Fruitfulness - Emile Zola
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"Why! he walks, he walks!"
Ah! those first lispings of life, those successive flights of the dear
little ones; the first glance, the first smile, the first step--what joy
do they not bring to parents' hearts! They are the rapturous _etapes_ of
infancy, for which father and mother watch, which they await impatiently,
which they hail with exclamations of victory, as if each were a conquest,
a fresh triumphal entry into life. The child grows, the child becomes a
man. And there is yet the first tooth, forcing its way like a
needle-point through rosy gums; and there is also the first stammered
word, the "pa-pa," the "mam-ma," which one is quite ready to detect amid
the vaguest babble, though it be but the purring of a kitten, the
chirping of a bird. Life does its work, and the father and the mother are
ever wonderstruck with admiration and emotion at the sight of that
efflorescence alike of their flesh and their souls.
"Wait a moment," said Marianne, "he will come back to me. Gervais!
Gervais!"
And after a little hesitation, a false start, the child did indeed
return, taking the four steps afresh, with arms extended and beating the
air as if they were balancing-poles.
"Gervais! Gervais!" called Mathieu in his turn. And the child went back
to him; and again and again did they want him to repeat the journey, amid
their mirthful cries, so pretty and so funny did they find him.
Then, seeing that the four other children began playing rather roughly
with him in their enthusiasm, Marianne carried him away. And once more,
on the same spot, on the young grass, did she give him the breast. And
again did the stream of milk trickle forth.
Close by that spot, skirting the new field, there passed a crossroad, in
rather bad condition, leading to a neighboring village. And on this road
a cart suddenly came into sight, jolting amid the ruts, and driven by a
peasant--who was so absorbed in his contemplation of the land which
Mathieu had cleared, that he would have let his horse climb upon a heap
of stones had not a woman who accompanied him abruptly pulled the reins.
The horse then stopped, and the man in a jeering voice called out: "So
this, then, is your work, Monsieur Froment?"
Mathieu and Marianne thereupon recognized the Lepailleurs, the people of
the mill. They were well aware that folks laughed at Janville over the
folly of their attempt--that mad idea of growing wheat among the marshes
of the plateau. Lepailleur, in particular, distinguished himself by the
violent raillery he levelled at this Parisian, a gentleman born, with a
good berth, who was so stupid as to make himself a peasant, and fling
what money he had to that rascally earth, which would assuredly swallow
him and his children and his money all together, without yielding even
enough wheat to keep them in bread. And thus the sight of the field had
stupefied him. It was a long while since he had passed that way, and he
had never thought that the seed would sprout so thickly, for he had
repeated a hundred times that nothing would germinate, so rotten was all
the land. Although he almost choked with covert anger at seeing his
predictions thus falsified, he was unwilling to admit his error, and put
on an air of ironical doubt.
"So you think it will grow, eh? Well, one can't say that it hasn't come
up. Only one must see if it can stand and ripen." And as Mathieu quietly
smiled with hope and confidence, he added, striving to poison his joy:
"Ah! when you know the earth you'll find what a hussy she is. I've seen
plenty of crops coming on magnificently, and then a storm, a gust of
wind, a mere trifle, has reduced them to nothing! But you are young at
the trade as yet; you'll get your experience in misfortune."
His wife, who nodded approval on hearing him talk so finely, then
addressed herself to Marianne: "Oh! my man doesn't say that to discourage
you, madame. But the land you know, is just like children. There are some
who live and some who die; some who give one pleasure, and others who
kill one with grief. But, all considered, one always bestows more on them
than one gets back, and in the end one finds oneself duped. You'll see,
you'll see."
Without replying, Marianne, moved by these malicious predictions, gently
raised her trustful eyes to Mathieu. And he, though for a moment
irritated by all the ignorance, envy, and imbecile ambition which he felt
were before him, contented himself with jesting. "That's it, we'll see.
When your son Antoine becomes a prefect, and I have twelve peasant
daughters ready, I'll invite you to their weddings, for it's your mill
that ought to be rebuilt, you know, and provided with a fine engine, so
as to grind all the corn of my property yonder, left and right,
everywhere!"
The sweep of his arm embraced such a far expanse of ground that the
miller, who did not like to be derided, almost lost his temper. He lashed
his horse with his whip, and the cart jolted on again through the ruts.
