CERISE
A TALE OF THE LAST CENTURY
CHAPTER I
THE DAISY-CHAIN
In the gardens of Versailles, as everywhere else within the
freezing influence of the Grand Monarque, nature herself
seemed to accept the situation, and succumbed inevitably
under the chain of order and courtly etiquette. The grass
grew, indeed, and the Great Waters played, but the former
was rigorously limited to certain mathematical patches,
and permitted only to obtain an established length, while
the latter threw their diamond showers against the sky with
the regular and oppressive monotony of clockwork. The
avenues stretched away straight and stiff like rows of lately-built
houses; the shrubs stood hard and defiant as the
white statues with which they alternated, and the very sunshine
off the blinding gravel glared and scorched as if its
duty were but to mark a march of dazzling hours on square
stone dials for the kings of France.
Down in Touraine the woods were sleeping, hushed, and peaceful in the glowing summer's day, sighing, as it were, and stirring in their repose, while the breeze crept through their shadows, and quivered in their outskirts, ere it passed on to cool the peasant's brow, toiling contented in his clearing, with blue home-spun garb, white teeth, and honest sunburnt face.
Far off in Normandy, sleek of skin and rich of colour, cows were ruminating knee-deep in pasturage; hedges were
