Country life -- Fiction; France -- Fiction; Love stories
So, after spending three or four days in fluttering with this
tranquil trio round the lodges and sitting with them in various
places in the woods, and having convinced myself that Brulette was
quite as safe in this country as in our own, I looked about me for
something to do, and finally asked the Head-Woodsman to allow me to
help him. He received my request very kindly, and I began to get
much amusement out of his company, when, unfortunately, I told him I
did not want to be paid, and was chopping wood only to get rid of the
time; on which his kind heart no longer compelled him to excuse my
blunders, and he began to let me see that there never was a more
exacting man than he in the matter of work. As his trade was not
mine and I did not even know how to use his tools, I provoked him by
my awkwardness, and I soon saw that he could scarcely restrain
himself from calling me a blockhead and imbecile; for his eyes
actually started from his head and the sweat rolled down his face.
Not wishing to quarrel with a man who was so kind and agreeable in
other ways, I found employment with the sawyers, and they were
satisfied with me. But dear me! I soon learned what a dull thing
work is when it is nothing but an exercise for the body, and is not
joined to the idea of profit for one's self or others.
Brulette said to me on the fourth day, "Tiennet, I see you are very
dull, and I don't deny that I am, too; but to-morrow is Sunday, and
we must invent some kind of amusement. I know that the foresters
meet in a pretty place, where the Head-Woodsman plays for them to
dance. Well, let us buy some wine and provisions and give them a
better Sunday than usual, and so do honor to our own country among
these strangers."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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