Again, on a French locomotive the
driver has far more combinations at his command for efficient
working under varying conditions, than is the case in England. The
trend of the national mind is towards complicating details rather
than simplifying them.
Delightful as was the winter climate of Nyons, that sun-scorched
little cup amongst the hills became a place of positive torment as
the summer advanced. The heat was absolutely unendurable. Day and
night, thousands of cicades (the cigales of the French) kept up
their incessant "dzig, dzig, dzig," a sound very familiar to those
who have sojourned in the tropics. Has Nature given this singular
insect the power of dispensing with sleep? What possible object
can it hope to attain by keeping up this incessant din? If a love-
song, surely the most optimistic cicada must realise that his
amorous strains can never reach the ears of his lady-love, since
hundreds of his brethren are all keeping up the same perpetual
purposeless chirping, which must obviously drown any individual
effort. Have the cicadas a double dose of gaiete francaise in
their composition, and is this their manner of expressing it? Are
they, like some young men we know, always yearning to turn night
into day? All these are, and will remain, unsolved problems?
As I found the summer heat of Nyons unbearable, I went back to
England for a holiday, and, on the morning of my departure,
climbed some olive trees and captured fourteen live cicadas, whom
I imprisoned in a perforated cardboard box, and took back to
London with me.
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