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 CHAPTER 1

Innovation: the clever country

LEARNING OBJECTIVES

After studying this chapter, you should be able to:

1.1 understand the meaning of innovation, six aspects of innovation, and
innovation and entrepreneurship
1.2 explain the difficulties in managing what is an uncertain and risky process
1.3 list some sources of innovation, both from within companies or industries and
in the social environment
1.4 discuss different innovation types
1.5 understand the key practices of successful innovators and entrepreneurs.
Where could Australia genuinely innovate?
Written by Peter C. Doherty, Laureate Professor, The Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and
Immunity
There is a lot of talk about innovation these days, but are we really innovating in
the areas where we could generate the most benefit for Australia and the world?
What is clear is that the decline in mining revenue, the elimination of
manufacturing jobs and climate–dependent uncertainties in agricultural
productivity mean Australia’s future prosperity cannot depend on endlessly
repeating the past.
The decline of coal and, indeed, all fossil fuel exports is inevitable if nation states
are to comply with the Paris agreement. That won’t happen overnight, but the
pace of change will inevitably accelerate as a more concerned and aware younger
generation seizes political control.
Future prospects for our greatest single tourism asset, the Great Barrier Reef seem
increasingly dim. The bleaching that’s killing the corals is a direct consequence of
ocean warming.
With 0.3% of the world’s population, we produce around 1.4% of the world’s
greenhouse gas emissions (and that’s excluding the emissions from our coal
exports). But the fact remains that there’s relatively little Australia can do to
protect the long-term health of the reef.
We could act to limit agricultural runoff. And, thinking innovatively, we might
research if it’s possible to engineer or transplant more heat resistant corals. But
apart from the technical challenges, any long-term success will depend on how
hot the seas eventually become.
If we’re thinking about places where a country like ours with a small population
can hope to innovate in ways that generate new technologies and more jobs, the
area with the greatest potential is renewable energy.

Playing to our strengths

We live on the world’s largest solar collector. How do we exploit that to serve our
own energy needs and, beyond that to develop a clean energy export industry?
One possibility is to produce an Asia–Pacific solar ‘super grid’, with Australia
exporting solar energy to our neighbours.
Given that we have massive solar resources, and assuming a realistic global price
for carbon (say A$100/ton levied on everything from energy generation to
transport), Australia would become a highly desirable place to site activities that
require a lot of energy. An obvious, immediate application is to host global data
centres.
We also have a strong record of innovation in the medical area, with the new
Medical Research Future Fund being tangible evidence that this is recognised at
the political level.
Vaccines, such as Gardasil, and devices such as the ResMed sleep mask and the
bionic ear have been major dollar earners, although each hasn’t necessarily
created many domestic jobs.
Given our increasing ethnic diversity and our centrally organised national health
system, Australia is a great place to do clinical trials that will be acceptable to the
emerging powerhouses, such as China, in drug discovery and development.
And we have established great models for networking university and research
institute talent across the nation.
Sometimes, I fear our politicians take too narrow a view of medical research. They
fail to grasp that the Australian Research Council and CSIRO-funded chemists,
physicists, mathematicians and so forth are centrally important to this enterprise,
although that is understood by those who administer the funding agencies. And
cutting research support funds to universities is a major regressive step.

Australia has a long history of innovation in agriculture, including through

the CSIRO.

Research prosperity
That said, a great deal of innovation has nothing to do with the formal research
sector. Innovation in areas such as design, visual imagery, fashion, surfboards,
bicycles and so forth is based on the insight and energy of inventors and
entrepreneurs.
That’s also true, to some extent, for innovation in engineering and architecture,
although developing novel solutions is likely to benefit from regulations and/or
investment strategies that mandate, for instance, energy efficiency and ‘greening’.
Government definitely has a part to play here. If we look at Silicon Valley, for
example, an enormous amount of support has been supplied by US Department of
Defence and Department of Energy grants.
CSIRO chief Larry Marshall’s strategy to take the institution down a more
entrepreneurial road is understandable. What is regrettable, though, is that there
has been no real political commitment to continuing the ‘public good’ (and long-
term economic good) science that has been a major focus for CSIRO and should,
perhaps, find another home.
One option would be to establish a new National Institute for Earth Systems
Science that incorporates some of the CSIRO activities that are slated for cuts.
If we don’t understand what is happening with the climate, tides, soils, water,
biodiversity and so forth, we limit our capacity to innovate in response to
environmental stress. We also risk making very bad political decisions about where
to invest for future development and to mitigate the effects of climate change.
Surely Australia should be the great laboratory for water conservation and dry land
agriculture. That won’t happen if we compromise the necessary science.

Finding the advantage

As a research scientist, the principle I’ve always adopted is to align with selective
advantage. That means collaborating with talented people (especially those at
close range with different expertise) and tackling issues where there is real need.
The big questions are: what are our selective advantages as a nation? And how do
we exploit them?
Although there are signs of erosion, one great advantage we still have is that we
live in a socially progressive and generally tolerant society with a strong record in
science, education and the arts.
So, although governments can help get the settings right and provide some
resources, genuine innovation depends on the actions of smart, courageous and
determined entrepreneurs.
Where the US prospers, it’s because it has outstanding tertiary educational
institutions that produce such people, it invests in science and technology and it
recruits talent from across the world.
That’s one place where we can take a lesson from their book. Although, when it
comes to social policy, other centres of innovation such as Scandinavia and
Germany seem to be more relevant to us.
Innovators want to live in places that are safe, decent, have affordable education,
and value personal freedom, bold ideas and creativity. What we are as a culture is
a major component of our selective advantage, and we need to preserve that
distinctiveness.
Source: Originally published on The Conversation.

 Part 1 Innovation 1.1 Innovation matters 

1.1 INNOVATION MATTERS
Learning objective 1
understand the meaning of innovation, six aspects of innovation, and innovation
and entrepreneurship

The meaning of innovation

You don’t have to look far before you bump into the innovation imperative. It leaps
out at you from a thousand mission statements and strategy documents, each
stressing how important innovation is to ‘our customers/our shareholders/our
business/our future’ and, most often, ‘our survival and growth’. Innovation shouts at
you from advertisements for products ranging from hairspray to hospital care. It
nestles deep in the heart of our history books, pointing out how far and for how long
it has shaped our lives. And it is on the lips of every politician (looking at you,
Malcolm Turnbull), recognising that our lifestyles are constantly shaped and
reshaped by the process of innovation.

Innovation in action
Everybody's talking about it

• ‘We have the strongest innovation programme that I can remember in my

30-year career at P&G, and we are investing behind it to drive growth
across our business’ — Bob McDonald, Chairman, President and CEO,
Procter & Gamble
• ‘We believe in making a difference. Virgin stands for value for money,
quality, innovation, fun and a sense of competitive challenge. We deliver a
quality service by empowering our employees and we facilitate and monitor
customer feedback to continually improve the customer's experience
through innovation’ — Virgin Life Care
• ‘Adi Dassler had a clear, simple, and unwavering passion for sport. Which is
why with the benefit of 50 years of relentless innovation created in his
spirit, we continue to stay at the forefront of technology’ — Adidas
• ‘Innovation is our lifeblood’ — Siemens
• ‘We're measuring GE's top leaders on how imaginative they are. Imaginative
leaders are the ones who have the courage to fund new ideas, lead teams to
discover better ideas, and lead people to take more educated risks’ — J.
Immelt, chairman and CEO, General Electric
• ‘We are always saying to ourselves. We have to innovate. We've got to come
up with that breakthrough’ — Bill Gates, former chairman and CEO,
Microsoft
• ‘Innovation distinguishes between a leader and a follower’ — Steve Jobs,
co-founder and former chairman and CEO, Apple
This isn’t just hype or advertising babble. Innovation does make a huge difference to
organisations of all shapes and sizes. The logic is simple: if we don't change what we
offer the world (products and services) and how we create and deliver them, we risk
being overtaken by others who do. At the limit it’s about survival, and history is very
clear on this point: survival is not compulsory! Those enterprises which survive do so
because they are capable of regular and focused change. (It’s worth noting that Bill
Gates used to say of Microsoft that it was always only two years away from
extinction. Or, as Andy Grove, one of the founders of Intel, pointed out, ‘Only the
paranoid survive!’)

