Last year (1861), on a fine morning in May, a traveler, the narrator of this story, arrived at Nivelles and walked towards La Yupo.He walks.He followed a paved road between two rows of trees on the hill.The avenue rises and falls with the continuous hills, like huge waves.He's already gone through Lillo and Isaaclin.Looking to the west, he could make out the bluestone bell tower of Branlar, shaped like a raspberry.He had just walked through the woods on a high ground, and saw a wooden post full of wormholes, standing at the corner of a cross road, on which was written "the former site of the fourth fence"; beside it, there was a drink shop with a wall The sign above reads "Ai Xiabo Sifeng Special Class Cafe".
An eighth of a league further on from the café, he came to the bottom of a small valley with a stream running through a culvert under the road.Sparse and green bushes are scattered in the valley beside the road, and on the other side of the road, the bushes are scattered towards Branlal.
On the right side of the road, there is a small inn, with a four-wheeled cart, a large bundle of hops and an iron plow in front of the door, and beside the green hedge, there is a pile of dry hay, and in a square pit, the lime is steaming. , a ladder lying against the wall of a dilapidated shed with straw for partitions.There was a big girl weeding in the field, and a big yellow advertisement, maybe a poster for a touring circus show, fluttered in the wind beside the field.Beyond the corner of the inn a flock of ducks was parading in the shallow swamp along which a badly paved path led into the thickets.The pedestrian walked into the bush.
He walked about a hundred steps, and came to the foot of a fifteenth-century wall with a gable-shaped spire made of tiled bricks. Walking along the wall, he saw an arched stone storehouse gate with a one-shaped lintel and two circular spires. The relief has the vigorous style of the Louis XIV era.The upper part of the gate is the front of the house, which is majestic. A wall perpendicular to the front of the house is close to the gate, forming a blunt right angle.On the grass in front of the door, there are three rakes upside down, and wild flowers in May bloom randomly between the rake tines.The gate is closed.The double doors were in tatters, and an old door hammer was rusted.
The sun was balmy, and the branches quivered softly in May, as if from their nests, and not from the wind.A cute little bird, maybe Huaichun, is singing heartily on a big tree.
The passer-by bent down to examine a vortex on the stone foot on the left side of the door. The vortex was quite large, like a mold of a sphere.At this moment, the double doors opened, and a village girl came out.
She looked at the passer-by and saw what he was examining.
"It's a French shell," she said to him.
Then she went on to say:
"A little higher up, above the gate, next to the nail, you see a hole made by a big gun. The gun didn't go through the board."
"What's this place called?" asked the passer-by.
"Ougumont," said the village girl.
The passer-by looked up.He took a few steps and looked over the fence.From the branches, he saw a small hill in the sky, and there was something on the hill, which looked like a lion from a distance.
