For your book

Soon, child, you will leave The roof that saw you born, To roam the world and confront Its perils, and perhaps to die Without having reached your destiny. Before your fleeing from our entreaty, As of old, I hear the trill Of the voice that guided you in childhood. Alas, alas! my son, upon your path Soon perhaps some difficulty Will wound your hand with a thorn, Which, truly venomous, Will make your wounded foot limp, More than once upon your fate. What does it matter, then!

Lifted up farther, You will follow the light that illumines you, Marching ever, ever onward; Without finding your homeland lost, Your little village, the distant hearth, And dying without weeping for life, If you had to lose it one day, Preaching to all as doctrine Charity, the most pious faith, Duties only of the divine law; Everywhere eradicating False knowledge, pride, egoism, Which are trying to shroud The cradle-light of Spiritism; In repeating that which the voice Of all invisible worlds Seems to reveal to you alone In their murmurs so profound; Suffering a coarse century, That joins insult to harsh injury When it calls you a sorcerer, A mere teller of fortune;

In pardoning it its disdain, Go seeking, through prayer, To set its friends aright In its holy and humble harvest. And I said: Depart, son, farewell; Your task is most difficult, But believe and hope in your good God, He will perhaps make it most easy. A Poet Spirit.

In the following session, of May 18, the same medium wrote spontaneously the following: Reply to a criticism of my verses: For your book, made somewhat thoughtlessly, last Friday, by a stranger whom I do not see here this evening. In a mysterious wood, Hidden in the choice foliage Of lilac, every year In the proud springtime Trills are heard of a graceful Warbler in a plaintive song. From the neighboring grove Each morning gently come To place themselves quite near her To hear better what she reveals, A voice so tender and marked, Modulated with perfection, With grace pure and indefinable. The almost unrestrained multitude Applauded the noble diva When another guest appears, A blackbird of black plumage With rage delights in whistling The monotonous song It admired without reason.

The warbler falls silent, And says to it, laughing, with irony: You whistle so well, so well you must sing. Will it not be a pleasure then to listen to you? And the blackbird without reply took flight, went away. Why? Guess… Farewell! I leave you now. Alfred de Musset. n [1]

[see Alfred de Musset.]