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 LIBRARY 
 
 WNrVERSlTY OF 
 
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 UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 SAN DIEGO 
 
 in memory of 
 
 Ruth B. Harris 
 (Mrs. Seymour E. Harris)
 
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 Honore De Balzac 
 
 Introductions by 
 
 GEORGE SAINTSBURY 
 
 VOLUME ONE 
 
 HONORS DE BALZAC 
 
 COUSIN PONS 
 
 AT THE SIGN OF THE CAT 
 AND RACKET 
 
 NEW YORK 
 THE REVIEW OF REVIEWS CO. 
 
 ....^^.^..^.^.^^^mMmE^:^ 
 
 li.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 COUSIN PONS 
 
 AT THE SIGN OF THE CAT AND RACKET
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 " Sans genie, je suis flambe! " 
 
 Volumes/ almost libraries, have been written about 
 Balzac ; and perhaps of very few writers, putting aside 
 the three or four greatest of all, is it so difficult to 
 select one or a few short phrases which will in any way 
 denote them, much more sum them up. Yet the five words 
 quoted above, which come from an early letter to his sister 
 when as yet he had not " found his way," characterize him, I 
 think, better than at least some of the volumes I have read 
 about him, and supply, when they are properly understood, 
 the most valuable of all keys and companions for his com- 
 prehension. 
 
 " If I have not genius, it is all up Vv^ith me ! " A very 
 matter-of-fact person may say : " Why ! there is nothing 
 wonderful in this. Everybody knows that genius is wanted 
 to make a name in literature, and most people think they 
 have it." But this would be a little short-sighted, and only 
 excusable because of the way in which the word " genius " is 
 too commonly bandied about. As a matter of fact, there is 
 not so very much genius in the world; and a great deal of 
 more than fair performance is attainable and attained by 
 more or less decent allowances or exhibitions of talent. In 
 prose, more especially, it is possible to gain a very high 
 place, and to deserve it, without any genius at all: 
 though it is difficult, if not impossible, to do so in verse. 
 
 ^ This general introduction attempts to deal chiefly, if not solely, with 
 Balzac's life, and with the great characteristics of his work and genius. 
 Particular books and special exemplifications of that genius will be only 
 incidentally referred to in it; more detailed criticism as well as a sum- 
 mary of the bibliographical information, which is often so interesting 
 and sometimes so important in Balzac's case, being reserved for the 
 prefaces or notes to the various novels of the series. I have, however, 
 attempted, while making these short prefaces or introductions inde- 
 pendently intelligible and sufficient, to link them to each other and 
 to this general essay, so that the whole may present a sufficient study 
 of Balzac and a sufficient commentary on his work.
 
 2 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 But what Balzac felt (whether he was conscious in detail of 
 the feeling or not) when he used these words to his sister 
 Laure, what his critical readers must feel when they have 
 read only a very little of his work, what they must feel still 
 more strongly when they have read that work as a whole — 
 is that for him there was no such door of escape and no such 
 compromise. He had the choice by his nature, his aims, his 
 capacities, of being a genius or nothing. He had no little 
 gifts, and he was even destitute of some of the separate and 
 divisible great ones. In mere writing, mere style, he was 
 not supreme ; one seldom or never derives from anything of 
 his the merely artistic satisfaction given by perfect prose. 
 His humor, except of the grim and gigantic kind, was not 
 remarkable ; his wit, for a Frenchman, curiously thin and 
 small. The minor felicities of the literature generally were 
 denied to him. Sans genie, il etait flambe; flambe as he 
 seemed to be, and very reasonably seemed, to his friends when 
 as yet the genius had not come to him, and when he was 
 desperately striving to discover where his genius lay in 
 those wondrous works which " Lord R'Hoone," and " Horace 
 de Saint Aubin," and others obligingly fathered for 
 him. 
 
 It must be the business of these introductions to give what 
 assistance they may to discover where it did lie ; it is only 
 necessary, before taking up the task in the regular biograph- 
 ical and critical way of the introductory cicerone, to make 
 two negative observations. It did not lie, as some have ap- 
 parently thought, in the conception, or the outlining, or the 
 filling up of such a scheme as the Comedie Humame. In the 
 fir^'. place the work of every great writer, of the creative 
 kind, including that of Dante himself, is a comedie humame. 
 All humanity is latent in every human being; and the great 
 writers are merely those who call most of it out of latency 
 and put it actually on the stage. And, as students of Balzac 
 know, the scheme and adjustment of his comedy varied so 
 remarkably as time went on that it can hardly be said to 
 have even in its latest form (which would pretty certainly 
 have been altered again) a distinct and definite character. Its 
 so-called scenes (cheap criticism may add and may add truly,
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 3 
 
 though not to much purpose) are even in the mass by no 
 means an exhaustive, and are, as they stand, a very " cross," 
 division of life; nor are they peopled by anything like an 
 exhaustive selection of personages. Nor again is Balzac's 
 genius by any means a mere vindication of the famous defi- 
 nition of that quality as an infinite capacity of taking pains. 
 That Balzac had that capacity — had it in a degree prob- 
 ably unequalled even by the dullest plodders on record — is 
 very well known ; is one of the best known things about him. 
 But he showed it for nearly ten years before the genius 
 came, and though no doubt it helped him when genius had 
 come, the two things are in his case, as in most, pretty suf- 
 ficiently distinct. What the genius itself was I must do my 
 best to indicate hereafter, always beseeching the reader to 
 remember that all genius is in its essence and quiddity in- 
 definable. You can no more get close to it than you can 
 get close to the rainbow, and your most scientific explana- 
 tion of it will always leave as much of the heart of the fact 
 unexplained as the scientific explanation of the rainbow 
 leaves of that. 
 
 Honore de Balzac was born at Tours on the 16th of May, 
 1799, in the same year which saw the birth of Heine, and 
 which therefore had the honor of producing perhaps the 
 most characteristic (I do not say the greatest) writers of 
 the nineteenth century in prose and verse respectively. The 
 family was a respectable one, though its right to the particle 
 which Balzac always carefully assumed, subscribing himself 
 (with dubious correctness, though the point is an argued 
 one) " de Balzac " was contested. And there appears to be 
 no proof of their connection with Jean Guez de Balzac, the 
 founder, as some will have him, of modern French prose, and 
 the contemporary and fellow-reformer of Malherbe.^ Bal- 
 zac's father, who, as the zac pretty surely indicates, was a 
 southerner and a native of Languedoc, was fifty-three years 
 old at the birth of his son, whose Christian name was selected 
 on the ordinary principle of accepting that of the saint on 
 
 ' Indeed, as the novelist pointed out with sufficient pertinence, his 
 earlier namesake had no hereditary right to the name at all, and merely 
 took it from some property.
 
 4i HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 whose day he was born. Balzac the elder had been a bar- 
 rister before the Revolution, but under it he obtained a post 
 in the commissariat, and rose to be head of that department 
 for a military division. His wife, who was much younger 
 than himself and who survived her son, is said to have pos- 
 sessed both beauty and fortune, and was evidently endowed 
 with the business faculties so common among Frenchwomen. 
 When Honore was born, the family had not long been estab- 
 lished at Tours, where Balzac the elder (besides his duties) 
 had a house and some land ; and this town continued to be 
 their headquarters till the novelist, who was the eldest of the 
 family, was about sixteen. He had two sisters (of whom 
 the elder, Laure, afterwards Madame Surville, was his first 
 confidante and his only authoritative biographer) and a 
 younger brother, who seems to have been, if not a scape- 
 grace, rather a burden to his friends, and who later went 
 abroad. 
 
 The eldest boy was, in spite of Rousseau, put out to nurse, 
 and at seven years old was sent to the Oratorian grammar- 
 school at Vendome, where he stayed another seven years, 
 going through, according to his own account, the future 
 experiences and performances of Louis Lambert, but making 
 no reputation for himself in the ordinary school course. If, 
 however, he would not work in his teacher's way, he over- 
 worked himself in his own by devouring books ; and was sent 
 home at fourteen in such a state of health that his grand- 
 mother (who, after the French fashion, was living with her 
 daughter and son-in-law), ejaculated: " Voila done comme le 
 college nous renvoie les jolis enfants que nous lui envoyons! " 
 It would seem indeed that, after making all due allowance 
 for grandmotherly and sisterly partiality, Balzac was 
 actually a very good-looking boy and young man, though 
 the portraits of him in later life may not satisfy the more 
 romantic expectations of his admirers. He must have had 
 at all times eyes full of character, perhaps the only feature 
 that never fails in men of intellectual eminence; but he 
 certainly does not seem to have been in his manhood either 
 exactly handsome or exactly (to use a foolish-sounding term 
 which yet has no exact equivalent of better sound) " distin-
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 5 
 
 gulshed-looklng." But the portraits of the middle of the 
 century are, as a rule, rather wanting in this characteristic 
 when compared with those of its first and last periods ; and 
 I cannot think of many that quite come up to one's expecta- 
 tions. 
 
 For a short time he was left pretty much to himself, and 
 recovered rapidly. But late in 1814 a change of official duties 
 removed the Balzacs to Paris, and when they had established 
 themselves in the famous old bourgeois quarter of the Marais, 
 Honore was sent to divers private tutors or private schools 
 till he had " finished his classes " in 1816 at the age of 
 seventeen and a half. Then he attended lectures at the Sor- 
 bonne, where Villemain, Guizot, and Cousin were lecturing, 
 and heard them, as his sister tells us, enthusiastically, though 
 there are probably no three writers of any considerable 
 repute in the history of French literature who stand further 
 apart from Balzac. For all three made and kept their fame 
 by spirited and agreeable generalizations and expatiations, 
 as different as possible from the savage labor of observation 
 on the one hand and the gigantic developments of imagina- 
 tion on the other, which were to compose Balzac's appeal. 
 His father destined him for the law ; and for three years 
 more he dutifully attended the offices of an attorney and a 
 notary, besides going through the necessary lectures and 
 examinations. All these trials he seems to have passed, if not 
 brilliantly, yet sufficiently. 
 
 And then came the inevitable crisis, which was of an un- 
 usually severe nature. A notary, who was a friend of the 
 elder Balzac's and owed him some gratitude, offered not 
 merely to take Honore into his office, but to allow him to suc- 
 ceed to his business, which was a very good one, in a few 
 years on very favorable terms. Most fathers, and nearly all 
 French fathers, would have jumped at this; and it so hap- 
 pened that about the same time M. de Balzac was under- 
 going that unpleasant process of compulsory retirement 
 which his son has described in one of the best passages of the 
 CEuvres de Jeunesse, the opening scene of Argow le Pirate. 
 It does not appear that Honore had revolted during his pro- 
 bation — indeed, he is said, and we can easily beUeve it from
 
 6 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 ■his books, to have acquired a very solid knowledge of law, 
 especially in bankruptcy matters, of which he was himself 
 to have a very close shave in future. A solicitor, indeed, told 
 Laure de Balzac that he found Cesar Birotteau a kind of 
 Balzac on Bankruptcy; but this may have been only the 
 solicitor's fun. 
 
 It was no part of Honore's intentions to use this knowl- 
 edge — however content he had been to acquire it — in the 
 least interesting, if nearly the most profitable, of the 
 branches of the legal profession ; and he protested eloquently, 
 and not unsuccessfully, that he would be a man of letters and 
 nothing else. Not unsuccessfully ; but at the same time with 
 distinctly qualified success. He was not turned out of doors ; 
 nor were the supplies, as in Quinet's case only a few months 
 later, absolutely withheld even for a short time. But his 
 mother (who seems to have been less placable than her hus- 
 band) thought that cutting them down to the lowest point 
 might have some effect. So, as the family at this time 
 (April 1819) left Paris for a house some twenty miles out of 
 it, she established her eldest son in a garret furnished in the 
 most Spartan fashion, with a starvation allowance and an 
 old woman to look after him. He did not literally stay in 
 this garret for the ten years of his astonishing and unparal- 
 leled probation ; but without too much metaphor it may be 
 said to have been his Wilderness, and his Wanderings in it to 
 have lasted for that very considerable time. 
 
 We know, in detail, very little of him during the period. 
 For the first years, between 1819 and 1822, we have a 
 good number of letters to Laure; between 1822 and 1829, 
 when he first made his mark, very few. He began of course 
 with verse, for which he never had the slightest vocation, 
 and almost equally of course with a tragedy. But by 
 degrees, and apparently pretty soon, he slipped into what 
 was his vocation, and like some, though not very many, 
 great writers, at first did little better in it than if it had 
 not been his vocation at all. The singular tentatives which, 
 after being allowed for a short time a sort of outhouse in the 
 structure of the Comedie Humaine, were excluded from the 
 octavo Edition Definitive five-and-twenty years ago, have
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 7 
 
 never been the object of that exhaustive bibliographical and 
 critical attention which has been bestowed on those which fol- 
 low them. They were not absolutely unproductive — we hear of 
 sixty, eighty, a hundred pounds being paid for them, though 
 whether this was the amount of Balzac's always sanguine 
 expectations, or hard cash actually handed over, we cannot 
 say. They were very numerous, though the reprints spoken 
 of above never extended to more than ten. Even these have 
 never been widely read. The only person I ever knew till 
 I began this present task who had read them through was 
 the friend whom all his friends are now lamenting and are 
 not likely soon to cease to lament, Mr. Louis Stevenson ; and 
 when I once asked him whether, on his honor and conscience, 
 he could recommend me to brace myself to the same effort, he 
 said that on his honor and conscience he must most earn- 
 estly dissuade me. I gather, though I am not sure, that 
 Mr. Wedmore, the latest writer in English on Balzac at 
 any length, had not read them through when he wrote. 
 
 Now I have, and a most curious study they are. Indeed 
 I am not sorry, as Mr. Wedmore thinks one would be, to 
 have been for my sins compelled to read them. Nay more, 
 I should have been really sorry if this or some other occasion 
 had not imposed upon me this particular punishment of 
 the sinner. They are curiously, interestingly, almost 
 enthrallingly bad. Couched for the most part in a kind 
 of Radcliffian or Monk-Lewisian vein — perhaps studied more 
 directly from Maturin (of whom Balzac was a great ad- 
 mirer) than from either — they often begin with and some- 
 tim.es contain at intervals passages not unlike the Balzac 
 that we know. The attractive title of Jane la Pale (it was 
 originally called, with a still more Early Romantic avidity 
 for baroque titles, W ann-Chlore ) has caused it, I believe, 
 to be more commonly read than any other. I know at 
 least three if not four people in England who claim acquain- 
 tance with it. It deals with a disguised duke, a villainous 
 Italian, bigamy, a surprising offer (which I wish Balzac 
 had had the courage to represent as accepted and carried 
 out) of the angelic first wife to submit to a sort of double 
 arrangement, the death of the second wife and first love,
 
 8 HONOEE DE BALZAC 
 
 and a great many other things. Argow le Fir ate opens 
 quite decently and in order with that story of the employe 
 which Balzac was to re-handle so often, but drops suddenly 
 into brigands stopping diligences, the marriage of the 
 heroine Annette with a retired pirate marquis of vast wealth, 
 the trial of the latter for murdering another marquis with 
 a poisoned fish-bone scarfpin, his execution, the sanguinary 
 reprisals by his redoubtable lieutenant, and a finale of 
 blunderbusses, fire, devoted peasant girl with retrousse nose, 
 and almost every possible tremhlement. 
 
 Ill strictness, mention of this should have been preceded 
 by mention of Le Vicaire des Ardennes, which is a sort of 
 first part of Argow le Pirate, and not only gives an account 
 of his crimes, early history, and manners (which seem to 
 have been a little robustious for such a mild-mannered man 
 as Annette's husband), but tells a thrilling tale of the loves 
 of the vicaire himself and a young woman, which loves are 
 crossed, first by the belief that they are brother and sister, 
 and secondly by the vicaire having taken orders under tliis 
 delusion. La Derniere Fee is the queerest possible cross 
 between an actual fairy story a la Nodier and a history of 
 the fantastic and inconstant loves of a great English lady, 
 the Duchess of " Sommerset " ( a piece of actual scandalum 
 magnatum nearly as bad as Balzac's cool use in his acknowl- 
 edged work of the title " Lord Dudley "). This book begins 
 so well that one expects it to go on better ; but the inevitable 
 defects in craftsmanship show themselves before long. Le 
 Centenaire connects itself with Balzac's almost lifelong 
 hankering after the recJierche de Vabsolu in one form or 
 another, for the hero is a wicked old person who every now 
 and then refreshes his hold on life by immolating a virgin 
 under a copper bell. It is one of the most extravagant and 
 *' Monk-Lewisy " of the whole. L' Excommunie, L Israelite, 
 and L^Herificre de Birague are mediseval or fifteenth cen- 
 tury tales of the most luxuriant kind, UExcommvnie being 
 the best, L'Israelite the most preposterous, and L'Heritiere 
 de Birague the dullest. But it is not nearly so dull as Dom 
 Gigadus and Jean Louis, the former of which deals with 
 the end of the seventeenth century and the latter with
 
 HONOEE DE BALZAC 9" 
 
 the end of the eighteenth. These are both as nearly un- 
 readable as anything can be. One interesting thing, how- 
 ever, should be noted in much of this early work: the affec- 
 tionate clinging of the author to the scenery of Touraine, 
 which sometimes inspires him with his least bad passages. 
 
 It is generally agreed that these singular (Euvres de 
 Jeunesse were of service to Balzac as exercises, and no 
 doubt they were so; but I think something may be said 
 on the other side. They must have done a little, if not 
 much, to lead him into and confirm him in those defects of 
 style and form wliich distinguish him so remarkably from 
 most writers of his rank. It very seldom happens when a 
 very young man writes very much, be it book-writing or 
 journalism, without censure and without " editing," that he 
 does not at the same time get into loose and slipshod habits. 
 And I think we may set down to this peculiar form of 
 apprenticeship of Balzac's not merely his failure ever to 
 attain, except in passages and patches, a thoroughly great 
 style, but also that extraordinary method of composition 
 which in after days cost him and his publishers so much 
 money. 
 
 However, if these ten years of probation taught him his 
 trade, they taught him also a most unfortunate avocation 
 or by-trade, which he never ceased to practice, or to try 
 to practice, which never did him the very least good, and 
 which not unfrequently lost him much of the not too abun- 
 dant gains which he earned with such enormous labor. 
 This was the " game of speculation." His sister puts the 
 tempter's part on an unknown " neighbor," who advised 
 him to try to procure independence by une bonne speculation. 
 Those who have read Balzac's books and his letters will 
 hardly think that he required much tempting. He began 
 by trying to publish — an attempt which has never yet 
 succeeded with a single man of letters, so far as I can remem- 
 ber. His scheme was not a bad one, indeed it was one which 
 has brought much money to other pockets since, being 
 neither more nor less than the issuing of cheap one-volume 
 editions of French classics. But he had hardly any capital ; 
 he was naturally quite ignorant of his trade, and as nat-
 
 10 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 urally the established publishers and booksellers boycotted 
 him as an intruder. So his Moliere and his La Fontaine are 
 said to have been sold as waste paper, though if any copies 
 escaped they would probably fetch a very comfortable price 
 now. Then, such capital as he had having been borrowed, 
 the lender, either out of good nature or avarice, determined 
 to throw the helve after the hatchet. He partly advanced 
 himself and partly induced Balzac's parents to advance more, 
 in order to start the young man as a printer, to which busi- 
 ness Honore himself added that of typefounder. The story 
 was just the same: knowledge and capital were again want- 
 ing, and though actual bankruptcy was avoided, Balzac 
 got out of the matter at the cost not merely of giving the 
 two businesses to a friend (in whose hands they proved 
 profitable), but of a margin of debt from which he may be 
 said never to have fully cleared himself. 
 
 He had more than twenty years to live, but he never cured 
 himself of this hankering after une honne speculation. 
 Sometimes it was ordinary stock-exchange gambling ; but his 
 special weakness was, to do him justice, for schemes that 
 had something more grandiose in them. Thus, to finish here 
 with the subject, though the chapter of it never actually 
 finished till his death, he made years afterwards, when he 
 was a successful and a desperately busy author, a long, 
 troublesome, and costly journey to Sardinia to carry out 
 a plan of re-smelting the slag from Roman and other mines 
 there. Thus in his very latest days, when he was living at 
 Vierzschovnia with the Hanska and Mniszech household, he 
 conceived the magnificently absurd notion of cutting down 
 twenty thousand acres of oak wood in the Ukraine, and 
 sending it hy railway right across Europe to be sold in 
 France. And he was rather reluctantly convinced that by 
 the time a single log reached its market the freight would 
 have eaten up the value of a whole plantation. 
 
 It was perhaps not entirely chance that the collapse of 
 the printing scheme which took place in 1827, the ninth 
 year of the Wanderings in the Wilderness, coincided with 
 or immediately preceded the conception of the book which 
 was to give Balzac passage into the Promised Land. This
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 11 
 
 was Les Chouans, called at its first issue, which diflPered con- 
 siderably from the present form, Le Dernier Chouan ou la 
 Bret ague en 1800 (later 1799). It was pubhshed in 1829 
 without any of the previous anagrammatic pseudonyms ; and 
 whatever were the reasons which had induced him to make 
 his bow in person to the public, they were well justified, for 
 the book was a distinct success, if not a great one. It 
 occupies a kind of middle position between the melo-dramatic 
 romance of his nonage and the strictly analytic romance- 
 novel of his later time; and, though dealing with war and 
 love chiefly, inclines in conception distinctly to the latter. 
 Corentin, Hulot, and other personages of the actual Comedy 
 (then by no means planned or at least avowed) appear; and 
 though the influence of Scott is in a way paramount ^ on 
 the surface, the under-work is quite different, and the whole 
 scheme of the loves of Montauran and Mademoiselle de Ver- 
 neuil is pure Balzac. 
 
 It would seem as if nothing but this sun of popular 
 approval had been wanted to make Balzac's genius burst out 
 in full bloom. Although we have a fair number of letters 
 for the ensuing years, it is not very easy to make out the 
 exact sequence of production of the marvelous harvest which 
 his genius gave. It is sufficient to say that in the three years 
 following 1829 there were actually published the Fhysiologie 
 dii Manage, the charming story of La Maison du Chat- 
 qid-Pelote, the Peau de Chagrin, the most original and 
 splendid, if not the most finished and refined of all Balzac's 
 books, most of the short Contes Philosophiques, of which some 
 
 ^Balzac was throughout his life a fervent admirer of Sir Walter, 
 and I think Mr. Wedmore, in his passage on the subject, distinctly 
 undervalues both the character and the duration of this esteem. Balzac 
 was far too acute to commit the common mistalce of thinliing Scott 
 superficial— men who know mankind are not often blind to each other s 
 knowledge. And while Mr. Wedmore seems not to know any testimony 
 later than Balzac's thirty-eighth year, it is in his forty-sixth, when all 
 his own best work was done, except the Parents Pauvres, that he 
 contrasts Dumas with Scott, saying that on relit Walter Scott, and he 
 does not think anyone will re-read Dumas. This may be unjust to the 
 one writer, but it is conclusive as to any sense of "wasted time' 
 (his own phrase)^ having ever existed in Balzac's mind about the 
 other.
 
 12 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 are among their author's greatest triumphs, many other 
 stories (chiefly included in the Scenes de la Vie Privee) and 
 the beginning of the Contes Drolatiques.^ 
 
 But without a careful examination of his miscellaneous 
 work, which is very abundant and includes journalism as well 
 as books, it is almost as impossible to come to a just apprecia- 
 tion of Balzac as it is without reading the early works and the 
 letters. This miscellaneous work is all the m )re important be- 
 cause a great deal of it represents the ai list at quite ad- 
 vanced stages of his career, and because all its examples, the 
 earlier as well as the later, give us abundanc insight on him 
 as he was " making himself." The comparison with the early 
 work of Thackeray (in Punch, Frascr, and elsewhere) is so 
 striking that it can escape no one who Icnows the two. Every 
 now and then Balzac transferred bodily, or with slight alter 
 ations, passages from these experiments to his finished can 
 vases. It appears that he had a scheme for codifying his 
 *' Physiologies " (of which the notorious one aV Dve mer ioned 
 is only a catchpenn}'^ exemplar and very far from th best] 
 into a seriously organized work. Chance war ind or ) iten-j 
 tion was wise in not allowing him to do so ; but the value oi 
 the things for the critical reader is not less. Here are tale; 
 — extensions of the scheme and manner of the CEuvres di 
 Jeunesse, or attempts (not often happy) at the gogucnarc 
 story of 1830 — a thing for which Balzac's hand was hardl; 
 
 * No regular attempt will after this be made to indicate the date o 
 production of successive works, unless they connect themselves verl 
 distinctly with incidents in the life or with general critical observa[ 
 tions. At the end of this introduction will be found a full table o 
 the ComMie Humaine and the other works; while, as explained in th 
 first note, additional bibliographical information, as to dates an 
 otherwise, will be found in the introduction or short note to each stor; 
 It may perhaps be worth while to add here, that while the labors c 
 M. de Lovenjoul (to whom every writer on Balzac must acknowledge tl 
 deepest obligation) have cleared this matter up almost to the verj| 
 of possibility as regards the published works, there is little light to 1 
 thrown on the constant references in the letters to books which nev 
 appeared. Sometimes they are known, and they may often be suspecte 
 to have been absorbed into or incorporated with others; tlie rest mu 
 have been lost or destroyed, or which is not quite impossible, hai 
 existed chiefly in the form of project. Nearly a hundred titles of su 
 things are preserved.
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 13 
 
 light enough. Here are interesting evidences of striving 
 to be cosmopolitan and polyglot — ^the most interesting of all 
 of which, I think, is the mention of certain British products 
 as " mufflings." " Muffling " used to be a domestic joke for 
 " muffin " ; but whether some wicked Briton deluded Balzac 
 into the idea that it was the proper form or not it is impos- 
 sible to say. Here is a Traite de la Vie Elegante, inestimable 
 for certain critical purposes. So early as 1825 we find a 
 Code des Gens Honnetes, which exhibits at once the author's 
 legal studies and his constant attraction for the shady side 
 of business, and which contains a scheme for defrauding by 
 means of lead pencils, actually carried out (if we may believe 
 his exulting note) by some literary swindlers with unhappy 
 results. A year later he wrote a Dictionnaire des Enseignes 
 de Paris, which we are glad enough to have from the author 
 of the Chat-qui-Pelote ; but the persistence with which this 
 kind of miscellaneous writing occupied him could not be better 
 exemplified than by the fact that, of two important works 
 which closely follow this in the collected edition, the Physi- 
 ologie de I Employe dates from 1841 and the Monographie 
 de la Presse Parisienne from 1843. 
 
 It is well known that from the time almost of his success 
 as a novelist he was given, like too many successful novelists 
 (not like Scott), to rather undignified and foolish attacks on 
 critics. The explanation may or may not be found in the 
 fact that we have abundant critical work of his, and that 
 it is nearly all bad. Now and then we have an acute remark 
 in his own special sphere; but as a rule he cannot be com- 
 plimented on these performances, and when he was half way 
 through his career tliis critical tendency of his culminated in 
 the unlucky Revue Parisienne, which he wrote almost entirely 
 himself, with slight assistance from his friends, MM. de Bel- 
 loy and de Grammont. It covers a wide range, but the lit- 
 erary part of it is considerable, and this part contains that 
 memorable and disastrous attack on Sainte-Beuve, for which 
 the critic afterwards took a magnanimous revenge in his 
 obituary causerie. Although the thing is not quite unex- 
 ampled it is not easily to be surpassed in the blind fury of its 
 abuse. Sainte-Beuve was by no means invulnerable, and an
 
 14. HONORS DE BALZAC 
 
 anti-critic who kept his head might have found, as M. de 
 Pontmartin and others did find, the joints in his armor. But 
 when, apropos of the Port Royal more especially, and of the 
 other works in general, Balzac informs us that Sainte-Beuve's 
 great characteristic as a writer is Vennui, Vennui houeux 
 jusqu^a mi-jambe, that his style is intolerable, that his his- 
 torical handling is like that of Gibbon, Hume, and other 
 dull people, when he jeers at him for exhuming " La mere 
 Angelique," and scolds him for presuming to obscure the 
 glory of the Roi Soleil, the thing is partly ludicrous, partly 
 melancholy. One remembers that agreeable Bohemian, who 
 at a symposium once interrupted his host by crying, " Man 
 o' the hoose, gie us less o' yer clack and mair o' yer Jairman 
 wine ! " Only, in human respect and other, we phrase it : 
 *' Oh, dear M. de Balzac ! give us more Eugenie Grandets, 
 more Pere Goriots, more Peaux de Chagrin, and don't talk 
 about what you do not understand ! " 
 
 Balzac was a great politician also, and here, though he 
 may not have been much more successful, he talked with 
 more knowledge and competence. He must have given him- 
 self immense trouble in reading the papers, foreign as well as 
 French ; he had really mastered a good deal of the political 
 religion of a French publicist. It is curious to read, sixty 
 years after date, his grave assertion that " La France a la 
 conquete de Madagascar a faire,^' and with certain very par- 
 donable defects (such as his Anglophobia), his politics may 
 be pronounced not unintelligent and not ungenerous, though 
 somewhat inconsistent and not very distinctly traceable to 
 any coherent theory. As for the Anglophobia, the English- 
 man who thinks the less of him for that must have very poor 
 and unhappy brains. A Frenchman who does not more or 
 less hate and fear England, an Englishman who does not 
 regard France with a more or less good-humored impatience, 
 is usually " either a god or a beast," as Aristotle saith. Bal- 
 zac began with an odd but not unintelligible compound, some- 
 thing like Hugo's, of Napoleonism and Royalism. In 1824, 
 when he was still in the shades of anonymity, he wrote and 
 published two by no means despicable pamphlets in favor of 
 Primos;eniture and the Jesuits, the latter of which was re-
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 15 
 
 printed in 1880 at the last Jesuitenhetze in France. His 
 Lettres sur Paris in 1830-31, and his La France et VEtran- 
 ger in 1836, are two considerable series of letters from 
 " Our Own Correspondent," handling the affairs of the 
 world with boldness and industry if not invariably with wis- 
 dom. They rather suggest (as does the later Revue Parisi- 
 enne still more) the political writing of the age of Anne 
 in England, and perhaps a little later, when " the wits " 
 handled politics and society, literature and things in gen- 
 eral with unquestioned competence and an easy uni- 
 versality. 
 
 His remaining works, the Physiologie du Mariage and 
 the Scenes de la Vie Conjugale, suffer not merely from the 
 most obvious of their faults but from defect of knowl- 
 edge. It may or may not be that marriage, in the 
 hackneyed phrase, is a net or other receptacle where 
 all the outsiders would be in, and all the insiders out. 
 But it is quite clear that Ccelebs cannot talk of it with 
 much authority. His state may or may not be the 
 more gracious: his judgment cannot but lack experience. 
 The " Theater," which brought its author little if any 
 profit, great annoyance, and a vast amount of trouble, 
 has been generally condemned by criticism. But the 
 Contes Drolatiques are not so to be given up. The famous 
 and splendid Succube is only the best of them, and though 
 all are more or less tarred with the brush which tars so 
 much of French literature, though the attempt to write in 
 an archaic style is at best a very successful tour de force, 
 and represents an expenditure of brain power by no means 
 justifiable on the part of a man who could have made so 
 much better use of it, they are never to be spoken of dis- 
 respectfully. Those who sneer at their " Wardour Street " 
 Old French are not usually those best qualified to do so ; 
 and it is not to be forgotten that Balzac was a real country- 
 man of Rabelais and a legitimate inheritor of Gauloiserie. 
 Unluckily no man can " throw back " in this way, except 
 now and then as a mere pastime. And it is fair to recol- 
 lect that as a matter of fact Balzac, after a year or two, 
 did not waste much more time on these things, and that the
 
 16 H0N0R:6 DE BALZAC 
 
 intended ten dizains never, as a matter of fact, went beyond 
 three. 
 
 Besides this work in books, pamphlets, etc., Balzac, as has 
 been said, did a certain amount of journalism, especially in 
 the Caricature, his performances including, I regret to saj', 
 more than one pufF of his own work ; and in this, as well as by 
 the success of the Chouans, he became known about 1830 to a 
 much wider circle, both of literary and of private acquain- 
 tance. It cannot indeed be said that he ever mixed much 
 in society ; it was impossible that he should do so, consider- 
 ing the vast amount of work he did and the manner in which 
 he did it. Tliis subject, like that of his speculations, may be 
 better finished off in a single passage than dealt with by scat- 
 tered indications here and there. He was not one of those 
 men who can do work by fits and starts in the intervals of 
 business or of amusement ; nor was he one who, like Scott, 
 could work very rapidly. It is true that he often achieved 
 immense quantities of work (subject to a caution to be given 
 presently) in a very few da3's, but then his working day was 
 of the most peculiar character. He could not bear disturb- 
 ance ; he wrote (as probably most people do) best at night, 
 and he could not work at all after heavy meals. His favorite 
 plan (varied sometimes in detail) was therefore to dine 
 lightly about five or six, then to go to bed and sleep till eleven, 
 twelve, or one, and then to get up, and with the help only of 
 coffee (which he drank very strong and in enormous quanti- 
 ties) to work for indefinite stretches of time into the morning 
 or afternoon of the next day. He speaks of a sixteen hours' 
 day as a not uncommon shift of work, and almost a regular 
 one with him ; and on one occasion he avers that in the course 
 of forty-eight hours he took but three of rest, working for 
 twenty-two hours and a half continuously on each side there- 
 of. In such spells, supposing reasonable facility of com- 
 position and mechanical power in the hand to keep going all 
 the time, an enormous amount can of course be accomplished. 
 A thousand words an hour is anything but an extraordinary 
 rate of writing, and fifteen hundred by no means unheard of 
 with persons who do not write rubbish. 
 
 The references to this subject in Balzac's letters are very
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 17 
 
 numerous ; but it is not easy to extract very definite informa- 
 tion from them. It would be not only impolite but incorrect 
 to charge him with unveracity. But the very heat of imagi- 
 nation which enabled him to produce his work created a sort 
 of mirage, through which he seems always to have regarded 
 it; and in writing to publishers, editors, creditors, and even 
 his own family, it was too obviously his interest to make the 
 most of his labor, his projects, and his performance. Even 
 his contemporary, though elder, Southey, the hardest-work- 
 ing and the most scrupulously honest man of letters in Eng- 
 land who could pretend to genius, seems constantly to have 
 exaggerated the idea of what he could perform, if not of what 
 he had performed in a given time. The most definite state- 
 ment of Balzac's that I remember is one which claims the 
 second number of Sur Catherine de Medicis, " La Confidence 
 des Ruggieri," as the production of a single night, and not 
 one of the most extravagant of his nights. Now " La Con- 
 fidence des Ruggieri " fills, in the small edition, eighty^ pages 
 of nearer four hundred than three hundred words each, or 
 some thirty thousand words in all. Nobody in the longest of 
 nights could manage that, except by dictating it to short- 
 hand clerks. But in the very context of this assertion Balzac 
 assigns a much longer period to the correction than to the 
 composition, and this brings us to one of the most curious and 
 one of the most famous points of his literary history. 
 
 Some doubts have, I believe, been thrown on the most 
 minute account of his ways of composition which we have, 
 that of the publisher Werdet. But there is too great a con- 
 sensus of evidence as to his general system to make the re- 
 ceived description of it doubtful. According to this, the first 
 draft of Balzac's work never presented it in anything like 
 fullness, and sometimes did not amount to a quarter of the 
 bulk finally published. This being returned to him from the 
 printer in " slip " on sheets with very large margins, he 
 would set to work on the correction ; that is to say on the 
 practical re-writing of the thing, with excisions, alterations, 
 and above all, additions. A " revise " being executed, he 
 would attack this revise in the same manner, and not un- 
 frequently more than once, so that the expenses of mere
 
 18 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 composition and correction of the press were enormously 
 heavy (so heavy as to eat into not merely his publisher's but 
 his own profits), and that the last state of the book, when 
 published, was something utterly different from its first state 
 in manuscript. And it will be obvious that if anything like 
 this was usual with him, it is quite impossible to judge his 
 actual rapidity of composition by the extent of the published 
 result. 
 
 However this may be (and it is at least certain that in the 
 years above referred to he must have worked his very hardest, 
 even if some of the work then published had been more or less 
 excogitated and begun during the Wilderness period), he 
 certainly so far left his eremitical habits as to become ac- 
 quainted with most of the great men of letters of the early 
 thirties, and also with certain ladies of more or less high rank, 
 who were to supply, if not exactly the full models, the texts 
 and starting-points for some of the most interesting figures 
 of the Comedie. He knew Victor Hugo, but certainly not 
 at this time intimately ; for as late as 1839 the letter in which 
 he writes to Hugo to come and breakfast with him at Les Jar- 
 dies (with interesting and minute directions how to find that 
 frail abode of genius) is couched in any tiling but the tone of 
 a familiar friendship. The letters to Beyle of about the same 
 date are also incompatible with intimate knowledge. Nodier 
 (after some contrary expressions) he seems to have regarded 
 as most good people did regard that true man of letters and 
 charming tale-teller ; while among the younger generation 
 Theophile Gautier and Charles de Bernard, as well as Gozlan 
 and others, were his real and constant friends. But he does 
 not figure frequently or eminently in any of the genuine gos- 
 sip of the time as a haunter of literary circles, and it is very 
 nearly certain that the assiduity with which some of his heroes 
 attend salons and clubs had no counterpart in his own life. 
 In the first place he was too busy ; in the second he would not 
 have been at home there. Like the young gentleman in 
 Punch, who " did not read books but wrote them," though in 
 no satiric sense, he felt it his business not to frequent society 
 but to create it. 
 
 He was, however, aided in the task of creation by the ladies
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 19 
 
 already spoken of, who were fairly numerous and of divers 
 degrees. The most constant after his sister Laure was that 
 sister's schoolfellow, Madame Zulma Carraud, the wife of a 
 military official at Angouleme and the possessor of a small 
 country estate at Frapesle, near Tours. At both of these 
 places Balzac, till he was a very great man, was a constant 
 visitor, and with Madame Carraud he kept up for years a 
 correspondence which has been held to be merely friendly, 
 and which was certainly in the vulgar sense innocent, but 
 which seems to me to be tinged with something of that feeling, 
 midway between love and f riendship^ which appears in Scott's 
 letters to Lady Abercorn, and which is probably not so rare 
 as some think. Madame de Berny, another family friend of 
 higher rank, was the prototype of most of his " angelic '* 
 characters, but she died in 1836. He knew the Duchesse 
 d'Abrantes, otherwise Madame Junot, and Madame de Girar- 
 din, otherwise Delphine Gay ; but neither seems to have exer- 
 cised much influence over him. It was different with another 
 and more authentic duchess, Madame de Castries, after whom 
 he dangled for a considerable time, who certainly first en- 
 couraged him and probably then snubbed him, and who is 
 thought to have been the model of his wickeder great ladies. 
 And it was comparatively early in the thirties that he met 
 the woman whom, after nearly twenty years, he was at last to 
 marry, getting his death in so doing, the Polish Madame 
 Hanska. These, with some relations of the last named, espe- 
 cially her daughter, and with a certain " Louise " — an In- 
 connue who never ceased to be so — were Balzac's chief cor- 
 respondents of the other sex, and as far as is known, his chief 
 friends in it. 
 
 About his life, without extravagant " padding " of guess- 
 work or of mere quotation and abstract of his letters, it 
 would be not so much difficult as impossible to say much ; and 
 accordingly it is a matter of fact that most lives of Balzac, 
 including all good ones, are rather critical than narrative. 
 From his real debut with Le Dernier Chouan to his departure 
 for Poland on the long visit, or brace of visits, from which 
 he returned finally to die, this life consisted solely of work. 
 One of his earliest utterances, " II faut piocher ferme" was
 
 20 HONOKE DE BALZAC 
 
 his motto to the very last, varied only by a certain amount of 
 traveling. Balzac was always a considerable traveler ; indeed 
 if he had not been so his constitution would probably have 
 broken down long before it actually did; and the expense of 
 these voyagings (though by his own account he generally con- 
 ducted his affairs with the most rigid economy), together 
 with the interruption to his work which they occasioned, en- 
 tered no doubt for something into his money difficulties. He 
 would go to Baden or Vienna for a day's sight of Madame 
 Hanska ; his Sardinian visit has been already noted ; and as a 
 specimen of others it may be mentioned that he once jour- 
 neyed from Paris to Besan9on, then from Besan^on right 
 across France to Angouleme, and then back to Paris on some 
 business of selecting paper for one of the editions of his books, 
 which his publishers would probably have done much better 
 and at much less expense. 
 
 Still his actual receipts were surprisingly small, partly, it 
 may be, owing to his expensive habits of composition, but far 
 more, according to his own account, because of the Belgian 
 piracies, from which all popular French authors suffered till 
 (I think) the government of Napoleon the Third managed 
 to put a stop to them. He also lived in such a thick atmo- 
 sphere of bills and advances and cross-claims on and by his 
 publishers, that even if there were more documents than there 
 are it would be exceedingly difficult to get at facts which are, 
 after all, not very important. He never seems to have been 
 paid much more than £500 for the newspaper publication 
 (the most valuable by far because the pirates could not in- 
 terfere with its profits) of any one of his novels. And to ex- 
 pensive fashions of composition and complicated accounts, a 
 steady back-drag of debt and the rest, must be added the 
 very delightful, and to a novelist not useless, but very ex- 
 pensive mania of the collector. Balzac had a genuine taste 
 for, and thought himself a genuine connoisseur in, pictures, 
 sculpture, and objects of art of all kinds, old and new; and 
 though prices in his day were not what they are in these, a 
 great deal of money must have run through his hands in this 
 way. He calculated the value of the contents of the house, 
 jvhich in his last days he furnished with such loving care for
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 21 
 
 his wife, and which turned out to be a chamber rather of 
 death than of marriage, at some £16,000. But part of this 
 was of Madame Hanska's own purchasing, and there were 
 offsets of indebtedness against it almost to the last. In short, 
 though during the last twenty years of his life such actual 
 " want of pence " as vexed him was not due, as it had been 
 earlier, to the fact that the pence refused to come in, but 
 only to imprudent management of them, it certainly cannot 
 be said that Honore de Balzac, the most desperately hard 
 worker in all literature for such time as was allotted him, and 
 perhaps the man of greatest genius who was ever a desper- 
 ately hard worker, falsified that most uncomfortable but 
 truest of proverbs — " Hard work never made money." 
 
 If, however, he was but scantily rewarded with the money 
 for which he had a craving (not absolutely, I think, devoid 
 of a touch of genuine avarice, but consisting chiefly of the 
 artist's desire for pleasant and beautiful things, and partly 
 presenting a variety or phase of the grandiose imagination, 
 which was his ruling characteristic), Balzac had plenty of 
 the fame for which he cared quite as much as he cared for 
 money. Perhaps no writer except Voltaire and Goethe earlier 
 made such a really European reputation ; and his books were 
 of a kind to be more widely read by the general public than 
 either Goethe's or Voltaire's. In England (Balzac liked our 
 literature but did not love us, and never came here, though 
 I believe he planned a visit) this popularity was, for obvious 
 reasons, rather less than elsewhere. The respectful vogue 
 which French literature had had among us in the eighteenth 
 century had ceased, owing partly to the national enmity re- 
 vived and fostered by the great war, and partly to the 
 growth of a fresh and magnificent literature at home during 
 the first thirty years of the nineteenth in England. But Bal- 
 zac could not fail to be read almost at once by the lettered; 
 and he was translated pretty early, though not perhaps to 
 any great extent. It was in England, moreover, that by far 
 his greatest follower appeared, and appeared very shortly. 
 For it would be absurd in the most bigoted admirer of Thack- 
 eray to deny that the author of Vanity Fair, who was in 
 Paris and narrowly watching French literature and French
 
 22 HONOEE DE BALZAC 
 
 life at the very time of Balzac's most exuberant flourishing 
 and education, owed something to the author of Le Fere 
 Goriot. There was no copying or imitation ; the lessons 
 taught by Balzac were too much blended with those of native 
 masters, such as Fielding, and too much informed and trans- 
 formed by individual genius. Some may think — it is a point 
 at issue not merely between Frenchmen and Englishmen, but 
 between good judges of both nations on each side — that in 
 absolute veracity and likeness to life, in limiting the operation 
 of the inner consciousness on the outward observation to 
 strictly artistic scale, Thackeray excelled Balzac as far as he 
 fell short of him in the powers of the seer and in the gigantic 
 imagination of the prophet. But the relations of pupil and 
 master in at least some degree are not, I think, deniable. 
 
 So things went on in light and in shade, in home-keeping 
 and in travel, in debts and in earnings, but always in work of 
 some kind or another, for eighteen years from the turning- 
 point of 1829. By degrees, as he gained fame and ceased to 
 be in the most pressing want of money, Balzac left off to some 
 extent, though never entirely, those miscellaneous writings — 
 reviews (including puffs), comic or general sketches, political 
 diatribes, " physiologies " and the like — which, with his dis- 
 carded prefaces and much other interesting matter, were at 
 last, not many years ago, included in four stout volumes of 
 the Edition D^nitive. With the exception of the Physiolo- 
 gies (a sort of short satiric analysis of this or that class, 
 character, or personage), which were very popular in th( 
 reign of Louis Philippe in France, and which Albert Smith 
 and others introduced into England, Balzac did not do any 
 of this miscellaneous work extremely well. Very shrewd ob- 
 servations are to be found in his reviews, for instance his in- 
 dication, in reviewing La Touche's Fragoletta, of that com- 
 mon fault of ambitious novels, a sort of woolly and " un- 
 graspable " looseness of construction and story, which con- 
 stantly bewilders the reader as to what is going on. But, as 
 a rule, he was thinking too much of his own work and his 
 own principles of working to enter very thoroughly into the 
 work of others. His politics, those of a moderate but decided 
 Royalist and Conservative, were, as has been said, intelligent
 
 HONORS DE BALZAC ^3 
 
 in theory, but in practice a little distinguished by that neg- 
 lect of actual business detail which has been noticed in his 
 speculations. 
 
 At last, in the summer of 1847, it seemed as if the Rachel 
 for whom he had served nearly if not quite the full fourteen 
 years already, and whose husband had long been out of the 
 way, would at last grant herself to him. He was invited to 
 Vierzschovnia in the Ukraine, the seat of Madame Hanska, 
 or in strictness of her son-in-law. Count Georges Mniszech; 
 and as the visit was apparently for no restricted period, and 
 Balzac's pretensions to the lady's hand were notorious, it 
 might have seemed that he was as good as accepted. But 
 to assume this would have been to mistake what perhaps the 
 greatest creation of Balzac's great English contemporary 
 and counterpart on the one side, as Thackeray was his con- 
 temporary and counterpart on the other, considered to be the 
 malignity of widows. What the reasons were which made 
 Madame Hanska delay so long in doing what she did at last, 
 and might just as well, it would seem, have done years before, 
 is not certainly known, and it would be quite unprofitable to 
 discuss them. But it was on the 8th of October 1847 that 
 Balzac first wrote to his sister from Vierzschovnia, and it 
 was not till the 14th of March 1850 that, " in the parish 
 church of Saint Barbara at Berditchef, by the Count Abbe 
 Czarski, representing the Bishop of Jitomir [this is as charac- 
 teristic of Balzac in one way as what follows is in another] 
 a Madame Eve de Balzac, born Countess Rzevuska, or a Ma- 
 dame Honore de Balzac or a Madame de Balzac the elder " 
 came into existence. 
 
 It does not appear that Balzac was exactly unhappy dur- 
 ing this huge probation, which was broken by one short visit 
 to Paris. The interest of uncertainty was probably much 
 for his ardent and unquiet spirit, and though he did very 
 little literary work for him, one may suspect that he would 
 not have done very much if he had stayed at Paris, for signs 
 of exhaustion, not of genius but of physical power, had shown 
 themselves before he left home. But it is not unjust or cruel 
 to say that by the delay " Madame Eve de Balzac " (her 
 actual baptismal name was Evelina) practically killed her
 
 24 * HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 husband. These winters in the severe climate of Russian 
 Poland were absolutely fatal to a constitution, and especially 
 to lungs, already deeply affected. At Vierzschovnia itself he 
 had illnesses, from which he narrowly escaped with life, before 
 the marriage ; his heart broke down after it ; and he and his 
 wife did not reach Paris till the end of May. Less than three 
 months afterwards, on the 18th of August, he died, having 
 been visited on the very day of his death in the paradise of 
 bric-a-brac which he had created for his Eve in the Rue 
 Fortunee — a name too provocative of Nemesis — by Victor 
 Hugo, the chief maker in verse as he himself was the chief 
 maker in prose of France. He was buried at Pere la Chaise. 
 The after fortunes of his house and its occupants were not 
 happy : but they do not concern us. 
 
 In person Balzac was a typical Frenchman, as indeed he 
 was in most ways. From his portraits there would seem to 
 have been more force and address than distinction or refine- 
 ment in his appearance, but, as has been already observed, 
 his period was one ungrateful to the iconographer. His char- 
 acter, not as a writer but as a man, must occupy us a little 
 longer. For some considerable time — indeed it may be said 
 until the publication of his letters — it was not very favorably 
 judged on the whole. We may, of course, dismiss the childish 
 scandals (arising, as usual, from clumsy or malevolent misin- 
 terpretation of such books as the Physiologie du Mariage, 
 the Peau de Chagrin, and a few others) which gave rise to 
 caricatures of him such as that of which we read, representing 
 him in a monk's dress at a table covered with bottles and sup- 
 porting a young person on his knee, the whole garnished with 
 the epigraph: Scenes de la Vie Cachee. They seem to have 
 given him, personally, a very unnecessary annoyance, and 
 indeed he was always rather sensitive to criticism. This 
 kind of stupid libel will never cease to be devised by the en- 
 vious, swallowed by the vulgar, and simply neglected by the 
 wise. But Balzac's peculiarities, both of life and of work, 
 lent themselves rather fatally to a subtler misconstruction 
 which he also anticipated and tried to remove, but which took 
 a far stronger hold. He was represented- — and in the absence 
 of any intimate male friends to contradict the representation,
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 25 
 
 it was certain to obtain some currency — as in his artistic per- 
 son a sardonic libeler of mankind, who cared only to take 
 foibles and vices for his subjects, and who either left goodness 
 and virtue out of sight altogether, or represented them as the 
 qualities of fools. In private life he was held up as at the 
 best a self-centered egotist who cared for nothing but him- 
 self and his own work, capable of interrupting one friend 
 who told him of the death of a sister by a suggestion that 
 they should change the subject and talk of " something real, 
 of Eugenie Grandet," and of levying a fifty per cent, com- 
 mission on another who had written a critical notice of his, 
 Balzac's, life and works. ^ With the first of these charges he 
 himself, on diff*erent occasions, rather vainly endeavored to 
 grapple, once drawing up an elaborate list of his virtuous 
 and vicious women, and showing that the former outnumbered 
 the latter; and, again, laboring (with that curious lack of 
 sense of humor which distinguishes all Frenchmen but a very 
 few, and distinguished him eminently) to show that though no 
 doubt it is very difficult to make a virtuous person interest- 
 ing, he, Honore de Balzac, had attempted it, and succeeded 
 in it, on a quite surprising number of occasions. 
 
 The fact is that if he had handled this last matter rather 
 more lightly his answer would have been a sufficient one, and 
 that in any case the charge is not worth answering. It does 
 not lie against the whole of his work; and if it lay as con- 
 clusively as it does against Swift's, it would not necessarily 
 matter. To the artist in analysis as opposed to the romance- 
 writer, folly always, and villainy sometimes, does supply a 
 much better subject than virtuous success, and if he makes 
 his fools and his villains lifelike and supplies them with a 
 fair contrast of better things, there is nothing more to be 
 said. He will not, indeed, be a Shakespeare, or a Dante, or 
 even a Scott ; but we may be very well satisfied with him as a 
 Fielding, a Thackeray, or a Balzac. As to the more purely 
 
 ^Sandeau and Gautier, the victims in these two stories, were neither 
 spiteful, nor mendacious, nor irrational, so they are probably true. The 
 second was possibly due to Balzac's odd notions of " business being busi- 
 ness." The first, \ have quite recently seen reason to think, may have 
 been a sort of reminiscence of one of the traits in Diderot's extravagant 
 encomium on Richardson.
 
 26 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 personal matter I own that it was some time before I could 
 persuade myself that Balzac, to speak familiarly, was a much 
 better fellow than others, and I myself, had been accustomed 
 to think him. But it is also some time since I came to the 
 conclusion that he was so, and my conversion is not to be at- 
 tributed to any editorial retainer. His education in a law- 
 yer's office, the accursed advice about the bonne speculation, 
 and his constant straitenings for money, will account for his 
 sometimes looking after the main chance rather too nar- 
 rowly; and as for the Eugenie Grandet story (even if the 
 supposition referred to in a note above be fanciful) it re- 
 quires no great stretch of charity or comprehension to see 
 in it nothing more than the awkward, very easily miscon- 
 strued, but not necessarily in the least heartless or brutal 
 attempt of a rather absent and very much self-centered re- 
 cluse absorbed in one subject, to get his intei'locutor as well 
 as himself out of painful and useless dwelling on sorrowful 
 matters. Self-centered and self-absorbed Balzac no doubt 
 was ; he could not have lived his life or produced his work if 
 he had been anything else. And it must be remembered that 
 he owed extremely little to others; that he had the inde- 
 pendence as well as the isolation of the self-centered ; that he 
 never spunged or fawned on a great man, or wronged others 
 of what was due to them. The only really unpleasant thing 
 about him that I know, and even this is perhaps due to igno- 
 rance of all sides of the matter, is a slight touch of snobbish- 
 ness now and then, especially in those late letters from Vierz- 
 schovnia to Madame de Balzac and Madame Surville, in 
 which, while inundating his mother and sister with commis- 
 sions and requests for service, he points out to them what 
 great people the Hanskas and Mniszechs are, what infinite 
 honor and profit it will be to be connected with them, and 
 how desirable it is to keep struggling engineer brothers-in- 
 law and ne'er-do-well brothers in the colonies out of sight lest 
 they should disgust the magnates. 
 
 But these are " sma' sums, sma' sums," as Bailie Jarvie 
 says ; and smallness of any kind has, whatever it may have 
 to do with Balzac the man, nothing to do with Balzac the 
 writer. With him as with some others, but not as with the
 
 HONORE DE BALZAC 21 
 
 larger number, the sense of greatness increases the longer 
 and the more fully he is studied. He resembles, I think, 
 Goethe more than any other man of letters — certainly more 
 than any other of the present century — in having done work 
 which is very frequently, if not even commonly, faulty, and 
 in yet requiring that his work shall be known as a whole. 
 His appeal is cumulative ; it repeats itself on each occasion 
 with a slight difference, and though there may now and then 
 be the same faults to be noticed, they are almost invariably 
 accompanied, not merely by the same, but by fresh merits. 
 
 As has been said at the beginning of this essay, no attempt 
 will be made in it to give that running survey of Balzac's work 
 which is always useful and sometimes indispensable in treat- 
 ment of the kind. That will be administered in brief intro- 
 ductions to the separate novels of which each, it is hoped, 
 will itself be cumulative and help to furnish forth the full 
 presentment of the subject. But something like a sum- 
 ming up of that subject will here be attempted, first, be- 
 cause of the manifest inconvenience of postponing it, and 
 secondly, because it is really desirable that in embarking 
 on so vast a voyage the reader should have some general 
 chart — some notes of the soundings and log generally of those 
 who have gone before him. 
 
 There are two things, then, which it is more especially 
 desirable to keep constantly before one in reading Balzac — 
 two things which, taken together, constitute his almost 
 unique value, and two things (I think it may be added) which 
 not a few critics have failed to take together in him, being 
 under the impression that the one excludes the other, and 
 that to admit the other is tantamount to a denial of the one. 
 These two things are, first, an immense attention to detail, 
 sometimes observed, sometimes invented or imagined ; and 
 secondl}^ a faculty of regarding these details through a 
 mental lens or arrangement of lenses almost peculiar to him- 
 self, which at once combines, enlarges, and invests them with 
 a peculiar magical halo or mirage. The two thousand per- 
 sonages of the Comedie Humaine are, for the most part, 
 " signaled," as the French official word has it, marked and 
 denoted by the minutest traits of character, gesture, gait,
 
 28 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 » 
 clothing, abode, what not ; the transactions recorded are 
 very often (more often indeed than not) given with a scrupu- 
 lous and microscopic accuracy of reporting which no detect- 
 ive could outdo. Defoe is not more circumstantial in detail 
 of fact than Balzac ; Richardson is hardly more prodigal of 
 character-stroke. Yet a very large proportion of these char- 
 acters, of these circumstances, are evidently things invented 
 or imagined, not observed. And in addition to this the artist's 
 magic glass, his Balzacian speculum, if we may so say (for 
 none else has ever had it), transforms even the most rigid 
 observation into something flickering and fanciful, the out- 
 line as of shadows on the wall, not the precise contour of etch- 
 ing or of the camera. 
 
 It is curious, but not unexampled, that both Balzac him- 
 self when he struggled in argument with his critics and those 
 of his partisans who have been most jealously devoted to him, 
 have usually tried to exalt the first and less remarkable of 
 these gifts over the second and infinitely more remarkable. 
 Balzac protested strenuously against the use of the word 
 " gigantesque " in reference to his work ; and of course it is 
 susceptible of an unhandsome innuendo. But if we leave that 
 innuendo aside, if we adopt the sane reflection that " gigan- 
 tesque " does not exclude " gigantic," or assert a constant 
 failure of greatness, but only indicates that the magnifying 
 process is carried on with a certain indiscriminateness, we 
 shall find none, I think, which so thoroughly well describes 
 him. 
 
 The effect of this singular combination of qualities, ap- 
 parently the most opposite, may be partly anticipated, but 
 not quite. It results occasionally in a certain shortcoming 
 as regards verite vraie, absolute artistic truth to nature. 
 Those who would range Balzac in point of such artistic 
 veracity on a level with poetical and universal realists like 
 Shakespeare and Dante, or prosaic and particular realists 
 like Thackeray and Fielding, seem not only to be utterly 
 wrong but to pay their idol the worst of all compliments, that 
 of ignoring his own special qualifications. The province of 
 Balzac may not be — I do not think it is — identical, much less 
 coextensive, with that of nature. But it is his own — a partly
 
 HONOEE DE BALZAC 29 
 
 real, partly fantastic region, where the lights, the shades, the 
 dimensions, and the physical laws are slightly different from 
 those of this world of ours, but with which, owing to the 
 things it has in common with that world, we are able to sym- 
 pathize, which we can traverse and comprehend. Every now 
 and then the artist uses his observing faculty more, and his 
 magnifying and (since there is no better word) distorting 
 lens less ; every now and then he reverses the proportion. 
 Some tastes will like him best in the one stage; some in the 
 other ; the happier constituted will like him best in both. 
 These latter will decline to put Eugenie Grandet above the 
 Peau de Cliagrin, or Le Pere Goriot above the wonderful 
 handful of tales which includes La Recherche de UAhsolu 
 and Le Chef d'CEuvre Inconnu, though they will no doubt 
 recognize that even in the two first named members of these 
 pairs the Balzacian quality, that of magnifying and render- 
 ing grandiose, is present, and that the martyrdom of 
 Eugenie, the avarice of her father, the blind self-devotion 
 of Goriot to his thankless and worthless children, would not be 
 what they are if they were seen through a perfectly achro- 
 matic and normal medium. 
 
 This specially Balzacian quality Is, I think, unique. It 
 is like — it may almost be said to be — the poetic imagination, 
 present in magnificent volume and degree, but in some mirac- 
 ulous way deprived and sterilized of the specially poetical 
 quality. By this I do not of course mean that Balzac did not 
 write in verse: we have a few verses of his, and they are 
 pretty bad, but that is neither here nor there. The difference 
 between Balzac and a great poet lies not in the fact that the 
 one fills the whole page with printed words, and the other only 
 a part of it — but in something else. If I could put that 
 something else into distinct words I should therein attain the 
 philosopher's stone, the elixir of life, the primum mobile, the 
 grand arcanum, not merely of criticism but of all things. It 
 might be possible to coast about it, to hint at it, by adumbra- 
 tions and in consequences. But it is better and really more 
 helpful to face the difficulty boldly, and to say that Balzac, 
 approaching a great poet nearer perhaps than any other 
 prose writer in any language, is distinguished from one by
 
 80 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 the absence of the very last touch, the finally constituting 
 quiddity, which makes a great poet different from Balzac. 
 
 Now, when we make this comparison, it is of the first in- 
 terest to remember — and it is one of the uses of the compari- 
 son, that it suggests the remembrance of the fact — that the 
 great poets have usually been themselves extremely exact ob- 
 servers of detail. It has not made them great poets ; but they 
 would not be great poets without it. And when Eugenie 
 Grandet starts from le petit banc de bois at the reference to 
 it in her scoundrelly cousin's letter (to take only one instance 
 out of a thousand), we see in Balzac the same observation, 
 subject to the limitation just mentioned, that we see in Dante 
 and Shakespeare, in Chaucer and Tennyson. But the great 
 poets do not as a rule accumulate detail. Balzac does, and 
 from his very accumulation he manages to derive that sin- 
 gular gigantesque vagueness — differing from the poetic 
 vague, but ranking next to it — which I have here ventured 
 to note as his distinguishing quality. He bewilders us a very 
 little by it, and he gives us the impression that he has slightly 
 bewildered himself. But the compensations of the bewilder- 
 ment are large. 
 
 For in this labyrinth and whirl of things, in this heat and 
 hurry of observation and imagination, the special intoxica- 
 tion of Balzac consists. Every great artist has his own 
 means of producing this intoxication, and it differs in result 
 like the stimulus of beauty or of wine. Those persons who 
 are unfortunate enough to see in Balzac little or nothing but 
 an ingenious piler-up of careful strokes — a man of science 
 taking his human documents and classing them after an or- 
 derly fashion in portfolio and deed-box — must miss this in- 
 toxication altogether. It is much more agreeable as well as 
 much more accurate to see in the manufacture of the Comedie 
 the process of a Cyclopean workshop — the bustle, the hurry, 
 the glare and shadow, the steam and sparks of Vulcanian 
 forging. The results, it is true, are by no means confused 
 or disorderly — neither were those of the forges that worked 
 under Lipari — ^but there certainly went much more to them 
 than the dainty fingering of a literary fretwork-maker or the 
 dull rummagings of a realist a la Zola.
 
 HONOKE DE BALZAC 31 
 
 In part no doubt, and in great part, the work of Balzac 
 is dream-stuff rather than Hfe-stuff, and it is all the better 
 for that. What is better than dreams? But the coherence 
 of his visions, their bulk, their solidity, the way in which they 
 return to us and we return to them, make them such dream- 
 stuff as there is all too little of in this world. If it is true 
 that evil on the whole predominates over good in the vision 
 of this " Voyant," as Philarete Chasles so justly called him 
 (and I think it does, though not to the same extent as I once 
 thought), two very respectable, and in one case very large, 
 though somewhat opposed di^^sions of mankind, the philo- 
 sophic pessimist and the convinced and consistent Christian 
 believer, will tell us that this is at least not one of the points 
 in which it is unfaithful to life. If the author is closer and 
 more faithful in his study of meanness and vice than in his 
 studies of nobility and ^^rtue, the blame is due at least as 
 much to his models as to himself. If, as I fear must be con- 
 fessed, he has seldom succeeded in combining a really passion- 
 ate with a really noble conception of love, very few of his 
 countrymen have been more fortunate in that respect. If in 
 some of his types — his journalists, his married women, and 
 others — he seems to have sacrificed to conventions, let us 
 remember that those who know attribute to his conventions 
 such a powerful if not altogether such a holy influence that 
 two generations of the people he painted have actually lived 
 more and more up to his painting of them. 
 
 And last of all, but also greatest, has to be considered the 
 immensity of his imaginative achievement, the huge space 
 that he has filled for us with ^-ivid creation, the range of 
 amusement, of instruction, of (after a fashion) edification 
 which he has thrown open for us to walk in. It is possible 
 that he himself and others more or less well-meaningly, 
 though more or less maladroitly, following his lead, may have 
 exaggerated the coherence and the architectural design of 
 the Comedie. But it has coherence and it has design; nor 
 shall we find an\i:hing exactly to parallel it. In mere bulk 
 the Comedie probably, if not certainly, exceeds the produc- 
 tion of any novelist of the first class in any kind of fiction 
 except Dumas, and with Dumas, for various and well-known
 
 82 HONORE DE BALZAC 
 
 reasons, there is no possibility of comparing it. All others 
 yield in bulk ; all in a certain concentration and intensity ; 
 none even aims at anything like the same system and com- 
 pleteness. It must be remembered that owing to shortness 
 of life, lateness of beginning, and the diversion of the author 
 to other work, the Comedie is the production, and not the 
 sole production, of some seventeen or eighteen years at most. 
 Not a volume of it, for all that failure to reach the com- 
 pletest perfection in form and style which has been acknowl- 
 edged, can be accused of tliinness, of scamped work, of mean 
 repetition, of mere cobbling up. Every one bears the marks 
 of steady and ferocious labor, as well as of the genius which 
 had at last come where it had been so earnestly called and had 
 never gone away again. It is possible to overpraise Balzac 
 in parts or to mispraise him as a whole. But so long as in- 
 appropriate and superfluous comparisons are avoided and as 
 his own excellence is recognized and appreciated, it is scarcely 
 possible to overestimate that excellence in itself and for itself. 
 He stands alone ; even with Dickens, who is his nearest an- 
 alogue, he shows far more points of difference than of like- 
 ness. His vastness of bulk is not more remarkable than his 
 peculiarity of quaHty ; and when these two things coincide in 
 literature or elsewhere, then that in which they coincide may 
 be called, and must be called, Great, without hesitation and 
 without reserve. 
 
 George Saintsbury.
 
 COUSIN PONS
 
 PREFACE 
 
 One of the last and largest of Balzac's great works — 
 the very last of them, if we except La Cousine Bette, to 
 which it is pendant and contrast — Le Cousin Pons has always 
 united suffrages from very different classes of admirers. In 
 the first place, it is not " disagreeable," as the common 
 euphemism has it, and as La Cousine Bette certainly is. In 
 the second, it cannot be accused of being a berquinade, as 
 those who like Balzac best when he is doing moral rag-picking 
 are apt to describe books like Le Medecin de Campagne and 
 Le Lys dans la Vallee, if not even like Eugenie Grandet. 
 It has a considerable variety of interest; its central figure 
 is curiously pathetic and attractive, even though the curse 
 of something like folly, which so often attends Balzac's good 
 characters, may a little weigh on him. It would be a book 
 of exceptional charm even if it were anonymous, or if we 
 knew no more about the author than we know about Shakes- 
 peare. 
 
 As it happens, however, Le Cousin Pons has other attrac- 
 tions than this. In the first place, Balzac is always great — 
 perhaps he is at his greatest — in depicting a mania, a 
 passion, whether the subject be pleasure or gold-hunger or 
 parental affection. Pons has two manias, and the one does 
 not interfere with, but rather helps, the other. But this 
 would be nothing if it were not that his chief mania, his 
 ruling passion, is one of Balzac's own. For, as we have 
 often had occasion to notice, Balzac is not by any means 
 one of the great impersonal artists. He can do many things ; 
 but he is never at his best in doing any unless his own per- 
 sonal interests, his likings and hatreds, his sufferings and 
 enjoyments, are concerned. He was a kind of actor-manager 
 in his Comedie Humaine; and perhaps, like other actor- 
 managers, he took rather disproportionate care of the parts 
 which he played himself. 
 
 Now, he was even more desperate as a collector and fancier 
 of bibelots than he was as a speculator; and while the one 
 
 iii
 
 iv PREFACE 
 
 mania was nearly as responsible for his pecuniary troubles 
 and his need to overwork himself as the other, it certainly 
 gave him more constant and more comparatively harmless 
 satisfactions. His connoisseurship has, of course, been 
 questioned — one connoisseur would be nothing if he did not 
 question the competence of another, if not of all others. 
 It seems certain that Balzac frequently bought things for 
 what they were not ; and probable that his own acquisitions 
 went, in his own eyes, through that succession of stages 
 which Charles Lamb (a sort of Cousin Pons in his way too) 
 described inimitably. His pictures, like John Lamb's, were 
 apt to begin as Raphaels, and end as Carlo Marattis. Balzac 
 too, like Pons, was even more addicted to bric-a-brac than 
 to art proper; and after many vicissitudes, he and Mme. 
 Hanska seem to have succeeded in getting together a very 
 considerable, if also a very miscellaneous and unequal, collec- 
 tion in the house in the Rue du Paradis, the contents of which 
 were dispersed in part (though, I believe, the Rothschild 
 who bought it, bought most of them too) not many years 
 ago. Pons, indeed, was too poor, and probably too queer, 
 to indulge in one fancy which Balzac had, and which, I 
 think, all collectors of the nobler and more poetic class have, 
 though this number may not be large. Balzac liked to have 
 new beautiful things as well as old — ^to have beautiful things 
 made for him. He was an unwearied customer, though not 
 an uncomplaining one, of the great jeweler Froment Meurice, 
 whose tarr'.ness in carrying out his behests he pathetically 
 upbraids in more than one extant letter. 
 
 Therefore, Balzac " did more than sjmipathize, he felt " 
 — as it has been well put — with Pons in the bric-a-brac 
 matter; and it would appear that he did so likewise in that 
 of music, though we have rather less direct evidence. This 
 other sympathy has resulted in the addition to Pons himself 
 of the figure of Schmucke, a minor and more parochial figure, 
 but good in itself, and very much appreciated, I believe, by 
 fellow melomanes . 
 
 It is with even more than his usual art that Balzac has 
 surrounded these two originals — these " humorists," as our 
 own ancestors would have called them — with figures much,
 
 PREFACE V 
 
 very much, more of the ordinary world than themselves. The 
 grasping worldliness of the parvenu family of Camusot in 
 one degree, and the greed of the portress, Mme. Cibot, on 
 the other, are admirably represented; the latter, in par- 
 ticular, must always hold a very high place among Balzac's 
 greatest successes. She is, indeed, a sort of companion 
 sketch to Cousine Bette herself in a still lower rank of life, 
 representing the diabolical in woman ; and perhaps we should 
 not wrong the author's intentions if we suspected that Diane 
 de Maufrigneuse has some claims to make up the trio in a 
 sphere even more above Lisbeth's than Lisbeth's is above 
 Mme. Cibot's own. 
 
 Different opinions have been held of the actual " bric-a- 
 bracery " of this piece — that is to say, not of Balzac's 
 competence in the matter, but of the artistic value of his 
 introduction of it. Perhaps his enthusiasm does a little 
 run away with him; perhaps he gives us a little too much 
 of it, and avails himself too freely of the license, at least 
 of the temptation, to digress which the introduction of such 
 persons as Elie Magus affords. And it is also open to any- 
 one to say that the climax, or what is in effect the climax, is 
 introduced somewhat too soon; that the struggle, first over 
 the body and then over the property of Patroclus-Pons, is 
 inordinately spun out ; and that, even granting the author's 
 mania, he might have utilized it better by giving us more 
 of the harmless and ill-treated cousin's happy hunts, and 
 less of the disputes over his accumulated quarry. This, 
 however, means simply the old, and generally rather imperti- 
 nent, suggestion to the artist that he shall do with his art 
 something different from that which he has himself chosen 
 to do. It is, or should be, sufficient that Le Cousin Pons 
 is a very agreeable book, more pathetic, if less " grimy," 
 than its companion, full of its author's idiosyncrasy, and 
 characteristic of his genius. It may not be uninteresting to 
 add that Le Cousin Pons was originally called Les Deux 
 Musiciens, or Le Parasite, and that the change, which is a 
 great improvement, was due to the instances of Mme. Hanska. 
 
 (For bibliography, see the Preface to La Cousine Bette.) 
 
 G. S.
 
 Fraisier catches his first glimpse of Pons's will
 
 COUSIN PONS 
 
 TOWARDS three o'clock in the afternoon of one October 
 day in the year 1844, a man of sixty or thereabouts, 
 whom anybody might have credited with more than his actual 
 age, was walking along the Boulevard des Italiens with his 
 head bent down, as if he were tracking someone. There was 
 a smug expression about the mouth — he looked like a 
 merchant who has just done a good stroke of business, or a 
 bachelor emerging from a boudoir in the best of humors with 
 himself; and in Paris this is the highest degree of self-satis- 
 faction ever registered by a human countenance. 
 
 As soon as the elderly person appeared in the distance, a 
 smile broke out over the faces of the frequenters of the 
 Boulevard, who daily, from their chairs, watch the passers-by, 
 and indulge in the agreeable pastime of analyzing thera. 
 That smile is peculiar to Parisians ; it says so many things — 
 ironical, quizzical, pitying; but nothing save the rarest of 
 human curiosities can summon that look of interest to the 
 faces of Parisians, sated as they are with every possible sight. 
 
 A saying recorded of Hyacinthe, an actor celebrated for 
 his repartees, will explain the archjeological value of the old 
 gentleman, and the smile repeated like an echo by all eyes. 
 Somebody once asked Hyacinthe where the hats were made 
 that set the house in a roar as soon as he appeared. " I don't 
 have them made," he said ; " I keep them ! " So also among 
 the million actors who make up the great troupe of Paris, 
 there are unconscious Hyacinthes who " keep " all the absurd 
 freaks of vanished fashions upon their backs ; and the appari- 
 tion of some bygone decade will startle you into laughter as 
 you walk the streets in bitterness of soul over the treason of 
 one who was your friend in the past. 
 
 In some respects the passer-by adhered so faithfully to the 
 fashions of the year 1806, that he was not so much a bur- 
 lesque caricature as a reproduction of the Empire period. To 
 an observer, accuracy of detail in a revival of this sort is ex- 
 tremely valuable, but accuracy of detail, to be properly ap-
 
 2 COUSIN PONS 
 
 predated, demands the critical attention of an expert flaneur^ 
 while the man in the street who raises a laugh as soon as he 
 comes in sight is bound to be one of those outrageous exhibi- 
 tions which stare jou in the face, as the saying goes, and pro- 
 duce the kind of effect which an actor tries to secure for the 
 success of his entry. The elderly person, a thin, spare man, 
 wore a nut-brown spencer over a coat of uncertain green, 
 with white metal buttons. A man in a spencer in the year 
 eighteen hundred and forty-four ! it was as if Napoleon him- 
 self had vouchsafed to come to life again for a couple of 
 hours. 
 
 The spencer, as its name indicates, was the invention of an 
 English lord, vain, doubtless, of his handsome shape. Some 
 time before the Peace of Amiens, this nobleman solved the 
 problem of covering the bust without destroying the outlines 
 of the figure and encumbering the person with the hideous 
 boxcoat, now finishing its career on the backs of aged hack- 
 ney cabmen ; but, elegant figures being in the minority, the 
 success of the spencer was short-lived in France, English 
 though it was. 
 
 At sight of the spencer, men of forty or fifty mentally 
 invested the wearer with top-boots, pistachio-colored kersey- 
 mere small clothes adorned with a knot of ribbon ; and beheld 
 themselves in the costumes of their youth. Elderly ladies 
 thought of former conquests ; but the younger men were ask- 
 ing each other why the aged Alcibiades had cut off the skirts 
 of his overcoat. The rest of the costume was so much in 
 keeping with the spencer, that you would not have hesitated 
 to call the wearer " an Empire man," just as you call a cer- 
 tain kind of furniture " Empire furniture " ; yet the new- 
 comer only symbolized the Empire for those who had known 
 that great and magnificent epoch at any rate de visu, for a 
 certain accuracy of memory was needed for the full apprecia- 
 tion of the costume, and even now the Empire is so far away 
 that not every one of us can picture it in its Gallo-Grecian 
 reality. 
 
 The stranger's hat, for instance, tipped to the back of his 
 head so as to leave almost the whole forehead bare, recalled a 
 certain jaunty air, with which civilians and ofncials attempted
 
 COUSIN PONS 3 
 
 to swagger it with military men ; but the hat itself was a 
 shocking specimen of the fifteen-franc variety. Constant 
 friction with a pair of enormous ears had left marks which 
 no brush could efface from the underside of the brim; the 
 silk tissue (as usual) fitted badly over the cardboard founda- 
 tion, and hung in wrinkles here and there ; and some skin- 
 disease (apparently) had attacked the nap in spite of the 
 hand which rubbed it down of a morning. 
 
 Beneath the hat, which seemed ready to drop off at any 
 moment, lay an expanse of countenance grotesque and droll, 
 as the faces which the Chinese alone of all people can imagine 
 for their quaint curiosities. The broad visage was as full of 
 holes as a colander, honey-combed with the shadows of the 
 dints, hollowed out like a Roman mask. It set all the laws of 
 anatomy at defiance. Close inspection failed to detect the 
 substructure. Where you expected to find a bone, you dis- 
 covered a layer of cartilaginous tissue, and the hollows of an 
 ordinary human face were here filled out with flabby bosses. 
 A pair of gray eyes, red-rimmed and lashless, looked for- 
 lornly out of a countenance which was flattened something 
 after the fashion of a pumpkin, and surmounted by a Don 
 Quixote nose that rose out of it like a monolith above a plain. 
 It was the kind of nose, as Cervantes must surely have ex- 
 plained somewhere, which denotes an inborn enthusiasm for all 
 things great, a tendency which is apt to degenerate into 
 credulity. 
 
 And yet, though the man's ugliness was something almost 
 ludicrous, it aroused not the shghtest inclination to laugh. 
 The exceeding melancholy which found an outlet in the poor 
 man's faded eyes reached the mocker himself and froze the 
 gibes on his lips ; for all at once the thought arose that this 
 was a human creature to whom Nature had forbidden any 
 expression of love or tenderness, since such expression could 
 only be painful or ridiculous to the woman he loved. In the 
 presence of such misfortune a Frenchman is silent ; to him it 
 seems the most cruel of all afflictions — to be unable to please ! 
 
 The man so ill-favored was dressed after the fashion of 
 shabby gentility, a fashion which the rich not seldom try to 
 copy. He wore low shoes beneath gaiters of the pattern
 
 4 COUSIN PONS 
 
 worn by the Imperial Guard, doubtless for the sake of econ- 
 omy, because they kept the socks clean. The rusty tinge 
 of his black breeches, like the cut and the white or shiny line 
 of the creases, assigned the date of the purchase some three 
 years back. The roomy garments failed to disguise the lean 
 proportions of the wearer, due apparently rather to con- 
 stitution than to a Pythagorean regimen, for the worthy man 
 was endowed with thick lips and a sensual mouth ; and when 
 he smiled, displayed a set of white teeth which would have 
 done credit to a shark. 
 
 A shawl-waistcoat, likewise of black cloth, was supple- 
 mented by a white under-waistcoat, and yet again beneath this 
 gleamed the edge of a red knitted under- jacket, to put you 
 in mind of Garat's five waistcoats. A huge white muslin 
 stock with a conspicuous bow, invented by some exquisite to 
 charm " the charming sex " in 1809, projected so far above 
 its wearer's chin that the lower part of his face was lost, as it 
 were, in a muslin abyss. A silk watch-guard, plaited to re- 
 semble the keepsakes made of hair, meandered down his shirt- 
 front and secured his watch from improbable theft. The 
 greenish coat, though older by some three years than the 
 breeches, was remarkably neat ; the black velvet collar and 
 shining metal buttons, recently renewed, told of carefulness 
 which descended even to trifles. 
 
 The particular manner of fixing the hat on the occiput, 
 the triple waistcoat, the vast cravat engulfing the chin, the 
 gaiters, the metal buttons on the greenish coat, — all these 
 reminiscences of Imperial fashions were blended with a sort 
 of afterwaft and lingering perfume of the coquetry of the 
 Incroyable — with an indescribable finical something in the 
 folds of the garments, a certain air of stiffness and correctness 
 in the demeanor that smacked of the school of David, that re- 
 called Jacob's spindle-legged furniture. 
 
 At first sight, moreover, you set him down either for the 
 gentleman by birth fallen a victim to some degrading habit, 
 or for the man of small independent means whose expenses 
 are calculated to such a nicety that the breakage of a window- 
 pane, a rent in a coat, or a visit from the philanthropic pest 
 who asks you for subscriptions to a charity, absorbs the
 
 COUSIN PONS 5 
 
 whole of a month's little surplus of pocket-money. If you 
 had seen him that afternoon, you would have wondered how 
 that grotesque face came to be lighted up with a smile; 
 usually, sui'ely, it must have worn the dispirited, passive look 
 of the obscure toiler condemned to labor without ceasing for 
 the barest necessaries of life. Yet when you noticed that the 
 odd-looking old man was carrying some object (evidently 
 precious) in his right hand with a mother's care; concealing 
 it under the skirts of his coat to keep it from collisions in the 
 crowd, and still more, when you remarked that important air 
 always assumed by an idler when intrusted with a commission, 
 you would have suspected him of recovering some piece of lost 
 property, some modern equivalent of the marquise's poodle; 
 you would have recognized the assiduous gallantry of the 
 " man of the Empire " returning in triumph from his mission 
 to some charming woman of sixty, reluctant as yet to dispense 
 with the daily visit of her elderly attentif. 
 
 In Paris only among great cities will you see such spec- 
 tacles as this; for of her boulevards Paris makes a stage 
 where a never-ending drama is played gratuitously by the 
 French nation in the interests of Art. 
 
 In spite of the rashly assumed spencer, you would scarcely 
 have thought, after a glance at the contours of the man's 
 bony frame, that this was an artist — that conventional type 
 which is privileged, in something the same way as a Paris 
 gamin, to represent riotous living to the bourgeois and phi- 
 listine mind, the most mirific joviaHty, in short (to use the old 
 Rabelaisian word newly taken into use). Yet, this elderly 
 person had once taken the medal and the traveling scholar- 
 ship ; he had composed the first cantata crowned by the In- 
 stitut at the time of the re-establishment of the Academie de 
 Rome; he was M. Sylvain Pons, in fact — M. Sylvain Pons, 
 whose name appears on the covers of well-known sentimental 
 songs trilled by our mothers, to say nothing of a couple of 
 operas, played in 1815 and 1816, and diverse unpublished 
 scores. The worthy soul was now ending his days as the 
 conductor of an orchestra in a boulevard theater, and a music 
 master in several young ladies' boarding-schools, a post for 
 which his face particularly recommended him. He was en-
 
 6 COUSIN PONS 
 
 tirely dependent uppn his earnings. Running about to give 
 private lessons at his age ! — Think of it. How many a mys- 
 tery lies in that unromantic situation ! 
 
 But the last man to wear the spencer carried something 
 else about him besides his Empire associations: a warning 
 and a lesson was written large over that triple waistcoat. 
 Wherever he went, he exhibited, without fee or charge, one of 
 the many victims of the fatal system of competition which 
 still prevails in France in spite of a century of trial without 
 result ; for Poisson de Marigny, brother of the Pompadour 
 and Director of Fine Arts, somewhere about 1746 invented 
 this method of applying pressure to the brain. That was a 
 hundred years ago. Try if you can count upon your fingers 
 the men of genius among the prizemen of those hundred years. 
 
 In the first place, no deliberate effort of schoolmaster or 
 administrator can replace the miracles of chance which pro- 
 duce great men : of all the mysteries of generation, this most 
 defies the ambitious modern scientific investigator. In the 
 second — the ancient Egyptians (we are told) invented in- 
 cubator-stoves for hatching eggs ; what would be thought of 
 Egyptians who should neglect to fill the beaks of the callow 
 fledglings? Yet this is precisely what France is doing. She 
 does her 'utmost to produce artists by the artificial heat of 
 competitive examination ; but, the sculptor, painter, engraver, 
 or musician once turned out by this mechanical process, she 
 no more troubles herself about them and their fate than 
 the dandy cares for yesterday's flower in his button-hole. 
 And so it happens that the really great man is a Greuze, a 
 Watteau, a Felicien David, a Pagnesi, a Gericault, a De- 
 camps, an Auber, a David d'Angers, an Eugene Delacroix, or 
 a Meissonier — artists who take but little heed of grands prix, 
 and spring up in the open field under the rays of that in- 
 visible sun called Vocation. 
 
 To resume. The Government sent Sylvain Pons to Rome 
 to make a great musician of himself; and in Rome Sylvain 
 Pons acquired a taste for the antique and works of art. He 
 became an admirable judge of those masterpieces of the brain 
 and hand which are summed up by the useful neologism " bric- 
 a-brac " ; and when the child of Euterpe returned to Paris
 
 COUSIN PONS T 
 
 somewhere about the year 1810, it was in the character of a 
 rabid collector, loaded with pictures, statuettes, frames, wood- 
 carving, ivories, enamels, porcelains, and the like. He had 
 sunk the greater part of his patrimony not so much in the 
 purchases themselves as on the expenses of transit ; and every 
 penny inherited from his mother had been spent in the course 
 of a three years' travel in Italy after the residence in Rome 
 came to an end. He had seen Venice, Milan, Florence, 
 Bologna, and Naples leisurely, as he wished to see them, as a 
 dreamer of dreams, and a philosopher ; careless of the future, 
 for an artist looks to his talent for support as the fille de joie 
 counts upon her beauty. 
 
 All through those splendid years of travel Pons was as 
 happy as was possible to a man with a great soul, a sensitive 
 nature, and a face so ugly that any " success with the fair " 
 (to use the stereotyped formula of 1809) was out of the ques- 
 tion ; the realities of life always fell short of the ideals which 
 Pons created for himself; the world without was not in tune 
 with the soul within, but Pons had made up his mind to the 
 dissonance. Doubtless the sense of beauty that he had kept 
 pure and living in his inmost soul was the spring from which 
 the delicate, graceful, and ingenious music flowed and won 
 him reputation between 1810 and 1814. 
 
 Every reputation founded upon the fashion or the fancy 
 of the hour, or upon the short-lived follies of Paris, pro- 
 duces its Pons. No place in the world is so inexorable in 
 great things; no city of the globe so disdainfully indulgent 
 in small. Pons's notes were drowned before long in floods of 
 German harmony and the music of Rossini ; and if in 1824 he 
 was known as an agreeable musician, a composer of various 
 drawing-room melodies, judge if he was likely to be famous in 
 1831 ! In 1844, the year in which the single drama of his 
 obscure life began, Sylvain Pons was of no more value than 
 an antediluvian semiquaver ; dealers in music had never heard 
 of his name though he was still composing, on scanty pay, for 
 his own orchestra or for neighboring theaters. 
 
 And yet, the worthy man did justice to the great masters 
 of our day ; a masterpiece finely rendered brought tears to 
 his eyes ; but his religion never bordered on mania, as in the
 
 S COUSIN PONS 
 
 case of Hoffmann's Krelslers ; he kept his enthusiasm to him- 
 self; his delight, like the paradise reached by opium or 
 Jiasheesh, lay within his own soul. 
 
 The gift of admiration, of comprehension, the single 
 faculty by which the ordinary man becomes the brother of the 
 poet, is rare in this city of Paris, that inn whither all ideas, 
 like travelers, come to stay for a while ; so rare is it, that 
 Pons surely deserves our respectful esteem. His personal 
 failure may seem anomalous, but he frankly admitted that he 
 was weak in harmony. He had neglected the study of coun- 
 terpoint ; there was a time when he might have begun his 
 studies afresh and held his own among modern composers, 
 when he might have been, not certainly a Rossini, but a 
 Herold. But he was alarmed by the intricacies of modern or- 
 chestration ; and at length, in the pleasures of collecting, he 
 found such ever-renewed compensation for his failure, that if 
 he had been made to choose between his curiosities and the 
 fame of Rossini — will it be believed.'' — Pons would have pro- 
 nounced for his beloved collection. 
 
 Pons was of the opinion of Chenavard, the print-collector, 
 who laid it down as an axiom — that you only fully enjoy the 
 pleasure of looking at your Ruysdael, Hobbema, Holbein, 
 Rafael, Murillo, Greuze, Sebastian del Piombo, Giorgione, 
 Albrecht Diirer, or what not, when you have paid less than 
 sixty francs for your picture. Pons never gave more than a 
 hundred francs for any purchase. If he laid out as much as 
 -fifty francs, he was careful to assure himself beforehand that 
 the object was worth three thousand. The most beautiful 
 ihing in the world, if it cost three hundred francs, did not 
 exist for Pons. Rare had been his bargains ; but he pos- 
 sessed the three qualifications for success — a stag's legs, an 
 idler's disregard of time, and the patience of a Jew. 
 
 This system, carried out for forty years, in Rome or Paris 
 alike, had borne its fruits. Since Pons returned from Italy, 
 he had regularly spent about two thousand francs a year 
 upon a collection of masterpieces of every sort and descrip- 
 tion, a collection hidden away from all eyes but his own ; and 
 now his catalogue had reached the incredible number 1907. 
 Wandering about Paris between 1811 and 1816, he had
 
 COUSIN PONS 9 
 
 picked up many a treasure for ten francs, which would fetch 
 a thousand or twelve hundred to-day. Some forty-five thou- 
 sand canvases change hands annually in Paris picture sales, 
 and these Pons had sifted through year by year. Pons had 
 Sevres porcelain, pate tendre, bought of Auvergnats, those 
 satellites of the Black Band who sacked chateaux and carried 
 off the marvels of Pompadour France in their tumbril carts ; 
 he had, in fact, collected the drifted wreck of the seventeenth 
 and eighteenth centuries ; he recognized the genius of the 
 French school, and discerned the merit of the Lepautres and 
 Lavallee-Poussins and the rest of the great obscure creators 
 of the Genre Louis Quinze and the Genre Louis Seize. Our 
 modern craftsmen now draw without acknowledgment from 
 them, pore incessantly over the treasures of the Cabinet des 
 Estampes, borrow adroitly, and give out their -pastiches for 
 new inventions. Pons had obtained many a piece by ex- 
 change, and therein lies the ineffable joy of the collector. 
 The joy of buying bric-a-brac is a secondary delight; in the 
 give-and-take of barter lies the joy of joys. Pons had be- 
 gun by collecting snuff-boxes and miniatures ; his name was 
 unknown in bric-a-bracology, for he seldom showed himself 
 in salesrooms or in the shops of well-known dealers ; Pons was 
 not aware that his treasures had any commercial value. 
 
 The late lamented Dusommerard tried his best to gain 
 Pons's confidence, but the prince of bric-a-brac died before he 
 could gain an entrance to the Pons museum, the one private 
 collection which could compare with the famous Sauvageot 
 museum. Pons and M. Sauvageot indeed resembled each 
 other in more ways than one. M. Sauvageot, like Pons, was a 
 musician ; he was likewise a comparatively poor man, and he 
 had collected his bric-a-brac in much the same way, with the 
 same love of art, the same hatred of rich capitalists with well- 
 known names who collect for the sake of running up prices as 
 cleverly as possible. There was yet another point of re- 
 semblance between the pair: Pons, like his rival competitor 
 and antagonist, felt in his heart an insatiable craving after 
 specimens of the craftsman's skill and miracles of workman- 
 ship ; he loved them as a man might love a fair mistress ; an 
 auction in the salesrooms in the Rue des Jeuneurs, with its ac-
 
 10 COUSIN PONS 
 
 companiments of hammer strokes and brokers' men, was a 
 crime of lese-hnc-a-hrac in Pons's eyes. Pons's museum was 
 for his own dehght at every hour; for the soul created to 
 know and feel all the beauty of a masterpiece has this in 
 common with the lover — to-day's joy is as great as the joy of 
 yesterday ; possession never palls ; and a masterpiece, happily, 
 never grows old. So the object that he held in his hand with 
 such fatherly care could only be a " find," carried off with 
 what affection amateurs alone know ! 
 
 After the first outlines of this biographical sketch, every- 
 one will cry at once, " Why ! this is the happiest man on 
 earth, in spite of his ugliness ! " And, in truth, no spleen, 
 no dullness can resist the counter-irritant supplied by a 
 " craze," the intellectual moxa of a hobby. You who can no 
 longer drink of " the cup of pleasure," as it has been called 
 through all ages, try to collect something, no matter what 
 (people have been known to collect placards), so shall you re- 
 ceive the small change for the gold ingot of happiness. Have 
 you a hobby ? You have transferred pleasure to the plane of 
 ideas. And yet, you need not envy the worthy Pons ; such 
 envy, like all kindred sentiments, would be founded upon a 
 misapprehension. 
 
