stir my blood, but I want to see a London policeman.
Take, oh, take me to see a London policeman."

He stood quite dark and still against the end of the sunset,
and I could not tell whether he understood or not. I got back
into his carriage.

"You will understand," I said, "if ever you are an exile even
for pleasure. The child to his mother, the man to his country,
as a countryman of yours once said. But since, perhaps, it is
rather too long a drive to the English end of the world,
we may as well drive back to Besancon."

Only as the stars came out among those immortal hills I wept
for Walham Green.


IX

In the Place de La Bastille

On the first of May I was sitting outside a cafe in the Place de
la Bastille in Paris staring at the exultant column, crowned with
a capering figure, which stands in the place where the people
destroyed a prison and ended an age. The thing is a curious
example of how symbolic is the great part of human history.
As a matter of mere material fact, the Bastille when it was taken
was not a horrible prison; it was hardly a prison at all.
But it was a symbol, and the people always go by a sure
instinct for symbols; for the Chinaman, for instance,