"Wheat in the ear is not wheat in the mill," said he. "Au revoir, and
good luck to you, all the same."
"Thanks, au revoir."
Then, while the children still ran about, seeking early primroses among
the mosses, Mathieu came and sat down beside Marianne, who, he saw, was
quivering. He said nothing to her, for he knew that she possessed
sufficient strength and confidence to surmount, unaided, such fears for
the future as threats might kindle in her womanly heart. But he simply
set himself there, so near her that he touched her, looking and smiling
at her the while. And she immediately became calm again and likewise
smiled, while little Gervais, whom the words of the malicious could not
as yet disturb, nursed more eagerly than ever, with a purr of rapturous
satisfaction. The milk was ever trickling, bringing flesh to little limbs
which grew stronger day by day, spreading through the earth, filling the
whole world, nourishing the life which increased hour by hour. And was
not this the answer which faith and hope returned to all threats of
death?--the certainty of life's victory, with fine children ever growing
in the sunlight, and fine crops ever rising from the soil at each
returning spring! To-morrow, yet once again, on the glorious day of
harvest, the corn will have ripened, the children will be men!
And it was thus, indeed, three months later, when the Beauchenes and the
Seguins, keeping their promise, came--husbands, wives, and children--to
spend a Sunday afternoon at Chantebled. The Froments had even prevailed
on Morange to be of the party with Reine, in their desire to draw him for
a day, at any rate, from the dolorous prostration in which he lived. As
soon as all these fine folks had alighted from the train it was decided
to go up to the plateau to see the famous fields, for everybody was
curious about them, so extravagant and inexplicable did the idea of
Mathieu's return to the soil, and transformation into a peasant, seem to
them. He laughed gayly, and at least he succeeded in surprising them when
he waved his hand towards the great expanse under the broad blue sky,
that sea of tall green stalks whose ears were already heavy and undulated
at the faintest breeze. That warm splendid afternoon, the far-spreading
fields looked like the very triumph of fruitfulness, a growth of germs
which the humus amassed through centuries had nourished with prodigious
sap, thus producing this first formidable crop, as if to glorify the
eternal source of life which sleeps in the earth's flanks. The milk had
streamed, and the corn now grew on all sides with overflowing energy,
creating health and strength, bespeaking man's labor and the kindliness,
the solidarity of the world. It was like a beneficent, nourishing ocean,
in which all hunger would be appeased, and in which to-morrow might
arise, amid that tide of wheat whose waves were ever carrying good news
to the horizon.
True, neither Constance nor Valentine was greatly touched by the sight of
the waving wheat, for other ambitions filled their minds: and Morange,
though he stared with his vague dim eyes, did not even seem to see it.
But Beauchene and Seguin marvelled, for they remembered their visit in
the month of January, when the frozen ground had been wrapt in sleep and
mystery. They had then guessed nothing, and now they were amazed at this
miraculous awakening, this conquering fertility, which had changed a part
of the marshy tableland into a field of living wealth. And Seguin, in
particular, did not cease praising and admiring, certain as he now felt
that he would be paid, and already hoping that Mathieu would soon take a
further portion of the estate off his hands.
Then, as soon as they had walked to the old pavilion, now transformed
into a little farm, and had seated themselves in the garden, pending
dinner-time, the conversation fell upon children. Marianne, as it
happened, had weaned Gervais the day before, and he was there among the
ladies, still somewhat unsteady on his legs, and yet boldly going from
one to the other, careless of his frequent falls on his back or his nose.
He was a gay-spirited child who seldom lost his temper, doubtless because
his health was so good. His big clear eyes were ever laughing; he offered
his little hands in a friendly way, and was very white, very pink, and
very sturdy--quite a little man indeed, though but fifteen and a half
months old. Constance and Valentine admired him, while Marianne jested
and turned him away each time that he greedily put out his little hands
towards her.
"No, no, monsieur, it's over now. You will have nothing but soup in
future."
"Weaning is such a terrible business," then remarked Constance. "Did he
let you sleep last night?"
"Oh! yes, he had good habits, you know; he never troubled me at night.
But this morning he was stupefied and began to cry. Still, you see, he is
fairly well behaved already. Besides, I never had more trouble than this
with the other ones."
Beauchene was standing there, listening, and, as usual, smoking a cigar.