 With a nature so sensitive, with a soul that lived by tireless 
 admiration of the magnificent achievements of art, of the high 
 rivalry between human toil and the work of Nature — Pons 
 was a slave to that one of the Seven Deadly Sins with which 
 God surely will deal least hardly; Pons was a glutton. A 
 narrow income, combined with a passion for bric-a-brac, con- 
 demned him to a regimen so abhorrent to a discriminating 
 palate, that, bachelor as he was, he had cut the knot of the 
 problem by dining out every day. 
 
 Now, in the time of the Empire, celebrities were more 
 sought after than at present, perhaps because there were 
 so few of them, perhaps because they made little or no politi- 
 cal pretension. In those days, besides, you could set up for 
 a poet, a musician, or a painter, with so little expense. Pons, 
 being regarded as the probable rival of Nicolo, Paer, and Ber- 
 ton, used to receive so many invitations, that he was forced 
 to keep a list of engagements, much as barristers note down
 
 COUSIN PONS 11 
 
 the cases for which they are retained. And Pons behaved 
 like an artist. He presented his amphitryons with copies of 
 his songs, he " obhged " at the pianoforte, he brought them 
 orders for boxes at the Feydeau, his own theater, he organized 
 concerts, he was not above taking the fiddle himself sometimes 
 in a relation's house, and getting up a little impromptu dance. 
 In those days, all the handsome men in France were away 
 at the wars exchanging saber-cuts with the handsome men of 
 the Coalition. Pons was said to be, not ugly, but " peculiar- 
 looking," after the grand rule laid down by Moliere in 
 Eliante's famous couplets ; but if he sometimes heard himself 
 described as a " charming man " ( after he had done some 
 fair lady a service), his good fortune went no further than 
 words. 
 
 It was between the years 1810 and 1816 that Pons con- 
 tracted the unlucky habit of dining out ; he grew accustomed 
 to see his hosts taking pains over the dinner, procuring the 
 first and best of everything, bringing out their choicest 
 vintages, seeing carefully to the dessert, the coffee, and 
 liqueurs, giving him of their best, in short ; the best, more- 
 over, of those times of the Empire when Paris was glutted 
 with kings and queens and princes, and many a private house 
 emulated royal spendors. 
 
 People used to play at Royalty then as they play nowadays 
 at parliament, creating a whole host of societies with presi- 
 dents, vice-presidents, secretaries and what not — agricultural 
 societies, industrial societies, societies for the promotion of 
 sericulture, viticulture, the growth of flax, and so forth. 
 Some have even gone so far as to look about them for social 
 evils in order to start a society to cure them. 
 
 But to return to Pons. A stomach thus educated is sure 
 to react upon the owner's moral fiber; the demoralization of 
 the man varies directly with his progress in culinary sapience. 
 Voluptuousness, lurking in every secret recess of the heart, 
 lays down the law therein. Honor and resolution are battered 
 in breach. The tyranny of the palate has never been de- 
 scribed ; as a necessity of life it escapes the criticism of litera- 
 ture; yet no one imagines how many have been ruined by the 
 table. The luxury of the table is indeed, in this sense, the
 
 12 COUSIN PONS 
 
 courtesan's one competitor in Paris, besides representing in a 
 manner the credit side in another account, where she figures as 
 the expenditure. 
 
 With Pons's decline and fall as an artist came his simul- 
 taneous transformation from invited guest to parasite and 
 hanger-on ; he could not bring himself to quit dinners so ex- 
 cellently served for the Spartan broth of a two-franc 
 ordinary. Alas ! alas ! a shudder ran through him at the mere 
 thought of the great sacrifices which independence required 
 him to make. He felt that he was capable of sinking to even 
 lower depths for the sake of good living, if there was no 
 other way of enjoying the first and best of everything, of 
 guzzling (vulgar but expressive word) nice little dishes care- 
 fully prepared. Pons lived like a bird, pilfering his meal, 
 flying away when he had taken his fill, singing a few notes by 
 way of return ; he took a certain pleasure in the thought that 
 he lived at the expense of society, which asked of him — what 
 but the trifling toll of grimaces.-^ Like all confirmed bach- 
 elors, who hold their lodgings in horror, and live as much as 
 possible in other people's houses. Pons was accustomed to the 
 formulas and facial contortions which do duty for feeling in 
 the world ; he used compliments as small change ; and as far 
 as others were concerned, he was satisfied with the labels they 
 bore, and never plunged a too curious hand into the sack. 
 
 This not intolerable phase lasted for another ten years. 
 Such years ! Pons's life was closing with a rainy autumn. 
 All through those years he contrived to dine without expense 
 by making himself necessary in the houses which he fre- 
 quented. He took the first step in the downward path by 
 undertaking a host of small commissions ; many and many a 
 time Pons ran on errands instead of the porter or the servant ; 
 many a purchase he made for his entertainers. He became a 
 kind of harmless, well-meaning spy, sent by one family into 
 another; but he gained no credit with those for whom he 
 trudged about, and so often sacrificed self-respect. 
 
 *' Pons is a bachelor," said they ; " he is at a loss to know 
 what to do with his time ; he is only too glad to trot about for 
 us. — What else would he do ? " 
 
 Very soon the cold which old age spreads about itself be-
 
 COUSIN PONS IS- 
 
 gan to set in ; the communicable cold which sensibly lowers the 
 social temperature, especially if the old man is ugly and poor. 
 Old and ugly and poor — is not this to be thrice old? Pons's 
 winter had begun, the winter which brings the reddened nose, 
 and frost-nipped cheeks, and the numbed fingers, numb in 
 how many ways ! 
 
 Invitations very seldom came for Pons now. So far from 
 seeking the society of the parasite, every family accepted him 
 much as they accepted the taxes ; they valued nothing that 
 Pons could do for them ; real sersaces from Pons counted for 
 naught. The family circles in which the worthy artist re- 
 volved had no respect for art or letters ; they went down on 
 their knees to practical results ; they valued nothing but the 
 fortune or social position acquired since the year 1830. 
 The bourgeoisie is afraid of intellect and genius, but Pons's 
 spirit and manner were not haughty enough to overawe his 
 relations, and naturally he had come at last to be accounted 
 less than nothing with them, though he was not altogether 
 despised. 
 
 He had suffered acutely among them, but, like all timid 
 creatures, he kept silence as to his pain ; and so by degrees 
 schooled himself to hide his feelings, and learned to take 
 sanctuary in his inmost self. Many superficial persons in- 
 terpret this conduct by the short word " selfishness " ; and, 
 indeed, the resemblance between the egoist and the solitary 
 human creature is strong enough to seem to justify the 
 harsher verdict; and this is especially true in Paris, where 
 nobody observes others closely, where all things pass swift as 
 waves, and last as little as a Ministry. 
 
 So Cousin Pons was accused of selfishness (behind his 
 back) ; and if the world accuses anyone, it usually finds him 
 guilty and condemns him into the bargain. Pons bowed to 
 the decision. Do any of us know how such a timid nature is 
 cast down by an unjust judgment? Who will ever paint all 
 that the timid suffer? This state of things, now growing 
 daily worse, explains the sad expression on the poor old musi- 
 cian's face ; he lived by capitulations of which he was ashamed. 
 Every time we sin against self-respect at the bidding of the 
 ruling passion, we rivet its hold upon us; the more that
 
 14 COUSIN PONS 
 
 passion requires of us, the stronger it grows, every sacrifice 
 increasing, as it were, the value of a satisfaction for which 
 so much has been given up, till the negative sum-total of re- 
 nouncements looms very large in a man's imagination. Pons, 
 for instance, after enduring the insolently patronizing looks 
 of some bourgeois, incased in buckram of stupidity, sipped his 
 glass of port or finished his quail v.ith bread-crumbs, and rel- 
 ished something of the savor of revenge besides. " It is not 
 too dear at the price ! " he said to himself. 
 
 After all, in the eyes of the moralist, there were extenuat- 
 ing circumstances in Pons's case. Man only lives, in fact, 
 by some personal satisfaction. The passionless, perfectly 
 righteous man is not human ; he is a monster, an angel want- 
 ing wings. The angel of Christian mythology has nothing 
 but a head. On earth, the righteous person is the sufficiently 
 tiresome Grandison, for whom the very Venus of the Cross- 
 roads is sexless. 
 
 Setting aside one or two commonplace adA^enturcs in Italy, 
 in which probably the climate accounted for his success, no 
 woman had ever smiled upon Pons. Plenty of men are 
 doomed to this fate. Pons was an abnormal birth ; the child 
 of parents well stricken in years, he bore the stigma of his 
 untimely genesis ; his cadaverous complexion might have been 
 contracted in the flask of spirit-of-wine in which science pre- 
 serves some extraordinary fetus. Artist though he was, with 
 his tender, dreamy, sensitive soul, he was forced to accept the 
 character which belonged to his face ; it was hopeless to think 
 of love, and he remained a bachelor, not so much of choice as 
 of necessity. Then Gluttony, the sin of the continent monk, 
 beckoned to Pons ; he rushed upon temptation, as he had 
 thrown his whole soul into the adoration of art and the cult of 
 music. Good cheer and bric-a-brac gave him the small 
 change for the love which could spend itself in no other way. 
 As for music, it was his profession, and where will you find 
 the man who is in love with his means of earning a livelihood.'* 
 For it is with a profession as with marriage: in the long 
 length you are sensible of nothing but the drawbacks. 
 
 Brillat-Sava^'in has deliberately set himself to justify the 
 gastronome, but perhaps even he has not dwelt sufficiently oa
 
 COUSIN PONS 15 
 
 the reality of the pleasures of the table. The demands of di- 
 gestion upon the human economy produce a.n internal wres- 
 tling-bout of human forces which rivals the highest degree of 
 amorous pleasure. The gastronome is conscious of an ex- 
 penditure of vital power, an expenditure so vast that the 
 brain is atrophied (as it were), that a second brain, located 
 in the diaphragm, may come into play, and the suspension of 
 all the faculties is in itself a kind of intoxication. A boa- 
 constrictor gorged with an ox is so stupid with excess that 
 the creature is easily killed. What man, on the wrong -side 
 of forty, is rash enough to work after dinner.'' And remark 
 in the same connection, that all great men have been moderate 
 eaters. The exhilarating effect of the wing of a chicken 
 upon invalids recovering from serious illness, and long con- 
 fined to a stinted and carefully chosen diet, has been' fre- 
 quently remarked. The sober Pons, whose whole enjoyment 
 was concentrated in the exercise of his digestive organs, was 
 in the position of chronic convalescence ; he looked to his din- 
 ner to give him the utmost degree of pleasurable sensation, 
 and hitherto he had procured such sensations daily. Who 
 dares to bid farewell to old habit.'* ^lany a man on the brink 
 of suicide has been plucked back on the threshold of death by 
 the thought of the cafe where he plays his nightly game of 
 dominoes. 
 
 In the year 1835, chance avenged Pons for the indifference 
 of womankind by finding him a prop for his declining years, 
 as the saying goes ; and he, who had been old from his 
 cradle, found a support in friendship. Pons took to himself 
 the only life-partner permitted to him among his kind — an old 
 man and a fellow musician. 
 
 But for La Fontaine's fable Les Deux Amis, this sketch 
 should have borne the title of The Two Friends ; but to take 
 the name of his divine story would surely be a deed of 
 violence, a profanation from which every true man of letters 
 would shrink. The title ought to be borne alone and forever 
 by the fabulist's masterpiece, the revelation of his soul, and 
 the record of his dreams ; those three words were set once 
 and forever by the poet at the head of a page which is his 
 by a sacred right of ownership ; for it is a shrine before which
 
 16 COUSIN PONS 
 
 all generations, all over the world, will kneel so long as the 
 art of printing shall endure. 
 
 Pons's friend gave lessons on the pianoforte. They met 
 and struck up an acquaintance in 1834 one prize day at a 
 boarding-school ; and so congenial were their ways of think- 
 ing and living, that Pons used to say that he had found his 
 friend too late for his happiness. Never, perhaps, did two 
 souls, so much alike, find each other in the great ocean of 
 humanity which flowed forth, in disobedience to the will of 
 God, from its source in the Garden of Eden. Before very 
 long the two musicians could not live without each other. 
 Confidences were exchanged, and in a week's time they were 
 like brothers. Schmucke (for that was his name) had not 
 believed that such a man as Pons existed, nor had Pons 
 imagined that a Schmucke was possible. Here already you 
 have a sufficient description of the good couple ; but it is not 
 every mind that takes kindly to the concise synthetic method, 
 and a certain amount of demonstration is necessary if the 
 credulous are to accept the conclusion. 
 
 This pianist, like all other pianists, was a German. A 
 German, like the eminent Liszt and the great Mendelssohn, 
 and Steibelt, and Dussek, and Meyer, and Mozart, and 
 Doelher, and Thalberg, and Dreschok, and Hiller, and Leo- 
 pold Mayer, and Cramer, and Zimmerman, and Kalkbrenner, 
 and Hertz, Woertz, Karr, Wolff, Pixis, and Clara Wieck — 
 and all Germans, generally speaking. Schmucke was a great 
 musical composer doomed to remain a music master, so ut- 
 terly did his character lack the audacity which a musical 
 genius needs if he is to push his way to the front. A Ger- 
 man's naivete does not invariably last him through his life; 
 in some cases it fails after a certain age ; and even as a culti- 
 vator of the soil brings water from afar by means of irriga- 
 tion channels, so, from the springs of his youth, does the Teu- 
 ton draw the simplicity which disarms suspicion — the peren- 
 nial supplies with which he fertilizes his labors in every field 
 of science, art, or commerce. A crafty Frenchman here and 
 there will turn a Parisian tradesman's stupidity to good ac- 
 count in the same way. But Schmucke had kept his child's 
 simplicity much as Pons continued to wear his relics of the
 
 COUSIN PONS lY, 
 
 Empire — all unsuspectingly. The true and noble-hearted 
 German was at once the theater and the audience, making 
 music within himself for himself alone. In this city of Paris 
 he lived as a nightingale lives among the thickets ; and for 
 twenty years he sang on, mateless, till he met with a second 
 self in Pons.^ 
 
 Both Pons and Schmucke were abundantly given, both by 
 heart and disposition, to the peculiarly German sentimental- 
 ity which shows itself in childlike ways — in a passion for 
 flowers, in that form of nature-worship which prompts a Ger- 
 man to plant his garden beds with big glass globes for the 
 sake of seeing miniature pictures of a view which he can be- 
 hold about him of a natural size ; in the inquiring turn of 
 mind that sets a learned Teuton trudging three hundred miles 
 in his gaiters in search of a fact which smiles up in his face 
 from a wayside spring, or lurks laughing under the jessa- 
 mine leaves in the backyard; or (to take a final instance) in 
 the German craving to endow every least detail in creation 
 with a spiritual significance, a craving which produces some- 
 times the inexplicable work of a Jean Paul Richter, sometimes 
 Hoffmann's tipsiness in type, sometimes the folios with which 
 Germany hedges the simplest questions round about, lest 
 haply any fool should fall into her intellectual excavations ; 
 and, indeed, if you fathom these abysses, you find nothing but 
 a German at the bottom. 
 
 Both friends were Catholics. They went to Mass and per- 
 formed the duties of religion together; and, like children, 
 found nothing to tell their confessors. It was their firm 
 behef that music is to feeling and thought as thought and 
 feeling are to speech ; and of their converse on this system 
 there was no end. Each made response to the other in orgies 
 of sound, demonstrating their convictions, each for each, like 
 lovers. 
 
 Schmucke was as absent-minded as Pons was wide awake. 
 Pons was a collector, Schmucke a dreamer of dreams; 
 Schmucke was a student of beauty seen by the soul. Pons a 
 preserver of material beauty. Pons would catch sight of a 
 china cup and buy it in the time that Schmucke took to blow 
 
 * See Une Fille d'ilve.
 
 18 COUSIN PONS 
 
 his nose, wondering the while within himself whether the 
 musical phrase that was ringing in his brain — the motif from 
 Rossini or Bellini or Beethoven or Mozart — had its origin or 
 its counterpart in the world of human thought and emotion. 
 Schmucke's economies were controlled by an absent mind, 
 Pons was a spendthrift through passion, and for both the 
 result was the same — they had not a penny on Saint Syl- 
 vester's day. 
 
 Perhaps Pons would have given way under his troubles 
 if it had not been for this friendship ; but life became bear- 
 able when he found someone to whom he could pour out his 
 heart. The first time that he breathed a word of his diffi- 
 culties, the good German had advised him to live as he himself 
 did, and eat bread and cheese at home sooner than dine abroad 
 at such a cost. Alas ! Pons did not dare to confess that heart 
 and stomach were at war within him, that he could digest 
 affronts which pained his heart, and, cost what it might, a 
 good dinner that satisfied his palate was a necessity to him, 
 even as your gay Lothario must have a mistress to tease. 
 
 In time Schmucke understood; not just at once, for he was 
 too much of a Teuton to possess that gift of swift perception 
 in which the French rejoice; Schmucke understood and loved 
 poor Pons the better. Nothing so fortifies a friendship as a 
 belief on the part of one friend that he is superior to the other. 
 An angel could not have found a word to say to Schmucke 
 rubbing his hands over the discovery of the held that gluttony 
 had gained over Pons. Indeed, the good German adorned 
 their breakfast-table next morning with delicacies of which he 
 went in search himself; and every day he was careful to pro- 
 vide something new for his friend, for they always break- 
 fasted together at home. 
 
 If anyone imagines that the pair could escape ridicule in 
 Paris, where nothing is respected, he cannot know that city. 
 When Schmucke and Pons united their riches and poverty, 
 they hit upon the economical expedient of lodging together, 
 each paying half the rent of the very unequally divided sec- 
 ond-floor of a house in the Rue de Normandie in the Marais. 
 And as it often happened that they left home together and 
 walked side by side along their beat of boulevard, the idlers
 
 COUSIN PONS 19 
 
 of the quarter dubbed them " the pair of nutcrackers," a nick- 
 name which makes any portrait of Schmucke quite super- 
 fluous, for he was to Pons as the famous statue of the Nurse 
 of Niobe in the Vatican is to the Tribune Venus, 
 
 Mme. Cibot, portress of the house in the Rue de Normandie, 
 was the pivot on which the domestic life of the nutcrackers 
 turned ; but Mme. Cibot plays so large a part in the drama 
 which grew out of their double existence, that it will be m.ore 
 appropriate to give her portrait on her first appearance in 
 this Scene of Parisian Life. 
 
 One thing remains to be said of the characters of the pair 
 of friends ; but this one thing is precisely the hardest to make 
 clear to ninety-nine readers out of a hundred in this forty- 
 seventh year of the nineteenth century, perhaps by reason of 
 the prodigious financial development brought about by the 
 railway system. It is a little thing, and yet it is much. It 
 is a question, in fact, of giving an idea of the extreme sensi- 
 tiveness of their natures. Let us borrow an illustration 
 from the railways, if only by way of retaliation, as it were, 
 for the loans which they levy upon us. The railway train 
 of to-day, tearing over the metals, grinds away fine 
 particles of dust, grains so minute that a traveler cannot 
 detect them with the eye ; but let a single one of those in- 
 visible motes find its way into the kidneys, it will bring about 
 that most excruciating, and sometimes fatal, disease known 
 as gravel. And our society, rushing like a locomotive along 
 its metaled track, is heedless of the all but imperceptible 
 dust made by the grinding of the wheels ; but it was other- 
 wise with the two musicians : the invisible grains of sand sank 
 perpetually into the very fibers of their being, causing them 
 intolerable anguish of heart. Tender exceedingly to the pain 
 of others, they wept for their own powerlessness to help ; 
 and their own susceptibilities were almost morbidly acute. 
 Neither age nor the continual spectacle of the drama of Paris 
 life had hardened two souls still young and childlike and 
 pure ; the longer they lived indeed, the more keenly they felt 
 their inward suffering ; for so it is, alas ! with natures un- 
 sullied by the world, with the quiet thinker, and with such 
 poets among poets as have never fallen into any excess.
 
 20 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Since the old men began housekeeping together, the (day's 
 routine was very nearly the same for them both. They 
 worked together in harness in the fraternal fashion of the 
 Paris cab-horse ; rising every morning, summer and winter, at 
 seven o'clock, and setting out after breakfast to give music 
 lessons in the boarding-schools, in which, upon occasion, they 
 would take lessons for each other. Towards noon Pons re- 
 paired to his theater, if there was a rehearsal on hand ; but all 
 his spare moments were spent in sauntering on the boulevards. 
 Night found both of them in the orchestra at the theater, for 
 Pons had found a place for Schmucke, and upon this wise. 
 
 At the time of their first meeting. Pons had just received 
 that marshal's baton of the unknown musical composer — an 
 appointment as conductor of an orchestra. It had come to 
 him unasked, by favor of Count Popinot, a bourgeois hero of 
 July, at that time a member of the Government. Count 
 Popinot had the license of a theater in his gift, and Count 
 Popinot had also an old acquaintance of the kind that the 
 successful man blushes to meet. As he rolls through the 
 streets of Paris in his carriage, it is not pleasant to see his 
 bo3^hood's chum down at heel, with a coat of many improbable 
 colors and trousers innocent of straps, and a head full of 
 soaring speculations on too grand a scale to tempt shy, easily 
 scared capital. Moreover, this friend of his youth, Gaudis- 
 sart by name, had done not a little in the past towards found- 
 ing the fortunes of the great house of Popinot. Popinot, 
 now a Count and a peer of France, after twice holding a port- 
 folio, had no wish to shake off " the Illustrious Gaudissart." 
 Quite otherwise. The pomps and vanities of the Court of the 
 Citizen-King had not spoiled the sometime druggist's kind 
 heart ; he wished to put his ex-commercial traveler in the way 
 of renewing his wardrobe and replenishing his purse. So 
 when Gaudissart, always an enthusiastic admirer of the fair 
 sex, applied for the license of a bankrupt theater, Popinot 
 granted it on condition that Pons (a parasite of the Hotel 
 Popinot) should be engaged as conductor of the orchestra; 
 and at the same time, the Count was careful to send certain 
 elderly amateurs of beauty to the theater, so that the new 
 manager might be strongly supported financially by wealthy
 
 COUSIN PONS £1 
 
 admirers of feminine charms revealed by the costume of the 
 ballet. 
 
 Gaudissart and Company, who, be it said, made their for- 
 tune, hit upon the grand idea of operas for the people, and 
 carried it out in a boulevard theater in 1834. A tolerable 
 conductor, who could adapt or even compose a little music 
 upon occasion, was a necessity for ballets and pantomimes; 
 but the last management had so long been bankrupt, that 
 they could not afford to keep a transposer and copyist. Pons 
 therefore introduced Schmucke to the company as copier of 
 music, a humble calling which requires no small musical knowl- 
 edge ; and Schmucke, acting on Pons's advice, came to an un- 
 derstanding with the chef -de-service at the Opera-Comique, so 
 saving himself the clerical drudgery. 
 
 The partnership between Pons and Schmucke produced 
 one brilliant result. Schmucke being a German, harmony 
 was his strong point ; he looked over the instrumentation of 
 Pons's compositions, and Pons provided the airs. Here and 
 there an amateur among the audience admired the new pieces 
 of music which served as accompaniment to two or three 
 great successes, but they attributed the improvement vaguely 
 to " progress." No one cared to know the composer's name ; 
 like occupants of the baignoires, lost to view of the house, to 
 gain a view of the stage. Pons and Schmucke eclipsed them- 
 selves by their success. In Paris (especially since the Revolu- 
 tion of July) no one can hope to succeed unless he will push 
 his way quibuscumque viis and with all his might through a 
 formidable host of competitors ; but for this feat a man needs 
 thews and sinews, and our two friends, be it remembered, had 
 that affection of the heart which cripples all ambitious effort. 
 
 Pons, as a rule, only went to his theater towards eight 
 o'clock, when the piece in favor came on, and overtures and 
 accompaniments needed the strict ruling of the baton ; most 
 minor theaters are lax in such matters, and Pons felt the 
 more at ease because he himself had been by no means grasp- 
 ing in all his dealings with the management ; and Schmucke, 
 if need be, could take his place. Time went by, and Schmucke 
 became an institution in the orchestra ; the Illustrious Gaudis- 
 sart said nothing, but he was well aware of the value of Pons's
 
 82 COUSIN PONS 
 
 collaborator. He was obliged to include a pianoforte in the 
 orchestra (following the example of the leading theaters); 
 the instrument was placed beside the conductor's chair, and 
 Schmucke played without increase of salary — a volunteer 
 supernumerary. As Schmucke's character, his utter lack of 
 ambition or pretense, became known, the orchestra recognized 
 him as one of themselves ; and as time went on, he was in- 
 trusted with the often needed miscellaneous musical instru- 
 ments which form no part of the regular band of a boulevard 
 theater. For a very small addition to his stipend, Schmucke 
 played the viola d'amore, hautboy, violoncello, and harp, as 
 well as the piano, the castanets for the cachucha, the bells, 
 saxhorn, and the like. If the Germans cannot draw harmony 
 from the mighty instruments of Liberty, yet to play all in- 
 struments of music comes to them by nature. 
 
 The two old artists were exceedingly popular at the 
 theater, and took its ways philosophically. They had put, 
 as it were, scales over their eyes, lest they should see the of- 
 fenses that needs must come when a corps de ballet is blended 
 with actors and actresses, one of the most trying combina- 
 tions ever created by the laws of supply and demand for the 
 torment of managers, authors, and composers alike. 
 
 Everyone esteemed Pons with his kindness and his modesty, 
 his great self-respect and respect for others ; for a pure and 
 limpid life wins something like admiration from the worst 
 nature in every social sphere, and in Paris a fair virtue meets 
 with something of the success of a large diamond, so great 
 a rarity it is. No actor, no dancer however brazen, would 
 have indulged in the mildest practical joke at the expense of 
 either Pons or Schmucke. 
 
 Pons very occasionally put in an appearance in the foyer; 
 but all that Schmucke knew of the theater was the under- 
 ground passage from the street door to the orchestra. Some- 
 times, however, during an interval, the good German would 
 venture to make a survey of the house and ask a few ques- 
 tions of the first flute, a young fellow from Strasbourg, who 
 came of a German family at Kehl. Gradually under the 
 flute's tuition Schmucke's childlike imagination acquired a 
 certain amount of knowledge of the world; he could believe
 
 COUSIN PONS 23 
 
 In the existence of that fabulous creature the lorette, the pos- 
 sibility of " marriages at the Thirteenth Arrondissement," 
 the vagaries of the leading lady, and the contraband traffic 
 carried on by box-openers. In his eyes the more harmless 
 forms of vice were the lov/est depths of Babylonish iniquity; 
 he did not believe the stories, he smiled at them for grotesque 
 inventions. The ingenious reader can see that Pons and 
 Schmucke were exploited, to use a word much in fashion ; but 
 what they lost in money they gained in consideration and 
 kindly treatment. 
 
 It was after the success of the ballet with which a run of 
 success began for the Gaudissart Company that the man- 
 agement presented Pons with a piece of plate — a group of fig- 
 ures attributed to Benvenuto Cellini. The alarming costli- 
 ness of the gift caused talk in the green-room. It was a mat- 
 ter of twelve hundred francs ! Pons, poor honest soul, was 
 for returning the present, and Gaudissart had a world of 
 trouble to persuade him to keep it. 
 
 " Ah ! " said the manager afterwards, when he told his 
 partner of the interview, " if we could only find actors up to 
 that sample." 
 
 In their joint life, outwardly so quiet, there was the one 
 disturbing element — the weakness to which Pons sacrificed, 
 the insatiable craving to dine out. Whenever Schmucke hap- 
 pened to be at home while Pons was dressing for the evening, 
 the good German would bewail this deplorable habit. 
 
 " Gif only he vas ony fatter vor it ! " he many a time cried. 
 
 And Schmucke would dream of curing his friend of his 
 degrading vice, for a true friend's instinct in all that belongs 
 to the inner life is unerring as a dog's sense of smell ; a friend 
 knows by intuition the trouble in his friend's soul, and guesses 
 at the cause and ponders it in his heart. 
 
 Pons, who always wore a diamond ring on the little finger 
 of his right hand, an ornament permitted In the time of the 
 Empire but ridiculous to-day — Pons, who belonged to the 
 "troubadour time," the sentimental period of the First Em- 
 pire, was too much a child of his age, too much of a French- 
 man to wear the expression of divine serenity which softened 
 Schmucke's hideous ugliness. From Pons's melancholy looks,
 
 M COUSIN PONS 
 
 Schmucke knew that the profession of parasite was growing 
 daily more difficult and painful. And, in fact, in that month 
 of October 1844, the number of houses at which Pons dined 
 was naturally much restricted; reduced to move round and 
 round the family circle, he had used the word family in far 
 too wide a sense, as will shortly be seen. 
 
 M. Camusot, the rich silk mercer of the Rue des Bourdon- 
 nais, had married Pons's first cousin. Mile. Pons, only child 
 and heiress of one of the well-known firm of Pons Brothers, 
 court embroiderers. Pons's own father and mother retired 
 from a firm founded before the Revolution of 1789, leaving 
 their capital in the business until Mile. Pons's father sold it 
 in 1815 to a M. Rivet. M. Camusot had since lost his wife 
 and married again, and retired from business some ten years, 
 and now in 1844 he was a member of the Board of Trade, a 
 deputy, and what not. But the Camusot clan were friendly ; 
 and Pons, good man, still considered that he was some 
 kind of cousin to the children of the second marriage, 
 who were not relations, or even connected with him in any 
 way. 
 
 The second Mme. Camusot being a Mile. Cardot, Pons in- 
 troduced himself as a relative into the tolerabl}^ numerous 
 Cardot family, a second bourgeois tribe which, taken with its 
 connections, formed quite as strong a clan as the Camusots ; 
 for Cardot the notary (brother of the second Mme. Camusot) 
 had married a Mile. Chiff reville ; and the well-known family 
 of Chiff reville, the leading firm of manufacturing chemists, 
 was closely connected with the wholesale drug trade, of which 
 M. Anselme Popinot was for many years the undisputed head, 
 until the Revolution of July plunged him into the very center 
 of the djrnastic movement, as everybody knows. So Pons, in 
 the wake of the Camusots and Cardots, reached the Chiff re- 
 villes, and thence the Popinots, always in the character of a 
 cousin's cousin. 
 
 The above concise statement of Pons's relations with his en- 
 tertainers explains how it came to pass that an old musician 
 was received in 1844 as one of the family in the houses of 
 four distinguished persons— to wit, M. le Comte Popinot, peer 
 of France, and twice in office; M. Cardot, retired notary,
 
 COUSIN PONS 25 
 
 mayor and deputy of an arrondissement in Paris ; M. Camusot 
 senior, a member of the Board of Trade and the Municipal 
 Council of Paris, and a deputy on the high way to the Upper 
 Chamber and a peerage ; and lastly, M. Camusot de Marville, 
 Camusot's son by his first marriage, and Pons's one genuine 
 relation, albeit even he was a first cousin once removed. 
 
 This Camusot, President of a Chamber of the Court of 
 Appeal in Paris, had taken the name of his estate at Marville 
 to distinguish himself from his father and a younger half- 
 brother. 
 
 Cardot, the retired notary, had married his daughter 
 to his successor, whose name was Berthier; and Pons, trans- 
 ferred as part of the connection, acquired a right to dine 
 with the Berthiers " in the presence of a notary," as he 
 put it. 
 
 This was the bourgeois empyrean which Pons called his 
 " family," that upper world in which he so painfully reserved 
 his right to a knife and fork. 
 
 Of all these houses, some ten in all, the one in which Pons 
 ought to have met with the kindest reception should by rights 
 have been his own cousin's ; and, indeed, he paid most atten- 
 tion to President Camusot's family. But, alas ! Mme. Cam- 
 usot de Marville, daughter of the Sieur Thirion, usher of the 
 cabinet to Louis XVIII. and Charles X., had never taken very 
 kindly to her husband's first cousin, once removed. Pons had 
 tried to soften this formidable relative; he wasted his time; 
 for in spite of the pianoforte lessons which he gave gratu- 
 itously to Mile. Camusot, a young woman with hair some- 
 what inclined to red, it was impossible to make a musician of 
 her. 
 
 And now, at this very moment, as he walked with that 
 precious object in his hand. Pons was bound for the Presi- 
 dent's house, where he always felt as if he were at the Tuileries 
 itself, so heavily did the solemn green curtains, the carmelite- 
 brown hangings, thick piled carpets, heavy furniture, and 
 general atmosphere of magisterial severity oppress his soul. 
 Strange as it may seem, he felt more at home in the Hotel 
 Popinot, Rue Basse-du-Rempart, probably because it was full 
 of works of art ; for the master of the house, since he entered
 
 26 COUSIN PONS 
 
 public life, had acquired a mania for collecting beautiful 
 things, by way of contrast no doubt, for a politician is 
 obhged to pay for secret services of the ugliest kind. 
 
 President de Marville lived in the Rue de Hanovre, in a 
 house which his wife had bought ten years previously, on the 
 death of her parents, for the Sieur and Dame Thirion left 
 their daughter about a hundred and fifty thousand francs, 
 the savings of a lifetime. With its north aspect, the house 
 looks gloomy enough seen from the street, but the back looks 
 towards the south over the courtyard, with a rather pretty 
 garden beyond it. As the President occupied the whole of 
 the first floor, once the abode of a great financier of the time 
 of Louis XIV., and the second was let to a wealthy old lady, 
 the house wore a look of dignified repose befitting a magis- 
 trate's residence. President Camusot had invested ^1 that 
 he inherited from his mother, together with the savings of 
 twenty years, in the purchase of the splendid Marville estate ; 
 a chateau (as fine a relic of the past as you will find to-day in 
 Normandy) standing in a hundred acres of park land, and a 
 fine dependent farm, nominally bringing in twelve thousand 
 francs per annum, though, as it cost the President at least a 
 thousand crowns to keep up a state almost princely in our 
 days, his yearly revenue, " all told," as the saying is, was 
 a bare nine thousand francs. With this and his salary, the 
 President's income amounted to about twenty thousand 
 francs; but though to all appearance a wealthy man, espe- 
 cially as one-half of his father's property would one day 
 revert to him as the only child of the first marriage, he was 
 obliged to live in Paris as befitted his official position, and M. 
 and Mme. de Marville spent almost the whole of their incomes. 
 Indeed, before the year 1834< they felt pinched. 
 
 This family schedule sufficiently explains why Mile, de 
 Marville, aged three-and-twenty, was still unwed, in spite of a 
 hundred thousand francs of dowry and tempting prospects, 
 frequently, skillfully, but so far vainly, held out. For the 
 past five years Pons had listened to Mme. la Presidente's 
 lamentations as she beheld one young lawyer after another led 
 to the altar, while all the newly appointed judges at the 
 Tribunal were fathers of famihes already; and she, all this
 
 COUSIN PONS 27 
 
 time, had displayed Mile, de Marville's brilliant expectations 
 before the undazzled eyes of young Vicomte Popinot, eldest 
 son of the great man of the drug trade, he of whom it was 
 said by the envious tongues of the neighborhood of the Rue 
 des Lombards, that the Revolution of July had been brought 
 about at least as much for his particular benefit as for the 
 sake of the Orleans branch. 
 
 Arrived at the comer of the Rue de Choiseul and the Rue 
 de Hanovre, Pons suffered from the inexplicable emotions 
 which torment clear consciences ; from a panic terror such as 
 the worst of scoundrels might feel at sight of a policeman, an 
 agony caused solely by a doubt as to Mme. de Marville's 
 probable reception of him. That grain of sand, grating 
 continually on the fibers of his heart, so far from losing its 
 angles, grew more and more jagged, and the family in the 
 Rue de Hanovre always sharpened the edges. Indeed, their 
 unceremonious treatment and Pons's depreciation in value 
 among them had affected the servants ; and while they did not 
 exactly fail in respect, they looked on the poor relation as a 
 kind of beggar. 
 
 Pons's arch-enemy In the house was the ladles'-maid, a thin 
 and wizened spinster, Madeleine Vivet by name. This Made- 
 leine, in spite of, nay, perhaps on the strength of, a pimpled 
 complexion and a viper-like length of spine, had made up her 
 mind that some day she would be Mme. Pons. But in vain 
 she dangled twenty-thousand francs of savings before the old 
 bachelor's eyes ; Pons had declined happiness accompanied by 
 so many pimples. From that time forth the Dido of the ante- 
 chamber, who fain had called her master and mistress 
 *' cousin," wreaked her spite in petty ways upon the poor 
 musician. She heard him on the stairs, and cried audibly, 
 " Oh ! here comes the sponger ! " She stinted him of wine 
 when she waited at dinner in the footman's absence ; she filled 
 the water-glass to the brim, to give him the difficult task of 
 lifting it without spilling a drop ; or she would pass the old 
 man over altogether, till the mistress of the house would re- 
 mind her (and in what a tone! — it brought the color to the 
 poor cousin's face) ; or she would spill the gravy over his 
 clothes. In short, she waged petty war after the manner of a
 
 2S COUSIN PONS 
 
 petty nature, knoAving that she could annoy an unfortunate 
 superior with impunity. 
 
 Madeleine Vivet was Mme. de Marville's maid and house- 
 keeper. She had lived with M. and Mme. Camusot de Mar- 
 ville since their marriage ; she had shared the early struggles 
 in the provinces when M. Camusot was a judge at Alen9on; 
 she had helped them to exist when M. Camusot, President of 
 the Tribunal of Mantes, came to Paris, in 1828, to be an ex- 
 amining magistrate. She was, therefore, too much one of the 
 family not to wish, for reasons of her own, to revenge herself 
 upon them. Beneath her desire to play a trick upon her 
 haughty and ambitious mistress, and to call her master her 
 cousin, there surely lurked a long-stifled hatred, built up 
 like an avalanche, upon the pebble of some past grievance. 
 
 " Here comes your M. Pons, Madame, still wearing that 
 spencer of his ! " Madeleine came to tell the Presidente, " He 
 really might tell me how he manages to make it look the same 
 for five-and-twenty years together." 
 
 Mme. Camusot de Marville, hearing a man's footstep in 
 the little drawing-room between the large drawing-room and 
 her bedroom, looked at her daughter and shrugged her shoul- 
 ders. 
 
 " You always make these announcements so cleverly that 
 you leave me no time to think, Madeleine." 
 
 " Jean is out, Madame ; I was all alone ; M. Pons rang 
 the bell, I opened the door; and as he is almost one of the 
 family, I could not prevent him from coming after me. 
 There he is, taking off his spencer." 
 
 " Poor little puss ! " said the Presidente, addressing her 
 daughter, " we are caught. We shall have to dine at home 
 now. — Let us see," she added, seeing that the " dear puss " 
 wore a piteous face ; " must we get rid of him for good ? " 
 
 " Oh ! poor man ! " cried Mile. Camusot, " deprive him of 
 one of his dinners ? " 
 
 Somebody coughed significantly in the next room by way 
 of warning that he could hear. 
 
 " Very well, let him come in ! " said Mme. Camusot, look- 
 ing at Madeleine with another shrug. 
 
 " You are here so early, cousin, that you have come in upon
 
 COUSIN PONS 29 
 
 us just as mother was about to dress," said Cecile Camusot 
 in a coaxing tone. But Cousin Pons had caught sight of the 
 Presidente's shrug, and felt so cruelly hurt that he could not 
 find a compliment, and contented himself with a profound re- 
 mark, " You are always charming, my little cousin." 
 
 Then, turning to the mother, he continued, with a bow — 
 
 " You will not take it amiss, I think, if I have come a little 
 earlier than usual, dear cousin; I have brought something 
 for you ; you once did me the pleasure of asking me for it," 
 
 Poor Pons ! Every time he addressed the President, the 
 President's wife, or Cecile as *' cousin," he gave them ex- 
 cruciating annoyance. As he spoke, he drew a long, narrow 
 cherry-wood box, marvelously carved, from his coat-pocket. 
 
 " Oh, did I.'' — I had forgotten," the lady answered dryly. 
 
 It was a heartless speech, was it not? Did not those few 
 words deny all merit to the pains taken for her by the cousin 
 whose one offense lay in the fact that he was a poor relation? 
 
 " But it is very kind of you, cousin," she added. " How 
 much do I owe you for this little trifle? " 
 
 Pons quivered inwardly at the question. He had meant the 
 trinket as a return for his dinners. 
 
 " I thought that you would permit me to offer it you " 
 
 he faltered out. 
 
 " What? " said Mme. Camusot. " Oh! but there need be 
 no ceremony between us ; we know each other well enough to 
 wash our linen among ourselves. I know very well that you 
 are not rich enough to give more than you get. And to go no 
 further, it is quite enough that you should have spent a good 
 deal of time in running about among the dealers " 
 
 " If you were asked to pay the full price of the fan, my 
 dear cousin, you would not care to have it," answered poor 
 Pons, hurt and insulted ; " it is one of Watteau's master- 
 pieces, painted on both sides ; but you may be quite easy, 
 cousin, I did not give one-hundredth part of its value as a 
 work of art." 
 
 To tell a rich man that he is poor ! you might as well tell 
 the Archbishop of Granada that his homihes show signs of 
 senility. Mme. la Presidente, proud of her husband's posi- 
 tion, of the estate of Marville, and her invitations to court
 
 30 COUSIN PONS 
 
 balls, was keenly susceptible on this point; and what was 
 worse, the remark came from a poverty-stricken musician to 
 whom she had been charitable. 
 
 " Then the people of whom you buy things of this kind are 
 very stupid, are they? " she asked quickly, 
 
 " Stupid dealers are unknown in Paris," Pons answered al- 
 most dryly. 
 
 " Then you must be very clever," put in Cecile by way of 
 calming the dispute. 
 
 " Clever enough to know a Lancret, a Watteau, a Pater, or 
 Greuze when I see it, little cousin; but anxious, most of all, 
 to please your dear mamma." 
 
 Mme. de Marville, ignorant and vain, was unwilling to ap- 
 pear to receive the slightest trifle from the parasite ; and here 
 her ignorance served her admirably, she did not even know 
 the name of Watteau. And, on the other hand, if anything 
 can measure the extent of the collector's passion, which, in 
 truth, is one of the most deeply seated of all passions, rivaling 
 the very vanity of the author — if anything can give an idea 
 of the lengths to which a collector will go, it is the audacity 
 which Pons displayed on this occasion, as he held his own 
 against his lady cousin for the first time in twenty years. 
 He was amazed at his own boldness. He made Cecile see the 
 beauties of the delicate carving on the sticks of this wonder, 
 and as he talked to her his face grew serene and gentle again. 
 But without some sketch of the Presidente, it is impossible 
 fully to understand the perturbation of heart from which 
 Pons suffered, 
 
 Mme. de Marville had been short and fair, plump and 
 fresh ; at forty-six she was as short as ever, but she looked 
 dried up. An arched forehead and thin lips, that had been 
 softly colored once, lent a soured look to a face naturally dis- 
 dainful, and now grown hard and unpleasant with a long 
 course of absolute domestic rule. Time had deepened her 
 fair hair to a harsh chestnut hue; the pride of office, in- 
 tensified by suppressed envy, looked out of eyes that had lost 
 none of their brightness nor their satirical expression. As a 
 matter of fact, Mme. Camusot de Marville felt almost poor in 
 the society of self-made wealthy bourgeois with whom Pons
 
 COUSIN PONS 31 
 
 dined. She could not forgive the rich retail druggist, ex- 
 president of the Commercial Court, for his successive eleva- 
 tions as deputy, member of the Government, count, and peer 
 of France. She could not forgive her father-in-law for put- 
 ting himself forward instead of his eldest son as deputy of 
 his arrondissement after Popinot's promotion to the peerage. 
 After eighteen years of services in Paris, she was still wait- 
 ing for the post of Councilor of the Court of Cassation for 
 her husband. It was Camusot's own incompetence, well 
 known at the Law Courts, which excluded him from the Coun- 
 cil. The Home Secretary of 1844 even regretted Camusot's 
 nomination to the presidency of the Court of Indictments in 
 1834, though, thanks to his past experience as an exam- 
 ining magistrate, he made himself useful in drafting decrees. 
 
 These disappointments had told upon Mme. de Marville, 
 who, moreover, had formed a tolerably correct estimate of her 
 husband. A temper naturally shrewish was soured till she 
 grew positively terrible. She was not old but she had aged ; 
 she deliberately set herself to extort by fear all that the world 
 was inclined to refuse her, and was harsh and rasping as a 
 file. Caustic to excess, she had few friends among women ; 
 she surrounded herself with prim, elderly matrons of her own 
 stamp, who lent each other mutual support, and people stood 
 in awe of her. As for poor Pons, his relations with this fiend 
 in petticoats were very much those of a schoolboy with the 
 master whose one means of communication is the ferule. 
 
 The Presidente had no idea of the value of the gift. She 
 was puzzled by her cousin's sudden access of audacity. 
 
 " Then, where did you find this.? " inquired Cecile, as she 
 looked closely at the trinket. 
 
 " In the Rue de Lappe. A dealer in second-hand furniture 
 there had just brought it back with him from a chateau that 
 is being pulled down near Dreux, Aulnay. Mme. de Pom- 
 padour used to spend part of her time there before she built 
 Menars. Some of the most splendid wood-carving ever 
 known has been saved from destruction; Lienard (our most 
 famous living wood-carver) has kept a couple of oval frames 
 for models, as the ne plus ultra of the art, so fine it is. — 
 There were treasures in that place. My man found the fan
 
 S2 COUSIN PONS 
 
 in the drawer of an inlaid what-not, which I should certainly 
 have bought if I were collecting things of the kind, but it is 
 quite out of the question — a single piece of Riesener's fur- 
 niture is worth three or four thousand francs ! People here 
 in Paris are just beginning to find out that the famous French 
 and German marquetry workers of the sixteenth, seventeenth, 
 and eighteenth centuries composed perfect pictures in wood. 
 It is a collector's business to be ahead of the fashion. Why, 
 in five years' time, the Frankenthal ware, which I have been 
 collecting these twenty years, will fetch twice the price of 
 Sevres pate tendre." 
 
 " What is Frankenthal ware.'' " asked Cecile. 
 
 " That is the name for the porcelain made by the Elector 
 of the Palatinate; it dates further back than our manu- 
 factory at Sevres; just as the famous gardens at Heidelberg, 
 laid waste by Turenne, had the bad luck to exist before the 
 gardens of Versailles. Sevres copied Frankenthal to a large 
 extent. — In justice to the Germans, it must be said that they 
 have done admirable work in Saxony and in the Palatinate.'' 
 
 Mother and daughter looked at one another as if Pons 
 were speaking Chinese. No one can imagine how ignorant 
 and exclusive Parisians are; they only learn what they are 
 taught, and that only when they choose. 
 
 " And how do you know the Frankenthal ware when you 
 see it.? " 
 
 " Eh ! by the mark ! " cried Pons with enthusiasm. " There 
 is a mark on every one of those exquisite masterpieces. 
 Frankenthal ware is marked with a C and T (for Charles 
 Theodore) interlaced and crowned. On old Dresden china 
 there are two crossed swords and the number of the order in 
 gilt figures. Vincennes bears a hunting-horn ; Vienna, a V 
 closed and barred. You can tell Berlin by the two bars, 
 Mayence by the wheel, and Sevres by the two crossed L's. 
 The queen's porcelain is marked A for Antoinette, with a 
 royal crown above it. In the eighteenth century all the 
 crowned heads of Europe had rival porcelain factories, and 
 workmen were kidnaped. Watteau designed services for 
 the Dresden factory ; they fetch frantic prices at the present 
 day. One has to know what one is about with them too, for
 
 COUSIN PONS SB 
 
 they are turning out imitations now at Dresden. Wonderful 
 things they used to make; they will never make the like 
 again " 
 
 " Oh ! pshaw ! " 
 
 " No, cousin. Some inlaid work and some kinds of porce- 
 lain will never be made again, just as there will never be 
 another Rafael, nor Titian, nor Rembrandt, nor Van Eyck, 
 nor Cranach. . . . Well, now ! there are the Chinese ; they 
 are very ingenious, very clever; they make modern copies of 
 their ' grand mandarin ' porcelain, as it is called. But a 
 pair of vases of genuine old * grand mandarin,' vases of the 
 largest size, are worth six, eight, and ten thousand francs, 
 while you can buy the modern replicas for a couple of hun- 
 dred!" 
 
 " You are joking ! " 
 
 " You are astonished at the prices, but that is nothing, 
 cousin. A dinner-service of Sevres pate tendre (and pate 
 tendre is not porcelain) — a complete dinner-service of Sevres 
 pate tendre for twelve persons — is not merely worth a hundred 
 thousand francs, but that is the price charged on the invoice. 
 Such a dinner-service cost fifty thousand francs at Sevres in 
 1750 ; I have seen the original invoices." 
 
 " But let us go back to this fan," said Cecile. Evidently 
 in her opinion the trinket was an old-fashioned thing. 
 
 " You can understand that as soon as your dear mamma 
 did me the honor of asking for a fan, I went the round of all 
 the curiosity shops in Paris, but I found nothing fine enough. 
 I wanted nothing less than a masterpiece for the dear 
 Presidente, and thought of giving her one that once belonged 
 to Marie Antoinette, the most beautiful of all celebrated fans. 
 But yesterday I was dazzled by this divine chef-d'oeuvre, which 
 certainly must have been ordered by Louis XV. himself. Do 
 you ask how I came to look for fans in the Rue de Lappe, 
 among an Auvergnat's stock of brass and iron and ormolu 
 furniture.^ Well, I myself believe that there is an intelligence 
 in works of art ; they know art-lovers, they call to them — 
 ' Cht-tt ! ' " 
 
 Mme. de Marville shrussed her shoulders and looked at 
 her daughter; Pons did not notice the rapid pantomime.
 
 34 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " I kiiow all those sharpers," continued Pons, " so I asked 
 him, 'Anything fresh to-day, Daddy Monistrol? ' — (for he 
 always lets me look over his lots before the big buyers come) 
 — and at that he began to tell me how Lienard, that did such 
 beautiful work for the Government in the Chapelle de Dreux, 
 had been at the Aulnay sale and rescued the carved panels out 
 of the clutches of the Paris dealers, while their heads were 
 running on china and inlaid furniture. — ' I did not do much 
 myself,' he went on, ' but I may make my traveling expenses 
 out of this,' and he showed me a what-not ; a marvel ! Bou- 
 cher's designs executed in marquetry, and with such art ! — 
 One could have gone down on one's knees before it. — ' Look, 
 sir,' he said, ' I have just found this fan in a little drawer; it 
 was locked, I had to force it open. You might tell me where I 
 can sell it ' — and with that he brings me out this little carved 
 cherry-wood box. — ' See,' says he, ' it is the kind of Pom- 
 padour that looks like decorated Grothic' — ' Yes,' I told him, 
 ' the box is pretty ; the box might suit me ; but as for the fan, 
 Monistrol, I have no Mme. Pons to give the old trinket to, 
 and they make very pretty new ones nowadays ; you can buy 
 miracles of painting on vellum cheaply enough. There are 
 two thousand painters in Paris, you know.' — And I opened 
 out the fan carelessly, keeping down my admiration, looking 
 indifferently at those two exquisite little pictures, touched off 
 with an ease fit to send you into raptures. I held Mme. de 
 Pompadour's fan in my hand ! Watteau had done his utmost 
 for this. — ' What do you want for the what-not .^^ ' — * Oh! a 
 thousand francs ; I have had a bid already.' — I offered him 
 a price for the fan corresponding with the probable ex- 
 penses of the journey. We looked each other in the eyes, 
 and I saw that I had my man. I put the fan back into the 
 box lest my Auvergnat should begin to look at it, and went 
 into ecstasies over the box; indeed, it is a jewel. — ' If I take 
 it,' said I, ' it is for the sake of the box ; the box tempts me. 
 As for the what-not, you will get more than a thousand francs 
 for that. Just see how the brass is wrought; it is a model. 
 There is business in it. . . . It has never been copied ; it is 
 a unique specimen, made solely for Mme. de Pompadour ' — 
 and so on, till ray man, all on fire for his what-not, forgets the
 
 COUSIN PONS 35 
 
 fan, and lets me have it for a mere trifle, because I have 
 pointed out the beauties of his piece of Riesener's furniture. 
 So here it is ! but it needs a great deal of experience to make 
 such a bargain as that. It is a duel, eye to eye ; and who has 
 such eyes as a Jew or an Auvergnat ? " 
 
 The old artist's wonderful pantomime, his vivid, eager way 
 of telling the story of the triumph of his shrewdness over the 
 dealer's ignorance, would have made a subject for a Dutch 
 painter ; but it was all thrown away upon the audience. 
 Mother and daughter exchanged cold, contemptuous glances. 
 — " What an oddity ! " they seemed to say. 
 
 "So it amuses you?" remarked Mme. de Marville. The 
 question sent a cold chill through Pons ; he felt a strong desire 
 to slap the Presidente. 
 
 " Why, my dear cousin, that is the way to hunt down a 
 work of art. You are face to face with antagonists that 
 dispute the game with you. It is craft against craft ! A 
 work of art in the hands of a Norman, an Auvergnat, or a 
 Jew, is like a princess guarded by magicians in a fairy 
 tale." 
 
 " And how can you tell that this is by Wat what do 
 
 you call him.'' " 
 
 " Watteau, cousin. One of the greatest eighteenth century 
 painters in France. Look! do you not see that it is his 
 work.^* " (pointing to a pastoral scene, court-shepherd swains 
 and shepherdesses dancing in a ring.) " The movement! the 
 hfe in it ! the coloring ! There it is — see ! — painted with a 
 stroke of the brush, as a writing-master makes a flourish with 
 a pen. Not a trace of effort here ! And, turn it over, look ! 
 — a ball in a drawing-room. Summer and Winter! And 
 what ornaments ! and how well preserved it is ! The hinge- 
 pin is gold, you see, and on cleaning it, I found a tiny ruby at 
 either end." 
 
 " If it is so, cousin, I could not think of accepting such a 
 valuable present from you. It would be better to lay up the 
 money for yourself," said Mme. de Marville ; but all the same, 
 she asked no better than to keep the splendid fan. 
 
 " It is time that it should pass from the service of Vice into 
 the hands of Virtue," said the good soul, recovering his as-
 
 36 COUSIN PONS 
 
 surance. " It has taken a century to work the miracle. No 
 princess at Court, you may be sure, will have anything to 
 compare with it ; for, unfortunately, men will do more for a 
 Pompadour than for a virtuous queen, such is human nature." 
 
 " Very well," Mme. de Marville said, laughing, " I will ac- 
 cept your present. — Cecile, my angel, go to Madeleine and 
 see that dinner is worthy of your cousin." 
 
 Mme. de Marville wished to make matters even. Her re- 
 quest, made aloud, in defiance of all rules of good taste, 
 sounded so much like an attempt to repay at once the balance 
 due to the poor cousin, that Pons flushed red, like a girl 
 found out in fault. The grain of sand was a little too large ; 
 for some moments he could only let it work in his heart. 
 Cecile, a red-haired young v/oman, with a touch of pedantic 
 affectation, combined her father's ponderous manner with a 
 trace of her mother's hardness. She went and left poor Pons 
 face to face with the terrible Presidente. 
 
 " How nice she is, my little Lili ! " said the mother. She 
 still called her Cecile by this baby name. 
 
 " Charming ! " said Pons, twirling his thumbs. 
 
 " I cannot understand these times in which we live," broke 
 out the Presidente. *' What is the good of having a Presi- 
 dent of the Court of Appeal in Paris and a Commander of 
 the Legion of Honor for your father, and for a grandfather 
 the richest wholesale silk merchant in Paris, a deputy, and a 
 millionaire that will be a peer of France some of these 
 days?" 
 
 The President's zeal for the new Government had, in fact, 
 recently been rewarded with a commander's ribbon, — thanks 
 to his friendship with Popinot, said the envious. Popinot 
 himself, modest though he was, had, as has been seen, ac- 
 cepted the title of count, " for his son's sake," he told his 
 numerous friends. 
 
 " Men look for nothing but money nowadays," said Cousin 
 Pons. " No one thinks anj'thing of you unless you are rich, 
 and " 
 
 " AVhat would it have been if Heaven had spared my poor 
 little Charles ! " cried the lady. 
 
 " Oh, with two children you would be poor," returned the
 
 COUSIN PONS ST 
 
 cousin. " It practically means the division of the property. 
 But you need not trouble yourself, cousin ; Cecile is sure to 
 marry, sooner or later. She is the most accomplished girl I 
 know." 
 
 To such depths had Pons fallen by adapting himself to the 
 company of his entertainers ! In their houses he echoed their 
 Ideas, and said the obvious thing, after the manner of a 
 chorus in a Greek play. He did not dare to give free play 
 to the artist's originality, which had overflowed in bright 
 repartee when he was young; he had effaced himself, till he 
 had almost lost his individuality ; and if the real Pons ap- 
 peared, as he had done a moment ago, he was immediately re- 
 pressed. 
 
 " But I myself was married wjth only twenty thousand 
 francs for my portion " 
 
 " In 1819, cousin. And it was you^ a woman with a head 
 on your shoulders, and the royal protection of Louis XVIII." 
 
 " But still, my child is a perfect angel. She is clever, she 
 has a warm heart, she will have a hundred thousand francs on 
 her wedding day, to say nothing of the most brilliant expecta- 
 tions ; and yet she stays on our hands," and so on and so on. 
 For twenty minutes, Mme. de Marville talked on about her- 
 self and her Cecile, pitying herself after the manner of 
 mothers in bondage to marriageable daughters. 
 
 Pons had dined at the house every week for twenty years, 
 and Camusot de Marville was the only cousin he had in the 
 world ; but he had yet to hear the first word spoken as to his 
 own affairs — nobody cared to know how he lived. Here and 
 elsewhere the poor cousin was a kind of sink down which his 
 relatives poured domestic confidences. His discretion was 
 well known ; indeed, was he not bound over to silence when a 
 single imprudent word would have shut the door of ten 
 houses upon him? And he must combine his role of listener 
 with a second part; he must applaud continually, smile on 
 everyone, accuse nobody, defend nobody; from his point of 
 view, everyone must be in the right. And so, in the house 
 of his kinsman. Pons no longer counted as a man ; he was a 
 digestive apparatus. 
 
 In the course of a long tirade, Mme. Camusot de Marville
 
 38 COUSIN PONS 
 
 avowed with due circumspection that she was prepared to take 
 almost any son-in-law M-ith her eyes shut. She was even dis- 
 posed to think that at eight-and-forty or so a man with 
 twenty thousand francs a year was a good match. 
 
 " Cecile is in her twenty-third year. If it should fall out 
 so unfortunately that she is not married before she is five or 
 six-and-twenty, it will be extremely hard to marry her at all. 
 When a girl reaches that age. people want to know why she 
 has been so long on hand. We are a good deal talked about 
 in our set. We have come to an end of all the ordinary ex- 
 cuses — ' She is so young. — She is so fond of her father and 
 mother that she doesn't like to leave them. — She is so happy 
 at home. — She is hard to please, she would like a good 
 name ' We are beginning to look silly ; I feel that dis- 
 tinctly. And besides, Cecile Is tired of waiting, poor child, 
 she suffers " 
 
 " In what way.^* " Pons was noodle enough to ask. 
 
 *' Why, because It is humiliating to her to see all her girl 
 friends married before her," repHed the mother, with a duen- 
 na's air. 
 
 *' But, cousin, has anything happened since the last time 
 that I had the pleasure of dining here ? Why do you think of 
 men of eight-and-forty .^ " Pons inquired humbly. 
 
 " This has happened," returned the Presidente. " We 
 were to have had an interview with a Court Councilor; his 
 son Is thirty years old and very well-to-do, and M. de Mar- 
 ville would have obtained a post in the audit -office for him and 
 paid the money. The young man is a supernumerary there 
 at present. And now they tell us that he has taken it into 
 his head to rush off to Italy in the train of a duchess from the 
 Bal Mabille. . . . It is nothing but a refusal in disguise. 
 The fact is, the young man's mother is dead; he has an in- 
 come of thirty thousand francs, and more to come at his 
 father's death, and they don't care about the match for him. 
 You have just come in In the middle of all this, dear cousin, so 
 you must excuse our bad temper." 
 
 While Pons was casting about for the complimentary an- 
 swer which Invariably occurred to him too late when he was 
 afraid of his host, Madeleine came In, handed a folded note
 
 COUSIN PONS 39 
 
 to the Presidente, and waited for an answer. The note ran 
 as follows : — 
 
 " Dear Mamma, — If we pretend that this note comes to 
 you from papa at the Palais, and that he wants us both to 
 dine with his friend because proposals have been renewed — 
 then the cousin will go, and we can carry out our plan of 
 going to the Popinots." 
 
 " Who brought the master's note? " the Presidente asked 
 quickly. 
 
 " A lad from the Salle du Palais," the withered waiting 
 woman unblushingly answered, and her mistress knew at once 
 that Madeleine had woven the plot with Cecile, now at the end 
 of her patience. 
 
 " Tell him that we will both be there at half-past five." 
 
 Madeleine had no sooner left the room than the Presidente 
 turned to Cousin Pons with that insincere friendliness which 
 is about as grateful to a sensitive soul as a mixture of milk 
 and vinegar to the palate of an epicure. 
 
 " Dinner is ordered, dear cousin ; you must dine without 
 us; my husband has just sent word from the court that the 
 question of the marriage has been reopened, and we are to 
 dine with the Councilor. We need not stand on ceremony 
 at all. Do just as if you were at home. I have no secrets 
 from you ; I am perfectly open with you, as you see. I am 
 sure you would not wish to break off the little darling's mar- 
 riage." 
 
 " /, cousin .'' On the contrary, I should like to find someone 
 for her ; but in my circle " 
 
 " Oh, that is not at all likely," said the Presidente, cutting 
 him short insolently. " Then you will stay, will you not.-* 
 Cecile will keep you company while I dress." 
 
 " Oh ! I can dine somewhere else, cousin." 
 
 Cruelly hurt though he was by her way of casting up his 
 poverty to him, the prospect of being left alone with the 
 servants was even more alarming. 
 
 "But why should you? Dinner is ready; you may just 
 as well have it ; if you do not, the servants will eat it."
 
 40 COUSIN PONS 
 
 At that atrocious speech Pons started up as if he had re- 
 ceived a shock from a galvanic battery, bowed stifHy to the 
 lady, and went to find his spencer. Now, it so happened that 
 the door of Cecile's bedroom, beyond the little drawing-room, 
 stood open, and looking into the mirror, he caught sight of 
 the girl shaking with laughter as she gesticulated and made 
 signs to her mother. The old artist understood beyond a 
 doubt that he had been the victim of some cowardly hoax. 
 Pons went slowly down the stairs ; he could not keep 
 back the tears. He understood that he had been turned 
 out of the house, but why and wherefore he did not 
 know. 
 
 " I am growing too old," he told himself, " The world 
 has a horror of old age and poverty — two ugly things. After 
 this I will not go anywhere unless I am asked." 
 
 Heroic resolve ! 
 
 Downstairs the great gate was shut, as it usually Js in 
 houses occupied by the proprietor ; the kitchen stood exactly 
 opposite the porter's lodge, and the door was open. Pons 
 was obliged to listen while Madeleine told the servants the 
 whole story amid the laughter of the servants. She had not 
 expected him to leave so soon. The footman loudly ap- 
 plauded a joke at the expense of a visitor who was always 
 coming to the house and never gave you more than three 
 francs at the year's end. 
 
 " Yes," put in the cook ; " but if he cuts up rough and does 
 not come back, there will be three francs the less for some of 
 us on New Year's Day." 
 
 " Eh ! How is he to know ? " retorted the footman. 
 
 " Pooh ! " said Madeleine, " a little sooner or a little later 
 — what difference does it make? The people at the other 
 houses where he dines are so tired of him that they are going 
 to turn him out." 
 
 " The gate, if you please ! " 
 
 Madeleine had scarcely uttered the words when they heard 
 the old musician's call to the porter. It sounded like a cry of 
 pain. There was a sudden silence in the kitchen. 
 
 " He heard ! " the footman said. 
 
 " Well, and if he did, so much the worse, or rather so much
 
 COUSIN PONS 41 
 
 the better," retorted Madeleine. " He is an arrant skin- 
 flint." 
 
 Poor Pons had lost none of the talk in the kitchen ; he 
 heard it all, even to the last word. He made his way home 
 along the boulevards, in the same state, physical and mental, 
 as an old woman after a desperate struggle with burglars. 
 As he went he talked to himself in quick spasmodic jerks; his 
 honor had been wounded, and the pain of it drove him on as a 
 gust of wind whirls away a straw. He found himself at last 
 in the Boulevard du Temple ; how he had come thither he could 
 not tell. It was five o'clock, and, strange to say, he had com- 
 pletely lost his appetite. 
 
 But if the reader is to understand the revolution which 
 Pons's unexpected return at that hour was to work in the Rue 
 de Normandie, the promised biography of Mme. Cibot must be 
 given in this place. 
 
 Anyone passing along the Rue de Normandie might be 
 pardoned for thinking that he was in some small provincial 
 town. Grass runs to seed in the street, everybody knows 
 everybody else, and the sight of a stranger is an event. The 
 houses date back to the reign of Henry IV., when there was 
 a scheme afoot for a quarter in which every street was to be 
 named after a French province, and all should converge in a 
 handsome square to which La France should stand god- 
 mother. The Quartier de I'Europe was a revival of the same 
 idea ; history repeats itself everywhere in the world, and even 
 in the world of speculation. 
 
 The house in which the two musicians used to live is an old 
 mansion with a courtyard in front and a garden at the back; 
 but the front part of the house which gives upon the street 
 is comparatively modern, built during the eighteenth century 
 when the Marais was a fashionable quarter. The friends 
 lived at the back, on the second floor of the old part of the 
 house. The whole building belonged to M. Pillerault, an old 
 man of eighty, who left matters very much in the hands of 
 M. and Mme. Cibot, his porters for the past twenty-six 
 years. 
 
 Now, as a porter cannot live by his lodge alone, the afore- 
 said Cibot had other means of gaining a livelihood; and sup-
 
 42 COUSIN PONS 
 
 .plemented his five per cent, on the rental and his fagot from 
 every cartload of wood by his own earnings as a tailor. In 
 time Cibot ceased to work for the master tailors; he made a 
 connection among the little tradespeople of the quarter, and 
 enjoyed a monopoly of the repairs, renovations, and fine- 
 drawing of all the coats and trousers in three adjacent 
 streets. The lodge was spacious and wholesome, and boasted 
 a second room; wherefore the Cibot couple were looked upon 
 as among the luckiest porters in the arrondissement. 
 
 Cibot, small and stunted, with a complexion almost olive- 
 colored by reason of sitting day in day out Turk-fashion 
 on a table level with the barred window, made about twelve 
 or fourteen francs a week. He worked still, though he was 
 fifty-eight years old, but fifty-eight is the porter's golden 
 age; he is used to his lodge, he and his room fit each other 
 like the shell and the oyster, and " he is known in the neigh- 
 borhood." 
 
 Mme. Cibot, sometime opener of oysters at the Cadran 
 Bleu, after all the adventures which come unsought to the 
 belle of an oyster-bar, left her post for love of Cibot at the 
 age of twenty-eight. The beauty of a woman of the people 
 is short-lived, especially if she is planted espalier fashion at a 
 restaurant door. Her features are hardened by puffs of hot 
 air from the kitchen ; the color of the heeltaps of customers' 
 bottles, finished in the company of the waiters, gradually 
 filters into her complexion — no beauty is full blown so soon as 
 the beauty of an oyster-opener. Luckily for Mme. Cibot, 
 lawful wedlock and a portress's life were oflPered to her just 
 in time; while she still preserved a comeliness of a masculine 
 order slandered by rivals of the Rue de Normandie, who called 
 her " a great blowsy thing," Mme. Cibot might have sat as a 
 model to Rubens. Those flesh tints reminded you of the ap- 
 petizing sheen on a pat of Isigny butter; but plump as she 
 was, no woman went about her work with more agility. Mme. 
 Cibot had attained the time of life when women of her stamp 
 are obliged to shave — which is as much as to say that she 
 had reached the age of forty-eight. A porter's wife with a 
 mustache is one of the best possible guarantees of respecta- 
 bility and security that a landlord can have. If Delacroix
 
 COUSIN PONS 43 
 
 could have seen Mme. Cibot leaning proudly on her broom 
 handle, he would assuredly have painted her as Bellona. 
 
 Strange as it may seem, the circumstances of the Cibots, 
 man and wife (in the style of an indictment), were one day 
 to affect the lives of the two friends ; wherefore the chronicler, 
 as in duty bound, must give some particulars as to the Cibots' 
 lodge. 
 
 The house brought in about eight thousand francs, for 
 there were three complete sets of apartments — back and 
 front, on the side nearest the Rue de Normandie, as well as 
 the three floors in the older mansion between the courtyard 
 and the garden, and a shop kept by a marine store-dealer 
 named Remonencq, which fronted on the street. During the 
 past few months this Remonencq had begun to deal in old 
 curiosities, and knew the value of Pons's collection so well that 
 he took off his hat whenever the musicians came in or went 
 out. 
 
 A sou in the livre on eight thousand francs therefore 
 brought in about four hundred francs to the Cibots. They 
 had no rent to pay and no expenses for firing; Cibot's earn- 
 ings amounted on an average to seven or eight hundred 
 francs, add tips at the New Year, and the pair had altogether 
 an income of sixteen hundred francs, every penny of which 
 they spent, for the Cibots lived and fared better than work- 
 ing people usually do. " One can only live once," La Cibot 
 used to say. She was born during the Revolution, you see, 
 and had never learned her Catechism. 
 
 The husband of this portress with the unblenching tawny 
 eyes was an object of envy to the whole fraternity, for La 
 Cibot had not forgotten the knowledge of cookery picked up 
 at the Cadran Bleu. So it had come to pass that the Cibots 
 had passed the prime of life, and saw themselves on the thresh- 
 old of old age without a hundred francs put by for the future. 
 Well clad and well fed, they enjoyed among the neighbors, 
 it is true, the respect due to twenty-six years of strict 
 honesty ; for if they had nothing of their own, they " hadn't 
 nothing belonging to nobody else," according to La Cibot, 
 who was prodigal of negatives. " There wasn't never such a 
 love of a man," she would say to her husband. Do you ask
 
 44 COUSIN PONS 
 
 why? You might as well ask the reason of her indifference 
 in matters of religion. 
 
 Both of them were proud of a life lived in open day, of the 
 esteem in which they were held for six or seven streets round 
 about, and of the autocratic rule permitted to them by the 
 proprietor (" perprietor," they called him); but in private 
 they groaned because they had no money lying at interest. 
 Cibot complained of pains in his hands and legs, and his wife 
 would lament that her poor, dear Cibot should be forced to 
 work at his age ; and, indeed, the day is not far distant when 
 a porter after thirty years of such a life will cry shame upon 
 the injustice of the Government and clamor for the ribbon of 
 the Legion of Honor. Every time that the gossip of the 
 quarter brought news of such and such a servant-maid, left 
 an annuity of three or four hundred francs after eight or 
 ten years of service, the porters' lodges would resound with 
 complaints, which may give some idea of the consuming jeal- 
 ousies in the lowest walks of life in Paris. 
 
 " Oh, indeed ! It will never happen to the like of us to 
 have our names mentioned in a will ! We have no luck, but 
 we do more than servants, for all that. We fill a place of 
 trust ; we give receipts, we are on the lookout for squalls, and 
 yet we are treated like dogs, neither more nor less, and that's 
 the truth ! " 
 
 " Some find fortune and some miss fortune," said Cibot, 
 coming in with a coat. 
 
 " If I had left Cibot here in his lodge and taken a place as 
 cook, we should have had our thirty thousand francs out at 
 interest," cried Mme. Cibot, standing chatting with a neigh- 
 bor, her hands on her prominent hips. " But I didn't under- 
 stand how to get on in life ; housed inside of a snug lodge and 
 firing found and want for nothing, but that is all." 
 
 In 1836 when the friends took up their abode on the second 
 floor, they brought about a sort of revolution in the Cibot 
 household. It befell on this wise. Schmucke, like his friend 
 Pons, usually arranged that the porter or the porter's wife 
 should undertake the cares of housekeeping; and being both 
 of one mind on this point when they came to live in the Rue de 
 Normandie, Mme. Cibot became their housekeeper at the
 
 COUSIN PONS 45 
 
 rate of twenty-five francs per month — twelve francs, fifty 
 centimes for each of them. Before the year was out, the 
 emeritus portress reigned in the estabhshment of the two old 
 bachelors, as she reigned everywhere in the house belonging 
 to M. Pillerault, great uncle of Mme. la Comtesse Popinot. 
 Their business was her business ; she called them " my gentle- 
 men." And at last, finding the pair of nutcrackers mild as 
 lambs, easy to live with, and by no means suspicious — perfect 
 children, in fact — her heart, the heart of a woman of the 
 people, prompted her to protect, adore, and serve them with 
 such thorough devotion, that she read them a lecture now and 
 again, and saved them from, the impositions which swell the 
 cost of living in Paris. For twenty-five francs a month, the 
 two old bachelors inadvertently acquired a mother. 
 
 As they became aware of Mme. Cibot's full value, they 
 gave her outspoken praises, and thanks, and little presents 
 which strengthened the bonds of the domestic alliance. Mme. 
 Cibot a thousand times preferred appreciation to money pay- 
 ments ; it is a well-known fact that the sense that one is ap- 
 preciated makes up for a deficiency in wages. And Cibot 
 did all that he could for his wife's two gentlemen, and ran 
 errands and did repairs at half-price for them. 
 
 The second year brought a new element into the friendship 
 between the lodge and the second floor, and Schmucke con- 
 cluded a bargain which satisfied his indolence and desire for 
 a life without cares. For thirty sous per day, or forty-five 
 francs per month, Mme. Cibot undertook to provide Schmucke 
 with breakfast and dinner ; and Pons, finding his friend's 
 breakfast very much to his mind, concluded a separate treaty 
 for that meal only at the rate of eighteen francs. This ar- 
 rangement, which added nearly ninety francs every month to 
 the takings of the porter and his wife, made two inviolable 
 beings of the lodgers ; they became angels, cherubs, divinities. 
 It is very doubtful whether the King of the French, who is 
 supposed to understand economy, is as well served as the pair 
 of nutcrackers used to be in those days. 
 
 For them the milk issued pure from the can ; they enjoyed 
 a free perusal of all the morning papers taken by other 
 lodgers, later risers, who were told, if need be, that the news-
 
 46 COUSIN PONS 
 
 paper had not come yet. Mme. Cibot, moreover, kept their 
 clothes, their rooms, and the landing as clean as a Flemish 
 interior. As for Schmucke, he enjoyed unhoped-for happi- 
 ness ; Mme. Cibot had made life easy for him ; he paid her 
 about six francs a month, and she took charge of his linen, 
 washing, and mending. Altogether his expenses amounted to 
 sixty-six francs per month (for he spent fifteen francs on 
 tobacco), and sixty-six francs multiplied by twelve produces 
 the sum-total of seven hundred and ninety-two francs. Add 
 two hundred and twenty francs for rent, rates, and taxes, 
 and you have a thousand and twelve francs. Cibot was 
 Schmucke's tailor; his clothes cost him on an average a 
 hundred and fifty francs, which further swells the total to the 
 sum of twelve hundred. On twelve hundred francs per 
 annum this profound philosopher lived. How many people in 
 Europe, whose one thought it is to come to Paris and live 
 there, will be agreeably surprised to learn that you may exist 
 in comfort upon an income of twelve hundred francs in the 
 Rue de Normandie in the Marais, under the wing of a Mme. 
 Cibot. 
 
 Mme. Cibot, to resume the story, was amazed beyond 
 expression to see Pons, good man, return at five o'clock in 
 the evening. Such a thing had never happened before; and 
 not only so, but " her gentleman " had given her no greet- 
 ing — had not so much as seen her ! 
 
 " Well, well, Cibot," said she to her spouse, " M. Pons has 
 come in for a million, or gone out of his mind ! " 
 
 " That is how it looks to me," said Cibot, dropping the 
 coat-sleeve in which he was making a " dart," in tailor's 
 language. 
 
 The savory odor of a stew pervaded the whole courtyard, 
 as Pons returned mechanically home. Mme. Cibot was dish- 
 ing up Schmucke's dinner, which consisted of scraps of boiled 
 beef from a little cook-shop not above doing a little trade of 
 this kind. These morsels were fricasseed in brown butter, 
 with thin slices of onion, until the meat and vegetables had 
 absorbed the gravy, and this true porter's dish was browned 
 to the right degree. With that fricassee, prepared with 
 loving care for Cibot and Schmucke, and accompanied by a
 
 COUSIN PONS 47 
 
 bottle of beer and a piece of cheese, the old German music- 
 master was quite content. Not King Solomon in all his 
 glory, be sure, could dine better than Schmucke. A dish of 
 boiled beef fricassed with onions, scraps of saute chicken, or 
 beef and parsley, or venison, or fish served with a sauce of 
 La Cibot's own invention (a sauce with which a mother might 
 unsuspectingly eat her child), — such was Schmucke's or- 
 dinary, varying with the quantity and quality of the remnants 
 of food supplied by boulevard restaurants to the cook-shop 
 in the Rue Boucherat. Schmucke took everything that 
 " goot Montame Zipod " gave him, and was content, and so 
 from day to day " goot Montame Zipod " cut down the cost 
 of his dinner, until it could be served for twenty sous. 
 
 " It won't be long afore I find out what is the matter 
 with him, poor dear," said Mme. Cibot to her husband, " for 
 here is M. Schmucke's dinner all ready for him." 
 
 As she spoke, she covered the deep earthenware dish with 
 a plate; and, notwithstanding her age, she climbed the 
 stair and reached the door before Schmucke opened it to 
 Pons. 
 
 " Vat is de matter mit you, mein goot friend.'' " asked the 
 German, scared by the expression on Pons's face. 
 
 " I will tell you all about it ; but I have come home to have 
 dinner with you " 
 
 " Tinner ! tinner ! " cried Schmucke in ecstasy ; " but it is 
 imbossible ! " the old German added, as he thought of his 
 friend's gastronomical tastes ; and at that very moment he 
 caught sight of Mme. Cibot listening to the conversation, as 
 she had a right to do as his lawful housewife. Struck with 
 one of those happy inspirations which only enlighten a 
 friend's heart, he marched up to the portress and drew her 
 out to the stairhead. 
 
 " Montame Zipod," he said, " der goot Bons is fond of 
 goot dings ; shoost go rount to der Catran Pleu und order a 
 dainty liddle tinner, mit anjovies und maggaroni. Ein 
 tinner for Lugullus in vact." 
 
 " What is that.? " inquired La Cibot. 
 
 " Oh ! ah ! " returned Schmucke, " it is veal a la pour- 
 cheoise " {hourgeoise, he meant), " a nice fisch, ein pottle off
 
 48 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Porteaux, und nice dings, der fery best dey haf, like gro- 
 quettes of rice und shmoked paeon ! Bay for it, und say 
 nodings; I will gif you back de money to-morrow morning." 
 
 Back went Schmucke, radiant and rubbing his hands ; but 
 his expression slowly changed to a look of bewildered aston- 
 ishment as he heard Pons's story of the troubles that had but 
 just now overwhelmed him in a moment. He tried to comfort 
 Pons by giving him a sketch of the world from his own 
 point of view. Paris, in his opinion, was a perpetual hurly- 
 burly, the men and women in it were whirled away by a tem- 
 pestuous waltz ; it was no use expecting anything of the 
 world, which only looked at the outsides of things, " und not 
 at der inderior." For the hundredth time he related how 
 that the only three pupils for whom he had really cared, for 
 whom he was ready to die, the three who had been fond of 
 him, and even allowed him a little pension of nine hundred 
 francs, each contributing three hundred to the amount — his 
 favorite pupils had quite forgotten to come to see him ; and so 
 swift was the current of Parisian life which swept them away, 
 that if he called at their houses, he had not succeeded in see- 
 ing them once in three years — (it is a fact, however, that 
 Schmucke had always thought fit to call on these great ladies 
 at ten o'clock in the morning!) — still, his pension was paid 
 quarterly through the medium of solicitors. 
 
 *' Und yet, dey are hearts of gold," he concluded. " Dey 
 are my liddle Saint Cecilias, sharming vimmen, Montame de 
 Bordentuere, Montame te Fantenesse, und Montame du Dilet. 
 Gif I see dem at all, it is at die Jambs Elusees, und dey do 
 not see me . . . yet dey are ver' fond of me, und I might 
 go to dine mit dem, und dey vould be ver' bleased to see me ; 
 und I might go to deir country-houses, but I would much 
 rader be mit mine friend Bons, because I kann see him venefer 
 I like, und efery tay." 
 
 Pons took Schmucke's hand and grasped it between his own. 
 All that was passing in his inmost soul was communicated in 
 that tight pressure. And so for a while the friends sat like 
 two lovers, meeting at last after a long absence. 
 
 " Tine here, efery tay ! " broke out Schmucke, inwardly 
 blessing Mme. de Marville for her hardness of heart. " Look
 
 COUSIN PONS 49 
 
 here! Ve shall go a prick-a-pracking togeders, und der 
 teufel shall nefer show his tail here." 
 
 " Ve shall go prick-a-pracking togeders ! " — for the full 
 comprehension of those truly heroic words, it must be con- 
 fessed that Schmucke's ignorance of bric-a-brac was some- 
 thing of the densest. It required all the strength of his 
 friendship to keep him from doing heedless damage in the 
 sitting-room and study which did duty as a museum for Pons. 
 Schmucke, wholly absorbed in music, a composer for love of 
 his art, took about as much interest in his friend's little trifles 
 as a fish might take in a flowershow at the Luxembourg, sup- 
 posing that it had received a ticket of admission. A certain 
 awe which he certainly felt for the marvels was simply a re- 
 flection of the respect which Pons showed his treasures when 
 he dusted them. To Pons's exclamations of admiration, he 
 was wont to reply with a " Yes, it is ver' bretty," as a mother 
 answers baby-gestures with meaningless baby-talk. Seven 
 times since the friends had lived together. Pons had ex- 
 changed a good clock for a better one, till at last he possessed 
 a timepiece in Boule's first and best manner, for Boule had 
 two manners, as Rafael had three. In the first he combined 
 ebony and copper ; in the second — contrary to his convic- 
 tions — he sacrificed to tortoise-shell, working miracles to out- 
 strip his rivals, the inventors of tortoise-shell inlaid work. In 
 spite of Pons's learned dissertations, Schmucke never could 
 see the slightest difference between the magnificent clock in 
 Boule's first manner and its six predecessors ; but, for Pons's 
 sake, Schmucke was even more careful among the *' chim- 
 cracks " than Pons himself. So it should not be surprising 
 that Schmucke's sublime words comforted Pons in his despair ; 
 for " Ve shall go prick-a-pracking togeders," meant, being 
 interpreted, " I will put money into bric-a-brac, if you will 
 only dine here." 
 
 " Dinner is ready," Mme. Cibot announced, with astonish- 
 ing self-possession. 
 
 It is not difficult to imagine Pons's surprise when he saw 
 and relished the dinner due to Schmucke's friendship. Sensa- 
 tions of this kind, that come so rarely in a lifetime, are never 
 the outcome of the constant, close relationship by which friend
 
 50 COUSIN PONS 
 
 daily says to friend, " You are a second self to me ; " for 
 this, too, becomes a matter of use and wont. It is only by 
 contact with the barbarism of the world without that the 
 happiness of that intimate life is revealed to us as a sudden 
 glad surprise. It is the outer world which renews the bond 
 between friend and friend, lover and lover, all their lives long, 
 wherever two great souls are knit together by friendship or 
 by love. 
 
 Pons brushed away two big tears, Schmucke himself wiped 
 his eyes; and though nothing was said, the two were closer 
 friends than before. Little friendly nods and glances ex- 
 changed across the table were like balm to Pons, soothing the 
 pain caused by the sand dropped in his heart by the President's 
 wife. As for Schmucke, he rubbed his hands till they were 
 sore ; for a new idea had occurred to him ; one of those great 
 discoveries which cause a German no surprise, unless they 
 sprout up suddenly in a Teuton brain frost-bound by the awe 
 and reverence due to sovereign princes. 
 
 " Mine goot Bons? " began Schmucke. 
 
 *' I can guess what you mean ; you would like us both to 
 dine together here, every day " 
 
 " Gif only I vas rich enof to lif like dis efery tay " 
 
 began the good German in a melancholy voice. But here 
 Mme. Cibot appeared upon the scene. Pons had given her 
 an order for the theater from time to time, and stood in conse- 
 quence almost as high in her esteem and affection as her 
 boarder Schmucke. 
 
 " Lord love you," said she, " for three francs and wine 
 extra I can give you both such a dinner every day that you 
 will be ready to lick the plates as clean as if they were 
 washed." 
 
 " It is a fact," Schmucke remarked, " dat die tinners dat 
 Montame Zipod cooks for me are better as de messes dey eat 
 at der royal dable ! " In his eagerness, Schmucke, usually 
 so full of respect for the powers that be, so far forgot himself 
 as to imitate the irreverent newspapers which scoffed at the 
 " fixed-price " dinners of Royalty. 
 
 " Really ? " said Pons. " Very well, I will try to-morrow." 
 
 And at that promise Schmucke sprang from one end of the
 
 COUSIN PONS 61 
 
 table to the other, sweeping off tablecloth, bottles, and dishes 
 as he went and hugged Pons to his heart. So might gas rush 
 to combine with gas. 
 
 " Vat happiness ! " cried he. 
 
 Mme. Cibot was quite touched. " Monsieur is going to 
 dine here every day ! " she cried proudly. 
 
 That excellent woman departed downstairs again in ig- 
 norance of the event which had brought about this result, 
 entered her room like Josepha in William Tell, set down the 
 plates and dishes on the table with a bang, and called aloud 
 to her husband — 
 
 " Cibot ! run to the Cafe Turc for two small cups of 
 coffee, and tell the man at the stove that it is for me." 
 
 Then she sat down and rested her hands on her massive 
 knees, and gazed out of the window at the opposite wall. 
 
 " I will go to-night and see what Ma'am Fontaine says," 
 she thought. (Mme. Fontaine told fortunes on the cards 
 for all the servants in the quarter of the Marais). " Since 
 these two gentlemen came here, we have put two thousand 
 francs in the savings bank. Two thousand francs in eight 
 years ! What luck ! Would it be better to make no profit 
 out of M. Pons's dinner and keep him here at home.'* Ma'am 
 Fontaine's hen will tell me that." 
 
 Three years ago INIme. Cibot had begun to cherish a hope 
 that her name might be mentioned in " her gentlemen's " wills ; 
 she had redoubled her zeal since that covetous thought tardily 
 sprouted up in the midst of that so honest mustache. Pons 
 hitherto had dined abroad, eluding her desire to have both of 
 " her gentlemen " entirely under her management ; his " trou- 
 badour " collector's life had scared away certain vague ideas 
 which hovered in La Cibot's brain ; but now her shadowy proj- 
 ects assumed the formidable shape of a definite plan, dating 
 from that memorable dinner. Fifteen minutes later she re- 
 appeared in the dining-room with two cups of excellent coffee, 
 flanked by a couple of tiny glasses of kirschwasser. 
 
 " Long lif Montame Zipod ! " cried Schmucke ; " she haf 
 guessed right ! " 
 
 The diner-out bemoaned himself a little, while Schmucke 
 met his lamentations with coaxing fondness, like a home
 
 52 COUSIN PONS 
 
 pigeon welcoming back a wandering bird. Then the pair set 
 out for the theater, 
 
 Schmucke could not leave his friend in the condition to 
 which he had been brought by the Camusots — mistresses and 
 servants. He knew Pons so well ; he feared lest some cruel, 
 sad thought should seize on him at his conductor's desk, 
 and undo all the good done by his welcome home to the 
 nest. 
 
 And Schmucke brought his friend back on his arm through 
 the streets at midnight. A lover could not be more careful 
 of his lady. He pointed out the edges of the curbstones, he 
 was on the lookout whenever they stepped on or off the pave- 
 ment, ready with a warning if there was a gutter to cross. 
 Schmucke could have wished that the streets were paved with 
 cotton-down ; he would have had a blue sky overhead, and 
 Pons should hear the music which all the angels in heaven 
 were making for him. He had won the lost province in his 
 friend's heart ! 
 
 For nearly three months Pons and Schmucke dined to- 
 gether every day. Pons was obliged to retrench at once ; for 
 dinner at forty-five francs a month and wine at thirty-five 
 meant precisely eighty francs less to spend on bric-a-brac. 
 And very soon, in spite of all that Schmucke could do, in 
 spite of his little German jokes. Pons fell to regretting the 
 delicate dishes, the liqueurs, the good coffee, the table-talk, 
 the insincere pohteness, the guests, and the gossip, and the 
 houses where he used to dine. On the wrong side of sixty a 
 man cannot break himself of a habit of thirtj^-six years' 
 growth. Wine at a hundred and thirty francs per hogshead 
 is scarcely a generous liquid in a gourmefs glass ; every time 
 that Pons raised it to his lips he thought, with infinite poign- 
 ant regret, of the exquisite wines in his entertainers' cellars. 
 
 In short, at the end of three months, the cruel pangs which 
 had gone near to break Pons's sensitive heart had died away ; 
 he forgot everything but the charms of society; and lan- 
 guished for them like some elderly slave of a petticoat com- 
 pelled to leave the mistress who too repeatedly deceives him. 
 In vain he tried to hide his profound and consuming melan- 
 choly ; it was too plain that he was suffering from one of the
 
 COUSIN PONS 53 
 
 mysterious complaints which the mind brings upon the 
 body, 
 
 A singk symptom will throw light upon this case of nos- 
 talgia (as it were) produced by breaking away from an old 
 habit ; in itself it is trifling, one of the myriad nothings which 
 are as rings in a coat of chain-mail enveloping the soul in a 
 network of iron. One of the keenest pleasures of Pons's old 
 life, one of the joys of the dinner-table parasite at all times, 
 was the " surprise," the thrill produced by the extra dainty 
 dish added triumphantly to the bill of fare by the mistress of 
 a bourgeois house, to give a festal air to the dinner. Pons's 
 stomach hankered after that gastronomical satisfaction. 
 Mme. Cibot, in the pride of her heart, enumerated every dish 
 beforehand; a salt and savour once periodically recurrent, 
 had vanished utterly from daily life. Dinner proceeded with- 
 out le plat convert, as our grandsires called it. This lay be- 
 yond the bounds of Schmucke's powers of comprehension. 
 
 Pons had too much delicacy to grumble ; but if the case of 
 unappreciated genius is hard, it goes harder still with the 
 stomach whose claims are ignored. Slighted affection, a 
 subject of which too much has been made, is founded upon an 
 illusory longing; for if the creature fails, love can turn 
 to the Creator, who has treasures to bestow. But the 
 stomach ! . . . Nothing can be compared to its sufferings ; 
 for, in the first place, one must live. 
 
 Pons thought wistfully of certain creams — surely the 
 poetry of cookery ! — of certain white sauces, masterpieces of 
 the art ; of truffled chickens, fit to melt your heart ; and above 
 these, and more than all these, of the famous Rhine carp, only 
 known at Paris, served with what condiments ! There were 
 days when Pons, thinking upon Count Popinot's cook, would 
 sigh aloud, " Ah, Sophie ! " x4.ny passer-by hearing the ex- 
 clamation might have thought that the old man referred to 
 a lost mistress ; but his fancy dwelt upon something rarer, on 
 a fat Rhine carp with a sauce, thin in the sauce-boat, creamy 
 upon the palate, a sauce that deserved the Montyon prize ! 
 The conductor of the orchestra, living on memories of past 
 dinners, grew visibly leaner; he was pining away, a victim 
 to gastric nostalgia.
 
 64. COUSIN PONS 
 
 By the beginning of the fourth month (towards the end 
 of January 1845) Pons's condition attracted attention at the 
 theater. The flute, a young man named Wilhelm, Hke almost 
 all Germans ; and Schwab, to distinguish him from all other 
 Wilhehns, if not from all other Schwabs, judged it expedient 
 to open Schmucke's eyes to his friend's state of health. It 
 was a first performance of a piece in which Schmucke's in- 
 struments were all required. 
 
 " The old gentleman is failing," said the flute ; " there is 
 something wrong somewhere; his eyes are heavy, and he 
 doesn't beat time as he used to do," added Wilhelm Schwab, 
 indicating Pons as he gloomily took his place, 
 
 " Dat is alvays de vay, gif a man is sixty years old," 
 answered Schmucke. 
 
