The island is deserted; sparse grass grows in spots, mingled here and
there with tufts of purple flowers and nettles. On the summit is a
dilapidated casemate, with a courtyard enclosed by crumbling walls.
Beneath this ruin, and half-way up the hill, is a space about ten feet
square, in the middle of which rises a granite slab surmounted by a
Latin cross. The tomb comprises three pieces: one for the socle, one for
the slab, and another for the cross.
Chateaubriand will rest beneath it, with his head turned towards the
sea; in this grave, built on a rock, his immortality will be like his
life--deserted and surrounded by tempests. The centuries and the
breakers will murmur a long time around his great memory; the breakers
will dash against his tomb during storms, or on summer mornings, when
the white sails unfold and the swallow arrives from across the seas;
they will bring him the melancholy voluptuousness of far-away horizons
and the caressing touch of the sea-breeze. And while time passes and the
waves of his native strand swing back and forth between his cradle and
his grave, the great heart of Rene, grown cold, will slowly crumble to
dust to the eternal rhythm of this never-ceasing music.
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