XVIII 
  
WILL YOU COME WITH ME? 
  
  
THERE is a superb country; a country of 
Cockaigne, they say, which I dream of visiting 
with an old friend. Singular country, drowned 
in the fogs of our northern marches, which one 
may call the east of the west, the China of 
Europe, so much does warm and capricious 
fancy there take the bit in its teeth; so much 
has it been patiently and obstinately made il-
lustrious by its wise and delicate flora. 
A true country of Cockaigne, where all is 
beautiful, rich, quiet, straightforward. Where 
luxury takes pleasure in admiring itself in the 
mirror of good order; where life is easy and 
may be softly breathed; from which disorder, 
turbulence, and the unforeseen are shut out; 
where happiness is wedded to silence; where 
the food itself is at once poetical, rich, and ex-
citing; where everything resembles you, dear 
angel. 
You know the feverish malady which takes 
possession of us in times of wretchedness and 
cold; this homesickness for unknown coun-