Constance appealed to him:
"You are lucky. But you, dear, remember--don't you?--what a life Maurice
led us when his nurse went away. For three whole nights we were unable to
sleep."
"But just look how your Maurice is playing!" exclaimed Beauchene. "Yet
you'll be telling me again that he is ill."
"Oh! I no longer say that, my friend; he is quite well now. Besides, I
was never anxious; I know that he is very strong."
A great game of hide-and-seek was going on in the garden, along the paths
and even over the flower-beds, among the eight children who were
assembled there. Besides the four of the house--Blaise, Denis, Ambroise,
and Rose--there were Gaston and Lucie, the two elder children of the
Seguins, who had abstained, however, from bringing their other
daughter--little Andree. Then, too, both Reine and Maurice were present.
And the latter now, indeed, seemed to be all right upon his legs, though
his square face with its heavy jaw still remained somewhat pale. His
mother watched him running about, and felt so happy and so vain at the
realization of her dream that she became quite amiable even towards these
poor relatives the Froments, whose retirement into the country seemed to
her like an incomprehensible downfall, which forever thrust them out of
her social sphere.
"Ah! well," resumed Beauchene, "I've only one boy, but he's a sturdy
fellow, I warrant it; isn't he, Mathieu?"
These words had scarcely passed his lips when he must have regretted
them. His eyelids quivered and a little chill came over him as his glance
met that of his former designer. For in the latter's clear eyes he
beheld, as it were, a vision of that other son, Norine's ill-fated child,
who had been cast into the unknown. Then there came a pause, and amid the
shrill cries of the boys and girls playing at hide-and-seek a number of
little shadows flitted through the sunlight: they were the shadows of the
poor doomed babes who scarce saw the light before they were carried off
from homes and hospitals to be abandoned in corners, and die of cold, and
perhaps even of starvation!
Mathieu had been unable to answer a word. And his emotion increased when
he noticed Morange huddled up on a chair, and gazing with blurred,
tearful eyes at little Gervais, who was laughingly toddling hither and
thither. Had a vision come to him also? Had the phantom of his dead wife,
shrinking from the duties of motherhood and murdered in a hateful den,
risen before him in that sunlit garden, amid all the turbulent mirth of
happy, playful children?
"What a pretty girl your daughter Reine is!" said Mathieu, in the hope of
drawing the accountant from his haunting remorse. "Just look at her
running about!--so girlish still, as if she were not almost old enough to
be married."
Morange slowly raised his head and looked at his daughter. And a smile
returned to his eyes, still moist with tears. Day by day his adoration
increased. As Reine grew up he found her more and more like her mother,
and all his thoughts became centred in her. His one yearning was that she
might be very beautiful, very happy, very rich. That would be a sign that
he was forgiven--that would be the only joy for which he could yet hope.
And amid it all there was a vague feeling of jealousy at the thought that
a husband would some day take her from him, and that he would remain
alone in utter solitude, alone with the phantom of his dead wife.
"Married?" he murmured; "oh! not yet. She is only fourteen."
At this the others expressed surprise: they would have taken her to be
quite eighteen, so womanly was her precocious beauty already.
"As a matter of fact," resumed her father, feeling flattered, "she has
already been asked in marriage. You know that the Baroness de Lowicz is
kind enough to take her out now and then. Well, she told me that an
arch-millionnaire had fallen in love with Reine--but he'll have to wait!
I shall still be able to keep her to myself for another five or six years
at least!"
He no longer wept, but gave a little laugh of egotistical satisfaction,
without noticing the chill occasioned by the mention of Seraphine's name;
for even Beauchene felt that his sister was hardly a fit companion for a
young girl.
Then Marianne, anxious at seeing the conversation drop, began,
questioning Valentine, while Gervais at last slyly crept to her knees.
"Why did you not bring your little Andree?" she inquired. "I should have
been so pleased to kiss her. And she would have been able to play with
this little gentleman, who, you see, does not leave me a moment's peace."
But Seguin did not give his wife time to reply. "Ah! no, indeed!" he
exclaimed; "in that case I should not have come. It is quite enough to
have to drag the two others about. That fearful child has not ceased
deafening us ever since her nurse went away."
