me my earth. I feel that I am not at home here. Give back to
me my furrows full of mud, give back to me my clayey paths. Give back
to me my native valley where the horns of the hunters make the mists
stir. Give back to me the wagon-track on the roadway from which I
heard sound the packs of hounds with their hanging ears, like an
angelus. Give back to me my timidity. Give back to me my fright. Give
back to me the agitation that I felt when suddenly a shot swept the
fragrant mint beneath my bounds, or when amid the bushes of wild
quince my nose touched the cold copper of a snare. Give back to me the
dawn upon the waters from which the skillful fisherman withdraws his
lines heavy with eels. Give back to me the blue gleaning under the
moon, and my timid and clandestine loves amid the wild sorrel, where
I could no longer distinguish the rosy tongue of my beloved from the
dew-laden petal of the eglantine which had fallen upon the grass. Give
back to me my weakness, oh thou, my dear heart. And go, and say unto
God, that I can no longer live with Him."

"Oh Rabbit," Francis answered, "my friend, gentle and suspicious like
a peasant, Oh Rabbit of little faith, you blaspheme. If you have not
known how to find your God it is because in order to find this God,
you would have had to die like your companions."

"But if I die, what will become of me?" cried he with the hide of the
color of stubble.

And Francis said:

"If you die you will become your Paradise."

* * * * *

Thus talking they reached the edge of the Paradise of beasts. There
the Paradise of men began. Rabbit turned his head, and read at the top
of a sign-post on a plate of blue cast-iron where an arrow indicated
the direction

Castetis to Balansun--5 M.

The day was so hot that the letters of the inscription seemed to
quiver in the dull light of summer. In the distance, on the road,
there were clouds of dust, as in Blue Beard when Sister Anne is asked:
"Sister Anne, Sister Anne, do you see anything coming?" This pale
dryness, how magnificent it was, and how filled it was with the bitter
fragrance of mint.

And Rabbit saw a horse and a covered cart approaching.

It was a sorry nag and dragged a two-wheeled cart and was unable to
move except in a jerky sort of gallop. Every leap made its disjointed
skeleton quiver and jolted its harness and made its earth-colored
mane fly in the air, shiny and greenish, like the beard of an anci