightened as he declared this, though his wife again coughed more than once.

Jérome replied that it was a common thing now to hear these things told; for the oppressed do get to speak out, sooner or later. The story of the king’s meeting a coffin was in everybody’s mouth. No one here had heard it: so Jérome told that the king was fond of asking questions of strangers, and particularly about disease, death, and churchyards; because he thought his gay attendants did not like to hear of such things. One day, he was hunting in the forest of Sénard, when he met a man on horseback, carrying a coffin.

“Where are you carrying that coffin?” asked the king.

“To the village yonder.”

“Is it for a man or a woman?”

“For a man.”

“What did he die of?”

“Of hunger.”

The king clapped spurs to his horse, and rode away.

“He might find the same thing happening in many other villages,” said Randolphe, stroking the thin cheeks of his boy Robin. “Look here!” showing the boy’s arm. “Is this an arm that can work or fight as a Frenchman’s should do, when my boy is a man?”

“Things may be different when that boy is a man,” said the smoker, between two whiffs of his pipe.

“How? Where? When? Why? Is anything going to be done for the poor?” asked Randolphe and his family, within and without doors.

“I don’t know when and how: but I think you need not ask why, if you live some days of the week upon boiled nettles, as many of your neighbours do. Those that have looked into the matter say that the country people (they who really do the work of the land) possess only one-third of the country, and yet pay three-fourths of the taxes. One does not see why this should go on, when once they choose that it shall not: and many think that they won’t choose it much longer.”

“And then something will be done for the poor?” said the hostess, coming to the door.

“Certainly; unless the rich do something for the poor first; which would be their wisest way.”

“But if the rich should not choose to do anything for us?” said Robin.

“Then they must look to themselves.”

“And what will happen to them? What will happen to the Dauphiness?”

“Oh, poor lady! There is no saying that. She knows little of what the French people are suffering, and nothing of what they are thinking. How should she? What notion should she have of poverty and the poor, when she is now buying, out of her allowance, a pair of ear-rings that cost 360,000 francs?”

(Note: This is fact; but it happened a little later in her history, immediately after she became queen: 360,000 francs are about 15,000 pounds.)

“You are joking, comrade.”

“No, it is true. She thinks there is no harm in it, because she will pay the whole out of her own allowance, year by year; and the diamonds are so rare and wonderful that she thinks she has a good bargain. What should she know of poverty and the poor?”

“God bless her!” said the hostess, “and may she never know what it is to eat boiled nettles, for want of anything better!”

“I wish she would have done with throwing away our money in diamonds at that rate,” said Randolphe, gloomily. “The people will not love her if she does. We all know it is what we pay for this cursed salt, and our poll-tax, and all our grinding taxes, that go to pay for such freaks as these.”

“Well, love,” said his wife, “she is young, and may learn. Don’t let us be grudging to her as a stranger.”

“Not I, love; I would grudge her nothing, if only I could give my family food that would make them plump and rosy, as I hope to see this lady to-morrow, and if I could but apprentice my boys to some trade that would give them a chance of a better living than their father had before them, and take them a little from under the Count’s hand, for that is very heavy upon us. If my boys have nothing better before them than to divide my poor field, and live as peasants under the Count, I don’t know that I should cry to lay them in their graves before I lie down myself.”

“And cannot you apprentice one of them, at least?” inquired Jérome.

“How can I? Besides the transaction between the artisan and me, there is a great sum to be paid to the king upon the indenture, and another and a larger before the lad begins his trade. What can a poor peasant do with his boys but make them poorer peasants than himself, if that is possible? But it is not possible. Is there coarser woollen than this that I wear? Is there a tougher leather than my belt is made of? And is there anything for the feet poorer than our wooden clogs? And as for food, we are as far from health and strength on the one hand, as we are from the grave on the other—just half-way. So my boys will be poor peasants, like their father, if they can make his field yield double; and if not, they will be in their graves.”

The boys trembled, and would have cried if they dared. Their mother wept outright: and the good-natured Jérome could only shake his head and sigh, and mutter that he feared that was the plight of millions more in France. His smoking comrade again gave out, between two puffs, that before these boys were men, everything might be changed, and the nobles might chance to find their mouths stuffed with boiled nettles, for once, just to show what they were like. This speech made the boys laugh. Their mother wiped her eyes, and gave notice that supper, such as it was, was ready. She knew there was nothing that could satisfy three men, if they happened to be very hungry; she could only say that here was all she had.

Her guests answered her with a civil nod, and sat down at her board with alacrity, saying that the fowls looked savoury, and the bowl of milk good for a thirsty man after a march. Some of their comrades in the village had wine, they knew: but nothing was said about it; for the soldiers’ pockets were empty, like those of their host.

It was growing dark. Randolphe made what blaze he could by throwing light wood upon the fire. By law, he was bound to furnish candles to his guests; and some soldiers whom he had entertained had required this of him; but his present guests felt no disposition to do so, after what they had heard. They cut up their fowls by firelight: then, before beginning to eat, they exchanged glances, the consequence of which was that the boys were called, made to sit down, each between two soldiers, and treated with some mouthfuls of savoury fowl. Can it be wondered at that they forgot, till afterwards, that they were eating poor Marie’s fowls, which they had hoped to see pecking about in the wood?

The lively talk that was going on round the table was soon interrupted by a loud rap upon the door, made by a heavy staff, such as the Count’s followers usually carried when they went on messages. Randolphe was not fond of receiving visits from the Count’s people, and he now desired Robin to go to the door, and see what was wanted. The message was heard by those within, for the bearer shouted it aloud from door to door of all the peasantry of the Count’s estate. Randolphe and another were wanted to-night, to flog the ponds.

“I will go myself, because I must,” observed Randolphe: “but how to find another I don’t know, so I shall just let that alone.”

“They won’t forgive you for not taking a second,” remarked his wife. “You will have to pay dear, one way or another: and yet I can’t ask you to take one of the boys.—It is bad enough for you, a poor rest between two days’ labour, to stand flogging the ponds till field time in the morning.”

“Have you often to do this night-work, neighbour?” asked Jérome.

“Only when the family are at the chateau. They are so used to live in Paris, away from country noises, that they cannot sleep in the country for the noise of the frogs, unless the ponds are flogged; so, when they come, we have that work to do.”

“Cannot you poison the frogs?” asked Jérome.

“O, yes, father!” cried Marc. “You poison rats: cannot you poison the frogs, and have done with them?”

The smoker here muttered something which made his comrade jog his elbow, and the host say, “Hush! Hush!” What he was muttering was, that if they wanted to get rid of a nuisance, the aristocrats were fewer than the frogs.

Randolphe was evidently anxious to be gone after he had heard this speech. He would not say another word on his own grievances, or those of his neighbours. He fetched his woollen cap, and stood only undecided as to what he should do about furnishing a second, to work with him that night. He glanced from one boy to the other: but both looked too pale to stand in the damps through an April night. He repeated that he would take no second: but while he said so, there were images in his mind of fine or compensation, bringing increased hardships on the morrow. At this moment a voice from the darkness without called his name, and said he need not look any further for a comrade.

All the family knew that this was Charles’s voice; but even the little boys had learned so much caution from hardship, that they did not speak, but only looked at each other. Jérome observed that it told well for his host that he had a neighbour ready, without asking, to help him in so irksome a service.

The soldiers contrived to make room for the boys to sleep, thinking it quite enough that the law obliged Randolphe to flog the ponds, and his wife and daughter to toil in the shed all night, without the addition of the two half-fed lads having to lie down on the clay floor, or not at all. So each boy had a share of the crib, and a corner of the rug.