 The Highland widow, in The Chronicles of the Canon- 
 gate, sent her son to his death to have him beside her for 
 twenty-four hours ; and Schmucke could have sacrificed Pons 
 for the sake of seeing his face every day across the dinner- 
 table. 
 
 " Everybody in the theater is anxious about him," continued 
 the flute ; " and, as the premiere danseuse. Mile. Brisetout, 
 says, ' he makes hardly any noise now when he blows his 
 nose.' " 
 
 And, indeed, a peal like the blast of a horn used to re- 
 sound through the old musician's bandana handkerchief 
 whenever he raised it to that lengthy and cavernous feature. 
 The President's wife had more frequently found fault with 
 him on that score than on any other. 
 
 " I vould gif a goot teal to amuse him," said Schmucke, 
 *' he gets so dull." 
 
 " M. Pons always seems so much above the like of us poor 
 devils, that, upon my word, I didn't dare to ask him to 
 my wedding," said Wilhelm Schwab. " I am going to be 
 
 married " 
 
 *' How ? " demanded Schmucke. 
 
 " Oh 1 quite properly," returned Wilhelm Schwab, taking 
 Schmucke's quaint inquiry for a gibe, of which that perfect 
 Christian was quite incapable. 
 
 " Come, gentlemen, take your places ! " called Pons, look-
 
 COUSIN PONS 55 
 
 ing round at his little army, as the stage manager's bell rang 
 for the overture. 
 
 The piece was a dramatized fairy tale, a pantomime called 
 The DeviVs Betrothed, which ran for two hundred nights. 
 In the interval, after the first act, Wilhelm Schwab and 
 Schmucke were left alone in the orchestra, with a house at a 
 temperature of thirty-two degrees Reaumur. 
 
 " Tell me your hishdory," said Schmucke. 
 
 " Look there ! Do you see that young man in the box 
 yonder.'' . . . Do you recognize him.^ " 
 
 " Nefer a pit " 
 
 " Ah .'' That is because he is wearing yellow gloves and 
 shines with all the radiance of riches, but that is my friend 
 Fritz Brunner out of Frankfort-on-the-Main." 
 
 " Dat used to komm to see du blay und sit peside you in 
 dcr orchestra.'' " 
 
 " The same. You would not believe he could look so dif- 
 ferent, would you ! " 
 
 The hero of the promised story was a German of that 
 particular type in which the somber irony of Goethe's Meph- 
 istopheles is blended with a homely cheerfulness found in 
 the romances of Auguste Lafontaine of pacific memory ; but 
 the predominating element in the compound of artlessness and 
 guile, of shopkeeper's shrewdness, and the studied careless- 
 ness of a member of the Jockey Club, was that form of dis- 
 gust which set a pistol in the hands of a young Werther, 
 bored to death less by Charlotte than by German princes. It 
 was a thoroughly German face, full of cunning, full of 
 simplicity, stupidity, and courage ; the knowledge which 
 brings weariness, the worldly wisdom which the veriest child's 
 trick leaves at fault, the abuse of beer and tobacco, — all these 
 were there to be seen in it, and to heighten the contrast of 
 opposed qualities, there was a wild diabolical gleam in the fine 
 blue eyes with the jaded expression. 
 
 Dressed with all the elegance of a city man, Fritz Brunner 
 sat in full view of the house displaying a bald crown of the 
 tint beloved by Titian, and a few stray fiery red hairs on 
 either side of it ; a remnant spared by debauchery and want, 
 that the prodigal might have a right to spend money with the
 
 56 COUSIN PONS 
 
 hairdresser when he should come into his fortune. A face, 
 once fair and fresh as the traditional portrait of Jesus Christ, 
 had grown harder since the advent of a red mustache; a 
 tawny beard lent it an almost sinister look. The bright blue 
 eyes had lost something of their clearness in the struggle with 
 distress. The countless courses by which a man sells himself 
 and his honor in Paris had left their traces upon his eyelids 
 and carved lines about the eyes, into which a mother once 
 looked with a mother's rapture to find a copy of her own 
 fashioned by God's hand. 
 
 This precocious philosopher, this wizened youth, was the 
 work of a stepmother. 
 
 Herewith begins the curious history of a prodigal son of 
 Frankfort-on-the-Main — the most extraordinary and as- 
 tounding portent ever beheld by that well-conducted, if cen- 
 tral, city. 
 
 Gideon Brunner, father of the aforesaid Fritz, was one of 
 the famous innkeepers of Frankfort, a tribe who make law- 
 authorized incisions in travelers' purses with the connivance 
 of the local bankers. An innkeeper and an honest Calvinist 
 to boot, he had married a converted Jewess and laid the 
 foundations of his prosperity with the money she brought 
 him. 
 
 When the Jewess died, leaving a son Fritz, twelve years of 
 age, under the joint guardianship of his father and maternal 
 uncle, a furrier at Leipsic, head of the firm of Virlaz and 
 Company, Brunner senior was compelled by his brother-in-law 
 (who was by no means as soft as his peltry) to invest little 
 Fritz's money, a goodly quantity of current coin of the realm, 
 with the house of Al-Sartchild. Not a penny of it was he 
 allowed to touch. So, by way of revenge for the Israelite's 
 pertinacity, Brunner senior married again. It was impos- 
 sible, he said, to keep his huge hotel single-handed ; it needed 
 a woman's eye and hand. Gideon Brunner's second wife was 
 an innkeeper's daughter, a very pearl, as he thought ; but he 
 had had no experience of only daughters spoiled by father 
 and mother. 
 
 The second Mme. Brunner behaved as German girls may be 
 expected to behave when they are frivolous and wayward.
 
 COUSIN PONS 57 
 
 She squandered her fortune, she avenged the first Mme. Brun- 
 ner by making her husband as miserable a man as you could 
 find in the compass of the free city of Frankfort-on-the-Main, 
 where the millionaires, it is said, are about to pass a law com- 
 pelling womenkind to cherish and obey them alone. She was 
 partial to all the varieties of vinegar commonly called Rhine 
 wine in Germany ; she was fond of articles Paris, of horses and 
 dress ; indeed, the one expensive taste which she had not was 
 a liking for women. She took a dislike to little Fritz, and 
 would perhaps have driven him mad if that young offspring 
 of Calvinism and Judaism had not had Frankfort for his 
 cradle and the firm of Virlaz at Leipsic for his guardian. 
 Uncle Virlaz, however, deep in his furs, confined his guardian- 
 ship to the safe-keeping of Fritz's silver marks, and left the 
 boy to the tender mercies of this stepmother. 
 
 That hyena in woman's form was the more exasperated 
 against the pretty child, the lovely Jewess's son, because she 
 herself could have no children in spite of efforts worthy of 
 a locomotive engine. A diabolical impulse prompted her to 
 plunge her young stepson, at twenty-one years of age, inta 
 dissipations contrary to all German habits. The wicked Ger- 
 man hoped that English horses, Rhine vinegar, and Goethe's 
 Marguerites would ruin the Jewess's child and shorten his 
 days ; for when Fritz came of age, Uncle Virlaz had handed 
 over a very pretty fortune to his nephew. But while roulette 
 at Baden and elsewhere, and boon companions (Wilhelm 
 Schwab among them) devoured the substance accumulated by 
 Uncle Virlaz, the prodigal son himself remained by the will of 
 Providence to point a moral to younger brothers in the 
 free city of Frankfort ; parents held him up as a warning 
 and an awful example to their offspring to scare them into 
 steady attendance in their cast-iron counting-houses, hned 
 with silver marks. 
 
 But so far from perishing in the flower of his age, Fritz 
 Brunner had the pleasure of laying his stepmother in one of 
 those charming little German cemeteries, in which the Teuton 
 indulges his unbridled passion for horticulture under the 
 specious pretext of honoring his dead. And as the second 
 Mme. Brunner expired while the authors of her being were
 
 68 COUSIN PONS 
 
 jet alive, Brunner senior was obliged to bear the loss of the 
 sums of which his wife had drained his coffers, to say nothing 
 of other ills which had told upon a Herculean constitution, till 
 at the age of sixty-seven the innkeeper had wizened and 
 shrunk as if the famous Borgia's poison had undermined his 
 system. For ten whole years he had supported his wife, and 
 now he inherited nothing ! The innkeeper was a second ruin 
 of Heidelberg, repaired continually, it is true, by travelers' 
 hotel bills, much as the remains of the castle of Heidel- 
 berg itself are repaired to sustain the enthusiasm of the 
 tourists who flock to see so fine and well-preserved a relic of 
 antiquity. 
 
 At Frankfort the disappointment caused as much talk 
 as a failure. People pointed out Brunner, saying, " See 
 what a man may come to with a bad wife that leaves him 
 nothing and a son brought up in the French fashion." 
 
 In Italy and Germany the French nation is the root of 
 all evil, the target for all bullets. " But the god pursu- 
 ing his way " (For the rest, see Lefranc de Pcmpignan's 
 
 Ode). 
 
 The wrath of the proprietor of the Grand Hotel de Hol- 
 lande fell on others besides the travelers, whose bills were 
 swelled with his resentment. When his son was utterly 
 ruined, Gideon, regarding him as the indirect cause of all his 
 misfortunes, refused him bread and salt, fire, lodging, and 
 tobacco — the force of the paternal malediction in a German 
 and an innkeeper could no farther go. Whereupon the local 
 authorities, making no allowance for the father's misdeeds, 
 regarded him as one of the most ill-used persons in Frank- 
 fort-on-the-Main, came to his assistance, fastened a quarrel 
 on Fritz (une querelle d^Allemand), and expelled him from 
 the territory of the free city. Justice in Frankfort is no 
 whit wiser nor more humane than elsewhere, albeit the city 
 is the seat of the German Diet. It is not often that a magis- 
 trate traces back the stream of wrongdoing and misfortune to 
 the holder of the urn from which the first beginnings trickled 
 forth. If Brunner forgot his son, his son's friends speedily 
 followed the old innkeeper's example. 
 
 Ah! if the journalists, the dandies, and some few fair
 
 COUSIN PONS 59 
 
 Parisians among the audience wondered how that German 
 with the tragical countenance had cropped up on a first night 
 to occupy a side box all to himself when fashionable Paris 
 filled the house, — if these could have seen the history played 
 out upon the stage before the prompter's box, they would 
 have found it far more interesting than the transformation 
 scenes of The DeviVs Betrothed, though indeed it was the two 
 hundred thousandth representation of a sublime allegory 
 performed aforetime in Mesopotamia three thousand years 
 before Christ was born. 
 
 Fritz betook himself on foot to Strasbourg, and there found 
 what the prodigal son of the Bible failed to find — to wit, a 
 friend. And herein is revealed the superiority of Alsace, 
 where so many generous hearts beat to show Germany the 
 beauty of a combination of Gallic wit and Teutonic solidity. 
 Wilhelm Schwab, but lately left in possession of a hundred 
 thousand francs by the dc^^^th of both parents, opened his 
 arms, his heart, his house, his purse to Fritz. As for de- 
 scribing Fritz's feelings, when dusty, down on his luck, and 
 almost like a leper, he crossed the Rhine and found a real 
 twenty-franc piece held out by the hand of a real friend, — 
 that moment transcends the powers of the prose-writer; 
 Pindar alone could give it forth to humanity in Greek that 
 should rekindle the dying warmth of friendship in the 
 world. 
 
 Put the names of Fritz and Wilhelm beside those of 
 Damon and Pythias, Castor and Pollux, Orestes and Pylades, 
 Dubreuil and Pmejah, Schmucke and Pons, and all the names 
 that we imagine for the two friends of Monomotapa, for la 
 Fontaine (man of genius though he was) has made of them 
 two disembodied spirits — they lack reality. The two new 
 names may join the illustrious company, and with so much 
 the more reason, since that Wilhelm who had helped to drink 
 Fritz's inheritance now proceeded, with Fritz's assistance, to 
 devour his own substance ; smoking, needless to say, every 
 known variety of tobacco. 
 
 The pair, strange to relate, squandered the property in the 
 dullest, stupidest, most commonplace fashion, in Strasbourg 
 brasseries, in the company of ballet-girls of the Strasbourg
 
 60 COUSIN PONS 
 
 theaters, and little Alsaciennes who had not a rag of a 
 tattered reputation left. 
 
 Every morning they would say, " We really must stop 
 this, and make up our minds and do something or other with 
 the money that is left." 
 
 "Pooh!" Fritz would retort, "just one more day, and 
 to-morrow " . . . ah ! to-morrow. 
 
 In the lives of Prodigal Sons, To-day is a prodigious cox- 
 comb, but To-morrow is a very poltroon, taking fright at the 
 big words of his predecessor. To-day is the truculent captain 
 of old world comedy. To-morrow the clown of modem panto- 
 mime. 
 
 When the two friends had reached their last thousand- 
 franc note, they took places in the mail-coach, styled 
 Royal, and departed for Paris, where they installed them- 
 selves in the attics of the Hotel de Rhin, in the Rue du Mail, 
 the property of one Graff, formerly Gideon B runner's head- 
 waiter. Fritz found a situation as clerk in the Kellers' bank 
 (on Graff's recommendation), with a salary of six hundred 
 francs. And a place as bookkeeper was likewise found for 
 Wilhelm, in the business of Graff the fashionable tailor, 
 brother of Graff of the Hotel du Rhin, who found the scant- 
 ily-paid employment for the pair of prodigals, for the sake 
 of old times, and his apprenticeship at the Hotel de Hollande. 
 These two incidents — the recognition of a ruined man by a 
 well-to-do friend, and a German innkeeper interesting him- 
 self in two penniless fellow-countrymen — give, no doubt, an 
 air of improbability to the story, but truth is so much the 
 more like fiction, since modern writers of fiction have been 
 at such untold pains to imitate truth. 
 
 It was not long before Fritz, a clerk with six hundred 
 francs, and Wilhelm, a bookkeeper with precisely the same 
 salary, discovered the difficulties of existence in a city so full 
 of temptations. In 1837, the second year of their abode, 
 Wilhehn, who possessed a pretty talent for the flute, entered 
 Pons's orchestra, to eara a Httle occasional butter to put on 
 his dry bread. As to Fritz, his only way to an increase of 
 income lay through the display of the capacity for business 
 inherited by a descendant of the Virlaz family. Yet, in
 
 COUSIN PONS 61 
 
 spite of his assiduity, in spite of abilities which possibly may 
 have stood in his way, his salary only reached the sum of two 
 thousand francs in 1843. Penury, that divine stepmother, 
 did for the two young men all that their mothers had not 
 been able to do for them; Poverty taught them thrift and 
 worldly wisdom ; Poverty gave them her grand rough educa- 
 tion, the lessons which she drives with hard knocks into the 
 heads of great men, who seldom know a happy childhood. 
 Fritz and Wilhelm, being but ordinary men, learned as little 
 as they possibly could in her school ; they dodged the blows, 
 shrank from her hard breast and bony arms, and never dis- 
 covered the good fairy lurking within, ready to yield to 
 the caresses of genius. One thing, however, they learned 
 thoroughly — they discovered the value of money, and vowed 
 to clip the wings of riches if ever a second fortune should 
 come to their door. 
 
 This was the history which Wilhelm Schwab related in Ger- 
 man, at much greater length, to his friend the pianist, end- 
 ing with — 
 
 " Well, Papa Schmucke, the rest is soon explained. Old 
 Brunner is dead. He left four millions ! He made an im- 
 mense amount of money out of Baden railways, though 
 neither his son nor M. Graff, with whom we lodge, had any 
 idea that the old man was one of the original shareholders. 
 I am playing the flute here for the last time this evening; I 
 would have left some days ago, but this was a first perform- 
 ance, and I did not want to spoil my part." 
 
 " Goot, mine friend," said Schmucke. " But who is die 
 prite?" 
 
 " She is Mile. Graff, the daughter of our host, the landlord 
 of the Hotel du Rhin. I have loved Mile. Emilie these seven 
 years ; she has read so many immoral novels, that she refused 
 all offers for me, without knowing what might come of it. 
 She will be a very wealthy young lady ; her uncles, the tailors 
 in the Rue de Richelieu, will leave her all their money. Fritz 
 is giving me the money we squandered at Strasbourg five 
 times over ! He is putting a million francs in a banking 
 house, M. Graff the tailor is adding another five hundred 
 thousand francs, and Mile. Emilie's father not only allows
 
 62 COUSIN PONS 
 
 me to incorporate her portion — two hundred and fifty thou- 
 sand francs — with the capital, but he himself will be a share- 
 holder with as much again. So the firm of Brunner, Schwab 
 and Company will start with two million five hundred thou- 
 sand francs. Fritz has just bought fifteen hundred thousand 
 francs' worth of shares in the Bank of France to 
 guarantee our account with them. That is not all Fritz's 
 fortune. He has his father's house property, supposed to 
 be worth another million, and he has let the Grand Hotel de 
 Hollande already to a cousin of the Graffs." 
 
 " You look sad ven you look at your friend," remarked 
 Schmucke, who had listened with great interest. " Kann 
 you pe chealous of him.'' " 
 
 " I am jealous for Fritz's happiness," said Wilhelm. 
 "Does that face look as if it belonged to a happy man.'* 
 I am afraid of Paris ; I should like to see him do as I 
 am doing. The old tempter may awake again. Of our 
 two heads, his carries the less ballast. His dress, and the 
 opera-glass, and the rest of it make me anxious. He keeps 
 looking at the lorettes in the house. Oh! if you only knew 
 how hard it is to marry Fritz. He has a horror of ' going 
 a-courting,' as you say; you would have to give him a drop 
 into a family, just as in England they give a man a drop 
 into the next world." 
 
 During the uproar that usually marks the end of a first 
 night, the flute delivered his invitation to the conductor. 
 Pons accepted gleefully ; and, for the first time in three 
 months, Schmucke saw a smile on his friend's face. They 
 went back to the Rue de Normandie in perfect silence ; that 
 sudden flash of joy had thrown a light on the extent of the 
 disease which was consuming Pons. Oh that a man so 
 truly noble, so disinterested, so great in feeling, should have 
 such a weakness! . . . This was the thought which 
 struck the stoic Schmucke dumb with amazement. He grew 
 woefully sad, for he began to see that there was no help for it ; 
 he must even renounce the pleasure of seeing " his goot Bons " 
 opposite him at the dinner-table, for the sake of Pons's wel- 
 fare ; and he did not know whether he could give him up ; the 
 mere thought of it drove him distracted.
 
 COUSIN PONS 63 
 
 Meantime, Pons's proud silence and withdrawal to the Mons 
 Aventinus of the Rue de Normandie had, as might be ex- 
 pected, impressed the Presidente, not that she troubled her- 
 self much about her parasite, now that she was freed from 
 him. She thought, with her charming daughter, that Cousin 
 Pons had seen through her little " Lili's " joke. But it was 
 otherwise with her husband the President. 
 
 Camusot de Marville, a short and stout man, grown 
 solemn since his promotion at the Court, admired Cicero, 
 preferred the Opera-Comique to the Italiens, compared the 
 actors one with another, and followed the multitude step by 
 step. He used to recite all the articles in the Ministerialist 
 journals, as if he were saying something original, and in 
 giving his opinion at the Council Board he paraphrased 
 the remarks of the previous speaker. His leading character- 
 istics were sufficiently well known ; his position compelled him 
 to take everything seriously ; and he was particularly tena- 
 cious of family ties. 
 
 Like most men who are ruled by their wives, the President 
 asserted his independence in trifles, in which his wife was 
 very careful not to thwart him. For a month he was satis- 
 fied with the Presidente's commonplace explanations of Pons's 
 disappearance ; but at last it struck him as singular that 
 the old musician, a friend of forty years' standing, should 
 first make them so valuable a present as a fan that belonged 
 to Mme. de Pompadour, and then immediately discontinue 
 his visits. Count Popinot had pronounced the trinket a mas- 
 terpiece ; when its owner went to Court, the fan had been 
 passed from hand to hand, and her vanity was not a little 
 gratified by the compliments it received ; others had dwelt 
 on the beauties of the ten ivory sticks, each one covered 
 with delicate carving, the like of which had never been seen. 
 A Russian lady (Russian ladies are apt to forget that 
 they are not in Russia) had offered her six thousand francs 
 for the marvel one day at Count Popinot's house, and smiled 
 to see it in such hands. Truth to tell, it was a fan for a 
 duchess. 
 
 " It cannot be denied that poor Cousin Pons understands 
 rubbish of that sort -" said Cecile, the day after the bid.
 
 64 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Rubbish ! " cried her parent. " Wby, Government is just 
 about to buy the late M. le Conseiller Dusoramerard's collec- 
 tion for three hundred thousand francs ; and the State and the 
 Municipality of Paris between them are spending nearly a 
 million francs over the purchase and repair of the Hotel de 
 Cluny to house the ' rubbish,' as you call it. — Such ' rub- 
 bish,' dear child," he resumed, " is frequently all that remains 
 of vanished civilizations. An Etruscan jar, and a necklace, 
 which sometimes fetch forty and fifty thousand francs, is 
 ' rubbish ' which reveals the perfection of art at the time 
 of the siege of Troy, proving that the Etruscans were Tro- 
 jan refugees in Italy." 
 
 This was the President's cumbrous way of joking; the 
 short, fat man was heavily ironical with his wife and 
 daughter. 
 
 " The combination of various kinds of knowledge required 
 to understand such ' rubbish,' Cecile," he resumed, " is a 
 science in itself, called archaeology. Archaeology compre- 
 hends architecture, sculpture, painting, goldsmiths' work, 
 ceramics, cabinetmaking ( a purely modem art) , lace, tapestry, 
 — in short, human handiwork of every sort and description." 
 
 " Then Cousin Pons is learned ? " said Cecile. 
 
 "Ah! by the by, why is he never to be seen nowadays.'* " 
 asked the President. He spoke with the air of a man in 
 whom thousands of forgotten and dormant impressions have 
 suddenly begun to stir, and shaping themselves into one idea, 
 reach consciousness with a ricochet, as sportsmen say. 
 
 " He must have taken offense at nothing at all," answered 
 his wife. " I dare say I was not as fully sensible as I might 
 have been of the value of the fan that he gave me. I am 
 ignorant enough, as you know, of " 
 
 " You! One of Serrin's best pupils, and you don't know 
 Watteau.^ " cried the President. 
 
 " I know Gerard and David and Gros and Girodet, and 
 M. de Forbin and M. Turpin de Crisse " 
 
 " You ought " 
 
 " Ought what, sir.' " demanded the lady, gazing at her 
 husband with the air of a Queen of Sheba. 
 
 " To know a Watteau when you see it, my dear. Watteau
 
 COUSIN PONS 65 
 
 is very much in fashion," answered the President with meek- 
 ness that told plainly how much he owed to his wife. 
 
 This conversation took place a few days before that night 
 of first performance of The DeviVs Betrothed, when the 
 vrhole orchestra noticed how ill Pons was looking. But by 
 that time all the circle of dinner-givers who were used to 
 see Pons's face at their tables, and to send him on errands, 
 had begun to ask each other for news of him, and uneasiness 
 increased when it was reported by some who had seen him that 
 he was always in his place at the theater. Pons had been 
 very careful to avoid his old acquaintances whenever he met 
 them in the streets ; but one day it so fell out that he met 
 Count Popinot, the ex-cabinet minister, face to face in a 
 bric-a-brac dealer's shop in the new Boulevard Beaumarchais. 
 The dealer was none other than that Monistrol of whom 
 Pons had spoken to the Presidente, one of the famous and 
 audacious vendors whose cunning enthusiasm leads them to 
 set more and more value daily on their wares ; for curiosities, 
 they tell you, are growing so scarce that they are hardl}' to 
 be found at all nowadays. 
 
 " Ah, my dear Pons, how comes it that we never see you 
 now.^ We miss you very much, and Mme. Popinot does not 
 know what to think of your desertion." 
 
 " M. le Comte," said the good man, " I was made to feel 
 in the house of a relative that at my age one is not wanted 
 in the world. I have never had much consideration shown 
 me, but at any rate I had not been insulted. I have never 
 asked anything of any man," he broke out with an artist's 
 pride. *' I have often made myself useful in return for 
 hospitality. But I have made a mistake, it seems : I am in- 
 definitely beholden to those who honor me by allowing me 
 to sit at table with them; my friends, my relatives. . . . 
 Well and good : I have sent in my resignation as smellfeast. 
 At home I find daily something wliich no other house has 
 offered me — a real friend." 
 
 The old artist's power had not failed him; with tone and 
 gesture he put such bitterness into the words, that the peer 
 of France was struck by them. He drew Pons aside. 
 
 "Come, now, mv old friend, what is it.'' "SMiat has hurt
 
 66 COUSIN PONS 
 
 you? Could you not tell me in confidence? You will permit 
 me to say that at my house surely you have always met with 
 consideration " 
 
 " You are the one exception," said the artist. " And be- 
 sides, you are a great lord and a statesman, you have so many 
 things to think about. That would excuse anything, if 
 there were need for it." 
 
 The diplomatic skill that Popinot had acquired in the 
 management of men and affairs was brought to bear upon 
 Pons, till at length the story of his misfortunes in the 
 President's house was drawn from him. 
 
 Popinot took up the victim's cause so warmly that he told 
 the story to Mme. Popinot as soon as he went home, and 
 that excellent and noble-natured woman spoke to the Presi- 
 dente on the subject at the first opportunity. As Popinot 
 himself likewise said a word or two to the President, there 
 was a general explanation in the family of Camusot de 
 Marville. 
 
 Camusot was not exactly master in his own house ; but 
 this time his remonstrance was so well founded in law and 
 in fact, that his wife and daughter were forced to acknowl- 
 edge the truth. They both humbled themselves and threw 
 the blame on the servants. The servants, first bidden, and 
 then chidden, only obtained pardon by a full confession, 
 which made it clear to the President's mind that Pons had 
 done rightly to stop away. The President displayed him- 
 self before the servants in all his masculine and magisterial 
 dignity, after the manner of men who are ruled by their 
 wives. He informed his household that they should be dis- 
 missed forthwith, and forfeit any advantages which their 
 long term of service in his house might have brought them, 
 unless from that time forward his cousin and all those who 
 did him the honor of coming to his house were treated as 
 he himself was. At which speech Madeleine was moved to 
 smile. 
 
 " You have only one chance of salvation as it is," con- 
 tinued the President. " Go to my cousin, make your excuses 
 to him, and tell him that you will lose your situations unless 
 he forgives you, for I shall turn you all away if he does not.'*
 
 COUSIN PONS 67 
 
 Next morning the President went out fairly early to pay 
 a call on his cousin before going down to the court. The 
 apparition of M. le Presidente de Marville, announced by 
 Mme. Cibot, was an event in the house. Pons, thus honored 
 for the first time in his life, saw reparation ahead. 
 
 " At last, my dear cousin," said the President after the 
 ordinary greetings ; " at last I have discovered the cause of 
 your retreat. Your behavior increases, if that were possible, 
 my esteem for you. I have but one word to say in that 
 connection. My servants have all been dismissed. My wife 
 and daughter are in despair ; they want to see you to have 
 an explanation. In all this, my cousin, there is one innocent 
 person, and he is an old judge; you will not punish me, 
 will you, for the escapade of a thoughtless child who wished 
 to dine with the Popinots? especially when I come to beg for 
 peace, admitting that all the wrong has been on our side? 
 An old friendship of thirty-six years, even suppose 
 that there had been a misunderstanding, has still some claims. 
 Come, sign a treaty of peace by dining with us to-night " 
 
 Pons involved himself in a diffuse reply, and ended 
 by informing his cousin that he was to sign a marriage con- 
 tract that evening ; how that one of the orchestra was not 
 only going to be married, but also about to fling his flute 
 to the winds to become a banker. 
 
 " Very well. To-morrow." 
 
 " Mme, la Comtesse Popinot has done me the honor of 
 asking me, cousin. She was so kind as to write " 
 
 *' The day after to-morrow then." 
 
 " M. Brunner, a German, my first flute's future partner, 
 returns the compliment paid him to-day by the young 
 couple " 
 
 " You are such pleasant company that it is not surprising 
 that people dispute for the honor of seeing you. Very well, 
 next Sunday.!^ Within a week, as we say at the courts .-^ " 
 
 " On Sunday we are to dine with M. Graff, the flute's 
 father-in-law." 
 
 " Very well, on Saturday ! Between now and then you 
 will have time to reassure a little girl who has shed tears 
 already over her fault. God asks no more than repentance;
 
 68 COUSIN PONS 
 
 you will not be more severe than the Eternal Father with 
 poor little Cecile? " 
 
 Pons, thus reached on his weak side, again plunged into 
 formulas more than polite, and went as far as the stairhead 
 with the President. 
 
 An hour later the President's servants arrived in a troop 
 on poor Pons's second floor. They behaved after the manner 
 of their kind ; they cringed and fawned ; they wept. Made- 
 leine took M. Pons aside and flung herself resolutely at his 
 feet. 
 
 " It is all my fault ; and ]Monsieur knows quite well that 
 I love him," here she burst into tears. " It was vengeance 
 boiling in my veins ; ^Monsieur ought to throw all the blame 
 of the unhappy aff'air on that. We are all to lose our 
 pensions . . . Monsieur, I was m£(d, and I would not 
 have the rest suff'er for my fault. ... I can see now 
 well enough that fate did not make me for Monsieur. I 
 have come to my senses, I aimed too high, but I love you still. 
 Monsieur. These ten years I have thought of nothing but 
 the happiness of making you happy and looking after things 
 here. What a lot ! . . . Oh ! if Monsieur but knew how 
 much I love him ! But Monsieur must have seen it through 
 all my mischief-making. If I were to die to-morrow, what 
 v.ould they find.^ — A will in your favor, Monsieur. . 
 Yes, Monsieur, in my trunk under my best things." 
 
 Madeleine had set a responsive chord vibrating ; the passion 
 inspired in another may be unwelcome, but it will always be 
 gratifying to self-love ; this was the case with the old 
 bachelor. After generously pardoning Madeleine, he ex- 
 tended his forgiveness to the other servants, promising to use 
 his influence with his cousin the Presidente on their behalf. 
 
 It was unspeakably pleasant to Pons to find all his old 
 enjoyments restored to him without any loss of self-respect. 
 The world had come to Pons, he had risen in the esteem of 
 his circle ; but Schmucke looked so downcast and dubious when 
 he heard the story of the triumph, that Pons felt hurt. 
 When, however, the kind-hearted German saw the sudden 
 change wrought in Pons's face, he ended by rejoicing with 
 his friend, and made a sacrifice of the happiness that he had
 
 COUSIN PONS 69 
 
 known during those four months that he had had Pons all to 
 himself. Mental suffering has this immense advantage over 
 physical ills — when the cause is removed it ceases at once. 
 Pons was not like the same man that morning. The old 
 man, depressed and visibly failing, had given place to the 
 serenely contented Pons, who entered the Presidente's house 
 that October afternoon with the Marquise de Pompadour's 
 fan in his pocket. Schmucke, on the other hand, pondered 
 deeply over this phenomenon, and could not understand it ; 
 your true stoic never can understand the courtier that dwells 
 in a Frenchman. Pons was a born Frenchman of the Em- 
 pire ; a mixture of eighteenth century gallantry and that 
 devotion to womankind so often celebrated in songs of the 
 type of Partant pour la Syrie. 
 
 So Schmucke was fain to bury his chagrin beneath the 
 flowers of his German philosophy ; but a week later he grew 
 so yellow that Mme. Cibot exerted her ingenuity to call in 
 the parish doctor. The leech had fears of icterus, and left 
 Mme. Cibot frightened half out of her wits by the Latin word 
 for an attack of the jaundice. 
 
 Meantime the two friends went out to dinner together, 
 perhaps for the first time in their lives. For Schmucke it was 
 a return to the Fatherland ; for Johann Graff of the Hotel 
 du Rhin and his daughter Emilie, Wolfgang Graff the tailor 
 and his wife, Fritz Brunner and Wilhelm Schwab, were Ger- 
 mans, and Pons and the notary were the only Frenchmen 
 present at the banquet. The Graffs of the tailor's business 
 owned a splendid house in the Rue de Richelieu, between the 
 Rue Neuve-des-Petits-Champs and the Rue Villedo ; they had 
 brought up their niece, for Emilie's father, not without 
 reason, had feared contact with the very mixed society of an 
 inn for his daughter. The good tailor Graffs, who loved 
 Emilie as if she had been their own daughter, were giving 
 up the ground floor of their great house to the young couple, 
 and here the bank of Brunner, Schwab and Company was 
 to be established. The arrangements for the marriage had 
 been made about a month ago ; some time must elapse before 
 Fritz Brunner, author of all this felicity, could settle his 
 deceased father's affairs, and the famous firm of tailors had
 
 70 COUSIN PONS 
 
 taken advantage of the delay to redecorate the first floor 
 and to furnish it very handsomely for the bride and bride- 
 groom. The offices of the bank had been fitted into the 
 wino; which united a handsome business house with the old 
 hotel at the back, between courtyard and garden. 
 
 On the way from the Rue de Normandie to the Rue de 
 Richelieu, Pons drew from the abstracted Schmucke the 
 details of the story of the modern prodigal son, for whom 
 Death had killed the fatted innkeeper. Pons, but newly 
 reconciled with his nearest relatives, was immediately smitten 
 with a desire to make a match between Fritz Brunner and 
 Cecile de Marville. Chance ordained that the notary was 
 none other than Berthier, old Cardot's son-in-law and suc- 
 cessor, the sometime second clerk with whom Pons had been 
 wont to dine. 
 
 " Ah ! M. Berthier, you here ! " he said, holding out a hand 
 to his host of former days. 
 
 " We have not had the pleasure of seeing you at dinner 
 lately; how is it.''" returned the notary. "My wife has 
 been anxious about you. We saw you at the first perform- 
 ance of The DeviVs Betrothed, and our anxiety became 
 curiosity .f* " 
 
 " Old folk are sensitive," replied the worthy musician; 
 " they make the mistake of being a century behind the times, 
 but how can it be helped? It is quite enough to represent 
 one century — they cannot entirely belong to the century which 
 sees them die." 
 
 " Ah ! " said the notary, with a shrewd look, " one cannot 
 run two centuries at once." 
 
 " By the bye," continued Pons, drawing the young lawyer 
 into a corner, " why do you not find someone for my 
 cousin Cecile de Marville " 
 
 "Ah! why ?" answered Berthier. "In this century, 
 
 when luxury has filtered down to our very porters' lodges, 
 a young fellow hesitates before uniting his lot with the 
 daughter of a President of the Court of Appeal in Paris 
 if she brings him onl}^ a hundred thousand francs. In the 
 rank of life which Mile, de Marville's husband would 
 take, the wife was never yet known that did not cost her
 
 COUSIN PONS 71 
 
 husband three thousand francs a year; the interest on a 
 hundred thousand francs would scarcely find her in pin- 
 money. A bachelor with an income of fifteen or twenty 
 thousand francs can live on an entresol; he is not expected 
 to cut any figure ; he need not keep more than one servant, 
 and all his surplus income he can spend on his amusements ; 
 he puts himself in the hands of a good tailor, and need not 
 trouble any further about keeping up appearances. Far- 
 sighted mothers make much of him- he is one of the kings 
 of fashion in Paris. 
 
 " But a wife changes everything. A wife means a properly 
 furnished house," continued the lawyer ; " she wants the 
 carriage for herself; if she goes to the play, she wants a 
 box, while the bachelor has only a stall to pay for; in short, 
 a wife represents the whole of the income which the bachelor 
 used to spend on himself. Suppose that husband and wife 
 have thirty thousand francs a year between them — prac- 
 tically the sometime bachelor is a poor devil who thinks twice 
 before he drives out to Chantilly. Bring children on the 
 scene — he is pinched for money at once. 
 
 " Now, as M. and Mme. de Marville are scarcely turned 
 fifty, Cecile's expectations are bills that will not fall due 
 for fifteen or twenty years to come ; and no young fellow 
 cares to keep them so long in his portfolio. The young 
 featherheads who are dancing the polka with lorettes at the 
 Jardin Mabille, are so cankered with self-interest, that they 
 don't stand in need of us to explain both sides of the problem 
 to them. Between ourselves, I may say that Mile, de Marville 
 scarcely sets hearts throbbing so fast but that their owners 
 can perfectly keep their heads, and they are full of these 
 anti-matrimonial reflections. If any eligible young man, in 
 full possession of his senses and an income of twenty thousand 
 francs, happens to be sketching out a programme of a 
 marriage that will satisfy his ambitions, Mile, de Marville 
 does not altogether answer the description " 
 
 " And why not.? " asked the bewildered musician. 
 
 " Oh ! " said the notary, " well a young man nowa- 
 days may be as ugly as you and I, my dear Pons, but he 
 is almost sure to have the impertinence to want six hundred
 
 72 COUSIN PONS 
 
 thousand francs, a girl of good family, with wit and good 
 looks and good breeding — flawless perfection in short." 
 
 " Then it will not be easy to marry her? " 
 
 " She will not be married so long as M. and Mme. de 
 Marville cannot make up their minds to settle Marville on 
 her when she marries ; if they had chosen, she might have 
 been the Vieomtesse Popinot by now. But here comes M. 
 Brunner. — We are about to read the deeds of partnership 
 and the marriage contract." 
 
 Greetings and introductions over, the relations made Pons 
 promise to sign the contract. He listened to the reading 
 of the documents, and towards half-past five the party went 
 into the dining-room. The dinner was magnificent, as a city 
 merchant's dinner can be, when he allows himself a respite 
 from monej^-making. Graff of the Hotel du Rhin was ac- 
 quainted with the first provision dealers in Paris ; never had 
 Pons nor Schmucke fared so sumptuously. The dishes were 
 a rapture to think of! Italian paste, delicate of flavor, un- 
 known to the public ; smelts fried as never smelts were fried 
 before ; fish from Lake Leman, with a real Genevese sauce, 
 and a cream for plum-pudding which would have astonished 
 the London doctor who is said to have invented it. It was 
 nearly ten o'clock before they rose from table. The amount 
 of wine, German and French, consumed at that dinner would 
 amaze the contemporary dandy ; nobody knows the amount 
 of liquor that a German can imbibe and yet keep calm 
 and quiet ; to have even an idea of the quantity, you must 
 dine in Gei*many and watch bottle succeed to bottle, like 
 wave rippling after wave along the sunny shores of the 
 Mediterranean, and disappear as if the Teuton possessed 
 ihe absorbing power of sponges or sea sand. Perfect 
 harmony prevails meanwhile ; there is none of the racket 
 that there would be over the liquor in France ; the talk is 
 as sober as a money-lender's extempore speech; countenances 
 flush, like the faces of the brides in frescoes by Cornelius 
 or Schnorr (imperceptibly, that is to say), and reminiscences 
 are poured out slowly while the smoke puffs from the pipes. 
 
 About half-past ten that evening Pons and Schmucke 
 found themselves sitting on a bench out in the garden with
 
 COUSIN PONS 73 
 
 the ex-flute between them; they were explaining their char- 
 acters, opinions, and misfortunes, with no very clear idea 
 as to why or how they had come to this point. In the thick 
 of a pot-pourri of confidences, Wilhelm spoke of his strong 
 desire to see Fritz married, expressing himself with vehement 
 and vinous eloquence. 
 
 " What do you say to this programme for your friend 
 Brunner?" cried Pons in confidential tones. "A charming 
 and sensible young lady of twenty-four, belonging to a family 
 of the highest distinction. The father holds a very high 
 position as a judge; there will be a hundred thousand francs 
 paid down and a million to come." 
 
 " Wait ! " answered Schwab ; " I will speak to Fritz this 
 instant." 
 
 The pair watched Brunner and his friend as they walked 
 round and round the garden ; again and again they passed 
 the bench, sometimes one spoke, sometimes the other. 
 
 Pons was not exactly intoxicated ; his head was a little 
 heavy, but his thoughts, on the contrary, seemed all the 
 lighter; he watched Fritz Brunner's face through the rain- 
 bow mist made of fumes of wine, and tried to read auguries 
 favorable to his family. Before very long Schwab intro- 
 duced his friend and partner to M. Pons ; Fritz Brunner 
 expressed his thanks for the trouble which Pons had been so 
 good as to take. 
 
 In the conversation which followed, the two old bachelors 
 Schmucke and Pons extolled the estate of matrimony, going so 
 far as to say, without any malicious intent, " that marriage 
 was the end of man." Tea and ices, punch and cakes, 
 were served in the future home of the betrothed couple. 
 The wine had begun to tell upon the honest merchants, and 
 the general hilarity reached its height when it was an- 
 nounced that Schwab's partner thought of following liis 
 example. 
 
 At two o'clock that morning, Schmucke and Pons walked 
 home along the boulevards, philosophizing a perte de raison 
 as they went on the harmony pervading the arrangements 
 of this our world below. 
 
 On the morrow of the banquet. Cousin Pons betook himself
 
 74 COUSIN PONS 
 
 to his fair cousin the Presidente, overjoyed — poor dear noble 
 soul! — to return good for evil. Surely he had attained to 
 a sublime height, as everyone will allow, for we live in 
 an age when the Montyon prize is given to those who do 
 their duty by carrying out the precepts of the Gospel. 
 
 " Ah ! " said Pons to himself, as he turned the corner of 
 the Rue de Choiseul, " they will lie under immense obligations 
 to their parasite." 
 
 Any man less absorbed in his contentment, any man of 
 the world, any distrustful nature would have watched the 
 President's wife and daughter very narrowly on this first 
 return to the house. But the poor musician was a child, 
 he had all the simplicity of an artist, believing in goodness 
 as he believed in beauty ; so he was delighted when Cecile 
 and her mother made much of him. After all the vaudevilles, 
 tragedies, and comedies which had been played under the 
 worthy man's eyes for twelve long years, he could not detect 
 the insincerity and grimaces of social comedy, no doubt be- 
 cause he had seen too much of it. Anyone who goes into 
 society in Paris, and knows the type of woman, dried up, 
 body and soul, by a burning thirst for social position, and a 
 fierce desire to be thought virtuous, anyone familiar with 
 the sham piety and the domineering character of a woman 
 whose word is law in her own house, may imagine the lurking 
 hatred she bore this husband's cousin whom she had wronged. 
 
 All the demonstrative friendliness of mother and daughter 
 was lined with a formidable longing for revenge, evidently 
 postponed. For the first time In Amelie de Marvllle's life she 
 had been put in the wrong, and that in the sight of the 
 husband over whom she tyrannized ; and not only so — she was 
 obliged to be amiable to the author of her defeat ! You can 
 scarcely find a match for this position save in the hypocritical 
 dramas which are sometimes kept up for years in the sacred 
 college of cardinals, or in chapters of certain religious 
 orders. 
 
 At three o'clock, when the President came back from 
 the law-courts. Pons had scarcely made an end of the marvel- 
 ous history of his acquaintance, M. Frederic Brunner. 
 Cecile had gone straight to the point. She wanted to know
 
 COUSIN PONS 75 
 
 how Frederic Brunner was dressed, how he looked, his height 
 and figure, the color of his hair and eyes ; and when she 
 had conjectured a distinguished air for Frederic, she ad- 
 mired his generosity of character. 
 
 " Think of his giving five hundred thousand francs to 
 his companion in misfortune ! Oh ! mamma, I shall have a 
 
 carriage and a box at the Italiens " Cecile grew almost 
 
 pretty as she thought that all her mother's ambitions for her 
 were about to be realized, that the hopes which had almost 
 left her were to come to something after all. 
 
 As for the Presidente, all that she said was, " My dear 
 little girl, you may perhaps be married within the fortnight." 
 
 All mothers with daughters of three-and-twenty address 
 them as " little girl." 
 
 " Still," added the President, " in any case, we must have 
 time to make inquiries ; never will I give my daughter to 
 just anybody " 
 
 " As to inquiries," said Pons, " Berthier is drawing up 
 the deeds. As to the young man himself, my dear cousin, 
 you remember what you told me.'* Well, he is quite forty 
 years old ; he is bald. He wishes to find in family life a 
 haven after storm ; I did not dissuade him ; every man has 
 his tastes " 
 
 " One reason the more for a personal interview," returned 
 the President. " I am not going to give my daughter to a 
 valetudinarian." 
 
 " Very good, cousin, you shall see my suitor in five days 
 if you like ; for, with your views, a single interview would 
 be enough " — (Cecile and her mother signified their rapture) 
 — " Frederic is decidedly a distinguished amateur ; he begged 
 me to allow him to see my little collection at his leisure. You 
 have never seen my pictures and curiosities; come and see 
 them," he continued, looking at his relatives. " You can 
 come simply as two ladies, brought by my friend Schmucke, 
 and make M. Brunner's acquaintance without betraying your- 
 selves. Frederic need not in the least know who you are." 
 
 " Admirable ! " cried the President. 
 
 The attention they paid to the once scorned parasite may 
 be left to the imagination ! Poor Pons that day became the
 
 76 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Presidente's cousin. The happy mother drowned her dis- 
 like in floods of joj; her looks, her smiles, her words sent 
 the old man into ecstasies over the good that he had done, 
 over the future that he saw by glimpses. Was he not sure 
 to find dinners such as yesterday's banquet over the signing 
 of the contract, multiplied indefinitely by three, in the houses 
 of Brunner, Schwab, and Graff .? He saw before him a 
 land of plenty — a vie de cocagne, a miraculous succession of 
 jylats converts, of delicate surprise dishes, of exquisite 
 wines. 
 
 " If Cousin Pons brings this through," said the President, 
 addressing his wife after Pons had departed, " we ought 
 to settle an income upon him equal to his salary at the 
 theater." 
 
 " Certainly," said the lady ; and Cecile was informed that 
 if the proposed suitor found favor in her eyes, she must 
 undertake to induce the old musician to accept a munificence 
 in such. bad taste. 
 
 Next day the President went to Berthler. He was anxious 
 to make sure of M. Frederic Brunner's financial position. 
 Berthler, forewarned by Mme. de Marville, had asked his new 
 client Schwab to come. Schwab the banker was dazzled by 
 the prospect of such a match for his friend (everybody knows 
 how deeply a German venerates social distinctions, so much 
 so, that in Germany a wife takes her husband's (official) title, 
 and is the Frau General, the Frau Rath, and so forth) — 
 Schwab therefore was as accommodating as a collector who 
 imagines that he is cheating a dealer. 
 
 " In the first place," said Cecile's father, " as I shall make 
 over my estate of Marville to my daughter, I should wish 
 the contract to be drawn up on the dotal system. In that 
 case, M. Brunner would Invest a million francs in land to 
 increase the estate, and by settling the land on his wife 
 he would secure her and his children from any share in the 
 liabilities of the bank." 
 
 Berthler stroked his chin. " He is coming on well, is 
 M. le President," thought he. 
 
 When the dotal system had been explained to Schwab, 
 he seemed much Inclined that way for his friend. He had
 
 COUSIN PONS 7T 
 
 heard Fritz say that he wished to find some way of insuring^ 
 himself against another lapse into poverty. 
 
 " There is a farm and pasture land worth twelve hundred 
 thousand francs in the market at this moment," remarked 
 the President. 
 
 " If we take up shares in the Bank of France to the 
 amount of a million francs, that will be quite enough to 
 guarantee our account," said Schwab. " Fritz does not want 
 to invest more than two million francs in business ; he will 
 do as you wish, I am sure, M. le President." 
 
 The President's wife and daughter were almost wild with 
 joy when he brought home this news. Never, surely, did so 
 rich a capture swim so complacently into the nets of matri- 
 mony. 
 
 " You will be Mme. Brunner de Marville," said the parent, 
 addressing his child ; " I will obtain permission for your 
 husband to add the name to his, and afterwards he can take 
 out letters of naturalization. If I should be a peer of 
 France some day, he will succeed me ! " 
 
 The five days were spent by Mme. de Marville in prepara- 
 tions. On the great day she dressed Cecile herself, taking 
 as much pains as the admiral of the British fleet takes over 
 the dressing of the pleasure yacht for Her Majesty of 
 England when she takes a trip to Germany. 
 
 Pons and Schwab, on their side, cleaned, swept, and dusted 
 Pons's museum rooms and furniture with the agility of 
 sailors cleaning down a man-of-war. There was not a speck 
 of dust on the carved wood ; not an inch of brass but it 
 glistened. The glasses over the pastels obscured nothing 
 of the work of Latour, Greuze, and Liotard (illustrious 
 painter of The Chocolate Girl), miracles of an art, alas! 
 so fugitive. The inimitable luster of Florentine bronze took 
 all the varying hues of the light ; the painted glass glowed 
 with color. Every line shone out brilliantly, every object 
 threw in its phrase in a harmony of masterpieces arranged 
 by two musicians — both of whom alike had attained to be 
 poets. 
 
 With a tact which avoided the difficulties of a late 
 appearance on the scene of action, the women were the first
 
 78 COUSIN PONS 
 
 to arrive; they wished to be upon their own ground. Pons 
 introduced his friend Schmucke, who seemed to his fair 
 visitors to be an idiot ; their heads were so full of the eligible 
 gentleman with the four millions of francs, that they paid but 
 little attention to the worthy Pons's dissertations upon mat- 
 ters of which they were completely ignorant. 
 
 They looked with indifferent eyes at Petitot's enamels, 
 spaced over crimson velvet, set in three frames of marvelous 
 workmanship. Flowers by Van Huysum, David, and Heim; 
 butterflies painted by Abraham Mignon; Van Eycks, un- 
 doubted Cranachs and Albrecht Diirers ; the Giorgione, the 
 Sebastian del Piombo; Backhuijzen, Hobbema, Gericault, the 
 rarities of painting — none of these things so much as aroused 
 their curiosity ; they were waiting for the sun to arise and 
 shine upon these treasures. Still, they were surprised by the 
 beauty of some of the Etruscan trinkets and the solid value 
 of the snuff-boxes, and out of politeness they went into 
 ecstasies over some Florentine bronzes which they held in 
 their hands when Mme. Cibot announced M. Brunner ! They 
 did not turn ; they took advantage of a superb Venetian 
 mirror framed in huge masses of carved ebony to scan this 
 phoenix of eligible young men. 
 
 Frederic, forewarned by W^ilhelm, had made the most of 
 the little hair that remained to him. He wore a neat pair 
 of trousers, a soft shade of some dark color, a silk waistcoat 
 of superlative elegance and the very newest cut, a shirt 
 with open-work, its linen hand-woven by a Friesland woman, 
 and a blue-and-white cravat. His watch chain, like the 
 head of his cane, came from Messrs. Florent and Chanor ; 
 and the coat, cut by old Graff himself, was of the very finest 
 cloth. The Suede gloves proclaimed the man who had run 
 through his mother's fortune. You could have seen the 
 banker's neat little brougham and pair of horses mirrored 
 in the surface of his speckless varnished boots, even if two 
 pairs of sharp ears had not already caught the sound of the 
 wheels outside in the Rue de Normandie. 
 
 When the prodigal of twenty years is a kind of chrysalis 
 from which a banker emerges at the age of forty, the said 
 banker is usually an observer of human nature ; and so
 
 COUSIN PONS 79 
 
 much the more shrewd if, as in Brunner's case, he understands 
 how to turn his German simplicity to good account. He 
 had assumed for the occasion the abstracted air of a man 
 who is hesitating between family life and the dissipations 
 of bachelorhood. This expression in a Frenchified German 
 seemed to Cecile to be in the highest degree romantic ; the 
 descendant of the Virlaz was a second Werther in her eyes — 
 where is the girl who will not allow herself to weave a little 
 novel about her marriage? Cecile thought herself the hap- 
 piest of women when Brunner, looking round at the magnifi- 
 cent works of art so patiently collected during forty years, 
 waxed enthusiastic, and Pons, to his no small satisfaction, 
 found an appreciative admirer of his treasures for the first 
 time in his life. 
 
 " He is poetical," the young lady said to herself ; " he 
 sees millions in the things, A poet is a man that cannot 
 count and leaves his wife to look after his money — an easy 
 man to manage and amuse with trifles." 
 
 Every pane in the two windows was a square of Swiss 
 painted glass ; the least of them was worth a thousand francs ; 
 and Pons possessed sixteen of these unrivaled works of art 
 for which amateurs seek so eagerly nowadays. In 1815 the 
 panes could be bought for six or ten francs apiece. The 
 value of the glorious collection of pictures, flawless great 
 works, authentic, untouched since they left the master's 
 hands, could only be proved in the fiery furnace of a saleroom. 
 Not a picture but was set in a costly frame ; there were 
 frames of every kind — Venetians, carved with heavy orna- 
 ments, like English plate of the present day ; Romans, dis- 
 tinguishable among the others for a certain dash that artists 
 call -flafla; Spanish wreaths in bold relief; Flemings and 
 Germans with quaint figures, tortoise-shell frames inlaid with 
 copper and brass and mother-of-pearl and ivory ; frames of 
 ebony and boxwood in the styles of Louis Treize, Louis 
 Quatorze, Louis Quinze, and Louis Seize — in short, it was a 
 unique collection of the finest models. Pons, luckier than the 
 art museums of Dresden and Vienna, possessed a frame by 
 the famous Brustoloni — the Michel Angelo of wood-carvers. 
 
 Mile, de Marville naturally asked for explanations of each
 
 80 COUSIN PONS 
 
 new curiosity, and was initiated into the mysteries of art 
 by Brunner. Her exclamations were so childish, she seemed 
 so pleased to have the value and beauty of paintings, carvings, 
 or bronzes pointed out to her, that the German gradually 
 thawed and looked quite young again, and both were led on 
 further than they intended at this (purely accidental) first 
 meeting. 
 
 The private view lasted for three hours. Brunner offered 
 his arm when Cecile went downstairs. As they descended 
 slowly and discreetly, Cecile, still talking fine art, wondered 
 that M. Brunner should admire her cousin's gimcracks so 
 much. 
 
 " Do you really think that these things that we have just 
 seen are worth a great deal of money ? " 
 
 " Mademoiselle, if your cousin would sell his collection, I 
 would give eight hundred thousand francs for it this evening, 
 and I should not make a bad bargain. The pictures alone 
 would fetch more than that at a public sale." 
 
 " Since you say so, I believe it," returned she ; " the things 
 took up so much of your attention that it must be so." 
 
 " Oh, Mademoiselle ! " protested Brunner. " For all an- 
 swer to your reproach, I will ask your mother's permission 
 to call so that I may have the pleasure of seeing you 
 again." 
 
 " How clever she is, that ' little girl ' of mine ! " thought 
 the Presidente, following closely upon her daughter's heels. 
 Aloud she said, " With the greatest pleasure, Monsieur. I 
 hope that you will come at dinner-time with our Cousin 
 Pons. The President will be delighted to make your ac- 
 quaintance. — Thank you, cousin." 
 
 The lady squeezed Pons's arm with deep meaning; she 
 could not have said more if she had used the consecrated 
 formula, " Let us swear an eternal friendship." The glance 
 which accompanied that " Thank you, cousin," was a caress. 
 
 When the young lady had been put into the carriage, and 
 the jobbed brougham had disappeared down the Rue Chariot, 
 Brunner talked bric-a-brac to Pons, and Pons talked mar- 
 riage. 
 
 " Then you see no obstacle ? " said Pons.
 
 COUSIN PONS 81 
 
 " Oh ! " said Brunner, " she is an insignificant little thing, 
 and the mother is a trifle prim. — We shall see." 
 
 " A handsome fortune one of these days. . , . More 
 than a million " 
 
 " Good-by till Monday ! " interrupted the millionaire. " If 
 you should care to sell your collection of pictures, I would 
 give you five or six hundred thousand francs " 
 
 " Ah ! " said Pons ; he had no idea that he was so rich. 
 ** But they are my great pleasure in life, and I could not 
 bring myself to part with them. I could only sell my collec- 
 tion to be delivered after my death." 
 
 " Very well. We shall see." 
 
 " Here we have two affairs afoot ! " said Pons ; he was 
 thinking only of the marriage. 
 
 Brunner shook hands and drove away in his splendid 
 carriage. Pons watched it out of sight. He did not notice 
 that Remonencq was smoking his pipe in the doorway. 
 
 That evening Mme. de Marville went to ask advice of her 
 father-in-law, and found the whole Popinot family at the 
 Camusots' house. It was only natural that a mother who had 
 failed to capture an eldest son should be tempted to take 
 her little revenge; so Mme. de Marville threw out hints of 
 the splendid marriage that her Cecile was about to make. — 
 " Whom can Cecile be going to marry ? " was the question 
 upon all lips. And Cecile's mother, without suspecting that 
 she was betraying her secret, let fall words and whispered 
 confidences, afterwards supplemented by Mme. Berthier, till 
 gossip, circulating in the bourgeois empyrean where Pons 
 accomplished his gastronomical evolutions, took something like 
 the following form: — 
 
 " Cecile de Marville is engaged to be married to a young 
 German, a banker from philanthropic motives, for he has 
 four milHons ; he is like a hero of a novel, a perfect Werther, 
 charming and kind-hearted. He has sown his wild oats, and 
 he is distractedly in love with Cecile; it is a case of love 
 at first sight; and so much the more certain, since Cecile 
 had all Pons's paintings of Madonnas for rivals," and so 
 forth and so forth. 
 
 Two or three of the set came to call on the Presidente,
 
 82 COUSIN PONS 
 
 ostensibly to congratulate, bvit roally to find out whether or 
 no the marvelous tale were true. For their benefit Mnie. de 
 Marville executed tlie following admirable variations on the 
 theme of son-in-law which mothers may consult, as people used 
 to refer to the Complete Letter }yriter. 
 
 " A marriage is not an accomplished fact," she told Mme. 
 Chiffreville, " until you have been to the ma^'or's oflice and 
 the church. We have only come as far as a personal inter- 
 view; so I count upon your friendship to say nothing of 
 our hopes." 
 
 "" You are very fortunate, Madame ; marriages are so diffi- 
 cult to arrange in these days." 
 
 "What can one do? It was chance; but marriages are 
 often made in that way." 
 
 "Ah, well! So you are going to marry Ccclle.'' " said 
 Mme. Cardot. 
 
 " Yes," said Cecile's mother, fully understanding the mean- 
 ing of the " so." " We were very particular, or Cecile would 
 liave been established before this. But now we have foinid 
 everything that we wish: money, good temper, good character, 
 and good looks; and my sweet little girl certainly deserves 
 nothing less. M. Brunner is a charming young man, most 
 distinguished; he is fond of luxury, he knows life; he is 
 wild about C6cilc, he loves her sincerely ; and in spite of his 
 three or four millions, Cecile is going to accept him. — ^We 
 had not looked so high for her; still, store is no sore." 
 
 " It was not so much the fortune as the affection inspired 
 by my daughter which decided us," the Prcsidente told Mine. 
 Lebas. " M. Brunner is in such a hurry that he wants the 
 marriage to take place with the least possible delay." 
 
 " Is he a foreigner.'' " 
 
 " Yes, Madame ; but I am very fortunate, I confess. No, 
 I shall not have a son-in-law in him, but a son. M. Brunner's 
 delicacy has quite won our hearts. No one would imagine 
 how anxious he was to marry under the dotal system. It 
 is a great security for families. He is going to invest twelve 
 hundred thousand francs in grazing land, which will be added 
 to Marville some day." 
 
 More variations followed on the morrow. For instance —
 
 COUSIN PONS 83 
 
 M. Brunner was a great lord, doing everything in lordly 
 fashion ; he did not haggle. If M. de Marville could obtain 
 letters of naturalization, qualifying M. Brunner for an office 
 under Government (and the Home Secretary surely could 
 strain a point for M. de Marville), his son-in-law would be 
 a peer of France. Nobody knew how much money M. 
 Brunner possessed ; " he had the finest horses and the smartest 
 carriages in Paris ! " and so on and so on. 
 
 From the pleasure with which the Camusots published their 
 hopes, it was pretty clear that this triumph was unexpected. 
 
 Immediately after the interview in Pons's museum, M. de 
 Marville, at his wife's instance, begged the Home Secretary, 
 his chief, and the attorney for the crown to dine with him 
 on the occasion of the introduction of this phoenix of a son- 
 in-law. 
 
 The three great personages accepted the invitation, albeit 
 it was given on short notice ; they all saw the part that they 
 were to play in the family politics, and readily came to the 
 father's support. In France we are usually pretty ready to 
 assist the mother of marriageable daughters to hook an eligi- 
 ble son-in-law. The Count and Countess Popinot likewise 
 lent their presence to complete the splendor of the occasion, 
 although they thought the invitation in questionable taste. 
 
 There were eleven in all. Cecile's grandfather, old Camu- 
 sot, came, of course, with his wife to a family reunion pur- 
 posely arranged to elicit a proposal from M. Brunner. 
 
 The Camusot de Marvilles had given out that the guest 
 of the evening was one of the richest capitalists in Germany, 
 a man of taste (he was in love with "the little girl"), a 
 future rival of the Nucingens, Kellers, du Tillets, and their 
 like. _ ^ . 
 
 " It is our day," said the Presidente with elaborate sim- 
 plicity, when she had named her guests one by one for the 
 German whom she already regarded as her son-in-law. " We 
 have only a few intimate friends — first, my husband's father, 
 who, as you know, is sure to be raised to the peerage ; M. 
 le Comte and Mme. la Comtesse Popinot, whose son was 
 not thought rich enough for Cecile ; the Home Secretary ; our 
 First President ; our attorney for the crown ; our personal
 
 84. , COUSIN PONS 
 
 friends, in short. — We shall be obliged to dine rather late 
 to-night, because the Chamber is sitting, and people cannot 
 get away before six." 
 
 Brunner looked significantly at Pons, and Pons rubbed 
 his hands as if to say, " Our friends, you see ! My friends ! " 
 
 Mme. de Marville, as a clever tactician, had something 
 very particular to say to her cousin, that Cecilie and her 
 Werther might be left together for a moment. Cecile chat- 
 tered away volubly, and contrived that Frederic should catch 
 sight of a German dictionary, a German grammar, and a 
 volume of Goethe hidden away in a place where he was likely 
 to find them. 
 
 " Ah! are you learning German? " asked Brunner, flushing 
 red. 
 
 (For laying traps of this kind the Frenchwoman has not 
 her match!) 
 
 " Oh ! how naughty you are ! " she cried ; " it is too bad 
 of you, Monsieur, to explore my hiding-places like this. 1 
 want to read Goethe in the original," she added ; " I have 
 been learning German for two years." 
 
 " Then the grammar must be very difficult to learn, for 
 
 scarcely ten pages have been cut " Brunner remarked 
 
 with much candor. 
 
 Cecile, abashed, turned away to hide her blushes. A Ger- 
 man cannot resist a display of this kind ; Brunner caught 
 Cecile's hand, made her turn, and watched her confusion 
 under his gaze, after the manner of the heroes of the novels 
 of Auguste Lafontaine of chaste memory. 
 
 " You are adorable," said he. 
 
 Cecile's petulant gesture replied, " So are you — who could 
 help liking you.''" 
 
 " It is all right, mamma," she whispered to her parent, 
 who came up at that moment with Pons. 
 
 The sight of a family party on these occasions is not to 
 be described. Everybody was well satisfied to see a mother 
 put her hand on an eligible son-in-law. Compliments, 
 double-barreled and double-charged, were paid to Brunner 
 (who pretended to understand nothing) ; to Cecile, on whom 
 nothing was lost ; and to the President, who fished for them.
 
 COUSIN PONS 85 
 
 Pons heard the blood singing in his ears, the Hght of all the 
 blazing gas-jets of the theater footlights seemed to be 
 dazzling his ej'^es, when Cecile, in a low voice and with the 
 most ingenious circumspection, spoke of her father's plan 
 of the annuity of twelve hundred francs. The old artist 
 positively declined the offer, bringing forward the value of 
 his fortune in furniture, only now made known to him by 
 Brunner. 
 
 The Home Secretary, the First President, the attorney 
 for the crown, the Popinots, and those who had other engage- 
 ments, all went ; and before long no one was left except M. 
 Camusot senior, and Cardot the old notary, and his assistant 
 and son-in-law Berthier. Pons, worthy soul, looking round 
 and seeing no one but the famil}^, blundered out a speech 
 of thanks to the President and his wife for the proposal 
 which Cecile had just made to him. So is it with those who 
 are guided by their feelings ; they act upon impulse. Brun- 
 ner, hearing of an annuity offered in this way, thought that 
 it had very much the look of a commission paid to Pons ; he 
 made an Israelite's return upon himself, his attitude told of 
 more than cool calculation. 
 
 Meanwhile Pons was saying to his astonished relations, 
 " My collection or its value will, in any case, go to your 
 family, whether I come to terms with our friend Brunner or 
 keep it." The Camusots were amazed to hear that Pons was 
 so rich. 
 
 Brunner, watching, saw how all these ignorant people 
 looked favorably upon a man once believed to be poor so 
 soon as they knew that he had great possessions. He had 
 seen, too, already that Cecile was spoiled by her father and 
 mother; he amused himself, therefore, by astonishing the 
 good bourgeois. 
 
 " I was telling mademoiselle," said he, " that M. Pons's 
 pictures were worth that sum to me; but the prices of works 
 of art have risen so much of late, that no one can tell how 
 much the collection might sell for at a public auction. 
 The sixty pictures might fetch a milhon francs ; several 
 that I saw the other day were worth fifty thousand 
 apiece."
 
 86 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " It is a fine thing to be your heir ! " remarked old Cardot, 
 looking at Pons. 
 
 " My heir is my cousin Cecile here," answered Pons, in- 
 sisting on the relationship. There was a flutter of admira- 
 tion at this, 
 
 " She will be a very rich heiress," laughed old Cardot, 
 as he took his departure. 
 
 Camusot senior, the President and his wife, Cecile, Brunner, 
 Berthier, and Pons were now left together ; for it was assumed 
 that the formal demand for Cecile's hand was about to be 
 made. No sooner was Cardot gone, indeed, than Brunner 
 began with an inquiry which augured well. 
 
 " I think I understood," he said, turning to Mme. de 
 Marville, " that mademoiselle is your only daughter." 
 
 " Certainly," the lady said proudly. 
 
 " Nobody will make any difficulties," Pons, good soul, 
 put in by way of encouraging Brunner to bring out his 
 proposal. 
 
 But Brunner grew thoughtful, and an ominous silence 
 brought on a coolness of the strangest kind. The Presidente 
 might have admitted that her " little girl " was subject to 
 epileptic fits. The President, thinking that Cecile ought 
 not to be present, signed to her to go. She went. Still 
 Brunner said nothing. They all began to look at one an- 
 other. The situation was growing awkward. 
 
 Camusot senior, a man of experience, took the German 
 to Mme. de Marville's room, ostensibly to show him Pons's 
 fan. He saw that some difficulty had arisen, and signed 
 to the rest to leave him alone with Cecile's suitor-desig- 
 nate. 
 
 " Here is the masterpiece," said Camusot, opening out the 
 fan. 
 
 Brunner took it in his hand and looked at it. " It is 
 worth five thousand francs," he said after a moment. 
 
 " Did you not come here, sir, to ask for my grand- 
 daughter.? " inquired the future peer of France. 
 
 " Yes, sir," said Brunner ; " and I beg you to believe 
 that no possible marriage could be more flattering to ray 
 vanity. I shall never find anyone more charming nor more
 
 COUSIN PONS 87 
 
 amiable nor a young lady who answers to my ideas like 
 Mile. Cecile ; but " 
 
 " Oh, not buts! " old Camusot broke in ; " or let us 
 have the translation of your ' buts ' at once, my dear 
 sir." 
 
 " I am very glad, sir, that the matter has gone no further 
 on either side," Brunner answered gravely. " I had no idea 
 that Mile. Cecile was an only daughter. Anybody else would 
 consider this an advantage ; but to me, believe me, it is an 
 insurmountable obstacle to " 
 
 " What, sir ! " cried Camusot, amazed beyond measure. 
 " Do you find a positive drawback in an immense advantage? 
 Your conduct is really extraordinary; I should very much 
 like to hear the explanation of it." 
 
 " I came here this evening, sir," returned the German 
 phlegmatically, " intending to ask M. le President for his 
 daughter's hand. It was my desire to give Mile. Cecile a 
 brilliant future by offering her so much of my fortune as she 
 would consent to accept. But an only daughter is a child 
 whose will is law to indulgent parents, who has never been 
 contradicted. I have had the opportunity of observing this 
 in many families, where parents worship divinities of this kind. 
 And your granddaughter is not only the idol of the house, 
 but Mme. la Presidente . . . you know what I mean. 
 I have seen my own father's house turned into a hell, sir, from 
 this very cause. My stepmother, the source of all my mis- 
 fortunes, an only daughter, idolized by her parents, the most 
 charming betrothed imaginable, after marriage became a fiend 
 incarnate. I do not doubt that Mile. Cecile is an exception 
 to the rule ; but I am not a young man, I am forty years 
 old, and the difference between our ages entails difficulties 
 which would put it out of my power to make the young 
 lady happy, when Mme. la Presidente has always carried out 
 her daughter's every wish and listened to her as if made- 
 moiselle was an oracle. What right have I to expect Mile. 
 Cecile to change her habits and ideas.?' Instead of a father 
 and mother who indulge her every whim, she would find an 
 egoistic man of forty ; if she should resist, the man of 
 forty would have the worst of it. So, as an honest man —
 
 «8 COUSIN PONS 
 
 I withdraw. If there should be any need to explain my visit 
 here, I desire to be entirely sacrificed " 
 
 " If these are your motives, sir," said the future peer of 
 France, " however singular they may be, they are plaus- 
 ible " 
 
 " Do not call my sincerity in question, sir," Brunner in- 
 terrupted quickly. " If you know of a penniless girl, one of 
 a large family, well brought up but without fortune, as 
 happens very often in France ; and if her character offers 
 me security, I will marry her." 
 
 A pause followed ; Frederic Brunner left Cecile's grand- 
 father and politely took leave of his host and hostess. When 
 he was gone, Cecile appeared, a living commentary upon 
 her Werther's leave-taking; she was ghastly pale. She had 
 hidden herself in her mother's wardrobe and overheard the 
 whole conversation. 
 
 " Refused ! . . ." she said in a low voice for her 
 mother's ear. 
 
 " And why ? " asked the Presidente, fixing her eyes upon 
 her embarrassed father-in-law. 
 
 " Upon the fine pretext that an only daughter is a spoilt 
 child," replied that gentleman. " And he is not altogether 
 wrong there," he added, seizing an opportunity of putting 
 the blame on the daughter-in-law, who had worried him not a 
 little for twenty years. 
 
 " It will kill my child ! " cried the Presidente, " and it is 
 your doing ! " she exclaimed, addressing Pons, as she sup- 
 ported her fainting daughter, for Cecile thought well to make 
 good her mother's words by sinking into her arms. The 
 President and his wife carried Cecile to an easy-chair, where 
 she swooned outright. The grandfather rang for the serv- 
 ants. 
 
 " It is a plot of his weaving ; I see it all now," said the 
 infuriated mother. 
 
 Pons sprang up as if the trump of doom were sounding 
 in his ears. 
 
 " Yes ! " said the lady, her eyes like two springs of green 
 bile, " this gentleman wished to repay a harmless joke by 
 an insult. Who will believe that that German was right in
 
 COUSIN PONS 89 
 
 his mind? He is either an accomplice in a wicked scheme 
 of revenge, or he is crazy. I hope, M. Pons, that in future 
 you will spare us the annoyance of seeing you in the house 
 where you have tried to bring shame and dishonor." 
 
 Pons stood like a statue, with his eyes fixed on the pattern 
 of the carpet. 
 
 "Well! Are you still here, monster of ingratitude?" 
 cried she, turning round on Pons, who was twirling his 
 thumbs. — " Your master and I are never at home, remember, 
 if this gentleman calls," she continued, turning to the serv- 
 ants. — " Jean, go for the doctor ; and bring hartshorn, 
 Madeleine." 
 
 In the Presidente's eyes, the reason given by Brunner was 
 simply an excuse, there was something else behind ; but, at 
 the same time, the fact that the marriage was broken off was 
 only the more certain. A woman's mind works swiftly in 
 great crises, and Mme. de Marville had hit at once upon the 
 one method of repairing the check. She chose to look upon 
 it as a scheme of revenge. This notion of ascribing a fiendish 
 scheme to Pons satisfied family honor. Faithful to her dislike 
 of the cousin, she treated a feminine suspicion as a fact. 
 Women, generally speaking, hold a creed peculiar to them- 
 selves, a code of their own ; to them anything which serves 
 their interests or their passions is true. The Presidente 
 went a good deal further. In the course of the evening she 
 talked the President into her belief, and next morning found 
 the magistrate convinced of his cousin's culpability. 
 
 Everyone, no doubt, will condemn the lady's horrible con- 
 duct ; but what mother in Mme. Camusot's position will not 
 do the same? Put the choice between her own daughter and 
 an alien, she will prefer to sacrifice the honor of the latter. 
 There are many ways of doing this, but the end in view is the 
 same. 
 
 The old musician fled down the staircase in haste; but he 
 went slowly along the boulevards to his theater, he turned in 
 mechanically at the door, and mechanically he took his place 
 and conducted the orchestra. In the interval he gave such 
 random answers to Schmucke's questions, that his old friend 
 dissembled his fear that Pons's mind had given way. To so
 
 90 COUSIN PONS 
 
 childlike a nature, the recent scene took the proportions of a 
 catastrophe. He had meant to make everyone happy, and 
 he had aroused a terrible slumbering feeling of hate ; every- 
 thing had been turned topsy-turvy. He had at last seen 
 mortal hate in the Presidente's eyes, tones, and gesture. 
 
 On the morrow, Mme. Camusot de Marville made a great 
 resolution; the President like .vise sanctioned the step now 
 forced upon them by circumstances. It was determined that 
 the estate of Marville should be settled upon Cecile at the 
 time of her marriage, as well as the house in the Rue de 
 Hanovre and a hundred thousand francs. In the course of 
 the morning, the Presidente went to call upon the Comtesse 
 Popinot ; for she saw plainly that nothing but a settled 
 marriage could enable them to recover after such a check. 
 To the Comtesse Popinot she told the shocking story of 
 Pons's revenge, Pons's hideous hoax. It all seemed probable 
 enough when it came out that the marriage had been broken 
 off simply on the pretext that Cecile was an only daughter. 
 The Presidente next dwelt artfully upon the advantage of 
 adding " de Marville " to the name of Popinot ; and the 
 immense dowry. At the present price fetched by land in 
 Normandy, at two per cent., the property represented nine 
 hundred thousand francs, and the house in the Rue de 
 Hanovre about two hundred and fifty thousand. No reason- 
 able family could refuse such an alhance. The Comte and 
 Comtesse Popinot accepted ; and as they were now touched by 
 the honor of the family which they were about to enter, 
 they promised to help to explain away the yesterday even- 
 ing's mishap. 
 
 And now in the house of the elder Camusot, before the 
 very persons who had heard Mme. de Marville singing 
 Frederic Brunner's praises but a few days ago, that lady, 
 to whom nobody ventured to speak on the topic, plunged 
 courageously into explanations. 
 
 " Really, nowadays," she said, " one could not be too 
 careful if a marriage was in question, especially if one 
 had to do with foreigners." 
 
 " And why, Madame? " 
 
 "What has happened to you.?" asked Mme. Chiffreville.
 
 COUSIN PONS 91 
 
 " Do you not know about our adventure with that Brunner, 
 who had the audacity to aspire to marry Cecile? His father 
 was a German that kept a wine-shop, and his uncle is a 
 dealer in rabbit-skins ! " 
 
 "Is it possible? So clearsighted as you are! . . ." 
 murmured a lady. 
 
 " These adventurers are so cunnning. But we found out 
 everything through Berthier. His friend is a beggar that 
 plays the flute. He is friendly with a person who lets 
 furnished lodgings in the Rue du Mail and some tailor or 
 other. . . . We found out that he had led a most 
 disreputable life, and no amount of fortune would be enough 
 for a scamp that has run through his mother's property." 
 
 " Why, Mile, de Marville would have been wretched ! " 
 said Mme. Berthier. 
 
 " How did he come to your house.? " asked old Mme. Lebas. 
 
 " It was M. Pons. Out of revenge, he introduced this 
 fine gentleman to us, to make us ridiculous. . . . This 
 Brunner (it is the same name as Fontaine in French) — this 
 Brunner, that was made out to be such a grandee, has poor 
 enough health, he is bald, and his teeth are bad. The first 
 sight of him was enough for me ; I distrusted him from the 
 first." 
 
 " But how about the great fortune that you spoke of? " 
 a young married woman asked shyly, 
 
 " The fortune was not nearly so large as they said. These 
 tailors and the landlord and he all scraped the money to- 
 gether among them, and put all their savings into this bank 
 that they are starting. What is a bank for those that begin 
 in these days.? Simply a license to ruin themselves. A 
 banker's wife may lie down at night a millionaire and wake 
 up in the morning with nothing but her settlement. At the 
 first word, at the very first sight of him, we made up our 
 minds about this gentleman — he is not one of us. You can 
 tell by his gloves, by his waistcoat, that he is a working man, 
 the son of a man that kept a pot-house somewhere in 
 Germany ; he has not the instincts of a gentleman ; he drinks 
 beer, and he smokes — smokes ? ah ! Madame, t'wenty-f,ve 'pipes 
 a day! . . . What would have become of poor Lili.?
 
 92 COUSIN PONS 
 
 . It makes me shudder even now to think of it. 
 God has indeed preserved us ! And besides, Cecile never liked 
 him. . . . Who would have expected such a trick from 
 a relative, an old friend of the house that had dined with 
 us twice a week for twenty years? We have loaded him with 
 benefits, and he played his game so well, that he said Cecile 
 was his heir before the Keeper of the Seals and the Attorney 
 General and the Home Secretary! . . . That Brunner 
 and M. Pons had their story ready, and each of them said 
 that the other was worth miUions ! . . . No, I do assure 
 you, all of you would have been taken in by an artist's hoax 
 like that." 
 
 In a few weeks' time, the united forces of the Camusot 
 and Popinot families gained an easy victory in the world, 
 for nobody undertook to defend the unfortunate Pons, that 
 parasite, that curmudgeon, that skinflint, that smooth- 
 faced humbug, on whom everybody heaped scorn ; he was 
 a viper cherished in the bosom of the family, he had not his 
 match for spite, he was a dangerous mountebank whom 
 nobody ought to mention. 
 
 About a month after the perfidious Werther's withdrawal, 
 poor Pons left his bed for the first time after an attack of 
 nervous fever, and walked along the sunny side of the street 
 leaning on Schmucke's arm. Nobody in the Boulevard du 
 Temple laughed at the " pair of nut-crackers," for one of 
 the old men looked so shattered, and the other so touchingly 
 careful of his invalid friend. By the time that they reached 
 the Boulevard Poissonniere, a little color came back to Pons's 
 face ; he was breathing the air of the boulevards, he felt 
 the vitalizing power of the atmosphere of the crowded street, 
 the life-giving property of the air that is noticeable in 
 quarters where human life abounds ; in the filthy Roman 
 Ghetto, for instance, with its swarming Jewish population, 
 where malaria is unknown. Perhaps, too, the sight of the 
 streets, the great spectacle of Paris, the daily pleasure of 
 his life, did the invalid good. They walked on side by side, 
 though Pons now and again left his friend to look at the shop 
 windows. Opposite the Theatre des Varietes he saw Count
 
 COUSIN PONS 93 
 
 Popinot, and went up to him very respectfully, for of all 
 men Pons esteemed and venerated the ex-Minister. 
 
 The peer of France answered him severely — 
 
 " I am at a loss to understand, sir, how you can have 
 no more tact than to speak to a near connection of a family 
 whom you tried to brand with shame and ridicule by a trick 
 which no one but an artist could devise. Understand this, 
 sir, that from to-day we must be complete strangers to each 
 other. Mme. la Comtesse Popinot, like everyone else, feels 
 indignant at your behavior to the Marvilles." 
 
 And Count Popinot passed on, leaving Pons thunderstruck. 
 Passion, justice, policy, and great social forces never take 
 into account the condition of the human creature whom 
 they strike down. The statesman, driven by family consid- 
 erations to crush Pons, did not so much as see the physical 
 weakness of his redoubtable enemy. 
 
 " Vat is it, mine boor friend .^ " exclaimed Schmucke, seeing 
 how white Pons had grown. 
 
 " It is a fresh stab in the heart," Pons replied, leaning 
 heavily on Schmucke's arm. " I think that no one, save 
 God in heaven, can have any right to do good, and that is 
 why all those who meddle in His work are so cruelly pun- 
 ished." 
 
 The old artist's sarcasm was uttered with a supreme 
 effort ; he was trying, excellent creature, to quiet the dismay 
 visible in Schmucke's face. 
 
 " So I dink," Schmucke replied simply. 
 
 Pons could not understand it. Neither the Camusots nor 
 the Popinots had sent him notice of Cecile's wedding. 
 
 On the Boulevard des Italiens Pons saw M. Cardot coming 
 towards them. Warned by Count Popinot's allocution. Pons 
 was very careful not to accost the old acquaintance with whom 
 he had dined once a fortnight for the last year; he lifted 
 his hat, but the other, mayor and deputy of Paris, threw 
 him an indignant glance and went by. Pons turned to 
 Schmucke. 
 
 " Do go and ask him what it is that they all have against 
 me," he said to the friend who knew all the details of the 
 catastrophe that Pons could tell him.
 
 94. COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Mennesir," Schmucke began diplomatically, " mine friend 
 Bons is chust recof ering from an illness ; you haf no doubt 
 fail to rekognize him? " 
 
 " Not in the least." 
 
 " But mit vat kann you rebroach him ? " 
 
 " You have a monster of ingratitude for a friend, sir ; 
 if he is still alive, it is because nothing kills ill weeds. People 
 do well to mistrust artists ; they are as mischievous and spite- 
 ful as monkeys. This friend of yours tried to dishonor his 
 own family, and to blight a young girl's character, in revenge 
 for a harmless joke. I wish to have nothing to do with 
 him ; I shall do my best to forget that I have known him, 
 or that such a man exists. All the members of his family 
 and my own share the wish, sir ; so do all the persons who 
 once did the said Pons the honor of receiving him." 
 
 " Boot, Mennesir, you are a reasonaple mann ; gif you vill 
 bermit me, I shall exblain die aflPair " 
 
 " You are quite at liberty to remain his friend, sir, if 
 you are minded that way," returned Cardot, " but you need 
 go no further ; for I must give you warning that in my 
 opinion those who try to excuse or defend his conduct are 
 just as much to blame." 
 
 "To chustify it?" 
 
 "Yes, for his conduct can neither be justified nor qualified." 
 And with that word, the deputy for the Seine went his way ; 
 he would not hear another syllable. 
 
 " I have two powers in the State against me," smiled 
 poor Pons, when Schmucke had repeated these savage 
 speeches. 
 
 " Eferypody is against us," Schmucke answered dolor- 
 ously. " Let us go avay pefore we shall meet oder fools." 
 
 Never before in the course of a truly ovine life had 
 Schmucke uttered such words as these. Never before had 
 his almost divine meekness been ruffled. He had smiled child- 
 like on all the mischances that befell him, but he could not 
 look and see his sublime Pons maltreated; his Pons, his 
 unknown Aristides, the genius resigned to his lot, the nature 
 that knew no bitterness, the treasury of kindness, the heart 
 of gold! . . . Alceste's indignation filled Schmucke's
 
 COUSIN PONS 95 
 
 soul — ^he was moved to call Pons's amphitryons " fools." 
 For his pacific nature that impulse equaled the wrath of 
 Roland. 
 
 With wise foresight, Schmucke turned to go home by the 
 way of the Boulevard du Temple, Pons passively submitting 
 like a fallen fighter, heedless of blows ; but chance ordered 
 that he should know that all his world was against him. 
 The House of Peers, the Chamber of Deputies, strangers and 
 the family, the strong, the weak, and the innocent, all com- 
 bined to send down the avalanche. 
 
 In the Boulevard Poissonniere, Pons caught sight of that 
 very M. Cardot's daughter, who, young as she was, had 
 learned to be charitable to others through trouble of her own. 
 Her husband knew a secret by which he kept her in bondage. 
 She was the only one among Pons's hostesses whom he called 
 by her Christian name; he addressed Mme. Berthier as 
 " Felicie," and he thought that she understood him. The 
 gentle creature seemed to be distressed by the sight of 
 Cousin Pons, as he was called (though he was in no way 
 related to the family of the second wife of a cousin by 
 marriage). There was no help for it, however; Felicie 
 Berthier stopped to speak to the invalid. 
 
 " I did not think you were cruel, cousin," she said ; " but 
 if even a quarter of all that I hear of you is true, you are 
 very false. . . . Oh! do not justify yourself," she added 
 quickly, seeing Pons's significant gesture, " it is useless, for 
 two reasons. In the first place, I have no right to accuse or 
 judge or condemn anybody, for I myself know so well how 
 much may be said for those who seem to be most guilty ; 
 secondly, your explanation would do no good. M. Berthier 
 drew up the marriage-contract for Mile, de Marville and 
 the Vicomte Popinot ; he is so exasperated, that if he knew 
 that I had so much as spoken one word to you, one word 
 for the last time, he would scold me. Everybody is against 
 you." 
 
 " So it seems indeed, Madame," Pons said, his voice shaking 
 as he lifted his hat respectfully. 
 
 Painfully he made his way back to the Rue de Normandie. 
 The old Grerman knew from the heavy weight on his arm that
 
 96 COUSIN PONS 
 
 his friend was struggling bravely against failing physical 
 strength. That third encounter was like the verdict of the 
 Lamb at the foot of the throne of God; and the anger of 
 the Angel of the Poor, the symbol of the Peoples, is the last 
 word of Heaven. They reached home without another word. 
 
 There are moments in our hves when the sense that our 
 friend is near is all that we can bear. Our wounds smart 
 under the consoling words that only reveal the depths of pain. 
 The old pianist, you see, possessed a genius for friendship, 
 the tact of those who, having suffered much, know the customs 
 of suffering. 
 
 Pons was never to take a walk again. From one illness 
 he fell into another. He was of a sanguine-bilious tempera- 
 ment, the bile passed into the blood, and a violent liver 
 attack was the result. He had never known a day's illness 
 in his life till a month ago; he had never consulted a doctor; 
 so La Cibot, with almost motherly care and intentions at 
 first of the very best, called in " the doctor of the quarter." 
 
 In every quarter of Paris there is a doctor whose name and 
 address are only known to the working classes, to the little 
 tradespeople and the porters, and in consequence he is called 
 *' the doctor of the quarter." He undertakes confinement 
 cases, he lets blood, he is in the medical profession pretty 
 much what the " general servant " of the advertising column 
 is in the scale of domestic service. He must perforce be kind 
 to the poor, and tolerably expert by reason of much practice, 
 and he is generally popular. Dr. Poulain, called in by Mme. 
 Cibot, gave an inattentive ear to the old musician's complain- 
 ings. Pons groaned out that his skin itched ; he had 
 scratched himself all night long, till he could scarcely feel. 
 The look of his eyes, with the yellow circles about them, 
 corroborated the symptoms. 
 
 " Had you some violent shock a couple of days ago? " the 
 doctor asked the patient. 
 
 " Yes, alas ! " 
 
 " You have the same complaint that this gentleman was 
 threatened with," said Dr. Poulain, looking at Schmucke 
 as he spoke; " it is an attack of jaundice, but you will soon 
 get over it," he added, as he wrote a prescription.
 
 COUSIN PONS 9% 
 
 But in spite of that comfortable phrase, the doctor's eyes 
 had told another tale as he looked professionally at the 
 patient ; and the death-sentence, though hidden under stereo- 
 typed compassion, can always be read by those who wish 
 to know the truth. Mme. Cibot gave a spy's glance at the 
 doctor, and read his thought ; his bedside manner did not 
 deceive her ; she followed him out of the room. 
 
 "Do you think he will get over it.?" asked Mme. Cibot, 
 at the stairhead. 
 
 " My dear Mme. Cibot, your lodger is a dead man ; 
 not because of the bile in the system, but because his vitality 
 is low. Still, with great care, your patient ma}- pull through. 
 Somebody ought to take him away for a change " 
 
 " How is he to go.'' " asked Mme. Cibot. " He has nothing 
 to live upon but his salary; his friend has just a little money 
 from some great ladies, very charitable ladies, in return for 
 his services, it seems. They are two children. I have looked 
 after them for nine years." 
 
 " I spend ray life in watching people die, not of their 
 disease, but of another bad and incurable complaint — the 
 want of money," said the doctor. " How often it happens 
 that so far from taking a fee, I am obliged to leave a five- 
 franc piece on the mantel-shelf when I go " 
 
 " Poor, dear M. Poulain ! " cried Mme. Cibot. " Ah, if 
 you hadn't only the hundred thousand livres a year, what 
 some stingy folks has in the quarter (regular devils from 
 hell they are), you would be like Providence on earth." 
 
 Dr. Poulain had made the little practice, by which he made 
 a bare subsistence, chiefly by winning the esteem of the 
 porters' lodges in his district. So he raised his eyes to 
 Heaven and thanked Mme. Cibot with a solemn face worthy 
 of Tartuffe. 
 
 " Then you think that with careful nursing our dear 
 patient will get better, my dear M. Poulain ? " 
 
 " Yes, if this shock has not been too much for him." 
 
 " Poor man ! who can have vexed him.'^ There isn't nobody 
 like him on earth, except his friend M. Schmucke. I will 
 find out what is the matter, and I will undertake to give 
 them that upset my gentleman a hauling over the coals "
 
 98 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Look here, my dear Mme. Cibot," said the doctor as they 
 stood in the gateway, " one of the principal symptoms of 
 his complaint is great irritability; and as it is hardly to be 
 supposed that he can afford a nurse, the task of nursing him 
 will fall to you. So " 
 
 " Are you talking of Mouchieu Ponsh? " asked the marine 
 store-dealer. He was sitting cmoking on the curb-post in the 
 gateway, and now he rose to join in the conversation. 
 
 " Yes, Daddy Remonencq." 
 
 " All right," said Remonencq, " ash to moneysh, he ish 
 better off than Mouchieur Monishtrol and the big men in the 
 curioshity line. I know enough in the art line to tell you 
 thish — the dear man hash treasursh ! " he spoke with a broad 
 Auvergne dialect. 
 
 " Look here, I thought you were laughing at me the other 
 day when my gentlemen were out and I showed you the old 
 rubbish upstairs," said Mme. Cibot. 
 
 In Paris wl^ere walls have ears, where doors have tongues, 
 and window bars have eyes, there are few things more danger- 
 ous than the practice of standing to chat in a gateway. 
 Partings are like postscripts to a letter — indiscreet utterances 
 that do as much mischief to the speaker as to those who 
 overhear them. A single instance will be sufficient as a 
 parallel to an event in this history. 
 
 In the time of the Empire when men paid considerable 
 attention to their hair, one of the first coiffeurs of the day 
 came out of a house where he had just been dressing a pretty 
 "woman's head. This artist in question enjoyed the custom 
 of all the lower floor inmates of the house ; and among these, 
 there flourished an elderly bachelor guarded by a house- 
 keeper who detested her master's next-of-kin. The ci-devant 
 young man, falling seriously ill, the most famous doctors 
 of the day (they were not as yet styled the "princes of 
 science") had been called in to consult upon his case; and 
 it so chanced that the learned gentlemen were taking leave 
 of one another in the gateway just as the hairdresser came 
 cut. They were talking as doctors usually talk among them- 
 selves when the farce of a consultation is over. " He is a 
 dead man," quoth Dr. Haudry. — " He has not a month to
 
 COUSIN PONS 99 
 
 live," added Desplein, " unless a miracle takes place." — These 
 were the words overheard by the hairdresser. 
 
 Like all hairdressers, he kept up a good understanding 
 with his customers' servants. Prodigious greed sent the man 
 upstairs again ; he mounted to the ci-devant young man's 
 apartment, and promised the servant-mistress a tolerably 
 handsome commission to persuade her master to sink a large 
 proportion of his money in an annuity. The dying bachelor, 
 fifty-six by count of years, and twice as old as his age by 
 reason of amorous campaigns, owned, among other property, 
 a splendid house in tlie Rue de Richelieu, worth at that time 
 about two hundred and fifty thousand francs. It was this 
 house that the hairdresser coveted ; and on agreement to 
 pay an annuity of thirty thousand francs so long as the 
 bachelor lived, it passed into his hands. This happened 
 in 1806. And in this present year 1846 the hairdresser 
 is still paying that annuity. He has retired from business, 
 he is seventy years old ; the ci-devant young man is in his 
 dotage ; and as he has married his Mme. Evrard, he may last 
 for a long while yet. As the hairdresser gave the woman 
 thirty thousand francs, his bit of real estate has cost him, 
 first and last, more than a million, and the house at this day 
 is worth eight or nine hundred thousand francs. 
 
