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When Harold turned the corner under the shadow of the oaks he saw a belated road-mender, surrounded by some gaping peasants, pointing excitedly in the distance. The man, who of course knew him, called to him to stop. 'What is it? he asked, reining up. 'It be Squire Rowly's bays which have run away with him. Three on 'em, all in a row and comin' like the wind.
Never yet has it entered the heads of its proprietors to join it permanently to the mainland. For three centuries its visitors and people have driven or walked over a tide-washed causeway at low water, or ferried over at high tide. You do so still, in a scrubbed and salty boat, while an ancient road-mender is occupied in the oddest of all forms of road maintenance.
Phosphate then lost its charm upon the proprietor of the donkey-cart, for it had caused him to 'eat all his economies, and he resigned himself to the wages of a road-mender, which were small but sure. It was getting dusk when we parted.
One afternoon, in Rome, on the way back from the Aventine, the road-mender climbed onto the tram as it trotted slowly along, and fastened to its front, alongside of the place of the driver, a bough of budding bay. Might one not search long for a better symbol of what we may all do by our life?
"Are you going to Arras?" added the road-mender. "Yes." "If you go on at that rate you will not arrive very early." He stopped his horse, and asked the laborer: "How far is it from here to Arras?" "Nearly seven good leagues." "How is that? the posting guide only says five leagues and a quarter." "Ah!" returned the road-mender, "so you don't know that the road is under repair?
That evening, when he startled me, he had been telling of his day's work as a road-mender, and he was mightily philosophical over the prospect of having to give up even that last form of regular employment, because of the exposure and the miles of walking which it entailed. Nobody could have thought him a vindictive or even a discontented man so far.
Some time after the events which we have just recorded, Sieur Boulatruelle experienced a lively emotion. Sieur Boulatruelle was that road-mender of Montfermeil whom the reader has already seen in the gloomy parts of this book. Boulatruelle, as the reader may, perchance, recall, was a man who was occupied with divers and troublesome matters. He broke stones and damaged travellers on the highway.
I mean this, that every man's work is entitled to consideration and respect, in every phase of life. The road-mender works well and makes a smooth way for men and horses; he deserves my honour for his skill, he has it, he shall have it, for I know he can teach me many things of which I am ignorant.
"And, besides, it is all cross-roads; stop! sir," resumed the road-mender; "shall I give you a piece of advice? your horse is tired; return to Tinques; there is a good inn there; sleep there; you can reach Arras to-morrow." "I must be there this evening." "That is different; but go to the inn all the same, and get an extra horse; the stable-boy will guide you through the cross-roads."
To what horrors had she been listening? the suffering of the blinded road-mender the grotesque and hideous death of the young laborer in his full strength the griefs of a childless and penniless old woman? Yet life had somehow engulfed the horrors; and had spread its quiet waves above them, under a pale, late-born sunshine.
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