"But all the pleasure of our wanderings never equalled the charm of our home-coming. There was our life and our delight. There we were truly happy. Looking back, I see that it was an ideal existence: a condition Heaven never permits to remain too long unbroken, or we might forget that this is not our abiding city.
"My father filled his leisure moments by cultivating vineyards, which in those days were very successful, and in the form of wine returned rich revenues. We lived in a rainbow atmosphere, and, if you know Provence--as doubtless you do--you will also know that this is no mere figure of speech. The airs of heaven were ever balmy. In those days one never heard of cold and snow and frost on the Riviera. We have since approached some degrees nearer to the North Pole. Little need for others to go off in search of it and bring it to us. At that time we lived in perpetual summer. The sapphire waters of the Mediterranean for ever flashed and flowed upon the white sands of the shores that belonged to us. It seems to me now that the skies were always blue and the sun ever shone. Olive-yards and vineyards, I have said, surrounded us. Orange and lemon-groves sent forth an exquisite perfume only known to those who live amongst them. An amphitheatre of hills rose about us; the lovely Maritime Alps with all their graceful undulations, all their rich foliage. Birds flashed in the sunshine. In the balmy nights of May the nightingales never ceased their song.
"I must have been an impressionable child, with all my strong, sturdy health, inheriting something of my mother's romantic nature. It is certain that the memory of those early days has never faded, but has been the background and colouring of all my after life. Even now in thought I often go back to them. There are times when I am a little undecided how to act. I ask myself how my father or mother would have acted under the circumstances, and in their clear, sensible tones seem to hear the reply.
"Up to the age of seven they were my sole instructors. Then fresh plans were formed. A precocious child, it was felt that I ought to enter upon more serious studies than they had leisure to direct.
"A tutor was found; the Abbé Rivière; a man of large mind and solid attainments; a profound thinker. To this he added the simple nature of a child. The marvel was that he condescended to become tutor and companion to a lad of seven. We soon found that his ambition was to have leisure for the writing of metaphysical works. His present appointment gave him his heart's desire. He had no parish or people to look after. With less singleness of purpose and more worldliness, he might have risen to any position in the church. No better companion for a boy could have been found, and he possessed the rare faculty of imparting knowledge. His mind could unbend, and he adapted his conversation to his hearers. No mere bookworm was he, dry, tedious and incomprehensible. My studies were a delight. I knew afterwards that one of the joys of his life was to watch day by day the unfolding of his pupil's mind. Thus he took the keenest interest in his work, and considered his days doubly blessed. I have heard him say that the offer of the triple crown could not have tempted him to change his life.