 Like the hairdresser, Remonencq the Auvergnat had over- 
 heard Brunner's parting remark in the gateway on the day 
 of Cecile's first interview with that phcEnix of eligible men. 
 Remonencq at once longed to gain a sight of Pons's museum ; 
 and as he lived on good terms with his neighbors the Cibots, 
 it was not very long before the opportunity came one day 
 when the friends were out. The sight of such treasures 
 dazzled him ; he saw a " good haul," in dealers' phrase, which 
 being interpreted means a chance to steal a fortune. He 
 had been meditating this for five or six days. 
 
 " I am sho far from joking," he said, in reply to Mme. 
 Cibot's remark, " that we will talk the thing over ; and if the 
 good shentleman will take an annuity of fifty thoushand 
 francsh, I will shtand a hamper of wine, if " 
 
 " Fifty thousand francs ! " interrupted the doctor ; " what 
 are you thinking about.'' Why, if the good man is so well
 
 100 COUSIN PONS 
 
 off as that, with me in attendance, and Mme. Cibot to nurse 
 him, he may get better — for liver complaint is a disease 
 that attacks strong constitutions." 
 
 "Fifty, did I shay? Why, a shentleman here, on your 
 very doorshtep, offered him sheven hundred thoushand 
 francsh, shimply for the pictursh, fouchtra! " 
 
 While Remonencq made this announcement, Mme. Cibot 
 was looking at Dr. Poulain. There was a strange expression 
 in her eyes ; the Devil might have kindled that sinister glitter 
 in their tawny depths. 
 
 " Oh, come ! we must not pay any attention to such idle 
 tales," said the doctor, well pleased, however, to find that his 
 patient could afford to pay for his visits. 
 
 " If my dear Mme. Cibot, here, would let me come and bring 
 an ekshpert (shinsh the shentleman upshtairs ish in bed), I 
 will shertainly find the money in a couple of hoursh, even if 
 sheven hundred thoushand francsh ish in queshtion " 
 
 " All right, my friend," said the doctor. " Now, Mme. 
 Cibot, be careful never to contradict the invalid. You must 
 be prepared to be very patient with him, for he will find 
 everything irritating and wearisome, even your services ; noth- 
 ing will please him ; you must expect grumbling " 
 
 " He will be uncommonly hard to please," said La Cibot. 
 
 " Look here, mind what I tell you," the doctor said in a 
 tone of authority, " M. Pons's life is in the hands of those 
 that nurse him ; I shall come perhaps twice a day. I shall 
 take him first on my round." 
 
 The doctor's profound indifference to the fate of a poor 
 patient had suddenly given place to a most tender solicitude 
 when he saw that the speculator was serious, and that there 
 was a possible fortune in question. 
 
 " He will be nursed like a king," said Mme. Cibot, forc- 
 ing up enthusiasm. She waited till the doctor turned the 
 corner into the Rue Chariot ; then she fell to talking again 
 with the dealer in old iron. Remonencq had finished smoking 
 his pipe, and stood in the doorway of his shop, leaning 
 against the frame ; he had purposely taken this position ; he 
 meant the portress to come to him. 
 
 The shop had once been a cafe. Nothing had been
 
 COUSIN PONS 101 
 
 changed there since the Auvergnat discovered it and took over 
 the lease ; you could still read " Cafe de Normandie " on the 
 strip left above the windows in all modern shops. Remonencq 
 had found somebody, probably a house painter's apprentice, 
 who did the work for nothing, to paint another inscription 
 in the remaining space below — " Remonencq," it ran, 
 
 " DEALER IN MARINE STORES, FURNITURE BOUGHT " painted 
 
 in small black letters. All the mirrors, tables, seats, shelves, 
 and fittings of the Cafe de Normandie had been sold, as might 
 have been expected, before Remonencq took possession of the 
 shop as it stood, paying a yearly rent of six hundred francs 
 for the place, with a back shop, a kitchen, and a single room 
 above, where the head waiter used to sleep, for the house 
 belonging to the Cafe de Normandie was let separately. Of 
 the former splendor of the cafe, nothing now remained save 
 the plain light green paper on the walls, and the strong iron 
 bolts and bars of the shop-front. 
 
 When Remonencq came hither in 1831, after the Revolu- 
 tion of July, he began by displaying a selection of broken 
 door-bells, cracked plates, old iron, and the obsolete scales 
 and weights abolished by a Government which alone fails to 
 carry out its own regulations, for pence and halfpence of the 
 time of Louis XVI. are still in circulation. After a time this 
 Auvergnat, a match for five ordinary Auvergnats, bought up 
 old saucepans and kettles, old picture-frames, old copper, and 
 chipped china. Gradually, as the shop was emptied and 
 filled, the quality of the stock-in-trade improved, like Nicolet's 
 farces. Remonencq persisted in an unfailing and prodi- 
 giously profitable martingale, a " system " which any philo- 
 sophical idler may study as he watches the increasing value 
 of the stock kept by this intelligent class of trader. Picture- 
 frames and copper succeed to tinware, argand lamps, and 
 damaged crockery ; china marks the next transition ; and 
 after no long tarriance in the " omnium gatherum " stage, 
 the shop becomes a museum. Some day or other the dusty 
 windows are cleaned, the interior is restored, the Auvergnat 
 relinquishes velveteen and jackets for a great-coat, and there 
 he sits like a dragon guarding his treasure, surrounded by 
 masterpieces ! He is a cunning connoisseur by this time ; he
 
 102 COUSIN PONS 
 
 has increased his capital tenfold ; he is not to be cheated ; 
 he knows the tricks of the trade. The monster among his 
 treasures looks like some old hag among a score of young 
 girls that she offers to the public. Beauty and miracles of 
 art are alike indifferent to him; subtle and dense as he is, 
 he has a keen eye to profits, he talks roughly to those who 
 know less than he does ; he has learned to act a part, he 
 pretends to love his pictures and his marquetry, or he tells 
 you that he is short of money, or again he lets you know 
 the price he himself gave for the things, he offers to let 
 you see the memoranda of the sale. He is a Proteus ; in one 
 hour he can be Jocrisse, Janot, Queue-rouge, Mondor, Har- 
 pagon, or Nicodeme. 
 
 The third year found armor, and old pictures, and some 
 tolerably fine clocks in Remonencq's shop. He sent for his 
 sister, and La Remonencq came on foot all the way from 
 Auvergne to take charge of the shop while her brother was 
 away. A big and very ugly woman, dressed like a Japanese 
 idol, a half-idiotic creature with a vague, staring gaze, she 
 would not bate a centime of the prices fixed by her brother. 
 In the intervals of business she did the work of the house, and 
 solved the apparently insoluble problem — how to live on " the 
 mists of the Seine." The Remonencqs' diet consisted of 
 bread and herrings, with the outside leaves of lettuce or 
 vegetable refuse selected from the heaps deposited in the 
 kennel before the doors of eating-houses. The two between 
 them did not spend more than fivepence a day on food 
 (bread included), and La Remonencq earned the money by 
 sewing or spinning. 
 
 Remonencq came to Paris in the first instance to work as 
 an errand-boy. Between the years 1825 and 1831 he ran 
 errands for dealers in curiosities in the Boulevard Beau- 
 marchais or coppersmiths in the Rue de Lappe. It is the 
 usual start in life in his line of business. Jews, Normans, 
 Auvergnats, and Savoyards, those four different races of 
 men, all have the same instincts, and make their fortunes 
 in the same way ; they spend nothing, make small profits, and 
 let them accumulate at compound interest. Such is their 
 trading charter, and that charter is no delusion.
 
 COUSIN PONS loa 
 
 Remonencq at this moment had made it up with his old 
 master Monistrol; he did business with wholesale dealers, he 
 was a chineur (the technical word), plying his trade in the 
 banlieue, which, as everybody knows, extends for some forty 
 leagues round Paris. 
 
 After fourteen years of business, he had sixty thousand 
 francs in hand and a well-stocked shop. He lived in the Rue 
 de Normandie because the rent was low, but casual customers 
 were scarce, most of his goods were sold to other dealers, 
 and he was content with moderate gains. All his business 
 transactions were carried on in the Auvergne dialect or 
 charabia, as people call it. 
 
 Remonencq cherished a dream ! He wished to establish 
 himself on a boulevard, to be a rich dealer in curiosities, 
 and do a direct trade with amateurs some day. And, indeed, 
 within him there was a formidable man of business. His 
 countenance was the more inscrutable because it was glazed 
 over by a deposit of dust and particles of metal glued 
 together by the sweat of his brow ; for he did everything 
 himself, and the use and wont of bodily labor had given 
 him something of the stoical impassibihty of the old soldiers 
 of 1799. 
 
 In personal appearance Remonencq was short and thin; 
 his little eyes were set in his head in porcine fashion; a 
 Jew's slyness and concentrated greed looked out of those 
 dull blue circles, though in his case the false humility that 
 masks the Hebrew's unfathomed contempt for the Gentile 
 was lacking. 
 
 The relations between the Cibots and the Remonencqs were 
 those of benefactors and recipients. Mme. Cibot, convinced 
 that the Auvergnats were wretchedly poor, used to let them 
 have the remainder of " her gentlemen's " dinners at ridicu- 
 lous prices. The Remonencqs would buy a pound of broken 
 bread, crusts and crumbs, for a farthing, a porringer-full of 
 cold potatoes for something less, and other scraps in pro- 
 portion. Remonencq shrewdly allowed them to believe that 
 he was not in business on his own account, he worked for 
 Monistrol, the rich shopkeepers preyed upon him, he said, 
 and the Cibots felt sincerely sorry for Remonencq. The vel-
 
 104 COUSIN PONS 
 
 veteen jacket, waistcoat, and trousers, particularly affected 
 by Auvergnats, were covered with patches of Cibot's making, 
 and not a penny had the little tailor charged for repairs 
 which kept the three garments together after eleven years 
 of wear. 
 
 Thus we see that all Jews are not in Israel. 
 
 " You are not laughing at me, Remonencq, are you? " 
 asked the portress. " Is it possible that M. Pons has such 
 a fortune, living as he does.f^ There is not a hundred francs 
 in the place " 
 
 " Amateursh are all like that," Remonencq remarked sen- 
 tentiously. 
 
 " Then do you think that my gentleman has the worth 
 of seven hundred thousand francs, eh? " 
 
 " In pictures alone," continued Remonencq (it is needless, 
 for the sake of clearness in the story, to give any further 
 specimens of his frightful dialect). " If he would take fifty 
 thousand francs for one up there that I know of, I would 
 find the money if I had to hang myself. Do you remember 
 those little frames full of enameled copper on crimson 
 velvet, hanging among the portraits? . . . Well, those 
 are Petitot's enamels ; and there is a cabinet minister as 
 used to be a druggist that will give three thousand francs 
 apiece for them." 
 
 La Cibot's eyes opened wide. " There are thirty of them 
 in the pair of frames ! " she said. 
 
 " Very well, you can judge for yourself how much he is 
 worth." 
 
 Mme. Cibot's head was swimming; she wheeled round. In 
 a moment came the thought that she would have a legacy, she 
 would sleep sound on old Pons's will, like the other servant- 
 mistresses whose annuities had aroused such envy in the 
 Marais. Her thoughts flew to some commune in the neighbor- 
 hood of Paris ; she saw herself strutting proudly about her 
 house in the country, looking after her garden and poultry 
 yard, ending her days, served like a queen, along with her 
 poor dear Cibot, who deserved such good fortune, like all 
 angelic creatures whom nobody knows nor appreciates. 
 
 Her abrupt, unthinking movement told Remonencq that
 
 COUSIN PONS 105 
 
 success was sure. In the chineur^s way of business — the 
 chineur, be it explained, goes about the country picking up 
 bargains at the expense of the ignorant — in the chineur's 
 way of business, the one real difficulty is the problem of gain- 
 ing an entrance to a house. No one can imagine the Scapin's 
 roguery, the tricks of a Sganarelle, the wiles of a Dorine 
 by which the chineur contrives to make a footing for himself. 
 These comedies are as good as a play, and founded indeed 
 on the old stock theme of the dishonesty of servants. For 
 thirty francs in money or goods, servants, and especially 
 country servants, will sometimes conclude a bargain on which 
 the chineur makes a profit of a thousand or two thousand 
 francs. If we could but know the history of such and such 
 a service of Sevres porcelain, pate tendre, we should find 
 that all the intellect, all the diplomatic subtlety displayed 
 at Miinster, Nimeguen, Utrecht, Ryswick, and Vienna was 
 surpassed by the chineur. His is the more frank comedy ; 
 his methods of action fathom depths of personal interest 
 quite as profound as any that plenipotentiaries can explore 
 in their difficult search for any means of breaking up the best 
 cemented alliances. 
 
 " I have set La Cibot nicely on fire," Remonencq told his 
 sister, when she came to take up her position again on the 
 ramshackle chair. " And now," he continued, " I shall go to 
 consult the only man that knows, our Jew, a good sort of 
 Jew that did not ask more than fifteen per cent, of us for 
 his money." 
 
 Remonencq had read La Cibot's heart. To will is to act 
 with women of her stamp. Let them see the end in view ; 
 they will stick at nothing to gain it, and pass from scrupulous 
 honesty to the last degree of scoundrelism in the twinkling 
 of an eye. Honesty, like most dispositions of mind, is divided 
 into two classes — negative and positive. La Cibot's honesty 
 was of the negative order ; she and her like are honest until 
 they see their way clear to gain money belonging to some- 
 body else. Positive honesty, the honesty of the bank col- 
 lector, can wade knee-deep through temptations. 
 
 A torrent of evil thoughts invaded La Cibot's heart and 
 brain so soon as Remonencq's diabolical suggestion opened
 
 106 COUSIN PONS 
 
 the floodgates of self-interest. La Cibot climbed, or, to be 
 more accurate, fled up the stairs, opened the door on the 
 landing, and showed a face disguised in false solicitude in 
 the doorway of the room where Pons and Schmucke were be- 
 moaning themselves. As soon as she came in, Schmucke made 
 her a warning sign ; for, true friend and sublime German 
 that he was, he too had read the doctor's eyes, and he was 
 afraid that Mme. Cibot might repeat the verdict. Mme. 
 Cibot answered by a shake of the head indicative of deep 
 woe. 
 
 " Well, my dear Monsieur," asked she, " how are you feel- 
 ing.? " Sbe sat down on the foot of the bed, hands on hips, 
 and fixed her eyes lovingly upon the patient ; but what a 
 glitter of metal there was in them, a terrible, tiger-like 
 gleam if anyone had watched her. 
 
 " I feel very ill," answered poor Pons. " I have not the 
 slightest appetite left. — Oh ! the world, the world ! " he 
 groaned, squeezing Schmucke's hand. Schmucke was sitting 
 by his bedside, and doubtless the sick man was talking of the 
 causes of his illness. — " I should have done far better to 
 follow your advice, my good Schmucke, and dined here every 
 day, and given up going into this society, that has fallen 
 on me with all its weight, like a tumbril cart crushing an 
 egg ! And why ? " 
 
 " Come, come, don't complain, M. Pons," said La Cibot ; 
 " the doctor told me just how it is " 
 
 Schmucke tugged at her gown. — " And you will pull 
 through," she continued, " only we must take great care of 
 you. Be easy, you have a good friend beside you, and with- 
 out boasting, a woman as will nurse you like a mother nurses 
 her first child. I nursed Cibot round once when Dr. Poulain 
 had given him over ; he had the shroud up to his eyes, as 
 the saying is, and they gave him up for dead. Well, well, 
 you have not come to that yet, God be thanked, ill though 
 you may be. Count on me ; I would pull you through 
 all by myself, I would! Keep still, don't you fidget like 
 that." 
 
 She pulled the coverlet over the patient's hands as she 
 spoke.
 
 COUSIN PONS 107 
 
 " There, sonny ! M. Schmucke and I will sit up with 
 you of nights. A prince won't be no better nursed . 
 and besides, you needn't refuse yourself nothing that's neces- 
 sary, you can afford it. — I have just been talking things 
 over with Cibot, for what would he do without me, poor 
 dear? — Well, and I talked him round; we are both so fond 
 of you, that he will let me stop up with you of a night. 
 And that is a good deal to ask of a man like him, for he 
 is as fond of me as ever he was the day we were married. 
 I don't know how it is. It is the lodge, you see ; we are 
 always there together! Don't you throw off the things like 
 that ! " she cried, making a dash for the bedhead to draw 
 the coverlet over Pons's chest. " If you are not good, and 
 don't do just as Dr. Poulain says — and Dr. Poulain is the 
 image of Providence on earth — I will have no more to do with 
 you. You must do as I tell you " 
 
 " Yes, Montame Zipod, he vill do vat you tell him," put 
 in Schmucke ; " he vants to lif for his boor friend Schmucke's 
 sake, I'll pe pound." 
 
 " And of all things, don't fidget yourself," continued La 
 Cibot, " for your illness makes you quite bad enough without 
 your making it worse for want of patience. God sends us 
 our troubles, my dear good gentleman ; He punishes us for 
 our sins. Haven't you nothing to reproach yourself with.^* 
 some poor little bit of a fault or other.? " 
 
 The invalid shook his head. 
 
 " Oh ! go on ! You were young once, you had your fling, 
 there is some love-child of yours somewhere — cold, and starv- 
 ing, and homeless. . . . What monsters men are ! Their 
 love doesn't last only for a day, and then in a jiffy they 
 forget, they don't so much as think of the child at the 
 breast for months. . . . Poor women ! " 
 
 " But no one has ever loved me except Schmucke and my 
 mother," poor Pons broke in sadly. 
 
 " Oh ! come, you aren't no saint ! You were young in 
 your time, and a fine-looking young fellow you must have 
 been at twenty. I should have fallen in love with you 
 m3^self, so nice as you are " 
 
 " I always was as ugly as a toad," Pons put in desperately.
 
 108 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " You say that because you are modest ; nobody can't 
 say that you aren't modest." 
 
 " My dear Mme. Cibot, no, I tell you. I always was 
 ugly, and I never was loved in my life." 
 
 " You, indeed ! " cried the portress. " You want to make 
 me believe at this time of day that you are as innocent as 
 a young maid at your time of life. Tell that to your 
 granny ! A musician at a theater, too ! Why, if a woman 
 told me that, I wouldn't believe her." 
 
 " Montame Zipod, you irritate him ! " cried Schmucke, 
 seeing that Pons was writhing under the bedclothes. 
 
 " You hold your tongue too ! You are a pair of old 
 libertines. If you were ugly, it don't make no difference; 
 there was never so ugly a saucepan-lid but it found a pot 
 to match, as the saying is. There is Cibot, he got one 
 of the handsomest oyster-women in Paris to fall in love with 
 him, and you are infinitely better looking than him ! You 
 are a nice pair, you are ! Come, now, you have sown your 
 wild oats, and God will punish you for deserting your children, 
 like Abraham " 
 
 Exhausted though he was, the invalid gathered up all 
 his strength to make a vehement gesture of denial. 
 
 " Do lie quiet ; if you have, it won't prevent you from 
 living as long as Methuselah." 
 
 " Then, pray let me be quiet ! " groaned Pons. " I have 
 never known what it is to be loved. I have had no child; 
 I am alone in the earth." 
 
 " Really, eh.? " returned the portress. " You are so kind, 
 and that is what women like, you see — it draws them — and 
 it looked to me impossible that when you were in your 
 prime " 
 
 " Take her away," Pons whispered to Schmucke ; " she sets 
 my nerves on edge." 
 
 " Then there's M. Schmucke, he has children. You old 
 bachelors are not all like that " 
 
 " /.' " cried Schmucke, springing to his feet, " vy ! " 
 
 " Come, then, you have none to come after you either, 
 eh.'' You both sprang up out of the earth like mush- 
 rooms "
 
 COUSIN PONS 10? 
 
 " Look here, komm mit me," said Schmucke. The good 
 German manfully took Mme. Cibot by the waist and carried 
 her off into the next room, in spite of her exclamations. 
 
 " At your age, you would not take advantage of a 
 defenseless woman ! " cried La Cibot, struggling in his 
 arms. 
 
 " Don't make a noise ! " 
 
 " You too, the better one of the two ! " returned La Cibot^ 
 " Ah ! it is my fault for talking about love to two old men 
 who have never had nothing to do with women. I have 
 roused your passions," cried she, as Schmucke's eyes glittered 
 with wrath. " Help ! help ! police ! " 
 
 " You are a stoopid ! " said the German. " Look here, vat 
 tid de toctor say? " 
 
 " You are a ruffian to treat me so," wept La Cibot, now 
 released, — " me, that would go through fire and water for 
 you both ! Ah ! well, well, they say that that is the way 
 with men — and true it is ! There is my poor Cibot, he would 
 not be rough with me like this. . . . And I treated you 
 like my children, for I have none of my own ; and yesterday, 
 yes, only yesterday I said to Cibot, ' God knew well what He 
 was doing, dear,' I said, ' when He refused us children, for 
 I have two children there upstairs.' By the holy crucifix 
 and the soul of my mother, that was what I said to 
 him " 
 
 " Eh ! but vat did der doctor say ? " Schmucke demanded 
 furiously, stamping on the floor for the first time in his 
 life. 
 
 " Well," said Mme. Cibot, drawing Schmucke into the 
 dining-room, " he just said this — that our dear, darling love 
 lying ill there would die if he wasn't carefully nursed; but 
 I am here in spite of all your brutality, for brutal you were, 
 you that I thought so gentle. And you are one of that 
 sort ! Ah, now, you would not abuse a woman at your age, 
 great blackguard " 
 
 "Placard.'* I.? Vill you not oonderstand that I lof no- 
 pody but Bons .? " 
 
 " Well and good, you will let me alone, won't you? " said 
 ehe, smiling at Schmucke. " You had better ; for if Cibot
 
 110 COUSIN PONS 
 
 knew that anybody had attempted his honor, he would breaK 
 every bone in his skin." 
 
 " Take crate care of him, dear Montame Zipod," answered 
 Schmucke, and he tried to take the portress's hand. 
 
 " Oh! look here now, again" 
 
 " Chust listen to me. You shall haf all dot I haf , gif 
 ve safe him." 
 
 " Very well ; I will go round to the chemist's to get the 
 things that are wanted; this illness is going to cost a lot, 
 you see, sir, and what will you do.^^ " 
 
 " I shall vork ; Bons shall be nursed like ein brince." 
 
 " So he shall, M. Schmucke ; and look here, don't you 
 trouble about nothing. Cibot and I, between us, have saved 
 a couple of thousand francs ; they are yours ; I have been 
 spending money on you this long time, I have." 
 
 " Goot voman ! " cried Schmucke, brushing the tears from 
 his eyes. " Vat ein heart ! " 
 
 " W^ipe your tears ; they do me honor ; this is my reward," 
 said La Cibot melodramatically. " There isn't no more disin- 
 terested creature on earth than me ; but don't you go into 
 the room with tears in your eyes, or M. Pons will be thinking 
 himself worse than he is." 
 
 Schmucke was touched by this delicate feeling. He took 
 La Cibot's hand and gave it a final squeeze. 
 
 " Spare me ! " cried the ex-oysterseller, leering at 
 Schmucke. 
 
 " Bons," the good German said when he returned, " Mon- 
 tame Zipod is an anchel; 'tis an anchel dat brattles, but an 
 anchel all der same." 
 
 " Do you think so.^* I have grown suspicious in the past 
 month," said the invalid, shaking his head. " After all I 
 have been through, one comes to believe in nothing but God 
 and my friend " 
 
 " Get bedder, and ve vill lif like kings, all tree of us," 
 exclaimed Schmucke. 
 
 " Cibot ! " panted the portress as she entered the lodge. 
 " Oh, my dear, our fortune is made. My two gentlemen 
 haven't nobody to come after them, no natural children,
 
 COUSIN PONS 111 
 
 no nothing, in short! Oh, I shall go round to Ma'am Fon- 
 taine's and get her to tell me mj fortune on the cards, then 
 we shall know how much we are going to have " 
 
 " Wife," said the little tailor, " it's ill counting on dead 
 men's shoes." 
 
 "Oh, I saj, are you going to worry me?" asked she, 
 giving her spouse a playful tap. " I know what I know I 
 Dr. Poulain has given up M. Pons. And we are going to 
 be rich! My name will be down in the will. . . . I'll 
 see to that. Draw your needle in and out, and look after 
 the lodge; you will not do it for long now. We will retire, 
 and go into the country, out at Batignolles. A nice house 
 and a fine garden ; you will amuse yourself with gardening, 
 and I shall keep a servant ! " 
 
 " Well, neighbor, and how are things going on upstairs ? " 
 The words were spoken with the thick Auvergnat accent, and 
 Remonencq put his head in at the door. " Do you know 
 what the collection is worth? " 
 
 " No, no, not yet. One can't go at that rate, my good 
 man. I have begun, myself, by finding out more important 
 things " 
 
 "More important!" exclaimed Remonencq; "why, what 
 things can be more important? " 
 
 " Come, let me do the steering, ragamuffin," said La Cibot 
 authoritatively. 
 
 " But thirty per cent, on seven hundred thousand francs," 
 persisted the dealer in old iron ; " you could be your own 
 mistress for the rest of your days on that." 
 
 " Be easy. Daddy Remonencq ; when we want to know the 
 value of the things that the old man has got together, then 
 we will see." 
 
 La Cibot went for the medicine ordered by Dr. Poulain, 
 and put off her consultation with Mme. Fontaine until the 
 morrow ; the oracle's faculties would be fresher and clearer in 
 the morning, she thought ; and she would go early, before 
 everybody else came, for there was often a crowd at Mme. 
 Fontaine's. 
 
 Mme. Fontaine was at this time the oracle of the Marais ; 
 she had survived the rival of forty years, the celebrated
 
 112 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Mile. Lenormand. No one imagines the part that fortune- 
 tellers play among Parisians of the lower classes, nor the 
 immense influence which thej exert over the uneducated; 
 general servants, portresses, kept women, workmen, all the 
 many in Paris who live on hope, consult the privileged beings 
 who possess the mysterious power of reading the future. 
 
 The belief in occult science is far more widely spread than 
 scholars, lawyers, doctors, magistrates, and philosophers 
 imagine. The instincts of the people are ineradicable. One 
 among those instincts, so foolishly styled " superstition," 
 runs in the blood of the populace, and tinges no less the 
 intellects of better educated folk. More than one French 
 statesman has been known to consult the fortune-teller's cards. 
 For skeptical minds, astrology, in French so oddly termed 
 astrologie judiciaire, is nothing more than a cunning device 
 for making a profit out of one of the strongest of all the 
 instincts of human nature — to wit, curiosity. The skeptical 
 mind consequently denies that there is any connection between 
 human destiny and the prognostications obtained by the seven 
 or eight principal methods known to astrology ; and the 
 occult sciences, like many natural phenomena, are passed 
 over by the freethinker or the materialist philosopher, id est, 
 by those who believe in nothing but visible and tangible facts, 
 in the results given by the chemist's retort and the scales of 
 modern physical science. The occult sciences still exist ; they 
 are at work, but they make no progress, for the greatest 
 intellects of two centuries have abandoned the field. 
 
 If you only look at the practical side of divination, it 
 seems absurd to imagine that events in a man's past life and 
 secrets known only to himself can be represented on the 
 spur of the moment by a pack of cards which he shuffles 
 and cuts for the fortune-teller to lay out in piles according 
 to certain mysterious rules; but then the steam-engine was 
 condemned as absurd, aerial navigation is still said to be 
 absurd; so in their time were the inventions of gunpowder, 
 printing, spectacles, engraving, and that latest great dis- 
 covery of all — the daguerreotype. If any man had come 
 to Napoleon to tell him that a building or a figure is at all 
 times and in all places represented by an image in the atmos-
 
 COUSIN PONS 113 
 
 phere, that every existing object has a spectral intangible 
 double which may become visible, the Emperor would have 
 sent his informant to Charenton for a lunatic, just as 
 RicheHeu before his day sent that Norman martyr Salomon 
 de Caux to the Bicetre for announcing his immense triumph, 
 the idea of navigation by steam. Yet Daguerre's discovery 
 amounts to nothing more nor less than this. 
 
 And if for some clairvoyant eyes God has written each 
 man's destiny over his whole outward and visible form, if 
 a man's body is the record of his fate, why should not the 
 hand in a manner epitomize the body.'' Since the hand rep- 
 resents the deed of man, and by his deeds he is known. 
 
 Herein lies the theory of palmistry. Does not Society 
 imitate God? At the sight of a soldier we can predict that 
 he will fight ; of a lawyer, that he will talk ; of a shoemaker, 
 that he shall make shoes or boots ; of a worker of the soil, 
 that he shall dig the ground and dung it; and is it a more 
 wonderful thing that such an one with the " seer's " gift 
 should foretell the events of a man's life from his hand.'' 
 
 To take a striking example. Genius is so visible in a 
 man that a great artist cannot walk about the streets of 
 Paris but the most ignorant people are conscious of his pass- 
 ing. He is a sun, as it were, in the mental world, shedding 
 light that colors everything in his path. And who does not 
 know an idiot at once by an impression the exact opposite 
 of the sensation of the presence of genius. Most observers 
 of human nature in general, and Parisian nature in par- 
 ticular, can guess the profession or calling of the man in the 
 street. 
 
 The mysteries of the witches' Sabbath, so wonderfully 
 painted in the sixteenth century, are no mysteries for us. 
 The Egyptian ancestors of that mysterious people of Indian 
 origin, the gypsies of the present day, simply used to drug 
 their clients with hasheesh, a practice that fully accounts 
 for broomstick rides and flights up the chimney, the real- 
 seeming visions, so to speak, of old crones transformed into 
 young damsels, the frantic dances, the exquisite music, and 
 all the fantastic tales of devil-worship. 
 
 So many proven facts have been first discovered by occult
 
 114 COUSIN PONS 
 
 science, that some day we shall have professors of occult 
 science, as we already have professors of chemistry and 
 astronomy. It is even singular that here in Paris, where we 
 are founding chairs of Mantchu and Slav and literatures 
 so little professable (to coin a word) as the literatures of 
 the North (which so far from providing lessons stand very 
 badly in need of them) ; when the curriculum is full of the 
 everlasting lectures on Shakespeare and the sixteenth century, 
 — it is strange that someone has not restored the teaching 
 of the occult philosophies, once the glory of the University 
 of Paris, under the title of anthropology. Germany, so 
 child-like and so great, has outstripped France in this par- 
 ticular; in Germany they have professors of a science of 
 far more use than a knowledge of the heterogeneous philoso- 
 phies, which all come to the same thing at bottom. 
 
 Once admit that certain beings have the power of dis- 
 cerning the future in its germ-form of the Cause, as the great 
 inventor sees a glimpse of the industry latent in his inven- 
 tion, or a science in something that happens every day 
 unnoticed by ordinary eyes — once allow this, and there is 
 nothing to cause an outcry in such phenomena, no violent 
 exception to nature's laws, but the operation of a recognized 
 faculty ; possibly a kind of mental somnambulism, as it were. 
 If, therefore, the hypothesis upon which the various ways 
 of divining the future are based seems absurd, the facts 
 remain. Remark that it is not really more wonderful that 
 the seer should foretell the chief events of the future than 
 that he should read the past. Past and future, on the 
 skeptic's system, equally lie beyond the limits of knowledge. 
 If the past has left traces behind it, it is not improbable 
 that future events have, as it were, their roots in the present. 
 
 If a fortune-teller gives you minute details of past facts 
 known only to yourself, why should he not foresee the 
 events to be produced by existing causes? The world of 
 ideas is cut out, so to speak, on the pattern of the physical 
 world; the same phenomena should be discernible in both, 
 allowing for the difference of the medium. As, for instance, 
 a corporeal body actually projects an image upon the 
 atmosphere — a spectral double detected and recorded by the
 
 COUSIN PONS 115 
 
 daguerreotype; so also ideas, having a real and effective 
 existence, leave an impression, as it were, upon the atmosphere 
 of the spiritual world; they likewise produce effects, and 
 exist spectrally (to coin a word to express phenomena for 
 which no words exist), and certain human beings are en- 
 dowed with the faculty of discerning these " forms " or 
 traces of ideas. 
 
 As for the material means employed to assist the seer — 
 the objects arranged by the hands of the consultant that 
 the accidents of his life may be revealed to him — this is the 
 least inexplicable part of the process. Everything in the 
 material world is part of a series of causes and effects. 
 Nothing happens without a cause, every cause is a part of 
 a whole, and consequently the whole leaves its impression 
 on the slightest accident. Rabelais, the greatest mind among 
 moderns, resuming Pythagoras, Hippocrates, Aristophanes, 
 and Dante, pronounced three centuries ago that " man is a 
 microcosm " — a little world. Three hundred years later, the 
 great seer Swedenborg declared that " the world was a 
 man." The prophet and the precursor of incredulity meet 
 thus in the greatest of all formulas. 
 
 Everything in human life is predestined, so is it also with 
 the existence of the planet. The least event, the most futile 
 phenomena, are all subordinate parts of a scheme. Great 
 things, therefore, great designs, and great thoughts are of 
 necessity reflected in the smallest actions, and that so faith- 
 fully, that should a conspirator shuffle and cut a pack of 
 playing-cards, he will write the history of his plot for the 
 eyes of the seer styled gypsy, fortune-teller, charlatan, or 
 what not. If you once admit fate, which is to say, the chain 
 of links of cause and effect, astrology has a locus standi, 
 and becomes what it was of yore, a boundless science, requir- 
 ing the same faculty of deduction by which Cuvier became 
 so great, a faculty to be exercised spontaneously, however, 
 and not merely in nights of study in the closet. 
 
 For seven centuries astrology and divination have exercised 
 an influence not only (as at present) over the uneducated, 
 but over the greatest minds, over kings and queens and 
 wealthy people. Animal magnetism, one of the great sciences
 
 116 COUSIN PONS 
 
 of antiquity, had its origin in occult philosophy; chemistry 
 is the outcome of alchemy ; phrenology and neurology are no 
 less the fruit of similar studies. The first illustrious workers 
 in these, to all appearance, untouched fields, made one mis- 
 take, the mistake of all inventors ; that is to say, they erected 
 an absolute system on a basis of isolated facts for which 
 modern analysis as yet carnot account. The Catholic 
 Church, the law of the land, and modern philosophy, in agree- 
 ment for once, combined to proscribe, persecute, and ridicule 
 the mysteries of the Cabala as well as the adepts ; the result 
 is a lamentable interregnum of a century in occult philosophy. 
 But the uneducated classes, and not a few cultivated people 
 (women especially), continue to pay a tribute to the mys- 
 terious power of those who can raise the veil of the future; 
 they go to buy hope, strength, and courage of the fortune- 
 teller ; in other words, to ask of him all that religion alone can 
 give. So the art is still practiced in spite of a certain 
 amount of risk. The eighteenth century encyclopaedists pro- 
 cured tolerance for the sorcerer, he is no longer amenable 
 to a court of law, unless indeed he lends himself to fraudulent 
 practices, and frightens his " clients " to extort money from 
 them, in which case he may be prosecuted on a charge of 
 obtaining money under false pretenses. Unluckily, the exer- 
 cise of the sublime art is only too often used as a method 
 of obtaining money under false pretenses, and for the follow- 
 ing reasons. 
 
 The seer's wonderful gifts are usually bestowed upon those 
 who are described by the epithets rough and uneducated. 
 The rough and uneducated are the chosen vessels into which 
 God pours the elixirs at which we marvel. From among the 
 rough and uneducated, prophets arise — an Apostle Peter, or 
 St. Peter the Hermit. Wherever mental power is imprisoned, 
 and remains intact and entire for want of an outlet in conver- 
 sation, in politics, in literature, in the imaginings of the 
 scholar, in the efforts of the statesman, in the conceptions 
 of the inventor, or the soldier's toils of war ; the fire within 
 is apt to flash out in gleams of marvelous!}' vivid light, like 
 the sparks hidden in an unpolished diamond. Let the occa- 
 sion come, and the spirit within kindles and glows, finds
 
 COUSIN PONS 117 
 
 wings to traverse space, and the god-like power of beholding 
 all things. The coal of yesterday under the play of some 
 mysterious influence becomes a radiant diamond. Better edu- 
 cated people, many-sided and highly polished, continually 
 giving out all that is in them, can never exhibit this supreme 
 power, save by one of the miracles which God sometimes 
 vouchsafes to work. For this reason the soothsayer is almost 
 always a beggar, whose mind is virgin soil, a creature coarse 
 to all appearance, a pebble borne along the torrent of misery 
 and left in the ruts of life, where it spends nothing of itself 
 save in mere physical suffering. 
 
 The prophet, the seer, in short, is some Martin le La- 
 houreur making a Louis XVIII. tremble by telling him a 
 secret known only to the King himself; or it is a Mile. 
 Lenormand, or a domestic servant like Mme. Fontaine, or 
 again, perhaps it is some half-idiotic negress, some herdsman 
 living among his cattle, who receives the gift of vision ; 
 some Hindoo fakir, seated by a pagoda, mortifying the flesh 
 till the spirit gains the mysterious power of the somnambulist. 
 
 Asia, indeed, through all time, has been the home of the 
 heroes of occult science. Persons of this kind, recovering 
 their normal state, are usually just as they were before. 
 They fulfill, in some sort, the chemical and physical functions 
 of bodies which conduct electricity ; at times inert metal, at 
 other times a channel filled with a mysterious current. In 
 their normal condition they are given to practices which 
 bring them before the magistrate, yea, verily, like the notori- 
 ous Balthazar, even unto the criminal court, and so to the 
 hulks. You could hardly find a better proof of the immense 
 influence of fortune-telling upon the working classes than the 
 fact that poor Pons's life and death hung upon the predic- 
 tion that Mme. Fontaine was to make from the cards. 
 
 Although a certain amount of repetition is inevitable in 
 a canvas so considerable and so full of detail as a complete 
 picture of French society in the nineteenth century, it is 
 needless to repeat the description of Mme. Fontaine's den, 
 already given in Les Comediens sans le S avoir; suffice it to 
 say that Mme. Cibot used to go to Mme. Fontaine's house 
 in the Rue Vieille-du-Temple as regularly as frequenters of
 
 118 COUSIN PONS 
 
 the Cafe Anglais drop in at that restaurant for lunch. 
 Mme. Cibot, being a very old customer, often introduced 
 young persons and old gossips consumed with curiosity to the 
 wise woman. 
 
 The old servant who acted as provost marshal flung open 
 the door of the sanctuary with no further ceremony than 
 the remark, " It's Mme. Cibot. — Come in, there's nobody 
 here." 
 
 " Well, child, what can bring you here so early of a morn- 
 ing? " asked the sorceress, as Mme. Fontaine might well be 
 called, for she was seventy-eight years old, and looked like 
 one of the Parc«e. 
 
 " Something has given me a turn," said La Cibot ; " I 
 want the grand jeu; it is a question of my fortune." There- 
 with she explained her position, and wished to know if her 
 sordid hopes were likely to be realized. 
 
 " Do you know what the grand jeu means ? " asked Mme. 
 Fontaine, with much solemnity. 
 
 " No. I haven't never seen the trick, I am not rich 
 enough. — A hundred francs. It's not as if it cost so much! 
 Where was the money to come from.'' But now I can't 
 help myself, I must have it." 
 
 " I don't do it often, child," returned Mme. Fontaine ; 
 " I only do it for rich people on great occasions, and they 
 pay me twenty-five louis for doing it ; it tires me, you see, 
 it wears me out. The ' Spirit ' rives my inside, here. It is 
 like going to the ' Sabbath,' as they used to say." 
 
 " But when I tell you that it means my whole future, my 
 dear good Ma'am Fontaine " 
 
 " Well, as it is you that have come to consult me so often, 
 I will submit myself to the Spirit ! " replied Mme. Fontaine, 
 with a look of genuine terror on her face. 
 
 She rose from her filthy old chair by the fireside, and went 
 to a table covered with a green cloth so worn that you could 
 count the threads. A huge toad sat dozing there beside 
 a cage, inhabited by a black disheveled-looking fowl. 
 
 " Astaroth ! here, my son ! " she said, and the creature 
 looked up intelligently at her as she rapped him on the back 
 with a long knitting-needle. — " And you. Mile. Cleopatre !
 
 COUSIN PONS 119 
 
 — attention ! " she continued, tapping the ancient fowl on the 
 beak. 
 
 Then Mme. Fontaine began to think; for several seconds 
 she did not move ; she looked like a corpse, her eyes rolled 
 in their sockets and grew white ; then she rose stiff and erect, 
 and a cavernous voice cried — 
 
 " Here I am ! " 
 
 Automatically she scattered millet for Cleopatre, took 
 up the pack of cards, shuffled them convulsively, and held 
 them out to Mme. Cibot to cut, sighing heavily all the time. 
 At the sight of that image of Death in the filthy turban 
 and uncanny looking bed-jacket, watching the black fowl 
 as it pecked at the millet-grains, calling to the toad Astaroth 
 to walk over the cards that lay out on the table, a cold thrill 
 ran through Mme. Cibot ; she shuddered. Nothing but 
 strong belief can give strong emotions. An assured income, 
 to be or not to be, that was the question. 
 
 The sorceress opened a magical work and muttered some 
 unintelligible words in a sepulchral voice, looked at the 
 remaining millet-seeds, and watched the way in which the 
 toad retired. Then after seven or eight minutes, she turned 
 her white eyes on the cards and expounded them. 
 
 " You will succeed, although nothing in the affair will 
 fall out as you expect. You will have many steps to take, 
 but you will reap the fruits of your labors. You will 
 behave very badly ; it will be with you as it is with all those 
 who sit by a sick-bed and covet part of the inheritance. 
 Great people will help you in this work of wrongdoing. 
 Afterwards in the death agony you will repent. Two escaped 
 convicts, a short man with red hair and an old man with 
 a bald head, will murder you for the sake of the money you 
 will be supposed to have in the village whither you will 
 retire with your second husband. Now, my daughter, it is 
 still open to you to choose your course." 
 
 The excitement which seemed to glow within, lighting up 
 the bony hollows about the eyes, was suddenly extinguished. 
 As soon as the horoscope was pronounced, Mme. Fontaine's 
 face wore a dazed expression ; she looked exactly like a 
 sleep-walker aroused from sleep, gazed about her with an
 
 120 COUSIN PONS 
 
 astonished air, recognized Mme. Cibot, and seemed surprised 
 by her terrified face. 
 
 " Well, child," she said, in a totally different voice, " are 
 you satisfied? " 
 
 Mme. Cibot stared stupidly at the sorceress, and could 
 not answer. 
 
 "Ah! you would have the grand jeu; I have treated 
 you as an old acquaintance. I only want a hundred 
 francs " 
 
 " Cibot, — going to die.'' " gasped the portress. 
 
 " So I have been telling you very dreadful things, have 
 I? " asked Mme. Fontaine, with an extremely ingenuous air. 
 
 *' Why, yes ! " said La Cibot, taking a hundred francs 
 from her pocket and laying them down on the edge of the 
 table. " Going to be murdered, think of it " 
 
 " Ah ! there it is ! You would have the grand jeu; but 
 don't take on so, all the folk that are murdered on the cards 
 don't die." 
 
 " But is it possible. Ma'am Fontaine? " 
 
 " Oh, / know nothing about it, my pretty dear ! You 
 would rap at the door of the future ; I pull the cord, and It 
 came." 
 
 "It, what?" asked Mme. Cibot. 
 
 " Well, then, the Spirit ! " cried the sorceress impatiently. 
 
 " Good-by, Ma'am Fontaine," exclaimed the portress. " I 
 did not know what the grand jeu was like. You have given 
 me a good fright, that you have." 
 
 " The mistress will not put herself in that state twice in 
 a month," said the servant, as she went with La Cibot to the 
 landing. " She would do herself to death if she did, it tires 
 her so. She will eat cutlets now and sleep for three hours 
 afterwards." 
 
 Out in the street, La Cibot took counsel of herself as she 
 went along, and, after the manner of all who ask for advice 
 of any sort or description, she took the favorable part of the 
 prediction and rejected the rest. The next day found her 
 confirmed in her resolutions — she would set all in train to 
 become rich by securing a part of Pons's collection. Nor for 
 some time had she any other thought than the combination
 
 COUSIN PONS 121 
 
 of various plans to this end. The faculty of self-concen- 
 tration seen in rough, uneducated persons, explained on a 
 previous page, the reserve power accumulated in those whose 
 mental energies are unworn by the daily wear and tear of 
 social life, and brought into action so soon as that terrible 
 weapon the " fixed idea " is brought into play, — all this 
 was pre-eminently manifested in La Cibot. Even as the 
 " fixed idea " works miracles of evasion, and brings forth 
 prodigies of sentiment, so greed transformed the portress 
 till she became as formidable as a Nucingen at bay, as subtle 
 beneath her seeming stupidity as the irresistible la Palferine. 
 
 About seven o'clock one morning, a few days afterwards, 
 she saw Remonencq taking down his shutters. She went 
 across to him. 
 
 " How could one find out how much the things yonder in 
 my gentlemen's rooms are worth ? " she asked in a wheedling 
 tone. 
 
 " Oh ! that is quite easy," replied the owner of the old 
 curiosity shop. " If you will play fair and above board 
 with me, I will tell you of somebody, a very honest man, 
 who will know the value of the pictures to a farthing " 
 
 "Who?" 
 
 " M. Magus, a Jew. He only does business to amuse 
 himself now." 
 
 Elie Magus has appeared so often in the Comedie Humaine, 
 that it is needless to say more of him here. Suffice it to 
 add that he had retired from business, and as a dealer was 
 following the example set by Pons the amateur. Well- 
 known valuers like Henry, Messrs. Pigeot and Moret, Theret, 
 Georges, and Roehn, the experts of the Musee in fact, were 
 but children compared with Elie Magus. He could see a 
 masterpiece beneath the accumulated grime of a century; 
 he knew all schools, and the handwriting of all painters. 
 
 He had come to Paris from Bordeaux, and so long ago 
 as 1835 he had retired from business without making any 
 change for the better in his dress, so faithful is the race to 
 old tradition. The persecutions of the Middle Ages com- 
 pelled them to wear rags, to snuffle and whine and groan 
 over their poverty in self-defense, till the habits induced by
 
 122 COUSIN PONS 
 
 the necessities of other times have come to be, as usual, in- 
 stinctive, a racial defect. 
 
 Elie Magus had amassed a vast fortune by buying and 
 selHng diamonds, pictures, lace, enamels, delicate carvings, 
 old jewelry, and rarities of all kinds, a kind of commerce 
 which has developed enormously of late, so much so indeed 
 that the number of dealers has increased tenfold during the 
 last twenty years in this city of Paris, whither all the curi- 
 osities in the world come to rub against one another. And 
 for pictures there are but three marts in the world — Rome, 
 London, and Paris. 
 
 Elie Magus lived in the Chaussee des Minimes, a short, 
 broad street leading to the Place Royale. He had bought 
 the house, an old-fashioned mansion, for a song, as the saying 
 is, in 1831. Yet there were sumptuous apartments within 
 it, decorated in the time of Louis XV. ; for it had once been 
 the Hotel Maulaincourt, built by the great President of the 
 Cour des Aides, and its remote position had saved it at 
 the time of the Revolution. 
 
 You may be quite sure that the old Jew had sound reasons 
 for buying house property, contrary to the Hebrew law and 
 custom. He had ended, as most of us end, with a hobby 
 that bordered on a craze. He was as miserly as his friend 
 the late lamented Gobseck; but he had been caught by the 
 snare of the eyes, by the beauty of the pictures in which 
 he dealt. As his taste grew more and more fastidious, it 
 became one of the passions which princes alone can indulge 
 when they are wealthy and art-lovers. As the second King 
 of Prussia found nothing that so kindled enthusiasm as the 
 spectacle of a grenadier over six feet high, and gave ex- 
 travagant sums for a new specimen to add to his living 
 museum of a regiment, so the retired picture-dealer was 
 roused to passion-pitch only by some canvas in perfect preser- 
 vation, untouched since the master laid down the brush ; and 
 what was more, it must be a picture of the painter's best 
 time. No great sales, therefore, took place but Elie Magus 
 was there ; every mart knew him, he traveled all over Europe. 
 The ice-cold, money-worshiping soul in him kindled at the 
 sight of a perfect work of art, precisely as a libertine, weary
 
 COUSIN PONS 1231 
 
 of fair women, is roused from apathy by the sight of a 
 beautiful girl, and sets out afresh upon the quest of flawless 
 loveliness. A Don Juan among fair works of art, a wor- 
 shiper of the Ideal, Elie Magus had discovered joys that 
 transcend the pleasure of the miser gloating over his gold — 
 he lived in a seraglio of great paintings. 
 
 His masterpieces were housed as became the children of 
 princes ; the whole first floor of the great old mansion was 
 given up to them. The rooms had been restored under Elie 
 Magus's orders, and with what magnificence ! 
 
 The windows were hung with the richest Venetian brocade ; 
 the most splendid carpets from the Savonnerie covered the 
 parquetry flooring. The frames of the pictures, nearly a 
 hundred in number, were magnificent specimens, regilded cun- 
 ningly by Servais, the one gilder in Paris whom Elie Magus 
 thought sufliciently painstaking; the old Jew himself had 
 taught him to use tlie English leaf, which is infinitely superior 
 to that produced by French gold-beaters. Servais is among 
 gilders as Thouvenin among bookbinders — an artist among 
 craftsmen, making his work a labor of love. Every window 
 in that gallery was protected by iron-barred shutters. Elie 
 Magus himself lived in a couple of attics on the floor above ; 
 the furniture was wretched, the rooms were full of rags, and 
 the whole place smacked of the Ghetto ; Elie Magus was 
 finishing his daj's without any change in liis life. 
 
 The whole of the ground floor was given up to the picture 
 trade (for the Jew still dealt in works of art). Here he 
 stored his canvases, here also packing-cases were stowed on 
 their arrival from other countries ; and still there was room 
 for a vast studio, where Moret, most skillful of restorers of 
 pictures, a craftsman whom the Musee ought to employ, was 
 almost always at work for Magus. The rest of the rooms 
 on the ground floor were given up to ^lagus's daughter, the 
 child of his old age, a Jewess beautiful as a Jewess can be 
 when the Semitic type reappears in its purity and nobility 
 in a daughter of Israel. Noemi was guarded by two serv- 
 ants, fanatical Jewesses, to say nothing of an advanced- 
 guard, a Polish Jew, Abramko by name, once involved in 
 a fabulous manner in political troubles, from which Elie
 
 lU COUSIN PONS 
 
 Magus saved him as a business speculation. Abramko, porter 
 of the silent, grim, deserted mansion, divided his office and 
 his lodge with three remarkably ferocious animals — an Eng- 
 lish bulldog, a Newfoundland dog, and another of the Pyre- 
 nean breed. 
 
 Behold the profound observations of human nature upon 
 which Elie Magus based his feeling of security, for secure 
 he felt ; he left home without misgivings, slept with both ears 
 shut, and feared no attempt upon his daughter (his chief 
 treasure), his pictures, nor his money. In the first place, 
 Abramko's salary was increased every year by two hundred 
 francs so long as his master should live ; and Magus, more- 
 over, was training Abramko as a money-lender in a small way. 
 Abramko never admitted anybody until he had surveyed them 
 through a formidable grated opening. He was a Hercules 
 for strength, he worshiped Elie Magus, as Sancho Panza wor- 
 shiped Don Quixote. All day long the dogs were shut up 
 without food ; at nightfall Abramko let them loose ; and 
 by a cunning device the old Jew kept each animal at his post 
 in the courtyard or the garden by hanging a piece of meat 
 just out of reach on the top of a pole. The animals guarded 
 the house, and sheer hunger guarded the dogs. No odor 
 that reached their nostrils could tempt them from the neigh- 
 borhood of that piece of meat ; they would not have left their 
 places at the foot of the poles for the most engaging female 
 of the canine species. If a stranger by any chance intruded, 
 the dogs suspected him of ulterior designs upon their rations, 
 which were only taken down in the morning by Abramko 
 himself when he awoke. The advantages of this fiendish 
 scheme are patent. The animals never barked, Magus's 
 ingenuity had made savages of them ; they were treacherous 
 as Mohicans. And now for the result. 
 
 One night burglars, emboldened by the silence, decided 
 too hastily that it would be easy enough to " clean out " 
 the old Jew's strong box. One of their number told off 
 to advance to the assault scrambled up the garden wall and 
 prepared to descend. This the bulldog allowed him to do. 
 The animal, knowing perfectly well what was coming, waited 
 for the burglar to reach the ground; but when that gentle-
 
 COUSIN PONS 125 
 
 man directed a kick at him, the bulldog flew at the visitor's 
 shins, and, making but one bite of it, snapped the ankle- 
 bone clean in two. The thief had the courage to tear himself 
 away, and returned, walking upon the bare bone of the 
 mutilated stump till he reached the rest of the gang, when 
 he fell fainting, and they carried him off. The Police News, 
 of course, did not fail to report this delightful night incident, 
 but no one believed in it. 
 
 Magus at this time was seventy-five years old, and there 
 was no reason why he should not live to a hundred. Rich 
 man though he was, he lived like the Remonencqs. His 
 necessary expenses, including the money he lavished on 
 his daughter, did not exceed three thousand francs. No 
 life could be more regular; the old man rose as soon as it 
 was light, breakfasted on bread rubbed with a clove of garhc, 
 and ate no more food until dinner-time. Dinner, a meal 
 frugal enough for a convent, he took at home. All the fore- 
 noon he spent among his treasures, walking up and down 
 the gallery where they hung in their glory. He would dust 
 everything himself, furniture and pictures ; he never wearied 
 of admiring. Then he would go downstairs to his daughter, 
 drink deep of a father's happiness, and start out upon his 
 walks through Paris, to attend sales or visit exhibitions and 
 the like. 
 
 If Elie Magus found a great work of art under the right 
 conditions, the discovery put new life into the man ; here 
 was a bit of sharp practice, a bargain to make, a battle of 
 Marengo to win. He would pile ruse on ruse to buy the new 
 sultana as cheaply as possible. Magus had a map of Europe 
 on which all great pictures were marked; his coreligionists 
 in every city spied out business for him, and received a com- 
 mission on the purchase. And then — what rewards for all 
 his pains ! The two lost Raf aels so earnestly sought after 
 by Rafael-lovers are both in his collection. Elie Magus owns 
 the original portrait of Giorgione's Mistress, the woman for 
 whom the painter died ; the so-called originals are merely 
 copies of the famous picture, which is worth five hundred 
 thousand francs, according to its owner's estimation. This 
 Jew possesses Titian's masterpiece, an Entombment painted
 
 126 COUSIN PONS 
 
 for Charles V., sent by the great man to the great Emperor 
 with a holograph letter, now fastened down upon the lower 
 part of the canvas. And Magus has jet another Titian, the 
 original sketch from which all the portraits of Philip II. were 
 painted. His remaining ninety-seven pictures are all of the 
 same rank and distinction. Wherefore Magus laughs at our 
 national collection, raked by the sunlight which destroys the 
 fairest paintings, pouring in through panes of glass that 
 act as lenses. Picture galleries can only be lighted from 
 above ; Magus opens and closes his shutters himself ; he is 
 as careful of his pictures as of his daughter, his second idol. 
 And well the old picture-fancier knows the laws of the lives 
 of pictures. To hear him talk, a great picture has a life 
 of its own ; it is changeable, it takes its beauty from the color 
 of the light. Magus talks of his paintings as Dutch fanciers 
 used to talk of their tulips ; he will come home on purpose 
 to see some one picture in the hour of its glory, when the 
 light is bright and clean. 
 
 And Magus himself was a living picture among the mo- 
 tionless figures on the wall — a little old man, dressed in a 
 shabby overcoat, a silk waistcoat, renewed twice in a score 
 of years, and a very dirty pair of trousers, with a bald head, 
 a face full of deep hollows, a wrinkled callous skin, a beard 
 that had a trick of twitching its long white bristles, a menac- 
 ing pointed chin, a toothless mouth, eyes bright as the eyes 
 of his dogs in the yard, and a nose like an obelisk — ^there 
 he stood in his gallery smiling at the beauty called into being 
 by genius. A Jew surrounded by his millions will always be 
 one of the finest spectacles which humanity can give. Robert 
 Medal, our great actor, cannot rise to this height of poetry, 
 sublime though he is. 
 
 Paris of all the cities of the world holds most of such men 
 as Magus, strange beings with a strange religion in their 
 heart of hearts. The London " eccentric " always finds that 
 worship, like life, brings weariness and satiety in the end ; 
 the Parisian monomaniac lives cheerfully in concubinage with 
 his crotchet to the last. 
 
 Often shall you meet in Paris some Pons, some Elie Magus, 
 dressed badly enough, with his face turned from the rising
 
 COUSIN PONS 12T 
 
 sun (like the countenance of the perpetual secretary of the 
 Academie), apparently heeding nothing, conscious of noth- 
 ing, paying no attention to shop-windows nor to fair passers- 
 by, walking at random, so to speak, with nothing in his 
 pockets, and to all appearance an equally empty head. Do 
 you ask to what Parisian tribe this manner of man belongs? 
 He is a collector, a millionaire, one of the most impassioned 
 souls upon earth; he and his like are capable of treading the 
 miry ways that lead to the police-court if so they may gain 
 possession of a cup, a picture, or some such rare unpublished 
 piece as £lie Magus once picked up one memorable day in 
 Germany. 
 
 This was the expert to whom Remonencq with much mys- 
 tery conducted La Cibot. Remonencq always asked advice 
 of Elie Magus when he met him in the streets ; and more than 
 once Magus had lent him money through Abramko, knowing 
 Remonencq's honesty. The Chaussee des Minimes is close 
 to the Rue de Normandie, and the two fellow-conspirators 
 reached the house in ten minutes. 
 
 " You will see the richest dealer in curiosities, the greatest 
 connoisseur in Paris," Remonencq had said. And Mme, Cibot, 
 therefore, was struck dumb with amazement to be confronted 
 with a little old man in a greatcoat too shabby for Cibot 
 to mend, standing watching a painter at work upon an old 
 picture in the chilly room on the vast ground floor. The 
 old man's eyes, full of cold feline malignance, were turned 
 upon her, and La Cibot shivered. 
 
 " What do you want, Remonencq? " asked this person. 
 
 " It is a question of valuing some pictures ; there is nobody 
 but you in Paris who can tell a poor tinker-fellow like me how 
 much he may give when he has not thousands to spend, like 
 you." 
 
 "Where is it?" 
 
 " Here is the portress of the house where the gentleman 
 lives; she does for him, and I have arranged with her " 
 
 " Who is the owner ? " 
 
 " M. Pons ! " put in La Cibot. 
 
 " Don't know the name," said Magus, with an innocent 
 air, bringing down his foot very gently upon his artist's toes.
 
 128 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Moret the painter, knowing the value of Pons's collec- 
 tion, had looked up suddenly at the name. It was a move 
 too hazardous to try with anyone but Remonencq and La 
 Cibot, but the Jew had taken the woman's measure at sight, 
 and his eye was as accurate as a jeweler's scales. It was im- 
 possible that either of the couple should know how often 
 Magus and old Pons had matched their claws. And, in 
 truth, both rabid amateurs were jealous of each other. The 
 old Jew had never hoped for a sight of a seraglio so care- 
 fully guarded ; it seemed to him that his head was swimming. 
 Pons's collection was the one private collection in Paris which 
 could vie with his own. Pons's idea had occurred to Magus 
 twenty years later ; but as a dealer-amateur the door of 
 Pons's museum had been closed for him, as for Dusommerard. 
 Pons and Magus had at heart the same jealousy. Neither 
 of them cared about the kind of celebrity dear to the ordinary 
 collector. And now for Elie Magus came his chance to see 
 the poor musician's treasures ! An amateur of beauty hiding 
 in a boudoir for a stolen glance at a mistress concealed from 
 him by his friend might feel as Elie Magus felt at that 
 moment. 
 
 La Cibot was impressed by Remonencq's respect for this 
 singular person ; real power, moreover, even when it cannot 
 be explained, is always felt ; the portress was supple and 
 obedient, she dropped the autocratic tone which she was wont 
 to use in her lodge and with the tenants, accepted Magus's 
 conditions, and agreed to admit him into Pons's museum that 
 very day. 
 
 So the enemy was to be brought into the citadel, and a 
 stab dealt to Pons's very heart. For ten years Pons had 
 carried his keys about with him ; he had forbidden La Cibot 
 to allow anyone, no matter whom, to cross his threshold ; and 
 La Cibot had so far shared Schmucke's opinions of bric-a- 
 brac, that she had obeyed him. The good Schmucke, by 
 speaking of the splendors as " chim-cracks," and deploring 
 his friend's mania, had taught La Cibot to despise the old 
 rubbish, and so secured Pons's museum from invasion for 
 many a long year. 
 
 When Pons took to his bed, Schmucke filled his place at
 
 COUSIN PONS 129 
 
 the theater and gave lessons for him at his boarding-schools. 
 He did his utmost to do the work of two ; but with Pons's 
 sorrows weighing heavily upon his mind, the task took all 
 his strength. He only saw his friend in the morning, and 
 again at dinner-time. His pupils and the people at the 
 theater, seeing the poor German look so unhappy, used to 
 ask for news of Pons ; and so great was his grief, that the 
 indifferent would make the grimaces of sensibility which Pari- 
 sians are wont to reserve for the greatest calamities. The 
 very springs of life had been attacked, the good German was 
 suffering from Pons's pain as well as from his own. When 
 he gave a music lesson, he spent half the time in talking of 
 Pons, interrupting himself to wonder whether his friend felt 
 better to-day, and the little school-girls listening heard 
 lengthy explanations of Pons's symptoms. He would rush 
 over to the Rue de Normandie in the interval between two 
 lessons for the sake of a quarter of an hour with Pons. 
 
 When at last he saw that their common stock was almost 
 exhausted, when Mme. Cibot (who had done her best to swell 
 the expenses of the illness ) came to him and frightened him ; 
 then the old music-master felt that he had courage of which 
 he never thought himself capable — courage that rose above 
 his anguish. For the first time in his life he set himself to 
 earn money ; money was needed at home. One of the school- 
 girl pupils, really touched by their troubles, asked Schmucke 
 how he could leave his friend alone. " Montemoiselle," he 
 answered, with the sublime smile of those who think no evil, 
 " ve haf Montame Zipod, ein dreasure, Montemoiselle, eine 
 bearl! Bons is nursed like ein brince." 
 
 So while Schmucke trotted about the streets. La Cibot 
 was mistress of the house and ruled the invalid. How should 
 Pons superintend his self-appointed guardian angel, when 
 he had taken no solid food for a fortnight, and lay there so 
 weak and helpless that La Cibot was obliged to lift him up 
 and carry him to the sofa while she made the bed.'' 
 
 La Cibot's visit to Elie Magus was paid (as might be 
 expected) while Schmucke breakfasted. She came in again 
 just as the German was bidding his friend good-by; for since 
 she learned that Pons possessed a fortune, she never left
 
 130 COUSIN PONS 
 
 the old bachelor ; she brooded over him and his treasures like 
 a hen. From the depths of a comfortable easy-chair at the 
 foot of the bed she poured forth for Pons's delectation the 
 gossip in which women of her class excel. With Machiavel- 
 lian skill, she had contrived to make Pons think that she 
 was indispensable to him ; she coaxed and she wheedled, always 
 uneasy, always on the alert. Mme. Fontaine's prophecy had 
 frightened La Cibot ; she vowed to herself that she would 
 gain her ends by kindness. She would sleep secure on M. 
 Pons's legacy, but her rascality should keep within the limits 
 of the law. For ten years she had not suspected the value 
 of Pons's collection ; she had a clear record behind her of 
 ten years of devotion, honesty, and disinterestedness ; it was 
 a magnificent investment, and now she proposed to realize. 
 In one day, Remonencq's hint of money had hatched the ser- 
 pent's egg, the craving for riches that had lain dormant with- 
 in her for twenty years. Since she had cherished that craving, 
 it had grown in force with the ferment of all the evil that 
 lurks in the corners of the heart. How she acted upon the 
 counsels whispered by the serpent will presently be seen. 
 
 " Well? " she asked of Schmucke, " has this cherub of ours 
 had plenty to drink? Is he better? " 
 
 " He is not doing fery veil, tear Montame Zipod, not fery 
 veil," said poor Schmucke, brushing away the tears from 
 his eyes. 
 
 " Pooh ! you make too much of it, my dear M. Schmucke ; 
 we must take things as we find them ; Cibot might be at 
 death's door, and I should not take it to heart as you do. 
 Come ! the cherub has a good constitution. And he has been 
 steady, it seems, you see ; you have no idea what an age sober 
 people live. He is very ill, it is true, but with all the care I 
 take of him, I shall bring him round. Be easy, look after 
 your affairs, I will keep him company and see that he drinks 
 his pints of barley water." 
 
 " Gif you vere not here, I should die of anxiety " said 
 
 Schmucke, squeezing his kind housekeeper's hand In both his 
 own to express his confidence in her. 
 
 La Cibot wiped her eyes as she went back to the invalid's 
 room.
 
 COUSIN PONS 131 
 
 "What is the matter, Mme. Cibot? " asked Pons. 
 
 " It is M. Schmucke that has upset me ; he is crying as 
 if you were dead," said she. " If you are not well, you are 
 not so bad yet that nobody need cry over you ; but it has given 
 me such a turn ! Oh dear ! oh dear ! how silly it is of me to 
 get so fond of people, and to think more of you than of Cibot ! 
 For, after all, you aren't nothing to me, you are only my 
 brother by Adam's side ; and yet, whenever you are in the 
 question, it puts me in such a taking, upon my word it does ! 
 I would cut off my hand — my left hand, of course — to see 
 you coming and going, eating your meals, and screwing 
 bargains out of dealers as usual. If I had had a child of 
 my own, I think I should have loved it as I love you, eh! 
 There, take a drink, dearie ; come, now, empty the glass. 
 Drink it off. Monsieur, I tell you! The first thing Dr. 
 Poulain said was, ' If M. Pons has no mind to go to Pere 
 Lachaise, he ought to drink as many buckets full of water 
 in a day as an Auvergnat will sell.' So, come now, drink " 
 
 " But I do drink, Cibot, my good woman ; I drink and drink 
 till I am deluged " 
 
 " That is right," said the portress, as she took away the 
 empty glass. " That is the way to get better. Dr. Poulain 
 had another patient, ill of your complaint; but he had no- 
 body to look after him; his children kft him to himself, and 
 he died because he didn't drink enough — so you must drink, 
 honey, you see — he died, and they buried him two months ago. 
 And if you were to die, you know, you would drag down old 
 M. Schmucke with you, sir. He is like a child. Ah ! he 
 loves you, he does, the dear lamb of a man; no woman never 
 loved a man like that ! He doesn't care for meat nor drink ; 
 he has grown as thin as you are in the last fortnight, and 
 you are nothing but skin and bones. — It makes me jealous to 
 see it, for I am very fond of you; but not to that degree; 
 I haven't lost my appetite, quite the other way; always going 
 up and down stairs, till my legs are so tired that I drop 
 down of an evening like a lump of lead. Here am I neglect- 
 ing my poor Cibot for you ; Mile. Remonencq cooks his 
 victuals for him, and he goes on about it and says that 
 nothing is right ! At that I tell him that one ought to put
 
 132 COUSIN PONS 
 
 up with something for the sake of other people, and that 
 you are so ill that I cannot leave you. In the first place, 
 you can't afford a nurse. And before I "would have a nurse 
 here! — I that have done for you these ten years. And those 
 nurses are such eaters, they eat enough for ten ; they want 
 wine, and sugar, and foot-warmers, and all sorts of comforts. 
 And they rob their patients ..mless the patients leave them 
 something in their wills. Have a nurse in here to-day, and 
 to-morrow we should find a picture or something or other 
 gone " 
 
 " Oh ! Mme. Cibot ! " cried Pons, quite beside himself, " do 
 not leave me ! No one must touch anything " 
 
 " I am here," said La Cibot ; " so long as I have the 
 strength I shall be here. — Be easy. There was Dr. Poulain 
 wanting to get a nurse for you ; perhaps he has his eye on 
 your treasures. I just snubbed him, I did. ' The gentleman 
 won't have anyone but me,' I told him. ' He is used to me, 
 and I am used to him.' So he said no more. A nurse, in- 
 deed ! They are all thieves ; I hate that sort of woman, I do. 
 Here is a tale that will show you how sly they are. There 
 was once an old gentleman — it was Dr. Poulain himself, mind 
 you, who told me this — well, a Mme. Sabatier, a woman of 
 thirty-six that used to sell slippers at the Palais Royal — ' 
 you remember the Galerie at the Palais that they pulled 
 down.'^ " 
 
 Pons nodded. 
 
 " Well, at that time she had not done very well ; her husband 
 used to drink, and died of spontaneous imbustion ; but she 
 had been a fine woman in her time, truth to tell, not that it 
 did her any good, though she had friends among the lawyers. 
 So, being hard up, she became a monthly nurse, and Hved 
 in the Rue Barre-du-Bec. Well, she went out to nurse an 
 old gentleman that had a disease of the lurinary guts (saving 
 your presence) ; they used to tap him like an artesian well, 
 and he needed such care that she used to sleep on a truckle-bed 
 in the same room with him. You would hardly believe such 
 a thing ! — ' Men respect nothing,' you'll tell me, * so selfish 
 as they are.' Well, she used to talk with him, you under- 
 stand ; she never left him, she amused him, she told him stories,
 
 COUSIN PONS 133 
 
 she drew him on to talk (just as we are chatting away 
 together now, you and I, eh?), and she found out that 
 his nephews — the old gentleman had nephews — that his 
 nephews were wretches ; they had worried him, and final end 
 of it, they had brought on this illness. Well, my dear sir, 
 she saved his life, he married her, and they have a fine child ; 
 Ma'am Bordevin, the butcher's wife in the Rue Chariot, a 
 relative of hers, stood godmother. There is luck for you ! 
 
 " As for me, I am married ; and if I have no children, I 
 don't mind saying that it is Cibot's fault ; he is too fond of 
 me, but if I cared — ^never mind. What would have become 
 of me and my Cibot if we had had a family, when we have not a 
 penny to bless ourselves with after thirty years of faithful 
 service.? I have not a farthing belonging to nobody else, 
 that is what comforts me. I have never wronged nobody. — 
 Look here, suppose now (there is no harm in supposing when 
 you will be out and about again in six weeks' time, and 
 sauntering along the boulevard) ; well, suppose that you had 
 put me down in your will; very good, I shouldn't never rest 
 till I had found your heirs and given the money back. Such 
 is my horror of anything that is not earned by the sweat 
 of my brow. 
 
 " You will say to me, ' Why, Mme. Cibot, why should you 
 worry yourself like that.'' You have fairly earned the money ; 
 you looked after your two gentlemen as if they had been 
 your children; you saved them a thousand francs a year — ' 
 (for there are plenty, sir, you know, that would have had 
 their ten thousand francs put out to interest by now if 
 they had been in my place) — ' so if the worthy gentleman 
 leaves you a trifle of an annuity, it is only right.' — Suppose 
 they told me that. Well, no ; I am not thinking of myself. — ■ 
 I cannot think how some women can do a kindness thinking 
 of themselves all the time. It is not doing good, sir, is it? 
 I do not go to church myself, I haven't the time; but my 
 conscience tells me what is right. . . . Don't you fidget 
 like that, my lamb ! — Don't scratch yourself ! . . . Dear 
 me, how yellow you grow ! So yellow you are — quite brown. 
 How funny it is that one can come to look like a lemon in 
 three weeks! . . . Honesty is all that poor folk have,
 
 134. COUSIN PONS 
 
 and one must surely have something! Suppose that you 
 were just at death's door, I should be the first to tell you 
 that you ought to leave all that you have to M. Schmucke. 
 It is your duty, for he is all the family you have. He loves 
 you, he does, as a dog loves his master," 
 
 " Ah ! yes," said Pons ; " nobody else has ever loved me all 
 my life long " 
 
 " Ah ! that is not kind of you, sir," said Mme. Cibot ; 
 " then I do not love you, I suppose? " 
 
 " I do not say so, my dear Mme. Cibot." 
 
 " Good. You take me for a servant, do you, a common 
 servant, as if I hadn't no heart ! Goodness me ! for eleven 
 years you do for two old bachelors, you think of nothing but 
 their comfort. I have turned half a score of greengrocers' 
 shops upside down for you, I have talked people round to 
 get you good Brie cheese; I have gone down as far as the 
 market for fresh butter for you; I have taken such care of 
 things that nothing of yours hasn't been chipped nor broken 
 in all these ten years ; I have just treated you like my own 
 children ; and then to hear a ' My dear Mme. Cibot,' that 
 shows that there is not a bit of feeling for you in the heart 
 of an old gentleman that you have cared for like a king's son ! 
 for the little King of Rome was not so well cared for as you 
 have been. You may bet that he was not as well looked 
 after. He died in his prime ; there is proof for you. 
 Come, sir, you are unjust! You are ungrateful! It is be- 
 cause I am only a poor portress. Goodness me! are you 
 one of those that think we are dogs? " 
 
 " But, my dear Mme. Cibot " 
 
 " Indeed, you that know so much, tell me why we porters 
 are treated like this, and are supposed to have no feelings ; 
 people look down on us in these days when they talk of 
 Equality ! — As for me, am I not as good as another woman, 
 I that Avas one of the finest women in Paris, and was called 
 La belle Ecailiere, and received declarations seven or eight 
 
 times a day? And even now if I liked Look here, sir, 
 
 you know that little scrubby marine-store-dealer downstairs? 
 Very well, he would marry me any day, if I were a widow 
 that is, with his eyes shut ; he has had them looking wide open
 
 COUSIN PONS 135 
 
 in my direction so often ; he is always saying, * Oh ! what 
 fine arms you have, Ma'am Cibot! — I dreamed last night 
 that it was bread and I was butter, and I was spread on the 
 top.' Look, sir, there is an arm ! " 
 
 She rolled up her sleeve and displayed the shapeliest arm 
 imaginable, as white and fresh as her hand was red and 
 rough ; a plump, round, dimpled arm, drawn from its merino 
 sheath like a blade from the scabbard to dazzle Pons, who 
 looked away. 
 
 " For every oyster the knife opened, that arm has opened 
 a heart! Well, it belongs to Cibot, and I did wrong when 
 I neglected him, poor dear ; he would throw himself over a 
 precipice at a word from me; while you, sir, that call me 
 ' My dear Mme. Cibot ' when I do impossible things for 
 
 you ;' 
 
 " Do just listen to me," broke in the patient; " I cannot 
 call you my mother, nor my wife " 
 
 " No, never in all my bom days will I take again to 
 anybody " 
 
 " Do let me speak ! " continued Pons. " Let us see ; I put 
 M. Schmucke first " 
 
 " M. Schmucke ! there is a heart for you," cried La Cibot. 
 " Ah ! he loves me, but then he is poor. It is money that 
 deadens the heart ; and you are rich ! Oh, well, take a nurse, 
 you will see what a life she will lead you; she will torment 
 you, you will be like a cockchafer on a string. The doctor 
 will say that you must have plenty to drink, and she will do 
 nothing but feed you. She will bring you to your grave and 
 rob you. You do not deserve to have a Mme. Cibot ! — there ! 
 When Dr. Poulain comes, ask him for a nurse." 
 
 " Oh, fiddlestick-end ! " the patient cried angrily. " Will 
 you listen to me? When I spoke of my friend Schmucke, I 
 was not thinking of women. I know quite well that no one 
 cares for me so sincerely as you do, you and Schmucke " 
 
 " Have the goodness not to irritate yourself in this way ! " 
 exclaimed La Cibot, plimging down upon Pons and covering 
 him by force with the bedclothes. 
 
 " How should I not love you.'' " said poor Pons. 
 
 " You love me, really ? . . . There, there, forgive me.
 
 136 COUSIN PONS 
 
 sir ! " she said, crying and wiping her eyest, " Ah, yes, of 
 course, you love me, as you love a servant, that is the way ! — 
 a servant to whom you throw an annuity of six hundred 
 francs hke a crust you fling into a dog's kennel " 
 
 " Oh ! Mme. Cibot," cried Pons, " for what do you take 
 me? You do not know me." 
 
 " Ah ! you will care even more than that for me," she said, 
 meeting Pons's eyes. " You will love your kind old Cibot 
 like a mother, will you not.^* A mother, that is it! I am 
 your mother ; you are both of you my children. . . . Ah, 
 if I only knew them that caused you this sorrow, I would do 
 that which would bring me into the police-courts, and even 
 to prison ; I would tear their eyes out ! Such people deserve 
 to die at the Barriere Saint-Jacques, and that is too good 
 for such scoundrels. ... So kind, so good as you are 
 ^for you have a heart of gold), you were sent into the world 
 to make some woman happy ! . . . Yes, you would have 
 made her happy, as anybody can see ; you were cut out for 
 that. In the very beginning, when I saw how you were with 
 M. Schmucke, I said to myself, ' M. Pons has missed the life he 
 was meant for; he was made to be a good husband.' Come 
 now, you like women." 
 
 " Ah, yes," said Pons, " and no woman has been mine." 
 
 "Really.'*" exclaimed La Cibot, with a provocative air 
 AS she came nearer and took Pons's hand in hers. " Do you 
 not know what it is to love a woman that will do anything 
 for her lover.'* Is it possible.'' If I were in your place, I 
 should not wish to leave this world for another until I had 
 known the greatest happiness on earth ! . . . Poor dear ! 
 If I was now what I was once, I would leave Cibot for you ! 
 upon my word, I would ! Why, with a nose shaped like that 
 — for you have a fine nose — how did you manage it, poor 
 cherub.'' . . . You will tell me that ' not every woman 
 knows a man when she sees him ' ; and a pity it is that they 
 marry so at random as they do, it makes you sorry to see 
 it. — Now, for my own part, I should have thought that you 
 had had mistresses by the dozen — dancers, actresses, and 
 duchesses, for you went out so much. . . . When you 
 went out, I used to say to Cibot, ' Look ! there is M. Pons
 
 COUSIN PONS 13T 
 
 going a-gallivanting,' on my word, I did, I was so sure that 
 women ran after you. Heaven made you for love. 
 Why, my dear sir, I found that out the first day that you 
 dined at home, and you were so touched with M. Schmucke's 
 pleasure. And next day M. Schmucke kept saying to me, 
 ' Montame Zipod, he haf tined hier,' with the tears in his 
 eyes, till I cried along with him like a fool, as I am. And 
 how sad he looked when you took to gadding abroad again 
 and dining out ! Poor man, you never saw anyone so dis- 
 consolate ! Ah ! you are quite right to leave everything to 
 him. Dear, worthy man, why, he is as good as a family to 
 you, he is ! Do not forget him ; for if you do, God will not 
 receive you into His Paradise, for those that have been un- 
 grateful to their friends and left them no rentes will not go 
 to Heaven." 
 
 In vain Pons tried to put in a word ; La Cibot talked as 
 the wind blows. Means of arresting steam-engines have been 
 invented, but it would tax a mechanician's genius to discover 
 any plan for stopping a portress's tongue. 
 
 " I know what you mean," continued she. " But it does 
 not kill you, my dear gentleman, to make a will when you 
 are out of health ; and in your place I would not leave that 
 poor dear alone, for fear that something might happen ; 
 he is like God Almighty's lamb, he knows nothing about noth- 
 ing, and I should not like him to be at the mercy of those 
 sharks of lawyers and a wretched pack of relations. Let 
 us see now, has one of them come here to see you in twenty 
 years.'' And would you leave your property to them? Do 
 you know, they say that all these things here are worth some- 
 thing." 
 
 " Why, yes," said Pons. 
 
 " Remonencq, who deals in pictures, and knows that you 
 are an amateur, says that he would be quite ready to pay 
 you an annuity of thirty thousand francs so long as you live,, 
 to have the pictures afterwards. . . . There is a chance ! 
 If I were you, I should take it. Why, I thought he said 
 it for a joke when he told me that. You ought to let M. 
 Schmucke know the value of all those things, for he is a man 
 that could be cheated like a child. He has not the slightest
 
 138 COUSIN PONS 
 
 idea of the value of these fine things that you have ! He so 
 little suspects it, that he would give them away for a morsel 
 of bread if he did not keep them all his life for love of you; 
 always supposing that he lives after you, for he will die of 
 your death. But / am here ; I will take his part against 
 anybody and everybody ! . . . I and Cibot will defend 
 him." 
 
 " Dear Mme. Cibot ! " said Pons, " what would have become 
 of me if it had not been for you and Schmucke.'' " He felt 
 touched by tliis horrible prattle ; the feeling in it seemed to 
 be ingenuous, as it usually is in the speech of the people. 
 
 " Ah ! we really are your only friends on earth, that is 
 very true, that is. But two good hearts are worth all the 
 families in the world. — Don't talk of families to me ! A 
 family, as the old actor said of the tongue, is the best and 
 the worst of all things. . . . Where are those relations 
 of yours now? Have you any.'' I have never seen them " 
 
 " They have brought me to lie here," said Pons, with 
 intense bitterness. 
 
 " So you have relations ! . . ." cried La Cibot, spring- 
 ing up as if her easy-chair had been heated red-hot. " Oh, 
 well, they are a nice lot, are your relations ! What ! these 
 three weeks — for this is the twentieth day, to-day, that you 
 have been ill and like to die — in these three weeks they have 
 not come once to ask for news of you.'' That's a trifle too 
 strong, that is ! . . . Why, in your place, I would leave 
 all I had to the Foundling Hospital sooner than give them 
 one farthing ! " 
 
 " Well, my dear Mme. Cibot, I meant to leave aU that I 
 had to a first cousin once removed, the daughter of my first 
 cousin. President Camusot, you know, who came here one 
 morning nearly two months ago." 
 
 " Oh ! a little stout man who sent his servants to beg 
 your pardon — for his wife's blunder.'' — The housemaid came 
 asking me questions about you, an affected old creature she 
 is, my fingers itched to give her velvet tippet a dusting with 
 my broom-handle ! A servant wearing a velvet tippet ! did 
 anybody ever see the like.'' No, upon my word, the world is 
 turned upside down; what is the use of making a Revolution.''
 
 COUSIN PONS 139 
 
 Dine twice a day if you can afford it, you scamps of rich 
 folk ! But laws are no good, I tell you, and nothing will 
 be safe if Louis-Philippe does not keep people in their places ; 
 for, after all, if we are all equal, eh, sir? a housemaid didn't 
 ought to have a velvet tippet, while I, Mme. Cibot, haven't 
 one, after thirty years of honest work. — There is a pretty 
 thing for you ! People ought to be able to tell who you are. 
 A housemaid is a housemaid, just as I myself am a portress. 
 Why do they have silk epaulettes in the army.'' Let every- 
 body keep their place. Look here, do you want me to tell 
 you what all this comes to? Very well, France is going to 
 the dogs ... If the Emperor had been here, things 
 would have been very different, Avouldn't they, sir? 
 So I said to Cibot, I said, ' See here, Cibot, a house where 
 the servants wear velvet tippets belongs to people that have 
 no heart in them ' " 
 
 " No heart in them, that is just it," repeated Pons. And 
 with that he began to tell Mme. Cibot about his troubles and 
 mortifications, she pouring out abuse of the relations the 
 while and showing exceeding tenderness on every fresh sen- 
 tence in the sad history. She fairly wept at last. 
 
 To understand the sudden intimacy between the old musi- 
 cian and Mme. Cibot, you have only to imagine the position 
 of an old bachelor lying on his bed of pain, seriously ill 
 for the first time in his life. Pons felt that he was alone 
 in the world ; the days that he spent by himself were all the 
 longer because he was struggling with the indefinable nausea 
 of a liver complaint which blackens the brightest life. Cut 
 off from all his many interests, the sufferer falls a victim 
 to a kind of nostalgia ; he regrets the many sights to be seen 
 for nothing in Paris. The isolation, the darkened days, the 
 suffering that affects the mind and spirits even more than 
 the body, the emptiness of the life, — all these things tend 
 to induce him to cling to the human being who waits on him 
 as a drowned man clings to a plank; and this especially if 
 the bachelor-patient's character is as weak as his nature is 
 sensitive and credulous. 
 
 Pons was charmed to hear La Cibot's tittle-tattle. 
 Schmucke, Mme. Cibot, and Dr. Poulain meant all human-
 
 140 COUSIN PONS 
 
 ily to him now, when his sickroom became the universe. If 
 invalids' thoughts, as a rule, never travel beyond in the little 
 space over which their ej^es can wander ; if their selfishness, 
 in its narrow sphere, subordinates all creatures and all things 
 to itself, you can imagine the lengths to which an old bachelor 
 may go. Before three weeks were out he had even gone so 
 far as to regret, once and again, that he had not married 
 Madeleine Vivet ! Mme. Cibot, too, had made immense prog- 
 ress in his esteem in those three weeks ; without her he felt 
 that he should have been utterly lost ; for as for Schmucke, 
 the poor invalid looked upon him as a second Pons. La 
 Cibot's prodigious art consisted in expressing Pons's own 
 ideas, and this she did quite unconsciously. 
 
 " Ah ! here comes the doctor ! " she exclaimed, as the bell 
 rang, and away she went, knowing very well that Remonencq 
 had come with the Jew. 
 
 " Make no noise, gentlemen," said she, " he must not know 
 anything. He is all on the fidget when his precious treasures 
 are concerned." 
 
 " A walk round will be enough," said the Hebrew, armed 
 with a magnifying-glass and a lorgnette. 
 
 The greater part of Pons's collection was installed in a 
 great old-fashioned salon such as French architects used to 
 build for the old noblesse; a room twenty-five feet broad, 
 some thirty feet in length, and thirteen in height. Pons's 
 pictures to the number of sixty-seven hung upon the white- 
 and-gold paneled walls ; time, however, had reddened the gold 
 and softened the white to an ivory tint, so that the whole 
 was toned down, and the general effect subordinated to the 
 effect of the pictures. Fourteen statues stood on pedestals 
 set in the corners of the room, or among the pictures, or on 
 brackets inlaid by Boule ; sideboards of carved ebony, royally 
 rich, surrounded the walls to elbow height, all the shelves filled 
 with curiosities ; in the middle of the room stood a row of 
 carved credence-tables, covered with rare miracles of handi- 
 craft — ^with ivories and bronzes, wood-carvings and enamels, 
 jewelry and porcelain. 
 
 As soon as Elie Magus entered the sanctuary, he went 
 straight to the four masterpieces; he saw at a glance that
 
 COUSIN PONS 141 
 
 these were the gems of Pons's collection, and masters lacking 
 in his own. For Elie Magus these were the naturalist's 
 desiderata for which men undertake long voyages from east 
 to west, through deserts and tropical countries, across south- 
 ern savannahs, through virgin forests. 
 
 The first was a painting by Sebastian del Piombo, the sec- 
 ond a Fra Bartolommeo della Porta, the third a Hobbema 
 landscape, and the fourth and last a Diirer — a portrait of 
 a woman. Four diamonds indeed ! In the history of art, 
 Sebastian del Piombo is like a shining point in which three 
 schools meet, each bringing its pre-eminent qualities. A 
 Venetian painter, he came to Rome to learn the manner of 
 Rafael under the direction of Michel Angelo, who would fain 
 oppose Rafael on his own ground by pitting one of his own 
 lieutenants against the reigning king of art. And so it came 
 to pass that in del Piombo's indolent genius Venetian color 
 was blended with Florentine composition and a something of 
 Rafael's manner in the few pictures which he deigned to 
 paint, and the sketches were made for him, it is said, by 
 Michel Angelo himself. 
 
 If you would see the perfection to which the painter at- 
 tained (armed as he was with triple power), go to the Louvre 
 and look at the Baccio Bandinelli portrait; you might place 
 it beside Titian's Man with a Glove, or by that other Portrait 
 of an Old Man in which Rafael's consummate skill blends 
 with Correggio's art ; or, again, compare it with Lionardo da 
 Vinci's Charles VIII., and the picture will scarcely lose. The 
 four pearls are equal ; there are the same luster and sheen, 
 the same rounded completeness, the same brilliancy. Art 
 can go no further than this. Art has risen above Nature, 
 since Nature only gives her creatures a few brief years of 
 Ufe. 
 
 Pons possessed one example of this immortal great genius 
 and incurably indolent painter; it was a Knight of Malta^ 
 a Templar kneeling in prayer. The picture was painted on 
 slate, and in its unfaded color and its finish was immeasur- 
 ably finer than the Baccio Bandinelli. 
 
 Fra Bartolommeo was represented by a Holy Family^ 
 which many connoisseurs might have taken for a Rafael.
 
 14a COUSIN PONS 
 
 The Hobbema would have fetched sixty thousand francs at 
 a pubhc sale ; and as for the Diirer, it was equal to the famous 
 Holzschuer portrait at Nuremberg for which the Kings of 
 Bavaria, Holland, and Prussia have vainly offered two hun- 
 dred thousand francs again and again. Was it the portrait 
 of the wife or the daughter of Holzschuer, Albrecht Diirer's 
 personal friend? — The hypothesis seems to be a certainty, 
 for the attitude of the figure in Pons's picture suggests that 
 it is meant for a pend" t, the position of the coat-of-arms 
 is the same as in the N.^-'emberg portrait; and, finally, the 
 atatis sucE XLI. accords perfectly with the age inscribed on 
 the picture religiously kept by the Holzschuers of Nurem- 
 berg, and but recently engraved. 
 
 The tears stood in Elie Magus's eyes as he looked from 
 one masterpiece to another. He turned round to La Cibot, 
 *' I will give you a commission of two thousand francs on 
 each of the pictures if you can arrange that I shall have them 
 for forty thousand francs," he said. La Cibot was amazed 
 at this good fortune dropped from the sky. Admiration, 
 or, to be more accurate, delirious joy, had wrought such 
 havoc in the Jew's brain, that it had actually unsettled his 
 habitual greed, and he fell headlong into enthusiasm, as 
 you see. 
 
 " And I .'' " put in Remonencq, who knew nothing 
 
 about pictures. 
 
 " Everything here is equally good," the Jew said cunningly, 
 lowering his voice for Remonencq's ear ; " take ten pictures 
 just as they come and on the same conditions. Your fortune 
 will be made." 
 
 Again the three thieves looked each other in the face, each 
 one of them overcome with the keenest of all joys — sated 
 greed. All of a sudden the sick man's voice rang through 
 the room ; the tones vibrated like the strokes of a bell — 
 
 "Who is there?" called Pons. 
 
 "Monsieur! just go back to bed!" exclaimed La Cibot, 
 springing upon Pons and dragging him by main force. 
 ''What next! Have you a mind to kill yourself.'' — ^Very 
 well, then, it is not Dr. Poulain, it is Remonencq, good 
 soul, so anxious that he has come to ask after you ! — Every-
 
 COUSIN PONS 143 
 
 body is so fond of you that the whole house is in a flutter. 
 So what is there to fear? " 
 
 " It seems to me that there are several of you," said Pons. 
 
 " Several ? that is good ! What next ! Are you dream- 
 ing? — You will go off your head before you have done, upon 
 my word ! — ^Here, look ! " — and La Cibot flung open the door, 
 signed to Magus to go, and beckoned to Remonencq. 
 
 " Well, my dear sir," said the Auvergnat, now supplied 
 with something to say, " I just came to ask after you, for 
 the whole house is alarmed about you. — Nobody likes Death 
 to set foot in a house ! — And lastly. Daddy Monistrol, whom 
 you know very well, told me to tell you that if you wanted 
 money he was at your service " 
 
 " He sent you here to take a look round at my knick- 
 knacks ! " returned the old collector from his bed ; and the 
 sour tones of his voice were full of suspicion. 
 
 A suff'erer from liver complaint nearly always takes mo- 
 mentary and special dislikes to some person or thing, and 
 concentrates all his ill-humor upon the object. Pons imag- 
 ined that someone had designs upon his precious collection ; 
 the thought of guarding it became a fixed idea with him; 
 Schmucke was continually sent to see if anyone had stolen 
 into the sanctuary. 
 
 " Your collection is fine enough to attract the attention of 
 chineurs" Remonencq answered astutely. " I am not much 
 in the art line myself; but you are supposed to be such a 
 great connoisseur, sir, that, little as I know, I would willingly 
 buy your collection, sir, with my eyes shut — supposing, for 
 instance, that you should need money some time or other, for 
 nothing costs so much as these confounded iUnesses ; there was 
 my sister now, when she had a bad turn, she spent thirty sous 
 on medicine in ten days, when she would have got better 
 again just as well without. Doctors are rascals that take 
 advantage of your condition to " 
 
 " Thank you, good-day, good-day," broke in Pons, eying 
 the marine-store-dealer uneasily. 
 
