Page:French life in town and country (1917).djvu/24

 rich and pleasant landscape, its castles of undying interest, its river of thrilling associations. Or let him wander in summer amid the cherry orchards of the Jura country, with the rampart of mountains above the pine-tops and the touch of Swiss beauty around; or dream away the present in musing upon forgotten Mediterranean glories among the ruins of dead Provençal cities between the grey-green silver of the olive and the sapphire waters beyond the broad grey river bends.

It is true that the townsman all over the land is largely governed by a need for excitement, and having, as a rule, no personal initiative to enable him to minister to it, he contents himself with looking toward the capital with envy, and devours the newspapers from Paris in eager expectation of the "something" he is in daily hope of happening. But whatever does happen in Paris rarely makes itself felt in the intellectually sleepy, industrious provinces; thanks to which wide-spread spirit of commercial and bucolic denseness to the inflammatory influences of the capital, France thrives now as she throve before the war, when at a word she could produce funds to pay off an enormous indemnity, without flinching or hesitating.

When you travel in the country or through small French towns, you are struck with the gaiety, intelligence, and good-will of the people