“And now,” he asked, “could you tell me, sir, where I will find the carriage?”
“The train, you mean.”
“I don’t know. Is that the name of the vehicle that is to transport me to Paris?” asked Eusebe, timidly.
“Vehicle!” cried the man. “What do you call a vehicle? Your jesting is ill timed, sir. Here is your car: another time try to be a little more polite.”
“This man,” said Eusebe to himself, “is not so clever, after all: he is a fool,—an ignoramus!”
Eusebe’s journey was without incident. Alone in a first-class coupé, he made himself a couch, on the floor, of the cushions, and, placing his valise under his head for a pillow, he slept quietly until daylight.
When he awoke, he had passed Orleans. His eyes, half open, glanced at the country, and a cry of admiration escaped him.
“Oh, what splendid farms! what beautiful fields!” cried he: “how admirably the land is cultivated! what care, what labor, is bestowed on it! My father was right: civilization has not penetrated into the departments of the interior. Fifteen hours ago, I left the Capelette. What a difference! Why is the soil so fertile here and so sterile with us? The soil is the same, but the cultivation is not. Here there are no immense forests, no uncultivated fields: the country is as populous as our cities. Laborers abound, and agricultural implements are brought to the highest state of perfection. What abundance! what riches! Everybody seems to be happy and contented. How beautiful and grand all this is!”
At the moment he made these reflections, the train began to slacken its speed. They approached a station. Eusebe watched attentively the groups of people who were waiting behind a barrier for the train to pass, in order that they might, in their turn, pass also. The noise of the locomotive frightened a cart-horse tied to a post near by. The poor animal, trembling with fear, snorted and reared up on his hind legs, when a man, armed with a whip, came out of an inn and began to strike the beast with all his might. The more he struck, the more the horse reared and pranced. Finally, breaking his halter, the animal sprang furiously against the barrier, which he struck with his head and fell dead. The man cursed like a carter, which he was.
“Surely,” said Eusebe to himself, “this is a very bad business. The fault is the man’s, and not the beast’s. If the man had not left the horse, the horse would not have been frightened. If the horse had not been frightened, the man would not have struck him; and if the man had not struck the horse, the animal would not be dead. This man is perhaps a savage, recently arrived among civilized people. That, however, I think scarcely probable, since he speaks with tolerable correctness. Is my father right in saying that extremes touch, and that the last word of civilization is perhaps the first of barbarism?”