added, with a sly smile. "You have a happy privilege, my dear sir: when our age turns prosy, you have but to take your lyre, in the sweet country of the south, and resuscitate the glory of the Troubadours. They tell me, that in one of your recent journeys you evoked enthusiastic applause, and entered many towns carpeted with flowers. Ah, mon Dieu, we can never do that with our prose!"
"Ah, dear sir," said Jasmin, "you have achieved much more glory than I. Without mentioning the profound respect with which all France regards you, posterity and the world will glorify you."
"Glory, indeed," replied Chateaubriand, with a sad smile. "What is that but a flower that fades and dies; but speak to me of your sweet south; it is beautiful. I think of it, as of Italy; indeed it sometimes seems to me better than that glorious country!"
Notwithstanding his triumphant career at Paris, Jasmin often thought of Agen, and of his friends and relations at home. "Oh, my wife, my children, my guitar, my workshop, my papillôtos, my pleasant Gravier, my dear good friends, with what pleasure I shall again see you." That was his frequent remark in his letters to Agen. He was not buoyed up by the praises he had received. He remained, as usual, perfectly simple in his thoughts, ways, and habits; and when the month had elapsed, he returned joyfully to his daily work at Agen.
Jasmin afterwards described the recollections of his visit in his 'Voyage to Paris' (Moun Bouyatage à Paris). It was a happy piece of poetry; full of recollections of the towns and departments through which he journeyed, and finally of his arrival in Paris. Then the wonders of the capital, the crowds in the streets, the soldiers, the palaces, the statues and columns, the Tuileries where the Emperor had lived.
And yet, he says, what a grand world it is! how tasteful! how fashionable! There seem to be no poor. They are all ladies and gentlemen. Each day is a Sabbath; and under the trees the children play about the fountains. So different from Agen! He then speaks of his interview with Louis Philippe and the royal family, his recital of L'Abuglo before "great ladies, great writers, lords, ministers, and great savants;" and he concludes his poem with the words: "Paris makes me proud, but Agen makes me happy."
"I pass, and repass, not a soul I know,
Not one Agenais in this hurrying crowd;
No one salutes or shakes me by the hand."
The poem is full of the impressions of his mind at the time-- simple, clear, naive. It is not a connected narrative, nor a description of what he saw, but it was full of admiration of Paris, the centre of France, and, as Frenchmen think, of civilisation. It is the simple wonder of the country cousin who sees Paris for the first time--the city that had so long been associated with his recollections of the past. And perhaps he seized its more striking points more vividly than any regular denizen of the capital.
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