One of the last days of September the rain had fallen all day in torrents, but finally, having ceased, left the sky so enveloped in fog that, though scarcely four o'clock, night seemed already to have overspread the earth.
A heavy diligence, with its relay of horses, ascended with difficulty one of the hills which separate Belleville from Lyons, while the postilions walked on each side of the team, pausing about every fifty steps to breathe and recover themselves. The wearied passengers had descended by invitation of the conductor, and were trudging along in no amiable mood, scolding the horses, the rain, and the miserable roads. Two of them, who came last, stopped suddenly at the turning of the ascent One was a man nearly fifty years old, with a mild and smiling countenance; but the other, much younger, had an air of gloom and dissatisfaction. Throwing his eyes over the surrounding country, half enveloped in fog, he said to his companion:
"What weather and what a year, Cousin Grugel! The Saône has hardly entered its bed, and the valleys are again inundated."
"God preserve us, Gontran!" replied the man with the mild countenance; "the rainbow can appear any moment above the deluge."
"Yes," replied the other traveller, with slight irony; "I know your mania of hope, Jacques."
"And I yours of discouragement, Darvon."
"Well, I am right when I examine how this world goes. Where do you see peace, order, or prosperity? I only hear of incendiaries, contagion, deluge, and murder. What man's wickedness spares, the wickedness of nature annihilates, for even brute matter seems to possess the instinct of destruction; and the elements, like kings, cannot remain neighbors without warring against each other."
"That is only one side of things, my cousin—the sad side; but of the other you never speak. Your eyes are riveted on the volcano which dims the horizon, but you cannot lower them to the fields of ripe corn undulating at your feet. There is happiness in the world, if you can make up your mind to believe it."
"Well, I know nothing of it," replied Darvon, in a tone of vexation.
"But, yourself considered, may you not be placed among the most favored?"