Valentine then explained that Andree was not really well behaved. She had
been weaned at the beginning of the previous week, and La Catiche, after
terrorizing the household for more than a year, had plunged it by her
departure into anarchy. Ah! that Catiche, she might compliment herself on
all the money she had cost! Sent away almost by force, like a queen who
is bound to abdicate at last, she had been loaded with presents for
herself and her husband, and her little girl at the village! And now it
had been of little use to take a dry-nurse in her place, for Andree did
not cease shrieking from morning till night. They had discovered, too,
that La Catiche had not only carried off with her a large quantity of
linen, but had left the other servants quite spoilt, disorganized, so
that a general clearance seemed necessary.
"Oh!" resumed Marianne, as if to smooth things, "when the children are
well one can overlook other worries."
"Why, do you imagine that Andree is well?" cried Seguin, giving way to
one of his brutal fits. "That Catiche certainly set her right at first,
but I don't know what happened afterwards, for now she is simply skin and
bones." Then, as his wife wished to protest, he lost his temper. "Do you
mean to say that I don't speak the truth? Why, look at our two others
yonder: they have papier-mache faces, too! It is evident that you don't
look after them enough. You know what a poor opinion Santerre has of
them!"
For him Santerre's opinion remained authoritative. However, Valentine
contented herself with shrugging her shoulders; while the others, feeling
slightly embarrassed, looked at Gaston and Lucie, who amid the romping of
their companions, soon lost breath and lagged behind, sulky and
distrustful.
"But, my dear friend," said Constance to Valentine, "didn't our good
Doctor Boutan tell you that all the trouble came from your not nursing
your children yourself? At all events, that was the compliment that he
paid me."
At the mention of Boutan a friendly shout arose. Oh! Boutan, Boutan! he
was like all other specialists. Seguin sneered; Beauchene jested about
the legislature decreeing compulsory nursing by mothers; and only Mathieu
and Marianne remained silent.
"Of course, my dear friend, we are not jesting about you," said
Constance, turning towards the latter. "Your children are superb, and
nobody says the contrary."
Marianne gayly waved her hand, as if to reply that they were free to make
fun of her if they pleased. But at this moment she perceived that
Gervais, profiting by her inattention, was busy seeking his "paradise
lost." And thereupon she set him on the ground: "Ah, no, no, monsieur!"
she exclaimed. "I have told you that it is all over. Can't you see that
people would laugh at us?"
Then for her and her husband came a delightful moment. He was looking at
her with deep emotion. Her duty accomplished, she was now returning to
him, for she was spouse as well as mother. Never had he thought her so
beautiful, possessed of so strong and so calm a beauty, radiant with the
triumph of happy motherhood, as though indeed a spark of something divine
had been imparted to her by that river of milk that had streamed from her
bosom. A song of glory seemed to sound, glory to the source of life,
glory to the true mother, to the one who nourishes, her travail o'er. For
there is none other; the rest are imperfect and cowardly, responsible for
incalculable disasters. And on seeing her thus, in that glory, amid her
vigorous children, like the good goddess of Fruitfulness, Mathieu felt
that he adored her. Divine passion swept by--the glow which makes the
fields palpitate, which rolls on through the waters, and floats in the
wind, begetting millions and millions of existences. And 'twas delightful
the ecstasy into which they both sank, forgetfulness of all else, of all
those others who were there. They saw them no longer; they felt but one
desire, to say that they loved each other, and that the season had come
when love blossoms afresh. His lips protruded, she offered hers, and then
they kissed.
"Oh! don't disturb yourselves!" cried Beauchene merrily. "Why, what is
the matter with you?"
"Would you like us to move away?" added Seguin.
But while Valentine laughed wildly, and Constance put on a prudish air,
Morange, in whose voice tears were again rising, spoke these words,
fraught with supreme regret: "Ah! you are right!"
Astonished at what they had done, without intention of doing it, Mathieu
and Marianne remained for a moment speechless, looking at one another in
consternation. And then they burst into a hearty laugh, gayly excusing
themselves. To love! to love! to be able to love! Therein lies all
health, all will, and all power.
XII
FOUR years went by. And during those four years Mathieu and Marianne had
two more children, a daughter at the end of the first year and a son at
the expiration of the third. And each time that the family thus
increased, the estate at Chantebled was increased also--on the first
occasion by fifty more acres of rich soil reclaimed among the marshes of
the plateau, and the second time by an extensive expanse of wood and
moorland which the springs were beginning to fertilize. It was the
resistless conquest of life, it was fruitfulness spreading in the
sunlight, it was labor ever incessantly pursuing its work of creation
amid obstacles and suffering, making good all losses, and at each
succeeding hour setting more energy, more health, and more joy in the
veins of the world.