Innovation in action
...and it’s a big issue

• OECD countries spend $1500 billion/yr on R&D.

• More than 16 000 firms in the US currently operate their own industrial
research labs, and there are at least 20 firms that have annual R&D budgets
in excess of $1 billion.
• In 2008, 16.8% of all firms’ turnover in Germany was earned with newly
introduced products; in the research-intensive sector this figure was 38%.
During the same year, the German economy was able to save costs of 3.9%
per piece by means of process innovations.
• ‘Companies that do not invest in innovation put their future at risk. Their
business is unlikely to prosper, and they are unlikely to be able to compete
if they do not seek innovative solutions to emerging problems’ — Australian
government website, 2006.
• ‘Innovation is the motor of the modern economy, turning ideas and
knowledge into products and services’ — UK Office of Science and
Technology, 2000.
• According to Statistics Canada, the following factors characterise successful
small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs):
◦ Innovation is consistently found to be the most important characteristic
associated with success.
◦ Innovative enterprises typically achieve stronger growth or are more
successful than those that do not innovate.
◦ Enterprises that gain market share and increasing profitability are those that
are innovative.

On the plus side innovation is also strongly associated with growth. New business is
created by new ideas, by the process of creating competitive advantage in what a
firm can offer. Economists have argued for decades over the exact nature of the
relationship but they are generally agreed that innovation accounts for a sizeable
proportion of economic growth. William Baumol points out that ‘virtually all of the
economic growth that has occurred since the eighteenth century is ultimately
attributable to innovation’.1
 Innovation in action
Growth champions and the return from innovation

Tim Jones has been studying successful innovating organisations for some time
(see growthchampions.org). His most recent work has built on this, looking to try
to establish a link between those organisations which invest consistently in
innovation and their subsequent performance.2 His findings show that over a
sustained period of time there is a strongly positive link between the two:
innovative organisations are more profitable and more successful.
An audio clip of an interview with Tim Jones discussing the link between
innovation and growth is available on the Innovation Portal.

Survival and growth poses a problem for established players but a huge opportunity
for newcomers to rewrite the rules of the game. One person’s problem is another’s
opportunity and the nature of innovation is that it is fundamentally about
entrepreneurship. The skill to spot opportunities and create new ways to exploit
them is at the heart of the innovation process. Entrepreneurs are risk-takers, but
they calculate the costs of taking a bright idea forward against the potential gains if
they succeed in doing something different — especially if that involves upstaging the
players already in the game.

Innovation in action
Global innovation performance

The consultancy Arthur D. Little conducts a regular survey of senior executives

around the world exploring innovation.3 In its 2012 survey of 650 organisations,
the following emerged:
• Top quartile innovation performers obtain on average 13% more profit from
new products and services than average performers do, and 30% shorter
time-to-break-even, although the gap is narrowing.
• There is a clear correlation between capability in innovation measurement
and innovation success.
• A number of key innovation management practices have a particularly
strong impact on innovation performance across industries.

Of course, not all games are about win/lose outcomes. Public services like healthcare,
education and social security may not generate profits but they do affect the quality
of life for millions of people. Bright ideas when implemented well can lead to valued
new services and the efficient delivery of existing ones at a time when pressure on
national purse strings is becoming ever tighter. New ideas — whether wind-up
radios in Tanzania or micro-credit financing schemes in Bangladesh — have the
potential to change the quality of life and the availability of opportunity for people in
some of the poorest regions of the world. There’s plenty of scope for innovation and
entrepreneurship and sometimes this really is about life and death.

Innovation in action
Finding opportunities

• There has always been a need for artificial limbs and the demand has, sadly,
significantly increased as a result of high-technology weaponry such as
mines. The problem is compounded by the fact that many of those
requiring new limbs are also in the poorest regions of the world and unable
to afford expensive prosthetics. The chance meeting of a young surgeon, Dr
Pramod Karan Sethi, and a sculptor, Ram Chandra, in a hospital in Jaipur,
India has led to the development of a solution to this problem: the Jaipur
Foot. This artificial limb was developed using Chandra’s skill as a sculptor
and Sethi’s expertise and is so effective that those who wear it can run,
climb trees and pedal bicycles. It was designed to make use of low-tech
materials and be simple to assemble, for example in Afghanistan craftsmen
hammer the foot together out of spent artillery shells, while in Cambodia
part of the foot’s rubber components are scavenged from truck tyres.
Perhaps the greatest achievement has been to do all of this for a low cost:
the Jaipur Foot costs only $28 in India. Since 1975, nearly one million
people worldwide have been fitted for the Jaipur limb and the design is
being developed and refined, for example using advanced new materials.
• Not all innovation is necessarily good for everyone. One of the most vibrant
entrepreneurial communities is in the criminal world where there is a
constant search for new ways of committing crime without being caught.
The race between the forces of crime and law and order is a powerful
innovation arena — as work by Howard Rush and colleagues have shown in
their studies of cybercrime.

Six aspects of innovation

Innovation is about identifying or creating opportunities, new ways of serving
existing markets, growing new markets, rethinking services, meeting social needs
and improving operations — doing what we do but better. Each of these aspects of
innovation is discussed below.

1: Identifying or creating opportunities

Innovation is driven by the ability to see connections, to spot opportunities and to
take advantage of them. Sometimes this is about completely new possibilities, for
example by exploiting radical breakthroughs in technology. New drugs based on
genetic manipulation have opened a major new front in the war against disease.
Mobile phones, tablets and other devices have revolutionised where and when we
communicate. Even the humble window pane is the result of radical technological
innovation — almost all the window glass in the world is made these days by the
Pilkington float glass process which moved the industry away from the time-
consuming process of grinding and polishing to get a flat surface.

2: New ways of serving existing markets

Innovation isn’t just about opening up new markets; it can also offer new ways of
serving established and mature ones. Low-cost airlines are still about transportation,
but the innovations firms like Southwest Airlines, easyJet and Ryanair have
introduced have revolutionised air travel and grown the market in the process.
Despite a global shift in textile and clothing manufacture towards developing
countries, the Spanish company Inditex (through its retail outlets under various
names, including Zara) has pioneered a highly flexible, fast turnaround clothing
operation with over 2000 outlets in 52 countries. It was founded by Amancio Ortega
Gaona, who set up a small operation in the west of Spain in La Coruña — a region
not previously noted for textile production — and the first store opened there in
1975. The company now has over 5000 stores worldwide and is the world’s biggest
clothing retailer; significantly, it is also the only manufacturer to offer specific
collections for northern and southern hemisphere markets. Central to the Inditex
philosophy is close linkage between design, manufacture and retailing and its
network of stores constantly feeds back information about trends, which are used to
generate new designs. It also experiments with new ideas directly on the public,
trying samples of cloth or design and quickly getting back indi-cations of what is
going to catch on. Despite its global orientation, most manufacturing is still done in
Spain, and it has managed to reduce the turnaround time between a trigger signal for
an innovation and responding to it to around 15 days.

