Cake

I was traveling. The landscape amidst which I was placed was of an irresistible grandeur and nobility. Something of it doubtless passed at that moment into my soul. My thoughts fluttered about with a nimbleness equal to the atmosphere's; vulgar passions, such as hate and profane love, appeared to me now as far-removed as the clouds that marched past at the bottom of abysses under my feet; my soul seemed to me as vast and pure as the dome of the sky that enveloped me; the memory of earthly things came to my heart only weakened and diminished, like the sound of bells from imperceptible cattle grazing far, far away, on the slopes of another mountain. Over the little motionless lake, dark with its immense depth, passed at times the shadow of a cloud, like the reflection of the mantle of an aerial giant soaring across the sky. And I recollect that that rare and solemn feeling, caused by a great movement perfectly silent, filled me with a joy mingled with fear. In short, I felt, thanks to the enthusing beauty that surrounded me, at perfect peace with myself and the universe; I even believe that, in my perfect beatitude and in my total forgetfulness of all earthly ill, there I had come to find no longer so ridiculous the journals which claim that man is born good—when, hopeless matter renewing its exigencies, I thought of repairing the fatigue and relieving the appetite caused by such a long ascent. I drew from my pocket a large piece of bread, a leather cap and a flask of a certain elixir that pharmacists sold in those days to tourists for mixing as needed with melted snow.

I was tranquilly cutting my bread, when a very faint sound made me raise my eyes. Before me stood a ragged, dark, disheveled little person, whose hollow eyes, shy and as if supplicating, devoured my piece of bread. And I heard sigh out, in a voice low and hoarse, the word: cake! I could not keep myself from laughing at the sound of the name with which he would so honor my nearly blank bread, and I cut him a fine piece which I offered him. Slowly he drew near, not taking his eyes off the object of his covetousness; then, snatching the bread with his hand, drew back quickly, as if he was afraid that my offer was not sincere or that I had already repented of it.

But at the same instant he was knocked down by another little savage, come out from I know not where, and so perfectly similar to the first that one could have taken him for his twin brother. Together they rolled on the ground, disputing the precious prey, neither wanting doubtless to sacrifice half for his brother. The first, exasperated, gripped the second by the hair; the latter seized his ear with his teeth, and spat a little bleeding piece of it with a superb patois curse. The legitimate owner of the cake tried to bury his little claws in the eyes of the usurper; in his turn the latter applied all his strength to strangle his adversary with one hand, while with the other, he tried to slip into his pocket the prize of battle. But, revived by despair, the vanquished got up and rolled the vanquisher on the ground with a head blow in the stomach. What is the point of describing a hideous fight that lasted in truth longer than their childish strength seemed to promise? The cake traveled from hand to hand and changed pockets at each instant; but, alas! it also changed volume, and when at last, tired out, panting, bleeding, they were stopped by the impossibility of continuing, there was no longer, to speak truth, any grounds for battle; the piece of bread had disappeared, and it was scattered in crumbs similar to the grains of sand with which it was mingled.

The spectacle had clouded the landscape for me, and the calm joy in which my soul had rejoiced before having seen those little men had totally disappeared; I remained sad over it a rather long time, repeating to myself ceaselessly: "So there is a superb land where bread is called cake, a delicacy so rare that it suffices to engender a war perfectly fratricidal!"

Charles Baudelaire