THE PETS OF AURORE DUPIN
During the years in which Napoleon and his armies were fighting in Spain, in Germany, and in Russia, a little girl might be seen running wild in the province of Berry, which is almost in the very centre of France. In those days if you had asked her name she would have answered that it was 'Aurore Dupin'; but by and bye she took another, which by her books she made famous—nearly as famous, indeed, in its own way as that of her great ancestor, the general Count Maurice de Saxe.
But it is not the celebrated writer who called herself 'George Sand' with whom we have to do now, but the child Aurore Dupin, and her friends the birds and beasts, dwellers like herself in the bare and desolate plains that surrounded her grandmother's château of Nohant. Maurice Dupin, father of Aurore, was a soldier like his grandfather, Maurice de Saxe; but her mother was the daughter of a bird-seller, who, curiously enough, lived in the 'Street of the Birds' (Quai des Oiseaux) in Paris. To this fact Aurore always declared that she owed her powers of fascination over the chaffinches, robins, or starlings that would sit on her shoulders or perch on her hands as she walked with her mother in the garden. And far from being frightened at the presence of a grown-up person, the birds often seemed to prefer Madame Maurice Dupin to Aurore herself.
Aurore became very learned about birds and their ways, considering them far cleverer than men or animals, and endowed with finer qualities than either. Warblers she held superior to any other small bird, and says that at fifteen days a warbler is as old in the feathered world as a child of ten is in that which speaks instead of chirping. When she was a little girl at Nohant, she brought up by hand two baby warblers of different sorts and different nests.
The one with a yellow breast she named Jonquil; while the other, who had a grey waistcoat, was called Agatha. Jonquil was as much as a fortnight older than Agatha, and when under the care of Aurore she was a slim, gentle young creature, inclined to be thin, and with scarcely enough feathers to cover her skin, and not yet able to fly with certainty from one branch to another, or even to feed herself. This Aurore knew was her own fault, because if Jonquil had remained at home she would have learned these things far earlier, for bird-mothers are much better teachers than our mothers, and insist that their children shall find out how to get on by themselves.
Agatha was a most tiresome child. She would never be quiet for a moment, but was always hopping about, crying out and tormenting Jonquil, who was beginning to wonder at all she saw around her, and would sit thinking with one claw drawn up under her wing, her eyes half shut, and her head sunk between her shoulders. But Agatha, who never thought at all, did not see why anybody else should do so either, and would peck at Jonquil's legs and wings in order to attract attention, unless Aurore happened to be in the room and glance at her. Then Agatha would dance up and down the branch uttering plaintive cries, till some bread or biscuit was given to her. For Agatha was always hungry, or always greedy; you did not quite know which.
One morning Aurore was absorbed in writing a story, and her two little friends were seated on a green branch some distance away. It was rather cold, and Agatha, whose feathers still only half covered her, was cuddling for warmth against Jonquil. They had actually been quiet for half an hour—a very rare occurrence—but at length they made up their minds it must be time for dinner, and if Aurore did not know it, she must be told.
So Jonquil hopped on to the back of a chair and from that to the table, and finally planted her claws upon the writing paper, making a great mess of the words; while Agatha, who was afraid to leave the branch by herself, flapped her wings and opened her beak, screaming with hunger.
Aurore was just in the middle of the great scene in her story, where the hero and heroine had found out the wicked uncle, and fond though she was of Jonquil, she felt for the first time very much provoked by her behaviour. She pointed out to her that by now she really was old enough to feed herself, and that close by was an excellent pasty in a pretty saucer, only she was too lazy to eat it, and expected her mistress to put it in her mouth. Jonquil was not accustomed to be scolded, and did not like it, and to show her displeasure hopped sulkily back to her branch. Agatha, however, had no mind to go without her dinner, and, turning to Jonquil, insisted that she should return at once and help her to that delicious dish. And she was so eloquent in her pleading that Jonquil seemed really moved, though she hesitated as to whether she should do as Agatha desired, or if she should keep her dignity and remain on her branch.
Of course, Aurore pretended to see nothing of all this, although in reality she was watching eagerly under her eyelids how it would end.