"And La Roche-Noire, where is that?"
"You mean La Roche-Blanche, I suppose, don’t you?—That’s that little village over there."
"I am not talking about your Roche-Blanche!—What astonishing creatures these Auvergnats are! they absolutely insist that black and white (noir and blanc) are the same thing!"
"Dame! then I don’t know, monsieur."
"And in this direction, my good man?"
"That’s the village of Chanonat, monsieur."
"Chanonat!" cried Edouard; "where Delille was born?"
"Delille?" replied the peasant; "as to that, I can’t say, monsieur. What did this Delille do? Wasn’t he a vine-dresser? Didn’t he make wine?"
"No, my good man; he made something better than wine; he was a poet! But he loved the fields; and, like another Virgil, he sang the praises of agriculture in his noble verses!"
"I never knew him, monsieur."