3: Growing new markets

Equally important is the ability to spot where and how new markets can be created
and grown. Alexander Bell’s invention of the telephone didn’t lead to an overnight
revolution in communications — that depended on developing the market for
person-to-person communications. Henry Ford may not have invented the motor car
but in making the Model T — ‘a car for Everyman’ at a price most people could
afford — he grew the mass market for personal transportation. And eBay justifies its
multi-billion-dollar price tag not because of the technology behind its online auction
idea but because it created and grew the market.

4: Rethinking services
In most economies the service sector accounts for the vast majority of activity, so
there is likely to be plenty of scope. And the lower capital costs often mean that the
opportunities for new entrants and radical change are greatest in the service sector.
Online banking and insurance have become commonplace but they have radically
transformed the efficiencies with which those sectors work and the range of services
they can provide. New entrants riding the Internet wave have rewritten the rule book
for a wide range of industrial games, for example Amazon in retailing, eBay in
market trading and auctions, Google in advertising and Skype in telephony.
5: Meeting social needs
Innovation offers huge challenges — and opportunities — for the public sector.
Pressure to deliver more and better services without increasing the tax burden is a
puzzle likely to keep many civil servants awake at night. But it’s not an impossible
dream: right across the spectrum there are examples of innovation changing the way
the sector works. For example, in healthcare there have been major improvements in
efficiencies around key targets such as waiting times. Hospitals like the Leicester
Royal Infirmary in the UK or the Karolinska Hospital in Stockholm, Sweden have
managed to make radical improvements in the speed, quality and effectiveness of
their care services, such as cutting waiting lists for elective surgery by 75% and
cancellations by 80%, through innovation.

6: Improving operations — doing what we do but better

At the other end of the scale Kumba Resources is a large South African mining
company which makes another dramatic claim: ‘We move mountains.’ In Kumba’s
case, the mountains contain iron ore and the company’s huge operations require
large-scale excavation — and restitution of the landscape afterwards. Much of its
business involves complex large-scale machinery — and its ability to keep it running
and productive depends on a workforce able to contribute innovative ideas on a
continuing basis.

Understanding innovation and entrepreneurship

Innovation matters — but it doesn’t happen automatically. It is driven by
entrepreneurship — a potent mixture of vision, passion, energy, enthusiasm, insight,
judgement and plain hard work which enables good ideas to become reality. The
power behind changing products, processes and services comes from individuals —
whether acting alone or embedded within organisations — who make innovation
happen. As the famous management writer Peter Drucker put it: 4
Innovation is the specific tool of entrepreneurs, the means by which they exploit change as an
opportunity for a different business or service. It is capable of being presented as a discipline,
capable of being learned, capable of being practised.

Innovation in action
Joseph Schumpeter

One of the most significant figures in this area of economic theory was Joseph
Schumpeter, who wrote extensively on the subject. He had a distinguished career
as an economist and served as Minister for Finance in the Austrian government.
His argument was simple: entrepreneurs will seek to use technological innovation
— a new product/service or a new process for making it — to get strategic
advantage. For a while, this may be the only example of the innovation so the
entrepreneur can expect to make a lot of money — what Schumpeter calls
‘monopoly profits’. But of course, other entrepreneurs will see what he has done
 and try to imitate it — with the result that other innovations emerge, and the
resulting ‘swarm’ of new ideas chips away at the monopoly profits until an
equilibrium is reached. At this point the cycle repeats itself: our original
entrepreneur or someone else looks for the next innovation that will rewrite the
rules of the game, and off we go again. Schumpeter talks of a process of ‘creative
destruction’, where there is a constant search to create something new which
simultaneously destroys the old rules and establishes new ones — all driven by the
search for new sources of profits.
In his view ‘[what counts is] competition from the new commodity, the new
technology, the new source of supply, the new type of organisation … competition
which … strikes not at the margins of the profits and the outputs of the existing
firms but at their foundations and their very lives.5

Entrepreneurship plays out on different stages in practice. One obvious example is

the start-up venture in which the lone entrepreneur takes a calculated risk to bring
something new into the world. But entrepreneurship matters just as much to the
established organisation which needs to renew itself in what it offers and how it
creates and delivers that offering. Internal entrepreneurs — often labelled as
‘intrapreneurs’ or working in ‘corporate entrepreneurship’ or ‘corporate venture’
departments — provide the drive, energy and vision to take risky new ideas forward
within that context.6 And of course, the passion to change things may not be
focused on creating commercial value but rather on improving conditions or enabling
change in the wider social sphere or in the direction of environmental sustainability
— a field which has become known as ‘social entrepreneurship’.
This idea of entrepreneurship driving innovation to create value — social and
commercial — across the lifecycle of organisations is central to this subject. Table 1.1
gives some examples.
In this book, we use this lens to look at managing innovation and entrepreneurship.
We’ll use three core concepts:
• innovation. As a process which can be organised and managed, whether in a
start-up venture or in renewing a 100-year-old business
• entrepreneurship. As the motive power to drive this process through the
efforts of passionate individuals, engaged teams and focused networks
• creating value. As the purpose for innovation, whether expressed in financial
terms, employment or growth, sustainability or improvement of social
welfare.

TABLE 1.1 Entrepreneurship and innovation

STAGE IN START-UP GROWTH SUSTAIN/SCALE RENEW

LIFECYCLE OF
AN
ORGANISATION

Creating Individual Growing the Building a portfolio of Returning to the

commercial entrepreneur business incremental and radical frame-
value exploiting new through adding radical innovation to breaking kind of
 STAGE IN START-UP GROWTH SUSTAIN/SCALE RENEW
LIFECYCLE OF
AN
ORGANISATION

technology or new products/ sustain the business innovation which

market services or and/or spread its began the business
opportunity moving into influence into new and enables it to
new markets markets move forward as
something very
different

Creating social Social Developing the Spreading the idea Changing the system
value entrepreneur, ideas and widely, diffusing it to — and then acting as
passionately engaging others other communities of agent for the next
concerned to in a network for social entrepreneurs, wave of change
improve or change — engaging links with
change perhaps in a mainstream players
something in region or like public sector
their around a key agencies
immediate issue
environment

 Innovation: the clever country 1.2 Innovation isn’t easy! 

1.2 INNOVATION ISN’T EASY!
Learning objective 2
explain the difficulties in managing what is an uncertain and risky process

Coming up with good ideas is what human beings are good at — we have this facility
already fitted as standard equipment in our brains! But taking those ideas forward is
not quite so simple, and most new ideas fail. It takes a particular mix of energy,
insight, belief and determination to push against these odds; it also requires
judgement to know when to stop banging against the brick wall and move on to
something else.
It’s important here to remember a key point: new ventures often fail, but it is the
ventures which are failures rather than the people who launched them. Successful
entrepreneurs recognise that failure is an intrinsic part of the process. They learn
from their mistakes, understanding where and when timing, market conditions,
technological uncertainties, etc. mean that even a great idea isn’t going to work. But
they also recognise that the idea may have had its weaknesses but that they have
not failed themselves but rather learnt some useful insights to carry over to their
next venture.

