“After the sacrifice, during which nothing was wanting to me but the daughter of Lopez, we went to the village. The most touching mixture of social and natural life reigned there. By the side of a cypress-wood of the ancient desert was a nascent vegetation; ears of corn rolled like gold about the trunk of a fallen oak, and summer sheaves replaced the tree of three centuries. On all sides forests given up to the flames were sending up their smoke into the air, and the plough was being pushed slowly through the remains of their roots. Surveyors with long chains went to measure the ground; arbitrators marked out the first properties; the bird gave up its nest; the den of the wild beast was converted into a cabin; forges were heard to roar, and the blows of the axe caused the echoes to resound for the last time as they expired with the trees which had served them for a refuse.
“I wandered with delight in the midst of these scenes, rendered still more enchanting by the image of Atala and by the dreams of felicity with which I was feeding my heart. I admired the triumph of Christianity over savage life. I saw the Indian becoming civilized by the voice of religion; I assisted at the primitive union of man and the earth—man, by this great contract, abandoning to the earth the inheritance of his labors; and the earth undertaking in return to bear faithfully the harvests, the sons, and the ashes of man.
“During this time a child was presented to the missionary, who baptized it among the flowering jessamine on the border of a spring, whilst a coffin, in the midst of these joys and labors, was being carried to the Groves of Death. Two spouses received the nuptial benediction beneath an oak, and we afterwards went to install them in a corner of the desert. The pastor walked in front of us, blessing here and there a rock, a tree or a fountain, as of old, according to the book of the Christians, God blessed the untilled land when He gave it to Adam for an inheritance. This procession, which, with the flocks, was following its venerable chief from rock to rock, represented to my affected heart the migrations of the first families, when Shem, with his children, advanced into an unknown world, following the sun as his guide.
“I desired to know from the hermit how he governed his flock. With great patience he replied to me, ‘I have laid down no law for them; I have merely taught them to love one another, to pray to God, and to hope for a better life. All the laws in the world are comprised therein. Towards the middle of the village you may perceive a cabin somewhat larger than the rest. It serves as a chapel during the rainy season. My children assemble there morning and evening to praise the Lord, and when I am absent an old man offers up the prayers; for old age, like maternity, is a sort of priesthood. The people afterwards go to work in the fields; and although the properties are divided, in order that each may learn something of social economy, the harvests are deposited in the same storehouse, out of a spirit of brotherly charity. Four old men are charged with the equal distribution of the produce of the general labors. Add to all that our religious ceremonies, plenty of hymns, the cross where I celebrate the mysteries, the elm-tree beneath which I preach in fine weather, our tombs near our corn-fields, our rivers into which I plunge the little children, and the Saint Johns of this new Bethany, and you will have a complete idea of this kingdom of Jesus Christ.’
“The language of the hermit delighted me, and I felt the superiority of this stable and busy life over the wandering and idle existence of the savage.
“Ah, René! I do not repine against Providence, yet I confess I never think of that evangelical society without experiencing bitter regret. How a hut, with Atala, in that neighborhood, would have rendered my life happy! There all my wanderings would have ceased; there, with a spouse, ignored by men and concealing my happiness in the depths of the forest, my days would have flown by like those rivers which have not even a name in the desert. Instead of the peace I was then bold enough to promise myself, amidst what troubles have my years been cast! The constant plaything of fortune, wrecked upon every shore, long an exile from my country, and on my return thither finding only a ruined cabin and friends in the tomb—such was to be the destiny of Chactas.
