For most Parisians, this fruit, gathered far away, and unremarkably round, with just a clipping of greenery from the tree, reminds them of sweets and desserts. The tissue they're wrapped in, and the parties at which they make their appearance, add to this impression. Come January, thousands of oranges are on the streets and their discarded skins are in the muddy gutters everywhere, looking as though some giant Christmas tree had shaken its branches of artificial fruit all over Paris. There's just about nowhere free of oranges; they are in the carefully arranged shop windows, sorted and prepared; outside prison and hospital gates, among the packets of biscuits and the stacks of apples, and in front of entrances to dances and Sunday street shows. Their exquisite perfume mixes variously with the smell of gas, the noise of old violins, and the dust in the gods at the theatre. It's easy to forget that it takes orange trees to make oranges, for when the fruit arrives from the Midi, by their thousands of boxfuls, the tree itself, pruned and unrecognisable, is hidden in a warm greenhouse for the winter and makes only a brief summer appearance in public gardens in Paris. To really appreciate oranges, you have to see them in their natural setting; in the Balearics, Sardinia, Corsica, and Algeria; in the sunny blue skies of the warm Mediterranean. I can recall with great pleasure a small orchard of orange trees, at the gates of Blidah, just such a place where their true beauty could be seen! Amongst the dark, glossy, lustred leaves, the fruits had the brilliance of stained glass windows and perfumed the air all around with the same magnificent aura that usually envelops gorgeous flowers. Here and there, gaps in the branches revealed the ramparts of the little town, the minaret of a mosque, the dome of a marabout, and, towering above, the immense Atlas mountains, green at the base, and snow-capped, with drifts of snow here and there. One night during my stay, a strange phenomenon, not seen for thirty years, occurred; the ice from the freezing zone descended onto the sleeping village, and Blidah woke up transformed, and powdered in white snow. In the light, pure Algerian air, the snow looked like the finest dusting of mother of pearl, and had the lustre of a white peacock's feather. But it was the orange orchard that was the most beautiful thing to be seen. The firm leaves kept the snow intact and upright like sorbets on a lacquered plate, and all the fruits, powdered over with frost, had a wonderful mellowness, a discrete radiance like silk-draped gold. It was all vaguely evocative of a church saint's day; the red cassocks under the lacy robes, and the gilt on a lace altar cloth....