Innovation in action
Failure breeds success

Thomas Edison was a pretty successful entrepreneur with over 1000 patents to his
name and the reputation for bringing many key technologies into widespread use,
including the phonograph, the electric telegraph and the light bulb; he also
founded the General Electric Company, which is still a major player today. He is
famous for his attitude towards failure, typified by the search for the right
material to make the filament for his incandescent light bulb, where he explored
over 1000 different options. He is reported as having said that the process did not
involve failure so much as ‘the elimination of a design that didn’t work, so we
must be getting close’.

While the road for an individual entrepreneur may be very rocky with a high risk of
hitting potholes, running into roadblocks or careering off the edge, it doesn’t get any
easier if you are a large established company. It’s a disturbing thought but the
majority of companies have a lifespan significantly less than that of a human being.
Even the largest firms can show worrying signs of vulnerability, and for the smaller
firm the mortality statistics are bleak.
Many SMEs fail because they don’t see or recognise the need for change. They are
inward looking, too busy fighting fires and dealing with today’s crises to worry about
storm clouds on the horizon. Even if they do talk to others about the wider issues, it
is very often to people in the same network and with the same perspectives, for
example the people who supply them with goods and services or their immediate
customers. The trouble is that by the time they realise there is a need to change it
may be too late.
But it isn’t just a small firm problem. There is no guaranteed security in size or in
previous technological success. Take the case of IBM — a giant firm which can justly
claim to have laid the foundations of the IT industry and came to dominate the
architecture of hardware and software and the ways in which computers were
marketed. But such core strength can sometimes become an obstacle to seeing the
need for change — as proved to be the case when, in the early 1990s, the company
moved too slowly to counter the threat of networking technologies — and nearly lost
the business in the process. Thousands of jobs and billions of dollars were lost and it
took years of hard work to bring the share price back to the high levels which
investors had come to expect.
One problem for successful companies occurs when the very things which helped
them achieve success — their ‘core competencies’ — become the things which make
it hard to see or accept the need for change. Sometimes the response is ‘not invented
here’: the new idea is recognised as good but in some way not suited to the business.

Innovation in action
The ‘not invented here’ problem

A famous example of ‘not invented here’ was the case of Western Union, which, in
the 19th century, was probably the biggest communications company in the world.
It was approached by one Alexander Graham Bell, who wanted the company to
consider helping him commercialise his new invention. After mounting a
demonstration to senior executives, he received a written reply which said, ‘after
careful consideration of your invention, which is a very interesting novelty, we
have come to the conclusion that it has no commercial possibilities … We see no
future for an electrical toy.’ Within four years of the invention, there were 50 000
telephones in the USA and within 20 years five million. Over the next 20 years, the
company which Bell formed grew to become the largest corporation in the USA.

Sometimes the pace of change appears slow and the old responses seem to work
well. It appears, to those within the industry that they understand the rules of the
game and have a good grasp of the relevant technological developments likely to
change things. But what can sometimes happen here is that change comes along
from outside the industry — and by the time the main players inside have reacted it
is often too late.

Innovation in action
The melting of the ice industry

In the late 19th century, there was a thriving industry in New England based upon
the harvesting and distribution of ice. In its heyday, it was possible for ice
 harvesters to ship hundreds of tons of ice around the world on voyages that lasted
as long as six months — and still have over half the cargo available for sale. By the
late 1870s, the 14 major firms in the Boston area of the USA were cutting around
700 000 tons per year and employing several thousand people. But the industry
was completely overthrown by the new developments which followed from the
invention of refrigeration and the growth of the modern cold storage industry.
A case study of the ice industry is available on the Innovation Portal.

Of course, for others these conditions provide an opportunity for moving ahead of
the game and writing a new set of rules. Think about what has happened in online
banking, call-centre-linked insurance or low-cost airlines. In each case, the existing
stable pattern has been overthrown, disrupted by new entrants coming in with new
and challenging business models. For many managers business model innovation is
seen as the biggest threat to their competitive position, precisely because they need
to learn to let go of their old models as well as learn new ones. We also need to see
that while for established organisations these crises are a problem, they represent a
rich source of opportunity for entrepreneurs looking to disrupt an established order
and create value in new ways.
In many cases the individual enterprise can renew itself, adapting to its environment
and moving into new things. Consider the example of the Stora company in Sweden:
founded in the 13th century as a timber cutting and processing operation it still
thrives today — albeit in the very different areas of food processing and electronics.
All of these examples point to the same conclusion. Organisations need
entrepreneurship at all stages in their lifecycle, from start-up to long-lived survival.
The ability to recognise opportunities, pull resources together in creative ways,
implement good ideas and capture the value from them are core skills.

 1.1 Innovation matters 1.3 Sources of innovation 

1.3 SOURCES OF INNOVATION
Learning objective 3
list some sources of innovation, both from within companies or industries and in
the social environment

Most innovations result from methodically analysing seven areas of opportunity,

some of which lie within particular companies or industries, and some of which lie in
broader social or demographic trends.7

Sources of innovation within companies or

industries
Drucker8 identified four such areas of opportunity within a company or an industry:

1. Unexpected occurrences. Unexpected successes and failures are

productive sources of innovation because most people and businesses
dismiss them, disregard them and even resent them.9 Many innovations
are the result of unexpected successes, particularly in the pharmaceutical
industry. For example, the antibacterial effect of penicillin was
discovered accidentally by Alexander Fleming in 1928. The discovery of
the Pfizer blockbuster Viagra was also an accident. In 1991, a group of
scientists at Pfizer, led by Andrew Bell, David Brown and Nicholas
Terrett, discovered a series of chemical compounds that were useful in
treating heart problems such as angina. The compounds were patented
as Sildenafil. In 1994, Terrett discovered during the trial studies of
Sildenafil as a heart medicine that it also allowed men to reverse erectile
dysfunction. The drug acts by enhancing the smooth muscle relaxant
effects of nitric oxide, a chemical that is normally released in response to
sexual stimulation.10
2. Incongruities. These occur whenever a gap exists between expectations
and reality. For example, in 1971, when Fred Smith proposed overnight
mail delivery, he was told: ‘If it were profitable, the US Postal Office
would be doing it.’11 It turned out Smith was right. An incongruity existed
between what Smith felt was needed and the way business was currently
conducted — and Federal Express, the world’s first overnight delivery
network, was born in the United States.12
3. Process needs. These exist whenever a demand arises for the
entrepreneur to innovate as a way of answering a particular need. For
example, eye surgeons long knew how to perform cataract surgery. An
enzyme that made the process easier had been known for decades, but
was not usable because it was too hard to preserve. In the 1950s an
entrepreneur named William Conner figured out how to preserve the
enzyme. He and a colleague set-up the Alcon Prescription Laboratory
 (now Alcon Laboratories Inc.) to manufacture and market this new
product.
4. Industry and market changes. There are continual shifts in the
marketplace, which are caused by changes in consumer attitudes,
advances in technology and industry growth. Industries and markets
undergo changes in structure, design and definition. When market or
industry structures change, traditional industry leaders often ignore the
fastest growing market segments.13 New opportunities rarely fit the way
the industry has always approached the market, defined it or organised
to serve it. An example is found in the healthcare industry in South-East
Asia, where private medical centres are imitating five-star hotels to win
a share of wealthy sick customers.

