Chapter 8

From Nature to Lessons

Autumn transformed the green and brown countryside, and it turned yellow and copper and gold, blood-red and purple.

The farmers brought in the corn, piled high on the wagons. They dug deep holes in the ground for potatoes and beets and cabbages. The holes were lined with straw and had little funnels of straw sticking above the ground.

The farmers brought the cattle in from the green river islands where many of them had been browsing all summer.

Delicious golden pears and misty purple grapes were ripening against the wall. Ripe apples lay on the ground in heaps like jewels—red ones, yellow ones, russet brown ones.

It was time for the Audubons to say goodbye to the country and go back to Nantes.

The great cream-colored house would be locked up for the winter, and all the family had things to do. Madame Audubon wiped and polished each bit of silver and china before she locked it behind the cupboard doors. She aired the linens and made sure that everything was clean.

Rose kissed her dolls good-by and tucked them away in their beds.

Jean wished he could take all his treasures to town with him, but there was no room in his little bedroom.

So he took a last look at the cuckoo’s egg, the stuffed thrushes, the dried snake skins, the feathers and tortoise shells and wasps’ nests which he had gathered that summer.

He hated to leave the corn crake. He was very proud of it, for he had stuffed the bird himself, and it looked almost alive. Its long legs were clasped about a beech twig, and it held a grain of corn in its bill.

“I wish I could take you with me,” he whispered, smoothing the feathers of the corn crake. Then he added, “But you will be here next summer when I return!”

“Come, son!” called his father. Jean gave the bird one last look and ran out the door, closing it behind him.

The October air was crisp today. Rose was wrapped in her crimson cape with the hood that came over her curls. Madame Audubon was wearing a quilted jacket.

“My beloved boy, you will be cold!” his stepmother cried as Jean came out. “Where is your good russet cloak?”

“I do not know, Maman,” answered Jean truthfully. The russet cloak had been new last spring. It had looked rich and beautiful when the tailor brought it home.

“Surely you brought the cloak,” puzzled Madame Audubon. “Yes, I remember well. You wore it to church, and how handsome you looked! Do you not remember?”

“Yes, Maman,” answered Jean, “but it is gone now. It is not in my wardrobe. I am certain it is not there!”

He did not tell his stepmother what had happened to the cloak. He could not bring himself to confess to her that he had traded it to a farmer boy for the corn crake which was up in his bedroom. He knew this would make her unhappy.

“I’ve grown too tall and big for a cloak,” he had thought. “But I’ll never grow so big or so old that I won’t be thrilled by the sight of that long-legged corn crake, holding tight to the beech limb and reaching out to bite off a grain of golden October corn!”

***

“You are the handsomest boy in all France,” Maman Anne told him. “You must have the education of a gentleman.”

There were no free public schools in France then. Private teachers were hired by those parents who could afford them.

Jean had several teachers, because he took many kinds of lessons. He had music teachers who taught him to sing and to play the violin, the guitar, the lute, and the flageolet.

The flageolet, a small instrument something like a flute, was Jean’s favorite. Jean had learned that he could imitate the songs of birds on the flageolet.

He had spent many hours during the summer just listening to the birds’ songs and memorizing their melodies. He had come to the conclusion that bird musicians have favorite places for their music, just as human musicians do. The birds’ songs sounded best at the edge of a woods or beside a stream or in a garden.

Jean liked his music lessons, and he would practice for a long time on the stiff, dainty little French tunes which the master gave him.

When he was alone, however, he liked to pick up the flageolet and play the lovely songs of his feathered masters at Wheatstacks. When he imitated the soft notes of the mourning dove, or the sweet pure whistle of the chickadee, or the fast, whispering song of the woodpecker, the walls of the house and the crowded roofs of Nantes seemed to drop away. He would be back in the country again with the fields and woods about him.

His dancing teacher reminded him of the country too. He was a small, elegant gentleman who wore a fashionable white satin vest under his long-tailed black suit.

“He needs only a pair of wings to make him look exactly like the pied wagtail,” Jean often thought, as he watched the dancing teacher doing the steps of the gavotte or the minuet.

“One, two, three, swing, bow!” the teacher would say to his pupils.

There had been many wagtails in the damp meadows about Wheatstacks. Jean had often watched them as they half walked, half ran along the ground, swinging their tails as they moved. They were very clean, prim little birds, too, Jean had noticed, always bathing and washing in the shallow water.

“Are you listening, Monsieur Audubon?” the dancing teacher said sharply. “Bow to your partner!”

Jean pulled himself back from his dreams. He bowed quickly—so quickly that he bumped his partner’s head.

“Yes, indeed, pardon me, Monsieur Wagtail!” he said politely. He could not understand why the other children laughed, the teacher looked angry, and his sister blushed with shame. (Figure 8.1)

Figure 8.1: He could not understand why the other children laughed, the teacher looked angry, and his sister blushed with shame.