 *' I will go to the door with him, for fear he should touch 
 something," La Cibot whispered to her patient. 
 
 *' Yes, yes," answered the invalid, thanking her by a glance.
 
 lU COUSIN PONS 
 
 La Clbot shut the bedroom door behind her, and Pons's 
 suspicions awoke again at once. 
 
 She found Magus standing motionless before the four pic- 
 tures. His immobility, his admiration, can only be under- 
 stood by other souls open to ideal beauty, to the ineffable 
 joy of beholding art made perfect: such as these can stand 
 for whole hours before the Antiope — Correggio's masterpiece 
 ■ — before Lionardo's Gioconda, Titian's Mistress, Andrea del 
 Sarto's Holy Family, Domenichino's Children among the 
 Flowers, Rafael's little cameo, or his Portrait of an Old Man 
 — Art's greatest masterpieces. 
 
 " Be quick and go, and make no noise," said La Cibot. 
 
 The Jew walked slowly backwards, giving the pictures such 
 a farewell gaze as a lover gives his love. Outside, on the 
 landing. La Cibot tapped his bony arm. His rapt con- 
 templation had put an idea into her head. 
 
 " Make it four thousand francs for each picture," said 
 she, " or I do nothing " 
 
 " I am so poor ! . . ." began Magus. " I want the 
 pictures simply for their own sake, simply and solely for 
 the love of art, my dear lady." 
 
 " I can understand that love, sonny, you are so dried up. 
 But if you do not promise me sixteen thousand francs now, 
 before Remonencq here, I shall want twenty to-morrow." 
 
 " Sixteen ; I promise," returned the Jew, frightened by 
 the woman's rapacity. 
 
 La Cibot turned to Remonencq. 
 
 " What oath can a Jew swear .f* " she inquired. 
 
 " You may trust him," replied the marine-store-dealer. 
 " He is as honest as I am." 
 
 " Very well ; and you ? " asked she, " if I get him to sell 
 them to you, what will you give me? " 
 
 " Half-share of profits," Remonencq answered briskly. 
 
 *' I would rather have a lump sum," returned La Cibot ; 
 *' I am not in business myself." 
 
 " You understand business uncommonly well ! " put in 
 Elie Magus, smiling ; " a famous saleswoman you would 
 make ! " 
 
 " I want her to take me into partnership, me and my
 
 COUSIN PONS 145 
 
 goods," said the Auvergnat, as he took La Cibot's plump 
 arm and gave it playful taps like hammer-strokes. " I don't 
 ask her to bring anything into the firm but her good looks ! 
 You are making a mistake when you stick to your Turk of 
 a Cibot and his needle. Is a little bit of a porter the man 
 to make a woman rich — a fine woman like you.'' Ah, what 
 a figure you would make in a shop on the boulevard, all 
 among the curiosities, gossiping with amateurs and twisting 
 them round your fingers ! Just you leave your lodge as soon 
 as you have lined your purse here, and you shall see what 
 will become of us both." 
 
 " Lined my purse ! " cried the Cibot. *' I am incapable 
 of taking the worth of a single pin ; you mind that, Remon- 
 encq ! I am known in the neighborhood for an honest woman, 
 I am." 
 
 La Cibot's eyes flashed fire. 
 
 " There, never mind," said Elie Magus ; " this Auvergnat 
 seems to be too fond of you to mean to insult you." 
 
 " How she would draw on the customers ! " cried the Auver- 
 gnat. 
 
 Mme. Cibot softened at this. 
 
 " Be fair, sonnies," quoth she, " and judge for yourselves 
 how I am placed. These ten years past I have been wearing 
 my life out for those two old bachelors yonder, and neither 
 of them has given me anything but words. Remonencq will 
 tell you that I feed them by contract, and lose twenty or 
 thirty sous a day; all my savings have gone that way, by 
 the soul of my mother (the only author of my days that I 
 ever knew), this is as true as that I live, and that this is 
 the light of day, and may my coffee poison me if I lie 
 about a farthing. Well, there is one up there that will die 
 soon, eh.? and he the richer of the two that I have treated 
 like my own cliildren. Would you believe it, my dear sir, 
 I have told him over and over again for days past that he 
 is at death's door (for Dr. Poulain has given him up), 
 and yet, if the old hunks had never heard of me, he could 
 not say less about putting my name down in his will. We 
 shall only get our due by takinsj it, upon my word, as an 
 honest woman, for as for trusting to the next-of-kin! — No
 
 146 COUSIN PONS 
 
 fear ! There ! look you here, words don't stink ; it Is a 
 bad world!" 
 
 " That is true," Elie Magus answered cunningly, " that 
 is true; and it is just the like of us that are among the best," 
 he added, looking at Remonencq. 
 
 " Just let me be," returned La Cibot ; " I am not speaking 
 of you. ' Pressing company is always accepted,' as the old 
 actor said. I swear to you that the two gentlemen already 
 owe me nearly three thousand francs ; the little I have is 
 gone by now in medicine and things on their account; and 
 now suppose they refuse to recognize my advances? I am 
 so stupidly honest that I did not dare to say nothing to them 
 about it. Now, you that are in business, my dear sir, do 
 you advise me to go to a lawyer? " 
 
 "A lawyer?" cried Remonencq; "you know more about 
 it than all the lawyers put together " 
 
 Just at that moment a sound echoed in the great staircase, 
 a sound as if some heavy body had fallen in the dining-room. 
 
 " Oh, goodness me ! " exclaimed La Cibot ; " it seems to me 
 that Monsieur has just taken a ticket for the ground 
 floor." 
 
 She pushed her fellow-conspirators out at the door, and 
 while the pair descended the stairs with remarkable agility, 
 she ran to the dining-room, and there beheld Pons, in his 
 shirt, stretched out upon the tiles. He had fainted. She 
 lifted him as if he had been a feather, carried him back to 
 his room, laid him in bed, burned feathers under his nose, 
 bathed his temples with eau-de-cologne, and at last brought 
 him to consciousness. When she saw his eyes unclose and 
 life return, she stood over him, hands on hips. 
 
 " No slippers ! In your shirt ! That is the way to kill 
 yourself! Why do you suspect me? If this is to be the 
 way of it, I wish you good-day, sir. Here have I served 
 you these ten years, I have spent money on you till my 
 savings are all gone, to spare trouble to that poor M. 
 Schmucke, crying like a child on the stairs — and this is my 
 reward ! You have been spying on me. God has punished 
 you ! It serves you right ! Here am I straining myself 
 to carry you, running the risk of doing myself a mischief
 
 COUSIN PONS 147 
 
 that I shall feel all my days. Oh dear, oh dear! and the 
 door left open too " 
 
 " You were talking with someone. Who was it? " 
 
 " Here are notions ! " cried La Cibot. " What next ! Am 
 I your bond-slave? Am I to give account of myself to you? 
 Do you know that if you bother me like this, I shall clear out ! 
 You shall take a nurse." 
 
 Frightened by this threat, Pons unwittingly allowed La 
 Cibot to see the extent of the power of her sword of Damocles. 
 
 " It is my illness ! " he pleaded piteously. 
 
 " It is as you please," La Cibot answered roughly. 
 
 She went. Pons, confused, remorseful, admiring his nurse's 
 scolding devotion, reproached himself for his behavior. The 
 fall on the paved floor of the dining-room had shaken and 
 bruised him, and aggravated his illness, but Pons was scarcely 
 conscious of his physical sufferings. 
 
 La Cibot met Schmucke on the staircase. 
 
 " Come here, sir," she said. *' There is bad news, there 
 is ! M. Pons is going off his head ! Just tliink of it ! 
 he got up with nothing on, he came after me — and down he 
 came full-length. Ask him why — he knows nothing about it. 
 He is in a bad way. I did nothing to provoke such violence, 
 unless, perhaps, I waked up ideas by talking to him of his 
 early amours. Who knows men? Old libertines that they 
 all are. I ought not to have shown him my arms when his 
 eyes were glittering like carbuckles." 
 
 Schmucke listened. Mme. Cibot might have been talking 
 Hebrew for anything that he understood. 
 
 " I have given myself a wrench that I shall feel all my 
 days," added she, making as though she were in great pain. 
 (Her amis did, as a matter of fact, ache a little, and the 
 muscular fatigue suggested an idea, which she proceeded 
 to turn to profit. ) "So stupid I am. When I saw him 
 lying there on the floor, I just took him up in my arms as 
 if he had been a child, and carried him back to bed, I did. 
 And I strained myself, I can feel it now. Ah ! how it hurts ! — 
 I am going downstairs. Look after our patient. I will send 
 Cibot for Dr. Poulain. I had rather die outright than be 
 crippled."
 
 148 COUSIN PONS 
 
 La Cibot crawled downstairs, clinging to the banisters, and 
 writhing and groaning so piteously that the tenants, in alarm, 
 came out upon their landings. Schmucke supported the suf- 
 fering creature, and told the story of La Cibot's devotion, 
 the tears running down his cheeks as he spoke. Before very 
 long the whole house, the whole neighborhood indeed, had 
 heard of Mme. Cibot's heroism ; she had given herself a 
 dangerous strain, it was said ; with lifting one of the " nut- 
 crackers." 
 
 Schmucke meanwhile went to Pons's bedside with the tale. 
 Their factotum was in a frightful state. " What shall we 
 do without her?" they said, as they looked at each other; 
 but Pons was so plainly the worse for his escapade, that 
 Schmucke did not dare to scold him. 
 
 " Confounded pric-a-prac ! I would sooner purn dem dan 
 loose mein friend ! " he cried, when Pons told him of the 
 cause of the accident. " To susbect Montame Zipod, dot 
 lend us her safings ! It is not goot ; but it is der illness " 
 
 " Ah ! what an illness ! I am not the same man, I can 
 feel it," said Pons. " My dear Schmucke, if only you did 
 not suffer through me ! " 
 
 " Scold me," Schmucke answered, " und leaf Montame 
 Zipod in beace." 
 
 As for Mme. Cibot, she soon recovered in Dr. Poulain's 
 hands ; and her restoration, bordering on the miraculous, 
 shed additional luster on her name and fame in the Marais. 
 Pons attributed the success to the excellent constitution of 
 the patient, who resumed her ministrations seven days later, 
 to the great satisfaction of her two gentlemen. Her in- 
 fluence in their household and her tyranny were increased a 
 hundredfold by the accident. In the course of a week, the 
 two nutcrackers ran into debt; Mme. Cibot paid the out- 
 standing amounts, and took the opportunity to obtain from 
 Schmucke (how easily!) a receipt for two thousand francs, 
 which she had lent, she said, to the friends. 
 
 " Oh, what a doctor M. Poulain is ! " cried La Cibot, for 
 Pons's benefit. " He will bring you through, my dear sir, 
 for he pulled me out of my coffin ! Cibot, poor man, thought 
 I was dead. . . . Well, Dr. Poulain will have told you
 
 COUSIN PONS 140 
 
 that while I was in bed I thought of nothing but you. 
 * God above,' said I, ' take me, and let my dear M. Pons 
 Hve ' " 
 
 " Poor dear Mme. Cibot, you all but crippled yourself 
 for me." 
 
 " Ah ! but for Dr. Poulain I should have been put to bed 
 with a shovel by now, as we shall all be one day. Well, 
 what must be must, as the old actor said. One must take 
 things philosophically. How did you get on without me.''" 
 
 " Schmucke nursed me," said the invalid ; " but our poor 
 money-box and our lessons have suffered. I do not know how 
 he managed." 
 
 " Calm yourself, Bons," exclaimed Schmucke ; " ve haf in 
 Zipod ein panker " 
 
 " Do not speak of it, my lamb. You are our children, 
 both of you," cried La Cibot. " Our savings will be well 
 invested; you are safer than the Bank. So long as we have 
 a morsel of bread, half of it is yours. It is not worth men- 
 tioning " 
 
 " Boor Montame Zipod ! " said Schmucke, and he went. 
 
 Pons said nothing. 
 
 " Would you believe it, my cherub.'' " said La Cibot, as 
 the sick man tossed uneasily, " in my agony — for it was a 
 near squeak for me — the thing that worried me most was 
 the thought that I must leave you alone, with no one to look 
 after you, and my poor Cibot without a farthing. 
 My savings are such a trifle, that I only mention them in 
 connection with my death and Cibot, an angel that he is ! 
 No. He nursed me as if I had been a queen, he did, and 
 cried like a calf over me ! . . . But I counted on you, 
 upon my word. I said to him, ' There, Cibot ! my gentlemen 
 will not let you starve ' " 
 
 Pons made no replj'^ to this thrust ad test amentum; but 
 as the portress waited for him to say something — " I shall 
 recommend you to M. Schmucke," he said at last. 
 
 ■" Ah ! " cried La Cibot, " whatever you do will be right ; 
 I trust in you and your heart. Let us never talk of this 
 again ; you make me feel ashamed, my cherub. Tliink of 
 getting better ; you will outlive us all yet."
 
 150 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Profound uneasiness filled Mme. Cibot's mind. She cast 
 about for some way of making the sick man understand that 
 she expected a legacy. That evening, when Schmucke was 
 eating his dinner as usual by Pons's bedside, she went out, 
 hoping to find Dr. Poulain at home. 
 
 Dr. Poulain lived in the Rue d'Orleans in a small ground 
 floor establishment, consisting of a lobby, a sitting-room, 
 and two bedrooms. A closet, opening into the lobby and the 
 bedroom, had been turned into a study for the doctor. The 
 kitchen, the servant's bedroom, and a small cellar were situ- 
 ated in a wing of the house, a huge pile built in the time 
 of the Empire, on the site of an old mansion of which the 
 garden still remained, though it had been divided among the 
 three ground-floor tenants. 
 
 Nothing had been changed in the doctor's house since it 
 was built. Paint and paper and ceilings were all redolent 
 of the Empire. The grimy deposits of forty years lay 
 thick on walls and ceilings, on paper and paint and mirrors 
 and gilding. And yet, this little establishment, in the 
 depths of the Marais, paid a rent of a thousand francs. 
 
 Mme. Poulain, the doctor's mother, aged sixty-seven, was 
 ending her days in the second bedroom. She worked for a 
 breeches-maker, stitching men's leggings, breeches, belts, and 
 braces, anything, in fact, that is made in a way of business 
 which has somewhat fallen off of late years. Her whole time 
 was spent in keeping her son's house and superintending the 
 one servant ; she never went abroad, and took the air in the 
 little garden entered through the glass door of the sitting- 
 room. Twenty years previously, when her husband died, 
 she had sold his business to his best workman, who gave his 
 master's widow work enough to earn a daily wage of thirty 
 sous. She had made every sacrifice to educate her only son. 
 At all costs, he should occupy a higher station than his 
 father before him ; and now she was proud of her ^Escula- 
 pius, she believed in him, and sacrificed everything to him 
 as before. She was happy to take care of him, to work and 
 put by a little money, and dream of nothing but his welfare, 
 and love him with an intelligent love of which every mother 
 is not capable. For instance, Mme. Poulain remembered
 
 COUSIN PONS 151 
 
 that she had been a working girl. She would not injure her 
 son's prospects ; he should not be shamed by his mother 
 (for the good woman's grammar was something of the same 
 kind as Mme. Cibot's) ; and for this reason she kept in the 
 background, and went to her room of her own accord if any 
 distinguished patient came to consult the doctor, or if some 
 old schoolfellow or fellow-student chanced to call. Dr. 
 Poulain had never had occasion to blush for the mother whom 
 he revered ; and this sublime love of hers more than atoned 
 for a defective education. 
 
 The breeches-maker's business sold for about twenty thou- 
 sand francs, and the widow invested the money in the Funds 
 in 1820. The income of eleven hundred francs per annum 
 derived from this source was, at one time, her whole fortune. 
 For many a year the neighbors used to see the doctor's linen 
 hanging out to dry upon a clothes-line in the garden, and 
 the servant and Mme. Poulain thriftily washed everything at 
 home ; a piece of domestic economy which did not a little to 
 injure the doctor's practice, for it was thought that if he 
 was so poor, it must be through his own fault. Her eleven 
 hundred francs scarcely did more than pay the rent. Dur- 
 ing those early days, Mme. Poulain, good, stout, little old 
 woman, was the breadwinner, and the poor household lived 
 upon her earnings. After twelve years of perseverance upon 
 a rough and stony road, Dr. Poulain at last was making an 
 income of three thousand francs, and Mme. Poulain had an 
 income of about five thousand francs at her disposal. Five 
 thousand francs for those who know Paris means a bare 
 subsistence. 
 
 The sitting-room, where patients waited for an Interview, 
 was shabbily furnished. There was the inevitable mahogany 
 sofa covered with yellow-flowered Utrecht velvet, four easy- 
 chairs, a tea-table, a console, and half a dozen chairs, all the 
 property of the deceased breeches-maker, and chosen by him. 
 A lyre-shaped clock between two Egyptian candlesticks still 
 preserved its glass shade intact. You asked yourself how 
 the yellow chintz window-curtains, covered with red flowers, 
 had contrived to hang together for so long; for evidently 
 they had come from the Jouy factory, and Oberkampf re-
 
 152 COUSIN PONS 
 
 ceived the Emperor's congratulations upon similar hideous 
 productions of the cotton industry in 1809. 
 
 The doctor's consulting-room was fitted up in the same 
 style, with household stuff from the paternal chamber. It 
 looked stiff, poverty-stricken, and bare. What patient could 
 put faith in the skill of an unknown doctor who could not 
 even furnish his house? And this in a time when advertising 
 is all-powerful; when we gild the gas-lamps in the Place de 
 la Concorde to console the poor man for his poverty by re- 
 minding him that he is rich as a citizen. 
 
 The antechamber did duty as a dining-room. The servant 
 sat at her sewing there whenever she was not busy in the 
 kitchen or keeping the doctor's mother company. From the 
 dingy short curtains in the windows you could have guessed 
 at the shabby thrift behind them without setting foot in 
 the dreary place. What could those wall-cupboards contain 
 but stale scraps of food, chipped earthenware, corks used over 
 and over again indefinitely, soiled table-linen, odds and ends 
 that could descend but one step lower into the dust-heap, 
 and all the squalid necessities of a pinched household in Paris ? 
 
 In these days, when the five-franc piece is always lurking 
 in our thoughts and intruding itself into our speech, Dr. 
 Poulain, aged thirty-three, was still a bachelor. Heaven 
 had bestowed on him a mother with no connections. In ten 
 years he had not met with the shghtest pretext for a romance 
 in his professional career ; his practice lay among clerks and 
 small manufacturers, people in his own sphere of life, with 
 homes very much like his own. His richer patients were 
 butchers, bakers, and the more substantial tradespeople of 
 the neighborhood. These, for the most part, attributed 
 their recovery to Nature, as an excuse for paying for the 
 services of a medical man, who came on foot, at the rate of 
 two francs per visit. In his profession, a carriage is more 
 necessary than medical skill. 
 
 A humdrum monotonous life tells in the end upon the 
 most adventurous spirit. A man fashions himself to his lot, 
 he accepts a commonplace existence; and Dr. Poulain, after 
 ten years of his practice, continued his labors of Sisyphus 
 without the despair that made early days so bitter. And
 
 COUSIN PONS 153 
 
 yet — ^like every soul In Paris — ^he cherished a dream. Remo- 
 nencq was happy in his dream ; La Cibot had a dream of her 
 own ; and Dr. Poulain too dreamed. Some day he would 
 be called in to attend a rich and influential patient, would 
 eff^ect a positive cure, and the patient would procure a post 
 for him; he would be head surgeon to a hospital, medical 
 officer of a prison or police-court, or doctor to the boulevard 
 theaters. He had come by his present appointment as doctor 
 to the Mairie in this very way. La Cibot had called him in 
 when the landlord of the house in the Rue de Normandie fell 
 ill ; he had treated the case with complete success ; M. 
 Plllerault, the patient, took an interest In the young doctor, 
 called to thank him, and saw his carefully hidden poverty. 
 Count Poplnot, the cabinet minister, had married M. Pille- 
 rault's grand-niece, and greatly respected her uncle ; of him 
 therefore, M. Plllerault had asked for the post, which Poulain 
 had now held for two years. That appointment and its 
 meager salary came just in time to prevent a desperate step; 
 Poulain was thinking of emigration ; and for a Frenchman, 
 it is a kind of death to leave France. 
 
 Dr. Poulain went, you may be sure, to thank Count 
 Poplnot ; but as Count Popinot's family physician was the 
 celebrated Horace Bianchon, It was pretty clear that his 
 chances of gaining a footing in that house were something 
 of the slenderest. The poor doctor had fondly hoped for 
 the patronage of a powerful cabinet minister, one of the 
 twelve or fifteen cards which a cunning hand has been 
 shuflling for sixteen years on the green baize of the council 
 table, and now he dropped back again Into his Marals, his 
 old groping life among the poor and the small tradespeople, 
 with the privilege of Issuing certificates of death for a yearly 
 stipend of twelve hundred francs. 
 
 Dr. Poulain had distinguished himself to some extent as 
 a house-student ; he was a prudent practitioner, and not with- 
 out experience. His deaths caused no scandal ; he had plenty 
 of opportunities of studying all kinds of complaints in anima 
 vili. Judge, therefore, of the spleen that he nourished ! The 
 expression of his countenance, lengthy and not too cheerful 
 to begin with, at times was positively appalling. Set a
 
 154» COUSIN PONS 
 
 Tartuffe's all-devouring eyes, and the sour humor of an 
 Alceste in a sallow parchment visage, and try to imagine 
 for yourself the gait, bearing, and expression of a man 
 who thought himself as good a doctor as the illustrious 
 Bianchon, and felt that he was held down in his narrow lot 
 by an iron hand. He could not help comparing his receipts 
 (ten francs a day if he was fortunate) with Bianchon's five 
 or six hundred. 
 
 Are the hatreds and jealousies of democracy incompre- 
 hensible after this.'' Ambitious and continually thwarted, 
 he could not reproach himself. He had once already tried 
 his fortune by inventing a purgative pill, something like 
 Morrison's, and intrusted the business operations to an old 
 hospital chum, a house-student, who afterwards took a retail 
 drug business ; but, unluckily, the druggist, smitten with the 
 charms of a ballet-dancer of the Ambigu-Comique, found 
 himself at length in the bankruptcy court ; and as the patent 
 had been taken out in his name, his partner was literally 
 without a remedy, and the important discovery enriched the 
 purchaser of the business. The sometime house-student set 
 sail for Mexico, that land of gold, taking poor Poulain's 
 little savings with him; and, to add insult to injury, the 
 opera-dancer treated him as an extortioner when he applied 
 to her for his money. 
 
 Not a single rich patient had come to him since he had 
 the luck to cure old M. Pillerault. Poulain made his rounds 
 on foot, scouring the Marais like a lean cat, and obtained 
 from two to forty sous out of a score of visits. The paying 
 patient was a phenomenon about as rare as that anomalous 
 fowl known as a " white blackbird " in all sublunary 
 regions. 
 
 The briefless barrister, the doctor without a patient, are 
 pre-eminently the two types of a decorous despair peculiar 
 to this city of Paris ; it is mute, dull despair in human form, 
 dressed in a black coat and trousers with shining seams that 
 recall the zinc on an attic roof, a glistening satin waistcoat, 
 a hat preserved like a relic, a pair of old gloves, and a 
 cotton shirt. The man is the incarnation of a melancholy 
 poem, somber as the secrets of the Conciergerie. Other kinds
 
 COUSIN PONS 155 
 
 of poverty, the poverty of the artist — actor, painter, musi- 
 cian, or poet — are relieved and lightened by the artist's 
 joviality, the reckless gayety of the Bohemian border country 
 — the first stage of the journey to the Thebaid of genius. 
 But these two black-coated professions that go afoot through 
 the street are brought continually in contact with disease 
 and dishonor ; they see nothing of human nature but its sores ; 
 in the forlorn first stages and beginnings of their career they 
 eye competitors suspiciously and defiantly ; concentrated dis- 
 like and ambition flash out in glances like the breaking forth 
 of hidden flames. Let two schoolfellows meet after twenty 
 years, the rich man will avoid the poor ; he does not recognize 
 him, he is afraid even to glance into the gulf which Fate has 
 set between him and the friend of other years. The one 
 has been borne through life on the mettlesome steed called 
 Fortune, or wafted on the golden clouds of success ; the 
 other has been making his way in underground Paris through 
 the sewers, and bears the marks of his career upon him. 
 How many a chum of old days turned aside at the sight 
 of the doctor's greatcoat and waistcoat ! 
 
 With this explanation, it should be easy to understand 
 how Dr. Poulain came to lend himself so readily to the farce 
 of La Cibot's illness and recovery. Greed of every kind, 
 ambition of every nature, is not easy to hide. The doctor 
 examined his patient, found that every organ was sound 
 and healthy, admired the regularity of her pulse and the 
 perfect ease of her movements ; and as she continued to moan 
 aloud, he saw that for some reason she found it convenient 
 to lie at Death's door. The speedy cure of a serious imag- 
 inary disease was sure to cause a sensation in the neighbor- 
 hood; the doctor would be talked about. He made up his 
 mind at once. He talked of rupture and of taking it in 
 time, and thought even worse of the case than La Cibot 
 herself. The portress was plied with various remedies, and 
 finally underwent a sham operation, crowned with complete 
 success. Poulain repaired to the Arsenal Library, looked 
 out a grotesque case in some of Desplein's records of ex- 
 traordinary cures, and fitted the details to Mme. Cibot, 
 modestly attributing the success of the treatment to the great
 
 156 COUSIN PONS 
 
 surgeon, In whose steps (he said) he walked. Such is the 
 impudence of beginners in Paris. Everything is made to 
 serve as a ladder by which to climb upon the scene ; and as 
 everything, even the rungs of a ladder, will wear out in time, 
 the new members of every profession are at a loss to find the 
 right sort of wood of which to make steps for themselves. 
 
 There are moments when the Parisian is not propitious. 
 He grows tired of raising pedestals, pouts like a spoiled child, 
 and will have no more idols ; or, to state it more accurately, 
 Paris cannot always find a proper object for infatuation. 
 Now and then the vein of genius gives out, and at such times 
 the Parisian may turn supercilious ; he is not always willing 
 to bow down and gild mediocrity. 
 
 Mme. Cibot, entering in her usual unceremonious fashion, 
 found the doctor and his mother at table, before a bowl of 
 lamb's lettuce, the cheapest of all salad-stuffs. The dessert 
 consisted of a thin wedge of Brie cheese flanked by a plate 
 of specked foreign apples and a dish of mixed dry fruits, 
 known as quatre-mendiants, in which the raisin-stalks were 
 abundantly conspicuous. 
 
 " You can stay, mother," said the doctor, laying a hand 
 on Mme. Poulain's arm ; " this is Mme. Cibot, of whom I 
 have told you." 
 
 " My respects to you, Madame, and my duty to you, sir," 
 sa,id La Cibot, taking the chair which the doctor offered. 
 "Ah! is this your mother, sir.? She is very happy to have 
 a son who has such talent ; he saved my hfe, Madame, brought 
 me back from the depths." 
 
 The widow, hearing Mme. Cibot praise her son in this 
 way, thought her a delightful woman. 
 
 "I have just come to tell you that, between ourselves, 
 poor M. Pons is doing very badly, sir, and I have something 
 to say to you about him " 
 
 " Let us go into the sitting-room," interrupted the 
 doctor, and with a significant gesture he indicated the 
 servant. 
 
 Li the sitting-room La Cibot explained her position with 
 regard to the pair of nutcrackers at very considerable length.
 
 COUSIN PONS 15T 
 
 She repeated the history of her loan with added embellish- 
 ments, and gave a full account of the immense services ren- 
 dered during the past ten years to MM. Pons and Schmucke. 
 The two old men, to aU appearance, could not exist without 
 her motherly care. She posed as an angel ; she told so many 
 lies, one after another, watering them with her tears, that 
 old Mme. Poulain was quite touched. 
 
 " You understand, my dear sir," she concluded, " that I 
 really ought to know how far I can depend on M. Pons's 
 intentions, supposing that he should die ; not that I want 
 him to die, for looking after those two innocents is my life, 
 Madame, you see ; still, when one of them is gone I shall look 
 after the other. For my own part, I was built by Nature 
 to rival mothers. Without nobody to care for, nobody to 
 take for a child, I don't know what I should do. ... So 
 if M. Poulain only would, he might do me a service for which 
 I should be very grateful ; and that is, to say a word to 
 M. Pons for me. Goodness me ! an annuity of a thousand 
 francs, is that too much, I ask you? . . . To M. 
 Schmucke it will be so much gained. — Our dear patient said 
 that he should recommend me to the German, poor man ; it 
 is his idea, no doubt, that M. Schmucke should be his heir. 
 But what is a man that cannot put two ideas together in 
 French? And besides, he would be quite capable of going 
 back to Germany, he will be in such despair over his friend's 
 death " 
 
 The doctor grew grave. " My dear Mme. Cibot," he 
 said, " this sort of thing does not in the least concern a 
 doctor. I should not be allowed to exercise my profession 
 if it was known that I interfered in the matter of my patients' 
 testamentary dispositions. The law forbids a doctor to re- 
 ceive a legacy from a patient " 
 
 " A stupid law ! What is to hinder me from dividing 
 my legacy with you? " La Cibot said immediately. 
 
 " I will go farther," said the doctor ; " my professional 
 conscience will not permit me to speak to M. Pons of his 
 death. In the first place, he is not so dangerously ill that 
 there is any need to speak of it; and in the second such 
 talk coming from me might give a shock to the system that
 
 158 COUSIN PONS 
 
 would do him real harm, and then his illness might terminate 
 fatally " 
 
 " / don't put on gloves to tell him to get his affairs in 
 order," cried Mme. Cibot, " and he is none the worse for that. 
 He is used to it. There is nothing to fear." 
 
 " Not a word more about it, my dear Mme. Cibot ! These 
 things are not within a doctor's province; it is a notary's 
 business " 
 
 " But, my dear M. Poulain, suppose that M. Pons of 
 his own accord should ask you how he is, and whether he 
 had better make his arrangements ; then, would you refuse 
 to tell him that if you want to get better it is an excellent 
 plan to set everything in order? Then you might just slip 
 in a little word for me " 
 
 " Oh, if he talks of making his will, I certainly shall not 
 dissuade him," said the doctor. 
 
 " Very well, that is settled. I came to thank you for 
 your care of me," she added, as she slipped a folded paper 
 containing three gold coins into the doctor's hands. " It 
 is all I can do at the moment. Ah ! my dear M. Poulain, 
 if I were rich, you should be rich, you that are the image 
 of Providence on earth. — Madame, you have an angel for 
 a son." 
 
 La Cibot rose to her feet, Mme. Poulain bowed amiably, 
 and the doctor went to the door with the visitor. Just then 
 a sudden, lurid gleam of light flashed across the mind of 
 this Lady Macbeth of the streets. She saw clearly that the 
 doctor was her accomplice — he had taken the fee for a sham 
 illness. 
 
 " M. Poulain," she began, " how can you refuse to say a 
 word or two to save me from want, when you helped me in 
 the affair of my accident.'' " 
 
 The doctor felt that the Devil had him by a hair, as the 
 saying is ; he felt, too, that the hair was being twisted round 
 the pitiless red claw. Startled and afraid lest he should sell 
 his honesty for such a trifle, he answered the diabolical 
 suggestion by another no less diabolical. 
 
 " Listen, my dear Mme. Cibot," he said, as he drew 
 her into his consulting-room. " I will now pay a debt
 
 COUSIN PONS 159 
 
 of gratitude that I owe you for my appointment to the 
 Mairie " 
 
 " We go shares ? " she asked briskly. 
 
 "In what?" 
 
 " In the legacy." 
 
 " You do not know me," replied Dr. Poulain, drawing 
 himself up like Valerius Publicola. " Let us have no more 
 of that. I have a friend, an old schoolfellow of mine, a 
 very intelligent young fellow; and we are so much the more 
 intimate, because our lives have fallen out very much in the 
 same way. He was studying law while I was studying medi- 
 cine; and when I was a house-student, he was engrossing 
 deeds in Maitre Couture's office. His father was a shoe- 
 maker, and mine was a breeches-maker ; he has not found 
 anyone to take much interest in his career, nor has he any 
 capital ; for, after all, capital is only to be had from 
 sympathizers. He could only afford to buy a provincial 
 connection — at Mantes — and so little do provincials under- 
 stand the Parisian intellect, that they set all sorts of intrigues 
 on foot against him." 
 
 " The wretches ! " cried La Cibot. 
 
 " Yes," said the doctor. " They combined against him 
 to such purpose, that they forced him to sell his connection 
 by misrepresenting something that he had done ; the attorney 
 for the crown interfered, he belonged to the place, and sided 
 with his fellow-townsmen. My friend's name is Fraisier. He 
 is lodged as I am, and he is even leaner and more threadbare. 
 He took refuge in our arrondissement, and is reduced to ap- 
 pear for clients in the police-court or before the magistrate. 
 He lives in the Rue de la Perle close by. Go to number 9, 
 third floor, and you will see his name on the door on the 
 landing, painted in gilt letters on a small square of red 
 leather. Fraisier makes a special point of disputes among 
 the porters, workmen, and poor folk in the arrondissement, 
 and his charges are low. He is an honest man ; for I need 
 not tell you that if he had been a scamp, he would be keep- 
 ing his carriage by now. I will call and see my friend 
 Fraisier this evening. Go to him early to-morrow ; he knows 
 M. Louchard, the bailiff; M. Tabareau, the clerk of the
 
 160 COUSIN PONS 
 
 court; and the justice of the peace, M. Vitel; and M. 
 Trognon, the notary. He is even now looked upon as one 
 of the best men of business in the Quarter. If he takes 
 charge of your interests, if you can secure him as M. Pons's 
 adviser, you will have a second self in him, you see. But do 
 not make dishonorable proposals to him, as you did just 
 now to me; he has a head on his shoulders, you will under- 
 stand each other. And as for acknowledging his services, I 
 will be your intermediary — — " 
 
 Mme. Cibot looked askance at the doctor. 
 
 " Is that the lawyer who helped Mme. Florimond the haber- 
 dasher in the Rue Vieille-du-Temple out of a fix in that 
 matter of her friend's legacy.'' " 
 
 " The very same." 
 
 " Wasn't it a shame that she did not marry him after 
 he had gained two thousand francs a year for her.? " ex- 
 claimed La Cibot. " And she thought to clear off scores 
 by making him a present of a dozen shirts and a couple of 
 dozen pocket-handkerchiefs ; an outfit, in short." 
 
 " My dear Mme. Cibot, that outfit cost a thousand francs, 
 and Fraisier was just setting up for himself in the Quarter, 
 and wanted the things very badly. And what was more, 
 she paid the bill without asking any questions. That afi^air 
 brought him clients, and now he is very busy; but in my 
 line a practice brings " 
 
 " It is only the righteous that suflPer here below," said 
 La Cibot. " Well, M. Poulain, good-day and thank you." 
 
 And herewith begins the tragedy, or, if you like to have 
 it so, a terrible comedy — the death of an old bachelor de- 
 livered over by circumstances too strong for him to the 
 rapacity and greed that gathered about his bed. And other 
 forces came to the support of rapacity and greed; there 
 was the picture collector's mania, that most intense of all 
 passions ; there was the cupidity of the Sleur Fraisier, whom 
 you shall presently behold in his den, a sight to make you 
 shudder; and lastly, there was the Auvergnat thirsting for 
 money, ready for anything — even for a crime — that should 
 bring him the capital he wanted. The first part of the story 
 serves in some sort as a prelude to this comedy in which
 
 COUSIN PONS 161 
 
 all the actors who have hitherto occupied the stage will 
 reappear. 
 
 The degradation of a word is one of those curious freaks 
 of manners upon which whole volumes of explanation might 
 be written. Write to an attorney and address him as 
 " Lawyer So-and-so," and you insult him as surely as you 
 would insult a wholesale colonial produce merchant by ad- 
 dressing your letter to " Mr. So-and-So, Grocer." There 
 are plenty of men of the world who ought to be aware, since 
 the knowledge of such subtle distinctions is their province, 
 that you cannot insult a French writer more cruelly than by 
 calling him un homme de lettres — a literary man. The word 
 monsieur is a capital example of the life and death of words. 
 Abbreviated from monseigneur, once so considerable a title, 
 and even now, in the form of sire, reserved for emperors and 
 kings, it is bestowed indifferently upon all and sundry ; 
 while the twin-word messire, which is nothing but its double 
 and equivalent, if by any chance it slips into a certificate 
 of burial, produces an outcry in the Republican papers. 
 
 Magistrates, councilors, jurisconsults, judges, barristers, 
 officers for the Crown, bailiffs, attorneys, clerks of the court, 
 procurators, solicitors, and agents of various kinds, represent 
 or misrepresent Justice. The " lawyer " and the bailiff's 
 men (commonly called " the brokers ") are the two lowest 
 rungs of the ladder. Now, the bailiflp's man is an outsider, 
 an adventitious minister of justice, appearing to see that 
 judgment is executed; he is, in fact, a kind of inferior ex- 
 ecutioner employed by the county court. But the word 
 "lawyer" (homme de loi) is a depreciatory term applied 
 to the legal profession. Consuming professional jealousy 
 finds similar disparaging epithets for fellow-travelers in 
 every walk in life, and every calling has its special insult. 
 The scorn flung into the words homm£ de loi, homme de 
 lettres, is wanting in the plural form, which may be used 
 without offense; but in Paris every profession, learned or 
 unlearned, has its omega, the individual who brings it down 
 to the level of the lowest class ; and the written law has its 
 connecting link with the custom right of the streets. There 
 are districts where the pettifogging man of business, known
 
 162 COUSIN PONS 
 
 as Lawyer So-and-so, is still to be found. M. Fraisier was 
 to the member of the Incorporated Law Society as the money- 
 lender of the Halles, offering small loans for a short period 
 at an exorbitant interest, is to the great capitalist. 
 
 Working people, strange to say, are as shy of officials 
 as of fashionable restaurants ; they take advice from irregular 
 sources as they turn into a little wineshop to drink. Each 
 rank in life finds its own level, and there abides. None but 
 a chosen few care to climb the heights, few can feel at ease 
 in the presence of their betters, or take their place among 
 them, like a Beaumarchais letting fall the watch of the great 
 lord who tried to humiliate him. And if there are few who 
 can even rise to a higher social level, those among them who 
 can throw off their swaddUng-clothes are rare and great 
 exceptions. 
 
 At six o'clock the next morning Mme. Cibot stood in the 
 Rue de la Perle ; she was making a survey of the abode of her 
 future adviser. Lawyer Fraisier. The house was one of the 
 old-fashioned kind formerly inhabited by small tradespeople 
 and citizens with small means. A cabinetmaker's shop occu- 
 pied almost the whole of the ground floor, as well as the little 
 yard behind, which was covered with his workshops and ware- 
 houses ; the small remaining space being taken up by the 
 porter's lodge and the passage entry in the middle. The 
 staircase walls were half rotten with damp and covered with 
 saltpeter to such a degree that the house seemed to be stricken 
 with leprosy. 
 
 Mme. Cibot went straight to the porter's lodge, and there 
 encountered one of the fraternity, a shoemaker, his wife, and 
 two small children, all housed in a room ten feet square, 
 lighted from the yard at the back. La Cibot mentioned her 
 profession, named herself, and spoke of her house in the Rue 
 de Normandie, and the two women were on cordial terms at 
 once. After a quarter of an hour spent in gossip while the 
 shoemaker's wife made breakfast ready for her husband and 
 the children, Mme. Cibot turned the conversation to the sub- 
 ject of the lodgers, and spoke of the lawyer. 
 
 " I have come to see him on business," she said. " One
 
 COUSIN PONS 163 
 
 of his friends, Dr. Poulain, recommended me to him. Do 
 you know Dr. Poulain.'' " 
 
 " I should think I do," said the lady of the Rue de la 
 Perle. " He saved my little girl's life when she had the 
 croup." 
 
 " He saved my life too, Madame. What sort of man is 
 this M. Fraisier.P " 
 
 " He is the sort of man, my dear lady, out of whom it 
 is very difficult to get the postage-money at the end of the 
 month." 
 
 To a person of La Cibot's intelligence this was enough. 
 
 " One may be poor and honest," observed she. 
 
 " I am sure I hope so," returned Fraisier's portress. " We 
 are not rolling in coppers, let alone gold or silver ; but we 
 have not a farthing belonging to anybody else." 
 
 This sort of talk sounded familiar to La Cibot. 
 
 " In short, one can trust him, child, eh.'' " 
 
 " Lord ! when M. Fraisier means well by anyone, there is 
 not his like, so I have heard Mme. Florimond say." 
 
 " And why didn't she marry him when she owed her for- 
 tune to him.!' " La Cibot asked quickly. " It is something 
 for a little haberdasher, kept by an old man, to be a barris- 
 ter's wife " 
 
 " Why ? " asked the portress, bringing Mme. Cibot 
 
 out into the passage. " Why ? You are going up 
 
 to see him, are you not, Madame.? — Very well, when you are 
 in his office you will know why." 
 
 From the state of the staircase, lighted by sash-windows 
 on the side of the yard, it was pretty evident that the inmates 
 of the house, with the exception of the landlord and M. 
 Fraisier himself, were all workmen. There were traces of vari- 
 ous crafts in the deposit of mud upon the steps — brass-filings, 
 broken buttons, scraps of gauze, and esparto grass lay 
 scattered about. The walls of the upper stories were cov- 
 ered with apprentices' ribald scrawls and caricatures. The 
 portress's last remark had roused La Cibot's curiosity ; she 
 decided, not unnaturally, that she would consult Dr. Poulain's 
 friend ; but as for employing him, that must depend upon 
 her impressions.
 
 164, COUSIN PONS 
 
 " I sometimes wonder how Mme. Sauvage can stop in 
 his service," said the portress, bj way of comment; she 
 was following in Mme. Cibot's wake. " I will come up with 
 you, Madame," she added ; " I am taking the milk and the 
 newspaper up to my landlord." 
 
 Arrived on the second floor above the entresol. La Cibot 
 beheld a door of the most villainous description. The doubt- 
 ful red paint was coated for seven or eight inches round the 
 keyhole with a filthy glaze, a grimy deposit from which 
 the modern house-decorator endeavors to protect the doors 
 of more elegant apartments by glass " finger-plates." A 
 grating, almost stopped up with some compound similar 
 to the deposit with which a restaurant-keeper gives an air 
 of cellar-bound antiquity to a merely middle-aged bottle, 
 only served to heighten the general resemblance to a prison 
 door; a resemblance further heightened by the trefoil-shaped 
 ironwork, the formidable hinges, the clumsy nail-heads. A 
 miser, or a pamphleteer at strife with the world at large, 
 must surely have invented these fortifications. A leaden 
 sink, which received the waste water of the household, con- 
 tributed its quota to the fetid atmosphere of the staircase, 
 and the ceiling was covered with fantastic arabesques traced 
 by candle-smoke — such arabesques ! On pulling a greasy 
 acorn tassel attached to the bell-rope, a little bell jangled 
 feebly somewhere within, complaining of the fissure in its 
 metal sides. 
 
 Every detail was in keeping with the general dismal effect. 
 La Cibot heard a heavy footstep, and the asthmatic wheezing 
 of a virago within, and Mme. Sauvage presently showed her- 
 self. Adrien Brauwer might have painted just such a hag 
 for his picture of Witches Starting for the Sabbath; a stout, 
 unwholesome slattern, five feet six inches in height, with a 
 grenadier countenance and a beard which far surpasssed La 
 Cibot's own ; she wore a cheap, hideously ugly cotton gown, 
 a bandanna handkerchief knotted over hair which she still 
 continued to put in curl-papers (using for that purpose the 
 printed circulars which her master received), and a huge 
 pair of gold earrings like cart-wheels in her ears. This 
 female Cerberus carried a battered skillet in one hand, and
 
 COUSIN PONS 166 
 
 opening the door, set free an imprisoned odor of scorched 
 milk — a nauseous and penetrating smell, that lost itself at 
 once, however, among the fumes outside. 
 
 " What can I do for you, missus ? " demanded Mme. 
 Sauvage, and with a truculent air she looked La Cibot 
 over; evidently she was of the opinion that the visitor was 
 too well dressed, and her eyes looked the more murderous 
 because they were naturally bloodshot. 
 
 " I have come to see M. Fraisier ; his friend. Dr. Poulain, 
 sent me." 
 
 " Oh ! come in, missus," said La Sauvage, groAvn very 
 amiable all of a sudden, which proves that she was prepared 
 for this morning visit. 
 
 With a sweeping courtesy, the stalwart woman flung open 
 the door of a private office, which looked upon the street, 
 and discovered the ex-attorney of Mantes. 
 
 The room was a complete picture of a third-rate solicitor's 
 office ; with the stained wooden cases, the letter-files so old 
 that they had grown beards (in ecclesiastical language), 
 the red tape dangling limp and dejected, the pasteboard 
 boxes covered with traces of the gambols of mice, the dirty 
 floor, the ceiling tawny with smoke. A frugal allowance 
 of wood was smoldering on a couple of fire-dogs on the 
 hearth. And on the chimney-piece above stood a foggy 
 mirror and a modern clock with an inlaid wooden case; 
 Fraisier had picked it up at an execution sale, together with 
 the tawdry imitation rococo candlesticks, with the zinc be- 
 neath showing through the lacquer in several places. 
 
 M. Fraisier was small, thin, and unwholesome-looking; his 
 red face, covered with an eruption, told of tainted blood; 
 and he had, moreover, a trick of continually scratching his 
 right arm. A wig pushed to the back of his head displayed 
 a brick-colored cranium of ominous conformation. This 
 person rose from a cane-seated armchair, in which he sat 
 on a green leather cushion, assumed an agreeable expression, 
 and brought forward a chair. 
 
 "Mme. Cibot, I believe?" queried he, in dulcet tones. 
 
 " Yes, sir," answered the portress. She had lost her 
 habitual assurance.
 
 166 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Something in the tones of a voice which strongly resembled 
 the sounds of the Httle door-bell, something in a glance even 
 sharper than the sharp green eyes of her future legal ad- 
 viser, scared Mme. Cibot. Fraisier's presence so pervaded 
 the room, that anyone might have thought there was pesti- 
 lence in the air ; and in a flash Mme. Cibot understood why 
 Mme. Florimond had not become Mme. Fraisier. 
 
 " Poulain told me about you, my dear Madame," said the 
 lawyer, in the unnatural fashion commonly described by the 
 words " mincing tones " ; tones sharp, thin, and grating as 
 verjuice, in spite of all his efforts. 
 
 Arrived at this point, he tried to draw the skirts of his 
 dressing-gown over a pair of angular knees encased in 
 threadbare felt. The robe was an ancient printed cotton 
 garment, lined with wadding which took the liberty of pro- 
 truding itself through various slits in it here and there; the 
 weight of this lining had pulled the skirts aside, disclosing 
 a dingy-hued flannel waistcoat beneath. With something 
 of a coxcomb's manner, Fraisier fastened this refractory 
 article of dress, tightening the girdle to define his reedy 
 figure ; then with a blow of the tongs, he effected a recon- 
 ciliation between two burning brands that had long avoided 
 one another, like brothers after a family quarrel. A sudden 
 bright idea struck him, and he rose from his chair. 
 
 " Mme. Sauvage ! " called he. 
 
 "Well?" 
 
 " I am not at home to anybody ! " 
 
 " Eh ! bless your life, there's no need to say that ! " 
 
 " She is my old nurse," the lawyer said in some confusion. 
 
 " And she has not recovered her figure yet," remarked 
 the heroine of the Halles. 
 
 Fraisier laughed, and drew the bolt lest his housekeeper 
 should interrupt Mme. Cibot's confidences. 
 
 " Well, Madame, explain your business," said he, making 
 another effort to drape himself in the dressing-gown. " Any- 
 one recommended to me by the only friend I have in the world 
 may count upon me — I may say — absolutely." 
 
 For half an hour Mme. Cibot talked, and the man of 
 law made no interruption of any sort; his face wore the
 
 COUSIN PONS 167 
 
 expression of curious Interest with which a young soldier 
 listens to a pensioner of " The Old Guard." Fraisier's silence 
 and acquiescence, the rapt attention with which he appeared 
 to listen to a torrent of gossip similar to the samples pre- 
 viously given, dispelled some of the prejudices inspired in 
 La Cibot's mind by his squalid surroundings. The little 
 lawyer with the black-speckled green eyes was in reality mak- 
 ing a study of his client. When at length she came to a 
 stand and looked to him to speak, he was seized with a fit 
 of the complaint known as a " churchyard cough," and had 
 recourse to an earthenware basin half full of herb tea, which 
 he drained. 
 
 " But for Poulain, my dear Madame, I should have been 
 dead before this," said Fraisier, by way of answer to the 
 portress's looks of motherly compassion ; " but he will bring 
 me round, he says " 
 
 As all the client's confidences appeared to have slipped 
 from the memory of her legal adviser, she began to cast 
 about for a way of taking leave of a man so apparently 
 near death. 
 
 " In an affair of this kind, Madame," continued the attor- 
 ney from Mantes, suddenly returning to business, " there are 
 two things which it is most important to know. In the 
 first place, whether the property is sufficient to be worth 
 troubling about ; and in the second, who the next-of-kin 
 may be; for if the property is the booty, the next-of-kin is 
 the enemy." 
 
 La Cibot immediately began to talk of Remonencq and 
 Elie Magus, and said that the shrewd couple valued the 
 pictures at six hundred thousand francs. 
 
 " Would they take them themselves at that price ? " In- 
 quired the lawyer. " You see, Madame, that men of business 
 are shy of pictures. A picture may mean a piece of canvas 
 worth a couple of francs or a painting worth two hundred 
 thousand. Now paintings worth two hundred thousand 
 francs are usually well known; and what errors in judgment 
 people make in estimating even the most famous pictures 
 of all ! There was once a great capitalist whose collection 
 was admired, visited, and engraved — actually engraved ! He
 
 168 COUSIN PONS 
 
 was supposed to have spent millions of francs on it. He 
 died, as men must ; and — well, his genuine pictures did not 
 fetch more than two hundred thousand francs! You must 
 let me see these gentlemen. — Now for the next-of-kin," and 
 Fraisier again relapsed into his attitude of listener. 
 
 When President Camusot's name came up, he nodded with 
 a grimace which riveted Mme. Cibot's attention. She tried 
 to read the forehead and the villainous face, and found what 
 is called in business a " wooden head." 
 
 " Yes, my dear sir," repeated La Cibot. " Yes, my M. 
 Pons is own cousin to President Camusot de Marville ; he tells 
 me that ten times a day. M. Camusot the silk mercer was 
 married twice " 
 
 " He that has just been nominated for a peer of 
 France .? " 
 
 " — ^And his first wife was a Mile. Pons, M. Pons's first 
 cousin." 
 
 " Then they are first cousins once removed " 
 
 " They are ' not cousins.' They have quarreled." 
 
 It may be remembered that before M. Camusot de Mar- 
 ville came to Paris, he was President of the Tribunal of 
 Mantes for five years; and not only was his name still 
 remembered there, but he had kept up a correspondence 
 with Mantes. Camusot's immediate successor, the judge 
 with whom he had been most intimate during his term of 
 office, was still President of the Tribunal, and consequently 
 knew all about Fraisier. 
 
 " Do you know, Madame," Fraisier said, when at last the 
 red sluices of La Cibot's torrent tongue were closed, " do 
 you know that your principal enemy will be a man who can 
 send you to the scaffold.'' " 
 
 The portress started on her chair, making a sudden spring 
 like a jack-in-the-box. 
 
 " Calm yourself, dear Madame," continued Fraisier. 
 " You may not have known the name of the President of 
 the Chamber of Indictments at the Court of Appeal in 
 Paris ; but you ought to have known that M. Pons must 
 have an heir-at-law. M. le President de Marville is your 
 invalid's sole heir; but as he is a collateral in the third
 
 COUSIN PONS 169 
 
 degree, M. Pons is entitled by law to leave Ms fortune 
 as he pleases. You are not aware either that, six weeks 
 ago at least, M. le President's daughter married the eldest 
 son of M. le Comte Popinot, peer of France, once Minister 
 of Agriculture, and President of the Board of Trade, one 
 of the most influential politicians of the day. President de 
 Marville is even more formidable through this marriage than 
 in his own quality of head of the Court of Assize." 
 
 At that word La Cibot shuddered. 
 
 " Yes, and it is he who sends you there," continued Fraisier. 
 " Ah ! my dear Madame, you little know what a red robe 
 means ! It is bad enough to have a plain black gown against 
 you! You see me here, ruined, bald, broken in health — all 
 because, unwittingly, I crossed a mere attorney for the 
 crown in the provinces. I was forced to sell my connection 
 at a loss, and very lucky I was to come off with the loss 
 of my money. If I had tried to stand out, my professional 
 position would have gone as well. 
 
 " One thing more you do not know," he continued, " and 
 this it is. If you had only to do with President Camusot 
 himself, it would be nothing ; but he has a wife, mind you ! — 
 and if you ever find yourself face to face with that wife, 
 you will shake in your shoes as if you were on the first step 
 of the scaffold, your hair will stand on end. The Presidente 
 is so vindictive that she would spend ten years over setting 
 a trap to kill you. She sets that husband of hers spinning 
 like a top. Through her a charming young fellow com- 
 mitted suicide at the Conciergerie. A count was accused of 
 forgery — she made his character as white as snow. She all 
 but drove a person of the highest quahty from the Court of 
 Charles X. Finally, she displaced the Attorney-General, M. 
 de Granville " 
 
 " That lived in the Rue Vieillt^du-Temple, at the corner 
 of the Rue Saint-Fran9ois? " 
 
 " The very same. They say that she means to make 
 her husband Home Secretary, and I do not know that she 
 will not gain her end. — If she were to take it into her head 
 to send us both to the Criminal Court first and the hulks 
 afterwards — I should apply for a passport and set sail for
 
 170 COUSIN PONS 
 
 America, though I am as innocent as a newborn babe. So 
 well I know what justice means. Now, see here, my dear 
 Mme. Cibot ; to marry her only daughter to young Vicomte 
 Popinot (heir to M. Pillerault, your landlord, it is said) — 
 to make that match, she stripped herself of her whole fortune, 
 so much so that the President and his wife have nothing at 
 this moment except his official salary. Can you suppose, 
 my dear Madame, that under the circumstances Mme. la 
 Presidente will let M. Pons's property go out of the family 
 without a word.'' — ^Why, I would sooner face guns loaded 
 with grape-shot than have such a woman for my enemy " 
 
 " But they have quarreled,'' put in La Cibot. 
 
 "What has that to do with it?" asked Fraisier. "It 
 is one reason the more for fearing her. To kill a relative 
 of whom you are tired, is something; but to inherit his 
 property afterwards — that is a real pleasure ! " 
 
 " But the old gentleman has a horror of his relatives. 
 He says over and over again that these people — M. Cardot, 
 M. Berthier, and the rest of them (I can remember their 
 names) — have crushed him as a tumbril cart crushes an 
 
 " Have you a mind to be crushed too ? " 
 
 " Oh dear ! oh dear ! " cried La Cibot. " Ah ! Ma'am 
 Fontaine was right when she said that I should meet with 
 difficulties : still, she said that I should succeed " 
 
 " Listen, my dear Mme. Cibot. — As for making some thirty 
 thousand francs out of this business — that is possible; but 
 for the whole of the property, it is useless to think of it. 
 We talked over your case yesterday evening. Dr. Poulain 
 and I " 
 
 La Cibot started again. 
 
 " Well, what is the matter.? " 
 
 " But if you knew about the affair, why did you let me 
 chatter away like a magpie?" 
 
 " Mme. Cibot, I knew all about your business, but I knew 
 nothing of Mme. Cibot. So many clients, so many char- 
 acters " 
 
 Mme. Cibot gave her legal adviser a queer look at this ; 
 all her suspicions gleamed in her eyes. Fraisier saw this.
 
 COUSIN PONS 171 
 
 *' I resume," he continued. " So our friend Poulain was 
 once called in bj you to attend old M. Pillerault, the Countess 
 Popinot's great-uncle ; that is one of your claims to my 
 devotion. Poulain goes to see your landlord (mark this!) 
 once a fortnight ; he learned all these particulars from him. 
 M. Pillerault was present at his grand-nephew's wedding — 
 for he is an uncle with money to leave ; he has an income 
 of fifteen thousand francs, though he has lived like a hermit 
 for the last five-and-twenty years, and scarcely spends a 
 thousand crowns — well, he told Poulain all about this 
 marriage. It seems that your old musician was pre- 
 cisely the cause of the row ; he tried to disgrace his own 
 family by way of revenge. — If you only hear one bell, you 
 only hear one sound. — Your invahd says that he meant no 
 harm, but everybody thinks him a monster of " 
 
 " And it would not astonish me if he was ! " cried La Cibot. 
 " Just imagine it ! — For these ten years past I have been 
 money out of pocket for him, spending my savings on him, 
 and he knows it, and yet he will not let me lie down to sleep 
 on a legacy ! — No, sir ! he will not. He is obstinate, a regular 
 mule he is. — I have talked to him these ten days, and the cross- 
 grained cur won't stir no more than a sign-post. He shuts 
 
 his teeth and looks at me like The most that he would 
 
 say was that he would recommend me to M. Schmucke." 
 
 " Then he means to make his will in favor of this 
 Schmucke? " 
 
 " Everything will go to him " 
 
 "Listen, my dear Mme. Cibot: if I am to arrive at any 
 definite conclusions and think of a plan, I must know M. 
 Schmucke. I must see the property and have some talk 
 with this Jew of whom you speak; and then, let me direct 
 you " 
 
 "We shall see, M. Fraisier." 
 
 " What is this ? * We shall see ' ? " repeated Fraisier, 
 speaking in the voice natural to him, as he gave La Cibot 
 a viperous glance. " Am I your legal adviser or am I not, 
 I say.f* Let us know exactly where we stand." 
 
 La Cibot felt that he read her thoughts. A cold chill 
 ran down her back.
 
 172 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " I have told you all I know," she said. She saw that 
 she was at the tiger's mercy. 
 
 *' We attorneys are accustomed to treachery. Just think 
 carefully over your position ; it is superb. — If you follow 
 my advice point by point, you will have thirty or forty 
 thousand francs. But there is a reverse side to this beautiful 
 medal. How if the Presidente comes to hear that M. Pons's 
 property is worth a million of francs, and that you mean 
 to have a bite out of it? — for there is always somebody 
 ready to take that kind of errand " he added paren- 
 thetically. 
 
 This remark, and the little pause that came before and 
 after it, sent another shudder through La Cibot. She thought 
 at once that Fraisier himself would probably undertake that 
 office. 
 
 " And then, my dear client, in ten minutes old Pillerault 
 is asked to dismiss you, and then on a couple of hours' 
 notice " 
 
 "What does that matter to me?" said La Cibot, rising 
 to her feet like a Bellona ; " I shall stay with the gentlemen 
 as their housekeeper." 
 
 " And then, a trap will be set for you, and some fine 
 morning you and your husband will wake up in a prison 
 cell, to be tried for your lives " 
 
 " /? " cried La Cibot, " I that have not a farthing that 
 doesn't belong to me. . . . I! . . . I! " 
 
 For five minutes she held forth, and Fraisier watched the 
 great artist before him as she executed a concerto of self- 
 praise. He was quite untouched, and even amused by the 
 performance. His keen glances pricked La Cibot like sti- 
 lettos ; he chuckled inwardly, till his shrunken wig was 
 shaking with laughter. He was a Robespierre at an age 
 when the Sylla of France was still making couplets. 
 
 "And how? And why? And on what pretext?" de- 
 manded she, when she came to an end. 
 
 "You wish to know how you may come to the guillotine? " 
 
 La Cibot turned pale as death at the words ; the words 
 fell like the knife upon her neck. She stared wildly at 
 Fraisier.
 
 COUSIN PONS 17^ 
 
 " Listen to me, my dear child," began Fraisier, suppress- 
 ing his inward satisfaction at his client's discomfiture. 
 
 "I would sooner leave things as they are " murmured 
 
 La Cibot, and she rose to go. 
 
 " Stay," Fraisier said imperiously. " You ought to know 
 the risks that you are running; I am bound to give you 
 the benefit of my lights. — You are dismissed by M. Pillerault, 
 we will say; there is no doubt about that, is there? You 
 enter the service of these two gentlemen. Very good ! That 
 is a declaration of war against the Presidente. You mean 
 to do everything you can to gain possession of the property, 
 and to get a slice out of it at any rate 
 
 " Oh, I am not blaming you," Fraisier continued, in answer 
 to a gesture from his client. " It is not my place to do so» 
 This is a battle, and j-ou will be led on further than you 
 think for. One grows full of one's idea, one hits hard " 
 
 Another gesture of denial. This time La Cibot tossed 
 her head. 
 
 " There, there, old lady," said Fraisier, with odious famil- 
 iarity, " you will go a very long way ! " 
 
 "You take me for a thief, I suppose?" 
 
 " Come, now. Mamma, you hold a receipt in M. Schmucke's 
 hand which did not cost you much. — Ah! you are in the 
 confessional, my lady. Don't deceive your confessor, espe- 
 cially when the confessor has the power of reading your 
 thoughts." 
 
 La Cibot was dismayed by the man's perspicacity; now 
 she knew why he had listened to her so intently. 
 
 " Very good," continued he, " you can admit at once 
 that the Presidente will not allow you to pass her in the 
 race for the property. — ^You will be watched and spied upon. 
 — You get your name into M. Pons's will; nothing could be 
 better. But some fine day the law steps in, arsenic is found 
 in a glass, and you and your husband are arrested, tried, 
 and condemned for attempting the life of the Sieur Pons, 
 so as to come by your legacy. I once defended a poor 
 woman at Versailles ; she was in reality as innocent as you 
 would be in such a case. Things were as I have told you, 
 and all that I could do was to save her life. The unhappy
 
 174 COUSIN PONS 
 
 creature was sentenced to twenty years' penal servitude. 
 She is working out her time now at St. Lazare." 
 
 Mme. Cibot's terror grew to the highest pitch. She grew 
 paler and paler, staring at the little, thin man with the 
 green eyes, as some wretched Moor, accused of adhering to 
 her own religion, might gaze at the inquisitor who doomed 
 her to the stake. 
 
 " Then do you tell me, that if I leave you to act, and 
 put my interests in your hands, I shall get something with- 
 out fear.? " 
 
 " I guarantee you thirty thousand francs," said Fraisier, 
 speaking like a man sure of the fact. 
 
 " After all, you know how fond I am of dear Dr. Poulain," 
 she began again in her most coaxing tones ; " he told me 
 to come to you, worthy man, and he did not send me here 
 to be told that I shall be guillotined for poisoning someone." 
 
 The thought of the guillotine so moved her that she burst 
 into tears, her nerves were shaken, terror clutched at her 
 heart, she lost her head. Fraisier gloated over his triumph. 
 When he saw his client hesitate, he thought that he had lost 
 his chance ; he had set himself to frighten and quell La Cibot 
 till she was completely in his power, bound hand and foot. 
 She had walked into his study as a fly walks into a spider's 
 web ; there she was doomed to remain, entangled in the toils 
 of the httle lawyer who meant to feed upon her. Out of 
 this bit of business, indeed, Fraisier meant to gain the living 
 of old days ; comfort, competence, and consideration. He 
 and his friend Dr. Poulain had spent the whole previous 
 evening in a microscopic examination of the case ; they had 
 made mature deliberations. The doctor described Schmucke 
 for his friend's benefit, and the alert pair had plumbed all 
 hypotheses and scrutinized all risks and resources, till Fraisier, 
 exultant, cried aloud, " Both our fortunes lie in this ! " He 
 had gone so far as to promise Poulain a hospital, and as 
 for himself, he meant to be justice of the peace of an 
 arrondissement. 
 
 To be a justice of the peace! For this man with his 
 abundant capacity, for this doctor of law without a pair of 
 socks to his name, the dream was a hippogriff so restive,
 
 COUSIN PONS 175 
 
 that he thought of it as a deputy-advocate thinks of the 
 silk gown, as an Italian priest thinks of the tiara. It was 
 indeed a wild dream! 
 
 M. Vitel, the justice of the peace before whom Fraisier 
 pleaded, was a man of sixty-nine, in failing health ; he 
 talked of retiring on a pension ; and Fraisier used to talk 
 with Poulain of succeeding him, much as Poulain talked 
 of saving the life of some rich heiress and marrying her 
 afterwards. No one knows how greedily every post in the 
 gift of authority is sought after in Paris. Everyone wants 
 to live in Paris. If a stamp or tobacco license falls in, a 
 hundred women rise up as one and stir all their friends to 
 obtain it. Any vacancy in the ranks of the twenty-four 
 collectors of taxes sends a flood of ambitious folk surging 
 in upon the Chamber of Deputies. Decisions are made in 
 committee, all appointments are made by the Government. 
 Now the salary of a justice of the peace, the lowest stipend- 
 iary magistrate in Paris, is about six thousand francs. The 
 post of registrar to the court is worth a hundred thousand 
 francs. Few places are more coveted in the administration. 
 Fraisier, as a justice of the peace, with the head physician 
 of a hospital for his friend, would make a rich marriage 
 himself and a good match for Dr. Poulain. Each would 
 lend a hand to each. 
 
 Night set its leaden seal upon the plans made by the 
 sometime attorney of Mantes, and a formidable scheme 
 sprouted up, a flourishing scheme, fertile in harvests of gain 
 and intrigue. La Cibot was the hinge upon which the whole 
 matter turned ; and for this reason, any rebellion on the 
 part of the instrument must be at once put down ; such action 
 on her part was quite unexpected ; but Fraisier had put forth 
 all the strength of his rancorous nature, and the audacious 
 portress lay trampled under his feet. 
 
 " Come, reassure yourself, my dear Madame," he re- 
 marked, holding out his hand. The touch of the cold serpent- 
 like skin made a terrible impression upon the portress. It 
 brought about something like a physical reaction, which 
 checked her emotion ; Mme. Fontaine's toad, Astaroth, seemed 
 to her to be less deadly than this poison-sac that wore a
 
 176 COUSIN PONS 
 
 sandy wig and spoke in tones like the creaking of a 
 hinge. 
 
 " Do not imagine that I am frightening you to no pur- 
 pose," Fraisier continued. (La Cibot's feeling of repulsion 
 had not escaped him. ) " The affairs which made Mme. 
 la Presidente's dreadful reputation are so well known at the 
 law-courts, that you can make inquiries there if you like. 
 The great person who was ail but sent into a lunatic asylum 
 was the Marquis d'Espard. The Marquis d'Escrignon was 
 saved from the hulks. The handsome young man with wealth 
 and a great future before him, who was to have married 
 a daughter of one of the first families of France, and hanged 
 himself in a cell of the Conciergerie, was the celebrated Lucien 
 de Rubempre ; the affair made a great deal of noise in Paris 
 at the time. That was a question of a will. His mistress, 
 the notorious Esther, died and left him several millions, 
 and they accused the young fellow of poisoning her. He 
 was not even in Paris at the time of her death, nor did he 
 so much as know that the woman had left the money to 
 him ! — One cannot well be more innocent than that ! Well, 
 after M. Camusot examined him, he hanged himself in his 
 cell. Law, like medicine, has its victims. In the first case, 
 one man suffers for the many, and in the second, he dies 
 for science," he added, and an ugly smile stole over his lips. 
 " Well, I know the risks myself, you see ; poor and obscure 
 little attorney as I am, the law has been the ruin of me. 
 My experience was dearly bought — it is all at your service." 
 
 " Thank you, no," said La Cibot ; " I will have nothing 
 to do with it, upon my word ! . . . I shall have nourished 
 ingratitude, that is all! I want nothing but my due; I 
 have thirty years of honesty behind me, sir. M. Pons says 
 that he will recommend me to his friend Schmucke; well and 
 good, I shall end my days in peace with the German, good 
 man." 
 
 Fraisier had overshot his mark. He had discouraged La 
 Cibot. Now he was obliged to remove these unpleasant im- 
 pressions. 
 
 " Do not let us give up," he said ; *' just go away quietly 
 home. Come, now, we will steer the affair to a good end."
 
 and- 
 
 COUSIN PONS 177 
 
 But what about ray rentes, what am I to do to get them, 
 
 And feel no remorse ? " he interrupted quickly. " Eh ! 
 it is precisely for that that men of business were invented ; 
 unless you keep within the law, you get nothing. You know 
 nothing of law ; I know a good deal. I will see that you keep 
 on the right side of it, and you can hold your own in all 
 men's sight. As for your conscience, that is your own 
 affair." 
 
 " Very well, tell me how to do it," returned La Cibot, 
 curious and delighted. 
 
 " I do not know how yet. I have not looked at the strong 
 points of the case yet ; I have been busy with the obstacles. 
 But the first thing to be done is to urge him to make a will ; 
 you cannot go wrong over that ; and find out, first of all, 
 how Pons means to leave his fortune; for if you were his 
 heir " 
 
 " No, no ; he does not like me. Ah ! if I had but known 
 the value of his gimcracks, and if I had known what I know 
 now about his amours, I should be easy in my mind this 
 day " 
 
 " Keep on, in fact," broke in Fraisier. " Dying folk have 
 queer fancies, my dear Madame; they disappoint hopes 
 many a time. Let him make his will, and then we shall see. 
 And of all things, the property must be valued. So I must 
 see this Remonencq and the Jew; they will be very useful 
 to us. Put entire confidence in me, I am at your disposal. 
 When a client is a friend to me, I am his friend through 
 thick and thin. Friend or enemy, that is my character." 
 
 "Very well," said La Cibot, "I am yours entirely; and 
 as for fees, M. Poulain " 
 
 " Let us say nothing about that," said Fraisier. " Think 
 how you can keep Poulain at the bedside; he is one of the 
 most upright and conscientious men I know; and, you see, 
 we want someone there whom we can trust. Poulain would 
 do better than I ; I have lost my character." 
 
 "You look as if you had," said La Cibot; "but, for my 
 own part, I should trust you." 
 
 *' And you would do well. Come to see me whenever any-
 
 178 COUSIN PONS 
 
 thing happens, and — ^there — ^you are an intelligent woman; 
 all will go well." 
 
 " Good-day, M. Fraisier. I hope you will recover your 
 health. Your servant, sir." 
 
 Fraisier went to the door with his client. But this time 
 it was he, and not La Cibot, who was struck with an idea 
 en the threshold. 
 
 " If you could persuade M. Pons to call me in, it would 
 be a great step." 
 
 " I will try," said La Cibot. 
 
 Fraisier drew her back into his sanctum. " Look here, 
 old lady, I know M. Trognon, the notary of tlie quarter, 
 very well. If M. Pons has not a notary, mention M. Trognon 
 to him. Make him take M. Trognon " 
 
 "Right," returned La Cibot. 
 
 And as she came out again she heard the rustle of a dress 
 and the sound of a stealthy, heavy footstep. 
 
 Out in the street and by herself, Mme. Cibot to some 
 extent recovered her liberty of mind as she walked. Though 
 the influence of the conversation was still upon her, and 
 she had always stood in dread of scaffolds, justice, and 
 judges, she took a very natural resolution, which was to bring 
 about a conflict of strategy between her and her formidable 
 legal adviser. 
 
 " What do I want with other folk ? " said she to herself. 
 " Let us make a round sum, and afterwards I will take all 
 that they offer me to push their interests ; " and this thought, 
 as will shortly be seen, hastened the poor old musician's 
 end. 
 
 " Well, dear M. Schmucke, and how is our dear, adored 
 patient.'' " asked La Cibot, as she came into the room. 
 
 " Fery pad ; Bons haf peen vandering all der night." 
 
 " Then what did he say? " 
 
 " Chust nonsense. He vould dot I haf all his fortune, 
 on kondition dot I sell nodings. — Den he cried ! Boor mann ! 
 It made me ver' sad." 
 
 " Never mind, honey," returned the portress. " I have 
 kept you waiting for your breakfast ; it is nine o'clock and
 
 COUSIN PONS 179 
 
 past ; but don't scold me. I have business on hand, you see, 
 business of yours. Here are we without any money, and I 
 have been out to get some." 
 
 " Vere ? " asked Schmucke. 
 
 " Of my uncle." 
 
 " Onkel.? " 
 
 " Up the spout." 
 
 "Shpout.?" 
 
 " Oh ! the dear man ! how simple he is ! No, you are a 
 saint, a love, an archbishop of innocence, a man that ought 
 to be stuffed, as the old actor said. What! you have lived 
 in Paris for twenty-nine years ; you saw the Revolution of 
 July, you did, and you have never so much as heard tell of 
 a pawnbroker — a man that lends you money on your things ? 
 — I have been pawning our silver spoons and forks, eight of 
 them, thread pattern. Pooh, Cibot can eat his victuals with 
 German silver ; it is quite the fashion now, they say. It is 
 not worth while to say anything to our angel there; it would 
 upset him and make him yellower than before, and he is 
 quite cross enough as it is. Let us get him round again 
 first, and afterwards we shall see. What must be must ; and 
 we must take things as we find them, eh? " 
 
 " Goot voman ! nople heart ! " cried poor Schmucke, with a 
 great tenderness in his face. He took La Cibot's hand and 
 clasped it to his breast. When he looked up, there were tears 
 in his eyes. 
 
 " There, that will do, Papa Schmucke ; how funny you 
 are ! This is too bad. I'm an old daughter of the people — 
 my heart is in my hand. I have something here, you see, 
 like you have, heart of gold that you are," she added, slapping 
 her chest. 
 
 " Baba Schmucke ! " continued the musician. " No. To 
 know de tepths of sorrow, to cry mit tears of blood, to mount 
 up in der hefn — dat is mein lot ! I shall not lif after 
 Bons " 
 
 " Gracious ! I am sure you won't, you are kilHng your- 
 self. — Listen, pet!" 
 
 "Bet.?" 
 
 *' Very well, my sonny "
 
 180 COUSIN PONS 
 
 "Zonny?" 
 
 " My lamb, then, if you like it better." 
 
 " It is not more clear." 
 
 " Oh, well, let me take care of you and tell you what 
 to do ; for if you go on like this, I shall have both of you 
 laid up on my hands, you see. To my little way of thinking, 
 we must do the work between us. You cannot go about Paris 
 to give lessons, for it tires you, and then you are not fit to 
 do anything afterwards, and somebody must sit up of a 
 night with M. Pons, now that he is getting worse and worse. 
 I will run round to-day to all your pupils and tell them that 
 you are ill; is it not so? And then you can spend the nights 
 with our lamb, and sleep of a morning from five o'clock till, 
 let us say, two in the afternoon. I myself will take the day, 
 the most tiring part, for there is your breakfast and dinner 
 to get ready, and the bed to make, and the things to change, 
 and the doses of medicine to give. I could not hold out for 
 another ten days at this rate. It is a month and more al- 
 ready since I have been like this. What would become of 
 you if I were to fall ill.'* And you yourself, it makes one 
 shudder to see you ; just look at yourself, after sitting up 
 with him last night ! " 
 
 She drew Schmucke to the glass, and Schmucke thought 
 that there was a great change. 
 
 " So, if you are of my mind, I'll have your breakfast ready 
 in a jiffy. Then you will look after our poor dear again 
 till two o'clock. Let me have a list of your people, and I 
 will soon arrange it. You will be free for a fortnight. You 
 can go to bed when I come in, and sleep till night." 
 
 So prudent did the proposition seem, that Schmucke then 
 and there agreed to it. 
 
 " Not a word to M. Pons ; he would think it was all over 
 with him, you know, if we were to tell him in this way that 
 his engagement at the theater and his lessons are put off. He 
 would be thinking that he should not find his pupils again, 
 poor gentleman — stuff and nonsense ! M. Poulain says that 
 we shall save our Benjamin if we keep him as quiet as 
 possible." 
 
 " Ach ! fery goot ! Pring up der preakf ast ; I shall make
 
 COUSIN PONS 181 
 
 der bett, and gif you die attresses ! — You are right ; it vould 
 pe too much for me." 
 
 An hour later La Cibot, in her Sunday clothes, departed in 
 great state, to the no small astonishment of the Remonencqs ; 
 she promised herself that she would support the character of 
 confidential servant of the pair of nutcrackers, in the board- 
 ing-schools and private families in which they gave music- 
 lessons. 
 
 It is needless to repeat all the gossip in which La Cibot 
 indulged on her round. The members of every family, the 
 head-mistress of every boarding-school, were treated to a 
 variation upon the theme of Pons's illness. A single scene, 
 which took place in the Illustrious Gaudissart's private room, 
 will give sufficient idea of the rest. La Cibot met with 
 unheard-of difficulties, but she succeeded in penetrating at 
 last to the presence. Kings and cabinet ministers are less 
 difficult of access than the manager of a theater in Paris ; 
 nor is it hard to understand why such prodigious barriers 
 are raised between them and ordinary mortals : a king has 
 only to defend himself from ambition; the manager of a 
 theater has reason to dread the wounded vanity of actors 
 and authors. 
 
 La Cibot, however, struck up an acquaintance with the 
 portress, and traversed all distances in a brief space. There 
 is a sort of freemasonry among the porter tribe, and, indeed, 
 among the members of every profession ; for each calling has 
 its shibboleth, as well as its insulting epithet and the mark 
 with which it brands its followers. 
 
 " Ah ! Madame, you are the portress here," began La 
 Cibot. " I myself am a portress, in a small way, in a house 
 in the Rue de Normandie. M. Pons, your conductor, lodges 
 with us. Oh, how glad I should be to have your place, and 
 see the actors and dancers and authors go past. It is the 
 marshal's baton in our profession, as the old actor said." 
 
 "And how is M. Pons going on, good man.?" inquired 
 the portress. 
 
 " He is not going on at all ; he has not left his bed these 
 two months. He will only leave the house feet foremost, 
 that is certain."
 
 182 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " He will be missed." 
 
 " Yes. I have come with a message to the manager from 
 him. Just try to get me a word with him, dear." 
 
 " A lady from M. Pons to see you, sir ! " After this 
 fashion did the youth attached to the service of the man- 
 ager's office announce Mme. Cibot, whom the portress below 
 had particularly recommended to his care. 
 
 Gaudissart had just come in for a rehearsal. Chance 
 so ordered it that no one wished to speak with him ; actors 
 and authors were alike late. Delighted to have news of his 
 conductor, he made a Napoleonic gesture, and La Cibot was 
 admitted. 
 
 The sometime commercial traveler, now the head of a 
 popular theater, regarded his sleeping partners in the light 
 of a legitimate wife ; they were not informed of all his doings. 
 The flourishing state of his finances had reacted upon his 
 person. Grown big and stout and high-colored with good 
 cheer and prosperity, Gaudissart made no disguise of his 
 transformation into a Mondor. 
 
 " We are turning into a city-father," he once said, trying 
 to be the first to laugh. 
 
 " You are only in the Turcaret stage yet, though," re- 
 peated Bixiou, who often replaced Gaudissart in the company 
 of the leading lady of the ballet, the celebrated Heloise 
 Brisetout. 
 
 The former Illustrious Gaudissart, in fact, was exploiting 
 the theater simply and solely for his own particular benefit, 
 and with brutal disregard of other interests. He first in- 
 sinuated himself as collaborator in various ballets, plays, and 
 vaude\dlles ; then he waited till the author wanted money 
 and bought up the other half of the copyright. These after- 
 pieces and vaudevilles, always added to successful plays, 
 brought him in a daily harvest of gold coins. He trafficked 
 by proxy in tickets, allotting a certain number to himself, 
 as the manager's share, till he took in this way a tithe of 
 the receipts. And Gaudissart had other methods of making 
 money besides these official contributions. He sold boxes, he 
 took presents from indifferent actresses burning to go upon 
 the stage to fill small speaking parts, or simply to appear
 
 COUSIN PONS 183 
 
 as queens, or pages, and the like; he swelled his nominal 
 third share of the profits to such purpose that the sleeping 
 partners scarcely received one-tenth instead of the remaining 
 two-thirds of the net receipts. Even so, however, the tenth 
 paid them a dividend of fifteen per cent, on their capital. 
 On the strength of that fifteen per cent. Gaudissart talked 
 of his intelligence, honesty, and zeal, and the good fortune 
 of his partners. When Count Popinot, showing an interest 
 in the concern, asked Matifat, or General Gouraud (Matifat's 
 son-in-law), or Crevel, whether they were satisfied with 
 Gaudissart, Gouraud, now a peer of France, answered, " They 
 say he robs us ; but he is such a clever, good-natured fellow, 
 that we are quite satisfied." 
 
 " This is like La Fontaine's fable," smiled the ex-cabinet 
 minister. 
 
 Gaudissart found investments for his capital in other 
 ventures. He thought well of Schwab, Brunner, and the 
 Graffs ; that firm was promoting railways, he became a share- 
 holder in the lines. His shrewdness was carefully hidden 
 beneath the frank carelessness of a man of pleasure; he 
 seemed to be interested in nothing but amusements and dress, 
 yet he thought everything over, and his wide experience of 
 business gained as a commercial traveler stood him in good 
 stead. 
 
 A self-made man, he did not take himself seriously. He 
 gave suppers and banquets to celebrities in rooms sumptu- 
 ously furnished by the house decorator. Showy by nature, 
 with a taste for doing things handsomely, he affected an 
 easy-going air, and seemed so much the less formidable be- 
 cause he had kept the slang of " the road" (to use his own 
 expression), with a few greenroom phrases superadded. 
 Now, artists in the theatrical profession are wont to express 
 themselves with some vigor ; Gaudissart borrowed sufficient 
 racy greenroom talk to blend with his commercial traveler's 
 lively jocularity, and passed for a wit. He was thinking 
 at that moment of selling his license and " going into 
 another line," as he said. He thought of being chairman 
 of a railway company, of becoming a responsible person and 
 an administrator, and finally of marrying Mile. Minard,
 
 184* COUSIN PONS 
 
 daughter of the richest major in Paris. He might hope 
 to get into the Chamber through " his line," and, with 
 Popinot's influence, to take office under the Government. 
 
 " Whom have I the honor of addressing? " inquired 
 Gaudissart, looking magisteriallj at La Cibot. 
 
 *' I am M. Pons's confidential servant, sir." 
 
 *' Well, and how is the dear fellow.? " 
 
 " 111, sir— very ill." 
 
 " The devil he is J I am sorry to hear it — I must come 
 and see him ; he is such a man as you don't often find." 
 
 " Ah, yes ! sir, he is a cherub, he is. I have always won- 
 dered how he came to be in a theater." 
 
 " Why, Madame, the theater is a house of correction 
 for morals," said Gaudissart. " Poor Pons ! — Upon my 
 word, one ought to cultivate the species to keep up the 
 stock. 'Tis a pattern man, and has talent too. When 
 will he be able to take his orchestra again, do you think.'* 
 A theater, unfortunately, is like a stage-coach: empty or 
 full, it starts at the same time. Here, at six o'clock every 
 evening, up goes the curtain ; and if we are never so sorry 
 for ourselves, it won't make good music. Let us see now — 
 how is he? " 
 
 La Cibot pulled out her pocket-handkerchief and held it 
 to her eyes. 
 
 " It is a terrible thing to say, my dear sir," said she ; 
 *' but I am afraid we shall lose him, though we are as careful 
 of him as of the apple of our eyes. And, at the same time, 
 I came to say that you must not count on M. Schmucke, 
 worthy man, for he is going to sit up with him at night. 
 One cannot help doing as if there was hope still left, and 
 trying one's best to snatch the dear, good soul from death. 
 But the doctor has given him up " 
 
 " What is the matter with him? " 
 
 " He is dying of grief, jaundice, and liver complaint, with 
 a lot of family affairs to complicate matters." 
 
 " And a doctor as well," said Gaudissart. " He ought 
 to have had Lebi*un, our doctor; it would have cost him 
 nothing." 
 
 " M. Pons's doctor is a Providence on earth. But what
 
 COUSIN PONS 185 
 
 can a doctor ido, no matter how clever he Is, with such com- 
 plications ! " 
 
 " I wanted the good pair of nutcrackers badly for the 
 accompaniment of my new fairy piece." 
 
 " Is it anything that I can do for them?" asked La Cibot, 
 and her expression would have done credit to a Jocrisse. 
 
 Gaudissart burst out laughing. 
 
 " I am their housekeeper, sir, and do many things my 
 
 gentlemen " She did not finish her speech, for in the 
 
 middle of Gaudissart's roar of laughter a woman's voice 
 exclaimed, " If you are laughing, old man, one may come 
 in," and the leading lady of the ballet rushed into the room 
 and flung herself upon the only sofa. The newcomer was 
 Heloise Brisetout, with a splendid algerienne, as such scarfs 
 used to be called, about her shoulders. 
 
 "Who is amusing you.f* Is it this lady.'' What post 
 does she want.'' " asked this nymph, giving the manager such 
 a glance as artist gives artist, a glance that would make 
 a subject for a picture. 
 
 Heloise, a young woman of exceedingly literary tastes, was 
 on intimate terms with great and famous artists in Bohemia. 
 Elegant, accomplished, and graceful, she was more intelligent 
 than dancers usually are. As she put her question, she 
 sniffed at a scent-bottle full of some aromatic perfume. 
 
 " One fine woman is as good as another, Madame ; and 
 if I don't sniffs the pestilence out of a scent-bottle, nor daub 
 brick-dust on my cheeks " 
 
 " That would be a sinful waste, child, when Nature put 
 it on for you to begin with," said Heloise, with a side glance 
 at her manager. 
 
 " I am an honest woman " 
 
 " So much the worse for you. It is not everyone by a 
 long chalk that can find someone to keep them, and kept I 
 am, and in slap-up style, Madame." 
 
 "So much the worse! What do you mean.'' Oh, you 
 may toss your head and go about in scarfs, you will never 
 have as many declarations as / have had, missus. You will 
 never match the Belle Ecaillere of the Cadran bleu." 
 
 Heloise Brisetout rose at once to her feet, stood at atten-
 
 186 COUSIN PONS 
 
 tion, and made a military salute, like a soldier who meets 
 his general. 
 
 "What?" asked Gaudissart, "are you really La Belle 
 Ecaillere of whom my father used to talk? " 
 
 " In that case the cachucha and the polka were after 
 your time ; and Madame has passed her fiftieth year," re- 
 marked Heloise, and striking an attitude, she declaimed, 
 *' * Cinna, let us be friends.' " 
 
 " Come, Heloise, the lady is not up to this ; let her alone." 
 
 " Madame is perhaps the New Heloise," suggested La 
 Cibot, with sly innocence. 
 
 " Not bad, old lady ! " cried Gaudissart. 
 
 " It is a venerable joke," said the dancer, " a grizzled 
 pun ; find us another, old lady — or take a cigarette." 
 
 " I beg your pardon, Madame, I feel too unhappy to 
 answer you ; my two gentlemen are very ill ; and to buy 
 nourishment for them and to spare them trouble, I have 
 pawned everything down to my husband's clothes that I 
 pledged this morning. Here is the ticket ! " 
 
 " Oh ! here, the affair is becoming tragic," cried the fair 
 Heloise. " What is it all about? " 
 
 " Madame drops down upon us like ^" 
 
 " Like a dancer," said Heloise ; " let me prompt you, — 
 
 missus 
 
 I " 
 
 "Come, I am busy," said Gaudissart. "The joke has 
 gone far enough. Heloise, this is M. Pons's confidential 
 servant ; she has come to tell me that I must not count upon 
 him ; our poor conductor is not expected to live. I don't 
 know what to do." 
 
 " Oh ! poor man ; why, he must have a benefit." 
 
 " It would ruin him," said Gaudissart. " He might find 
 next day that he owed five hundred francs to charitable in- 
 stitutions, and they refuse to admit that there are any 
 sufferers in Paris except their own. No, look here, my good 
 woman, since you are going in for the Montyon prize " 
 
 He broke off, rang the bell, and the youth before men- 
 tioned suddenly appeared. 
 
 " Tell the cashier to send me up a thousand-franc note. — 
 Sit down, Madame."
 
 COUSIN PONS 187 
 
 " Ah ! poor woman, look, she is crying ! " exclaimed Heloise. 
 " How stupid ! There, there, mother, we will go to see him ; 
 don't cry. — I say, now," she continued, taking the manager 
 into a corner, " you want to make me take the leading part 
 in the ballet in Ariane, you Turk. You are going to be 
 married, and you know how I can make you miserable " 
 
 " Heloise, my heart is copper-bottomed like a man-of-war." 
 
 " I shall bring your children on the scene ! I will borrow 
 some somewhere." 
 
 "I have owned up about the attachment." 
 
 " Do be nice, and give Pons's post to Garangeot ; he has 
 talent, poor fellow, and he has not a penny ; and I promise 
 peace." 
 
 " But wait till Pons is dead, in case the good man may 
 come back again." 
 
 " Oh, as to that, no, sir," said La Cibot. " He began 
 to wander in his mind last nlghb, and now he is delirious. 
 It will soon be over, unfortunately." 
 
 " At any rate, take Garangeot as a stop-gap ! " pleaded 
 Helo'ise. " He has the whole press on his side " 
 
 Just at that moment the cashier came in with a note for 
 a thousand francs in his hand. 
 
 " Give it to Madame here," said Gaudissart. " Good-day, 
 my good woman; take good care of the dear man, and tell 
 him that I am coming to see him to-morrow, or sometime — 
 as soon as I can, in short." 
 
 *' A drowning man," said Heloise. 
 
 " Ah, sir, hearts like yours are only found in a theater. 
 May God bless you ! " 
 
 "To what account shall I post this item.?" asked the 
 cashier. 
 
 " I will countersign the order. Post it to the bonus 
 account." 
 
 Before La Cibot went out, she made Mile. Brisetout a fine 
 courtesy, and heard Gaudissart remark to his mistress — 
 
 " Can Garangeot do the dance-music for the Mohicans 
 in twelve days.? If he helps me out of my predicament, he 
 shall have Pons's place." 
 
 La Cibot had cut off the incomes of the two friends, she
 
 188 COUSIN PONS 
 
 had left them without means of subsistence if Pons should 
 chance to recover, and was better rewarded for all this 
 mischief than for any good that she had done. In a few 
 days' time her treacherous trick would bring about the de- 
 sired result — Elie Magus would have his coveted pictures. 
 But if this first spoliation was to be effected, La Cibot must 
 throw dust in Fraisier's eyes, and lull the suspicions of that 
 terrible fellow-conspirator of her own seeking; and Elie 
 Magus and Remonencq must be bound over to secrecy. 
 
 As for Remonencq, he had gradually come to feel such a 
 passion as uneducated people can conceive when they come 
 to Paris from the depths of the country, bringing with them 
 all the fixed ideas bred of the solitary country life; all the 
 ignorance of a primitive nature, all the brute appetites that 
 become so many fixed ideas. Mme. Cibot's mascuhne beauty, 
 her vivacity, her market-woman's wit, had all been remarked 
 by the marine-store-dealer. He thought at first of taking 
 La Cibot from her husband, bigamy among the lower classes 
 in Paris being much more common than is generally supposed ; 
 but greed was like a slip-knot drawn more and more tightly 
 about his heart, till reason at length was stifled. When 
 Remonencq computed that the commission paid by himself 
 and Elie Magus amounted to about forty thousand francs, 
 he determined to have La Cibot for his legitimate spouse, 
 and his thoughts turned from a misdemeanor to a crime. A 
 romantic, purely speculative dream, persistently followed 
 through a tobacco-smoker's long musings as he lounged in the 
 doorway, had brought him to the point of wishing that the 
 little tailor were dead. At a stroke he beheld his capital 
 trebled ; and then he thought of La Cibot. What a good sales- 
 woman she would be ! What a handsome figure she would make 
 in a magnificent shop on the Boulevards ! The twofold covet- 
 ousness turned Remonencq's head. In fancy he took a shop 
 that he knew of on the Boulevard de la Madeleine, he stocked 
 it with Pons's treasures, and then — after dreaming his dream 
 in sheets of gold, after seeing millions in the blue spiral 
 wreaths that rose from his pipe — he awoke to find himself 
 face to face with the little tailor. Cibot was sweeping the 
 yard, the doorstep, and the pavement just as his neighbor
 
 COUSIN PONS 189 
 
 was taking down the shutters and displaying his wares ; for 
 since Pons fell ill, La Cibot's work had fallen to her husband. 
 