Sources of innovation in the social environment

Three additional sources of opportunity exist outside a company in its social and
intellectual environment:

5. Demographic changes. Of the external sources of innovation opportunity,

demographics are the most reliable.14 Census data, for instance, provide
a precise picture of the actual demographic structure of a country, and
from these data it is relatively easy to extrapolate the future age
structure. In Australia and New Zealand, two countries that have
integrated a large number of migrants over the past decades, ‘ethnic
food’ is one of the fastest growing market opportunities for
entrepreneurs. Another demographic trend in the industrialised countries
is the ageing population. This creates many opportunities in the field of
assistive technology.
6. Perceptual changes. Sometimes the members of a community can
change their interpretation of facts and concepts, and thereby open up
new opportunities. What determines whether people see a glass as half
full or half empty is mood rather than fact, and a change in mood often
defies quantification.15 But it is not esoteric. It is concrete and it can be
tested and exploited for innovation opportunity. Perceptual changes can
particularly affect dimensions, such as acceptability, beauty, time and
distance. For example, commuters living in suburbs of big cities often
perceive a 50-kilometre or one-hour journey to their workplace as
acceptable, whereas residents in small towns would not.
7. New knowledge. Among history-making innovations, those based on
new knowledge — whether scientific, technical or social — rank high.
Knowledge-based innovations differ from all others in the time they
take, in their casualty rates, and in their predictability, as well as in the
challenges they pose to entrepreneurs.16 They have, for instance, the
longest lead time of all innovations. To become effective, innovation of
this sort usually demands many kinds of knowledge.17 Innovations in
bioscience are a case in point. In recent innovations awards organised by
The Economist, the category receiving the largest number of
nominations was bioscience.18 Interestingly, many of these could just as
Another random document with
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The Project Gutenberg eBook of Rabevel, ou le
mal des ardents, Volume 1 (of 3)
This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States
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Title: Rabevel, ou le mal des ardents, Volume 1 (of 3)

I. La jeunesse de Rabevel

Author: Lucien Fabre

Release date: October 21, 2023 [eBook #71926]

Language: French

Original publication: Paris: Nouvelle revue française, 1923

Credits: Laurent Vogel and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team

at https://www.pgdp.net (This book was produced from
images made available by the HathiTrust Digital Library.)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RABEVEL,

OU LE MAL DES ARDENTS, VOLUME 1 (OF 3) ***
 LUCIEN FABRE

RABEVEL
OU
LE MAL DES ARDENTS

*
LA JEUNESSE DE RABEVEL
« Il n’y a pas de passion sans excès. »

Pascal.

Treizième Édition

PARIS
ÉDITIONS DE LA
NOUVELLE REVUE FRANÇAISE
3, rue de Grenelle, (VIme)
 DU MÊME AUTEUR :

Connaissance de la Déesse, avant-propos de Paul

Valéry (Société Littéraire de France, 1919) Épuisé
Les Théories d’Einstein. (Payot, 1921)
Vanikoro (Nouvelle Revue Française, 1923) Épuisé
IL A ÉTÉ TIRÉ DE CET OUVRAGE, APRÈS IMPOSITIONS SPÉCIALES CENT
HUIT EXEMPLAIRES IN-QUARTO TELLIÈRE SUR PAPIER VERGÉ PUR FIL
LAFUMA-NAVARRE AU FILIGRANE DE LA NOUVELLE REVUE FRANÇAISE,
DONT HUIT EXEMPLAIRES HORS COMMERCE MARQUÉS DE A à H, CENT
EXEMPLAIRES RÉSERVÉS AUX BIBLIOPHILES DE LA NOUVELLE REVUE
FRANÇAISE, NUMÉROTÉS DE I A C, ET SEPT CENT QUATRE VINGT DOUZE
EXEMPLAIRES RÉSERVÉS AUX AMIS DE L’ÉDITION ORIGINALE SUR PAPIER
VELIN PUR FIL LAFUMA-NAVARRE, DONT DOUZE EXEMPLAIRES HORS
COMMERCE MARQUÉS DE a à l, SEPT CENT CINQUANTE EXEMPLAIRES
NUMÉROTÉS DE 1 A 750 ET TRENTE EXEMPLAIRES D’AUTEUR HORS
COMMERCE NUMÉROTÉS DE 751 A 780, CE TIRAGE CONSTITUANT
PROPREMENT ET AUTHENTIQUEMENT L’ÉDITION ORIGINALE.

TOUS DROITS DE REPRODUCTION ET DE TRADUCTION RÉSERVÉS POUR

TOUS LES PAYS Y COMPRIS LA RUSSIE.
COPYRIGHT BY LIBRAIRIE GALLIMARD 1923
 PARENT. ET FRAT.
ABAFFECT. LUC. EOR. DIC.
 CHAPITRE PREMIER

