the captain lent him. The
island wood of which it was made must have been stout for it withstood
the games of a little boy. The piece of furniture had drifted into my
home, and slept there almost forgotten. Its soul too had been asleep
for many long years, because the child who had cherished it was no
more, and no other children had come to perch upon it like birds.

But recently the house was made merry by my little niece who was just
_seven_. On my work-table she had found an old book with plates of
flowers. When I entered the room I found her sitting on the little
chair in the lamplight, looking at the charming pictures, just as once
a long time ago her grandfather had done. And I was deeply touched.
And I said to myself that this little girl alone had been able to
make live again the soul of the chair, and that the gentle soul of the
chair had bewitched the candor of the child. There was between her and
this object a mysterious affinity. The one could not help but go to
the other, and it could be awakened by her alone.

Things are gentle. They never do harm voluntarily. They are the
sisters of the spirits. They protect us, and we let our thoughts rest
upon them. Our thoughts need them for resting-places as perfumes need
the flowers.

The prisoner, whom no human soul can any longer console, must feel
tenderly toward his pallet and his earthen jug. When everything has
been refused him by his fellows his obscure bed gives him sleep and
his jug quenches his thirst. And even if it separates him from all the
world without, the very barrenness of his walls stands between him and
his executioners. The child who has been punished loves the pillow on
which he cries; for when every one of an evening has hurt and scolded
him, he finds consolation in the soul of the silent down. It is like a
friend who remains silent in order to calm a friend.

But it is not only out of the silence of things that is born their
sympathy for us. They have secret harmonies. Sometimes they weep in
the forest which Rene fills with his tempestuous soul; and sometimes
they sing on the lake where another poet dreams.

* * * * *

There are hours and seasons when certain of these accords are most to
the fore, when one hears best the thousand voices of things. Two or
three times in my life I have been present at the awakening of this
mysterious world. At the end of August toward midnight, when the day
has been hot, an