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HIS FRONTIERS
The gamin loves the city, he also loves solitude, since he
has something of the sage in him.
Urbis amator, like Fuscus; ruris amator, like Flaccus.
To roam thoughtfully about, that is to say, to lounge, is
a fine employment of time in the eyes of the philosopher; particularly
in that rather illegitimate species of campaign, which is tolerably
ugly but odd and composed of two natures, which surrounds certain
great cities, notably Paris.
To study the suburbs is to study the amphibious animal.
End of the trees, beginning of the roofs; end of the grass,
beginning of the pavements; end of the furrows, beginning of the
shops, end of the wheel-ruts, beginning of the passions; end of
the divine murmur, beginning of the human uproar; hence an extraordinary
interest.
Hence, in these not very attractive places, indelibly stamped
by the passing stroller with the epithet:
melancholy, the apparently objectless promenades of the dreamer.
He who writes these lines has long been a prowler about the
barriers of Paris, and it is for him a source of profound souvenirs.
That close-shaven turf, those pebbly paths, that chalk, those
pools, those harsh monotonies of waste and fallow lands, the plants
of early market-garden suddenly springing into sight in a bottom,
that mixture of the savage and the citizen, those vast desert
nooks where the garrison drums practise noisily, and produce a
sort of lisping of battle, those hermits by day and cut-throats
by night, that clumsy mill which turns in the wind, the hoisting-wheels
of the quarries, the tea-gardens at the corners of the cemeteries;
the mysterious charm of great, sombre walls squarely intersecting
immense, vague stretches of land inundated with sunshine and full
of butterflies,--all this attracted him.
There is hardly any one on earth who is not acquainted with
those singular spots, the Glaciere, the Cunette, the hideous wall
of Grenelle all speckled with balls, Mont-Parnasse, the Fosse-aux-Loups,
Aubiers on the bank of the Marne, Mont-Souris, the Tombe-Issoire,
the Pierre-Plate de Chatillon, where there is an old, exhausted
quarry which no longer serves any purpose except to raise mushrooms,
and which is closed, on a level with the ground, by a trap-door
of rotten planks. The campagna of Rome is one idea, the banlieue
of Paris is another; to behold nothing but fields, houses, or
trees in what a stretch of country offers us, is to remain on
the surface; all aspects of things are thoughts of God.
The spot where a plain effects its junction with a city is
always stamped with a certain piercing melancholy. Nature and
humanity both appeal to you at the same time there. Local originalities
there make their appearance.
Any one who, like ourselves, has wandered about in these solitudes
contiguous to our faubourgs, which may be designated as the limbos
of Paris, has seen here and there, in the most desert spot, at
the most unexpected moment, behind a meagre hedge, or in the corner
of a lugubrious wall, children grouped tumultuously, fetid, muddy,
dusty, ragged, dishevelled, playing hide-and-seek, and crowned
with corn-flowers. All of them are little ones who have made their
escape from poor families.
The outer boulevard is their breathing space; the suburbs
belong to them.
There they are eternally playing truant. There they innocently
sing their repertory of dirty songs. There they are, or rather,
there they exist, far from every eye, in the sweet light of May
or June, kneeling round a hole in the ground, snapping marbles
with their thumbs, quarrelling over half-farthings, irresponsible,
volatile, free and happy; and, no sooner do they catch sight of
you than they recollect that they have an industry, and that they
must earn their living, and they offer to sell you an old woollen
stocking filled with cockchafers, or a bunch of lilacs. These
encounters with strange children are one of the charming and at
the same time poignant graces of the environs of Paris.
Sometimes there are little girls among the throng of boys,--
are they their sisters?--who are almost young maidens, thin, feverish,
with sunburnt hands, covered with freckles, crowned with poppies
and ears of rye, gay, haggard, barefooted.
They can be seen devouring cherries among the wheat.
In the evening they can be heard laughing. These groups, warmly
illuminated by the full glow of midday, or indistinctly seen in
the twilight, occupy the thoughtful man for a very long time,
and these visions mingle with his dreams.
Paris, centre, banlieue, circumference; this constitutes all
the earth to those children.
They never venture beyond this. They can no more escape from
the Parisian atmosphere than fish can escape from the water.
For them, nothing exists two leagues beyond the barriers:
Ivry, Gentilly, Arcueil, Belleville, Aubervilliers, Menilmontant,
Choisy-le-Roi, Billancourt, Mendon, Issy, Vanvre, Sevres, Puteaux,
Neuilly, Gennevilliers, Colombes, Romainville, Chatou, Asnieres,
Bougival, Nanterre, Enghien, Noisy-le-Sec, Nogent, Gournay, Drancy,
Gonesse; the universe ends there.
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