The fourth canto summed up the whole, and concluded with these daring
words,--not published, be it remarked, from 1810 to 1814; in fact, they
did not see the light till 1824, after Napoleon's death.

'Twas thus that I sang in the time of alarms.
Oh, if kings would consent to bear no other arms,
And people enjoyed what was best for them all,
The sweet little game of the Cup and the Ball,
Our Burgundy then might be free of all fear,
And return to the good days of Saturn and Rhea.

These fine verses were published in a first and only edition from the
press of Bournier, printer of Ville-aux-Fayes. One hundred subscribers,
in the sum of three francs, guaranteed the dangerous precedent of
immortality to the poem,--a liberality that was all the greater because
these hundred persons had heard the poem from beginning to end a hundred
times over.

Madame Soudry had lately suppressed the cup-and-ball, which usually lay
on a pier-table in the salon and for the last seven years had given rise
to endless quotations, for she finally discovered in the toy a rival to
her own attractions.

As to the author, who boasted of future poems in his desk, it is enough
to quote the terms in which he mentioned to the leading society of
Soulanges a rival candidate for literary honors.

"Have you heard a curious piece of news?" he had said, two years
earlier. "There is another poet in Burgundy! Yes," he added, remarking
the astonishment on all faces, "he comes from Macon. But you could
never imagine the subjects he takes up,--a perfect jumble, absolutely
unintelligible,--lakes, stars, waves, billows! not a single
philosophical image, not even a didactic effort! he is ignorant of the
very meaning of poetry. He calls the sky by its name. He says 'moon,'
bluntly, instead of naming it 'the planet of night.' That's what the
desire to be thought original brings men to," added Gourdon, mournfully.
"Poor young man! A Burgundian, and sing such stuff as that!--the pity
of it! If he had only consulted me, I would have pointed out to him the
noblest of all themes, wine,--a poem to be called the Baccheide; for
which, alas! I now feel myself too old."

This great poet is still ignorant of his finest triumph (though he owes
it to the fact of being a Burgundian), namely, that of living in the
town of Soulanges, so rounded and perfected within itself that it knows
nothing of the modern Pleiades, not even their names.

A hundred Gourdons made