Ask not the population of our plains and forests, and secluded agricultural districts, to which political party they belong; if they are republicans, royalists, socialists or communists, reds or blues, whites or tricolor,--they know nothing of all this. Their opinions--their religion--are those of _Monsieur le Curé_. They know his prudence, his charity, his good sense; they know he loves them like a father; that he would not leave them for a bishopric--no, not for a cardinal's scarlet hat;--that as he has lived, so will he die with them: that is enough for them. Thus they consult him when they wish to form an opinion for themselves, much in the same way as a sportsman, anxious to take the field, looks up at the chanticleer on some village-steeple to know what he ought to think of the cloudy sky above; and when they see the good man sauntering past their cottages, with head erect and animated step, smiling, and evidently full of cheerful, charitable thoughts, and on good deeds intent, kissing the little children, giving a rosy apple to one, and a playful tap to another; offering a sly word of hope to the young girls, and a few kind ones to the aged and infirm,--all the village is elated; and the old maids fail not to present him with a fat fowl, or some such substantial expression of their respect. But if, alas! the good _curé_ should appear walking with a slow and solemn step, his hands behind his back, his eyes fixed upon the ground, and an anxious and thoughtful look upon his brow, his flock gaze at one another, and whisper in an under tone that something is amiss.
At the epoch of political convulsions and revolutions, when systems and governments, men and ideas, arise and disappear, as if they went by steam,--when the authorities in the great towns wish to interfere with the police regulations and customs that govern the agricultural classes,--when they attempt to force them to gallop at full speed on the high road of progress as they call it, and that to attain this desirable end, handsome young men arrive from Paris in black coats and white neckcloths, furnished with a marvellous flow of eloquent sophisms, pretending to prove to the simple and honest peasants that in order to be more free, happy, and rich, they must, without further ado, kill, burn, and destroy,--the villagers, quite mystified, listen with open mouth; but as to understanding what the gentleman in black--the dark shadow of the government of progress--so glibly states, he might as well be talking Turkish or Japanese. Every one looks at _Monsieur le Curé_, they scan his face, and ask him what they are to do; and let him only feel angry or disgusted with the wordy nonsense, and just make one sign, or raise one finger, and 1200--aye, 2000 men would in a trice surround him, and send the orator and all his staff to preach their pestilential doctrines under the turf, and this without more ceremony and remorse than if they were so many mad dogs. Poor fools! who think it possible to change a people in a few weeks, and imagine that a fine discourse from lips unknown and unloved will have a deeper effect upon men's minds than the admonitions of a pastor, whose life has been without reproach, and adorned with every practical virtue.