Sur l'eau; or, On the face of the waters. Des vers; or, Romances in rhyme. A tale of old times. A family affairSt. Dunstan Society, 1903 |
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Antibes arms Bailli de Suffren Bazaine beauty Bel-Ami beneath Bernard birds boat bosom breath breeze calm Cannes charming Chenet crowd cry of love dark dead death delight door dream Esterel eyes face feel feet felt filled float forest France Fréjus glance gulf hand happy head heard heart heavens hour kiss laugh light lips living look lots united Louis XIV Madame Caravan madcaps laughing magnificent lie MARCHIONESS mind Molière Monaco moon morning mother mountain murmur neath never night o'clock o'er once pale passed passion plain Prince prisoner replied rising round sail Saint-Raphaël Saint-Tropez Sainte-Maxime SECOND DECORÉ seemed shore side sight six the prison smile soft song soon soul sound spirit strange suddenly sweet talk tender things thought trees trembling turned voice wandering waves wild wind woman yacht
Popular passages
Page 76 - Macclesfield, who had the greatest share in forming the bill, and who is one of the greatest mathematicians and astronomers in Europe, spoke afterwards with infinite knowledge, and all the clearness that so intricate a matter would admit of: but as his words, his periods, and his utterance were not near so good as mine, the preference was most unanimously, though most unjustly, given to me.
Page 43 - ... that all is vanity, falls back into a contempt for all that is, my animal body, at least, is enraptured with all the intoxication of life. Like the birds, I love the sky — like the prowling wolf, the forests; I delight in rocky heights like a chamois; the thick grass I love to roll in and gallop over like a horse, and, like a fish, I revel in the clear waters.
Page 43 - I revel in the clear waters. I feel thrilling within me the sensations of all the different species of animals, of all their instincts, of all the confused longings of inferior creatures. I love the earth as they do, not as other men do; I love it without admiring it, without poetry, without exultation; I love with a deep and animal attachment, contemptible...
Page 38 - ... rot with dirt, lie down in mire, live like brutes in a continual besotment, pillage towns, burn villages, ruin nations ; then, meeting another similar agglomeration of human flesh, rush upon it, shed lakes of blood, cover plains with pounded flesh mingled with muddy and bloody earth; pile up heaps of slain; have arms and legs blown off, brains scattered without benefit to...
Page 56 - ... with a useless hope, all that toward which it had been tempted to soar, without being able to tear asunder the chains of ignorance that held it. Ah! I have coveted all, and delighted in nothing. I should have required the vitality of a whole race, the varying intelligence, all the faculties, all the powers scattered among all beings, and thousands of existences in reserve; for I bear within myself every desire and every curiosity, and I am compelled to see all, and grasp nothing. From whence,...
Page 100 - ... Philip VI, beaten and wounded at the battle of Crecy, cried as he knocked at the gates of the castle of Arbroie: " Open! Here are the fortunes of France! " They are still grateful to him for this melodramatic speech. John II, made prisoner by the Prince of Wales, remarks, with chivalrous good will and the graceful gallantry of a French troubadour : "I had counted upon entertaining you at supper to-night, but fortune wills otherwise and ordains that I should sup with you." It would be impossible...
Page 56 - Let no one envy, but rather pity us, for in the following manner does the literary man differ from his fellow creatures. For him no simple feeling any longer exists. All he sees, his joys, his pleasures, his suffering, his despair, all instantaneously become subjects of observation. In spite of all, in spite of himself, he analyzes everything, hearts, faces, gestures, intonations. As soon as he has seen, whatever it may be, he must know the wherefore. He has not a spark of enthusiasm, not a cry,...
Page 57 - ... muscular contractions, the strain of the four men who lowered the coffin into the grave, a thousand things in fact that a poor fellow suffering with all his heart, soul, and strength would never have noticed. He has seen all, noticed all, remembered all, in spite of himself, because he is above all a literary man, and his intellect is constructed in such a manner that the reverberation in him is much more vivid, more natural, so to speak, than the first shock, the echo more sonorous than the...
Page 39 - In six months the generals have destroyed the efforts of twenty years' patience and genius. And this is what is called, not falling into the most hideous materialism. We have seen war. We have seen men maddened and gone back to their brute estate, killing for mere pleasure, killing out of terror, out of bravado, from sheer ostentation. Then when right no longer exists, when...
Page 36 - I am seized with a sense of bewilderment, as though I heard of witchcraft, of the inquisition, of some far distant thing, ended long ago, abominable and monstrous, against all natural law. When we talk of cannibals, we proudly smile and proclaim our superiority over these savages. Which are the savages, the true savages? Those who fight to eat the vanquished, or those who fight to kill, only to kill? The gallant little soldiers running about over there are as surely doomed to death as the flocks...