“They are given me by one and another. The butcher, the grocer, the cabinetmaker, these are very kind to me.”
“Are you happy all alone so?”
“I am not all alone. I have my dogs. The only thing I lack is my eyesight. But I thank Providence every day for keeping me in good health.”
It was in consequence of a malignant fever that he had lost his eyesight, for unlike my blind man at Passy, this man was not born blind. Formerly he had been able to admire nature, to see pretty girls in a country flooded with sunlight, to enjoy with his own eyes the smile in other eyes, in eyes tender and well loved. In short he had seen. What sadness his must be, to be unable to see again!
With much diplomacy I asked him about this.
He had far less difficulty in answering me.
“I used to admire many pretty things,” he said. “I still have them carefully enclosed under my eyelids. I see them again whenever I wish, just as if they were there before me once again. And so, you see, as these are things of my youth it seems to me that, in spite of everything, in spite of being such an old hulk as I am, I have remained young. And I thank the dear Lord for having been kind enough not to have made me blind from birth.”
“And how old are you?”
“Eighty years, madam.”
This old man had a long walk before him to get back to his residence. As I commiserated him regarding this, he replied: