Anyhow, I Am Not Wasting Money On Food Just Now, And
That Is A Consolation."
Now periostitis can hardly be called an amusing complaint, and I would
have purchased a franc's worth of iodine for almost anybody on earth.
Not then.
On the contrary, I grew positively low-spirited when, after
three more days, the lamentations began to diminish in volume. They were
sweet music to my ears, at the time. They are sweeter by far, in
retrospect. If only one could extract the same amount of innocent and
durable pleasure out of all other landladies!...
My second joyful memory centres round another thing of beauty - a spiky
agave (miscalled aloe) of monstrous dimensions which may be seen in the
garden of a certain hill-side hotel. Many are the growths of this kind
which I have admired in various lands; none can vaunt as proud and
harmonious a development as this one. You would say it had been cast in
some dull blue metal. The glaucous wonder stands by itself, a prodigy of
good style, more pleasing to the eye than all that painfully generated
tropicality of Mr. Hanbury's Mortola paradise. It is flawless. Vainly
have I teased my fancy, endeavouring to discover the slightest defect in
shape or hue. Firm-seated on the turf, in exultant pose, with a pallid
virginal bloom upon those mighty writhing leaves, this plant has drawn
me like a magnet, day after day, to drink deep draughts of contentment
from its exquisite lines.
For the rest, the whole agave family thrives at Mentone; the ferox is
particularly well represented; one misses, among others, that delightful
medio-picta variety, of which I have noticed only a few indifferent
specimens. [1] It is the same with the yuccas; they flourish here,
though one kind, again, is conspicuous by its absence - the Atkinsi
(some such name, for it is long since I planted my last yucca) with
drooping leaves of golden-purple. You will be surprised at the number of
agaves in flower here. The reason is, that they are liable to be moved
about for ornamental purposes when they want to be at rest; the plant,
more sensitive and fastidious than it looks, is outraged by this
forceful perambulation and, in an access of premature senility, or
suicidal mania, or sheer despair, gives birth to its only flower - herald
of death. The fatal climax could be delayed if gardeners, in
transplanting, would at least take the trouble to set them in their old
accustomed exposure so far as the cardinal points are concerned. But
your professional gardener knows everything; it is useless for an
amateur to offer him advice; worse than useless, of course, to ask him
for it. Indeed, the flowers, even the wild ones, might almost reconcile
one to a life on the Riviera. Almost.... I recall a comely plant, for
instance, seven feet high at the end of June, though now slumbering
underground, in the Chemin de Saint Jacques - there, where the steps
begin - -
Almost....
And here my afternoon musings, up yonder, took on a more acrid
complexion.
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