[Gutenberg 14793] • La vie errante

This historic book may have numerous typos or missing text. Not indexed. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1911. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... "Yes, all." He placed the coins in a little heap. The croupier turned the wheel. The ball ran, (lanced and stopped. "Nothing further counts," jerks forth the voice, which resumes after a moment: "Twenty-eight." The young woman started and in a hard, sharp tone said: "Come away." He rose, and, without looking at her, followed her; and one felt that some dreadful thing had sprung up between them. Some one remarked: "Good-by to love. They don't look as if they were of one mind to-day." A hand taps me on the shoulder. I turn round. It is my friend. I have now only to ask pardon for having thus trespassed on my reader by talking so much of myself. I had written this journal of day dreams entirely for myself, or, rather, I had taken advantage of my floating solitude to capture the wandering ideas which are wont to traverse our minds, like birds on the wing. But I am asked to publish these few pages, which, unconnected, deficient in composition and in art, follow one after the other without a reason and abruptly conclude without a motive, simply because a squall of wind put an end to my voyage. I have yielded to this request. Perhaps I am wrong. LA VIE ERRANTE; OR, THE WANDERING LIFE CHAPTER I WEARINESS ILEFT Paris, and France, too, on account of the Eiffel Tower. It could not only be seen from everywhere, but it could be found everywhere, made of every kind of known material, exhibited in all windows, an ever-present and racking nightmare. It was not only the thing itself, however, that created in me an irresistible desire to be alone for a while, but all that has been built up around it, within it, above it and in its neighborhood. How can the newspapers have dared to speak of "new architecture" and refer to this metallic skeleton? Architecture, to-day the leas...