Rosebud County news. [volume] (Forsyth, Mont.) 1901-1906, 1903-12-31
BY Anatole Franco.

VI IAO particular ulSQC Oh WQlCn
! write. the fever Of an influenza pre-
venting me from sleeping. I distinct
~ heard three raps on the glass door
OF a cabinet which stood beside my
bed, and in which were jumbled con-
fusedly images in Saxon. porcelain
and Sevres. terra Gotta statuettes from
Tanagra and from Myrina, small
branzes, Japanese worries, Venetian
glasses, Chinese cups, boxes in vernis
Martin, enameled and lacquered trays
in short, a thousand trifles, which l
adore through fetichism and which
recall to my mind past hours of JOY
or sorrow.
The raps were light but perfectly
clear, and by the CLEAN of the night
lamp, / saw that little leaden sol
der was trying to set himself at lib
erty. He soon succeeded and the glass
door opened wide.
"Hello!" exclaimed. Couldn't
you make less noise, La Tulipe, and
let me rest? / am Sick
The little fellow replied grumbling-
ly:
COSL a. yOil oCS u1C, UOuI ECOls, L
took the Bastile hundred years ago.
I do not believe there are many leaden
soldiers left who are as old as am.
Goodnight; l am going to the re-
view
LA Tulipe." replied sternly,
your regiment was crushed out of
existence by Louis XVI, August 81,
1890 &c
Stay in that cabinet"
La Tulipe curled his moustache and,
looking at me contemptuously out Of
the corners of his eyes. replied:
What! do you not know that every
year, on the night OF the 31st OF De-
cember while children are asleep, the
grand parade of leaden soldiers de-
that smoke joyously and from which
escape the last cmbers of Christmas
logs? 1t is a mad Cavalcade in which
gallops more than one headless cav
alier. The ghosts of all the leoden
soldiers who have persisted in war
rush past in an internal whirlwind.
There are many broken and twisted
bayonets and the spirits of dead dolls.
looking CHASTITY in the moonlight, look
at them pass.
This discourse left me perplexcd.
so, La Tulipe, it is custom, a
solemn custom, is it? I have an in
finite respect for usage, customs, ira
ditions, legends, popular beliefs. We
call that folklore and we make
study of it that amuses us very much
l see with pleasure, La Tulipe, that
you are traditioniste. 1 do not know
as I ought to let you go out of that
cabinet
BE patient. l could not go under
your gaze without contradicting all
the laws of occultism. When you are
asleep, it will be easy for me to es-
cape on ray of moonlight as l am
subtitle. But there is no hurry; have
an hour or two to spare. If you would
like, 1 will tell you story of the
olden time. l know more than one"
Tell me one"
One hundred and four years ago
this very day, l was on table with
about dozen comrades exactly like
myself. Many of us were without
head or feet; We were the remains
Of a box of soldiers purchased the
year before at the Saint-Germain fair.
The apartment in which we were was
hung with pale-blue silk. A spinet.
chairs with lyre-shaped backs, a ma
hogany writing-desk, a white bed or
namented with roses, all smiled with
tender grace. The lamp burned with
a soft light, and the flame in the fire.
place seemed to beat like wings in the
shadows. Seated at the desk, In
robe de chambre. her slender neck
bent under her heavy golden tresses,
Julie took out the letters that lay in
the drawers tied together with rib
bons.
Midnight sounded: it was the sig
nal of the passage from one year to
another. 1898 was ended.
By turns, Julie looked at the flick.
ering fire and at the letters, from
which pressed flowers dropped. It was
hard for her to burn them. It must
be done. for those letters. if found,
would send to the guillotine both their
writer and the one who had received
them. If she alone were concerned,
she would not destroy them. so weary
was she of struggling to preserve ner-
self from the executioner. But she
thought of the writer. prescribed and
hunted, who was now in hiding in
some garnet at the other end Of Paris.
One of those letters would reveal his
hiding place and deliver him up to
death.