 The Auvergnat began to look upon the little, swarthy, 
 stunted, copper-colored tailor as the one obstacle in his way, 
 and pondered how to be rid of him. Meanwhile, this grow- 
 ing passion made La Cibot very proud, for she had reached 
 an age when a woman begins to understand that she may 
 grow old. 
 
 So early one morning, she meditatively watched Remonencq 
 as he arranged his odds and ends for sale. She wondered 
 how far his love could go. He came across to her. 
 
 " Well," he said, " are things going as you wish? " 
 
 " It is you who make me uneasy," said La Cibot. " I 
 shall be talked about; the neighbors will see you making 
 sheep's eyes at me." 
 
 She left the doorway and dived into the Auvergnat's back 
 shop. 
 
 " What a notion ! " said Remonencq. 
 
 " Come here, I have something to say to you," said La 
 Cibot. " M. Pons's heirs are about to make a stir ; they 
 are capable of giving us a lot of trouble. God knows what 
 might come of it if they send the lawyers here to poke their 
 noses into the affair like hunting-dogs. I cannot get M. 
 Schmucke to sell a few pictures unless you like me well 
 enough to keep the secret — such a secret! — With your head 
 on the block, you must not say where the pictures come 
 from, nor who it was that sold them. When M. Pons 
 is once dead and buried, you understand, nobody will know 
 how many pictures there ought to be ; if there are fifty-three 
 pictures instead of sixty-seven, nobody will be any the wiser. 
 Besides, if M. Pons sold them himself while he was alive> 
 nobody can find fault." 
 
 " No," agreed Remonencq, " it is all one to me, but M. 
 Elie Magus will want receipts in due form." 
 
 " And you shall have your receipt too, bless your life ! 
 Do you suppose that / should write them ? — ^No, M. Schmucke 
 win do that. But tell your Jew that he must keep the 
 secret as closely as you do," she continued. 
 
 '* We will be as mute as fishes. That is our business. I
 
 190 COUSIN PONS 
 
 myself can read, but I cannot write, and that is why I want 
 a capable wife that has had education like you. I have 
 thought of nothing but earning my bread all my days, and 
 now I wish I had some little Remonencqs. Do leave that 
 Cibot of yours." 
 
 " Why, here comes your Jew," said the portress ; ** we 
 can arrange the whole business." 
 
 Elie Magus came every third day very early in the morning 
 to know when he could buy his pictures. " Well, my dear 
 lady," said he, " how are we getting on.'' " 
 
 " Has nobody been to speak to you about M. Pons and 
 his gimcracks.'' " asked La Cibot. 
 
 " I received a letter from a lawyer," said Elie Magus, 
 *' a rascal that seems to me to be trying to work for himself ; 
 I don't like people of that sort, so I took no notice of his 
 letter. Three days afterwards he came to see me, and left 
 his card. I told my porter that I am never at home when 
 he calls." 
 
 " You are a love of a Jew," said La Cibot. Little did she 
 know Elie Magus's prudence. " Well, sonnies, in a few 
 days' time I will bring M. Schmucke to the point of selling 
 you seven or eight pictures, ten at most. But on two con- 
 ditions. — Absolute secrecy in the first place. M. Schmucke 
 will send for you, sir, is not that so.^* And M. Remonencq 
 suggested that you might be a purchaser, eh? — And, come 
 what may, I will not meddle in it for nothing. You are 
 giving forty-six thousand francs for four pictures, are you 
 not.?" 
 
 " So be it," groaned the Jew. 
 
 " Very good. This is the second condition. You will 
 give me forty-three thousand francs, and pay three thousand 
 only to M. Schmucke; Remonencq will buy four for two 
 thousand francs, and hand over the surplus to me. — But, 
 at the same time, you see, my dear M. Magus, I am going 
 to help you and Remonencq to a splendid bit of business — 
 on condition that the profits are shared among the three of 
 us. I will introduce you to that lawyer, as he, no doubt, 
 will come here. You shall make a valuation of M. Pons's 
 things at the prices which you can give for them, so that
 
 COUSIN PONS 191 
 
 M. Fraisier may know how much the property Is worth. 
 But — not until after our sale, you understand ! " 
 
 " I understand," said the Jew, " but it takes time to look 
 at the things and value them." 
 
 " You shall have half a day. But, there, that is my affair. 
 Talk it over between yourselves, my boys, and for that 
 matter the business will be settled by the day after to-morrow. 
 I will go round to speak to this Fraisier ; for Dr. Poulain 
 tells him everything that goes on in the house, and it is a 
 great bother to keep that scarecrow quiet." 
 
 La Cibot met Fraisier halfway between the Rue de la 
 Perle and the Rue de Normandie ; so impatient was he to 
 know the " elements of the case " (to use his own expression), 
 that he was coming to see her. 
 
 " I say ! I was going to you," said she. 
 
 Fraisier grumbled because Elie Magus had refused to 
 see him. But La Cibot extinguished the spark of distrust 
 that gleamed in the lawyer's eyes by informing him that 
 Elie Magus had returned from a journey, and that she 
 would arrange for an interview in Pons's rooms and for 
 the valuation of the property ; for the day after to-morrow 
 at latest. 
 
 " Deal frankly with me," returned Fraisier. " It is more 
 than probable that I shall act for M. Pons's next-of-kin. 
 In that case, I shall be even better able to serve you." 
 
 The words were spoken so dryly that La Cibot quaked. 
 This starving limb of the law was sure to maneuver on his 
 side as she herself was doing. She resolved forthwith to 
 hurry on the sale of the pictures. 
 
 La Cibot was right. The doctor and lawyer had clubbed 
 together to buy a new suit of clothes in which Fraisier could 
 decently present himself before Mme. la Presidente Camusot 
 de Marville. Indeed, if the clothes had been ready, the 
 interview would have taken place sooner, for the fate of the 
 couple hung upon its issues. Fraisier left Mme. Cibot, and 
 went to try on his new clothes. He found them waiting 
 for him, went home, adjusted his new wig, and towards ten 
 o'clock that morning set out in a carriage from a livery 
 stable for the Rue de Hanovre, hoping for an audience. In
 
 192 COUSIN PONS 
 
 his white tie, yellow gloves, and new wig, redolent of eau de 
 Portugal, he looked something like a poisonous essence kept 
 in a cut-glass bottle, seeming but the more deadly because 
 everything about it is daintily neat, from the stopper covered 
 with white kid to the label and the thread. His peremptory 
 manner, the eruption on his blotched countenance, the green 
 eyes, and a malignant something about him, — all these things 
 struck the beholder with the same sense of surprise as storm- 
 clouds in a blue sky. If in his private ojffice, as he showed 
 himself to La Cibot, he was the common knife that a mur- 
 derer catches up for his crime, — now, at the Presidente's 
 door, he was the daintily-wrought dagger which a woman 
 sets among the ornaments on her what-not. 
 
 A great change had taken place in the Rue de Hanovre. 
 The Count and Countess Popinot and the young people would 
 not allow the President and his wife to leave the house that 
 they had settled upon their daughter to pay rent elsewhere. 
 M. and Mme. la Presidente, therefore, were installed on the 
 second floor, now left at hberty, for the elderly lady had 
 made up her mind to end her days in the country. 
 
 Mme. Camusot took Madeleine Vivet, with her cook and 
 her man-servant, to the second floor, and would have been 
 as much pinched for money as in the early days, if the house 
 had not been rent-free, and the President's salary increased 
 to ten thousand francs. This aurea mediocritas was but 
 little satisfactory to Mme. de Marville. Even now she 
 wished for means more in accordance with her ambitions ; 
 for when she handed over their fortune to their daughter, 
 she spoiled her husband's prospects. Now Amelie had set her 
 heart upon seeing her husband in the Chamber of Deputies ; 
 she was not one of those women who find it easy to give up 
 their way; and she by no means despaired of returning her 
 husband for the arrondissement in which Marville is situated. 
 So for the past two months she had teased her father-in- 
 law, M. le Baron Camusot (for the new peer of France had 
 been advanced to that rank), and done her utmost to extort 
 an advance of a hundred thousand francs of the inheritance 
 which one day would be theirs. She wanted, she said, to 
 buy a small estate worth about two thousand francs per
 
 COUSIN PONS 193 
 
 annum set like a wedge within the Marville lands. There 
 she and her husband would be near their children and in 
 their own house, while the addition would round out the 
 Marville property. With that the Presidente laid stress 
 upon the recent sacrifices which she and her husband had been 
 compelled to make in order to marry Cecile to Viscount 
 Popinot, and asked the old man how he could bar his eldest 
 son's way to the highest honors of the magistracy, when 
 such honors were only to be had by those who made them- 
 selves a strong position in parliament. Her husband would 
 know how to take up such a position, he would make himself 
 feared by those in office, and so on and so on. " They do 
 nothing for you unless you tighten a halter round their necks 
 to loosen their tongues," said she. " They are ungrateful. 
 What do they not owe to Camusot ! Camusot brought the 
 House of Orleans to the throne by enforcing the ordinances 
 of July." 
 
 M. Camusot senior answered that he had gone out of his 
 depth in railway speculations. He quite admitted that it 
 was necessary to come to the rescue, but put off the day 
 until shares should rise, as they were expected to do. 
 
 This half-promise, extracted some few days before 
 Fraisier's visit, had plunged the Presidente into depths of 
 affliction. It was doubtful whether the ex-proprietor of 
 Marville was eligible for re-election without the land quali- 
 fication. 
 
 Fraisier found no difficulty in obtaining speech of Made- 
 leine Vivet ; such viper natures own their kinship at once. 
 
 " I should like to see Mme. la Presidente for a few mo- 
 ments, Mademoiselle," Fraisier said in bland accents ; " I 
 have come on a matter of business which touches her fortune ; 
 it is a question of a legacy, be sure you mention that. I 
 have not the honor of being known to Mme. la Presidente, 
 so my name is of no consequence. I am not in the habit of 
 leaving my chambers, but I know the respect that is due to 
 a President's wife, and I took the trouble of coming myself 
 to save all possible delay." 
 
 The matter thus broached, when repeated and amplified 
 by the waiting-maid, naturally brought a favorable answer.
 
 194. COUSIN PONS 
 
 It was a decisive moment for the double ambition hidden in 
 Fraisier's mind. Bold as a petty provincial attorney, sharp, 
 rough-spoken, and curt as he was, he felt as captains feel 
 before the decisive battle of a campaign. As he went into 
 the little drawing-room where Amelie was waiting for him, 
 he felt a slight perspiration breaking out upon his forehead 
 and down his back. Every sudorific hitherto employed had 
 failed to produce this result upon a skin which horrible 
 diseases had left impervious. " Even if I fail to make my 
 fortune," said he to himself, " I shall recover. Poulain said 
 that if I could only perspire I should recover." 
 
 The Presidente came forward in her morning gown. 
 
 " Madame " said Fraisier, stopping short to bow with 
 
 the humility by which officials recognize the superior rank 
 of the person whom they address. 
 
 " Take a seat, Monsieur," said the Presidente. She saw 
 at a glance that this was a man of law. 
 
 " Mme. la Presidente, if I take the liberty of calling your 
 attention to a matter which concerns M. le President, it is 
 because I am sure that M. de Marville, occupying, as he does, 
 a high position, would leave matters to take their natural 
 course, and so lose seven or eight hundred thousand francs, 
 a sum which ladies (who, in my opinion, have a far better 
 understanding of private business than the best of magis- 
 trates) — a sum which ladies, I repeat, would by no means 
 despise " 
 
 " You spoke of a legacy," interrupted the lady, dazzled 
 by the wealth, and anxious to hide her surprise. Amelie de 
 Marville, like an impatient novel-reader, wanted the end of 
 the story. 
 
 " Yes, Madame, a legacy that you are like to lose ; 3'es, 
 to lose altogether ; but I can, that is, I could recover it for 
 you, if " 
 
 " Speak out. Monsieur." Mme. de Marville spoke frigidly, 
 scanning Fraisier as she spoke with a sagacious eye. 
 
 " Madame, your eminent capacity is known to me ; I was 
 once at Mantes. M. Leboeuf, President of the Tribunal, 
 is acquainted with M. de Marville, and can answer inquiries 
 about me "
 
 COUSIN PONS 195 
 
 The Presldente's shrug was so ruthlessly significant, that 
 Fraisier was compelled to make short work of his parenthetic 
 discourse. 
 
 " So distinguished a woman will at once understand why 
 I speak of myself in the first place. It is the shortest way 
 to the property," 
 
 To this acute observation the lady replied by a gesture. 
 Fraisier took the sign for a permission to continue. 
 
 " I was an attorney, Madame, at Mantes. My connection 
 was all the fortune that I was likely to have. I took over 
 M. Levroux's practice. You knew him, no doubt.'' " 
 
 The Presidente inclined her head. 
 
 " With borrowed capital and some ten thousand francs 
 of my own, I went to Mantes. I had been with Desroches, 
 one of the cleverest attorneys in Paris, I had been his head- 
 clerk for six years. I was so unlucky as to make an enemy 
 of the attorney for the crown at Mantes, Monsieur " 
 
 " Olivier Vinet." 
 
 " Son of the Attorney-General, yes, Madame. He was 
 paying his court to a little person " 
 
 "Whom?" 
 
 "Mme. Vatinelle." 
 
 " Oh ! Mme. Vatinelle. She was very pretty and very — er 
 — when I was there " 
 
 " She was not unkind to me: inde irce," Fraisier continued. 
 " I was industrious ; I wanted to repay my friends and to 
 marry ; I wanted work ; I went in search of it ; and before 
 long I had more on my hands than anybody else. Bah ! I 
 had every soul in Mantes against me — attorneys, notaries, 
 and even the bailiffs. They tried to fasten a quarrel on me. 
 In our ruthless profession, as you know, Madame, if you 
 wish to ruin a man, it is soon done. I was concerned for 
 both parties in a case, and they found it out. It was a 
 trifle irregular ; but it is sometimes done in Paris ; attorneys 
 in certain cases hand the rhubarb and take the senna. They 
 do things differently at Mantes, I had done M. Bouyonnet 
 this little service before ; but, egged on by his colleagues and 
 the attorney for the crown, he betrayed me. — I am keeping 
 back nothing, you see. — There was a great hue and cry
 
 196 COUSIN PONS 
 
 about it. I was a scoundrel; they made me out blacker 
 than Marat; forced me to sell out; ruined me. And I am 
 in Paris now. I have tried to get together a practice; 
 but my health is so bad, that I have only two quiet hours 
 out of the twenty-four. 
 
 " At this moment I have but one ambition, and a very 
 small one. Some day," he continued, " you will be the wife 
 of the Keeper of the Seals, or of the Home Secretary, it 
 may be ; but I, poor and sickly as I am, desire nothing but 
 a post in which I can live in peace for the rest of my life, 
 a place without any opening in which to vegetate. I should 
 like to be a justice of the peace in Paris. It would be a 
 mere trifle to you and M. le President to gain the appointment 
 for me ; for the present Keeper of the Seals must be anxious 
 to keep on good terms with you 
 
 " And that is not all, Madame," added Fraisier. Seeing 
 that Mme. de Marville was about to speak, he cut her short 
 with a gesture. " I have a friend, the doctor in attendance 
 on the old man who ought to leave his property to M. le 
 President. (We are coming to the point, you see.) The 
 doctor's co-operation is indispensable, and the doctor is pre- 
 cisely in my position: he has abilities, he is unlucky. I 
 learned through him how far your interests were imperiled; 
 for even as I speak, all may be over, and the will disinheriting 
 M. le President may have been made. This doctor wishes 
 to be head-surgeon of a hospital or of a Government school. 
 He must have a position in Paris equal to mine. 
 Pardon me if I have enlarged on a matter so delicate ; but 
 we must have no misunderstandings in this business. The 
 doctor is, besides, much respected and learned ; he saved the 
 life of the Comtesse Popinot's great-uncle, M. Pillerault. 
 
 " Now, if you are so good as to promise these two posts — 
 the appointment of justice of the peace and the sinecure for 
 my friend — I will undertake to bring you the property, 
 almost intact. — ^Almost intact, I say, for the co-operation 
 of the legatee and of several other persons is absolutely in- 
 dispensable, and some obligations will be incurred. You will 
 not redeem your promises until I have fulfilled mine." 
 
 The Presidente had folded her arms, and for the last
 
 COUSIN PONS 197 
 
 minute or two sat like a person compelled to listen to a 
 sermon. Now she unfolded her arms, and looked at Fraisier 
 as she said, " Monsieur, all that you say concerning your 
 interests has the merit of clearness ; but my own interests 
 in the matter are by no means so clear " 
 
 *' A word or two will explain everything, Madame. M. 
 le President is M. Pons's first cousin once removed, and his 
 sole heir. M. Pons is very ill; he is about to make his will, 
 if it is not made already, in favor of a German, a friend 
 of his named Schmucke ; and he has more than seven hundred 
 thousand francs to leave. I hope to have an accurate valua- 
 tion made in two or three days " 
 
 *' If this is so," said the Presidente, " I made a great 
 
 mistake in quarreling with him and throwing the blame " 
 
 she thought aloud, amazed by the possibility of such a 
 sum. 
 
 ** No, Madame. If there had been no rupture, he would 
 be as blithe as a lark at this moment, and might outlive 
 you and M. le President and me. . . . The ways of 
 Providence are mysterious, let us not seek to fathom them," 
 he added, to palliate to some extent the hideous idea. " It 
 cannot be helped. We men of business look at the practical 
 aspects of things. Now you see clearly, Madame, that M. 
 de Marville in his public position would do nothing, and 
 could do nothing, as things are. He has broken off all 
 relations with liis cousin. You see nothing now of Pons; 
 you have forbidden him the house ; you had excellent reasons, 
 no doubt, for doing as you did, but the old man is ill, and 
 he is leaving his property to the only friend left to him. 
 A President of the Court of Appeal in Paris could say 
 nothing under such circumstances if the will was made out 
 in due form. But between ourselves, Madame, when one 
 has a right to expect seven or eight hundred thousand francs 
 — or a million, it may be (how should I know?) — it is very 
 unpleasant to have it slip through one's fingers, especially 
 if one happens to be the heir-at-law. . . . But, on the 
 other hand, to prevent this, one is obliged to stoop to dirty 
 work; work so difficult, so ticklish, bringing you cheek by 
 jowl with such low people, servants and subordinates; and
 
 198 COUSIN PONS 
 
 into such close contact with them too, that no barrister, no 
 attorney in Paris could take up such a case. 
 
 " What you want is a briefless barrister like me," said he, 
 " a man who should have real and solid ability, who has 
 learned to be devoted, and yet, being in a precarious position, 
 is brought temporarily to a level with such people. In my 
 arrondissement I undertake business for small tradespeople 
 and working folk. Yes, Madame, you see the straits to which 
 I have been brought by the enmity of an attorney for the 
 crown, now a deputy-public prosecutor in Paris, who could 
 not forgive me my superiority. — I know you, Madame, I know 
 that your influence means a solid certainty ; and in such a 
 service rendered to you, I saw the end of my troubles and 
 success for my friend Dr. Poulain." 
 
 The lady sat pensive during a moment of unspeakable 
 torture for Fraisier. Vinet, an orator of the Center, attor- 
 ney-general (procureur-general) for the past sixteen years, 
 nominated half-a-score of times for the chancellorship, the 
 father, moreover, of the attorney for the crown at Mantes, 
 who had been appointed to a post in Paris within the last 
 year — Vinet was an enemy and a rival for the malignant 
 Presidente. The haughty attorney-general did not hide his 
 contempt for President Camusot. This fact Fraisier did 
 not know, and could not know. 
 
 " Have you nothing on your conscience but the fact that 
 you were concerned for both parties ? " asked she, looking 
 steadily at Fraisier. 
 
 " Mme. la Presidente can see M. Leboeuf ; M. Leboeuf was 
 favorable to me." 
 
 " Do you feel sure that M. Leboeuf will give M. de Marville 
 and M. le Comte Popinot a good account of you ? " 
 
 " I will answer for it, especially now that M. Olivier Vinet 
 has left Mantes ; for between ourselves, good M. Leboeuf was 
 afraid of that crabbed little official. If you will permit me, 
 Mme. la Presidente, I will go to Mantes and see M. 
 Leboeuf. No time will be lost, for I cannot be certain of 
 the precise value of the property for two or three days. 
 I do not wish that you should know all the ins and outs of 
 this aff'air ; you ought not to know them, Mme. la Presidente,
 
 COUSIN PONS 199 
 
 but is not the reward that I expect for my complete devotion 
 a pledge of my success?" 
 
 " Very well. If M. Leboeuf will speak in your favor, and 
 if the property is worth as much as you think (I doubt it 
 myself), you shall have both appointments, if you succeed, 
 mind you " 
 
 " I will answer for it, Madame. Only, you must be so 
 good as to have your notary and your attorney here when 
 I shall need them ; you must give me a power of attorney 
 to act for M. le President, and tell those gentlemen to follow 
 my instructions, and to do nothing on their own responsi- 
 bility." 
 
 " The responsibility rests with you," the Presidente an- 
 swered solemnly, " so you ought to have full powers. — But 
 is M. Pons very ill.? " she asked, smiling. 
 
 *' Upon my word, Madame, he might pull through, espe- 
 cially with so conscientious a doctor as Poulain in attendance ; 
 for this friend of mine, Madame, is simply an unconscious 
 spy directed by me in your interests. Left to himself, he 
 would save the old man's life ; but there is someone else by 
 the sick-bed, a portress, who would push him into his grave 
 for thirty thousand francs. Not that she would kill him 
 outright ; she will not give him arsenic, she is not so merci- 
 ful ; she will do worse, she will kill him by inches, she will 
 worry him to death day by day. If the poor old man were 
 kept quiet and left in peace ; if he were taken into the country 
 and cared for and made much of by friends, he would get 
 well again ; but he is harassed by a sort of Mme. Evrard. 
 When the woman was young she was one of thirty Belles 
 Ecailleres, famous in Paris ; she is a rough, greedy, gossip- 
 ing woman ; she torments him to make a will and to leave 
 her something handsome, and the end of it will be induration 
 of the liver; calculi are possibly forming at this moment, 
 and he has not strength to bear an operation. The doctor, 
 noble soul, is in a horrible predicament. He really ought 
 to send the woman away " 
 
 " Why, then, this vixen is a monster ! " cried the lady in 
 thin flute-like tones. 
 
 Fraisier smiled inwardly at the likeness between himself
 
 SOO COUSIN PONS 
 
 and the terrible Presidente ; he knew all about those suave 
 modulations of a naturally sharp voice. He thought of 
 another President, the hero of an anecdote related by Louis 
 XI., stamped by that monarch's final phrase. Blessed with 
 a wife after the pattern of Socrates' spouse, and ungifted 
 with the sage's philosophy, he mingled salt with the corn 
 in the mangers and forbade the grooms to give water to the 
 horses. As his wife rode out along the Seine towards their 
 country-house, the animals bolted into the river with the lady, 
 and the magistrate returned thanks to Providence for ridding 
 him of his wife " in so natural a manner." At this present 
 moment Mme. de Marville thanked Heaven for placing at 
 Pons's bedside a woman so likely to get him " decently " out 
 of the way. 
 
 Aloud she said, " I would not take a million at the price 
 of a single scruple. — Your friend ought to speak to M. Pons 
 and have the woman sent away." 
 
 " In the first place, Madame, Messrs. Schmucke and Pons 
 think the woman an angel; they would send my friend away. 
 And secondly, the doctor lies under an obligation to this 
 horrid oyster-woman ; she called him in to attend M. Pille- 
 rault. When he tells her to be as gentle as possible with 
 the patient, he simply shows the creature how to make matters 
 worse." 
 
 " What does your friend think of my cousin's condition.? " 
 
 This man's clear, business-hke way of putting the facts 
 of the case frightened Mme. de Marville ; she felt that his 
 keen gaze read the thoughts of a heart as greedy as La 
 Cibot's own. 
 
 " In six weeks the property will change hands." 
 
 The Presidente dropped her eyes. 
 
 " Poor man ! " she sighed, vainly striving after a dolorous 
 expression. 
 
 " Have you any message, Madame, for M. Leboeuf .? I 
 am taking the train to Mantes." 
 
 "Yes. Wait a moment, and I will write to ask him to 
 dine with us to-morrow. I want to see him, so that we may 
 act in concert to repair the injustice to which you have 
 fallen a victim."
 
 COUSIN PONS 201 
 
 The Presldenle left the room. Fraisier saw himself a 
 justice of the peace. He felt transformed at the thought; 
 he grew stouter ; his lungs were filled with the breath of 
 success, the breeze of prosperity. He dipped into the mys- 
 terious reservoirs of volition for fresh and strong doses of 
 the divine essence. To reach success, he felt, as Remonencq 
 had felt, that he was ready for anything, for crime itself, 
 provided that no proofs of it remained. He had faced the 
 Presidente boldly ; he had transmuted conjecture into reality ; 
 he had made assertions right and left, all to the end that 
 she might authorize him to protect her interests and win 
 her influence. As he stood there, he represented the infinite 
 misery of two lives, and the no less boundless desires of two 
 men. He spurned the squalid horrors of the Rue de la Perle. 
 He saw the glitter of a thousand crowns in fees from La 
 Cibot, and five thousand francs from the Presidente. This 
 meant an abode such as befitted his future prospects. 
 Finally, he was repaying Dr. Poulain. 
 
 There are hard, ill-natured beings, goaded by distress 
 or disease into active malignity, that yet entertain diamet- 
 rically opposed sentiments with a like degree of vehemence. 
 If Richelieu was a good hater, he was no less a good friend. 
 Fraisier, in his gratitude, would have let himself be cut in 
 two for Poulain. 
 
 So absorbed was he in these visions of a comfortable and 
 prosperous life, that he did not see the Presidente come in 
 with the letter in her hand, and she, looking at him, thought 
 him less ugly now than at first. He was about to be useful 
 to her, and as soon as a tool belongs to us we look upon 
 it with other eyes. 
 
 " M. Fraisier," said she, " you have convinced me of your 
 intelligence, and I think that you can speak frankly." 
 
 Fraisier replied by an eloquent gesture. 
 
 " Very well," continued the lady, " I must ask you to 
 give a candid reply to this question : Are we, either of us, 
 M. de Marville or I, likely to be compromised, directly or 
 indirectly, by your action in this matter? " 
 
 " I would not have come to you, Madame, if I thought 
 that some day I should have to reproach myself for bringing
 
 502 COUSIN PONS 
 
 so much as a splash of mud upon you, for In your position 
 a speck the size of a pin's head is seen by all the world. 
 You forget, Madame, that I must satisfy you if I am to be 
 a justice of the peace in Paris. I have received one lesson 
 at the outset of my life ; it was so sharp that I do not care 
 to lay myself open to a second thrashing. To sum it up 
 in a last word, Madame, I will not take a step in which you 
 are directly involved without previously consulting you " 
 
 " Very good. Here is the letter. And now I shall expect 
 to be informed of the exact value of the estate." 
 
 " There is the whole matter," said Fraisier shrewdly, 
 making his bow to the Presidente with as much graciousness 
 as his countenance could exhibit. 
 
 " What a providence ! " thought Mme. Camusot de Mar- 
 ville. " So I am to be rich ! Camusot will be sure of his 
 election if we let loose this Fraisier upon the Bolbec con- 
 stituency. What a tool ! " 
 
 " What a providence ! " Fraisier said to himself as he 
 descended the staircase ; " and what a sharp woman Mme. 
 Camusot is ! I should want a woman in these circumstances. 
 Now to work! " 
 
 And he departed for Mantes to gain the good graces of a 
 man he scarcely knew ; but he counted upon Mme. Vatinelle, 
 to whom, unfortunately, he owed all his troubles — and some 
 troubles are of a kind that resemble a protested bill while 
 the defaulter is yet solvent, in that they bear interest. 
 
 Three days afterwards, while Schmucke slept (for in 
 accordance with the compact he now sat up at night with 
 the patient), La Cibot had a "tiff," as she was pleased 
 to call it, with Pons. It will not be out of place to call 
 attention to one particularly distressing symptom of liver 
 complaint. The sufferer is always more or less incHned 
 to impatience and fits of anger; an outburst of this kind 
 seems to give relief at the time, much as a patient while the 
 fever fit is upon him feels that he has boundless strength; 
 but collapse sets in so soon as the excitement passes off, and 
 the full extent of mischief sustained by the system is dis- 
 cernible. This is especially the case when the disease has 
 been induced by some great shock; and the prostration is
 
 COUSIN PONS 203 
 
 so much the more dangerous because the patient is kept upon 
 a restricted diet. It is a kind of fever affecting neither 
 the blood nor the brain, but the humoristic mechanism, 
 fretting the whole system, producing melancholy, in which 
 the patient hates himself; in such a crisis anything may 
 cause dangerous irritation. 
 
 In spite of all that the doctor could say, La Cibot had 
 no belief in this wear and tear of the nervous system by the 
 humoristic. She was a woman of the people, without ex- 
 perience or education ; Dr. Poulain's explanations for her 
 were simply " doctors' notions." Like most of her class, she 
 thought that sick people must be fed, and nothing short of 
 Dr. Poulain's direct order prevented her from adminis- 
 tering ham, a nice omelette, or vanilla chocolate upon the 
 sly. 
 
 " Give M. Pons one single mouthful of any solid food 
 whatsoever, and you will kill him as surely as if you put 
 a bullet through him," he said. 
 
 The infatuation of the working classes on this point is 
 very strong. The reason of their reluctance to enter a 
 hospital is the idea that they will be starved there. The 
 mortality caused by the food smuggled in by the wives of 
 patients on visiting-days was at one time so great that the 
 doctors were obliged to institute a very strict search for 
 contraband provisions. 
 
 If La Cibot was to realize her profits at once, a momentary 
 quarrel must be worked up in some way. She began by 
 telling Pons about her visit to the theater, not omitting her 
 passage of arms with Mile. Heloise, the dancer. 
 
 " But why did you go ? " the invalid asked for the third 
 time. La Cibot once launched on a stream of words, he 
 was powerless to stop her. 
 
 " So, then, when I had given her a piece of my mind, 
 Mile. Heloise saw who I was and knuckled under, and we 
 were the best of friends. — And now do you ask me why I 
 went.?" she added, repeating Pons's question. 
 
 There are certain babblers, babblers of genius are they, 
 who sweep up interruptions, objections, and observations in 
 this way as they go along, by way of provision to swell
 
 !204 COUSIN PONS 
 
 the matter of their conversation, as if that source were ever 
 in any danger of running dry. 
 
 " Why I went ? " repeated she. " I went to get your 
 M. Gaudissart out of a fix. He wants some music for a 
 ballet, and you are hardly fit to scribble on sheets of paper 
 and do your work, dearie. — So I understood, things being 
 so, that a M. Garangeot was to be asked to set the Mohicans 
 to music " 
 
 "Garangeot!" roared Pons in fury. "Garangeot! a 
 man with no talent; I would not have liim for first violin! 
 He is very clever, he is very good at musical criticism, but 
 as to composing — I doubt it ! And what the devil put the 
 notion of going to the tlieater into your head? " 
 
 " How confoundedly contrairy the man is ! Look here, 
 dearie, we mustn't boil over like milk on the fire ! How 
 are you to write music in the state that you are in? Why, you 
 can't have looked at yourself in the glass ! Will you have 
 the glass and see? You are nothing but skin and bone- — 
 you are as weak as a sparrow, and do you think that you 
 are fit to make your notes? why, you would not so much 
 as make out mine. . . . And that reminds me that I 
 ought to go up to the third-floor lodger's that owes us 
 seventeen francs ; it is worth going to fetch is seventeen 
 francs, for when the chemist has been paid we shall not 
 have twenty left. — So I had to tell M. Gaudissart (I like that 
 name), a good sort he seems to be, — a regular Roger Bon- 
 temps that would just suit me. — He will never have liver 
 complaint ! — ^Well, so I had to tell him how you were. — Lord ! 
 you are not well, and he has put someone else in your place 
 for a bit " 
 
 " Someone else in my place ! " cried Pons in a terrible voice, 
 as he sat upright in bed. Sick people, generally speaking, 
 and those more particularly who lie within the sweep of the 
 scythe of Death, chng to their places with the same passionate 
 energy that the beginner displays to gain a start in life. 
 To hear that someone had taken his place was like a fore- 
 taste of death to the dying man. 
 
 " Why, the doctor told me that I was going on as well 
 as possible," continued he ; " he said that I should soon be
 
 COUSIN PONS 205 
 
 about again as usual. You have killed me, mined me, mur- 
 dered me ! " 
 
 "Tut, tut, tut!" cried La Cibot, "there you go! I 
 am killing you, am I ? Mercy on us ! these are the pretty 
 things that you are always telling M. Schmucke when my 
 back is turned. I hear all that you say, that I do! You 
 are a monster of ingratitude." 
 
 " But you do not know that if I am only away for another 
 fortnight, they will tell me that I have had my day, that 
 I am old-fashioned, out of date. Empire, rococo, when I 
 go back. Garangeot will have made friends all over the 
 theater, high and low. He will lower the pitch to suit some 
 actress that cannot sing, he will lick M. Gaudissart's boots ! " 
 cried the sick man, who clung to life. " He has friends that 
 will praise him in all the newspapers ; and when things are 
 like that in such a shop, Mme. Cibot, they can find holes in 
 anybody's coat. . . . What fiend drove you to do it.?" 
 
 " Why ! plague take it, M. Schmucke talked it over with 
 me for a week. What would you have.'' You see nothing 
 but yourself! You are so selfish that other people may die 
 if you can only get better. — Why, poor M. Schmucke has 
 been tired out this month past ! he is tied by the leg, he can 
 go nowhere, he cannot give lessons nor take his place at 
 the theater. Do you really see nothing.'' He sits up with 
 you at night, and I take the nursing in the day. If I were 
 to sit up at night with you, as I tried to do at first when 
 I thought you were so poor, I should have to sleep all day. 
 And who would see to the house and look out for squalls! 
 Illness is illness, it cannot be helped, and here are you " 
 
 " This was not Schmucke's idea, it is quite impossible " 
 
 " That means that it was / who took it into my head 
 to do it, does it.? Do you think that we are made of iron? 
 Why, if M. Schmucke had given seven or eight lessons every 
 day and conducted the orchestra every evening at the theater 
 from six o'clock to half-past eleven at night, he would have 
 died in ten days' time. Poor man, he would give his life for 
 you, and do you want to be the death of him? By the 
 authors of my days, I have never seen a sick man to match 
 you! Where are your senses? have you put them in pawn?
 
 206 COUSIN PONS 
 
 We are all slaving our lives out for you; we do all for the 
 best, and you are not satisfied! Do you want to drive us 
 raging mad? I myself, to begin with, am tired out as 
 it is " 
 
 La Cibot rattled on at her ease; Pons was too angry to 
 say a word. He writhed on his bed, painfully uttering in- 
 articulate sounds ; the blow was killing him. And at this 
 point, as usual, the scolding turned suddenly to tenderness. 
 The nurse dashed at her patient, grasped him by the head, 
 made him lie down by main force, and dragged the blankets 
 over him. 
 
 " How anyone can get into such a state ! " exclaimed she. 
 " After all, it is your illness, dearie. That is what good 
 M. Poulain says. See now, keep quiet and be good, my 
 dear little sonny. Everybody that comes near you worships 
 you, and the doctor himself comes to see you twice a day. 
 What would he say if he found you in such a way.'' You 
 put me out of all patience ; you ought not to behave like this. 
 If you have Ma'am Cibot to nurse you, you should treat her 
 better. You shout and you talk ! — you ought not to do it, 
 you know that. Talking irritates you. And why do you 
 fly into a passion.'^ The wrong is all on your side; you are 
 are always bothering me. Look here, let us have it out! 
 If M. Schmucke and I, who love you like our life, thought 
 that we were doing right — well, my cherub, it was right, 
 you may be sure." 
 
 " Schmucke never could have told you to go to the theater 
 without speaking to me about it " 
 
 " And must I wake him, poor dear, when he is sleeping 
 like one of the blest, and call him in as witness .'' " 
 
 " No, no ! " cried Pons. " If my kind and loving Schmucke 
 made the resolution, perhaps I am worse than I thought." 
 His eyes wandered round the room, dwelling on the beautiful 
 things in it with a melancholy look painful to see. 
 
 " So I must say good-by to my dear pictures, to all the 
 things that have come to be like so many friends to me 
 and to my divine friend Schmucke? . . . Oh! 
 can it be true? " 
 
 La Cibot, acting her heartless comedy, held her hand-
 
 COUSIN PONS 207 
 
 kerchief to her eyes ; and at that mute response the sufferer 
 fell to dark musings — so sorely stricken was he by the double 
 stab dealt to health and his interests by the loss of his post 
 and the near prospect of death, that he had no strength left 
 for anger. He lay, ghastly and wan, like a consumptive 
 patient after a wrestling bout with the Destroyer. 
 
 " In M. Schmucke's interests, you see, you would do well 
 to send for M. Trognon ; he is the notary of the quarter 
 and a very good man," said La Cibot, seeing that her 
 victim was completely exhausted. 
 
 " You are always talking about this Trognon " 
 
 *' Oh ! he or another, it is all one to me, for anything you 
 will leave me." 
 
 She tossed her head to signify that she despised riches. 
 There was silence in the room. 
 
 A moment later Schmucke came in. He had slept for 
 six hours, hunger awakened him, and now he stood at Pons's 
 bedside watching his friend without saying a word, for 
 Mme. Cibot had laid a finger on her lips. 
 
 " Hush ! " she whispered. Then she rose and went up to 
 add under her breath, " He is going off to sleep at last, 
 thank Heaven ! He is as cross as a red donkey ! — What 
 can you expect, he is struggling with his illness " 
 
 " No, on the contrary, I am very patient," said the victim 
 in a weary voice that told of a dreadful exhaustion ; " but, 
 oh ! Schmucke, my dear friend, she has been to the theater 
 to turn me out of my place." 
 
 There was a pause. Pons was too weak to say more. 
 La Cibot took the opportunity and tapped her head sig- 
 nificantly. " Do not contradict him," she said to Schmucke ; 
 " it would kill him." 
 
 Pons gazed into Schmucke's honest face. " And she says 
 that you sent her " he continued. 
 
 " Yes," Schmucke affirmed heroically. " It had to pe. 
 Hush! — let us safe your life. It is absurd to vork and 
 train your sdrength gif you haf a dreasure. Get better; 
 ve vill sell some pric-a-prac und end our tays kvietly in a 
 corner somveres, mit kind Montame Zipod." 
 
 " She has perverted you," moaned Pons.
 
 208 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Mme. Cibot had taken up her station behind the bed to 
 make signals unobserved. Pons thought that she had left 
 the room. " She is murdering me," he added. 
 
 "What is that.^* I am murdering you, am I?" cried La 
 Cibot, suddenly appearing, hand on hips and eyes aflame. 
 *' I am as faithful as a dog, and this is all I get ! God 
 Almighty ! " 
 
 She burst into tears and dropped down into the great 
 chair, a tragical movement which wrought a most disastrous 
 revulsion in Pons. 
 
 " Very good," she said, rising to her feet. The woman's 
 malignant eyes looked poison and bullets at the two friends. 
 " Very good. Nothing that I can do is right here, and I 
 am tired of slaving my life out. You shall take a nurse." 
 
 Pons and Schmucke exchanged glances in dismay. 
 
 " Oh ! you may look at each other Hke actors. I mean it. 
 I shall ask Dr. Poulain to find a nurse for you. And now 
 we will settle accounts. You shall pay me back the money 
 that I have spent on you, and that I would never have asked 
 you for, I that have gone to M. Pillerault to borrow another 
 five hundred francs of him " 
 
 " It ees his illness ! " cried Schmucke — he sprang to Mme. 
 Cibot and put an arm round her waist — " haf batience." 
 
 " As for you, you are an angel, I could kiss the ground 
 you tread upon," said she. " But M. Pons never liked me, 
 he always hated me. Besides, he thinks perhaps that I want 
 to be mentioned in his will " 
 
 " Hush ! you xiU kill him ! " cried Schmucke. 
 
 " Good-by, sir," said La Cibot, with a withering look at 
 Pons. " You may keep well for all the harm I wish you. 
 When you can speak to me pleasantly, when you can believe 
 that what I do is done for the best, I will come back again. 
 Till then I shall stay in my own room. You were like my 
 own child to me ; did anybody ever see a child revolt against 
 its mother.? . . . No, no, M. Schmucke, I do not want 
 to hear more. I will bring you your dinner and wait upon 
 you, but you must take a nurse. Ask M. Poulain about it." 
 
 And out she went, slamming the door after her so violently 
 that the precious, fragile objects in the room trembled.
 
 COUSIN PONS 209 
 
 To Pons in his torture, the rattle of china was like the final 
 blow dealt by the executioner to a victim broken on the wheel. 
 
 An hour later La Cibot called to Schmucke through the 
 door, telling him that his dinner was waiting for him in 
 the dining-room. She would not cross the threshold. Poor 
 Schmucke went out to her with a haggard, tear-stained face. 
 
 " Mein boor Bons is vandering," said he ; " he says dat 
 you are ein pad voman. It ees his illness," he added hastily, 
 to soften La Cibot and excuse his friend. 
 
 " Oh, I have had enough of his illness ! Look here, he is 
 neither father, nor husband, nor brother, nor child of 
 mine. He has taken a dislike to me ; well and good, that 
 is enough 1 As for you, you see, I would follow you to the 
 end of the world; but when a woman gives her life, her 
 heart, and all her savings, and neglects her husband (for 
 here has Cibot fallen ill), and then hears that she is a Dad 
 woman — it is coming it rather too strong, it is." 
 
 "Too sthrong?" 
 
 " Too strong, yes. Never mind idle words. Let us come 
 to the facts. As to that, you owe me for three months at 
 a hundred and ninety francs — that is five hundred and 
 seventy francs ; then there is the rent that I have paid twice 
 (here are the receipts), six hundred more, including rates and 
 the sou in the franc for the porter — something under twelve 
 hundred francs altogether, and with the two thousand francs 
 besides — ^without interest, mind you — the total amounts to 
 three thousand one hundred and ninety-two francs. And 
 remember that you will want at least two thousand francs 
 before long for the doctor, and the nurse, and the medicine, 
 and the nurse's board. That was why I borrowed a thousand 
 francs of M. Pillerault," and with that she held up Gaudis- 
 sart's bank-note. 
 
 It may readily be conceived that Schmucke listened to 
 this reckoning with amazement, for he knew about as much 
 of business as a cat knows of music. 
 
 " Montame Zipod," he expostulated, " Bons haf lost his 
 head. Bardon him, and nurse him as pefore, und pe our 
 profidence; I peg it of you on mein knees," and he knelt 
 before La Cibot and kissed the tormentor's hands.
 
 210 COUSIN PONS 
 
 La Cibot raised Schmucke and kissed him on the forehead. 
 *' Listen, my lamb," said she, " here is Cibot ill in bed ; I 
 have just sent for Dr. Poulain. So I ought to set my affairs 
 in order. And what is more, Cibot saw me crying, and flew 
 into such a passion that he will not have me set foot in here 
 again. It is he who wants the money ; it is his, you see. 
 We women can do nothing when it comes to that. But if 
 you let him have his money back again — the three thousand 
 two hundred francs — he will be quiet perhaps. Poor man, 
 it is his all, earned by the sweat of his brow, the savings of 
 twenty-six years of life together. He must have his money 
 to-morrow ; there is no getting round him. — You do not 
 know Cibot ; when he is angry he would kill a man. Well, 
 I might perhaps get leave of him to look after you both 
 as before. Be easy. I will just let him say anything that 
 comes into his head. I will bear it all for love of you, an 
 angel as you are." 
 
 " No, I am cin boor man, dot lof his friend and vould gif 
 his life to save him " 
 
 " But the money .'' " broke in La Cibot. " My good M. 
 Schmucke, let us suppose that you pay me nothing; you 
 will want three thousand francs, and where are they to come 
 from? Upon my word, do you know what I should do in 
 jour place? I should not think twice, I should just sell 
 seven or eight good-for-nothing pictures and put up some 
 of those instead that are standing in your closet with their 
 faces to the wall for want of room. One picture or another, 
 what difference does it make."^ " 
 
 "Und vy?" 
 
 " He is so cunning. It is his illness, for he is a lamb when 
 he is well. He is capable of getting up and prying about ; 
 and if by any chance he went into the salon, he is so weak 
 that he could not go beyond the door; he would see that 
 they were all still there." 
 
 " Drue ! " 
 
 " And when he is quite well, we will tell him about the sale. 
 And if you wish to confess, throw it all upon me, say that 
 you were obliged to pay me. Come! I have a broad 
 back " 

 
 COUSIN PONS 211 
 
 " I cannot tispose of dings dot are not mine," the good 
 German answered simply. 
 
 " Very well. I will summons you, you and M. Pons." 
 
 " It vould kill him " 
 
 " Take your choice ! Dear me, sell the pictures and tell 
 him about it afterwards . . . you can show him the 
 summons " 
 
 " Ver' goot. Summons us. Dot shall pe mine egscuse. 
 I shall show him der chudgment." 
 
 Mme. Cibot went down to the court, and that very day 
 at seven o'clock she called to Schmucke. Schmucke found 
 himself confronted with M. Tabareau the bailiff, who called 
 upon him to pay. Schmucke made answer, trembling from 
 head to foot, and was forthwith summoned, together with 
 Pons, to appear in the county court to hear judgment against 
 him. The sight of the bailiff and a bit of stamped paper 
 covered with scrawls produced such an effect upon Schmucke, 
 that he held out no longer. 
 
 " Sell die bictures," he said, with the tears in his eyes. 
 
 Next morning, at six o'clock, Elie Magus and Remonencq 
 took down the paintings of their choice. Two receipts for 
 two thousand five hundred francs were made out in correct 
 form : — 
 
 " I, the undersigned, representing M. Pons, acknowledge 
 the receipt of two thousand five hundred francs from M. 
 Elie Magus for the four pictures sold to him, the said sum 
 being appropriated to the use of M. Pons. The first picture, 
 attributed to Diirer, is a portrait of a woman ; the second, 
 likewise a portrait, is of the Italian School ; the third, a 
 Dutch landscape by Breughel; and the fourth, a Holy Fam- 
 ily, by an unknown master of the Florentine School." 
 
 Remonencq's receipt was worded in precisely the same 
 way ; a Greuze, a Claude Lorraine, a Rubens, and a Van 
 Dyck being disguised as pictures of the French and Flemish 
 schools. 
 
 " Der monny makes me beleef dot the chimcracks haf som 
 value," said Schmucke when the five thousand francs were 
 paid over.
 
 212 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " They are worth something," said Remonencq. " I would 
 wilHnglj give a hundred thousand francs for the lot." 
 
 Remonencq, asked to do a trijfling service, hung eight 
 pictures of the proper size in the same frames, taking them 
 from among the less valuable pictures in Schmucke's bed- 
 room. 
 
 No sooner was Elie Magus in possession of the four great 
 pictures than he went, taking La Cibot with him, under 
 pretense of settling accounts. But he pleaded poverty, he 
 found fault with the pictures, they needed rebacking, he 
 offered La Cibot thirty thousand francs by way of commis- 
 sion, and finally dazzled her with the sheets of paper on 
 which the Bank of France engraves the words " One thou- 
 sand francs " in capital letters. Magus thereupon con- 
 demned Remonencq to pay the like sum to La Cibot, by 
 lending him the money on the security of his four pictures, 
 which he took with him as a guarantee. So glorious were 
 they, that Magus could not bring himself to part with them, 
 and next day he bought them of Remonencq for six thousand 
 francs over and above the original price, and an invoice was 
 duly made out for the four. Mme. Cibot, the richer by 
 sixty-eight thousand francs, once more swore her two accom- 
 plices to absolute secrecy. Then she asked the Jew's advice. 
 She wanted to invest the money in such a way that no one 
 should know of iL 
 
 " Buy shares in the Orleans Railway," said he ; " they are 
 thirty francs below par, you will double your capital in three 
 years. They will give you scraps of paper, which you keep 
 safe in a portfolio." 
 
 " Stay here, M. Magus. I will go and fetch the man of 
 business who acts for M. Pons's family. He wants to know 
 how much you will give for the whole bag of tricks upstairs. 
 I will go for him now." 
 
 " If only she were a widow ! " said Remonencq when she 
 was gone. " She would just suit me; she will have plenty 
 of money now " 
 
 " Especially if she puts her money into the Orleans Rail- 
 way; she will double her capital in two years' time. I have 
 put all my poor little savings into it," added the Jew, " for
 
 , COUSIN PONS 213 
 
 my daughter's portion. — Come, let us take a turn on the 
 boulevard until this lawyer arrives." 
 
 " Cibot is very bad as it is," continued Remonencq ; " if 
 it should please God to take him to Himself, I should have 
 a famous wife to keep a shop; I could set up on a large 
 scale " 
 
 " Good-day, M. Fraisier," La Cibot began in an in- 
 gratiating tone as she entered her legal adviser's office. 
 "Why, what is this that your porter has been teUing me? 
 are you going to move? " 
 
 " Yes, my dear Mme. Cibot. I am taking the first floor 
 above Dr. Poulain, and trying to borrow two or three thou- 
 sand francs so as to furnish the place properly ; it is very 
 nice, upon my word; the landlord has just papered and 
 painted it. I am acting, as I told you, in President de 
 Marville's interests and yours. ... I am not a solicitor 
 now ; I mean to have my name entered on the roll of barristers, 
 and I must be well lodged. A barrister in Paris cannot have 
 his name on the rolls unless he has decent furniture and books 
 and the like. I am a doctor of law, I have kept my terras, 
 and have powerful interest already. . . . Well, how 
 are we getting on ? " 
 
 " Perhaps you would accept my savings," said La Cibot. 
 " I have put them in the savings bank. I have not much, 
 only three thousand francs, the fruits of twenty-five years 
 of stinting and scraping. You might give me a bill of ex- 
 change, as Remonencq says ; for I am ignorant myself, I 
 only know what they tell me." 
 
 " No. It is against the rules of the guild for a barrister 
 (avocat) to put his name to a bill. I will give you a 
 receipt, bearing interest at five per cent, per annum, on the 
 understanding that if I make an income of twelve hundred 
 francs for you out of old Pons's estate you will cancel it." 
 
 La Cibot, caught in the trap, uttered not a word. 
 
 " Silence gives consent," Fraisier continued. " Let me 
 have it to-morrow morning." 
 
 " Oh ! I am quite willing to pay fees in advance," said 
 La Cibot ; " it is one way of making sure of my money."
 
 214 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Fraisier nodded. " How are we getting on? " he repeated. 
 *' I saw Poulain yesterday ; you are hurrying your invalid 
 along, it seems. . . . One more scene such as yester- 
 day's, and gall-stones will form. Be gentle with him, my 
 dear Mme. Cibot, do not lay up remorse for yourself. Life 
 is not too long." 
 
 " Just let me alone with your remorse ! Are you going 
 to talk about the guillotine again? M. Pons is a contrairy 
 old thing. You don't know him. It is he that bothers me. 
 There is not a more crossgrained man alive; his relations 
 are in the right of it, he is sly, revengeful, and contrairy. 
 M. Magus has come, as I told you, and is waiting 
 to see you." 
 
 " Right ! I will be there as soon as you. Your income 
 depends upon the price the collection will fetch. If it 
 brings in eight hundred thousand francs, you shall have 
 fifteen hundred francs a year. It is a fortune." 
 
 " Very well. I will tell them to value the things on their 
 consciences." 
 
 An hour later. Pons was fast asleep. The doctor had 
 ordered a soothing draught, which Schmucke administered, 
 all unconscious that La Cibot had doubled the dose. Fraisier, 
 Remonencq, and Magus, three gallows-birds, were examining 
 the seventeen hundred different objects which formed the 
 old musician's collection, one by one. 
 
 Schmucke had gone to bed. The three kites, drawn by 
 the scent of a corpse, were masters of the field. 
 
 " Make no noise," said La Cibot whenever Magus went 
 into ecstasies or explained the value of some work of art 
 to Remonencq. The dying man slept on in the neighboring 
 room, while greed in four different forms appraised the 
 treasures that he must leave behind, and waited impatiently 
 for him to die — a sight to wring the heart. 
 
 Three hours went by before they had finished the salon. 
 
 " On an average," said the grimy old Jew, " everything 
 here is worth a thousand francs." 
 
 " Seventeen hundred thousand francs ! " exclaimed Fraisier 
 in bewilderment.
 
 COUSIN PONS 215 
 
 " Not to me," Magus answered promptly, and his eyes 
 grew dull. " I would not give more than a hundred thousand 
 francs myself for the collection. You cannot tell how long 
 you may keep a thing on hand. . . . There are master- 
 pieces that wait ten years for a buyer, and meanwhile the 
 purchase-money is doubled by compound interest. Still, I 
 should pay cash." 
 
 " There is stained glass in the other room, as well as 
 enamels and miniatures and gold and silver snuflFboxes," put 
 in Remonencq. 
 
 " Can they be seen ? " inquired Fraisier. 
 
 " I'll see if he is sound asleep," replied La Cibot. She 
 made a sign, and the three birds of prey came in. 
 
 " There are masterpieces yonder ! " said Magus, indicating 
 the salon, every bristle of his white beard twitching as he 
 spoke. " But the riches are here ! And what riches ! Kings 
 have nothing more glorious in royal treasuries." 
 
 Remonencq's eyes lighted up till they glowed like carbuncles 
 at the sight of the gold snuffboxes. Fraisier, cool and calm 
 as a serpent, or some snake-creature with the power of rising 
 erect, stood with his viper's head stretched out, in such an 
 attitude as a painter would choose for Mephistopheles. The 
 three covetous beings, thirsting for gold as devils thirst for 
 the dew of heaven, looked simultaneously, as it chanced, at 
 the owner of all this wealth. Some nightmare troubled Pons : 
 he stirred, and suddenly, under the influence of those diabol- 
 ical glances, he opened his eyes with a shrill cry. 
 
 " Thieves ! . . . There they are ! . . . Help ! 
 Murder! Help!" 
 
 The nightmare was evidently still upon him, for he sat 
 up in bed, staring before him with blank, wide-open eyes, 
 and had not power to move. 
 
 Elie Magus and Remonencq made for the door, but a 
 word glued them to the spot. 
 
 " Magus here ! ... I am betrayed ! " 
 
 Instinctively the sick man had known that his beloved 
 pictures were in danger, a thought that touched him at least 
 as closely as any dread for liimself, and he awoke. Fraisier 
 meanwhile did not stir.
 
 ^16 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Mme. Cibot! who is that gentleman? " cried Pons, shiver- 
 ing at the sight. 
 
 "Goodness me! how could I put him out of the door?" 
 she inquired, with a wink and gesture for Fraisier's benefit. 
 *' This gentleman came just a minute ago, from your family." 
 
 Fraisier could not conceal his admiration for La Cibot. 
 
 " Yes, sir," he said, " I have come on behalf of Mme. la 
 Presidente de Marville, her husband, and her daughter, to 
 express their regret. They learned quite by accident that 
 you are ill, and they would like to nurse you themselves. 
 They want you to go to Marville and get well there. Mme. 
 la Vicomtesse Popinot, the little Cecile that you love so much, 
 will be your nurse. She took your part with her mother. 
 She convinced Mme. de Marville that she had made a mis- 
 take." 
 
 " So my next-of-kin have sent you to me, have they? " 
 Pons exclaimed indignantly, " and sent the best judge and 
 expert in all Paris with you to show you the way ? Oh ! 
 a nice commission ! " he cried, bursting into wild laughter. 
 " You have come to value my pictures and curiosities, my 
 snuflPboxes and miniatures ! . . . Make your valuation. 
 You have a man there who understands everything, and 
 more — he can buy everything, for he is a millionaire ten 
 times over. . . . My dear relatives will not have long 
 to wait," he added with bitter irony, " they have choked the 
 last breath out of me. . . . Ah ! Mme. Cibot, you said 
 you were a mother to me, and you bring dealers into the 
 house, and my competitor and the Camusots, while I am 
 asleep ! . . . Get out, all of you ! " 
 
 The unhappy man was beside himself with anger and fear ; 
 he rose from the bed and stood upright, a gaunt, wasted 
 jfigure. 
 
 " Take my arm, sir," said La Cibot, rushing to the rescue, 
 lest Pons should fall. " Pray calm yourself, the gentlemen 
 are gone." 
 
 " I want to see the salon . . ." said the death-stricken 
 man. La Cibot made a sign to the three ravens to take 
 flight. Then she caught up Pons as if he had been a 
 feather, and put him in bed again, in spite of his cries.
 
 COUSIN PONS aiT 
 
 When she saw that he was quite helpless and exhausted, she 
 went to shut the door on the staircase. The three who had 
 done Pons to death were still on the landing ; La Cibot told 
 them to wait. She heard Fraisier say to Magus — 
 
 " Let me have it in writing, and sign it, both of you. 
 Undertake to pay nine hundred thousand francs in cash for 
 M. Pons's collection, and we will see about putting you in 
 the way of making a handsome profit." 
 
 With that he said something to La Cibot in a voice so low 
 that the others could not catch it, and went down after the 
 two dealers to the porter's room. 
 
 "Have they gone, Mme. Cibot.''" asked the unhappy 
 Pons, when she came back again. 
 
 " Gone.? . . . who.'* " asked she. 
 
 " Those men." 
 
 "What men.? There, now! you have seen men," said 
 she. " You have just had a raving fit; if it hadn't been for 
 me you would have gone out of the window, and now you 
 are still talking of men in the room. . . . Is it always 
 to be hke this ? " 
 
 " What! was there not a gentleman here just now, saying 
 that my relatives had sent him.? " 
 
 " Will you still stand me out.? " said she. " Upon my 
 word, do you know where you ought to be sent.? — To the 
 asylum at Charenton. You see men " 
 
 " Elie Magus, Remonencq, and " 
 
 " Oh ! as for Remonencq, you may have seen him, for he 
 came up to tell me that my poor Cibot is so bad that I must 
 clear out of this and come down. My Cibot comes first, 
 you see. When my husband is ill, I can think of nobody 
 else. Try to keep quiet and sleep for a couple of hours ; 
 I have sent for Dr. Poulain, and I will come up with him. 
 Take a drink and be good " 
 
 *' Then was there no one in the room just now, when 
 I waked.? . . ." 
 
 " No one," said she. " You must have seen M. Remonencq 
 in one of your looking-glasses." 
 
 " You are right, Mme. Cibot," said Pons, meek as a 
 lamb.
 
 218 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Well, now you are sensible again. . , . Good-by, 
 my cherub; keep quiet, I shall be back agam in a 
 minute." 
 
 When Pons heard the outer door close upon her, he sum- 
 moned up all his remaining strength to rise. 
 
 " They are cheating me," he muttered to himself, " they 
 are robbing me! Schmucke is a child that would let them 
 tie him up in a sack." 
 
 The terrible scene had seemed so real, it could not be a 
 dream, he thought ; a desire to throw light upon the puzzle 
 excited him ; he managed to reach the door, opened it after 
 many efforts, and stood on the threshold of his salon. 
 There they were — his dear pictures, his statues, his Floren- 
 tine bronzes, his porcelain ; the sight of them revived him. 
 The old collector walked in his dressing-gown along the 
 narrow spaces between the credence-tables and the sideboards 
 that lined the wall ; his feet bare, his head on fire. His first 
 glance of ownership told him that everything was there ; he 
 turned to go back to bed again, when he noticed that a Greuze 
 portrait looked out of the frame that had held Sebastian 
 del Piombo's Templar. Suspicion flashed across his brain, 
 making his dark thoughts apparent to him, as a flash of 
 lightning marks the outlines of the cloud-bars on a stormy 
 sky. He looked round for the eight capital pictures of the 
 collection ; each one of them was replaced by another. A 
 dark film suddenly overspread his eyes ; his strength failed 
 him ; he fell fainting upon the polished floor. 
 
 So heavy was the swoon, that for two hours he lay as he 
 fell, till Schmucke awoke and went to see his friend, and 
 found him lying unconscious in the salon. With endless 
 pains Schmucke raised the half-dead body and laid it on the 
 bed ; but when he came to question the death-stricken man, 
 and saw the look in the dull eyes and heard the vague, in- 
 articulate words, the good German, so far from losing his 
 head, rose to the very heroism of friendship. Man and child 
 as he was, with the pressure of despair came the inspiration 
 of a mother's tenderness, a woman's love. He warmed towels 
 (he found towels!), he wrapped them about Pons's hands, 
 he laid them over the pit of the stomach; he took the cold,
 
 COUSIN PONS 219 
 
 moist forehead in his hands, he summoned back life with a 
 might of will worthy of Apollonius of Tjana, laying kisses 
 on his friend's eyelids like some Mary bending over the dead 
 Christ, in a pieta carved in bas-relief by some great Italian 
 sculptor. The divine effort, the outpouring of one life into 
 another, the work of mother and of lover, was crowned with 
 success. In half an hour the warmth revived Pons ; he be- 
 came himself again, the hues of life returned to his eyes, sus- 
 pended faculties gradually resumed their play under the 
 influence of artificial heat. Schmucke gave him balm-water 
 with a little wine in it ; the spirit of life spread through the 
 body ; intelligence lighted up the forehead so short a while 
 ago insensible as a stone; and Pons knew that he had been 
 brought back to life, by what sacred devotion, what might 
 of friendship ! 
 
 " But for you, I should die," he said, and as he spoke he 
 felt the good German's tears falling on his face. Schmucke 
 was laughing and crying at once. 
 
 Poor Schmucke! he had waited for those words with a 
 frenzy of hope as costly as the frenzy of despair; and now 
 his strength utterly failed him, he collapsed like a rent 
 balloon. It was his turn to fall ; he sank into the easy-chair, 
 clasped his hands, and thanked God in fervent prayer. For 
 him a miracle had just been wrought. He put no belief in 
 the efficacy of the prayer of his deeds ; the miracle had been 
 wrought by God in direct answer to his cry. And yet that 
 miracle was a natural effect, such as medical science often 
 records. 
 
 A sick man, surrounded by those who love him, nursed 
 by those who wish earnestly that he should live, will recover 
 (other things being equal), when another patient tended 
 by hirelings will die. Doctors decline to see unconscious 
 magnetism in this phenomenon; for them it is the result 
 of intelligent nursing, of exact obedience to their orders; 
 but many a mother knows the virtue of such ardent pro- 
 jection of strong, unceasing prayer. 
 
 " My good Schmucke " 
 
 " Say nodings ; I shall hear you mit mein heart . . , 
 rest, rest ! " said Schmucke, smiling at him.
 
 220 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Poor friend, noble creature, child of God living in God ! 
 . . . The one being that has loved me. ..." The 
 words came out with pauses between them; there was a new 
 note, a something never heard before, in Pons's voice. All 
 the soul, so soon to take flight, found utterance in the words 
 that filled Schmucke with happiness almost like a lover's 
 rapture. 
 
 " Yes, yes. I shall be shtrong as a lion. I shall vork 
 for two ! " 
 
 " Listen, my good, my faithful, adorable friend. Let me 
 speak, I have not much time left. I am a dead man. I 
 cannot recover from these repeated shocks." 
 
 Schmucke was crying like a child. 
 
 " Just listen," continued Pons, " and cry afterwaids. As 
 a Christian, you must submit. I have been robbed. It is 
 La Cibot's doing. ... I ought to open your eyes before 
 I go ; you know nothing of life. . . . Somebody has 
 taken away eight of the pictures, and they were worth a 
 great deal of money." 
 
 " Vorgif me — I sold dem." 
 
 " You sold them?" 
 
 " Yes, I," said poor Sclimucke. " Dey summoned us to 
 der court " 
 
 ** Summoned? . . . Who summoned us ? " 
 
 " Wait," said Schmucke. He went for the bit of stamped 
 paper left by the bailiff, and gave it to Pons. Pons read 
 the scrawl through with close attention, then he let the paper 
 drop and lay quite silent for a while. A close observer of 
 the work of men's hands, unheedful so far of the workings 
 of the brain, Pons finally counted out the threads of the plot 
 woven about him by La Cibot. The artist's fire, the intellect 
 that won the Roman scholarship — all his youth, came back 
 to him for a little. 
 
 " My good Schmucke," he said at last, " you must do as 
 I tell you, and obey like a soldier. Listen! go downstairs 
 into the lodge and tell that abominable woman that I should 
 like to see the person sent to me by my cousin the President ; 
 and that unless he comes, I shall leave my collection to the 
 Musee. Say that a will is in question."
 
 COUSIN PONS 221 
 
 Schmucke went on his errand; but at the first word, La 
 Cibot answered by a smile. 
 
 " My good M. Schmucke, our dear invalid has had a 
 dehrious fit; he thought that there were men in the room. 
 On my word as an honest woman, no one has come from 
 the family." 
 
 Schmucke went back with this answer, which he repeated 
 word for word. 
 
 " She is cleverer, more astute and cunning and wily, than 
 I thought," said Pons with a smile. " She lies even in her 
 room. Imagine it ! This morning she brought a Jew here, 
 Elie Magus by name, and Remonencq, and a third whom 
 I do not know, more terrific than the other two put together. 
 She meant to make a valuation while I was asleep ; I hap- 
 pened to wake, and saw them all three, estimating the worth 
 of my snuffboxes. The stranger said, indeed, that the 
 Camusots had sent him here ; I spoke to him. . . . That 
 shameless woman stood me out that I was dreaming ! . . . 
 My good Schmucke, it was not a dream. I heard the man 
 perfectly plainly ; he spoke to me. . . . The two dealers 
 took fright and made for the door. ... I thought that 
 La Cibot would contradict herself— the experiment failed. 
 . . . I will lay another snare, and trap the wretched 
 woman. . . . Poor Schmucke, you think that La Cibot 
 is an angel; and for this month past she has been killing 
 me by inches to gain her covetous ends. I would not believe 
 that a woman who served us faithfully for years could be so 
 wicked. That doubt has been my ruin. . . . How much 
 did the eight pictures fetch.?" 
 
 " Vife tausend vrancs." 
 
 " Good Heavens ! they were worth twenty times as much ! " 
 cried Pons ; " the gems of the collection ! I have not time 
 now to institute proceedings ; and if I did, you would figure 
 in court as the dupe of those rascals. ... A lawsuit 
 would be the death of you. You do not know what justice 
 means — a court of justice is a sink of iniquity. . . . At 
 the sight of such horrors, a soul like yours would give way. 
 And besides, you will have enough. The pictures cost me 
 forty thousand francs. I have had them for thirty-six years.
 
 222 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Oh, we have been robbed with surprising dexterity. 
 I am on the brink of the grave, I care for nothing now but 
 thee — for thee, the best soul under the sun. 
 
 " I will not have you plundered ; all that I have is yours. 
 So you must trust nobody, Schmucke, you that have never 
 suspected anyone in your life. I know God watches over 
 you, but He may forget for one moment, and you will be 
 seized like a vessel among pirates. . . . La Cibot is a 
 monster ! She is killing me ; and you think her an angel ! 
 You shall see what she is. Go and ask her to give you 
 the name of a notary, and I will show you her with her hand 
 in the bag." 
 
 Sclmiucke listened as if Pons proclaimed an apocalypse. 
 Could so depraved a creature as La Cibot exist.'* If Pons 
 was right, it seemed to imply that there was no God in the 
 world. He went down again to Mme. Cibot. 
 
 " Mein boor vriend Bons feel so ill," he said, " dat he vish 
 to make his vill. Go und pring ein nodary." 
 
 This was said in the hearing of several persons, for 
 Cibot's life was despaired of. Remonencq and his sister, 
 two women from neighboring porters' lodges, two or three 
 servants, and the lodger from the first floor on the side next 
 the street, were all standing outside in the gateway. 
 
 "Oh! you can just fetch a notary yourself, and have 
 your will made as you please," cried La Cibot, with tears 
 in her eyes. " My poor Cibot is dying, and it is no time 
 to leave him. I would give all the Ponses in the world to 
 save Cibot, that has never given me an ounce of unhappiness 
 in these thirty years since we were married." 
 
 And in she went, leaving Schmucke in confusion. 
 
 " Is M. Pons really seriously ill, sir? " asked the first- 
 floor lodger, one Jolivard, a clerk in the registrar's office 
 at the Palais de Justice. 
 
 " He nearly died chust now," said Schmucke, with deep 
 sorrow in his voice. 
 
 " M. Trognon lives near by in the Rue Saint-Louis," 
 said M. Jolivard, " he is the notary of the quarter." 
 
 " Would you like me to go for him ? " asked Remonencq. 
 
 " I should pe fery glad," said Schmucke ; " for gif
 
 COUSIN PONS 223 
 
 Montame Zipod cannot pe mit mine vriend, I shall not visrh 
 to leaf him in der shtate he is in " 
 
 " Mrae. Cibot told us that he was going out of his mind,'* 
 resumed Jolivard. 
 
 " Bons ! out off his mind ! " cried Schmucke, terror-stricken 
 by the idea. " Nefer vas he so clear in der head . 
 dat is chust der reason vy I am anxious for him." 
 
 The little group of persons listened to the conversation 
 with a very natural curiosity, which stamped the scene upon 
 their memories. Schmucke did not know Fraisier, and could 
 not note his satanic countenance and glittering eyes. But 
 two words whispered by Fraisier in La Cibot's ear had 
 prompted a daring piece of acting, somewhat beyond La 
 Cibot's range, it may be, though she played her part through- 
 out in a masterly style. To make others believe that the 
 dying man was out of his mind — it was the very corner-stone 
 of the edifice reared by the petty lawyer. The morning's 
 incident had done Fraisier good service; but for him, La 
 Cibot in her trouble might have fallen into the snare inno- 
 cently spread by Schmucke, when he asked her to send back 
 the person sent by the family. 
 
 Remonencq saw Dr. Poulain coming towards them, and 
 asked no better than to vanish. The fact was that for the 
 last ten days the Auvergnat had been playing Providence 
 in a manner singularly displeasing to Justice, which claims 
 the monopoly of that part. He had made up his mind to rid 
 himself at all costs of the one obstacle in his way to happiness, 
 and happiness for him meant capital trebled and marriage 
 with the irresistibly charming portress. He had watched the 
 little tailor drinking his herb-tea, and a thought struck him. 
 He would convert the ailment into mortal sickness ; his stock 
 of old metals supplied him with the means. 
 
 One morning as he leaned against the door-post, smoking 
 his pipe and dreaming of that fine shop on the Boulevard 
 de la Madeleine where Mme. Cibot, gorgeously arrayed, 
 should some day sit enthroned, his eyes fell upon a copper 
 disc, about the size of a five-franc piece, covered thickly with 
 verdigris. The economical idea of using Cibot's medicine 
 to clean the disc immediately occurred to him. He fastened
 
 g24 COUSIN PONS 
 
 the thing to a bit of twine, and came over every morning to 
 inquire for tidings of his friend the tailor, timing his visit 
 during La Cibot's visit to her gentlemen upstairs. He 
 dropped the disc into the tumbler, allowed it to steep there 
 while he talked, and drew it out again by the string when 
 he went away. 
 
 The trace of tarnisheil copper, commonly called verdigris, 
 poisoned the wholesome draught ; a minute dose administered 
 by stealth did incalculable mischief. Behold the results of 
 this criminal homeopathy I On the third day poor Cibot's 
 hair came out, his teeth were loosened in their sockets, his 
 whole system was deranged by a scarcely perceptible trace 
 of poison. Dr. Poulain racked his brains. He was enough 
 of a man of science to see that some destructive agent was 
 at work. He privately carried off the decoction, analyzed 
 it himself, but found nothing. It so chanced that Remonencq 
 had taken fright and omitted to dip the disc in the tumbler 
 that day. 
 
 Then Dr. Poulain fell back on himself and science and 
 got out of the difficulty with a theory. A sedentary life in 
 a damp room ; a cramped position before the barred window 
 — these conditions had vitiated the blood in the absence of 
 proper exercise, especially as the patient continually breathed 
 an atmosphere saturated with the fetid exhalations of the 
 gutter. The Rue de Normandie is one of the old-fashioned 
 streets that slope towards the middle ; the municipal authori- 
 ties of Paris as yet have laid on no water supply to flush 
 the central kennel which drains the houses on either side, and 
 as a result a stream of filthy ooze meanders among the 
 cobble-stones, filters into the soil, and produces the mud 
 peculiar to the city. La Cibot came and went ; but her 
 husband, a hard-working man, sat day in day out like a 
 fakir on the table in the window, till his knee-joints were 
 stiffened, the blood stagnated in his body, and his legs grew 
 so thin and crooked that he almost lost the use of them. 
 The deep copper tint of the man's complexion naturally sug- 
 gested that he had been out of health for a very long time. 
 The wife's good health and the husband's illness seemed to 
 the doctor to be satisfactorily accounted for by this theory.
 
 COUSIN PONS 225 
 
 " Then what is the matter with my poor Cibot? " asked 
 the portress. 
 
 " My dear Mme. Cibot, he is dying of the porter's disease," 
 said the doctor. " Incurable vitiation of the blood is evident 
 from the general anaemic condition." 
 
 No one had anything to gain by a crime so objectless. 
 Dr. Poulain's first suspicions were effaced by this thought. 
 Who could have any possible interest in Cibot's death.? Plis 
 wife!' — the doctor saw her taste the herb-tea as she sweetened 
 it. Crimes which escape social vengeance are many enough, 
 and as a rule they are of this order — to-wit, murders com- 
 mitted without any startling sign of violence, without blood- 
 shed, bruises, marks of strangling, without any bungling of 
 the business, in short ; if there seems to be no motive for the 
 crime, it most likely goes unpunished, especially if the death 
 occurs among the poorer classes. Murder is almost always 
 denounced by its advanced guards, by hatred or greed well 
 known to those under whose eyes the whole matter has 
 passed. 
 
 But in the case of the Cibots no one save the doctor had any 
 interest in discovering the actual cause of death. The little 
 copper-faced tailor's wife adored her husband ; he had no 
 money and no enemies ; La Cibot's fortune and the marine- 
 store-dealer's motives were alike hidden in the shade. Poulain 
 knew the portress and her way of thinking perfectly well; 
 he thought her capable of tormenting Pons, but he saw that 
 she had neither motive enough nor wit enough for murder ; 
 and besides — every time the doctor came and she gave her 
 husband a draught, she took a spoonful herself. Poulain 
 himself, the only person who might have thrown light on 
 the matter, inclined to believe that this was one of the un- 
 accountable freaks of disease, one of the astonishing ex- 
 ceptions which make medicine so perilous a profession. And 
 in truth, the little tailor's unwholesome life and insanitary 
 surroundings had unfortunately brought him to such a pass 
 that the trace of copper-poisoning was like the last straw. 
 Gossips and neighbors took it upon themselves to explain 
 the sudden death, and no suspicion of blame lighted upon 
 Remonencq.
 
 226 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Oh ! this long time past I have said that M. Cibot was 
 not well," cried one. 
 
 " He worked too hard, he did," said another ; " he heated 
 his blood." 
 
 " He would not listen to me," put in a neighbor ; " I advised 
 him to walk out of a Sunday and keep Saint ^Monday ; two 
 daj'S in the week is not too much for amusement." 
 
 In short, the gossip of the quarter, the tell-tale voice to 
 which Justice, in the person of the commissary' of police, 
 the king of the poorer classes, lends an attentive ear — 
 gossip explained the little tailor's demise in a perfectly 
 satisfactory manner. Yet M. Poulain's pensive air and un- 
 easy eyes embarrassed Remonencq not a little, and at sight 
 of the doctor he offered eagerly to go in search of M. 
 Trognon, Fraisier's acquaintance. Fraisier turned to La 
 Cibot to say in a low voice, " I shall come back again as 
 soon as the will is made. In spite of your sorrow, you must 
 look out for squalls." Then he slipped away like a shadow 
 and met his friend, the doctor. 
 
 " Ah, Poulain ! " he exclaimed, " it is all right. We are 
 safe ! I will tell you about it to-night ! Look out a post 
 that will suit you, you shall have it ! For my own part, 
 I am a justice of the peace. Tabareau will not refuse me 
 now for a son-in-law. And as for you, I will undertake that 
 you shall marry Mile. Vitel, grand-daughter of our justice 
 of the peace." 
 
 Fraisier left Poulain reduced to dumb bewilderment by 
 these wild words ; bounced like a ball into the boulevard, 
 hailed an omnibus, and was set down ten minutes later by 
 the modern coach at the corner of the Rue de Choiseul. By 
 this time it was nearly four o'clock. Fraisier felt quite sure 
 of a word in private with the Presidente, for officials seldom 
 leave the Palais de Justice before five o'clock. 
 
 Mme. de Mar^^lle's reception of him assured Fraisier that 
 jNI. Leboeuf had kept the promise made to Mme. Vatinelle 
 and spoken favorably of the sometime attorney at ]\Iantes. 
 Amelie's manner was almost caressing. So might the 
 Duchesse de Montpensier have treated Jacques Clement. 
 The petty attorney was a knife in her hand. But, when
 
 COUSIN PONS 227 
 
 Fraisler produced the joint-letter signed by Elie Magus and 
 Remonencq offering the sum of nine hundred thousand francs 
 in cash for Pons's collection, then the Presidente looked at 
 her man of business and the gleam of the money flashed from 
 her eyes. That ripple of greed reached the attorney. 
 
 " M. le President left a message with me," she said ; " he 
 hopes that you will dine with us to-morrow. It will be a 
 family party. M. Godeschal, Desroche's successor and my 
 attorney, will come to meet you, and Berthier, our notary, 
 and my daughter and son-in-law. After dinner, you and I 
 and the notary and attorney will have the little consultation 
 for which you ask, and I will give you full powers. The 
 two gentlemen will do as you require and act upon your 
 inspiration ; and see that everything goes well. You shall 
 have a power of attorney from M. de Marville as soon as 
 you want it." 
 
 " I shall want it on the day of the decease." 
 
 " It shall be in readiness." 
 
 " Mme. la Presidente, if I ask for a power of attorney, 
 and would prefer that your attorney's name should not 
 appear, I wish it less in my own interest than in yours. 
 . When I give myself, it is without reserve. And 
 in return, Madame, I ask the same fidelity ; I ask my patrons 
 (I do not venture to call you my clients) to put the same 
 confidence in me. You may think that in acting thus I am 
 trying to fasten upon this affair — no, no, Madame ; there 
 may be reprehensible things done ; with an inheritance in 
 view one is dragged on . . . especially with nine hundred 
 thousand francs in the balance. Well now, you could not 
 disavow a man like Maitre Godeschal, honesty itself, but you 
 can throw all the blame on the back of a miserable petti- 
 fogging lawyer " 
 
 Mme. Camusot de Marville looked admiringly at Fraisler. 
 
 " You ought to go very high," said she, " or sink very 
 low. In your place, instead of asking to hide myself away 
 as a justice of the peace, I would aim at a crown attorney's 
 appointment — at, say. Mantes ! — and make a great career 
 for myself." 
 
 *' Let me have my way, Madame. The post of justice of
 
 228 COUSIN PONS 
 
 the peace is an ambling pad for M. Vitel; for me it shall 
 be a war-horse." 
 
 And in this way the Presidente proceeded to a final con- 
 fidence. 
 
 " You seem to be so completely devoted to our interests," 
 she began, " that I will tell you about the difficulties of our 
 position and our hopes. The President's great desire, ever 
 since a match was projected between his daughter and an 
 adventurer who recently started a bank, — the President's 
 wish, I say, has been to round out the Marville estate with 
 some grazing land, at that time in the market. We dis- 
 possessed ourselves of fine property, as you know, to settle 
 it upon our daughter; but I wish very much, my daughter 
 being an only child, to buy all that remains of the grass 
 land. Part has been sold already. The estate belongs to an 
 Englishman who is returning to England after a twenty 
 years' residence in France. He built the most charming 
 cottage in a delightful situation, between Marville Park and 
 the meadows which once were part of the Marville lands; 
 he bought up covers, copse, and gardens at fancy prices to 
 make the grounds about the cottage. The house and its 
 surroundings make a feature of the landscape, and it lies 
 clase to my daughter's park palings. The whole, land and 
 house, should be bought for seven hundred thousand francs, 
 for the net revenue is about twenty thousand francs. 
 But if Mr. Wadman finds out that we think of buying it, 
 he is sure to add another two or three hundred thousand 
 francs to the price ; for he will lose money if the house counts 
 for nothing, as it usually does when you buy land in the 
 country " 
 
 " Why, Madame," Fraisier broke in, " in my opinion you 
 can be so sure that the inheritance is yours that I will offer 
 to act the part of purchaser for you. I will undertake that 
 you shall have the land at the best possible price, and have 
 a written engagement made out under private seal, like a 
 contract to deliver goods. ... I will go to the English- 
 man in the character of buyer. I imderstand that sort of 
 thing; it was my specialty at Mantes. Vatinelle doubled 
 the value of liis practice, while I worked in his name."
 
 COUSIN PONS 229 
 
 " Hence jour connection with little Mme. Vatinelle. He 
 must be very well off " 
 
 " But Mme. Vatinelle has expensive tastes, ... So 
 be easy, Madame — I will serve you up the Englishman done 
 to a turn " 
 
 " If you can manage that you will have eternal claims to 
 my gratitude. Good-day, my dear M. Fraisier. Till to- 
 morrow " 
 
 Fraisier went. His parting bow was a degree less cringing 
 than on the first occasion. 
 
 " I am to dine to-morrow with President de Marville ! " he 
 said to himself. " Come now, I have these folk in my power. 
 Only, to be absolute master, I ought to be the German's legal 
 adviser in the person of Tabareau, the justice's clerk. 
 Tabareau will not have me now for his daughter, his only 
 daughter, but he will give her to me when I am a justice 
 of the peace. I shall be eligible. Mile. Tabareau, that tall 
 consumptive girl with the red hair, has a house in the Place 
 Royale in right of her mother. At her father's death she 
 is sure to come in for six thousand livres per annum as well. 
 She is not handsome ; but, good Lord, if you step from 
 nothing at all to an income of eighteen thousand francs, you 
 must not look too hard at the plank." 
 
 As he went back to the Rue de Normandie by way of the 
 boulevards, he dreamed out his golden dream ; he gave himself 
 up to the happiness of the thought that he should never 
 know want again. He would marry his friend Poulain to 
 Mile. Vitel, the daughter of the justice of the peace; to- 
 gether, he and his friend, the doctor, would reign like kings 
 in the quarter ; he would carry all the elections — municipal, 
 military, or political. The boulevards seem short if, while 
 you pace afoot, you mount your ambition on the steed of 
 fancy in this way. 
 
 Schmucke meanwhile went back to his friend Pons with 
 the news that Cibot was dying, and Remonencq gone in 
 search of M. Trognon, the notary. Pons was struck by 
 the name. It had come up again and again in La Cibot's 
 interminable talk, and La Cibot always recommended him 
 as honesty incarnate. And with that a luminous idea oc-
 
 ^30 COUSIN PONS 
 
 curred to Pons, in whom mistrust had grown paramount since 
 the morning, an idea which completed his plan for outwitting 
 La Cibot and unmasking her completely for the too credulous 
 Schmucke. 
 
 So many unexpected things had happened that day that 
 poor Schmucke was quite bewildered. Pons took his friend's 
 hand. 
 
 " There must be a good deal of confusion in the house, 
 Schmucke; if the porter is at death's door, we are almost 
 free for a minute or two; that is to say, there will be no 
 spies — for we are watched, you may be sure of that. Go 
 out, take a cab, go to the theater, and tell Mile. Brisetout 
 that I should like to see her before I die. Ask her to come 
 here to-night when she leaves the theater. Then go to your 
 friends Brunner and Schwab and beg them to come to-morrow 
 morning at nine o'clock to inquire after me; let them come 
 up as if they were just passing by and called in to see me." 
 
 The old artist felt that he was dying, and this was the 
 scheme that he forged. He meant Schmucke to be his uni- 
 versal legatee. To protect Schmucke from any possible 
 legal quibbles he proposed to dictate his will to a notary 
 in the presence of witnesses, lest his sanity should be called 
 in question and the Camusots should attempt upon that pre- 
 text to dispute the will. At the name of Trognon he caught 
 a glimpse of machinations of some kind ; perhaps a flaw 
 purposely inserted, or premeditated treachery on La Cibot's 
 part. He would prevent this. Trognon should dictate a 
 holograph will which should be signed and deposited in a 
 sealed envelope in a drawer. Then Schmucke, hidden in one 
 of the cabinets in his alcove, should see La Cibot search for 
 the will, find it, open the envelope, read it through, and seal 
 it again. Next morning, at nine o'clock, he would cancel 
 the will and make a new one in the presence of two notaries, 
 everything in due form and order. La Cibot had treated 
 him as a madman and a visionary ; he saw what this meant — 
 he saw the Presidente's hate and greed, her revenge in La 
 Cibot's behavior. In the sleepless hours and lonely days 
 of the last two months, the poor man had sifted the events 
 of his past life.
 
 COUSIN PONS 231 
 
 It has been the wont of sculptors, ancient and modern, 
 to set a tutelary genius with a lighted torch upon either 
 side of a tomb. Those torches that light up the paths 
 of death throw light for dying eyes upon the spectacle of 
 a life's mistakes and sins ; the carved stone figures express 
 great ideas, they are symbols of a fact in human experience. 
 The agony of death has its own wisdom. Not seldom a 
 simple girl, scarcely more than a child, will grow wise with 
 the experience of a hundred years, will gain prophetic vision, 
 judge her family, and see clearly through all pretenses, at 
 the near approach of Death. Herein lies Death's poetry. 
 But, strange and worthy of remark it is, there are two 
 manners of death. 
 
 The poetry of prophecy, the gift of seeing clearly into 
 the future or the past, only belongs to those whose bodies 
 are stricken, to those who die by the destruction of the 
 organs of physical life. Consumptive patients, for instance, 
 or those who die of gangrene like Louis XIV., of fever like 
 Pons, of a stomach complaint like Mme. de Mortsauf, or of 
 wounds received in the full tide of life like soldiers on the 
 battlefield — all these may possess this supreme lucidity to 
 the full ; their deaths fill us with surprise and wonder. But 
 many, on the other hand, die of intelligential diseases, as they 
 may be called; of maladies seated in the brain or in that 
 nervous system which acts as a kind of purveyor of thought 
 fuel — and these die wholly, body and spirit are darkened 
 together. The former are spirits deserted by the body, 
 realizing for us our ideas of the spirits of Scripture; the 
 latter are bodies untenanted by a spirit. 
 
 Too late the virgin nature, the epicure-Cato, the righteous 
 man almost without sin, was discovering the Presidente's 
 real character — the sac of gall that did duty for her heart. 
 He knew the world now that he was about to leave it, and 
 for the past few hours he had risen gayly to his part, like 
 a joyous artist finding a pretext for caricature and laughter 
 in everything. The last links that bound him to life, the 
 chains of admiration, the strong ties that bind the art-lover 
 to Art's masterpieces, had been snapped that morning. When 
 Pons knew that La Cibot had robbed him, he bade farewell,,
 
 232 COUSIN PONS 
 
 like a Christian, to the pomps and vanities of Art, to his 
 collection, to all his old friendships with the makers of so 
 many fair things. Our forefathers counted the day of death 
 as a Christian festival, and in something of the same spirit 
 Pons's thoughts turned to the coming end. In his tender 
 love he tried to protect Schmucke when he should be low in 
 the grave. It was this father's thought that led him to fix 
 his choice upon the leading ladj of the ballet. Mile. Brisetout 
 should help him to baffle surrounding treachery, and those 
 who in all probability would never forgive his innocent uni- 
 versal legatee. 
 
 Heloise Brisetout was one of the few^ natures that remain 
 true in a false position. She was an opera-girl of the 
 school of Josepha and Jenny Cadine, capable of playing 
 any trick on a paying adorer; yet she was a good comrade, 
 dreading no power on earth, accustomed as she was to see 
 the weak side of the strong and to hold her own with the 
 police at the scarcely idyllic Bal de Mabille and the carnival. 
 
 " If she asked for my place for Garangeot, she will think 
 that she owes me a good turn by so much the more," said 
 Pons to himself. 
 
 Thanks to the prevailing confusion in the porter's lodge, 
 Schmucke succeeded in getting out of the house. He re- 
 turned with the utmost speed, fearing to leave Pons too long 
 alone. M. Trognon reached the house just as Schmucke 
 came in. Albeit Cibot was dying, his wife came upstairs 
 with the notary, brought him into the bedroom, and withdrew, 
 leaving Schmucke and Pons with M. Trognon ; but she left 
 the door ajar, and went no further than the next room. 
 Providing herself with a little hand-glass of curious work- 
 manship, she took up her station in the doorway, so that she 
 could not only hear but see all that passed at the supreme 
 moment. 
 
 " Sir," said Pons, " I am in the full possession of my 
 faculties, unfortunately for me, for I feel that I am about 
 to die; and doubtless, by the will of God, I shall be spared 
 nothing of the agony of death. This is M. Schmucke " — 
 (the notary bowed to M. Schmucke) — "my one friend on 
 earth," continued Pons. " I wish to make him my universal
 
 COUSIN PONS 233 
 
 legatee. Now, tell me how to word the will, so that my 
 friend, who is a German and knows nothing of French law, 
 may succeed to my possessions without any dispute." 
 
 " Anything is liable to be disputed, sir," said the notary ; 
 " that is the drawback of human justice. But in the matter 
 of wills, there are wills so drafted that they cannot be 
 upset " 
 
 " In what way ? " queried Pons. 
 
 *' If a will is made in the presence of a notary, and before 
 witnesses who can swear that the testator was in the full 
 possession of his faculties ; and if the testator has neither 
 wife nor children, nor father nor mother " 
 
 " I have none of these ; all my affection is centered upon 
 my dear friend Schmucke here." 
 
 The tears overflowed Schmucke's eyes. 
 
 " Then, if you have none but distant relatives, the law 
 leaves you free to dispose of both personalty and real estate 
 as you please, so long as you bequeath them for no unlawful 
 purpose ; for you must have come across cases of wills dis- 
 puted on account of the testator's eccentricities. A will 
 made in the presence of a notary is considered to be authentic ; 
 for the person's identity is established, the notary certifies 
 that the testator was sane at the time, and there can be no 
 possible dispute over the signature. — Still, a holograph will, 
 properly and clearly worded, is quite as safe." 
 
 " I have decided, for reasons of my own, to make a holo- 
 graph will at your dictation, and to deposit it with my friend 
 here. Is this possible? " 
 
 "Quite possible," said the notary. "Will you write .'^ 
 I will begin to dictate " 
 
 " Schmucke, bring me my little Boule writing-desk. — 
 Speak low, sir," he added ; " we may be overheard." 
 
 " Just tell me, first of all, what you intend," demanded 
 the notary. 
 
 Ten minutes later La Cibot saw the notary look over the 
 will, while Schmucke lighted a taper (Pons watching her 
 reflection all the while in a mirror). She saw the envelope 
 sealed, saw Pons give it to Schmucke, and heard him say 
 that it must be put away in a secret drawer in his bureau.
 
 234 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Then the testator asked for the key, tied it to the corner 
 of his handkerchief, and slipped it under his pillow. 
 
 The notary himself, by courtesy, was appointed executor. 
 To him Pons left a picture of price, such a thing as the 
 law permits a notary to receive. Trognon went out and 
 came upon Mme. Cibot in the salon. 
 
 "Well, sir, did M. Pons remember me?" 
 
 " You do not expect a notary to betray secrets confided 
 to him, my dear," returned M. Trognon. " I can only tell 
 you this — there will be many disappointments, and some that 
 are anxious after the money will be foiled. M. Pons has 
 made a good and very sensible will, a patriotic will, which 
 I highly approve." 
 
 La Cibot's curiosity, kindled by such words, reached an 
 unimaginable pitch. She went downstairs and spent the 
 night at Cibot's bedside, inwardly resolving that Mile. 
 Remonencq should take her place towards two or three in 
 the morning, when she would go up and have a look at the 
 document. 
 
 Mile. Brisetout's visit towards half-past ten that night 
 seemed natural enough to La Cibot; but in her terror lest 
 the ballet-girl should mention Gaudissart's gift of a thousand 
 francs, she went upstairs with her, lavishing polite speeches 
 and flattery as if Mile. Heloise had been a queen. 
 
 " Ah ! my dear, you are much nicer here on your own 
 ground than at the theater," Heloise remarked. " I advise 
 you to keep to your employment." 
 