On the day when Mathieu called on Seguin to purchase the wood and
moorland, he lunched with Dr. Boutan, whom he found in an execrable
humor. The doctor had just heard that three of his former patients had
lately passed through the hands of his colleague Gaude, the notorious
surgeon to whose clinic at the Marbeuf Hospital society Paris flocked as
to a theatre. One of these patients was none other than Euphrasie, old
Moineaud's eldest daughter, now married to Auguste Benard, a mason, and
already the mother of three children. She had doubtless resumed her usual
avocations too soon after the birth of her last child, as often happens
in working-class families where the mother is unable to remain idle. At
all events, she had for some time been ailing, and had finally been
removed to the hospital. Mathieu had for a while employed her young
sister Cecile, now seventeen, as a servant in the house at Chantebled,
but she was of poor health and had returned to Paris, where, curiously
enough, she also entered Doctor Gaude's clinic. And Boutan waxed
indignant at the methods which Gaude employed. The two sisters, the
married woman and the girl, had been discharged as cured, and so far,
this might seem to be the case; but time, in Boutan's opinion, would
bring round some terrible revenges.
One curious point of the affair was that Beauchene's dissolute sister,
Seraphine, having heard of these so-called cures, which the newspapers
had widely extolled, had actually sought out the Benards and the
Moineauds to interview Euphrasie and Cecile on the subject. And in the
result she likewise had placed herself in Gaude's hands. She certainly
was of little account, and, whatever might become of her, the world would
be none the poorer by her death. But Boutan pointed out that during the
fifteen years that Gaude's theories and practices had prevailed in
France, no fewer than half a million women had been treated accordingly,
and, in the vast majority of cases, without any such treatment being
really necessary. Moreover, Boutan spoke feelingly of the after results
of such treatment--comparative health for a few brief years, followed in
some cases by a total loss of muscular energy, and in others by insanity
of a most violent form; so that the padded cells of the madhouses were
filling year by year with the unhappy women who had passed through the
hands of Gaude and his colleagues. From a social point of view also the
effects were disastrous. They ran counter to all Boutan's own theories,
and blasted all his hopes of living to see France again holding a
foremost place among the nations of the earth.
"Ah!" said he to Mathieu, "if people were only like you and your good
wife!"
During those four years at Chantebled the Froments had been ever
founding, creating, increasing, and multiplying, again and again proving
victorious in the eternal battle which life wages against death, thanks
to that continual increase both of offspring and of fertile land which
was like their very existence, their joy and their strength. Desire
passed like a gust of flame--desire divine and fruitful, since they
possessed the power of love, kindliness, and health. And their energy did
the rest--that will of action, that quiet bravery in the presence of the
labor that is necessary, the labor that has made and that regulates the
earth. But during the first two years they had to struggle incessantly.
There were two disastrous winters with snow and ice, and March brought
hail-storms and hurricanes which left the crops lying low. Even as
Lepailleur had threateningly predicted with a laugh of impotent envy, it
seemed as if the earth meant to prove a bad mother, ungrateful to them
for their toil, indifferent to their losses. During those two years they
only extricated themselves from trouble thanks to the second fifty acres
that they purchased from Seguin, to the west of the plateau, a fresh
expanse of rich soil which they reclaimed amid the marshes, and which, in
spite of frost and hail, yielded a prodigious first harvest. As the
estate gradually expanded, it also grew stronger, better able to bear
ill-luck.
But Mathieu and Marianne also had great family worries. Their five elder
children gave them much anxiety, much fatigue. As with the soil, here
again there was a daily battle, endless cares and endless fears. Little
Gervais was stricken with fever and narrowly escaped death. Rose, too,
one day filled them with the direst alarm, for she fell from a tree in
their presence, but fortunately with no worse injury than a sprain. And,
on the other hand, they were happy in the three others, Blaise, Denis,
and Ambroise, who proved as healthy as young oak-trees. And when Marianne
gave birth to her sixth child, on whom they bestowed the gay name of
Claire, Mathieu celebrated the new pledge of their affection by further
acquisitions.