asoline? Why
should one have to keep one's eyes wandering from far ahead to back over
one's shoulder for fifty-two weeks in the year? We wanted to get away
from clang-clang and honk-honk and puff-puff. Since the real vacation is
change, we welcomed the task of looking out for hostile dogs instead of
swiftly moving vehicles. Our noses wanted whiffs of hay and pig, and our
boots wanted unadulterated mud.

We were not allowed to have our way without a warning. There always is
someone to keep you in the straight and narrow path. As we were turning
into the low road a passer-by remonstrated.

"If you're going to Saint-Paul-du-Var," he explained, "you want to keep
to the high road. It's very muddy down there, and will take you longer."

When our adviser saw that we did not stop, he raised his voice and
called, "There are no signposts and you may get lost."

"You take the high road and we'll take the low," sang back the Artist.

He who had meant well disappeared, shaking his head. No doubt, as he
shuffled along, he was muttering to himself over the inexplicable actions
of _ces droles d'Anglais_.

The miles passed coolly and pleasantly. Trees and bushes did not allow
many glimpses of the outside world. The dogs that barked were behind
farmhouse gates, and we had use for our stones only at an occasional
jackrabbit. "At" is a convenient preposition. It gives one latitude.
Jackrabbits on the Riviera are not like human products of the south.
They jump quickly. They jump, too, in directions that cannot be
foretold. After one particularly bad throw, the Artist explained that he
did not enjoy inflicting pain. His boyish instincts had long ago been
controlled by reading S. P. C. A. literature. I told him that I thought
he had given up baseball too early in life. So had I. The jackrabbits
escaped.

I am rarely oblivious to the duty of the noon hour. Although I knew the
Artist's habit of stopping suddenly, and the hopelessness of budging him
by plea or argument as long as the reason for stopping remained, it had
not occurred to me that there would be a risk in taking the low road. We
had started in plenty of time, and as we were out for a medieval town, I
thought he would not be tempted until we reached the vicinity of a
restaurant. But about a mile below Saint-Paul-du-Var the low road
brought us to a view of the city that would have held me at any other
time than twelve noon. I tried the old expedient of wal