SYLVIANE.* Sylviane is a Christmas story of the Cevennes, breathing
the spirit of the South of France and its childlike religion. It is a story within a story. The outside story is one of a simple, smooth, uncomplicated, but perfectly artistic kind, dealing with the disappointment of that devout and excellent Christian, M. Fuleran, Cure of Camplong, in the Southern Cevennes, at the absence of the Mayor of the Commune from midnight mass on Christmas Eve. This was a grave and deep trouble to M. Fuloran, whose character, all through the story, has a most attractive sweetness, as well as a depth of devotion that would do honour to any Christian community. He is a saint by nature, this kind old Cure of Camplong, whose story is told with tenderness by the young nephew who serves him at the altar.
These two go home from church together on Christmas morning, their heads bowed with sorrow. It is a disgrace to the village, as well as a personal pain, that M. Bassac, the Mayor, with his scarf of office, should not have been present at those solemn Christmas services. Prudence, however, the Curifs housekeeper, a sharp-tongued and benevolent person, has a word of good sense to say in favour of the Mayor. The poor man is ill : he is stiff and helpless with rheumatism : want of power, not want of will, keeps him at home in the cold Christmas weather. The Cure must forgive him, and must attend the Christmas feast at his house. He must start at once, as soon as Prudence 'has brushed his soutane : the guests are all waiting, and must not be affronted by delay.
So we tramp up the village street, and find our places at the long table in the Mayor's kitchen, where the great fire of logs is burning, and M. Bassac, a peasant like the rest of us, slow and well-intentioned—it was fifty years ago—sits packed • up with great pillows in his chair. The first care of our excellent Prudence is to heat these pillows and rearrange them, for she is a much cleverer woman than La Bassague, the Mayor's humble wife,—in fact, the whole village bows flown to Prudence, and it is very interesting to notice how, with an authority greater than that of maire or cura she keeps the guests in order on this occasion.
It was not unnecessary, for they were a rough set of people, these good mountaineers of the Cevennes. No persons of refinement were present at that feast, except the Cure and his quiet nephew. The young shepherd Galibert was a very un- manageable character, and a great deal too much inclined to flirt with Melie, the shoemaker's daughter. Then her father, Cornaz, cracked bones in his teeth with a terrible noise ; and others of the guests were strange and unpleasant in their manners. All the neighbours were there ; no one was turned away from that Christmas dinner,—even the old beggars who came down from the mountains had their corner and their Plateful ; and La Bassague, who could cook, if she could not nurse, waited dutifully on all. It is a pleasant picture, in strong colours, of warm-hearted hospitality.
But the most distinguished guest—for so he proved himself --has not yet been mentioned. This was Jean Vigneron, the garde ehampetre, a native of that country, though not of Camplong. He was a man who had seen many vicissitudes ; —in his youth a servant to M. Sylvian at the metairie of Les Orniades, near Tarrassac, where the great monastery was ; afterwards a eoldier ; then a village schoolmaster—it must have been hard to find one leas fitted for his office—now constable or watchman of the parish of Camplong. Vigneron was a prodigious gossip, and given to drinking. Everybody
new his weaknesses, and nobody respected him, least of all Prudence. But at this Christmas dinner Vigneron proved that he was a guest worth inviting. He told two stories hours long, of which one, as the fashion of this book is, was wrapped up in the other, and this inner one, the inside kernel of M. Fabre's nut, is a truly characteristic and beautiful legend, the leg,nd of the Crucifix of Tarrassac-le-Haut.
• S ltriane. Par Ferdinand Fab'-ø. Illustrations do Georges Emu, (Gollee. tion Brai e Tostard,) Paris Charm-tier et Fasguelle.
Vigneron, with all his faults, had a very remarkable memory. Here and there one suspects that memory may have been helped by imagination ; but no such thought occurred to the guests of M. Bassac. The Cure found it necessary to check Vigneron now and then, when his language rather befitted past soldiering days than a religious festival ; but for the stories themselves this good man had nothing but enthusiasm. We cannot attempt to tell them here,—eith er the pleasing romance of M. l'abbe Victor Sylvian among his books at Les Ormades, deep in those antiquarian studies which result in the beautiful history of the Cruciax of Tarrassac and the devout Spanish monk who carved it ; or that memorable history itself, the centre of all ; or the lively love-story of Mdlle. " Sylviane" and M. Casimir ; or the final miracle which raises the Abbe from his sick-bed and brings him to the midnight mass on Christmas Eve in the ancient church where that saintly monk, Martinez Ombros, had worshipped centuries before.
When the story was done, M. le cure de Camplong thanked God and hurried away to his vespers ; and the guests, fired by these miraculous histories, hoisted M. Bassac, well wrapped up, into a cart, and carried him also to church through the Christmas twilight : an imprudence of which the poor man very nearly died. This was a sad disappointment to M. Ful- cran, who had been ready to expect a miracle ; but be bowed humbly to the remark of Vigneron—"que in paroisse de Camplong me va,ut pas pour in saintete la paroiese de Tar- rassao-le-Haut." Outsiders, however, miracle or not, will be inclined to claim as high a place for this humble and simple- minded Cura as for M. l'abbd Victor Sylvian, or even the sainted Prior, Martinez Ombros himself.
We have said enough, perhaps, to show something of the attractiveness of this Christmas story of the South. The way in which it is told is of course one of its great merits ; the lightness and grace of M. Fabre's style, which never passes into irreverence or flippancy, is exactly suited to its sub- ject. The Christmas logs crackle on Bassac's hearth, the laugh of human kindness goes round ; yet outside the Christ- mas bells are ringing through the mountains, and it is a real, if also a realistic, faith, on the greatest night of all the year, which brings the Cure and his flock to church together.
We must not close without saying a word of the illustra- tions, by M. George Roux, nearly all of which are very good and appropriate, and some— such as Prudence warming the inaire's pillows, La Bassague preparing her feast, M. l'abbe Victor sitting on a bench with the fat Cure of Tarrassac, the dreamy sculptor-monk standing before his half-carved cruci- fix—really excellent. And we must also add that half through the story, breaking out here and there in unexpected places, runs one of the quaint old no'els of the South, " un noal fameux aux eavenues," beginning- " Joseph dit ii Marie- Allons h Bethl6em."
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