The Serpent of Stars by Jean Giono Page B

sky.

    â€œOh!” cried Césaire and Barberousse.
    â€œOh!” I cried.
    â€œOh!” said the girl softly against my ear.
    The mare, held hard, reared up like struck water. We had arrived!
    As far as you could see, the heavy sea of herds was lapping the black earth. It began there, under the mare’s feet, and it extended over the whole of Mallefougasse. Despite the darkness, you could see it. All the stars had descended upon the earth; they were the eyes of the sheep lit up by the watchfires, by the four bonfires, by all the Saint-Jean fires that illuminated the countryside from here to the distant mountains of the Mées, and of Peyruis, Saint-Auban, and Digne. You could hear the last shepherds to arrive whistling and the bells of the rams and the mules, and far off in the distance, toward Sisteron, the clusters of dogs howling, necks extended, into the moonless night. . . .
    â€œPause! Pause! Pause!” sang the shepherds to the sheep.
    Men ran by, hands raised toward the new herds. The animals lay down in a mass around them. You could hear them kneeling down on the ground, crushing the hyssop. The whole heavy batter of herds turned slowly like a whirlpool of mud.
    â€œFédo, Fédo,” sang the shepherds, to reassure the ewes.
    On the crest of the hill, someone tried the aeolian harps, then tightened the keys. A cord broke and the moan traveled on the wind to the depths of the county, toward the Durance lowlands. Men’s voices called for strings. The tympon players played their bright scales, and then blew the warning notes, and a shiver of fear like wind on the sea raised the waves of beasts again. Young shepherds carried tubs of water. One of them, with the lantern, walked backwards, lighting the way. A little lost harmonica sounded in a juniper.
    â€œTéou, Téou, Téou!” said the shepherds to calm the beasts.

    Everything fell silent.
    That “téou,” the word of peace, sang itself through the whole expanse. Afterwards, there was silence, and then the voice of a few masters, and then the great silence.
    Someone tried the music conductor’s whistle. The aeolian harps murmured. Someone whistled. Silence.
    Césaire had tied up the mare. As an extra precaution, he had hobbled her legs with a blanket.
    â€œOn a night like this, you never know.”
    We walked toward the clearing.
    The shepherds were sitting all around. Despite the two hundred men and the hundred thousand beasts, there was so little noise that you could hear us coming. Heads turned toward us; someone made room. I squatted down in the folds of my coat. My arms shook. I took out my notebook and pencils. Barberousse gave me a board to write on.
    Four huge fires lit up and defined the large stage of grass and earth.
    Right in the middle, a man was standing. He was waiting for what would flow from his heart. I remember that he was a tall, thin man, one who saw things, who feasted on visions. His nose turned into a bird’s beak under the fire’s high flames. He was wearing a red scarf on his head, tied gypsy-fashion.
    Suddenly he raised his hand to greet the night. A rumbling flowed from the aeolian harps. The muffled flutes sang like springs.
    â€œThe worlds,” said the man, “were in the god’s net like tuna in the madrague . . .”
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    You could have heard him on the other sides of the earth and the sky.

IV

    I ’VE BEEN ASKED MANY TIMES—every time I relate this shepherds’ play—if this ceremony was part of some esoteric tradition. I don’t know. I don’t believe that it was a ceremony. I’m the one who says “shepherds’ plays; ” they say, “We’re going to perform.” All the same, there are arguments for and against. To find out the truth, you would have to go stay with them through the long months in the high summer pastures, get on familiar terms with them, share their breadcrusts rubbed with garlic, and take