And shall to all eternity endure.


* There is a village called Paradou in Provence, between
Les Baux and Arles.

And if we pass to the young pair whose duo of love is sung amidst the
varied voices of creation, we are irresistibly reminded of the Paul and
Virginia of St. Pierre, and the Daphnis and Chloe of Longus. Beside
them, in their marvellous garden, lingers a memory too of Manon and Des
Grieux, with a suggestion of Lauzun and a glimpse of the art of
Fragonard. All combine, all contribute--from the great classics to the
eighteenth century _petits maitres_--to build up a story of love's rise
in the human breast in answer to Nature's promptings.

M. Zola wrote 'La Faute de l'Abbe Mouret' one summer under the trees of
his garden, mindful the while of gardens that he had known in childhood:
the flowery expanse which had stretched before his grandmother's home at
Pont-au-Beraud and the wild estate of Galice, between Roquefavour and
Aix-en-Provence, through which he had roamed as a lad with friends then
boys like himself: Professor Baille and Cezanne, the painter. And into
his description of the wondrous Paradou he has put all his remembrance
of the gardens and woods of Provence, where many a plant and flower
thrive with a luxuriance unknown to England. True, in order to refresh
his memory and avoid mistakes, he consulted various horticultural
manuals whilst he was writing; of which circumstance captious critics
have readily laid hold, to proclaim that the description of the Paradou
is a mere florist's catalogue.

But it is nothing of the kind. The florist who might dare to offer such