The shots had dispersed the birds; there remained only two marabous, standing between ten and twenty paces away and plunged in reverie. They were like two old men with bald heads pressed between the shoulders.

On an exhausted field, only weeds grow.

The shots had dispersed the birds; there remained only two marabous, standing between ten and twenty paces away and plunged in reverie. They were like two old men with bald heads pressed between the shoulders.

Nevertheless, in this sea of human wretchedness and malice there bloomed at times compassion, as a pale flower blooms in a putrid marsh.

But I think happiness springs from another source, a far deeper one that doesn't depend on will because it comes from love.

In the meantime the groans changed into the protracted, thunderous roar by which all living creatures are struck with terror, and the nerves of people, who do not know what fear is, shake, just as the window-panes rattle from distant cannonading.

Wealth is not a hindrance, but rather a help towards attaining a proper standing in a chosen field of activity. I confess that as far as I am concerned, it has done me some service as it preserved my character from many a crookedness poverty might have exposed it to.