 Heloise was splendidly dressed. Bixiou, her lover, had 
 brought her in his carriage on the way to an evening party 
 at Mariette's. It so fell out that the first-floor lodger, 
 M. Chapoulot, a retired braid manufacturer from the Rue 
 Saint-Denis, returning from the Ambigu-Comique with his 
 wife and daughter, was dazzled by a vision of such a costume 
 and such a charming woman upon their staircase. 
 
 "Who is that, Mme. Cibot.?" asked Mme. Chapoulot. 
 
 " A no-better-than-she-should-be, a light-skirts that you 
 may see half-naked any evening for a couple of francs," 
 La Cibot answered in an undertone for Mme. Chapoulot's 
 ear.
 
 COUSIN PONS 235 
 
 " Victorine ! " called the braid manufacturer's wife, " let 
 the lady pass, child." 
 
 The matron's alarm signal was not lost upon Heloise. 
 
 "Your daughter must be more inflammable than tinder, 
 Madame, if you are afraid that she will catch fire by touch- 
 ing me," she said. 
 
 M. Chapoulot waited on the landing. " She is uncom- 
 monly handsome off the stage," he remarked. Whereupon 
 Mme. Chapoulot pinched him sharply and drove him in- 
 doors. 
 
 " Here is a second-floor lodger that has a mind to set 
 up for being on the fourth floor," said Heloise as she con- 
 tinued to climb. 
 
 " But Mademoiselle is accustomed to going higher and 
 higher." 
 
 " Well, old boy," said Heloise, entering the bedroom and 
 catching sight of the old musician's white, wasted face. 
 " Well, old boy, so we are not very well ? Everybody at 
 the theater is asking after you ; but though one's heart may 
 be in the right place, everyone has his own affairs, you know, 
 and cannot find time to go to see friends. Gaudissart talks 
 of coming round every day, and every morning the tiresome 
 management gets hold of him. Still, we are all of us fond 
 of you " 
 
 " Mme. Cibot," said the patient, " be so kind as leave 
 us ; we want to talk about the theater and my post as con- 
 ductor, with this lady. Schmucke, will you go to the door 
 with Mme. Cibot.?" 
 
 At a sign from Pons, Schmucke saw Mme. Cibot out at 
 the door, and drew the bolts. 
 
 " Ah, that blackguard of a German! Is he spoiled too? " 
 La Cibot said to herself as she heard the significant sounds. 
 " That is M. Pons's doing ; he taught him these disgusting 
 tricks. . . . But you shall pay for this, my dears," 
 she thought as she went down the stairs. " Pooh ! if that 
 tight-rope dancer tells him about the thousand francs, I 
 shall say that it is a farce." 
 
 She seated herself by Cibot's pillow. Cibot complained 
 of a burning sensation in the stomach. Remonencq had
 
 236 COUSIN PONS 
 
 called in and given him a draught while his wife was upstairs. 
 As soon as Schmucke had dismissed La Cibot, Pons turned 
 to the ballet-girl. 
 
 " Dear child, I can trust no one else to find me a notary, 
 an honest man, and send him here to make mj will to-morrow 
 morning at half-past nine precisely. I want to leave all 
 that I have to Schmucke. If he is persecuted, poor German 
 that he is, I shall reckon upon the notary ; the notary must 
 defend him. And for that reason I must have a very wealthy 
 notary, highly thought of, a man above the temptations to 
 which pettifogging lawyers yield. He must succor my poor 
 friend. I cannot trust Berthier, Cardot's successor. And 
 you know so many people " 
 
 " Oh ! I have the very man for you," Heloise broke in ; 
 " there is the notary that acts for Florine and the Comtesse 
 du Bruel, Leopold Hannequin, a virtuous man that does 
 not know what a lorette is ! He is a sort of chance-come 
 father — a good soul that will not let you play ducks and 
 drakes with your earnings ; I call him Le Pere aux Rats, 
 because he instills economical notions into the minds of all 
 my friends. In the first place, my dear fellow, he has a 
 private income of sixty thousand francs ; and he is a notary 
 of the real old sort, a notary while he walks or sleeps ; his 
 children must be little notaries and notaresses. He is a 
 heavy, pedantic creature, and that's the truth ; but on his 
 own ground, he is not the man to flinch before any power 
 in creation. . . . No woman ever got money out of 
 him ; he is a fossil paterfamilias, his wife worships him and 
 does not deceive him, although she is a notary's wife. — ■ 
 What more do you want.^* as a notary he has not his match 
 in Paris. He is in the patriarchal style ; not queer and 
 amusing, as Cardot used to be with Malaga ; but he will 
 never decamp like little What's-his-name that lived with 
 Antonia. So I will send round my man to-morrow morning 
 at eight o'clock. . . . You may sleep in peace. And 
 I hope, in the first place, that you will get better, and make 
 charming music for us again ; and yet, after all, you see, 
 life is very dreary — managers chisel you, and kings mizzle 
 and ministers fizzle and rich folk economizzle. — Artists have
 
 COUSIN PONS 2S1 
 
 nothing left here ^' (tapping her breast) — "it is a time to 
 die in. Good-by, old boy." 
 
 " Heloise, of all things, I ask you to keep my counsel." 
 
 " It is not a theater affair," she said ; " it is sacred for 
 an artist." 
 
 "Who is your gentleman, child.'' " 
 
 " M. Baudoyer, the mayor of your arrondissement, a 
 man as stupid as the late Crevel ; Crevel once financed 
 Gaudissart, you know, and a few days ago he died and left 
 me nothing, not so much as a pot of pomatum. That made 
 me say just now that this age of ours is something sick- 
 ening." 
 
 "What did he die of?" 
 
 " Of his wife. If he had stayed with me, he would be 
 living now. Good-by, dear old boy. I am talking of 
 going off, because I can see that you will be walking about 
 the boulevards in a week or two, hunting up pretty little 
 curiosities again. You are not ill; I never saw your eyes 
 look so bright." And she went, fully convinced that her 
 protege Garangeot would conduct the orchestra for good. 
 
 Every door stood ajar as she went downstairs. Every 
 lodger, on tiptoe, watched the lady of the ballet pass on 
 her way out. It was quite an event in the house. 
 
 Fraisier, like the bulldog that sets his teeth and never 
 lets go, was on the spot. He stood beside La Cibot when 
 Mile. Brisetout passed under the gateway and asked for 
 the door to be opened. Knowing that a will had been made, 
 he had come to see how the land lay, for Maitre Trognon, 
 notary, had refused to say a syllable — Fraisier's questions 
 were as fruitless as Mme. Cibot's. Naturally the ballet- 
 girPs visit in extremis was not lost upon Fraisier ; he vowed 
 to himself that he would turn it to good account. 
 
 " My dear Mme. Cibot," he began, " now is the critical 
 moment for you." 
 
 " Ah, yes . . . my poor Cibot ! " said she. " When I 
 think that he will not live to enjoy anything I may get " 
 
 " It is a question of finding out whether M. Pons has left 
 you anything at all ; whether your name is mentioned or left 
 out, in fact," he interrupted. " I represent the next-of-kin.
 
 228 COUSIN PONS 
 
 and to them you must look in any case. It is a holograph 
 will, and consequently very easy to upset. — Do you know 
 where our man has put it-f* " 
 
 " In a secret drawer in his bureau, and he has the key 
 of it. He tied it to a corner of his handkerchief, and put 
 it under his pillow. I saw it all." 
 
 "Is the will sealed.?" 
 
 " Yes, alas ! " 
 
 " It is a criminal offense if you carry off a will and 
 suppress it, but it is only a misdemeanor to look at it; 
 and anyhow, what does it amount to? A peccadillo, and 
 nobody will see you. Is your man a heavy sleeper?" 
 
 " Yes. But when you tried to see all the things and value 
 them, he ought to have slept like a top, and yet he woke up. 
 Still, I will see about it. I will take M. Schmucke's place 
 about four o'clock this morning; and if you care to come, 
 you shall have the will in your hands for ten minutes." 
 
 " Good. I will come up about four o'clock, and I will 
 knock very softly " 
 
 " Mile. Remonencq will take my place with Cibot. She 
 will know, and open the door ; but tap on the window, so as 
 to rouse nobody in the house." 
 
 " Right," said Fraisier. " You will have a light, will 
 you not? A candle will do." 
 
 At midnight poor Schmucke sat in his easy-chair, watch- 
 ing with a breaking heart that shrinking of the features that 
 comes with death ; Pons looked so worn out with the day's 
 exertions, that death seemed very near. 
 
 Presently Pons spoke. " I have just enough strength, I 
 think, to last till to-morrow night," he said philosophically. 
 " To-morrovr night the death agony will begin ; poor 
 Schmucke ! As soon as the notary and your two friends 
 are gone, go for our good Abbe Duplanty, the curate of 
 Saint-Fran9ois. Good man, he does not know that I am ill, 
 and I wish to take the Holy Sacrament to-morrow at noon." 
 
 There was a long pause. 
 
 " God so willed it that life has not been as I dreamed," 
 Pons resumed. " I should so have loved wife and children
 
 COUSIN PONS 239 
 
 and home. . . . To be loved by a very few in some 
 corner — ^that was my whole ambition! Life is hard for 
 everyone; I have seen people who had all that I wanted so 
 much and could not have, and yet they were not happy. 
 . . . Then at the end of my life God put untold comfort 
 in my way, when He gave me such a friend. . . . And 
 one thing I have not to reproach myself with — that I have 
 not known your worth nor appreciated you, my good 
 Schmucke. ... I have loved you with my whole heart, 
 with all the strength of love that is in me. . . . Do not 
 cry, Schmucke ; I shall say no more if you cry, and it is so 
 sweet to me to talk of ourselves to you. ... If I had 
 listened to you, I should not be dying. I should have left 
 the world and broken off my habits, and then I should not 
 have been wounded to death. And now, I want to think of 
 no one but you at the last " 
 
 " You are misdaken " 
 
 " Do not contradict me — listen, dear friend. . . . You 
 are as guileless and simple as a six-year-old child that has 
 never left its mother ; one honors you for it — it seems to me 
 that God Himself must watch over such as you. But men 
 are so wicked, that I ought to warn you beforehand . 
 and then you will lose your generous trust, your saintlike 
 belief in others, the bloom of a purity of soul that only 
 belongs to genius or to hearts like yours. ... In a 
 little while you will see Mme. Cibot, who left the door ajar 
 and watched us closely while M. Trognon was here — in a 
 little while you will see her come for the will, as she believes 
 it to be. ... I expect the worthless creature will do 
 her business this morning when she thinks you are asleep. 
 Now, mind what I say, and carry out my instructions to the 
 letter. . . . Are you listening.'' " asked the dying man. 
 
 But Schmucke was overcome with grief, his heart was 
 throbbing painfully, his head fell back on the chair, he seemed 
 to have lost consciousness. 
 
 " Yes," he answered, " I can hear, but it is as if you vere 
 doo huntert baces afay from me. . . . It seem to me 
 dat I am going town into der grafe mit you," said Schmucke, 
 crushed with pain.
 
 240 COUSIX PONS 
 
 He went over to the bed, took one of Pons's hands in both 
 his own, and within himself put up a fervent prayer. 
 
 " What is that that you are mumbling in Grerman ? " 
 
 " I asked of Gott dat He vould take us poth togedders to 
 Himself ! " Schmucke answered simply when he had finished 
 his prayer. 
 
 Pons bent over — it was a great effort, for he was suffering 
 intolerable pain ; but he managed to reach Schmucke, and 
 kissed him on the forehead, pouring out his soul, as it were, 
 in benediction upon a nature that recalled the lamb that lies 
 at the foot of the ThroEie of God. 
 
 " See here, listen, my good Schmucke, you must do as 
 dying people tell you " 
 
 " I am hsdening." 
 
 " The little door in the recess in your bedroom opens into 
 that closet." 
 
 " Yes, but it is blocked up mit bictures." 
 
 " Clear them away at once, without making too much 
 noise." 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 " Clear a passage on both sides, so that you can pass 
 from your room into mine. — ^Xow, leave the door ajar. — 
 When La Cibot comes to take your place (and she is 
 capable of coming an hour earlier than usual), you can 
 go away to bed as if nothing had happened, and look very 
 tired. Try to look sleepy. As soon as she settles down 
 into the armchair, go into the closet, draw aside the muslin 
 curtains over the glass door, and watch her. . . . Do 
 you understand? " 
 
 " I oondershtand ; you belief dat die pad voman is going 
 to pum der vill." 
 
 " I do not know what she will do ; but I am sure of this — 
 that you will not take her for an angel afterwards. — And 
 now play for me; improvise and make me happy. It will 
 divert your thoughts ; your gloomy ideas will vanish, and 
 for me the dark hours will be filled with your dreams. . . ." 
 
 Schmucke sat down to the piano. Here he was in his 
 element; and in a few moments, musical inspiration, quick- 
 ened by the pain with which he was quivering and the con-
 
 COUSIN PONS 241] 
 
 sequent irritation that followed, came upon the kindly Ger- 
 man, and, after his wont, he was caught up and borne above 
 the world. On one sublime theme after another he executed 
 variations, putting into them sometimes Chopin's sorrow, 
 Chopin's Rafael-like perfection ; sometimes the stormy Dante's 
 grandeur of Liszt — the two musicians who most nearly 
 approach Paganini's temperament. When execution reaches 
 this supreme degree, the executant stands beside the poet, 
 as it were ; he is to the composer as the actor is to the writer 
 of plays, a divinely inspired interpreter of things di^'ine, 
 But that night, when Schmucke gave Pons an earnest of 
 diviner symphonies, of that heavenly music for which Saint 
 CeciHa let fall her instruments, he was at once Beethoven 
 and Paganini, creator and interpreter. It was an out- 
 pouring of music inexhaustible as the nightingr 's song 
 — varied and full of delicate undergrowth as the forest 
 flooded with her trills ; sublime as the sky overhead. 
 Schmucke plaj-ed as he had never played before, and the 
 soul of the old musician listening to liim rose to ecstasy such 
 as Rafael once painted in a picture which you may see at 
 Bologna. 
 
 A terrific ringing of the door-bell put an end to these 
 visions. The first-floor lodgers sent up the servant with a 
 message. Would Schmucke please to stop the racket over- 
 head. Mme., M., and Mile. Chapoulot had been wakened, and 
 could not sleep for the noise ; they called liis attention to the 
 fact that the day was quite long enough for rehearsals of 
 theatrical music, and added that people ought not to 
 " strum " all night in a house in the Marais. — It was then 
 three o'clock in the morning. At half-past three. La Cibot 
 appeared, just as Pons had predicted. He might have 
 actually heard the conference between Fraisier and the 
 portress: "Did I not guess exactly how it would be?" his 
 eyes seemed to say as he glanced at Schmucke, and, turning 
 a little, he seemed to be fast asleep. 
 
 Schmucke's guileless simplicity was an article of belief 
 with La Cibot (and be it noted that this faith in simplicity 
 is the great source and secret of the success of all infantine 
 strategy) ; La Cibot, therefore, could not suspect Schmucke
 
 242 COUSIN PONS 
 
 of deceit when he came to say to her, with a face half of 
 distress, half of glad relief — 
 
 " I haf had a derrible night ! a derrible dime of it ! I 
 vas opliged to blay to keep him kviet, and the virst-floor 
 lodgers vas komn up to tell me to be kviet! ... It was 
 frightful, for der life of mein friend vas at shtake. I am 
 so tired mit der blaying all night, dat dis morning I am all 
 knocked up." 
 
 " My poor Cibot is very bad, too ; one more day like 
 yesterday, and he will have no strength left. . . . One 
 can't help it ; it is God's will." 
 
 " You haf a heart so honest, a soul so peautiful, dot gif 
 der Zipod die, ve shall lif togedder," said the cunning 
 Schmucke. 
 
 The craft of simple, straightforward folk is formidable 
 indeed ; they are exactly like children, setting their un- 
 suspected snares with the perfect craft of the savage. 
 
 " Oh, well, go and sleep, sonny ! " returned La Cibot. 
 " Your eyes look tired, they are as big as my fist. But 
 there ! if anything could comfort me for losing Cibot, it would 
 be the thought of ending my days with a good man like you. 
 Be easy. I will give Mme. Chapoulot a dressing down. 
 . To think of a retired haberdasher's wife giving 
 herself such airs ! " 
 
 Schmucke went to his room and took up his post in the 
 closet. 
 
 La Cibot had left the door ajar on the landing; Fraisier 
 came in and closed it noiselessly as soon as he heard Schmucke 
 shut his bedroom door. He had brought with him a lighted 
 taper and a bit of very fine wire to open the seal of the 
 will. La Cibot, meanwhile, looking under the pillow, found 
 the handkerchief with the key of the bureau knotted to one 
 corner; and this so much the more easily because Pons pur- 
 posely left the end hanging out over the bolster, and lay 
 with his face to the wall. 
 
 La Cibot went straight to the bureau, opened it cautiously 
 so as to make as little noise as possible, found the spring 
 of the secret drawer, and hurried into the salon with the 
 will in her hand. Her flight roused Pons's curiosity to the
 
 COUSIN PONS 243 
 
 highest pitch; and as for Schmucke, he trembled as if he 
 were the guilty person. 
 
 " Go back," said Fraisier, when she handed over the will. 
 " He may wake, and he must find you there." 
 
 Fraisier opened the seal with a dexterity which proved 
 that his was no 'prentice hand, and read the following 
 curious document, headed : " My Will," with ever-deepening 
 astonishment : — 
 
 " On this fifteenth day of April, eighteen hundred and 
 forty-five, I, being in my sound mind (as this my Will, 
 drawn up in concert with M. Trognon, will testify), and 
 feeling that I must shortly die of the malady from which I 
 have suffered since the beginning of February last, am 
 anxious to dispose of my property, and have herein recorded 
 my last wishes : — 
 
 " I have always been impressed by the untoward circum- 
 stances that injure great pictures, and not unfrequently 
 bring about total destruction. I have felt sorry for the 
 beautiful paintings condemned to travel from land to land, 
 never finding some fixed abode whither admirers of great 
 masterpieces may travel to see them. And I have always 
 thought that the truly deathless work of a great master 
 ought to be national property ; put where everyone of every 
 nation may see it, even as the Light, God's masterpiece, 
 shines for all His children. 
 
 " And as I have spent my life in collecting together and 
 choosing a few pictures, some of the greatest masters' most 
 glorious work, and as these pictures are as the master left 
 them — genuine examples, neither repainted nor retouched, — 
 it has been a painful thought to me that the paintings which 
 have been the joy of my life, may be sold by public auction, 
 and go, some to England, some to Russia, till they are all 
 scattered abroad again as if they had never been gathered 
 together. From this wretched fate I have determined to 
 save both them and the frames in which they are set, all 
 of them the work of skilled craftsmen. 
 
 " On these grounds, therefore, I give and bequeath the
 
 244 COUSIN PONS 
 
 pictures which compose my collection to the King, for the 
 gallery in the Louvre, subject to the charge (if the legacy 
 is accepted) of a life-annuity of two thousand four hundred 
 francs to my friend Wilhelm Schmucke. 
 
 " If the King, as usufructuary of the Louvre collection, 
 should refuse the legacy with the charge upon it, the said 
 pictures shall form a part of the estate which I leave to 
 my friend Schmucke, on condition that he shall deliver 
 the Monkey^s Head, by Goya, to my cousin, President 
 Camusot ; a Floxcer-piece, the tulips, by Abraham Mignon, 
 to M. Trognon, notary (whom I appoint as my executor) ; 
 and allow Mme. Cibot, who has acted as my housekeeper 
 for ten years, the sum of two hundred francs per annum. 
 
 " Finally, my friend Schmucke is to give the Descent 
 from the Cross, Rubens's sketch for his great picture at 
 Antwerp, to adorn a chapel in the parish church, in grateful 
 acknowledgment of M. Duplanty's kindness to me; for to 
 him I owe it that I can die as a Christian and a Catholic," — 
 So ran the will. 
 
 " This is ruin ! " mused Fraisier, " the ruin of all my hopes. 
 Ha ! I begin to believe all that the Presidente told me about 
 this old artist and his cunning.'* 
 
 " Well.'' " La Cibot came back to say. * 
 
 *' Your gentleman is a monster. He is leaving everything 
 to the Crown. Now, you cannot plead against the Crown. 
 The will cannot be disputed. . . . We are 
 robbed, ruined, spoiled, and murdered ! " 
 
 "What has he left to me.?" 
 
 " Two hundred francs a year." 
 
 " A pretty come-down ! . . . Why, he is a finished 
 scoundrel ! " 
 
 " Go and see," said Fraisier, " and I will put your scoun- 
 drel's will back again in the envelope." 
 
 While Mme. Cibot's back was turned, Fraisier nimbly 
 slipped a sheet of blank paper into the envelope; the will 
 he put in his pocket. He next proceeded to seal the en- 
 velope again so cleverly that he showed the seal to Mme. 
 Cibot when she returned, and asked her if she could see
 
 COUSIN PONS 145 
 
 the slightest trace of the operation. La Cibot took lip the 
 envelope, felt it over, assured herself that it was not empty, 
 and heaved a deep sigh. She had entertained hopes that 
 Fraisier himself would have burned the unlucky document 
 while she was out of the room. 
 
 *' Well, my dear M. Fraisier, what is to be done? " 
 
 " Oh ! that is your affair ! I am not one of the next-of- 
 kin, myself ; but if I had the slightest claim to any of that " 
 (indicating the collection), " I know very well what I should 
 do." 
 
 " That is just what I want to know," La Cibot answered, 
 with sufficient simplicity. 
 
 " There is a fire in the grate " he said. Then he rose 
 
 to go. 
 
 " After all, no one will know about it but you and me " 
 
 began La Cibot. 
 
 " It can never be proved that a will existed," asserted the 
 man of law. 
 
 "And you.?" 
 
 "I.'* . . . If M. Pons dies intestate, you shall have a 
 hundred thousand francs." 
 
 " Oh yes, no doubt," returned she. " People promise you 
 heaps of money, and when they come by their own, and 
 
 there ^s talk of paying, they swindle you like " " Like 
 
 Elie Magus," she was going to say, but she stopped herself 
 just in time. 
 
 " I am going," said Fraisier ; " it is not to your interest 
 that I should be found here ; but I shall see you again down- 
 stairs." 
 
 La Cibot shut the door and returned with the sealed 
 packet in her hand. She had quite made up her mind to 
 burn it; but as she went towards the bedroom fireplace, she 
 felt the grasp of a hand on each arm, and saw — Schmucke 
 on one hand, and Pons himself on the other, leaning against 
 the partition wall on either side of the door. 
 
 La Cibot cried out, and fell face downwards in a fit ; 
 real or feigned, no one ever knew the truth. This sight 
 produced such an impression on Pons that a deadly faintness 
 came upon him, and Schmucke left the woman on the floor
 
 046 COUSIN PONS 
 
 to help Pons back to bed. The friends trembled In every 
 limb ; they had set themselves a hard task, it was done, but 
 it had been too much for their strength. When Pons lay 
 in bed again, and Schmucke had regained strength to some 
 extent, he heard a sound of sobbing. La Cibot, on her 
 knees, bursting into tears, held out supplicating hands to 
 them in very expressive pantomime. 
 
 " It was pure curiosity ! " she sobbed, when she saw that 
 Pons and Schmucke were paying any attention to her pro- 
 ceedings. " Pure curiosity ; a woman's fault, you know. 
 But I did not know how else to get a sight of your will, 
 and I brought it back again " 
 
 " Go ! " said Schmucke, standing erect, his tall figure 
 gaining in height by the full height of his indignation. 
 " You are a monster ! You dried to kill mein goot Bons ! 
 He is right. You are worse than a monster, you are a lost 
 soul!" 
 
 La Cibot saw the look of abhorrence in the frank German's 
 face; she rose, proud as Tartuffe, gave Schmucke a glance 
 which made him quake, and went out, carrying off under 
 her dress an exquisite little picture of Metzu's pointed out 
 by Elie Magus. " A diamond," he had called it. Fraisier 
 downstairs in the porter's lodge was waiting to hear that 
 La Cibot had burned the envelope and the sheet of blank 
 paper inside it. Great was his astonisliment when he beheld 
 his fair client's agitation and dismay. 
 
 "What has happened?" 
 
 " TJiis has happened, my dear M. Fraisier. Under pre- 
 tense of giving me good advice and telling me what to do, 
 you have lost me my annuity and the gentlemen's confi- 
 dence. . . .'* 
 
 One of the word tornadoes in which she excelled was in 
 full progress, but Fraisier cut her short. 
 
 " This is idle talk. The facts, the facts ! and be quick 
 about it." 
 
 " Well ; it came about in this way," — and she told him 
 of the scene which she had just come through. 
 
 " You have lost nothing through me," was Fraisier's com- 
 ment. " The gentlemen had their doubts, or they would not
 
 COUSIN PONS 24T 
 
 have set this trap for you. They were lying in wait and 
 spying upon you. . . . You have not told me every- 
 thing," he added, with a tiger's glance at the woman before 
 him. 
 
 " / hide anything from you ! " cried she — " after all that 
 we have done together ! " she added with a shudder. 
 
 " My dear Madame, / have done nothing blameworthy," 
 returned Fraisier. Evidently he meant to deny his nocturnal 
 visit to Pons's rooms. 
 
 Every hair on La Cibot's head seemed to scorch her, 
 while a sense of icy cold swept over her from head to foot. 
 
 " What? "... she faltered in bewilderment. 
 
 " Here is a criminal charge on the face of it. . . . 
 You may be accused of suppressing the will," Fraisier 
 made answer dryly. 
 
 La Cibot started. 
 
 "Don't be alarmed; I am your legal adviser. I only 
 wished to show you how easy it is, in one way or another, 
 to do as I once explained to you. Let us see, now; what 
 have you done that this simple German should be hiding in 
 the room? " 
 
 " Nothing at all, unless it was that scene the other day 
 when I stood M. Pons out that his eyes dazzled. And ever 
 since, the two gentlemen have been as different as can be. 
 So you have brought all my troubles upon me ; I might have 
 lost my influence with M. Pons, but I was sure of the German ; 
 just now he was talking of marrying me or of taking me 
 with him — it is all one." 
 
 The excuse was so plausible that Fraisier was fain to 
 be satisfied with it. " You need fear nothing," he resumed. 
 " I gave you my word that you shall have your money, and 
 I shall keep my word. The whole matter, so far, was up 
 in the air, but now it is as good as bank-notes. . . . You 
 shall have at least twelve hundred francs per annum. 
 But, my good lady, you must act intelligently under my 
 orders." 
 
 " Yes, my dear M. Fraisier," said La Cibot with cringing 
 servility. She was completely subdued. 
 
 Very good. Good-by," and Fraisier went, taking the 
 
 «(
 
 g48 COUSIN PONS 
 
 dangerous document with him. He reached home in great 
 spirits. The will was a terrible weapon. 
 
 " Now," thought he, " I have a hold on Mme. la Presidente 
 de Marville ; she must keep her word with me. If she did 
 not, she would lose the property," 
 
 At daybreak, when Remonencq had taken down his shutters 
 and left his sister in charge of the shop, he came, after 
 his wont of late, to inquire for his good friend Cibot. The 
 portress was contemplating the Metzu, privately wondering 
 how a little bit of painted wood could be worth such a lot 
 of money. 
 
 " Aha ! " said he, looking over her shoulder, " that is the 
 one picture which M. Elie Magus regretted; with that little 
 bit of a thing, he says, his happiness would be complete." 
 
 " What would he give for it? " asked La Cibot. 
 
 " Why, if you will promise to marry me within a year of 
 widowhood, I will undertake to get twenty thousand francs 
 for it from Elie Magus ; and unless you marry me you wiU 
 never get a thousand francs for the picture." 
 
 "Why not?" 
 
 " Because you would be obliged to give a receipt for the 
 money, and then you might have a lawsuit with the heirs-at- 
 law. If you were my wife, I myself should sell the thing 
 to M. Magus, and in the way of business it is enough to 
 make an entry in the day-book, and I should note that M. 
 Schmucke sold it to me. There, leave the panel with me. 
 If your husband were to die you might have a lot 
 of bother over it, but no one would think it odd that I should 
 have a picture in the shop. . . . You know me quite 
 well. Besides, I will give you a receipt if you like." 
 
 The covetous portress felt that she had been caught ; 
 she agreed to a proposal which was to bind her for the rest 
 of her life to the marine-store-dealer. 
 
 " You are right," said she, as she locked the picture away 
 in a chest ; " bring me the bit of writing." 
 
 Remonencq beckoned her to the door. 
 
 " I can see, neighbor, that we shall not save our poor 
 dear Cibot," he said, lowering his voice. " Dr. Poulain gave 
 him up yesterday evening, and said that he CQuld not last
 
 COUSIN PONS 249 
 
 out the day. . . . It is a great misfortune. But, after 
 all, this was not the place for you. . . . You ought to 
 be in a fine curiosity shop on the Boulevard des Capucines. 
 Do you know that I have made nearly a hundred thousand 
 francs in ten years? and if you will have as much some day, 
 I will undertake to make a handsome fortune for you — as 
 my wife. You would be the mistress — my sister should wait 
 on you and do the work of the house, and " 
 
 A heartrending moan from the little tailor cut the tempter 
 short ; the death agony had begun. 
 
 " Go away," said La Cibot. " You are a monster to talk 
 of such things and my poor man dying like this " 
 
 " Ah ! it is because I love you," said Remonencq ; " I 
 could let everything else go to have you " 
 
 " If you loved me, you would say nothing to me just now," 
 returned she. And Remonencq departed to liis shop, sure 
 of marrying La Cibot. 
 
 Towards ten o'clock there was a sort of commotion in 
 the street ; M. Cibot was taking the Sacrament. All the 
 friends of the pair, all the porters and porters' wives in 
 the Rue de Normandie and neighboring streets, had crowded 
 into the lodge, under the archway, and stood on the pavement 
 outside. Nobody so much as noticed the arrival of M. 
 Leopold Mannequin and a brother lawyer. Schwab and 
 Brunner reached Pons's rooms unseen by Mme. Cibot. The 
 notary, inquiring for Pons, was shown upstairs by the por- 
 tress of a neighboring house. Brunner remembered his pre- 
 vious visit to the museum, and went straight in with his 
 friend Schwab. 
 
 Pons formally revoked his previous will and constituted 
 Schmucke his universal legatee. This accomplished, he 
 thanked Schwab and Brunner, and earnestly begged M. 
 Leopold Mannequin to protect Schmucke's interests. The 
 demands made upon him by last night's scene with La Cibot, 
 and this final settlement of his worldly affairs, left him so 
 faint and exhausted that Schmucke begged Schwab to go 
 for the Abbe Duplanty ; it was Pons's great desire to take 
 the Sacrament, and Schmucke could not bring himself to 
 leave his friend.
 
 ^60 COUSIN PONS 
 
 La Cibot, sitting at the foot of her husband's bed, gave 
 not so much as a thought to Schmucke's breakfast — for 
 that matter had been forbidden to return ; but the morning's 
 events, the sight of Pons's heroic resignation in the death 
 agony, so oppressed Schmucke's heart that he was not con- 
 scious of hunger. Towards two o'clock, however, as nothing 
 had been seen of the old German, La Cibot sent Remonencq's 
 sister to see whether Schmucke wanted anything; prompted 
 not so much by interest as by curiosity. The Abbe Duplanty 
 had just heard the old musician's dying confession, and the 
 administration of the sacrament of extreme unction was dis- 
 turbed by repeated ringing of the door-bell. Pons, in his 
 terror of robbery, had made Schmucke promise solemnly to 
 Admit no one into the house ; so Schmucke did not stir. 
 Again and again Mile. Remonencq pulled the cord, and 
 finally went downstairs in alarm to tell La Cibot that 
 Schmucke would not open the door; Fraisier made a note of 
 this. Schmucke had never seen anyone die in his life ; before 
 long he would be perplexed by the many difficulties which 
 beset those who are left with a dead body in Paris, this more 
 especially if they are lonely and helpless and have no one 
 to act for them. Fraisier knew, moreover, that in real 
 affiiction people lose their heads, and therefore immediately 
 after breakfast he took up his position in the porter's lodge, 
 and sitting there in perpetual committee with Dr. Poulain, 
 conceived the idea of directing all Schmucke's actions himself. 
 
 To obtain the important result, the doctor and the lawyer 
 took their measures on this wise: — 
 
 The beadle of Saint-Fran9ois, Cantinet by name, at one 
 time a retail dealer in glassware, lived in the Rue d'Orleans, 
 next door to Dr. Poulain and under the same roof. Mme. 
 Cantinet, who saw to the letting of the chairs at Saint- 
 Fran9ois, once had fallen ill and Dr. Poulain had attended 
 her gratuitously ; she was, as might be expected, grateful, 
 and often confided her troubles to him. " The nutcrackers," 
 punctual in their attendance at Saint-Francois on Sundays 
 and saints'-days, were on friendly terms with the beadle and 
 the lowest ecclesiastical rank and file, commonly called in 
 Paris le has clerge, to whom the devout usually give little
 
 COUSIN PONS 251 
 
 presents from time to time. Mme. Cantinet therefore knew 
 Schmucke almost as well as Schmucke knew her. And Mme. 
 Cantinet was afflicted with two sore troubles which enabled 
 the lawyer to use her as a blind and involuntary agent. 
 Cantinet, junior, a stage-struck youth, had deserted the 
 paths of the Church and turned his back on the prospect 
 of one day becoming a beadle, to make his debut among the 
 supernumeraries of the Cirque-Olympique ; he was leading 
 a wild life, breaking his mother's heart and draining her 
 purse by frequent forced loans. Cantinet, senior, much ad- 
 dicted to spirituous liquors and idleness, had, in fact, been 
 driven to retire from business by those two failings. So far 
 from reforming, the incorrigible offender had found scope in 
 his new occupation for the indulgence of both cravings ; 
 he did nothing, and he drank with drivers of wedding- 
 coaches, with the undertaker's men at funerals, with poor 
 folk relieved by the vicar, till his morning's occupation was 
 set forth in rubric on his countenance by noon. 
 
 Mme. Cantinet saw no prospect but want in her old age, 
 and yet she had brought her husband twelve thousand francs, 
 she said. The tale of her woes related for the hundredth 
 time suggested an idea to Dr. Poulain. Once introduce her 
 into the old bachelors' quarters, and it would be easy by 
 her means to establish Mme. Sauvage there as working house- 
 keeper. It was quite impossible to present Mme. Sauvage 
 herself, for the " nutcrackers " had grown suspicious of 
 everyone, Schmucke's refusal to admit Mile. Remonencq 
 had sufficiently opened Fraisier's eyes. Still, it seemed evi- 
 dent that Pons and Schmucke, being pious souls, would take 
 anyone recommended by the Abbe, with blind confidence. 
 Mme. Cantinet should bring Mme, Sauvage with her, and 
 to put in Fraisier's servant was almost tantamount to in- 
 stalling Fraisier himself. 
 
 The Abbe Duplanty, coming downstairs, found the gate- 
 way blocked by the Cibots' friends, all of them bent upon 
 showing their interest in one of the oldest and most re- 
 spectable porters in the Marais. 
 
 Dr. Poulain raised his hat, and took the Abbe aside. 
 
 ** I am just about to go to poor M. Pons," he said. " There
 
 «6^ COUSIN PONS 
 
 is still a chance of recovery ; but it is a question of inducing 
 him to undergo an operation. The calculi are perceptible 
 to the touch, they are setting up an inflammatory condition 
 which will end fatally, but perhaps it is not too late to remove 
 them. You should really use your influence to persuade the 
 patient to submit to surgical treatment; I will answer for 
 his life, provided that no untoward circumstance occurs dur- 
 ing the operation." 
 
 " I will return as soon as I have taken the sacred ciborium 
 back to the church," said the Abbe Duplanty, " for M. 
 Schmucke's condition claims the support of religion." 
 
 " I have just heard that he is alone," said Dr. Poulain. 
 " The German, good soul, had a little altercation this morn- 
 ing with Mme. Cibot, who has acted as housekeeper to them 
 both for the past ten years. They have quarreled (for the 
 moment only, no doubt), but under the circumstances they 
 must have someone in to help upstairs. It would be a 
 charity to look after him. — I say, Cantinet," continued the 
 doctor, beckoning to the beadle, " just go and ask your wife 
 if she will nurse M. Pons, and look after M. Schmucke, and 
 take Mme. Cibot's place for a day or two. . . . Even 
 without the quarrel, Mme. Cibot would still require a sub- 
 stitute. Mme. Cantinet is honest," added the doctor, turning 
 to M. Duplanty. 
 
 " You could not make a better choice," said the good 
 priest ; " she is intrusted with the letting of chairs in the 
 church." 
 
 A few minutes later. Dr. Poulain stood by Pons's pillow 
 watching the progress made by death, and Schmucke's vain 
 eff"orts to persuade his friend to consent to the operation. 
 To all the poor German's despairing entreaties Pons only 
 replied by a shake of the head and occasional impatient 
 movements ; till, after a while, he summoned up all his fast- 
 failing strength to say, with a heartrending look — 
 
 *' Do let me die in peace ! " 
 
 Schmucke almost died of sorrow, but he took Pons's 
 hand, and softly kissed it, and held it between his own, 
 as if trying a second time to give his own vitality to his 
 friend.
 
 COUSIN PONS 253 
 
 Just at this moment the bell rang, and Dr. Poulain, going 
 to the door, admitted the Abbe Duplantj. 
 
 " Our poor patient is struggling in the grasp of death," 
 he said. " All will be over in a few hours. You will send 
 a priest, no doubt, to watch to-night. But it is time that 
 Mme. Cantinet came, as well as a woman to do the work, 
 for M. Schmucke is quite unfit to think of anything: I am 
 afraid for his reason ; and there are valuables here which 
 ought to be in the custody of honest persons." 
 
 The Abbe Duplanty, a kindly, upright priest, guileless and 
 unsuspicious, was struck with the truth of Dr. Poulain's 
 remarks. He had, moreover, a certain belief in the doctor 
 of the quarter. So, on the threshold of the death-chamber, 
 he stopped and beckoned to Schmucke, but Schmucke could 
 not bring himself to loosen the grasp of the hand that grew 
 tighter and tighter. Pons seemed to think that he was slip- 
 ping over the edge of a precipice and must catch at something 
 to save himself. But, as many know, the dying are haunted 
 by an hallucination that leads them to snatch at things about 
 them, like men eager to save their most precious possessions 
 from a fire. Presently Pons released Schmucke to clutch at 
 the bedclothes, dragging them and huddling them about 
 himself with a hasty, covetous movement significant and pain- 
 ful to see. 
 
 " What will you do, left alone with your dead friend.? " 
 asked M. I'Abbe Duplanty when Schmucke came to the door. 
 " You have not Mme. Cibot now " 
 
 " Ein monster dat haf killed Bons ! " 
 
 " But you must have somebody with you," began Dr. 
 Poulain. " Someone must sit up with the body to-night." 
 
 " I shall sit up ; I shall say die prayers to Gott," the inno- 
 cent German answered. 
 
 " But you must eat — and who is to cook for you now? " 
 asked the doctor. 
 
 "Grief haf taken afay mein abbetite," Schmucke said, 
 simply. 
 
 " And someone must give notice to the registrar," said 
 Poulain, " and lay out the body, and order the funeral ; and 
 the person who sits up with the body and the priest will
 
 554 COUSIN PONS 
 
 want meals. Can you do this all by yourself? A man can- 
 not die like a dog in the capital of the civilized world." 
 
 Schmucke opened wide eyes of dismay. A brief fit of 
 madness seized him. 
 
 " But Bons shall not tie ! . . ." he cried aloud. " I 
 shall safe him ! " 
 
 " You cannot go without sleep much longer, and who will 
 take your place? Someone must look after M. Pons, and 
 give him drink, and nurse him " 
 
 " Ah ! dat is drue." 
 
 " Very well," said the Abbe, " I am thinking of sending 
 you Mme. Cantinet, a good and honest creature " 
 
 The practical details of the care of the dead bewildered 
 Schmucke, till he was fain to die with his friend. 
 
 " He is a child," said the doctor, turning to the Abbe 
 Duplanty. 
 
 " Ein child," Schmucke repeated mechanically. 
 
 " There, then," said the curate ; " I will speak to Mme. 
 Cantinet, and send her to you." 
 
 " Do not trouble yourself," said the doctor ; " I am going 
 home, and she lives in the next house." 
 
 The dying seem to struggle with Death as with an in- 
 visible assassin ; in the agony at the last, as the final thrust 
 is made, the act of dying seems to be a conflict, a hand-to- 
 hand fight for life. Pons had reached the supreme moment. 
 At the sound of his groans and cries, the three standing in 
 the doorway hurried to the bedside. Then came the last 
 blow, smiting asunder the bonds between soul and body, 
 striking down to life's sources ; and suddenly Pons regained 
 for a few brief moments the perfect calm that follows the 
 struggle. He came to himself, and with the serenity of 
 death in his face he looked round almost smilingly at them. 
 
 " Ah, doctor, I have had a hard time of it ; but you were 
 right, I am doing better. Thank you, my good Abbe; I 
 was wondering what had become of Schmucke " 
 
 " Schmucke has had nothing to eat since yesterday even- 
 ing, and now it is four o'clock! You have no one with you 
 now, and it would not be wise to send for Mme. Cibot." 
 
 " She is capable of anything ! " said Pons, without attempt-
 
 COUSIN PONS 255 
 
 ing to conceal all his abhorrence at the sound of her name. 
 *' It is true, Schmucke ought to have some trustworthy 
 person." 
 
 " M. Duplanty and I have been thinking about you 
 both " 
 
 " Ah ! thank you, I had not thought of that." 
 
 " — and M. Duplanty suggests that you should have 
 Mme. Cantinet " 
 
 " Oh ! Mme. Cantinet who lets the chairs ! " exclaimed 
 Pons. " Yes ; she is an excellent creature." 
 
 " She has no liking for Mme. Cibot," continued the doctor, 
 " and she would take good care of M. Schmucke " 
 
 " Send her to me, M. Duplanty . . . send her and 
 her husband too. I shall be easy. Nothing will be stolen 
 here." 
 
 Schmucke had taken Pons's hand again, and held it joy- 
 ously in his own. Pons was almost well again, he thought. 
 
 " Let us go, M. I'Abbe," said the doctor. " I will send 
 Mme. Cantinet round at once. I see how it is. She perhaps 
 may not find M. Pons alive." 
 
 While the Abbe Duplanty was persuading Pons to engage 
 Mme. Cantinet as his nurse, Fraisier had sent for her. He 
 had plied the beadle's wife with sophistical reasoning and 
 subtlety. It was difficult to resist his corrupting influence. 
 And as for Mme. Cantinet — a lean, sallow woman, with large 
 teeth and thin lips — her intelligence, as so often happens with 
 women of the people, had been blunted by a hard life, till 
 she had come to look upon the slenderest daily wage as 
 prosperity. She soon consented to take Mme. Sauvage with 
 her as general servant. 
 
 Mme. Sauvage had had her instructions already. She 
 had undertaken to weave a web of iron wire about the two 
 musicians, and to watch them as a spider watches a fly 
 caught in the toils ; and her reward was to be a tobacconist's 
 license. Fraisier had found a convenient opportunity of 
 getting rid of his so-called foster-mother, while he posted 
 Jier as a detective and policeman to supervise Mme. Cantinet. 
 As there was a servant's bedroom and a little kitchen included
 
 256 COUSIN PONS 
 
 in the apartment, La Sauvage could sleep on a truclde-bed 
 and cook for the German. Dr. Poulain came with the two 
 women just as Pons drew his last breath. Schmucke was 
 sitting beside his friend, all unconscious of the crisis, holding 
 the hand that slowly grew colder in his grasp. He signed 
 to Mme. Cantinet to be silent ; but Mme. Sauvage's soldierly 
 figure surprised him so much that he started in spite of 
 himself, a kind of homage to which the -virago was quite 
 accustomed. 
 
 " M. Duplanty answers for this lady," whispered Mme. 
 Cantinet by way of introduction. " She once was cook to 
 a bishop ; she is honesty itself ; she will do the cooking," 
 
 " Oh ! you may talk out loud," wheezed the stalwart dame. 
 *' The poor gentleman is dead. . . . He has just 
 gone." 
 
 A shrill cry broke from Schmucke. He felt Pons's cold 
 hand stiffening in his, and sat staring into his friend's eyes ; 
 the look in them would have driven him mad, if Mme. 
 Sauvage, doubtless accustomed to scenes of this sort, had 
 not come to the bedside with a mirror, which she held over 
 the lips of the dead. When she saw that there was no mist 
 upon the surface, she briskly snatched Schmucke's hand 
 away. 
 
 " Just take away your hand, sir ; you may not be able 
 to do it in a little while. You do not know how the bones 
 harden. A corpse grows cold very quickly. If you do not 
 lay out a body while it is warm, you have to break the joints 
 later on . . ." 
 
 And so it was this terrible woman who closed the poor 
 dead musician's eyes. 
 
 With a businesslike dexterity acquired in ten years of 
 experience, she stripped and straightened the body, laid the 
 arms by the sides, and covered the face with the bedclothes, 
 exactly as a shopman wraps a parcel. 
 
 " A sheet will be wanted to lay him out. — ^Where is there 
 a sheet.?" she demanded, turning on the terror-stricken 
 Schmucke. 
 
 He had watched the religious ritual with its deep rever- 
 ence for the creature made for such high destinies in heaven ;
 
 COUSIN PONS 257 
 
 and now he saw his dead friend treated simply as a thing 
 in this packing process — saw with the sharp pain that dis- 
 solves the very elements of thought. 
 
 " Do as you vill " he answered mechanically. The 
 
 innocent creature for the first time in his life had seen a 
 man die, and that man was Pons, his only friend, the one 
 human being who understood him and loved him. 
 
 " I will go and ask Mme. Cibot where the sheets are kept," 
 said La Sauvage. 
 
 " A truckle-bed will be wanted for the person to sleep 
 upon," Mme. Cantinet came to tell Schmucke. 
 
 Schmucke nodded and broke out into weeping. ]VIme. 
 Cantinet left the unhappy man in peace; but an hour later 
 she came back to say — 
 
 " Have you any money, sir, to pay for the things ? " 
 
 The look that Schmucke gave Mme. Cantinet would have 
 disarmed the fiercest hate ; it was the white, blank, peaked 
 face of death that he turned upon her, as an explanation 
 that met everything, 
 
 " Dake it all and leaf me to mein prayers and tears," 
 he said, and knelt. 
 
 Mme. Sauvage went to Fraisier with the news of Pons's 
 death. Fraisier took a cab and went to the Presidente. 
 To-morrow she must give him the power of attorney to 
 enable him to act for the heirs. 
 
 Another hour went by, and Mme. Cantinet came again 
 to Schmucke. 
 
 " I have been to Mme. Cibot, sir, who knows all about 
 things here," she said. " I asked her to tell me where every- 
 thing is kept. But she almost jawed me to death with her 
 abuse. . . . Sir, do listen to me. . . ." 
 
 Schmucke looked up at the woman, and she went on, inno- 
 cent of any barbarous intention, for women of her class are 
 accustomed to take the worst of moral suffering passively, 
 as a matter of course. 
 
 " We must have linen for the shroud, sir ; we must have 
 money to buy a truckle-bed for the person to sleep upon, 
 and some things for the kitchen — plates, and dishes, and 
 glasses, for a priest will be coming to pass the night here,
 
 258 COUSIN PONS 
 
 and the person says that there Is absolutely nothing In the 
 kitchen." 
 
 " And what is more, sir, I must have coal and firing if 
 I am to get the dinner ready," echoed La Sauvage, " and not 
 a thing can I find. Not that there is anything so very sur- 
 prising In that, as La Cibot used to do everything for 
 you " 
 
 Schmucke lay at the feet of the dead; he heard nothing, 
 knew nothing, saw nothing. Mme. Cantinet pointed to him. 
 " My dear woman, you would not believe me," she said. 
 " Whatever you say, he does not answer." 
 
 " Very well, child," said La Sauvage ; " now I will show 
 you what to do in a case of this kind." 
 
 She looked round the room as a thief looks in search of 
 possible hiding-places for money; then she went straight to 
 Pons's chest, opened the first drawer, saw the bag in which 
 Schmucke had put the rest of the money after the sale of 
 the pictures, and held it up before him. He nodded mechan- 
 ically. 
 
 " Here is money, child," said La Sauvage, turning to 
 Mme. Cantinet. " I will count it first and take enough to 
 buy everything we want — wine, provisions, wax-candles, all 
 sorts of things, in fact, for there is nothing in the house. 
 Just look in the drawers for a sheet to bury him in. 
 I certainly was told that the poor gentleman was simple, 
 but I don't know what he is ; he is worse. He is like a new- 
 born child ; we shall have to feed him with a funnel." 
 
 The women went about their work, and Schmucke looked 
 on precisely as an idiot might have done. Broken down with 
 sorrow, wholly absorbed, in a half-cataleptic state, he could 
 not take his eyes from the face that seemed to fascinate him, 
 Pons's face, refined by the absolute repose of Death. 
 Schmucke hoped to die ; everything was alike indifferent. If 
 the room had been on fire he would not have stirred. 
 
 " There are twelve hundred and fifty francs here," La 
 Sauvage told liim. 
 
 Schmucke shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 But when La Sauvage came near to measure the body by 
 laying the sheet over it, before cutting out the shroud, a
 
 COUSIN PONS 259 
 
 horrible struggle ensued between her and the poor German. 
 Schmucke was furious. He behaved like a dog that watches 
 by his dead master's body, and shows his teeth at all who 
 try to touch it. La Sauvage grew impatient. She grasped 
 him, set him in the armchair, and held him down with hercu- 
 lean strength. 
 
 " Go on, child ; sew him in his shroud," she said, turning 
 to Mme. Cantinet. 
 
 As soon as this operation was completed, La Sauvage 
 set Schmucke back in his place at the foot of the bed. 
 
 " Do you understand ? " said she. " The poor dead 
 man lying there must be done up, there is no help for 
 it." 
 
 Schmucke began to cry. The women left him and took 
 possession of the kitchen, whither they brought all the neces- 
 saries in a very short time. La Sauvage made out a pre- 
 liminary statement accounting for three hundred and sixty 
 francs, and then proceeded to prepare a dinner for four 
 persons. And what a dinner! A fat goose (the cobbler's 
 pheasant) by way of a substantial roast, an omelette with 
 preserves, a salad, and the inevitable broth — the quantities 
 of the ingredients for this last being so excessive that the 
 soup was more like a strong meat- jelly. 
 
 At nine o'clock the priest, sent by the cure to watch 
 by the dead, came in with Cantinet, who brought four tall 
 wax candles and some tapers. In the death-chamber 
 Schmucke was lying with his arms about the body of his 
 friend, holding him in a tight clasp ; nothing but the authority 
 of religion availed to separate him from his dead. Then the 
 priest settled himself comfortably in the easy-chair and 
 read his prayers ; while Schmucke, kneehng beside the couch, 
 besought God to work a miracle and unite him to Pons, so 
 that they might be buried in the same grave; and Mme. 
 Cantinet went on her way to the Temple to buy a pallet 
 and complete bedding for Mme. Sauvage. The twelve hun- 
 dred and fifty francs were regarded as plunder. At eleven 
 o'clock Mme, Cantinet came in to ask if Schmucke would 
 not eat a morsel, but with a gesture he signified that he 
 wished to be left in peace.
 
 260 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Your supper is ready, M. Pastelot," she said, addressing 
 the priest, and they went. 
 
 Schmucke, left alone in the room, smiled to himself like a 
 madman free at last to gratify a desire like the longing of 
 pregnancy. He flung himself down beside Pons, and yet 
 again he held his friend in a long, close embrace. At mid- 
 night the priest came back and scolded him, and Schmucke 
 returned to his prayers. At daybreak the priest went, and 
 at seven o'clock in the morning the doctor came to see 
 Schmucke, and spoke kindly and tried hard to persuade him 
 to eat, but the German refused. 
 
 " If you do not eat now you will feel very hungry when 
 you come back," the doctor told him, " for you must go to 
 the mayor's office and take a witness with you, so that the 
 registrar may issue a certificate of death." 
 
 " I must go ! " cried Schmucke in frightened tones. 
 
 *' Who else ? . . . You must go, for you were the one 
 person who saw him die." 
 
 " Mein legs vill nicht carry me," pleaded Schmucke, im- 
 ploring the doctor to come to the rescue. 
 
 " Take a cab," the hypocritical doctor blandly suggested. 
 " I have given notice alread3^ Ask someone in the house to 
 go with you. The two women will look after the place while 
 you are away." 
 
 No one imagines how the requirements of the law jar upon 
 a heartfelt sorrow. The thought of it is enough to make 
 one turn from civilization and choose rather the customs 
 of the savage. At nine o'clock that morning Mme. Sauvage 
 half-carried Schmucke downstairs, and from the cab he was 
 obliged to beg Remonencq to come with him to the registrar 
 as a second witness. Here in Paris, in this land of ours 
 besotted with Equality, the inequality of conditions is glar- 
 ingly apparent everywhere and in everything. The immu- 
 table tendency of things peeps out even in the practical 
 aspects of death. In well-to-do families, a relative, a friend, 
 or a man of business spares the mourners these painful de- 
 tails ; but in this, as in the matter of taxation, the whole 
 burden falls heaviest upon the shoulders of the poor. 
 
 " Ah ! you have good reason to regret him," said Remo-
 
 COUSIN PONS 261 
 
 nencq in answer to the poor martyr's moan ; " he was a very 
 good, a very honest man, and he has left a fine collection 
 behind him. But being a foreigner, sir, do you know that 
 you are Hke to find yourself in a great predicament — for 
 everybody says that M. Pons left everything to you? " 
 
 Schmucke was not listening. He was sounding the dark 
 depths of sorrow that border upon madness. There is such 
 a thing as tetanus of the soul. 
 
 " And you would do well to find someone — some man of 
 business — to advise you and act for you," pursued Remo- 
 nencq. 
 
 " Ein mann of pizness ! " echoed Schmucke. 
 
 " You will find that you will want someone to act for you. 
 If I were you, I should take an experienced man, somebody 
 well known in the quarter, a man you can trust. ... I 
 always go to Tabareau myself for my bits of aflPairs — he 
 is the bailiff. If you give his clerk power to act for you, 
 you need not trouble yourself any further." 
 
 Remonencq and La Cibot, prompted by Fraisier, had 
 agreed beforehand to make a suggestion which stuck in 
 Schmucke's memory ; for there are times in our lives when 
 grief, as it were, congeals the mind by arresting all its 
 functions, and any chance impression made at such moments 
 is retained by a frost-bound memory. Schmucke heard his 
 companion with such a fixed, mindless stare, that Remonencq 
 said no more. 
 
 " If he is always to be idiotic like this," thought Remo- 
 nencq, " I might easily buy the whole bag of tricks up yonder 
 for a hundred thousand francs ; if it is really his. 
 Here we are at the mayor's office, sir." 
 
 Remonencq was obliged to take Schmucke out of the cab 
 and to half-carry him to the registrar's department, where 
 a wedding-party was assembled. Here they had to wait for 
 their turn, for, by no very uncommon chance, the clerk had 
 five or six certificates to make out that morning ; and here 
 it was appointed that poor Schmucke should suffer ex- 
 cruciating anguish. 
 
 "Monsieur is M. Schmucke?" remarked a person in a 
 suit of black, reducing Schmucke to stupefaction by the men-
 
 262 COUSIN PONS 
 
 tion of his name. He looked up with the same blank, unsee- 
 ing eyes that he had turned upon Remonencq, who now inter- 
 posed. 
 
 "What do you want with him?" he said. "Just leave 
 him in peace ; you can see plainly that he is in trouble." 
 
 " The gentleman has just lost his friend, and proposes, 
 no doubt, to do honor to his memory, being, as he is, the 
 sole heir. The gentleman, no doubt, will not haggle over 
 it ; he will buy a piece of ground outright for a grave. 
 And as M. Pons was such a lover of the arts, it would be 
 a great pity not to put Music, Painting, and Sculpture on 
 his tomb — three handsome full-length figures, weeping " 
 
 Remonencq waved the speaker away, in Auvergnat fashion, 
 but the man replied with another gesture, which being in- 
 terpreted means " Don't spoil sport " ; a piece of commercial 
 freemasonry, as it were, which the dealer understood. 
 
 " I represent the firm of Sonet and Company, monumental 
 stone-masons ; Sir Walter Scott would have dubbed me Young 
 3Iortalitij," continued this person. " If you, sir, should 
 decide to intrust your orders to us, we would spare you the 
 trouble of the journey to purchase the ground necessary for 
 the interment of a friend lost to the arts " 
 
 At this Remonencq nodded assent, and jogged Schmucke's 
 elbow. 
 
 " Every day we receive orders from families to arrange 
 all formalities," continued he of the black coat, thus en- 
 couraged by Remonencq. " In the first moment of bereave- 
 ment, the heir-at-law finds it very difficult to attend to such 
 matters, and we are accustomed to perform these little serv- 
 ices for our clients. Our charges, sir, are on a fixed scale, 
 so much per foot, freestone or marble. Family vaults a 
 specialty. — We undertake everything at the most moderate 
 prices. Our firm executed the magnificent monument erected 
 to the fair Esther Gobseck and Lucien de Rubempre, one of 
 the finest ornaments of Pere-Lachaise. We only employ the 
 best workmen, and I must warn you, sir, against small 
 contractors — who turn out nothing but trash," he added, 
 seeing that another person in a black suit was coming up 
 to say a word for another firm of marble-workers.
 
 COUSIN PONS 263 
 
 It is often said that "death is the end of a journey," 
 but the aptness of the simile is reahzed most fully in Paris. 
 Any arrival, especially of a person of condition, upon the 
 " dark brink," is hailed in much the same way as the trav- 
 eler recently landed is hailed by hotel touts and pestered 
 with their recommendations. With the exception of a few 
 philosophically-minded persons, or here and there a family 
 secure of handing down a name to posterity, nobody thinks 
 beforehand of the practical aspects of death. Death always 
 comes before he is expected; and, from a sentiment easy to 
 understand, the heirs usually act as if the event were im- 
 possible. For which reason, almost everyone that loses 
 father or mother, wife or child, is immediately beset by scouts 
 that profit by the confusion caused by grief to snare orders. 
 In former days, agents for monuments used to live round- 
 about the famous cemetery of Pere-Lachaise, and were gath- 
 ered together in a single thoroughfare which should by rights 
 have been called the Street of Tombs ; issuing thence, they 
 fell upon the relatives of the dead as they came from the 
 cemetery, or even at the grave-side. But competition and 
 the spirit of speculation induced them to spread themselves 
 further and further afield, till, descending into Paris itself, 
 they reached the very precincts of the mayor's office. In- 
 deed, the stone-mason's agent has often been known to invade 
 the house of mourning with a design for the sepulcher in 
 his hand. 
 
 " I am in treaty with this gentleman," said the representa- 
 tive of the firm of Sonet to another agent who came up. 
 
 " Pons deceased ! . . ." called the clerk at this mo- 
 ment. "Where are the witnesses?" 
 
 " This way, sir," said the stone-mason's agent, this time 
 addressing Remonencq. 
 
 Schmucke stayed where he had been placed on the bench, 
 an inert mass. Remonencq begged the agent to help him, 
 and together they pulled Schmucke towards the balustrade, 
 behind which the registrar shelters himself from the mourning 
 public. Remonencq, Schmucke's Providence, was assisted 
 by Dr. Poulain, who filled in the necessary information as to 
 Pons's age and birthplace ; the German knew but one thing —
 
 264. COUSIN PONS 
 
 that Pons was his friend. So soon as the signatures were 
 afiixed, Remonencq and the doctor (followed by the stone- 
 mason's man), put Schmucke into a cab, the desperate agent 
 whisking in afterwards, bent upon taking a definite order. 
 
 La Sauvage, on the lookout in the gateway, half-carried 
 Schmucke's almost unconscious form upstairs. Remonencq 
 and the agent went up with her. 
 
 " He will be ill 1 " exclaimed the agent, anxious to make 
 an end of the piece of business which, according to him, 
 was in progress. 
 
 " I should think he will ! " returned Mme. Sauvage. *' He 
 has been crying for twenty-four hours on end, and he would 
 not take anything. There is nothing like grief for giving 
 one a sinking in the stomach." 
 
 " My dear client," urged the representative of the firm of 
 Sonet, " do take some broth. You have so much to do ; some- 
 one must go to the Hotel de Ville to buy the ground in the 
 cemetery on which you mean to erect a monument to per- 
 petuate the memory of the friend of the arts, and bear 
 record to your gratitude." 
 
 " Why, there is no sense in this ! " added Mme. Cantinet, 
 coming in with broth and bread. 
 
 " If you are as weak as this, you ought to think of finding 
 someone to act for you," added Remonencq, " for you have 
 a good deal on your hands, my dear sir. There is the funeral 
 to order. You would not have your friend buried like a 
 pauper ! " 
 
 " Come, come, my dear sir," put in La Sauvage, seizing 
 a moment when Schmucke laid his head back in the great 
 chair to pour a spoonful of soup into his mouth. She fed 
 him as if he had been a child, and almost in spite of himself. 
 
 " Now, if you were wise, sir, since you are inclined to 
 give yourself up quietly to grief, you would find someone 
 to act for you " 
 
 " As you are thinking of raising a magnificent monument 
 to the memory of your friend, sir, you have only to leave 
 it all to me ; I will undertake " 
 
 " What is all this? What is all this.? " asked La Sauvage. 
 *' Has M. Schmucke ordered something.'' Who may you be.'* "
 
 COUSIN PONS 365 
 
 ** I represent the firm of Sonet, my dear Madame, the 
 biggest monumental stone-masons in Paris," said the person 
 in black, handing a business-card to the stalwart Sauvage. 
 
 " Very well, that will do. Someone will go to you when 
 the time comes ; but you must not take advantage of the 
 gentleman's condition now. You can quite see that he is 
 not himself " 
 
 The agent led her out upon the landing. 
 
 " If you will undertake to get the order for us," he said 
 confidentially, " I am empowered to offer you forty francs." 
 
 Mme. Sauvage grew placable. " Very well, let me have 
 your address," said she. 
 
 Schmucke meantime being left to himself, and feeling the 
 stronger for the soup and bread that he had been forced 
 to swallow, returned at once to Pons's room, and to his 
 prayers. He had lost himself in the fathomless depths of 
 sorrow, when a voice sounding in his ears drew him back 
 from the abyss of grief, and a young man in a suit of 
 black returned for the eleventh time to the charge, pulling 
 the poor, tortured victim's coatsleeve until he listened. 
 
 " Sir ! " said he. 
 
 " Vat ees it now.? " 
 
 " Sir ! we owe a supreme discovery to Dr, Gannal : we 
 'do not dispute his fame, he has worked the miracles of Egypt 
 afresh ; but there have been improvements made upon his sys- 
 tem. We have obtained surprising results. So, if you 
 would like to see your friend again, as he was when he was 
 alive " 
 
 " See him again ! " cried Schmucke. *' Shall he speak 
 to me?" 
 
 " Not exactly. Speech is the only thing wanting," con- 
 tinued the embalmer's agent. " But he will remain as he is 
 after embalming for all eternity. The operation is over 
 in a few seconds. Just an incision in the carotid artery and 
 an injection. — But it is high time; if you wait one single 
 quarter of an hour, sir, you will not have the sweet satis- 
 faction of preserving the body . . ." 
 
 " Go to der teufel ! . . . Bons is ein spirit — und dat 
 spirit is in hefn."
 
 .^66 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " That man has no gratitude in his composition," re- 
 marked the youthful agent of one of the famous Gannal's 
 rivals ; " he will not embalm his friend." 
 
 The words were spoken under the archway, and addressed 
 to La Cibot, who had just submitted her beloved to the 
 process. 
 
 " What would you have, sir? " she said. " He is the heir, 
 the universal legatee. As soon as they get what they want, 
 the dead are nothing to them." 
 
 An hour later, Schmucke saw Mme. Sauvage come into 
 the room, followed by another man in a suit of black, a 
 workman to all appearance. 
 
 " Cantinet has been so obliging as to send this gentleman, 
 sir," she said ; " he is coffin-maker to the parish." 
 
 The coffin-maker made his bow with a sympathetic and 
 compassionate air, but none the less he had a businesslike 
 look, and seemed to know that he was indispensable. He 
 turned an expert's eye upon the dead. 
 
 " How does the gentleman wish ' it ' to be made? Deal, 
 plain oak, or oak lead-lined? Oak with a lead lining is the 
 best style. The body is a stock size," — he felt for the 
 feet and proceeded to take the measure — " one meter sev- 
 enty ! " he added. " You will be thinking of ordering the 
 funeral service at the church, sir, no doubt ? " 
 
 Schmucke looked at him as a dangerous madman might 
 look before striking a blow. La Sauvage put in a word. 
 
 " You ought to find somebody to look after all these 
 things," she said. 
 
 " Yes " the victim murmured at length. 
 
 " Shall I fetch M. Tabareau.'' — for you will have a good 
 deal on your hands before long. M. Tabareau is the most 
 honest man in the quarter, you see." 
 
 " Yes. Mennsir Dapareau ! Somepody vas speaking 
 of him chust now " said Schmucke, completely beaten. 
 
 " Very well. You can be quiet, sir, and give yourself up 
 to grief, when you have seen your deputy." 
 
 It was nearly two o'clock when M. Tabareau's head-clerk, 
 a young man who aimed at a bailiff's career, modestly pre- 
 sented himself. Youth has wonderful privileges ; no one is
 
 COUSIN PONS 26T 
 
 alarmed by youth. This young man, Villemot by name, sat 
 down by Schmucke's side and waited his opportunity to speak. 
 His diffidence touched Schmucke very much. 
 
 " I am M. Tabareau's head-clerk, sir," he said ; " he sent 
 me here to take charge of your interests, and to superintend 
 the funeral arrangements. Is this your wish.'' " 
 
 " You cannot safe my life, I haf not long to lif ; but you 
 vill leaf me in beace ! " 
 
 " Oh ! you shall not be disturbed," said Villemot. 
 
 " Ver' goot. Vat must I do for dat.'* " 
 
 " Sign this paper appointing M. Tabareau to act for you 
 in all matters relating to the settlement of the affairs of the 
 deceased." 
 
 " Goot ! gif it to me," said Schmucke, anxious only to sign 
 it at once. 
 
 " No, I must read it over to you first." 
 
 " Read it ofer." 
 
 Schmucke paid not the slightest attention to the reading 
 of the power of attorney, but he set his name to it. The 
 young clerk took Schmucke's orders for the funeral, the 
 interment, and the burial service ; undertaking that he should 
 not be troubled again in any way, nor asked for money. 
 
 " I vould gif all dat I haf to pe left in beace," said the 
 unhappy man. And once more he knelt beside the dead body 
 of his friend. 
 
 Fraisier had triumphed. Villemot and La Sauvage 
 completed the circle which he had traced about Pons's 
 heir. 
 
 There is no sorrow that sleep cannot overcome. Towards 
 the end of the day La Sauvage, coming in, found Schmucke 
 stretched asleep at the bed-foot. She carried him off, put 
 him to bed, tucked him in maternally, and till the morning 
 Schmucke slept. 
 
 When he awoke, or rather when the truce was over and 
 he again became conscious of his sorrows, Pons's coffin lay 
 under the gateway in such state as a third-class funeral 
 may claim, and Schmucke, seeking vainly for his friend, 
 wandered from room to room, across vast spaces, as it seemed 
 to him, empty of everything save hideous memories. La
 
 268 COUSIN PONS 
 
 Sauvage took him in hand, much as a nurse manages a child ; 
 she made him take his breakfast before starting for the 
 church ; and while the poor sufferer forced himself to eat, 
 she discovered, with lamentations worthy of Jeremiah, that 
 he had not a black coat in his possession. La Cibot took 
 entire charge of his wardrobe ; since Pons fell ill his apparel, 
 like his dinner, had been reduced to the lowest terms — ^to a 
 couple of coats and two pairs of trousers. 
 
 "And you are going just as you are to M. Pons's 
 funeral .f^ It is an unheard-of thing; the whole quarter will 
 cry shame upon us ! " 
 
 " Und how vill you dat I go.'' " 
 
 " Why, in mourning " 
 
 *' Mourning ! " 
 
 " It is the proper thing." 
 
 " Der bropper ding ! . . . confound all dis stupid 
 nonsense ! " cried poor Schmucke, driven to the last degree 
 of exasperation which a childlike soul can reach under stress 
 of sorrow. 
 
 " Why, the man is a monster of ingratitude ! " said La 
 Sauvage, turning to a personage who just then appeared. 
 At the sight of tliis functionary Schmucke shuddered. The 
 new-comer wore a splendid suit of black, black knee-breeches, 
 black silk stockings, a pair of white cuffs, an extremely cor- 
 rect white musHn tie, and white gloves. A silver chain 
 with a coin attached ornamented his person. A typical 
 official, stamped with the official expression of decorous 
 gloom, an ebony wand in his hand by way of insignia of 
 office, he stood waiting with a three-cornered hat adorned 
 with the tricolor cockade under his arm. 
 
 " I am the master of the ceremonies," this person re- 
 marked in a subdued voice. 
 
 Accustomed daily to superintend funerals, to move among 
 families plunged in one and the same kind of tribulation, 
 real or feigned, this man, like the rest of his fraternity, 
 spoke in hushed and soothing tones ; he was decorous, polished, 
 and formal, like an allegorical stone figure of Death. 
 
 Schmucke quivered through every nerve as if he were con- 
 fronting his executioner.
 
 COUSIN PONS 269 
 
 " Is this gentleman the son, brother, or father of the 
 deceased? " inquired the official. 
 
 " I am all dat und more pesides — I am his friend," said 
 Schmucke through a torrent of weeping. 
 
 " Are you his heir.? " 
 
 " Heir.? . . ." repeated Schmucke. " Noding matters 
 to me more in dis vorld," returning to his attitude of hopeless 
 sorrow. 
 
 " Where are the relatives, the friends ? " asked the master 
 of the ceremonies. 
 
 " All here ! " exclaimed the German, indicating the pictures 
 and rarities. " Not von of dem haf efer gifn bain to mein 
 boor Bons. . . . Here ees everydings dot he lofed, after 
 me." 
 
 " He is off his head, sir," put in La Sauvage. " It is use- 
 less to listen to him." 
 
 Schmucke had taken his seat again, and looked as vacant 
 as before; he dried his eyes mechanically. Villemot came 
 up at that moment ; he had ordered the funeral, and the 
 master of the ceremonies, recognizing him, made an appeal 
 to the newcomer. 
 
 " Well, sir, it is time to start. The hearse is here ; but 
 I have not often seen such a funeral as this. Where are 
 the relatives and friends ? " 
 
 " We have been pressed for time," replied Villemot. " This 
 gentleman was in such deep grief that he could think of 
 nothing. And there is only one relative." 
 
 The master of the ceremonies looked compassionately at 
 Schmucke ; this expert in sorrow knew real grief when he 
 saw it. He went across to him. 
 
 " Come, take heart, my dear sir. Think of paying honor 
 to your friend's memory." 
 
 " We forgot to send out cards ; but I took care to send a 
 special message to M. le President de Marville, the one rela- 
 tive that I mentioned to you. — There are no friends. — M. 
 Pons was conductor of an orchestra at a theater, but I do 
 not think that anyone will come. — This gentleman is the uni- 
 versal legatee, I believe." 
 
 " Then he ought to be chief mourner," said the master of
 
 ^70 COUSIN PONS 
 
 the ceremonies. — " Have you not a black coat? " he con- 
 tinued, noticing Schmucke's costume. 
 
 " I am all in plack insite ! " poor Schmucke replied in 
 
 heartrending tones ; " so plack it is dot I feel death in me. 
 
 Gott in hefn is going to haf pity upon me; He 
 
 vill send me to mein friend in der grafe, und I dank Him 
 
 for it " 
 
 He clasped his hands. 
 
 " I have told our management before now that we ought 
 to have a wardrobe department and lend the proper mourn- 
 ing costumes on hire," said the master of the ceremonies, 
 addressing Villemot ; " it is a want that is more and more 
 felt every day, and we have even now introduced improve- 
 ments. But as this gentleman is chief mourner he ought 
 to wear a cloak, and this one that I have brought with me 
 will cover him from head to foot ; no one need know that 
 he is not in proper mourning costume. — Will you be so kind 
 as to rise ? " 
 
 Schmucke rose, but he tottered on his feet. 
 
 " Support him," said the master of the ceremonies, turn- 
 ing to Villemot ; " you are his legal representative." 
 
 Villemot held Schmucke's arm while the master of the 
 ceremonies invested Schmucke with the ample, dismal-looking 
 garment worn by heirs-at-law in the procession to and from 
 the house and the church. He tied the black silken 
 cords under the chin, and Schmucke as heir was in " full 
 dress." 
 
 " And now comes a great difficulty," continued the master 
 of the ceremonies ; " we want four bearers for the pall. . . . 
 If nobody comes to the funeral, who is to fill the corners? 
 It is half-past ten already," he added, looking at his watch ; 
 " they are waiting for us at the church." 
 
 " Oh ! here comes Fraisier ! " Villemot exclaimed, very im- 
 prudently; but there was no one to hear the tacit confession 
 of complicity. 
 
 " Who is this gentleman ? " inquired the master of the 
 ceremonies. 
 
 " Oh ! he comes on behalf of the family." 
 
 "Whose family?"
 
 COUSIN PONS 271; 
 
 " The disinherited family. He is M. Camusot de Mar- 
 ville's representative." 
 
 " Good," said the master of the ceremonies, with a satis- 
 fied air. *' We shall have two pall-bearers at any rate— 
 you and he." 
 
 And, happy to find two of the places filled up, he took 
 out some wonderful white buckskin gloves, and poHtely pre- 
 sented Fraisier and Villemot with a pair apiece. 
 
 " If you gentlemen will be so good as to act as pall- 
 bearers " said he. 
 
 Fraisier, in black from head to foot, pretentiously dressed, 
 with his white tie and official air, was a sight to shudder at ; 
 he embodied a hundred briefs. 
 
 " Willingly, sir," said he. 
 
 " If only two more persons will come, the four corners will 
 be filled up," said the master of the ceremonies. 
 
 At that very moment the indefatigable representative of 
 the firm of Sonet came up, and, closely following him, the 
 one man who remembered Pons and thought of paying him 
 a last tribute of respect. This was a supernumerary at 
 the theater, the man who put out the scores on the music- 
 stands for the orchestra. Pons had been wont to give him a 
 five-franc piece once a month, knowing that he had a wife 
 and family. 
 
 " Oh, Dobinard [Topinard] ! " Schmucke cried out at the 
 sight of him, " you love Pons ! " 
 
 " Why, I have come to ask news of M. Pons every morn- 
 ing, sir." 
 
 " Efery morning ! boor Dobinard ! " and Schmucke squeezed 
 the man's hand. 
 
 " But they took me for a relation, no doubt, and did not 
 like my visits at all. I told them that I belonged to the 
 theater and came to inquire after M. Pons ; but it was no 
 good. They saw through that dodge, they said. I asked 
 to see the poor dear man, but they never would let me come 
 upstairs." 
 
 " Dat apominable Zipod ! " said Schmucke, squeezing 
 Topinard's horny hand to his heart. 
 
 " He was the best of men, that good M. Pons. Every
 
 272 COUSIN PONS 
 
 month he used to give me five francs. . . . He knew 
 that I had three children and a wife. My wife has gone 
 to the church." 
 
 " I shall difide mein pread mit you," cried Schmucke, in 
 his joy at finding at his side someone who loved Pons. 
 
 " If this gentleman will take a corner of the pall, we 
 shall have all four filled up," said the master of the cere- 
 monies. 
 
 There had been no difficulty over persuading the agent 
 for monuments. He took a corner the more readily when 
 he was shown the handsome pair of gloves which, according 
 to custom, was to be his property. 
 
 " A quarter to eleven ! We absolutely must go down. 
 They are waiting for us at the church." 
 
 The six persons thus assembled went down the staircase. 
 
 The cold-blooded lawyer remained a moment to speak to 
 the two women on the landing. *' Stop here, and let nobody 
 come in," he said, " especially if you wish to remain in 
 charge, Mme. Cantinet. Aha! two francs a day, you 
 know ! " 
 
 By a coincidence in nowise extraordinary in Paris, two 
 hearses were waiting at the door, and two coffins standing 
 under the archway ; Cibot's funeral was to take place at 
 the same hour. Nobody came to pay any tribute of affection 
 to the " deceased friend of the arts," lying in state among 
 the lighted tapers, but every porter in the neighborhood 
 sprinkled a drop of holy water upon the second bier. And 
 this contrast between the crowd at Cibot's funeral and the 
 solitary state in which Pons was lying was made even more 
 striking in the street. Schmucke was the only mourner that 
 followed Pons's coffin ; Schmucke, supported by one of the 
 undertaker's men, for he tottered at every step. From the 
 Rue de Normandie to the Rue d'Orleans and the church of 
 Saint-Fran9ois the two funerals went between a double row 
 of curious onlookers, for everything (as was said before) 
 makes a sensation in the quarter. Everyone remarked the 
 splendor of the white funeral car, with a big embroidered 
 P suspended on a hatchment, and the one solitary mourner be- 
 hind it ; while the cheap bier that came after it was followed
 
 COUSIN PONS a7S 
 
 by an immense crowd. Happily, Schmucke was so bewil- 
 dered by the throng of idlers and the rows of heads in the 
 windows, that he heard no remarks and only saw the faces 
 through a mist of tears. 
 
 "Oh, it is the nutcracker!" said one, "the musician, 
 you know " 
 
 " Who can the pall-bearers be ? " 
 
 " Pooh \ play-actors." 
 
 *' I say, just look at poor old Cibot's funeral. There is 
 one worker the less. What a man! he could never get 
 enough work ! " 
 
 " He never went out." 
 
 "He never kept Saint Monday." 
 
 " How fond he was of his wife ! " 
 
 " Ah ! There is an unhappy woman ! " 
 
 Remonencq walked behind his victim's coffin. People con- 
 doled with him on the loss of his neighbor. 
 
 The two funerals reached the church. Cantinet and the 
 doorkeeper saw that no beggars troubled Schmucke. Ville- 
 mot had given his word that Pons's heir should be left in 
 peace; he watched over his client, and gave the requisite 
 sums ; and Cibot's humble bier, escorted by sixty or eighty 
 persons, drew all the crowd after it to the cemetery. At 
 the church door Pons's funeral procession mustered four 
 mourning-coaches, one for the priest and three for the re- 
 lations ; but one only was required, for the representative 
 of the firm of Sonet departed during Mass to give notice to 
 liis principal that the funeral was on the way, so that the 
 design for the monument might be ready for the survivor 
 at the gates of the cemetery. A single coach sufficed for 
 Fraisier, Villemot, Schmucke, and Topinard ; but the re- 
 maining two, instead of returning to the undertaker, followed 
 in the procession to Pere-Lachaise — a useless procession, not 
 unfrequently seen ; there are always too many coaches when 
 the dead are unknown beyond their own circle and there is 
 no crowd at the funeral. Dear, indeed, the dead must have 
 been in their lifetime if relative or friend will go with them 
 so far as the cemetery in this Paris, where everyone would 
 fain have twenty-five hours iu the day. But with the coach-
 
 ^74. COUSIN PONS 
 
 men it is different ; they lose their tips if they do not make 
 the journey; so, empty or full, the mourning-coaches go to 
 church and cemetery and return to the house for gratuities. 
 A death is a sort of drinking-fountain for an unimagined 
 crowd of thirsty mortals. The attendants at the church, 
 the poor, the undertaker's men, the drivers and sextons, are 
 creatures like sponges that dip into a hearse and come out 
 again saturated. 
 
 From the church door, where he was beset with a swarm 
 of beggars (promptly dispersed by the beadle), to Pere- 
 Lachaise, poor Schmucke went as criminals went in old times 
 from the Palais de Justice to the Place de Greve. It was 
 his own funeral that he followed, clinging to Topinard's 
 hand, to the one living creature besides himself who felt a 
 pang of real regret for Pons's death. 
 
 As for Topinard, greatly touched by the honor of the 
 request to act as pall-bearer, content to drive in a carriage, 
 the possessor of a new pair of gloves, — it began to dawn 
 upon him that this was to be one of the great days of his life. 
 Schmucke was driven passively along the road, as some 
 unlucky calf is driven in a butcher's cart to the slaughter- 
 house. Fraisier and Villemot sat with their backs to the 
 horses. Now, as those know whose sad fortune it has been 
 to accompany many of their friends to their last resting- 
 place, all hypocrisy breaks down in the coach during the 
 journey (often a very long one) from the church to the 
 eastern cemetery, to that one of the burying-grounds of 
 Paris in Avhich all vanities, all kinds of display, are met, so 
 rich is it in sumptuous monuments. On these occasions those 
 who feel least begin to talk soonest, and in the end the sad- 
 dest listen, and their thoughts are diverted. 
 
 " M. le President had already started for the Court," 
 Fraisier told Villemot, " and I did not think it necessary to 
 tear him away from business ; he would have come too late 
 in any case. He is the next-of-kin ; but as he has been 
 disinherited and M. Schmucke gets everything, I thought 
 that if his legal representative were present it would be 
 enough." 
 
 Topinard lent an ear to this.
 
 COUSIN PONS 275 
 
 " Who was the queer customer that took the fourth 
 comer? " continued Fraisier. 
 
 " He is an agent for a firm of monumental stone-masons. 
 He would Hke an order for a tomb, on which he proposes 
 to put three sculptured marble figures — Music, Painting, and 
 Sculpture shedding tears over the deceased." 
 
 " It is an idea," said Fraisier ; " the old gentleman cer- 
 tainly deserved that much ; but the monument would cost 
 seven or eight hundred francs." 
 
 "Oh! quite that!" 
 
 " If M. Schmucke gives the order, it cannot affect the 
 estate. You might eat up a whole property with such ex- 
 penses." 
 
 " There would be a lawsuit, but you would gain it " 
 
 " Very well," said Fraisier, " then it will be his affair. — ■ 
 It would be a nice practical joke to play upon the monument- 
 makers," Fraisier added in Villemot's ear ; " for if the will 
 is upset (and I can answer for that), or if there is no Avill 
 at all, who would pay them.'' " 
 
 Villemot grinned like a monkey, and the pair began to 
 talk confidentially, lowering their voices ; but the man from 
 the theater, with his wits and senses sharpened in the world 
 behind the scenes, could guess at the nature of their dis- 
 course; in spite of the rumbling of the carriage and other 
 hindrances, he began to understand that these representatives 
 of justice were scheming to plunge poor Schmucke into 
 difficulties ; and when at last he heard the ominous word 
 " Clichy," ^ the honest and loyal servitor of the stage made 
 up his mind to watch over Pons's friend. 
 
 At the cemetery, where three square yards of ground had 
 been purchased through the good offices of the firm of 
 Sonet (Villemot having announced Schmucke's intention of 
 erecting a magnificent monument), the master of the cere- 
 monies led Schmucke through a curious crowd to the grave 
 into which Pons's coffin was about to be lowered; but here, 
 at the sight of the square hole, the four men waiting with 
 ropes to lower the bier, and the clergy saying the last prayer 
 
 ^The old debtors' prison in the Rue de Clichy.
 
 g76 COUSIN PONS 
 
 for the dead at the grave-sido, something clutched tightly 
 at the German's heart. He fainted away. 
 
 Sonet's agent and M. Sonet himself came to help Topinard 
 to carry poor Schmucke into the marble-works hard by, 
 where Mme. Sonet and Mme. Vitelot (Sonet's partner's 
 wife) were eagerly prodigal of efforts to revive him. Topi- 
 nard stayed. He had seen Fraisier in conversation with 
 Sonet's agent, and Fraisier, in his opinion, had gallows-bird 
 written on his face. 
 
 An hour later, towards half-past two o'clock, the poor, 
 innocent German came to himself. Schmucke thought that 
 he had been dreaming for the past two days ; if he could 
 only wake, he should find Pons still alive. So many wet 
 towels had been laid on his forehead, he had been made to 
 ■inhale salts and vinegar to such an extent, that he opened 
 his eyes at last. Mme. Sonet made him take some meat- 
 soup, for they had put the pot on the fire at the marble- 
 works. 
 
 " Our clients do not often take things to heart like this ; 
 still, it happens once in a year or two " 
 
 At last Schmucke talked of returning to the Rue de 
 Normandie, and at this Sonet began at once. 
 
 " Here is the design, sir," he said ; " Vitelot drew it 
 expressly for you, and sat up last night to do it. . . . 
 And he has been happily inspired ; it will look fine " 
 
 " One of the finest in Pere-Lachaise ! " said little Mme. 
 Sonet. " But you really ought to honor the memory of a 
 friend who left you all his fortune." 
 
 The design, supposed to have been drawn on purpose, 
 had, as a matter of fact, been prepared for de Marsay, the 
 famous cabinet Minister. His widow, however, had given 
 the commission to Stidmann ; people were disgusted with the 
 tawdriness of the project, and it was refused. The three 
 figures at that period represented the Three Days of July 
 which brought the eminent Minister to power. Subsequently, 
 Sonet and Vitelot had turned the Three Glorious Days — " les 
 trois glorieuses " — into the Army, Finance, and the Family', 
 and sent in the design for the sepulcher of the late lamented 
 Charles Keller; and here again Stidmann took the commis-
 
 COUSIN PONS 27T 
 
 sion. In the eleven years that followed, the sketch had been 
 modified to suit all kinds of requirements, and now in Vitelot's 
 fresh tracing they reappeared as Music, Sculpture, and 
 Painting. 
 
 " It is a mere trifle when you think of the details and 
 cost of setting it up ; for it will take six months," said 
 Vitelot. " Here is the estimate and the order-form — seven 
 thousand francs, sketch in plaster not included." 
 
 " If M. Schmucke would like marble," put in Sonet 
 (marble being his special department), " it would cost twelve 
 thousand francs, and Monsieur would immortalize himself 
 as well as his friend." 
 
 Topinard turned to Vitelot. 
 
 " I have just heard that they are going to dispute the 
 will," he whispered, " and the relatives are likely to come 
 by their property. Go and speak to M. Camusot, for this 
 poor, harmless creature has not a farthing." 
 
 " This is the kind of customer that you always bring us," 
 said Mme. Vitelot, beginning a quarrel with the agent. 
 
 Topinard led Schmucke away, and they returned home 
 on foot to the Rue de Normandie, for the mourning-coaches 
 had been sent back. 
 
 " Do not leaf me," Schmucke said, when Topinard had 
 seen him safe into Mme. Sauvage's hands, and wanted to go. 
 
 " It is four o'clock, dear M. Schmucke. I must go home 
 to dinner. My wife is a box-opener — she will not know 
 what has become of me. The theater opens at a quarter to 
 six, you know." 
 
 " Yes, I know . . . but remember dat I am alone 
 in die earth, dat I haf no friend. You dat haf shed a tear 
 for Bons, enliden me ; I am in teep tarkness, und Bons 
 said dat I vas in der midst of shcoundrels." 
 
 "I have seen that plainly already; I have just prevented 
 them from sending you to Clichy." 
 
 " Gligy! " repeated Schmucke ; " I do not understand." 
 
 " Poor man ! Well, never mind, I will come to you. 
 Good-by." 
 
 " Goot-by ; komm again soon," said Schmucke, dropping 
 half-dead with weariness.
 
 278 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Good-bj, Mosieu," said Mme. Sauvage, and there was 
 something in her tone that struck Topinard. 
 
 " Oh, come, what is the matter now? " he asked banter- 
 inglj. " You are attitudinizing like a traitor in a melo- 
 drama." 
 
 "Traitor yourself! Why have you come meddling here? 
 Do you want to have a hand in the master's affairs, and 
 swindle him, eh? " 
 
 " Swindle him ! . . . Your very humble servant ! " 
 Topinard answered with supreme disdain. " I am only a 
 poor super at a theater, but I am something of an artist, 
 and you may as well know that I never asked anything of 
 anybody yet! Who asked anything of you? Who owes 
 you anything? eh, old lady!" 
 
 " You are employed at a theater, and your name is ? " 
 
 " Topinard, at your service." 
 
 " Kind regards to all at home," said La Sauvage, " and 
 my compliments to your missus, if you are married, mister. 
 That was all I wanted to know." 
 
 "Why, what is the matter, dear?" asked Mme. Cantinet-, 
 coming out. 
 
 " This child — stop here and look after the dinner while 
 I run round to speak to Monsieur." 
 
 " He is down below, talking with poor Mme. Cibot, that 
 is crying her eyes out," said Mme. Cantinet. 
 
 La Sauvage dashed down in such headlong haste that the 
 stairs trembled beneath her tread. 
 
 " Monsieur ! " she called, and drew him aside a few paces 
 to point out Topinard. 
 
 Topinard was just going away, proud at heart to have 
 made some return already to the man who had done him 
 so many a kindness. He had saved Pons's friend from a 
 trap, by a stratagem from that world behind the scenes 
 in which everyone has more or less ready wit. And within 
 himself he vowed to protect a musician in his orchestra from 
 future snares set for his simple sincerity. 
 
 " Do you see that little wretch? " said La Sauvage. " He 
 is a kind of honest man that has a mind to poke his nose 
 into M. Schmucke's affairs."
 
 COUSIN PONS 279 
 
 " Who Is he? " asked Fraisier. 
 
 " Oh ! he is a nobody." 
 
 " In business there is no such thing as a nobody." 
 
 •' Oh, he is employed at the theater," said she ; " his namt 
 is Topinard." 
 
 " Good, Mme. Sauvage ! Go on like this, and you shall 
 have your tobacconist's shop." 
 
 And Fraisier resumed his conversation with Mme. Cibot. 
 
 " So I say, my dear client, that you have not played 
 openly and above-board with me, and that one is not bound 
 in any way to a partner who cheats." 
 
 "And how have I cheated you.'*" asked La Cibot, hands 
 on hips. " Do you think that you will frighten me with 
 your sour looks and your frosty airs? You look about for 
 bad reasons for breaking your promises, and you call your- 
 self an honest man! Do you know what you are? You are 
 a blackguard! Yes! yes! scratch your arm; but just 
 pocket that " 
 
 " No words, and keep your temper, dearie. Listen to me. 
 You have been feathering your nest. ... I found this 
 catalogue this morning while we were getting ready for the- 
 funeral ; it is all in M. Pons's handwriting, and made out 
 in duplicate. And as it chanced, my eyes fell on this " 
 
 And opening the catalogue, he read — 
 
 *' No. 7. Magnificent portrait painted on marble, by Se- 
 bastian del Piombo, in 154-6. Sold by a family who had it 
 removed from Terni cathedral. The picture, which repre- 
 sents a Knight-Templar kneeling vn prayer, used to hang 
 above a tomb of the Rossi family with a companion portrait 
 of a Bishop, afterwards purchased by an Englishman. The 
 portrait might be attributed to Rafael, but for the date. 
 This example is, to my mind, superior to the portrait of 
 Baccio Bandinelli in the Musee; the latter is a little hardy 
 while the Templar, being painted upon ' lavagna,* or slate, 
 has preserved its freshness of coloring.^' 
 
 " When I come to look for No. 7," continued Fraisier, 
 " I find a portrait of a lady, signed ' Chardin,' without a 
 number on it ! I went through the pictures with the cata- 
 logue while the master of the ceremonies was making up the
 
 «80 COUSIN PONS 
 
 number of pall-bearers, and found that eight of those indi- 
 cated as works of capital importance by M. Pons had dis- 
 appeared, and eight paintings of no special merit, and with- 
 out numbers, were there instead. . . . And finally, one 
 was missing altogether, a little panel-painting by Metzu, 
 described in the catalogue as a masterpiece." 
 
 "And was / in charge of the pictures?" demanded La 
 Cibot. 
 
 " No ; but you were in a position of trust. You were 
 M. Pons's housekeeper, you looked after his affairs, and he 
 has been robbed " 
 
 "Robbed! Let me tell you this, sir: M. Schmucke sold 
 the pictures, by M. Pons's orders, to meet expenses." 
 
 " And to whom? " 
 
 " To Messrs. Elie Magus and Remonencq." 
 
 " For how much ? " 
 
 " I am sure I do not remember." 
 
 " Look here, my dear Madame ; you have been feathering 
 your nest, and very snugly. I shall keep an eye upon you ; 
 I have you safe. Help me, I will say nothing ! In any case 
 you know that since you judged it expedient to plunder 
 M. le President Camusot, you ought not to expect anything 
 from him." 
 