Le premier Octobre 1875 qui était un mardi, vers les trois heures
de relevée, un homme sortit subitement de la maison qui porte
encore le numéro vingt-six dans la rue des Rosiers. Il tombait une
grosse pluie froide. L’homme maugréa un instant sur la porte en
ouvrant son parapluie. Puis il se retourna brusquement, assujettit sur
la tête d’un gamin qui se tenait dans l’ombre du couloir, un capuchon
de laine bleue et partit à grandes enjambées, au milieu de la boue et
d’un ruissellement de torrent, tandis que l’enfant dont un cartable
battait le dos, trottinait sur ses pas en geignant et toussant.
Ayant suivi la rue jusqu’au bout dans la direction de l’Hôtel de
Ville, ils traversèrent le passage des Singes, remontèrent la rue des
Guillemites et prirent enfin la rue Sainte Croix de la Bretonnerie. Le
gamin à bout de souffle tirait la jambe si bien que l’homme ne
l’entendant plus piétiner tout contre lui se retourna et, distinguant
sous le capuchon le petit visage rougi, s’arrêta en souriant :
— Je cours donc si vite, petit Bernard ? lui dit-il.
— Oh ! oui, oncle Noë, répondit l’enfant avec assurance. Mais je
te ferai trotter moi aussi quand je serai plus grand que toi.
— Eh ! qui te dit que tu deviendras plus grand que moi,
moucheron ?
— Je le sais bien, moi.
 Noë Rabevel regarda son neveu. L’enfant assez grand pour ses
dix ans semblait robuste. Ses cheveux bouclés qu’il portait longs
adoucissaient un peu une mine têtue et sournoise qui gâtait
l’intelligence des yeux vifs. L’homme poussa un soupir et marmonna
quelques mots. Mais l’enfant tendait l’oreille et l’observait de côté
d’un regard fixe qu’il surprit et qui lui pesa. Il sentit après un peu de
réflexion son étonnement et sa gêne.
— Damné gosse, se dit-il, qui ne sera pas commode.
Il avait ralenti l’allure et ils firent encore quelques pas en silence.
Noë poursuivait le cours de ses réflexions.
— Bon Dieu, oui, songeait-il, qu’il grandisse et tant mieux s’il est
capable de faire autre chose qu’un menuisier ou un tailleur. On en
sera enfin débarrassé.
Une calèche lancée au grand trot de ses deux chevaux les
dépassa et projeta sur sa cotte de velours une flaque de boue
luisante.
— Les cochons ! fit-il.
— Je les connais, dit l’enfant. C’est Monsieur Bansperger, tu sais,
le fils du rabbin ? Il est avec une dame. Il va voir son père sans
doute.
— Oui, il a eu vite fait fortune celui-là avec les fournitures de la
guerre, grommela Noë.
Un camarade d’école, de quelques années à peine plus âgé que
lui ; oui, il devait être de 1844, ce qui représentait une différence de
cinq ans ; il s’était enrichi tandis que d’autres, dont lui-même,
faisaient le coup de feu dans la mobile et allaient pourrir dans les
casemates glacées de la Prusse.
— Pourquoi tu n’es pas riche comme ce Bansperger ? demanda
l’enfant comme si les pensées de son oncle ne lui avaient pas
échappé.
— Parce que, mon petit, il faisait du commerce tandis que je me
battais.
— Et l’oncle Rodolphe se battait aussi ?
 — Oui, mon frère se battait aussi.
— Mais pourquoi Bansperger ne se battait-il pas ?
— Bansperger était Polonais, mon petit Bernard.
— Alors, pour devenir riche, il valait mieux être Polonais ?
— Oui, pendant la guerre. Mais à présent cela n’a plus
d’importance…
— Alors je pourrai rester Français ? demanda l’enfant.
Noë eut un serrement de cœur qu’il reconnut bien. Souvent les
réflexions de son neveu le transperçaient.
— Je pourrai rester Français ? répéta l’enfant d’une voix
insistante.
— Oui, répondit Noë, avec une émotion qu’il tentait vainement de
surmonter. Sais-tu que c’est un grand honneur d’être Français ?
— Pourquoi ? demanda Bernard.
— Ah ! le maître te l’expliquera ! D’ailleurs, nous arrivons.
Ils s’arrêtèrent devant une vieille bâtisse en pans de bois, toute
vermoulue, où déjà stationnaient des groupes d’enfants et de
grandes personnes. Le menuisier reconnut quelques amis et
bavarda un instant avec eux sous le déluge qui ne cessait point.
— Alors, vous menez ce gosse au régent ? lui demandait-on.
— Ma foi, oui, c’est de son âge ; il faut bien qu’il apprenne son
alphabet. Et puis, quelques coups de rabot au caractère ça ne fait
point de mal, pas vrai ? Surtout que le petit gars ne l’a pas toujours
verni ; hein, Bernard ?
Mais l’enfant se taisait ; il avait un pli au front et semblait méditer.
— Il est toujours comme ça, ce petit, c’est une souche, dit Noë à
ses interlocuteurs ; on ne sait pas d’où ça sort.
Bernard leva les yeux.
— Tu ferais mieux de te taire, fit-il d’un ton froid qui remua les
auditeurs.
 — Voilà, s’écria l’oncle en prenant ceux-ci à témoin, voilà
comment me parle ce gosse. Et c’est mon neveu ; et j’ai seize ans
de plus que lui !
« Et encore moi, ça m’est égal, je ne le vois guère que quand il
descend à l’atelier, et aux repas. Mais avec mon frère Rodolphe, le
tailleur, qui est marié, lui, et chez qui nous sommes en pension, c’est
pareil. On ne peut pas dire qu’il soit grossier ; mais il vous a des
raisonnements et tout le temps des raisonnements. Tout le jour, je
l’entends à travers le plancher qui fait damner les compagnons
tailleurs à l’étage et qui leur mange tout leur temps. Ça veut tout
savoir, et ça a un mauvais esprit du diable. C’est un badinguet de
mes bottes, quoi !
— Une bonne claque, dit un gros monsieur décoré, une bonne
claque je vous lui donnerais, moi, quand il veut faire le zouave.
Pourquoi vous ne le corrigez pas ?
Noë eut un petit mouvement de stupéfaction.
— Eh ! bien, répondit-il, c’est vrai, vous me croirez si vous voulez,
on n’y a jamais songé. Ce gosse-là, c’est pas tout le monde. Rien ne
nous empêcherait, pas ? Mais c’est comme le mauvais bois.
Comment qu’on veuille le prendre, au guillaume ou au bouvet, on l’a
toujours à contrefil ; il répond comme un homme. Alors… Et, ajouta-
t-il après un instant en baissant la voix et après avoir constaté que
Bernard regardait ailleurs, que voulez-vous ? le gronder, ça passe,
mais le battre, je crois bien que j’oserais pas !
A ce moment la porte de l’école s’ouvrit et le maître parut sur le
seuil. C’était un homme d’une cinquantaine d’années, aux longues
moustaches fatiguées, qui traînait les pieds dans des savates. Il ôta
sa calotte défraîchie à pompon noir pour saluer son monde ; puis,
d’un tic qui l’agitait tout entier, il secoua ses vêtements verdis par
l’usage et d’où s’envolaient de la poussière et du tabac à priser. Noë
le regardait avec admiration.
— Tu sais, dit-il au petit, c’est un savant et un républicain de la
première heure. Il était près de Lamartine en 48 et il possède encore
des lettres qu’il a reçues de Béranger et de Victor Hugo. C’est un
Père du peuple, ça. Tu as de la chance d’avoir un pareil maître.
Mais Bernard contemplait les vêtements avachis du pauvre
homme et sa contenance misérable ; un grand air d’ennui, de
tristesse et de solitude émanait du pédagogue. L’enfant y cherchait
vainement l’éclat des rêves, la féerie de la science, toute la lumière
de ces paradis dont ses oncles, petits patrons intelligents et cultivés,
lui parlaient si souvent. Cette minute qu’il avait attendue longuement,
et longtemps souhaitée, lui parut tellement morne qu’il sentit monter
les larmes. Il se retint par orgueil et fit du coin de la bouche une
mauvaise grimace ; son démon coutumier lui souffla le mot le plus
propre à blesser Noë :
— Il n’est pas reluisant ton bonhomme, lui dit-il ; et il souffla avec
dérision.
A peine achevait-il qu’il sentait à la joue une brûlure cuisante :
pour la première fois de sa vie on l’avait giflé. L’oncle et le neveu se
regardaient aussi interdits l’un que l’autre. Le maître d’école les
aborda :
— Que viens-tu de faire, Noë ? dit-il d’un ton de reproche.
Mais l’enfant, les yeux humides, le prévint :
— Il m’a battu parce que je ne vous trouve pas reluisant.
Le père Lazare hocha la tête.
— Il est pourtant vrai, dit-il, que je ne me soigne guère.
L’observation de cet enfant m’est une leçon, Noë, et elle me profitera
plus que ne t’ont profité celles que je t’ai données. Où irons-nous,
mon pauvre ami, si tu ne sais pas respecter le citoyen qui dort dans
cette petite âme d’enfant ? Que nous donneront les institutions dont
nous rêvons et qu’ont préparées les barricades et la défaite des
tyrans, si nous ne conservons intacte la bonté naturelle, si nous ne
l’éduquons, si nous ne révérons la raison dans cette source si pure
où elle nous apparaît à l’état naissant ?
Il s’exprimait à voix presque basse, si bien que nul ne les avait
remarqués. Il les avait conduits en parlant dans un coin obscur de
l’école où les enfants déjà prenaient leur place au milieu d’un
murmure joyeux tandis que les parents se rassemblaient au fond de
la salle pour échanger des nouvelles ou des témoignages d’amitié.
— Je vous jure, dit Noë tout rouge, je vous jure…
— Eh ! sur quoi veux-tu jurer, mon ami ? L’Être suprême est bien
loin et nul ne sait ce qu’est devenu Jésus, le plus grand des
hommes. Les formes de la superstition demeurent-elles à ce point
vivantes dans les cœurs de vingt ans ? La tâche d’éduquer
l’humanité est la plus lourde et la plus ingrate. Faut-il donc douter du
progrès ? Autrefois, ton père, comme toi, poussait le riflard en
chantant Lisette. Mais il avait à peine desserré le valet et rangé les
outils qu’il prenait, pour les dévorer, tous les ouvrages des
émancipateurs.
— Il le fait encore, remarqua le jeune homme comme pour lui-
même. Mais nous le faisons aussi, Maître Lazare. Moi, évidemment,
je suis encore un peu jeune vous comprenez ; j’en suis toujours à
revenir aux livres moins secs…
— Oui, dit le maître en lui prenant affectueusement le bras, je
sais bien que le sang des faubourgs ne ment pas. Va, tu peux lire les
poëtes, ils ne sont pas les ennemis de la République, nous ne
l’ignorons pas, quoi qu’en dise Platon.
Il ferma à demi les yeux et sourit à sa vision. C’était là, tout à
côté, que, près de lui, Lamartine… Depuis, il y avait eu l’Usurpateur,
puis, la défaite, la Commune… Cette belle Commune qui avait
pourtant, de l’Hôtel de Ville, laissé les ruines fumantes… Bah !
songeait Lazare, crise de croissance. Et Noë qui rêvait aussi disait,
tout doucement, avec amour :

