“ At any rate, you have some walks in the neighbourhood?” continued Madame Bovary, speaking to the young man.
“ Oh, very few,” he answered. “There is a place they call La Pature, on the top of the hill, on the edge of the forest. Sometimes, on Sundays, I go and stay there with a book, watching the sunset.”
“ I think there is nothing so admirable as sunsets,” she resumed; “but especially by the side of the sea.”
“ Oh, I adore the sea!” said Monsieur Leon.
“ And then, does it not seem to you,” continued Madame Bovary, “that the mind travels more freely on this limitless expanse, the contemplation of which elevates the soul, gives ideas of the infinite, the ideal?”
“ It is the same with mountainous landscapes,” continued Leon. “A cousin of mine who travelled in Switzerland last yea
