' But Gringoire Bac, the cobbler, who was with me,--it was
a fete day,--Bac, _he_ said, 'Do not you believe that, Bebee; they
only muddle folks' brains; for one book tells them one thing, and another
book another, and so on, till they are dazed with all the contrary
lying; and if you see a bookish man, be sure you see a very poor creature
who could not hoe a patch, or kill a pig, or stitch an upper-leather,
were it ever so.' But I do not believe that Bac said right. Did he?"
"I am not sure. On the whole, I think it is the truest remark on
literature I have ever heard, and one that shows great judgment in Bac.
Well?"
"Well, sometimes, you know," said Bebee, not understanding his answer,
but pursuing her thoughts confidentially,--"sometimes I talk like this to
the neighbors, and they laugh at me. Because Mere Krebs says that when
one knows how to spin and sweep and make bread and say one's prayers and
milk a goat or a cow, it is all a woman wants to know this side of
heaven. But for me, I cannot help it, when I look at those windows in the
cathedral, or at those beautiful twisted little spires that are all over
our Hotel de Ville, I want to know who the men were that made them,--what
they did and thought,--how they looked and spoke,--how they learned to
shape stone into leaves and grasses like that,--how they could imagine
all those angel faces on the glass.
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