Ainsi, toujours poussé vers de nouveaux rivages…

— Le progrès, Noë, le progrès, murmura le maître. Il se pencha

vers l’enfant qui avait ôté son capuchon et son béret. Sa main
dégagea des boucles un beau front lumineux mais serré aux
tempes, froncé près des sourcils sur une arête coupante et dure.
 — Il est fait pour tout comprendre, ce petit, dit-il au jeune homme
à voix basse.
— Pour ça, c’est sûr ; reste le caractère ; et là, dame, je vous
assure qu’il n’est pas de droit fil.
— Ah ? fit le maître pensif.
— Et puis, comment vous dire ? Ce gosse-là c’est presque
effrayant comme il ne pense qu’au sérieux. Il a tout le temps l’air de
faire des expériences. Il va, il vient, mais toujours il calcule et il vous
a des réflexions qui vous tournent quartier. Plus de nœuds que de
bois sain je vous dis.
— A quoi paraît-il plus particulièrement s’intéresser ? A quoi
songe-t-il ?
— Difficile à dire, pour moi qui ne réfléchis pas à vos affaires
d’esprit. Mais enfin, je ne mentirai pas, au moins que je croie, si je
vous disais qu’il me fait l’effet de ne pas guère penser à autre chose
qu’au profit ; au profit et aux moyens d’avoir du profit.
Le père Lazare qui regardait l’enfant releva la tête :
— Que c’est grave, que c’est grave. Il faut que j’y songe à tout
cela… Mais attends encore. Je vais maintenant m’occuper de tout
ce petit monde. En attendant, installe l’enfant à quelqu’une de ces
tables, n’importe où ; le rang est provisoire.
Il quitta le jeune homme ; dans le groupe des parents qu’il
connaissait à peu près tous il s’attarda encore un instant cependant
que les écoliers achevaient de se placer suivant leurs préférences.
Enfin, il gagna la chaire et il se fit peu à peu le silence.
— Je vais, dit-il, mes enfants, vous demander de vous lever l’un
après l’autre. Chacun de vous me donnera son nom afin que je
grave dans ma mémoire les traits qui répondent à tous ces livrets
que m’ont apportés vos parents. Ne soyez pas intimidés et parlez-
moi tout bonnement, comme à un ami que vous connaîtriez depuis
longtemps.
Une trentaine d’écoliers répondirent d’une voix coupée par
l’émotion. Noë fut frappé du nombre de noms étrangers qui
blessaient son oreille au passage, Schalom, Hirschbein, Alheihem,
Schapiro, Ionah, Mandelé, Pérès, Mocher, Séforim… Et, venue il ne
savait d’où, une image de Ghetto médiéval s’imposa à ses yeux puis
se dégrada peu à peu pour reprendre les couleurs familières de la
rue des Rosiers. Il eut, un instant, le souci de la race et de la patrie ;
la calèche de Bansperger, d’une copieuse volée de fange,
l’éclaboussa au plus bleu de l’âme ; il en ressentit presque une
douleur physique. Autour de lui, à voix basse, des personnages en
lévite et en caftan parlaient et multipliaient les sourires, les clins
d’yeux, précipitaient une mimique inconnue de l’occident.
— Ces gens-là aiment la France, se dit-il pour se rassurer,
puisqu’ils viennent y vivre.
Il écouta, mais les étrangers parlaient yiddisch.
— En tous cas leurs enfants parleront français ; ils seront
Français. » Mais la calèche de Bansperger passait encore contre lui,
il fit un pas de côté pour l’éviter.
— Je rêve debout et éveillé, ça n’est pas ordinaire, grommela-t-il,
et je radote. J’ai le comprenoir mal affûté ce matin, faudra donner de
la voie.
Pourtant, se rappelant encore l’incident du chemin, comme la
réflexion de son neveu lui revenait à la mémoire, de nouveau il se
sentit pincé au cœur.
— Si nous n’avons que cette graine pour reprendre l’Alsace…
Le père Lazare interrogeait justement l’enfant ; debout, d’une voix
nette et tranquille, son beau visage mat sous les boucles brunes
tourné vers le maître, le petit Rabevel répondait sans l’ombre de
timidité ni d’arrogance.
— Il est né bon, se disait le maître, il est évidemment né bon
comme tous les êtres, mais il a dû être mal conduit… Un enfant
élevé sans père ni mère… Pourtant ses oncles sont de si braves
gens.
L’enfant se rassit. Il n’avait pas eu un regard pour ses voisins. Il
examinait la grande salle, les murs recouverts d’images
pédagogiques, les tableaux luisants comme des eaux profondes au
bord des rives de craie, les rayons chargés de livres qui recélaient
un formidable inconnu et enfin ce maître jugé quelques minutes
auparavant sans indulgence et où déjà il devinait une puissance.
Puissance encore occulte, amie ou ennemie, il ne savait ; il ne se le
demandait pas tout-à-fait ; un obscur instinct triple de force, de ruse
et de possession commandait l’observation. Les yeux grand ouverts,
toute l’attention de son jeune esprit appliquée à comprendre, il
écoutait la voix de ce vieil homme dont on lui avait dit qu’il lui
donnerait ce qui était l’essentiel de la vie.
— Mes enfants, poursuivait le maître d’une voix infiniment douce
tant s’y reflétait la sérénité du cœur, maintenant je vous connais
tous. Vous voici autour de moi pour apprendre, c’est-à-dire pour
devenir des hommes bons et forts. Quelques-uns d’entre vous sont
nés dans des pays étrangers mais ils sont en France et seront
Français, citoyens du premier des pays libres ; ils y vivront utiles,
respectés, aimés de tous. Vous êtes des petits enfants du peuple
mais vous savez que vous pouvez espérer en la République. Vous
pouvez devenir ce qu’il vous plaira de devenir. Enfants du peuple,
vous pourrez commander un régiment, conduire un cuirassé, devenir
banquiers, notaires, armateurs, députés, ministres. La République
aime pareillement tous ses fils, juifs ou chrétiens, nobles ou
roturiers, pauvres ou riches. Il s’agit pour vous d’être persévérants et
laborieux. Et chacun, suivant son intelligence, arrivera, sans que rien
au monde puisse l’arrêter, à la place digne de lui. Ainsi, mes petits
enfants, travaillez, travaillez de tout votre cœur, non pas seulement
pour contenter vos parents et votre maître qui déjà vous aime tous,
mais pour assurer votre avenir.
Bernard avalait goulûment ces paroles dont beaucoup lui
demeuraient étrangères mais dont le sens général ne lui échappait
pas. Il se sentait né premier, au-dessus de tous, et brûlait déjà d’en
donner les preuves. Et cette République dont les oncles ne
cessaient de parler, elle devait donc l’aider ? Mais le préférerait-elle ?
Oui, le maître disait qu’elle aimait pareillement tous ses enfants.
D’abord, quels enfants ? Lui-même n’avait aucune mère, il le savait
bien. Ensuite on préfère toujours quelqu’un. Allons, on n’allait pas lui
dire le contraire, à lui, Bernard, à dix ans ! Pourtant…
Il regarda à la dérobée ses voisins. Puis s’adressant à l’un d’eux,
un petit garçon de mine timide, aux yeux candides et tout rêveurs, il
lui demanda son nom : François Régis, répondit l’enfant.
— As-tu compris tout ce qu’il a dit, le maître ?
— Pas tout. Mais je sais ce que c’est qu’un armateur, dit le petit
garçon tout fier.
Bernard fut blessé de cette supériorité.
— Moi aussi, fit-il sèchement. Et, ayant proféré son mensonge, il
se tourna vers son autre voisin qui les observait. Celui-là s’appelait
Abraham Blinkine ; il montrait un visage souffreteux, prématurément
ridé ; des boutons blancs gonflaient son cou. Il regarda un instant
Bernard de ses yeux mi-fermés, luisants d’une intelligence acérée,
héritée d’une civilisation vieille de millénaires. Quand le petit
Rabevel lui demanda à lui aussi s’il avait tout compris, il ne dit rien,
haussant les épaules. Bernard, perplexe, baissait les yeux, mais,
comme il les relevait à l’improviste, il surprit dans ceux d’Abraham
une telle expression de finesse qu’il sentit, comme en un choc, que
si le petit camarade n’avait rien dit c’était uniquement afin de ne pas
le blesser par l’étalage d’une supériorité. Et, dans cet égard dont il
n’aurait pas eu l’idée lui-même vis-à-vis d’un autre, il devina une
ampleur telle, une puissance au regard de laquelle il se sentait si
petit, que son humiliation fit remonter une boule amère dans sa
gorge. Il serra sa langue entre ses dents pour ne pas crier.
Cependant le père Lazare annonçait qu’il remettait en liberté
« ses jeunes étourneaux » et que la véritable classe commencerait le
lendemain matin. Puis il fit ses dernières recommandations, donna
tous les renseignements utiles pour l’achat des livres et descendit de
sa chaire.
— Venez donc dîner avec nous, demanda Noë comme il le
rejoignait. Cela fera plaisir à tout le monde.
— Je ne dis pas non, dit le régent, laisse-moi le temps de devenir
un peu plus « reluisant… »
 Il avait prononcé le mot sans regarder Bernard ; mais celui-ci,
bien qu’il eût entendu, ne rougit point. Seul, un mouvement de la
mâchoire et qui décelait de la colère et non de la confusion, fit
trembler légèrement sa joue.
Le père Lazare prit l’escalier ; l’enfant s’assit au pupitre qui lui
était destiné et, avec beaucoup d’attention, l’examina de tous côtés ;
puis il l’ouvrit, fit, à plusieurs reprises, jouer les gonds ; s’étant
aperçu tout-à-coup qu’il manquait une vis à l’une des charnières, il
se mit en devoir d’en retirer une du pupitre voisin. Mais à peine l’eut-
il retirée qu’il s’arrêta comme interdit. Il fit la moue, eut un
imperceptible mouvement d’impatience contre lui-même comme s’il
déplorait sa propre sottise et remit la vis qu’il venait d’enlever ; puis,
ayant avisé à quelques tables plus loin un autre pupitre, il mena
cette fois son opération jusqu’au bout.
Noë qui, feignant de lire un journal, avait suivi son manège se
demandait s’il devait admirer l’attention, la précision, la minutie et
l’adresse de l’enfant, s’étonner de sa rare prudence ou essayer
d’inculquer une idée de scrupule à une nature qui témoignait d’une
parfaite et si calme absence de sens moral. Il l’appela, mais Bernard
sembla ne pas entendre. « Il me boude, se dit le jeune homme,
parce qu’il a reçu de moi cette première gifle » ; et il se sentit
attendri ; ce serait la dernière, bien sûr ; comment un tel mouvement
d’humeur avait-il pu lui échapper ? Il voulut faire la paix avec le petit
sauvage ; il l’appela de nouveau ; mais l’enfant, levant enfin la tête et
le regardant fixement, lui montra de tels yeux, et si chargés de
haine, qu’il redouta l’avenir.
Le maître d’école descendait à ce moment. Ils sortirent tous trois.
— Voilà le temps qui s’est remis au beau, dit le père Lazare. Il est
cinq heures et ton après-midi est perdue et bien perdue, mon petit
Noë. Alors, si tu veux, nous allons prendre le chemin des écoliers.
— Bah ! répondit le jeune homme, il faut que je passe tout de
même chez nous pour avertir de votre arrivée…
— Oui, et que ta mère et ta belle-sœur se mettent en cuisine ?
Non, mon petit, rien de tout ça. Combien êtes-vous à table ?
 — Mes parents, mon frère et sa femme, Bernard et moi ; cela fait
six.
— Eh bien ! quand il y en a pour six il y en a pour sept… Si tu
veux, nous allons prendre la rue de Rivoli jusqu’au Châtelet et nous
ferons tout le tour par la Cité et l’île Saint-Louis pour reprendre la rue
des Rosiers par l’autre bout. Cela te va à toi, petit Bernard ?
— Oui, Monsieur, répondit l’enfant d’une voix sans nuance.
— Alors, passe devant comme un homme, pour voir si tu ne te
tromperas pas de chemin.
Quand Bernard eut pris quelque avance, le maître qui le
regardait marcher et jugeait cette démarche forte et sûre, cette
foulée sans distraction, se tourna vers Noë.
— Vois-tu ce qui le distingue des autres dans son allure, cet
enfant ? C’est qu’il n’applique son attention qu’à bon escient. Il ne
fait point le badaud devant tout, il n’est pas non plus indifférent à
tout, mais il discerne parfois un objet digne d’être observé et alors il
s’arrête ; il enregistre et il mûrit. Tu as dû remarquer cela
fréquemment.
Noë avoua qu’il n’avait jamais prêté attention à la chose. Quand il
sortait avec son neveu il ne s’en occupait guère, étant toujours
pressé lui-même et il laissait courir le petit derrière lui.
— Tu as tort ; il faut gagner la confiance de ces jeunes êtres pour
les guider et il faut les observer sans relâche ; c’est très important ;
une promenade comme celle-ci peut suffire à se faire une idée du
caractère de cet enfant. Regarde-le. Il s’est déjà arrêté devant la
devanture d’un bijoutier ; et le voici devant celle d’un changeur,
justement le père de son voisin, le petit Blinkine ; de toute évidence il
ne peut comprendre ce qu’il y a dans cette vitrine ni ce qui peut se
vendre et s’acheter dans cette boutique ; mais il s’y intéresse. Vois à
présent comme il passe dédaigneusement devant ce petit bazar à
jouets. Si, il s’arrête ; il examine les bateaux, les chemins de fer.
Qu’en ferons-nous ? Un navigateur, ou un mécanicien ? ou un
géographe ? car il s’arrête aussi devant les cartes de l’armateur
Bordes ; le petit François Régis pourra le piloter, c’est le cas de le