 " I was sure that this would all end in smoke, for 
 me," said La Cibot, mollified by the words " I will say 
 nothing," 
 
 Remonencq chimed in at this point. 
 
 •** Here are you finding fault with Mme. Cibot ; that is not 
 right ! " he said. " The pictures were sold by private treaty 
 between M. Pons, M. Magus, and me. We waited for three 
 days before we came to terms with the deceased ; he slept on 
 his pictures. We took receipts in proper form ; and if we 
 gave Mme. Cibot a few forty-franc pieces, it is the custom 
 ■of the trade — ^we always do so in private houses when we 
 conclude a bargain. Ah ! my dear sir, if you think to cheat a 
 defenseless woman, you will not make a good bargain! Do 
 you understand, master lawyer ? — M. Magus rules the 
 market, and if you do not come down off the high horse, 
 if you do not keep your word to Mme. Cibot, I shall wait
 
 COUSIN PONS 281 
 
 till the collection is sold, and you shall see what you will 
 lose if you have M. Magus and me against you; we can get 
 the dealers in a ring. Instead of realizing seven or eight 
 hundred thousand francs, you will not so much as make two 
 hundred thousand." 
 
 " Good, good, we shall see. We are not going to sell ; 
 or if we do, it will be in London." 
 
 " We know London," said Remonencq. " M. Magus is as 
 powerful there as at Paris." 
 
 " Good-day, Madame ; I shall sift these matters to the 
 bottom," said Fraisier — " unless you continue to do as I 
 tell you," he added. 
 
 " You little pickpocket ! " 
 
 "Take care! I shall be a justice of the peace before 
 long." And with threats understood to the full upon either 
 side, they separated. 
 
 " Thank you, Remonencq ! " said La Cibot ; " it is very 
 pleasant to a poor widow to find a champion." 
 
 Towards ten o'clock that evening, Gaudissart sent for 
 Topinard. The manager was standing with his back to the 
 fire, in a Napoleonic attitude — a trick which he had learned 
 since he began to command his army of actors, dancers, 
 "figurants, musicians, and stage-carpenters. He grasped 
 his left-hand brace with his right hand, always thrust into 
 his waistcoat ; his head was flung far back, his eyes gazed 
 out into space. 
 
 " Ah ! I say, Topinard, have you independent means ? " 
 
 " No, sir." 
 
 " Are you on the lookout to better yourself somewhere 
 else.? " 
 
 " No, sir " said Topinard, with a ghastly countenance. 
 
 " Why, hang it all, your wife takes the first row of boxes 
 out of respect to my predecessor, who came to grief; I 
 gave you the job of cleaning the lamps in the wings in the 
 daytime, and you put out the scores. And that is not all, 
 either. You get twenty sous for acting monsters and man- 
 aging devils when a hell is required. There is not a super 
 that does not covet your post, and there are those that are
 
 282 COUSIN PONS 
 
 jealous of you, my friend; you have enemies in the 
 theater." 
 
 " Enemies ! " repeated Topinard. 
 
 " And you have three children ; the oldest takes children's 
 parts at fifty centimes " 
 
 "Sir !" 
 
 " Allow me to speak " thundered Gaudissart. " And 
 
 in your position, you want to leave " 
 
 "Sir !" 
 
 " You want to meddle in other people's business, and put 
 your finger into a will case. — Why, you wretched man, you 
 would be crushed like an egg-shell! My patron is his Ex- 
 cellency, Monseigneur le Comte Popinot, a clever man and a 
 man of high character, whom the King in his wisdom has 
 summoned back to the privy council. This statesman, this 
 great politician, has married his eldest son to a daughter 
 of M. le President de Marville, one of the foremost men 
 among the high courts of justice; one of the leading lights 
 of the law-courts. Do you know the law-courts.'* Very 
 good. Well, he is cousin and heir to M. Pons, to our old 
 conductor, whose funeral you attended this morning. I do 
 not blame you for going to pay the last respects to him, 
 poor man. . . . But if you meddle in M. Schmucke's 
 affairs, you will lose your place. I wish very well to M. 
 Schmucke, but he is in a delicate position with regard to the 
 heirs — and as the German is almost nothing to me, and the 
 President and Count Popinot are a great deal, I recommend 
 you to leave the worthy German to get out of his difficulties 
 by himself. There is a special Providence that watches over 
 Germans, and the part of deputy guardian-angel would not 
 suit you at all. Do you see? Stay as you are — you cannot 
 do better." 
 
 " Very good, M. le Directeur," said Topinard, much 
 distressed. And in this way Schmucke lost the protector 
 sent to him by fate, the one creature that shed a tear for 
 Pons, the poor super for whose return he looked on the 
 morrow. 
 
 Next morning poor Schmucke awoke to a sense of his 
 great and heavy loss. He looked roimd the empty rooms.
 
 COUSIN PONS 283 
 
 Yesterday and the day before yesterday the preparations 
 for the funeral had made a stir and bustle which distracted 
 his eyes ; but the silence which follows the day, when the 
 friend, father, son, or loved wife has been laid in the grave — 
 the dull, cold silence of the morrow is terrible, is glacial. 
 Some irresistible force drew him to Pons's chamber, but the 
 sight of it was more than the poor man could bear ; he shrank 
 away and sat down in the dining-room, where Mme. Sauvage 
 was busy making breakfast ready. 
 
 Schmucke drew his chair to the table, but he could eat 
 nothing. A sudden, somewhat sharp ringing of the door- 
 bell rang through the house, and Mme. Cantinet and Mme. 
 Sauvage allowed three black-coated personages to pass. 
 First came Vitel, the justice of the peace, with his highly 
 respectable clerk; the third was Fraisier, neither sweeter 
 nor milder for the disappointing discovery of a valid will 
 canceling the formidable instrument so audaciously stolen 
 by him. 
 
 " We have come to affix seals on the property," the justice 
 of the peace said gently, addressing Schmucke. But the 
 remark was Greek to Schmucke ; he gazed in dismay at his 
 three visitors. 
 
 " We have come at the request of M. Fraisier, legal repre- 
 sentative of M. Camusot de Marville, heir of the late 
 Pons " added the clerk. 
 
 " The collection is here in this great room, and in the 
 bedroom of the deceased," remarked Fraisier. 
 
 " Very well, let us go into the next room. — Pardon us, 
 sir; do not let us interfere with your breakfast." 
 
 The invasion struck an icy chill of terror into poor 
 Schmucke. Fraisier's venomous glances seemed to possess 
 some magnetic influence over his victims, like the power of 
 a spider over a fly. 
 
 " M. Schmucke understood how to turn a will, made in 
 the presence of a notary, to his own advantage," he said, 
 " and he surely must have expected some opposition from 
 the family. A family does not allow itself to be plundered 
 by a stranger without some protest; and we shall see, sir, 
 which carries the day — fraud and corruption or the rightful
 
 284. COUSIN PONS 
 
 heirs. . . . We have a right as next-of-kin to affix 
 seals, and seals shall be affixed. I mean to see that the pre- 
 caution is taken with the utmost strictness." 
 
 " Ach, mein Gott! how haf I offended against Hefn.'' " 
 cried the innocent Schmucke. 
 
 " There is a good deal of talk about jou in the house," 
 said La Sauvage. " While you were asleep, a little whipper- 
 snapper in a black suit came here, a puppy that said he was 
 M. Hannequin's head-clerk, and must see you at all costs ; 
 but as you were asleep and tired out with the funeral yester- 
 day, I told him that M. Villemot, Tabareau's head-clerk, was 
 acting for you, and if it was a matter of business, I said, he 
 might speak to M. Villemot. ' Ah, so much the better ! ' the 
 youngster said. ' I shall come to an understanding with 
 him. We will deposit the will at the Tribunal, after showing 
 it to the President.' So at that, I told him to ask M. 
 Villemot to come here as soon as he could. — Be easy, my 
 dear sir, there are those that will take care of you. They 
 shall not shear the fleece off your back. You will have some- 
 one that has beak and claws. M. Villemot will give them a 
 piece of his mind. I have put myself in a passion once al- 
 ready with that abominable hussy, La Cibot, a porter's wife 
 that sets up to judge her lodgers, forsooth, and insists that 
 you have filched the money from the heirs ; you locked M. 
 Pons up, she says, and worked upon him till he was stark, 
 staring mad. She got as good as she gave, though, the 
 wretched woman. ' You are a thief and a bad lot,' I told 
 her ; ' you will get into the police-courts for all the things 
 that you have stolen from the gentlemen,' and she shut 
 up." 
 
 The clerk came out to speak to Schmucke. 
 
 *' Would you wish to be present, sir, when the seals are 
 aJ0Bxed in the next room ? " 
 
 " Go on, go on," said Schmucke ; " I shall pe allowed to die 
 in beace, I bresume.'' " 
 
 " Oh, under any circumstances a man has a right to die," 
 the clerk answered, laughing ; " most of our business relates 
 to wills. But, in my experience, the universal legatee very 
 seldom follows the testator to the tomb."
 
 COUSIN PONS 885 
 
 *' I am going," said Schmucke. Blow after blow had 
 given him an intolerable pain at the heart. 
 
 " Oh ! here comes M. Villemot ! " exclaimed La Sauvage. 
 
 " Mennesir Fillemod," said poor Schmucke, " rebresent 
 me." 
 
 " I hurried here at once," said Villemot. " I have come 
 to tell you that the will is completely in order; it will cer- 
 tainly be confirmed by the court, and you will be put in 
 possession. You will have a fine fortune." 
 
 " If Ein fein vordune.'* " cried Schmucke despairingly. 
 That he of all men should be suspected of caring for the 
 money ! 
 
 " And meantime, what is the justice of the peace doing here 
 with his wax candles and his bits of tape.? " asked La 
 Sauvage. 
 
 " Oh, he is affixing seals. . . . Come, M. Schmucke, 
 you have a right to be present." 
 
 " No — go in yourself." 
 
 " But where is the use of the seals if M. Schmucke is in 
 his own house and everything belongs to him.'' " asked La 
 Sauvage, doing justice in feminine fashion, and interpreting 
 the Code according to her fancy, like one and all of her sex. 
 
 " M. Schmucke is not in possession, Madame ; he is in 
 M. Pons's house. Everything will be his, no doubt ; but 
 the legatee cannot take possession without an authorization 
 — an order from the Tribunal. And if the next-of-kin set 
 aside by the testator should dispute the order, a lawsuit 
 is the result. And as nobody knows what may happen, every- 
 thing is sealed up, and the notaries representing either side 
 proceed to draw up an inventory during the delay prescribed 
 by the law. . . . And there you are ! " 
 
 Schmucke, hearing such talk for the first time in his life, 
 was completely bewildered by it ; his head sank down upon 
 the back of his chair — he could not support it, it had grown 
 so heavy. 
 
 Villemot meanwhile went off to chat with the justice of the 
 peace and his clerk, assisting with professional coolness to 
 affix the seals — a ceremony which always involves some 
 buffoonery and plentiful comments on the objects thus
 
 286 COUSIN PONS 
 
 secured, unless indeed one of the family happens to be pres- 
 ent. At length the party sealed up the chamber and re- 
 turned to the dining-room, whither the clerk betook himself. 
 Schmucke watched the mechanical operation which consists 
 in setting the justice's seal at either end of a bit of tape 
 stretched across the opening of a folding door ; or, in the 
 case of a cupboard or ordinary door, from edge to edge 
 above the door-handle. 
 
 " Now for this room," said Fraisier, pointing to Schmucke's 
 bedroom, which opened into the dining-room. 
 
 " But that is M. Schmucke's own room," remonstrated La 
 Sauvage, springing in front of the door. 
 
 " We found the lease among the papers," Fraisier said 
 ruthlessly ; " there is no mention of M. Schmucke in it ; 
 it is taken out in M. Pons's name only. The whole place, 
 and every room in it, is a part of the estate. And besides " 
 — flinging open the door — " look here, M. le Juge de la 
 Paix, it is full of pictures." 
 
 " So it is," answered the justice of the peace, and Fraisier 
 thereupon gained his point. 
 
 " Wait a bit, gentlemen," said Villemot. " Do you know 
 that you are turning the universal legatee out of doors, and 
 as yet his right has not been called in question.'' " 
 
 " Yes, it has," said Fraisier ; " we are opposing the trans- 
 fer of the property." 
 
 " And upon what grounds ? " 
 
 " You shall know that by and by, my boy," Fraisier re- 
 plied banteringly. " At this moment, if the legatee with- 
 draws everything that he declares to be his, we shall raise 
 no objections, but the room itself will be sealed. And M. 
 Schmucke may lodge where he pleases." 
 
 " No," said Villemot ; " M. Schmucke is going to stay in 
 his room." 
 
 "And how.?" 
 
 " I shall demand an immediate special inquiry," continued 
 Villemot, " and prove that we pay half the rent. You shall 
 not turn us out. Take away the pictures, decide on the 
 ownership of the various articles, but here my client stops — 
 * my boy.' "
 
 COUSIN PONS 287 
 
 "I shall go out!" the old musician suddenly said. He 
 had recovered energy during the odious dispute. 
 
 " You had better," said Fraisier. " Your course will save 
 expense to you, for your contention would not be made good. 
 The lease is evidence " 
 
 " The lease I the lease ! " cried Villemot, " it is a question 
 of good faith " 
 
 " That could only be proved as in a criminal case, by 
 calling witnesses. — Do you mean to plunge into experts' 
 fees and verifications, and orders to show cause why judgment 
 should not be given, and law proceedings generally? " 
 
 " No, no ! " cried Schmucke in dismay. " I shall turn out ; 
 I am used to it " 
 
 In practice Schmucke was a philosopher, an unconscious 
 cynic, so greatly had he simplified his life. Two pairs of 
 shoes, a pair of boots, a couple of suits of clothes, a dozen 
 shirts, a dozen bandanna handkerchiefs, four waistcoats, a 
 superb pipe given to him by Pons, with an embroidered 
 tobacco-pouch — these were all his belongings. Overwrought 
 by a fever of indignation, he went into his room and piled 
 his clothes upon a chair. 
 
 " All dese are mine," he said, with simplicity worthy of 
 Cincinnatus. " Der biano is also mine." 
 
 Fraisier turned to La Sauvage. " Madame, get help," 
 he said ; " take that piano out and put it on the 
 landing." 
 
 " You are too rough into the bargain," said Villemot, 
 addressing Fraisier. " The justice of the peace gives orders 
 here ; he is supreme." 
 
 " There are valuables in the room," put in the clerk. 
 
 "And besides," added the justice of the peace, " M. 
 Schmucke is going out of his own free will." 
 
 " Did anyone ever see such a chent ! " Villemot cried in- 
 dignantly, turning upon Schmucke. " You are as limp as 
 a rag " 
 
 "Vat does it matter vere von dies.?" Schmucke said as 
 he went out. " Dese men haf tigers' faces. ... I shall 
 send sompody to vetch mein bits of dings." 
 
 "Where are you going, sir?"
 
 g88 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Vere it shall blease Gott," returned Pons's universal 
 legatee with supreme indifference. 
 
 " Send me word," said Villemot. 
 
 Fraisier turned to the head-clerk. " Go after him," he 
 whispered. 
 
 Mme. Cantinet was left in charge with a provision of fifty 
 francs paid out of the money that they found. The justice 
 of the peace looked out ; there Schmucke stood in the court- 
 yard, looking up at the windows for the last time. 
 
 " You have found a man of butter," remarked the justice. 
 
 " Yes," said Fraisier, " yes. The thing is as good as done. 
 You need not hesitate to marry your grand-daughter to 
 Poulain ; he will be head-surgeon at the Quinze-Vingts." ^ 
 
 " We shall see. — Good-day, M. Fraisier," said the justice 
 of the peace with a friendly air. 
 
 " There is a man with a head on his shoulders," remarked 
 the justice's clerk. " The dog will go a long way." 
 
 By this time it was eleven o'clock. The old German went 
 like an automaton down the road along which Pons and he 
 had so often walked together. Wherever he went he saw 
 Pons, he almost thought that Pons was by his side ; and 
 so he reached the theater just as his friend Topinard was 
 coming out of it after a morning spent in cleaning the lamps 
 and meditating on the manager's tyranny. 
 
 " Oh, shoost der ding for me ! " cried Schmucke, stopping 
 his acquaintance. " Dopinart ! you haf a lodging someveres, 
 eh? " 
 
 "Yes, sir." 
 
 " A home off your own ? " 
 
 " Yes, sir. 
 
 " Are you vilHng to take me for ein poarder ? Oh ! I 
 shall bay ver' veil; I haf nine hundert vrancs of inkomm, 
 und — I haf not ver' long to lif. ... I shall gif no 
 drouble vatefer. ... I can eat onydings — I only vant 
 to shmoke mein bipe. Und — you are der only von dat haf 
 shed a tear for Bons, mit me ; und so, I lof you." 
 
 " I should be very glad, sir ; but, to begin with, M. Gaudis- 
 sart has given me a proper wigging " 
 
 * The asylum founded by St. Louis for three hundred blind people.
 
 COUSIN PONS 289 
 
 " Viggingf " 
 
 " That is one way of saying that he combed my hair 
 for me." 
 
 " Combed your hair? " 
 
 " He gave me a scolding for meddhng in your affairs. 
 So we must be very careful if you come to me. But 
 I doubt whether you will stay when you have seen the place ; 
 you do not know how we poor devils live." 
 
 " I should rader der boor home of a goot-hearted mann 
 dot haf mourned Bons, dan der Duileries mit men dot haf 
 ein tiger's face. ... I haf chust left tigers in Bons's 
 house; dey vill eat up everydings " 
 
 " Come with me, sir, and you shall see. But — well, any- 
 how, there is a garret. Let us see what Mme. Topinard 
 says." 
 
 Schmucke followed like a sheep, while Topinard led the 
 way into one of the squalid districts wliich might be called 
 the cancers of Paris — a spot known as the Cite Bordin. 
 It is a slum out of the Rue de Bondy, a double row of houses 
 run up by the speculative builder, under the shadow of the 
 huge mass of the Porte Saint-Martin theater. The pavement 
 at the higher end lies below the level of the Rue de Bondy ; 
 at the lower it falls away towards the Rue des Mathurins du 
 Temple. Follow its course and you find that it terminates 
 in another slum running at right angles to the first — the Cite 
 Bordin is, in fact, a T-shaped blind alley. Its two streets 
 thus arranged contain some thirty houses, six or seven stories 
 high ; and every story, and every room in every story, is 
 a workshop and a warehouse for goods of every sort and 
 description, for this wart upon the face of Paris is a minia- 
 ture Faubourg Saint-Antoine. Cabinet-work and brass-work, 
 theatrical costumes, blown glass, painted porcelain — all the 
 various fancy goods known as Varticle Paris are made here. 
 Dirty and productive like commerce, always full of traffic — 
 foot-passengers, vans, and drays — the Cite Bordin is an 
 unsavory-looking neighborhood, with a seething population 
 in keeping with the squalid surroundings. It is a not unin- 
 telligent artisan population, though the whole power of the 
 intellect is absorbed by the day's manual labor. Topinard,
 
 290 COUSIN PONS 
 
 like every other inhabitant of the Cite Bordin, lived in it 
 for the sake of the comparatively low rent, the cause of its 
 existence and prosperity. His sixth-floor lodging, in the 
 second house to the left, looked out upon the belt of green 
 garden, still in existence, at the back of three or four large 
 mansions in the Rue de Bondy. 
 
 Topinard's apartment consisted of a kitchen and two bed- 
 rooms. The first was a nursery with two little deal bed- 
 steads and a cradle in it, the second was the bedroom, and 
 the kitchen did duty as a dining-room. Above, reached by a 
 short ladder, kno^vn among builders as a " trap-ladder," 
 there was a kind of garret, six feet high, with a sash- 
 window let into the roof. This room, given as a servant's 
 bedroom, raised the Topinards' establishment from mere 
 " rooms " to the dignity of a tenement, and the rent to a 
 corresponding sum of four hundred francs. An arched 
 lobby, lighted from the kitchen by a small round window, did 
 duty as an ante-chamber, and filled the space between the 
 bedroom, the kitchen, and house doors — three doors in all. 
 The rooms were paved with bricks, and hung with a hideous 
 wall-paper at threepence a piece ; the chimneypieces that 
 adorned them were of the kind called capucines — a shelf set 
 on a couple of brackets painted to resemble wood. Here in 
 these three rooms dwelt five human beings, three of them 
 children. Anyone, therefore, can imagine how the walls 
 were covered with scores and scratches so far as an infant 
 arm can reach. 
 
 Rich people can scarcely realize the extreme simplicity 
 of a poor man's kitchen. A Dutch oven, a kettle, a gridiron, 
 a saucepan, two or three dumpy cooking-pots, and a frying- 
 pan — that was all. All the crockery in the place, white 
 and brown earthenware together, was not worth more than 
 twelve francs. Dinner was served on the kitchen table, 
 which, with a couple of chairs and a couple of stools, com- 
 pleted the furniture. The stock of fuel was kept under the 
 stove with a funnel-shaped chimney, and in a corner stood 
 the washtub in which the family linen lay, often steeping 
 overnight in soapsuds. The nursery ceiling was covered 
 with clotheslines, the walls were variegated with theatrical
 
 COUSIN PONS 291 
 
 placards and woodcuts from newspapers or advertisements. 
 Evidently the eldest boy, the owner of the schoolbooks 
 stacked in a corner, was left in charge while his parents were 
 absent at the theater. In many a French workingman's 
 family, so soon as a child reaches the age of six or seven, 
 it plays the part of mother to younger sisters and brothers. 
 
 From this bare outline, it may be imagined that the Topi- 
 nards, to use the hackneyed formula, were " poor but honest." 
 Topinard himself was verging on forty; Mme. Topinard, 
 once leader of a chorus — mistress too, it was said, of Gaudis- 
 sart's predecessor — was certainly thirty years old. Lolotte 
 had been a fine woman in her day ; but the misfortunes of 
 the previous management had told upon her to such an extent, 
 that it had seemed to her to be both advisable and necessary 
 to contract a stage-marriage with Topinard. She did not 
 doubt but that, as soon as they could muster the sum of a 
 hundred and fifty francs, her Topinard would perform his 
 vows agreeably to the civil law, were it only to legitimize 
 the three children, whom he worshiped. Meantime, Mme. 
 Topinard sewed for the theater wardrobe in the morning; 
 and with prodigious effort, the brave couple made nine hun- 
 dred francs per annum between them. 
 
 " One more flight ! " Topinard had twice repeated since 
 they reached the third floor. Schmucke, engulfed in his 
 sorrow, did not so much as know whether he was going up 
 or coming down. 
 
 In another minute Topinard had opened the door; but 
 before he appeared in his white workman's blouse Mme. 
 Topinard's voice rang from the kitchen — 
 
 " There, there ! children, be quiet ! here comes papa ! " 
 
 But the children, no doubt, did as they pleased with papa, 
 for the oldest member of the little family, sitting astride a 
 broomstick, continued to command a charge of cavalry (a 
 reminiscence of the Cirque-Olympique), the second blew a 
 tin trumpet, while the third did its best to keep up with the 
 main body of the army. Their mother was at work on 
 a theatrical costume. 
 
 " Be quiet ! or I shall slap you ! " shouted Topinard in 
 a formidable voice ; then in an aside for Schmucke's benefit —
 
 292 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Always have to say that ! — Here, little one," he continued, 
 addressing his Lolotte, " this is M. Schmucke, poor M. Pons's 
 friend. He does not know where to go, and he would like 
 to live with us. I told him that we were not very spick-and- 
 span up here, that we lived on the sixth floor, and had only 
 the garret to offer him ; but it was no use, he would come " 
 
 Schmucke had taken the chair which the woman brought 
 him, and the children, stricken with sudden shyness, had 
 gathered together to give the stranger that mute, earnest, 
 so soon finished scrutiny characteristic of childhood. For 
 a child, like a dog, is wont to judge by instinct rather than 
 reason. Sclimucke looked up ; his eyes rested on that charm- 
 ing little picture ; he saw the performer on the tin trumpet, 
 a little five-year-old maiden ^vith wonderful golden hair. 
 
 " She looks like ein liddle German girl," said Schmucke, 
 holding out his arms to the child. 
 
 " Monsieur will not be very comfortable here," said Mme. 
 Topinard. " I would propose that he should have our room, 
 at once, but I am obliged to have the cliildren near me." 
 
 She opened the door as she spoke, and bade Schmucke 
 come in. Such splendor as their abode possessed was all 
 concentrated here. Blue cotton curtains with a white fringe 
 hung from the mahogany bedstead and adorned the window ; 
 the chest of drawers, bureau, and chairs, though all made 
 of mahogany, were neatly kept. The clock and candlesticks 
 on the chimneypiece were evidently the gift of the bankrupt 
 manager, whose portrait, a truly frightful performance of 
 Pierre Grassou's, looked down upon the chest of drawers. 
 The children tried to peep in at the forbidden glories. 
 
 " Monsieur might be comfortable in here," said their 
 mother. 
 
 " No, no," Schmucke replied. " Eh ! I haf not ver' long 
 to lif, I only vant a corner to die in." 
 
 The door was closed, and the three went up to the garret. 
 *' Dis is der ding for me," Schmucke cried at once. " Pefore 
 I lifd mit Bons, I vas nefer better lodged." 
 
 " Very well. A truckle-bed, a couple of mattresses, a 
 bolster, a pillow, a couple of chairs, and a table — that is all 
 that you need to buy. That will not ruin you — it may cost
 
 COUSIN PONS 293 
 
 a hundred and fifty francs, with the crockeryware and strip 
 of carpet for the bedside." 
 
 Everything was settled — save the money, which was not 
 forthcoming. Schmucke saw that his new friends were very 
 poor, and, recollecting that the theater was only a few 
 steps away, it naturally occurred to him to apply to the 
 manager for his salary. He went at once, and found Gaudis- 
 sart in his office. Gaudissart received him with the somewhat 
 stiffly polite manner which he reserved for professionals. 
 Schmucke's demand for a month's salary took him by sur- 
 prise, but on inquiry he found that it was due. 
 
 " Oh, confound it, my good man, a German can always 
 count, even if he has tears in his eyes. ... I thought 
 that you would have taken the thousand francs that I sent 
 you into account, as a final year's salary, and that we were 
 quits." 
 
 " We haf receifed nodings," said Schmucke ; " und gif I 
 komm to you, it ees because I am In der shtreet, und haf 
 not ein benny. How did you send us der ponus ? " 
 
 " By your portress." 
 
 " By Montame Zipod ! " exclaimed Schmucke. " She killed 
 Bons, she robbed him, she sold him— she tried to purn his 
 vill — she is a pad creature, a monster ! " 
 
 " But, my good man, how come you to be out in the street 
 without a roof over your head or a penny In your pocket, 
 when you are the sole heir.'' That does not necessarily fol- 
 low, as the saying is." 
 
 " They haf put me out at der door. I am a vorelgner, 
 I know nodings of die laws." 
 
 " Poor man ! " thought Gaudissart, foreseeing the probable 
 end of the unequal contest. — " Listen," he began, " do you 
 know what you ought to do In this business ? " 
 
 "I haf ein mann of pizness!" 
 
 " Very good, come to terms at once with the next-of-kin ; 
 make them pay you a lump sum of money down and an 
 annuity, and you can live In peace " 
 
 " I ask noding more." 
 
 " Very well. Let me arrange It for you," said Gaudissart. 
 Fraisier had told him the whole story only yesterday, and
 
 294 COUSIN PONS 
 
 he thought that he saw his way to making interest out of 
 the case with the young Vicomtesse Popinot and her mother. 
 He would finish a dirty piece of work, and some day he would 
 be a privy councilor at least; or so he told himself. 
 
 " I gif you full powers." 
 
 " Well. Let us see. Now, to begin with," said Gaudis- 
 sart, Napoleon of the boulevard theaters, " to begin with, 
 
 here are a hundred crowns " (he took fifteen louis from 
 
 his purse and handed them to Schmucke). 
 
 " That is yours, on account of six months' salary. If 
 you leave the theater, you can repay me the money. Now 
 for your budget. What are your yearly expenses? How 
 much do you want to be comfortable.'* Come, now, scheme 
 out a life for a Sardanapalus " 
 
 " I only need two suits of clothes, von for der vinter, von 
 for der sommer." 
 
 *' Three hundred francs," said Gaudissart. 
 
 " Shoes. Vour bairs." 
 
 " Sixty francs." 
 
 " Shtockings " 
 
 " A dozen pairs — thirty-six francs." 
 
 " Half a tozzen shirts." 
 
 " Six calico shirts, twenty-four francs ; as many linen 
 shirts, forty-eight francs ; let us say seventy-two. That 
 makes four hundred and sixty-eight francs altogether. — Say 
 five hundred, including cravats and pocket-handkerchiefs ; a 
 hundred francs for the laundress — six hundred. And now, 
 how much for your board — three francs a day.'*" 
 
 " No, it ees too much." 
 
 " After all, you want hats ; that brings it to fifteen hun- 
 dred ; five hundred more for rent ; that makes two thousand. 
 If I can get two thousand francs per annum for you, are 
 you willing .f* . . . Good securities." 
 
 " Und mein tabacco." 
 
 " Two thousand four hundred, then. . . . Oh ! papa 
 Schmucke, do you call that tobacco? Very well, the tobacco 
 shall be given in. — So that is two thousand four hundred 
 francs per annum." 
 
 " Dat ees not all ! I should like som monny."
 
 COUSIN PONS 295 
 
 " Pin-money ! — Just so ! Oh, these Germans ! And calls 
 himself an innocent, the old Robert Macaire ! " thought Gau- 
 dissart. Aloud he said, " How much do jou want? But this 
 must be the last." 
 
 " It ees to bay a zacred debt." 
 
 " A debt ! " said Gaudissart to himself. " What a shark 
 it is ! He is worse than an eldest son. He will invent a 
 bill or two next ! We must cut him short. This Fraisier 
 cannot take large views. — ^What debt is this, my good man.^* 
 Speak out." 
 
 " Dere vas but von mann dot half mourned Bons mit me. 
 . He haf a tear liddle girl mit wunderschones haar; 
 it vas as if I saw mine boor Deutschland dot I should nefer 
 haf left. . . . Baris is no blace for die Germans ; dey 
 laugh at dem " (with a little nod as he spoke, and the air 
 of a man who knows something of life in this world below). 
 
 *' He is off his head," Gaudissart said to himself. And 
 a sudden pang of pity for this poor innocent before him 
 brought a tear to the manager's eyes. 
 
 " Ah ! you understand, mennesir le directeur ! Ver' goot. 
 Dat mann mit die liddle taughter is Dobinard, vat tidies der 
 orchestra und lights die lamps. Bons vas fery fond of him, 
 und helped him. He vas der only von dat accombanied mein 
 only friend to die church und to die grafe. ... I vant 
 dree tausend vrancs for him, und dree tausend for die liddle 
 
 vone- 
 
 " Poor fellow ! " said Gaudissart to himself. 
 
 Rough, self-made man though he was, he felt touched by 
 this nobleness of nature, by a gratitude for a mere trifle, 
 as the world views it ; though for the eyes of this divine 
 innocence the trifle, like Bossuet's cup of water, was worth 
 more than the victories of great captains. Beneath all 
 Gaudissart's vanity, beneath the fierce desire to succeed in 
 life at all costs, to rise to the social level of his old friend 
 Popinot, there lay a warm heart and a kindly nature. 
 Wherefore he canceled his too hasty judgments and went 
 over to Schmucke's side. 
 
 " You shall have it all ! But I will do better still, my dear 
 Schmucke. Topinard is a good sort "
 
 296 COUSIN PONS 
 
 " Yes. I haf chust peen to see him in his boor home, vere 
 he ees happy mit his children " 
 
 " I will give him the cashier's place. Old Baudrand is 
 going to leave." 
 
 " Ah ! Gott pless you ! " cried Schmucke. 
 
 " Very well, my good, kind fellow, meet me at Berthier's 
 office about four o'clock this afternoon. Everything shall 
 be ready, and you shall be secured from want for the rest 
 of your days. You shall draw your six thousand francs, 
 and you shall have the same salary with Garangeot that you 
 used to have with Pons." 
 
 " No," Schmucke answered. " I shall not lif. ... I 
 haf no heart for anydings ; I feel that I am attacked " 
 
 " Poor lamb ! " Gaudissart muttered to himself as the 
 Germ.an took his leave. " But, after all, one lives on mutton; 
 and, as the sublime Beranger says, ' Poor sheep ! you were 
 made to be shorn,' " and he hummed the political squib by 
 way of giving vent to his feelings. Then he rang for the 
 office-boy. 
 
 " Call my carriage," he said. 
 
 " Rue de Hanovre," he told the coachman. 
 
 The man of ambitions by this time had reappeared; he 
 saw the way to the Council of State lying straight before 
 him. 
 
 And Schmucke? He was busy buying flowers and cakes 
 for Topinard's children, and went home almost joyously. 
 
 " I am gifing die bresents . . ." he said, and he smiled 
 It was the first smile for three months, but anyone who 
 had seen Schmucke's face would have shuddered to see it there. 
 
 " But dere is ein condition " 
 
 " It is too kind of you, sir," said the mother. 
 
 " De liddle girl shall gif me a kiss and put die flowers 
 in her hair, like die liddle German maidens " 
 
 " Olga, child, do just as the gentleman wishes," said the 
 mother, assuming an air of discipline. 
 
 " Do not scold mein liddle German girl," implored 
 Schmucke. It seemed to him that the little one was his dear 
 Germany. Topinard came in.
 
 COUSIN PONS 297 
 
 " Three porters are bringing up the whole bag of tricks," 
 he said. 
 
 " Oh ! Here are two hundred vrancs to bay for efery- 
 dings . . ." said Schmucke. " But, mein friend, your 
 Montame Dobinard is ver' nice; you shall marry her, is it 
 not so? I shall gif you tausend crowns, and die liddle vone 
 shall haf tausend crowns for her toury, and you shall infest 
 it in her name. . . . Und you are not to pe ein zuper 
 any more — ^you are to pe de cashier at de teater " 
 
 " U instead of old Baudrand? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 "Who told you so.?" 
 
 " Mennesir Gautissart ! " 
 
 " Oh ! it is enough to send one wild with joy ! . . . 
 Eh ! I say, Rosalie, what a rumpus there will be at the thea- 
 ter ! But it is not possible " 
 
 Our benefactor must not live in a garret- 
 
 " Pshaw ! for die few tays dat I haf to lif it ees fery kom- 
 fortable," said Schmucke. " Goot-py ; I am going to der 
 zemetery, to see vat dey haf don mit Bons, und to order som 
 flowers for his grafe." 
 
 Mme. Camusot de Marville was consumed by the liveliest 
 apprehensions. At a council held with Fraisier, Berthier, 
 and Godeschal, the two last-named authorities gave it as 
 their opinion that it was hopeless to dispute a will drawn 
 up by two notaries in the presence of two witnesses, so pre- 
 cisely was the instrument worded by Leopold Hannequin. 
 Honest Godeschal said that even if Schmucke's own legal 
 adviser should succeed in deceiving him, he would find out 
 the truth at last, if it were only from some officious barrister, 
 the gentlemen of the robe being wont to perform such acts 
 of generosity and disinterestedness by way of self-advertise- 
 ment. And the two officials took their leave of the Presidente 
 with a parting caution against Fraisier, concerning whom 
 they had naturally made inquiries. 
 
 At that very moment Fraisier, straight from the affixing 
 of the seals in the Rue de Normandie, was waiting for an 
 interview with Mme. de Marville. Berthier and Godeschal
 
 298 COUSIN PONS 
 
 had suggested that he should be shown into the study ; the 
 whole affair was too dirty for the President to look into 
 (to use their own expression), and they wished to give Mme. 
 de Marville their opinion in Fraisier's absence. 
 
 " Well, Madame, where are these gentlemen? " asked 
 Fraisier, admitted to audience. 
 
 " They are gone. They advise me to give up," said 
 Mme. de Marville. 
 
 " Give up ! " repeated Fraisier, suppressed fury in his voice. 
 " Give up ! . . . Listen to this, Madame : — 
 
 " ' At the request of . . . and so forth (I will omit 
 the formalities) . . . 'Whereas there has been depos- 
 ited in the hands of M. le President of the Court of First 
 Instance, a will drawn up by Maitres Leopold Mannequin 
 and Alexandre Crottat, notaries of Paris, and in the presence 
 of two witnesses, the Sieurs Brunner and Schwab, aliens 
 domiciled at Paris, and by the said will the Sicur Pons, de- 
 ceased, has bequeathed his property to one Sieur Schmucke, 
 a German, to the prejudice of his natural heirs: 
 
 " ' Whereas the applicant undertakes to prove that the 
 said will was obtained under undue influence and by unlawful 
 means ; and persons of credit are prepared to show that it 
 was the testator's intention to leave his fortune to Mile. 
 Cecile, daughter of the aforesaid Sieur de Marville, and 
 the applicant can show that the said will was extorted from 
 the testator's weakness, he being unaccountable for his 
 actions at the time: 
 
 " ' Whereas the Sieur Schmucke, to obtain a will in his 
 favor, sequestrated the testator, and prevented the family 
 from approaching the deceased during his last illness ; and 
 his subsequent notorious ingratitude was of a nature to scan- 
 dalize the house and residents in the quarter who chanced 
 to witness it when attending the funeral of the porter at 
 the testator's place of abode : 
 
 " ' Whereas still more serious charges, of which appli- 
 cant is collecting proofs, will be formally made before their 
 •worships the judges: 
 
 *' ' I, the undersigned Registrar of the Court, etc., etc.,
 
 COUSIN PONS 299 
 
 on behalf of the aforesaid, etc., have summoned the Sieur 
 Schmucke, pleading, etc., to appear before their worships 
 the judges of the first chamber of the Tribunal, and to be 
 present when application is made that the will received by 
 Maitres Hannequin and Crottat, being evidently obtained 
 by undue influence, shall be regarded as null and void in law ; 
 and I, the undersigned, on behalf of the aforesaid, etc., have 
 likewise given notice of protest, should the Sieur Schmucke 
 as universal legatee make application for an order to be put 
 into possession of the estate, seeing that the applicant op- 
 poses such order, and makes objection by his application 
 bearing date of to-day, of which a copy has been duly de- 
 posited with the Sieur Schmucke, costs being charged to 
 etc., etc' 
 
 " I know the man, Mme. la Presidente. He will come to 
 terms as soon as he reads this little love-letter. He will 
 consult Tabareau, and Tabareau will advise him to take our 
 terms. Are you going to give the thousand crowns per 
 annum.'' " 
 
 " Certainly. I only wish I were paying the first install- 
 ment now." 
 
 " It will be done in three days. The summons will come 
 down upon him while he is stupefied with grief, for the poor 
 soul regrets Pons and is taking the death to heart." 
 
 "Can the application be withdrawn.''" inquired the 
 lady. 
 
 " Certainly, Madame. You can withdraw at any time." 
 
 " Very well. Monsieur, let it be so . . . go on ! Yes, 
 the purchase of land that you have arranged for me is worth 
 the trouble ; and, besides, I have managed Vitel's business — he 
 is to retire, and you must pay Vitel's sixty thousand francs 
 out of Pons's property. So, you see, you must succeed." 
 
 " Have you Vitel's resignation ? " 
 
 " Yes, Monsieur. M. Vitel has put himself in M. de 
 Marville's hands." 
 
 " Very good, Madame. I have already saved you sixty 
 thousand francs which I expected to give to that vile creature 
 Mme. Cibot. But I still require the tobacconist's license
 
 SOO COUSIN PONS 
 
 for the woman Sauvage, and an appointment to the vacant 
 place of head-physician at the Quinze-Vingts for my friend 
 Poulain." 
 
 " Agreed — it is all arranged." 
 
 " Very well. There is no more to be said. Everyone 
 is for you in this business, even Gaudissart, the manager of 
 the theater. I went to look him up yesterday, and he under- 
 took to crush the workman who seemed likely to give us 
 trouble." 
 
 " Oh, I know M. Gaudissart is devoted to the Popinots." 
 
 Fraisier went out. Unluckily, he missed Gaudissart, and 
 the fatal summons was served forthwith. 
 
 If all covetous minds will sympathize with the Presidente, 
 all honest folk will turn in abhorrence from her joy when 
 Gaudissart came twenty minutes later to report his con- 
 versation with poor Schmucke. She gave her full approval ; 
 she was obliged beyond all expression for the thoughtful way 
 in which the manager relieved her of any remaining scruples 
 by observations which seemed to her to be very sensible and 
 just. 
 
 " I thought as I came, Mme. la Presidente, that the poor 
 devil would not know what to do with the money. 'Tis a 
 patriarchally simple nature. He is a child, he is a German, 
 he ought to be stuffed and put in a glass case like a waxen 
 image. Which is to say that, in my opinion, he is quite 
 puzzled enough already with his income of two thousand five 
 hundred francs, and here you are provoking him into ex- 
 travagance " 
 
 *' It is very generous of him to wish to enrich the poor 
 fellow who regrets the loss of our cousin," pronounced the 
 Presidente. " For my own part, I am sorry for the little 
 squabble that estranged M. Pons and me. If he had come 
 back again, all would have been forgiven. If you only knew 
 how my husband misses him ! M. de Marville received no 
 notice of the death, and was in despair ; family claims are 
 sacred for him, he would have gone to the ser^ace and the 
 interment, and I myself should have been at the Mass " 
 
 " Very well, fair lady," said Gaudissart. " Be so good as 
 to have the documents drawn up, and at four o'clock I will
 
 COUSIN PONS 301 
 
 bring this German to you. Please remember me to your 
 charming daughter the Vicomtesse, and ask her to tell my 
 illustrious friend the great statesman, her good and excellent 
 father-in-law, how deeply I am devoted to him and his, and 
 ask him to continue his valued favors. I owe my life to his 
 uncle the judge, and my success in life to him; and I should 
 wish to be bound to both you and your daughter by the high 
 esteem which links us with persons of rank and influence. 
 I wish to leave the theater and become a serious person." 
 
 " As you are already. Monsieur ! " said the Presidente. 
 
 " Adorable ! " returned Gaudissart, kissing the lady's 
 shriveled fingers. 
 
 At four o'clock that afternoon several people were gathered 
 together at Berthier's office : Fraisier, arch-concocter of the 
 whole scheme ; Tabareau, appearing on behalf of Schmucke, 
 and Schmucke himself. Gaudissart had come with him. 
 Fraisier had been careful to spread out the money on 
 Berthier's desk, and so dazzled was Schmucke by the sight 
 of the six thousand franc banknotes for which he had asked, 
 and six hundred francs for the first quarter's allowance, that 
 he paid no heed whatsoever to the reading of the document. 
 Poor man, he was scarcely in full possession of his faculties, 
 shaken as they had already been by so many shocks. Gaudis- 
 sart had snatched him up on his return from the cemetery, 
 where he had been talking with Pons, promising to join him 
 soon — very soon. So Schmucke did not listen to the preamble 
 in which it was set forth that Maitre Tabareau, bailiff, was 
 acting as his proxy, and that the Presidente, in the interests 
 of her daughter, was taking legal proceedings against him. 
 Altogether, in that preamble the German played a sorry 
 part, but he put his name to the document, and thereby ad- 
 mitted the truth of Fraisier's abominable allegations ; and 
 so joyous was he over receiving the money for the Topinards, 
 so glad to bestow wealth according to his little ideas upon the 
 one creature who loved Pons, that he heard not a word of 
 lawsuit nor compromise. 
 
 But in the middle of the reading a clerk came into the 
 private office to speak to his employer. " There is a man 
 here, sir, who wishes to speak to M. Schmucke," said he.
 
 302 COUSIN PONS 
 
 The notary looked at Fraisier, and, taking his cue from 
 him, shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " Never disturb us when we are signing documents. Just 
 ask his name — is it a man or a gentleman? Is he a cred- 
 itor?" 
 
 The clerk went and returned. " He insists that he must 
 speak to M. Schraucke." 
 
 " His name? " 
 
 " His name is Topinard, he says." 
 
 " I will go out to him. Sign without disturbing yourself,'* 
 said Gaudissart, addressing Schmucke. " Make an end of 
 it ; I will find out what he wants with us." 
 
 Gaudissart understood Fraisier ; both scented danger. 
 
 *' Why are you here? " Gaudissart began. " So you have 
 no mind to be cashier at the theater? Discretion is a 
 cashier's first recommendation." 
 
 " Sir " 
 
 *' Just mind your own business ; you will never be anything 
 if you meddle in other people's affairs." 
 
 " Sir, I cannot eat bread if every mouthful of it is to 
 stick in my throat. . . . M. Schmucke ! — M. Schmucke ! " 
 he shouted aloud. 
 
 Schmucke came out at the sound of Topinard's voice. 
 He had just signed. He held the money in his hand. 
 
 " These ees for die liddle German maiden und for you," 
 he said. 
 
 " Oh ! my dear M. Schmucke, you have given away your 
 wealth to inhuman wretches, to people who are trying to take 
 away your good name. I took this paper to a good man, 
 an attorney who knows this Fraisier, and he says that you 
 ought to punish such wickedness ; you ought to let them 
 summon you and leave them to get out of it. — Read this," 
 and Schmucke's imprudent friend held out the summons de- 
 livered in the Cite Bordin. 
 
 Standing in the notary's gateway, Schmucke read the 
 document, saw the imputations made against him, and, all 
 ignorant as he was of the amenities of the law, the blow 
 was deadly. The little grain of sand stopped his heart's 
 beating. Topinard caught him in his arms, hailed a passing
 
 COUSIN PONS 303 
 
 cab, and put the poor German into it. He was suffering from 
 congestion of the brain ; his eyes were dim, his head was 
 throbbing, but he had enough strength left to put the money 
 into Topinard's hands. 
 
 Schmucke ralHed from the first attack, but he never re- 
 covered consciousness, and refused to eat. Ten days after- 
 wards he died without a complaint ; to the last he had not 
 spoken a word. Mme. Topinard nursed him, and Topinard 
 laid him by Pons's side. It was an obscure funeral; Top- 
 inard was the only mourner who followed the son of Germany 
 to his last resting-place. 
 
 Frasier, now a justice of the peace, is very intimate with 
 the President's family, and much valued by the Presidente. 
 She could not think of allowing him to marry " that girl 
 of Tabareau's," and promises infinitely better things for the 
 clever man to whom she considers that she owes not merely 
 the pasture-land and the English cottage at Marville, but 
 also the President's seat in the Chamber of Deputies, for 
 M. le President was returned at the general election in 1846. 
 
 Everyone, no doubt, wishes to know what became of the 
 heroine of a story only too veracious in its details ; a chronicle 
 which, taken with its twin sister the preceding volume,^ 
 proves that Character is the great social force. You, O 
 amateurs, connoisseurs, and dealers, will guess at once that 
 Pons's collection is now in question. Wherefore it will suffice 
 if we are present during a conversation that took place only 
 a few days ago in Count Popinot's house. He was showing 
 his splendid collection to some visitors. 
 
 " M. le Comte, you possess treasures indeed," remarked 
 a distinguished foreigner. 
 
 " Oh! as to pictures, nobody can hope to rival an obscure 
 collector, one Elie Magus, a Jew, an old monomaniac, the 
 prince of picture-lovers," the Count replied modestly. *' And 
 when I say nobody, I do not speak of Paris only, but of all 
 Europe. When the old Croesus dies, France ought to spare 
 seven or eight millions of francs to buy the gallery. For 
 
 ^ La Cousine Bette.
 
 S04 COUSIN PONS 
 
 curiosities, my collection is good enough to be talked 
 about " 
 
 " But how, busy as you are, and with a fortune so honestly 
 earned in the first instance in business " 
 
 " In the drug business," broke in Popinot ; " you ask how 
 I can continue to interest myself in things that are a drug 
 in the market " 
 
 " No," returned the foreign visitor, " no, but how do you 
 find time to collect? The curiosities do not come to find 
 you." 
 
 " My father-in-law owned the nucleus of the collection," 
 said the young Vicomtesse ; " he loved the arts and beautiful 
 work, but most of his treasures came to him through 
 me." 
 
 " Through you, Madame.? — So young! and yet have you 
 such vices as this.?" asked a Russian prince. 
 
 Russians are by nature imitative ; imitative indeed to such 
 an extent that the diseases of civilization break out among 
 them in epidemics. The bric-a-brac mania had appeared in 
 an acute form in St. Petersburg, and the Russians caused 
 such a rise of prices in the " art line," as Remonencq would 
 say, that collections became impossible. The prince who 
 spoke had come to Paris solely to buy bric-a-brac. 
 
 " The treasures came to me. Prince, on the death of a 
 cousin. He was very fond of me," added the Vicomtesse 
 Popinot, " and he had spent some forty odd years since 1805 
 in picking up these masterpieces everywhere, but more espe- 
 cially in Italy " 
 
 " And what was his name? " inquired the English lord. 
 
 " Pons," said President Camusot. 
 
 " A charming man he was," piped the Presidente in her 
 thin, flute tones, " very clever, very eccentric, and yet very 
 good-hearted. This fan that you admire once belonged to 
 Mme. de Pompadour ; he gave it to me one morning with 
 a pretty speech which you must permit me not to repeat," 
 and she glanced at her daughter. 
 
 " Mme. la Vicomtesse, tell us the pretty speech," begged 
 the Russian prince. 
 
 " The speech was as pretty as the fan," returned the
 
 COUSIN PONS 305 
 
 Vicomtesse, who brought out the stereotyped remark on all 
 occasions. " He told my mother that it was quite time that 
 it should pass from the hands of vice into those of virtue." 
 The English lord looked at Mme. Camusot de Marville with 
 an air of doubt not a little gratifying to so withered a 
 woman. 
 
 " He used to dine at our house two or three times a week," 
 she said ; " he was so fond of us ! We could appreciate 
 him, and artists like the society of those who relish their wit. 
 My husband was, besides, his one surviving relative. So 
 when, quite unexpectedly, M. de Marville came into the prop- 
 erty, M. le Comte preferred to take over the whole collection- 
 to save it from a sale by auction ; and we ourselves much pre- 
 ferred to dispose of it in that way, for it would have been 
 so painful to us to see the beautiful things, in which our 
 dear cousin was so much interested, all scattered abroad. 
 Elie Magus valued them, and in that way I became possessed 
 of the cottage that your uncle built, and I hope you will do 
 us the honor of coming to see us there." 
 
 Gaudissart's theater passed into other hands a year ago, 
 but M. Topinard is still the cashier. M. Topinard, how- 
 ever, has grown gloomy and misanthropic ; he says little. 
 People think that he has something on his conscience. Wags 
 at the theater suggest that his gloom dates from his marriage 
 with Lolotte. Honest Topinard starts whenever he hears 
 Fraisier's name mentioned. Some people may think it 
 strange that the one nature worthy of Pons and Schmucke 
 should be found on the third floor beneath the stage of a 
 boulevard theater. 
 
 Mme. Remonencq, much impressed with Mme. Fontaine's 
 prediction, declines to retire to the country. She is still 
 living in her splendid shop on the Boulevard de la Madeleine, 
 but she is a widow now for the second time. Remonencq, in 
 fact, by the terms of the marriage contract, settled the 
 property upon the survivor, and left a little glass of vitriol 
 about for his wife to drink by mistake ; but his wife, with 
 the very best intentions, put the glass elsewhere, and Remo- 
 nencq swallowed the draught himself. The rascal's appro-
 
 806 COUSIN PONS 
 
 priate end vindicates Providence, as well as the chronicler 
 of manners, who is sometimes accused of neglect on this 
 head, perhaps because Providence has been so overworked 
 by playwrights of late. 
 
 Pardon the transcriber's errors.
 
 AT THE SIGN OF THE CAT AND 
 RACKET
 
 AT THE SIGN OF THE CAT AND RACKET 
 
 Dedicated to Mile. Marie de Montheau. 
 
 HALFWAY down the Rue Saint-Denis, almost at the 
 corner of the Rue du Petit-Lion, there stood foiTnerly 
 one of those dehghtful houses which enable historians to 
 reconstruct old Paris by analogy. The threatening walls 
 of this tumbledown abode seemed to have been decorated 
 with hieroglyphics. For what other name could the passerby 
 give to the X's and V's which the horizontal or diagonal tim- 
 bers traced on the front, outlined by little parallel cracks 
 in the plaster? It was evident that every beam quivered 
 in its mortices at the passing of the lightest vehicle. This 
 venerable structure was crowned by a triangular roof of 
 which no example will, ere long, be seen in Paris. This 
 covering, warped by the extremes of the Paris climate, pro- 
 jected three feet over the roadway, as much to protect the 
 threshold from the rainfall as to shelter the wall of a loft 
 and its sill-less dormer window. This upper story was 
 built of planks, overlapping each other like slates, in order, 
 no doubt, not to overweight the frail house. 
 
 One rainy morning in the month of March, a young man, 
 carefully wrapped in his cloak, stood under the awning of 
 a shop opposite this old house, which he was studying with 
 the enthusiasm of an antiquary. In point of fact, this relic 
 of the civic life of the sixteenth century offered more than 
 one problem to the consideration of an observer. Each 
 story presented some singularity ; on the first floor four 
 tall, narrow windows, close together, were filled as to the 
 lower panes with boards, so as to produce the doubtful light 
 by which a clever salesman can ascribe to his goods the color 
 his customers inquire for. The young man seemed very 
 scornful of this essential part of the house; his eyes had 
 not yet rested on it. The windows of the second floor, where 
 the Venetian blinds were drawn up, revealing little dingy 
 muslin curtains beliind the large Bohemian glass panes, did
 
 2 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 not interest him either. His attention was attracted to the 
 third floor, to the modest sash-frames of wood, so clumsily 
 wrought that they might have found a place in the Museum 
 of Arts and Crafts to illustrate the early efforts of French 
 carpentry. These windows were glazed with small squares 
 of glass so green that, but for his good eyes, the young 
 man could not have seen the blue-checked cotton curtains 
 which screened the mysteries of the room from profane eyes. 
 Now and then the watcher, weary of his fruitless contempla- 
 tion, or of the silence in which the house was buried, like 
 the whole neighborhood, dropped his eyes towards the lower 
 regions. An involuntary smile parted his lips each time he 
 looked at the shop, where, in fact, there were some laughable 
 details. 
 
 A formidable wooden beam, resting on four pillars, which 
 appeared to have bent under the weight of the decrepit 
 house, had been encrusted with as many coats of different 
 paint as there are of rouge on an old duchess's cheek. In 
 the middle of this broad and fantastically carved joist there 
 was an old painting representing a cat playing rackets. This 
 picture was what moved the young man to mirth. But it 
 must be said that the wittiest of modem painters could not 
 invent so comical a caricature. The animal held in one of 
 its forcpaws a racket as big as itself, and stood on its 
 hind legs to aim at hitting an enormous ball, returned by 
 a man in a fine embroidered coat. Drawing, color, and 
 accessories, all were treated in such a way as to suggest 
 that the artist had meant to make game of the shop-owner 
 and of the passing observer. Time, while impairing this 
 artless painting, had made it yet more grotesque by intro- 
 ducing some uncertain features which must have puzzled 
 the conscientious idler. For instance, the cat's tail had been 
 eaten into in such a way that it might now have been taken 
 for the figure of a spectator — so long, and thick, and furry 
 were the tails of our forefathers' cats. To the right of the 
 picture, on an azure field which ill disguised the decay of 
 the wood, might be read the name " Guillaume," and to the 
 left, " Successor to Master Chevrel." Sun and rain had worn 
 away most of the gilding parsimoniously applied to the letters
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 3 
 
 of this superscription, in which the U's and V's had changed 
 places in obedience to the laws of old-world orthography. 
 
 To quench the pride of those who believe that the world 
 is growing cleverer day by day, and that modem humbug 
 surpasses everything, it may be observed that these signs, 
 of which the origin seems so whimsical to many Paris mer- 
 chants, are the dead pictures of once living pictures by which 
 our roguish ancestors contrived to tempt customers into 
 their houses. Thus the Spinning Sow, the Green Monkey, 
 and others, were animals in cages whose skill astonished the 
 passerby, and whose accomplishments prove the patience of 
 the fifteenth-century artisan. Such curiosities did more to 
 enrich their fortunate owners than the signs of " Providence," 
 " Good-faith," " Grace of God," and " Decapitation of John 
 the Baptist," which may still be seen in the Rue Saint-Denis. 
 
 However, our stranger was certainly not standing there 
 to admire the cat, which a minute's attention sufficed to 
 stamp on his memory. The young man himself had his 
 peculiarities. His cloak, folded after the manner of an 
 antique drapery, showed a smart pair of shoes, all the more 
 remarkable in the midst of the Paris mud because he wore 
 white silk stockings, on which the splashes betrayed his im- 
 patience. He had just come, no doubt, from a wedding or 
 a ball; for at this early hour he had in his hand a pair of 
 white gloves, and his black hair, now out of curl, and flowing 
 over his shoulders, showed that it had been dressed a la 
 Caracalla, a fashion introduced as much by David's school 
 of painting as by the mania for Greek and Roman styles 
 which characterized the early years of this century. 
 
 In spite of the noise made by a few market gardeners, 
 who, being late, rattled past towards the great market-place 
 at a gallop, the busy street lay in a stillness of which the 
 magic charm is known only to those who have wandered 
 through deserted Paris at the hours when its roar, hushed 
 for a moment, rises and spreads in the distance like the 
 great voice of the sea. This strange young man must have 
 seemed as curious to the shopkeeping folk of the " Cat and 
 Racket " as the " Cat and Racket " was to him. A daz- 
 zlingly white cravat made his anxious face look even paler
 
 4 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 than it really was. The fire that flashed in his black ejes, 
 gloomy and sparkling by turns, was in harmony with the 
 singular outline of his features, with his wide, flexible mouth, 
 hardened into a smile. His forehead, knit with violent annoy- 
 ance, had a stamp of doom. Is not the forehead the most 
 prophetic feature of a man.'' When the stranger's brow ex- 
 pressed passion the furrows formed in it were terrible in 
 their strength and energy ; but when he recovered his calm- 
 ness, so easily upset, it beamed with a luminous grace which 
 gave great attractiveness to a countenance in which joy, 
 grief, love, anger, or scorn blazed out so contagiously that 
 the coldest man could not fail to be impressed. 
 
 He was so thoroughly vexed by the time when the dormer 
 window of the loft was suddenly flung open, that he did 
 not observe the apparition of three laughing faces, pink and 
 white and chubby, but as vulgar as the face of Commerce 
 as it is seen in sculpture on certain monuments. These three 
 faces, framed by the window, recalled the puff^y cherubs 
 floating among the clouds that surround God the Father. 
 The apprentices snuff'ed up the exhalations of the street 
 with an eagerness that showed how hot and poisonous the 
 atmosphere of their garret must be. After pointing to 
 the singular sentinel, the most jovial, as he seemed, of the 
 apprentices retired and came back holding an instrument 
 whose hard metal pipe is now superseded by a leather tube; 
 and they all grinned with mischief as they looked down 
 on the loiterer, and sprinkled him with a fine white shower 
 of which the scent proved that three chins had just been 
 shaved. Standing on tiptoe, in the farthest comer of their 
 loft, to enjoy their victim's rage, the lads ceased laughing on 
 seeing the haughty indiff'erence with which the young man 
 shook his cloak, and the intense contempt expressed by his 
 face as he glanced up at the empty window frame. 
 
 At this moment a slender white hand threw up the lower 
 half of one of the clumsy windows on the third floor by 
 the aid of the sash runners, of which the pulley so often 
 suddenly gives way and releases the heavy panes it ought 
 to hold up. The watcher was then rewarded for his long 
 waiting. The face of a young girl appeared, as fresh as
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 5 
 
 one of the white cups that bloom on the bosom of the waters, 
 crowned by a frill of tumbled muslin, which gave her head 
 a look of exquisite innocence. Though wrapped in brown 
 stuff, her neck and shoulders gleamed here and there through 
 little openings left by her movements in sleep. No expres- 
 sion of embarrassment detracted from the candor of her 
 face, or the calm look of eyes immortalized long since in 
 the sublime works of Raphael; here were the same grace, 
 the same repose as in these Virgins, and now proverbial. 
 There was a delightful contrast between the cheeks of that 
 face on which sleep had, as it were, given high relief to a 
 superabundance of life, and the antiquity of the heavy window 
 with its clumsy shape and black sill. Like those day-blowing 
 flowers, which in the early morning have not yet unfurled 
 their cups, twisted by the chills of night, the girl, as yet 
 hardly awake, let her blue eyes wander beyond the neighbor- 
 ing roofs to look at the sky ; then, from habit, she cast them 
 down on the gloomy depths of the street, where they imme- 
 diately met those of her adorer. Vanity, no doubt, distressed 
 her at being seen in undress ; she started back, the worn 
 pulley gave way, and the sash fell with the rapid run which 
 in our day has earned for this artless invention of our fore- 
 fathers an odious name.^ The vision had disappeared. To 
 the young man the most radiant star of morning seemed to 
 be hidden by a cloud. 
 
 During these little incidents the heavy inside shutters that 
 protected the slight windows of the shop of the " Cat and 
 Racket " had been removed as if by magic. The old door 
 with its knocker was opened back against the wall of the 
 entry by a man-servant, apparently coeval with the sign, 
 who, with a shaking hand, hung upon it a square of cloth, 
 on which were embroidered in yellow silk the words : " Guil- 
 laurae. Successor to Chevrel." Many a passerby would have 
 found it difficult to guess the class of trade carried on by 
 M. Guillaume. Between the strong iron bars which pro- 
 tected his shop windows on the outside, certain packages, 
 wrapped in brown linen, were hardly visible, though as numer- 
 ous as herrings swimming in a shoal. Notwithstanding the 
 * Fenetre h la Guillotine.
 
 6 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 primitive aspect of the Gothic front, M. Guillaume, of all the 
 merchant clothiers in Paris, was the one whose stores were 
 always the best provided, whose connections were the most 
 extensive, and whose commercial honesty never lay under 
 the slightest suspicion. If some of his brethren in business 
 made a contract with the Government, and had not the 
 required quantity of cloth, he was always ready to deliver 
 it, however large the number of pieces tendered for. The 
 wily dealer knew a thousand ways of extracting the largest 
 profits without being obliged, like them, to court patrons, 
 cringing to them, or making them costly presents. When 
 his fellow-tradesmen could only pay in good bills of long 
 date, he would mention his notary as an accommodating man, 
 and managed to get a second profit out of the bargain, 
 thanks to this arrangement, which had made it a proverb 
 among the traders of the Rue Saint-Denis : " Heaven preserve 
 you from M. Guillaume's notary ! " to signify a heavy dis- 
 count. 
 
 The old merchant was to be seen standing on the threshold 
 of his shop, as if by a miracle, the instant the servant with- 
 drew. M. Guillaume looked at the Rue Saint-Denis, at the 
 neighboring shops, and at the weather, like a man disem- 
 barking at Havre, and seeing France once more after a long 
 voyage. Having convinced himself that nothing had changed 
 while he was asleep, he presently perceived the stranger on 
 guard, and he, on his part, gazed at the patriarchal draper 
 as Humboldt may have scrutinized the first electric eel he 
 saw in America, M. Guillaume wor« loose black velvet 
 breeches, pepper-and-salt stockings, and square-toed shoes 
 with silver buckles. His coat, with square-cut fronts, square- 
 cut tails, and square-cut collar, clothed his slightly bent 
 figure in greenish cloth, finished with white metal buttons, 
 tawny from wear. His gray hair was so accurately combed 
 and flattened over his yellow pate that it made it look like 
 a furrowed field. His little green eyes, that might have been 
 pierced with a gimlet, flashed beneath arches faintly tinged 
 with red in the place of eyebrows. Anxieties had wrinkled 
 his forehead with as many horizontal lines as there were 
 creases in his coat. This colorless face expressed patience,
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 7 
 
 commercial shrewdness, and the sort of wily cupidity which 
 is needful in business. At that time these old families 
 were less rare than they are now, in which the characteristic 
 habits and costume of their calling, surviving in the midst 
 of more recent civilization, were preserved as cherished tra- 
 ditions, like the antediluvian remains found by Cuvier in 
 the quarries. 
 
 The head of the Guillaume family was a notable upholder 
 of ancient practices ; he might be heard to regret the Provost 
 of Merchants, and never did he mention a decision of the 
 Tribunal of Commerce without calling it the Sentence of the 
 Consuls. Up and dressed the first of the household, in 
 obedience, no doubt, to these old customs, he stood sternly 
 awaiting the appearance of his three assistants, ready to 
 scold them in case they were late. These young disciples 
 of Mercury knew nothing more terrible than the wordless 
 assiduity with which the master scrutinized their faces and 
 their movements on Monday in search of evidence or traces 
 of their pranks. But at this moment the old clothier paid 
 no heed to his apprentices ; he was absorbed in trying to 
 divine the motive of the anxious looks which the young man 
 in silk stockings and a cloak cast alternately at his signboard 
 and into the depths of his shop. The daylight was now 
 brighter, and enabled the stranger to discern the cashier's 
 corner inclosed by a railing and screened by old green silk 
 curtains, where were kept the immense ledgers, the silent 
 oracles of the house. The too inquisitive gazer seemed to 
 covet this little nook, and to be taking the plan of a dining- 
 room at one side, lighted by a skylight, whence the family 
 at meals could easily see the smallest incident that might 
 occur at the shop-door. So much affection for his dwelling 
 seemed suspicious to a trader who had lived long enough 
 to remember the law of maximum prices ; M. Guillaume natu- 
 rally thought that this sinister personage had an eye to the 
 till of the Cat and Racket. After quietly observing the mute 
 duel which was going on between his master and the stranger, 
 the eldest of the apprentices, having seen that the young man 
 was stealthily watching the windows of the third floor, 
 ventured to place himself on the stone flag where M. Guil-
 
 S AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 laume was standing. He took two steps out into the street, 
 raised his head, and fancied that he caught sight of Mile. 
 Augustine Guillaume in hasty retreat. The draper, an- 
 noyed by his assistant's perspicacity, shot a side glance at 
 him; but the draper and his amorous apprentice were sud- 
 denly relieved from the fears which the young man's presence 
 had excited in their minds. He hailed a hackney cab on 
 its way to a neighboring stand, and jumped into it with an 
 air of affected indifference. This departure was a balm to 
 the hearts of the other two lads, who had been somewhat 
 uneasy as to meeting the victim of their practical joke. 
 
 " Well, gentlemen, what ails you that you are standing 
 there with your arms folded.'*" said M. Guillaume to his 
 three neophytes. " In former days, bless you, when I was 
 in Master Chevrel's service, I should have overhauled more 
 than two pieces of cloth by this time." 
 
 " Then it was daylight earlier," said the second assistant, 
 whose duty this was. 
 
 The old shopkeeper could not help smiling. Though two 
 of these young fellows, who were confided to his care by 
 their fathers, rich manufacturers at Louviers and at Sedan, 
 had only to ask and to have a hundred thousand francs the 
 day when they were old enough to settle in life, Guillaume 
 regarded it as his duty to keep them under the rod of an 
 old-world despotism, unknown nowadays in the showy mod- 
 em shops, where the apprentices expect to be rich men at 
 thirty. He made them work like negroes. These three 
 assistants were equal to a business which would harry ten 
 such clerks as those whose sybaritical tastes now swell the 
 columns of the budget. Not a sound disturbed the peace 
 of this solemn house, where the hinges were always oiled, 
 and where the meanest article of furniture showed the re- 
 spectable cleanliness which reveals strict order and economy. 
 The most waggish of the three youths often amused himself 
 by writing the date of its first appearance on the Gruyere 
 cheese which was left to their tender mercies at breakfast, 
 and which it was their pleasure to leave untouched. This 
 bit of mischief, and a few others of the same stamp, would 
 sometimes bring a smile on the face of the younger of
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 9 
 
 Guillaume's two daughters, the pretty maiden who has just 
 now appeared to the bewitched man in the street. 
 
 Though each of the apprentices, even the eldest, paid a 
 round sum for his board, not one of them would have been 
 bold enough to remain at the master's table when dessert 
 was served. When Mme. Guillaume talked of dressing the 
 salad, the hapless youths trembled as they thought of the 
 thrift with which her prudent hand dispensed the oil. They 
 could never think of spending a night away from the house 
 without having given, long before, a plausible reason for 
 such an irregularity. Every Sunday, each in his turn, two 
 of them accompanied the Guillaume family to Mass at Saint- 
 Leu, and to vespers. Miles. Virginie and Augustine, simply 
 attired in cotton print, each took the arm of an apprentice 
 and walked in front, under the piercing eye of their mother, 
 who closed the little family procession with her husband, 
 accustomed by her to carry two large prayer-books, bound 
 in black morocco. The second apprentice received no salary. 
 As for the eldest, whose twelve years of perseverance and 
 discretion had initiated him into the secrets of the house, he 
 was paid eight hundred francs a year as the reward of his 
 labors. On certain family festivals he received as a gratuity 
 some little gift, to which Mme. Guillaume's dry and wrinkled 
 hand alone gave value — netted purses, which she took care 
 to stuff with cotton wool, to show off the fancy stitches, braces 
 of the strongest make, or heavy silk stockings. Sometimes, 
 but rarely, this prime minister was admitted to share the 
 pleasures of the family when they went into the country, or 
 when, after waiting for months, they made up their mind to 
 exert the right acquired by taking a box at the theater to 
 command a piece which Paris had already forgotten. 
 
 As to the other assistants, the barrier of respect which 
 formerly divided a master draper from his apprentices was 
 so firmly established between them and the old shopkeeper, 
 that they would have been more likely to steal a piece of 
 cloth than to infringe this time-honored etiquette. Such 
 reserve may now appear ridiculous ; but these old houses 
 were a school of honesty and sound morals. The masters 
 adopted their apprentices. The young man's linen was
 
 10 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 cared for, mended, and often replaced by the mistress of 
 the house. If an apprentice fell ill, he was the object of truly 
 maternal attention. In a case of danger the master lavished 
 his money in calling in the most celebrated physicians, for 
 he was not answerable to their parents merely for the good 
 conduct and training of the lads. If one of them, whose 
 character was unimpeachable, suffered misfortune, these old 
 tradesmen knew how to value the intelligence he had dis- 
 played, and they did not hesitate to intrust the happiness 
 of their daughters to men whom they had long trusted with 
 their fortunes. Guillaume was one of these men of the old 
 school, and if he had their ridiculous side, he had all their 
 good qualities ; and Joseph Lebas, the chief assistant, an 
 orphan without any fortune, was in his mind destined to be 
 the husband of Virginie, his elder daughter. But Joseph 
 did not share the symmetrical ideas of his master, who would 
 not for an empire have given his second daughter in marriage 
 before the elder. The unhappy assistant felt that his heart 
 was wholly given to Mile. Augustine, the younger. In order 
 to justify this passion, which had grown up in secret, it is 
 necessary to inquire a little further into the springs of the 
 absolute government which ruled the old cloth-merchant's 
 household. 
 
 Guillaume had two daughters. The elder. Mile. Virginie, 
 was the very image of her mother. Mme. Guillaume, daugh- 
 ter of the Sieur Chevrel, sat so upright in the stool behind 
 her desk, that more than once she had heard some wag bet 
 that she was a stuffed figure. Her long, thin face betrayed 
 exaggerated piety. Devoid of attractions or of amiable 
 manners, Mme. Guillaume commonl}^ decorated her head — 
 that of a woman near on sixty — with a cap of a particular 
 and unvarying shape, with long lappets, like that of a widow. 
 In all the neighborhood she was known as the " portress 
 nun." Her speech was curt and her movements had the 
 stiff precision of a semaphore. Her eye, with a gleam in 
 it like a cat's, seemed to spite the world because she was so 
 ugly. Mile. Virginie, brought up, like her younger sister, 
 under the domestic rule of her mother, had reached the age 
 of eight-and-twenty. Youth mitigated the graceless effect
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 11 
 
 which her likeness to her mother sometimes gave to her 
 features, but maternal austerity had endowed her with two 
 great qualities which made up for everything. She was 
 patient and gentle. Mile. Augustine, who was but just 
 eighteen, was not like either her father or her mother. She 
 was one of those daughters whose total absence of any phys- 
 ical affinity with their parents makes one believe in the adage: 
 God gives children. Augustine was little, or, to describe 
 her more truly, delicately made. Full of gracious candor, 
 a man of the world could have found no fault in the charming 
 girl beyond a certain meanness of gesture or vulgarity of 
 attitude, and sometimes a want of ease. Her silent and 
 placid face was full of the transient melancholy which comes 
 over all young girls who are too weak to dare to resist 
 their mother's will. 
 
 The two sisters, always plainly dressed, could not gratify 
 the innate vanity of womanhood but by a luxury of cleanli- 
 ness which became them wonderfully, and made them har- 
 monize with the polished counters and the shining shelves, 
 on which the old man-servant never left a speck of dust, 
 and with the old-world simplicity of all they saw about them. 
 As their style of living compelled them to find the elements 
 of happiness in persistent work, Augustine and Virginie had 
 hitherto always satisfied their mother, who secretly prided 
 herself on the perfect characters of her two daughters. It is 
 easy to imagine the results of the training they had received. 
 Brought up to a commercial life, accustomed to hear nothing 
 but dreary arguments and calculations about trade, having 
 studied nothing but grammar, bookkeeping, a little Bible- 
 history, and the history of France in Le Ragois, and never 
 reading any book but those their mother would sanction, their 
 ideas had not acquired much scope. They knew perfectly 
 how to keep house; they were familiar with the prices of 
 things ; they understood the difficulty of amassing money ; 
 they were economical, and had a great respect for the qual- 
 ities that make a man of business. Although their father 
 was rich, they were as skilled in darning as in embroidery ; 
 their mother often talked of having them taught to cook, 
 so that they might know how to order a dinner and scold
 
 12 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 a cook with due knowledge. They knew nothing of the 
 pleasures of the world; and, seeing how their parents spent 
 their exemplary lives, they very rarely suffered their eyes 
 to wander beyond the walls of their hereditary home, which 
 to their mother was the whole universe. The meetings to 
 which family anniversaries gave rise filled in the future of 
 earthly joy to them. 
 
 When the great drawing-room on the second floor was to 
 be prepared to receive company — Mme. Roquin, a Demoiselle 
 Chevrel, fifteen months younger than her cousin, and be- 
 decked with diamonds ; young Rabourdin, employed in the 
 Finance Office; M. Cesar Birotteau, the rich perfumer, and 
 his wife, known as Mme. Cesar; M. Camusot, the richest silk 
 mercer in the Rue des Bourdonnais; with his father^n-law, M. 
 Cardot, two or three old bankers, and some immaculate ladies 
 — the arrangements, made necessary by the way in which 
 everything was packed away — the plate, the Dresden china, 
 the candlesticks, and the glass — made a variety in the monot- 
 onous lives of the three women, who came and went and exerted 
 themselves as nuns would to receive their bishop. Then, in 
 the evening, when all three were tired out with having wiped, 
 rubbed, unpacked, and arranged all the gauds of the festival, 
 as the girls helped their mother to undress, Mme. Guillaume 
 would say to them, " Children, we have done nothing to-day." 
 
 When, on very great occasions, " the portress nun " al- 
 lowed dancing, restricting the games of boston, whist, and 
 backgammon within the limits of her bedroom, such a con- 
 cession was accounted as the most unhoped felicity, and 
 made them happier than going to the great balls, to two 
 or three of which Guillaume would take the girls at the time 
 of the Carnival. 
 
 And once a year the worthy draper gave an entertainment, 
 when he spared no expense. However rich and fashionable 
 the persons invited might be, they were careful not to be 
 absent; for the most important houses on the Exchange had 
 recourse to the immense credit, the fortune, or the time- 
 honored experience of M. Guillaume. Still, the excellent 
 merchant's two daughters did not benefit as much as might 
 be supposed by the lessons the world has to offer to young
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 13 
 
 spirits. At these parties, which were indeed set down in 
 the ledger to the credit of the house, they wore dresses the 
 shabbiness of which made them blush. Their style of dancing 
 was not in any way remarkable, and their mother's sur- 
 veillance did not allow of their holding any conversation 
 with their partners beyond Yes and No. Also, the law of 
 the old sign of the Cat and Racket commanded that they 
 should be home by eleven o'clock, the hour when balls and 
 fetes begin to be lively. Thus their pleasures, which seemed 
 to conform very fairly to their father's position, were often 
 made insipid by circumstances which were part of the family 
 habits and principles. 
 
 As to their usual life, one remark will sufficiently paint it. 
 Mme. Guillaume required her daughters to be dressed very 
 early in the morning, to come down every day at the same 
 hour, and she ordered their employments with monastic 
 regularity. Augustine, however, had been gifted by chance 
 with a spirit lofty enough to feel the emptiness of such a life. 
 Her blue eyes would sometimes be raised as if to pierce the 
 depths of that gloomy staircase and those damp store-rooms. 
 After sounding the profound cloistral silence, she seemed to 
 be listening to remote, inarticulate revelations of the life of 
 passion, which accounts feelings as of higher value than 
 things. And at such moments her cheek would flush, her 
 idle hands would lay the muslin sewing on the polished oak 
 counter, and presently her mother would say in a voice, of 
 which even the softest tones were sour, " Augustine, my 
 treasure, what are you thinking about? " It is possible 
 that two romances discovered by Augustine in the cupboard 
 of a cook Mme. Guillaume had lately discharged — Hippolyte 
 Comte de Douglas and Le Comte de Commmges — may have 
 contributed to develop the ideas of the young girl, who had 
 devoured them in secret, during the long nights of the 
 past winter. 
 
 And so Augustine's expression of vague longing, her gentle 
 voice, her jasmine skin, and her blue eyes had lighted in poor 
 Lebas's soul a flame as ardent as it was reverent. From 
 an easily understood caprice, Augustine felt no affection for 
 the orphan; perhaps because she did not know that he
 
 14 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 loved her. On the other hand, the senior apprentice, with 
 his long legs, his chestnut hair, his big hands and powerful 
 frame, had found a secret admirer in Mile. Virginie, who, in 
 spite of her dower of fifty thousand crowns, had as yet no 
 suitor. Nothing could be more natural than these two pas- 
 sions at cross-purposes, born in the silence of the dingy shop, 
 as violets bloom in the depths of a wood. The mute and 
 constant looks which made the young people's eyes meet by 
 sheer need of change in the midst of persistent work and 
 cloistered peace, were sure, sooner or later, to give rise to 
 feelings of love. The habit of seeing always the same face 
 leads insensibly to our reading there the qualities of the 
 soul, and at last effaces all its defects. 
 
 " At the pace at which that man goes, our girls will 
 soon have to go on their knees to a suitor!" said M. 
 Guillaume to himself, as he read the first decree by which 
 Napoleon drew in advance on the conscript classes. 
 
 From that day the old merchant, grieved at seeing his 
 eldest daughter fade, remembered how he had married Mile. 
 Chevrel under much the same circumstances as those of 
 Joseph Lebas and Virginie. A good bit of business, to marry 
 off his daughter, and discharge a sacred debt by repaying 
 to an orphan the benefit he had formerly received from his 
 predecessor under similar conditions ! Joseph Lebas, who 
 was now three-and-thirty, was aware of the obstacle which a 
 difference of fifteen years placed between Augustine and 
 himself. Being also too clear-sighted not to understand M. 
 Guillaume's purpose, he knew his inexorable principles well 
 enough to feel sure that the second would never marry before 
 the elder. So the hapless assistant, whose heart was as 
 warm as his legs were long and his chest deep, suffered in 
 silence. 
 
 This was the state of affairs In the tiny republic which, 
 in the heart of the Rue Saint-Denis, was not unlike a 
 dependency of La Trappe. But to give a full account of 
 events as well as of feelings, it is needful to go back to 
 some months before the scene with which this story opens. 
 At dusk one evening, a young man passing the darkened 
 shop of the Cat and Racket had paused for a moment to
 
 THE CAT AND KACKET 15 
 
 gaze at a picture which might have arrested every painter 
 in the world. The shop was not yet lighted, and was as a 
 dark cave beyond which the dining-room was visible. A 
 hanging lamp shed the yellow light which lends such charm 
 to pictures of the Dutch school. The white linen, the silver, 
 the cut glass, were brilliant accessories, and made more 
 picturesque by strong contrasts of light and shade. The 
 figures of the head of the family and his wife, the faces of 
 the apprentices, and the pure form of Augustine, near whom 
 a fat chubby-cheeked maid was standing, composed so strange 
 a group ; the heads were so singular, and every face had so 
 candid an expression ; it was so easy to read the peace, the 
 silence, the modest way of life in this family, that to an 
 artist accustomed to render nature, there was something 
 hopeless in any attempt to depict this scene, come upon 
 by chance. The stranger was a young painter, who, seven 
 years before, had gained the first prize for painting. He 
 had now just come back from Rome. His soul, full-fed with 
 poetry ; his eyes, satiated with Raphael and Michael Angelo, 
 thirsted for real nature after long dwelling in the pompous 
 land where art has everywhere left something grandiose. 
 Right or wrong, this was his personal feeling. His heart, 
 which had long been a prey to the fire of Italian passion, 
 craved one of those modest and meditative maidens whom in 
 Rome he had unfortunately seen only in painting. From 
 the enthusiasm produced in his excited fancy by the living 
 picture before him, he naturally passed to a profound ad- 
 miration for the principal figure; Augustine seemed to be 
 pensive, and did not eat; by the arrangement of the lamp 
 the light fell full on her face, and her bust seemed to move 
 in a circle of fire, which threw up the shape of her head 
 and illuminated it with almost supernatural effect. The 
 artist involuntarily compared her to an exiled angel dream- 
 ing of heaven. An almost unknown emotion, a limpid, seeth- 
 ing love flooded his heart. After remaining a minute, over- 
 whelmed by the weight of his ideas, he tore himself from his 
 bliss, went home, ate nothing, and could not sleep. 
 
 The next day he went to his studio, and did not come 
 out of it till he had placed on canvas the magic of the scene
 
 16 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 of which the memory had, in a sense, made him a devotee; 
 his happiness was incomplete till he should possess a faithful 
 portrait of his idol. He went many times past the house 
 of the Cat and Racket; he even ventured in once or twice, 
 under a disguise, to get a closer view of the bewitching 
 creature that Mme. Guillaum*^ covered with her wing. For 
 eight whole months, devoted to his love and to his brush, 
 he was lost to the sight of his most intimate friends, for- 
 getting the world, the theater, poetry, music, and all his 
 dearest habits. One morning Girodet broke through all the 
 barriers with which artists are familiar, and which they 
 know how to evade, went into his room, and woke him by 
 asking, " What are you going to send to the Salon ? *' The 
 artist grasped his friend's hand, dragged him off to the 
 studio, uncovered a small easel picture and a portrait. After 
 a long and eager study of the two masterpieces, Girodet 
 threw himself on his comrade's neck and hugged him, without 
 speaking a word. His feelings could only be expressed as he 
 felt them — soul to soul. 
 
 " You are in love .'' " said Girodet. 
 
 They both knew that the finest portraits by Titian, Ra- 
 phael, and Leonardo da Vinci, were the outcome of the 
 enthusiastic sentiments by which, indeed, under various con- 
 ditions, every masterpiece is engendered. The artist only 
 bent his head in reply. 
 
 " How happy are you to be able to be in love, here, after 
 coming back from Italy ! But I do not advise you to send 
 such works as these to the Salon," the great painter went on. 
 " You see, these two works will not be appreciated. Such 
 true coloring, such prodigious work, cannot yet be under- 
 stood; the public is not accustomed to such depths. The 
 pictures we paint, my dear fellow, are mere screens. We 
 should do better to turn rhymes, and translate the antique 
 poets! There is more glory to be looked for there than 
 from our luckless canvases ! " 
 
 Notwithstanding this charitable advice, the two pictures 
 were exhibited. The Interior made a revolution in painting. 
 It gave birth to the pictures of genre which pour into all 
 our exhibitions in such prodigious quantity that they might
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 17 
 
 be supposed to be produced by machinery. As to the por- 
 trait, few artists have forgotten that lifelike work; and 
 the public, which as a body is sometimes discerning, awarded 
 it the crown which Girodet himself had hung over it. The 
 two pictures were surrounded by a vast throng. They fought 
 for places, as women say. Speculators and moneyed men 
 would have covered the canvas with double Napoleons, but 
 the artist obstinately refused to sell or to make replicas. 
 An enormous sum was offered him for the right of engraving 
 them, and the print-sellers were not more favored than the 
 amateurs. 
 
 Though these incidents occupied the world, they were not 
 of a nature to penetrate the recesses of the monastic solitude 
 in the Rue Saint-Denis. However, when paying a visit to 
 Mme. Guillaume, the notary's wife spoke of the exhibition 
 before Augustine, of whom she was very fond, and explained 
 its purpose. Mme. Roquin's gossip naturally inspired 
 Augustine with a wish to see the pictures, and with courage 
 enough to ask her cousin secretly to take her to the Louvre. 
 Her cousin succeeded in the negotiations she opened with 
 Mme. Guillaume for permission to release the young girl for 
 two hours from her dull labors. Augustine was thus able to 
 make her way through the crowd to see the crowned work. 
 A fit of trembling shook her like an aspen leaf as she 
 recognized herself. She was terrified, and looked about her 
 to find Mme. Roquin, from whom she had been separated 
 by a tide of people. At that moment her frightened eyes fell 
 on the impassioned face of the young painter. She at once 
 recalled the figure of a loiterer whom, being curious, she 
 had frequently observed, believing him to be a new neighbor. 
 
 " You see how love has inspired me," said the artist in 
 the timid creature's ear, and she stood in dismay at the 
 words. 
 
 She found supernatural courage to enable her to push 
 through the crowd and join her cousin, who was still strug- 
 gling with the mass of people that hindered her from getting 
 to the picture. 
 
 " You will be stifled ! " cried Augustine. " Let us go." 
 
 But there are moments, at the Salon, when two women
 
 18 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 are not always free to direct their steps through the galleries. 
 By the irregular course to which they were compelled b^' the 
 press, Mile. Guillaume and her cousin were pushed to within 
 a few steps of the second picture. Chance thus brought them, 
 both together, to where thej- could easily see the canvas 
 made famous by fashion, for once in agreement with talent. 
 Mme. Roquin's exclamation of surprise was lost in the hub- 
 bub and buzz of the crowd; Augustine involuntarily shed 
 tears at the sight of this wonderful study. Then, by an 
 almost unaccountable impulse, she laid her finger on her 
 lips, as she perceived quite near her the ecstatic face of the 
 young painter. The stranger replied by a nod, and pointed 
 to ^Ime. Roquin, as a spoil-sport, to show Augustine that 
 he had understood. This pantomime struck the young girl 
 like hot coals on her flesh; she felt quite guilty as she 
 perceived that there was a compact between herself and the 
 artist. The suffocating heat, the dazzling sight of beautiful 
 dresses, the bewilderment produced in Augustine's brain by the 
 truth of coloring, the multitude of living or painted figures, 
 the profusion of gilt frames, gave her a sense of intoxication 
 which doubled her alarms. She would perhaps have fainted 
 if an unknown rapture had not surged up in her heart to 
 vivify her whole being, in spite of this chaos of sensations. 
 She nevertheless believed herself to be under the power of 
 the Devil, of whose awful snares she had been warned by the 
 thundering words of preachers. This moment was to her 
 like a moment of madness. She found herself accompanied 
 to her cousin's carriage by the young man, radiant with joy 
 and love. Augustine, a prey to an agitation new to her 
 experience, an intoxication which seemed to abandon her 
 to nature, listened to the eloquent voice of her heart, and 
 looked again and again at the young painter, betraying the 
 emotion that came over her. Never had the bright rose of 
 her cheeks shown in stronger contrast with the whiteness of 
 her skin. The artist saw her beauty in all its bloom, her 
 maiden modesty in all its glory. She herself felt a sort of 
 rapture mingled with terror at thinking that her presence 
 had brought happiness to him whose name was on every lip, 
 and whose talent lent immortality to transient scenes. She
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 19 
 
 was loved! It was impossible to doubt it. When she no 
 longer saw the artist, these simple words still echoed in her 
 ear, " You see how love has inspired me ! " And the throbs 
 of her heart, as they grew deeper, seemed a pain, her heated 
 blood revealed so many unknown forces in her being. She 
 affected a severe headache to avoid replying to her cousin's 
 questions concerning the pictures ; but on their return Mme. 
 Roquin could not forbear from speaking to Mme. Guillaume 
 of the fame that had fallen on the house of the Cat and 
 Racket, and Augustine quaked in every limb as she heard 
 her mother say that she should go to the Salon to see her 
 house there. The young girl again declared herself suffering, 
 and obtained leave to go to bed. 
 
 " That is what comes of sight-seeing," exclaimed M. Guil- 
 laume — " a headache. And is it so very amusing to see in 
 a picture what you can see any day in your own street .f* 
 Don't talk to me of your artists ! Like writers, they are a 
 starveling crew. Why the devil need they choose my house 
 to flout it in their pictures ? " 
 
 " It may help to sell a few ells more of cloth," said Joseph 
 Lebas. 
 
 This remark did not protect art and thought from being 
 condemned once again before the judgment-seat of trade. 
 As may be supposed, these speeches did not infuse much hope 
 into Augustine, who, during the night, gave herself up to 
 the first meditations of love. The events of the day were 
 like a dream, which it was joy to recall to her mind. She 
 was initiated into the fears, the hopes, the remorse, all the 
 ebb and flow of feeling which could not fail to toss a heart 
 so simple and so timid as hers. What a void she perceived 
 in this gloomy house! What a treasure she found in her 
 soul ! To be the wife of a genius, to share his glory ! What 
 ravages must such a vision make in the heart of a girl 
 brought up among such a family ! What hopes must it raise 
 in a young creature who, in the midst of sordid elements, had 
 pined for a life of elegance! A sunbeam had fallen into 
 the prison. Augustine was suddenly in love. So many of 
 her feelings were soothed that she succumbed without re- 
 flection. At eighteen does not love hold a prism between
 
 20 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 the world and the eyes of a young girl? She was incapable 
 of suspecting the hard facts which result from the union 
 of a loving woman with a man of imagination, and she be- 
 lieved herself called to make him happy, not seeing any dis- 
 parity between herself and him. To her the future would be 
 as the present. When, next day, her father and mother re- 
 turned from the Salon, their dejected faces proclaimed some 
 disappointment. In the first place, the painter had removed 
 the two pictures ; and then Mme. Guillaume had lost her 
 cashmere shawl. But the news that the pictures had dis- 
 appeared from the walls since her visit revealed to Augustine 
 a delicacy of sentiment which a woman can always appreciate, 
 even by instinct. 
 
 On the morning when, on his way home from a ball, 
 Theodore de Sommervieux — for this was the name which 
 fame had stamped on Augustine's heart — had been squirted 
 on by the apprentices while awaiting the appearance of his 
 artless little friend, who certainly did not know that he was 
 there ; the lovers had seen each other for the fourth time only 
 since their meeting at the Salon. The difficulties which the 
 rule of the house placed in the way of the painter's ardent 
 nature gave added violence to his passion for Augustine. 
 
 How could he get near to a young girl seated in a count- 
 ing-house between two such women as Mile. Virginie and 
 Mme. Guillaume.'' How could he correspond with her when 
 her mother never left her side.'' Ingenious, as lovers are, 
 to imagine woes, Theodore saw a rival in one of the assistants, 
 to whose interests he supposed the others to be devoted. If 
 he should evade these sons of Argus, he would yet be wrecked 
 under the stem eyes of the old draper or of Mme. Guillaume. 
 The very vehemence of his passion hindered the j'oung painter 
 from hitting on the ingenious expedients which, in prisoners 
 and in lovers, seem to be the last effort of intelligence spurred 
 by a wild craving for liberty, or by the fire of love. Theo- 
 dore wandered about the neighborhood with the restlessness 
 of a madman, as though movement might inspire him with 
 some device. After racking his imagination, it occurred to 
 him to bribe the blowsy waiting-maid with gold. Thus a few 
 notes were exchanged at long intervals during the fortnight
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET U 
 
 following the ill-starred morning when M. Guillaume and 
 Theodore had so scrutinized one another. At the present 
 moment the young couple had agreed to see each other at a 
 certain hour of the day, and on Sunday, at Saint-Leu, during 
 Mass and vespers. Augustine had sent her dear Theodore a 
 list of the relations and friends of the family, to whom the 
 young painter tried to get access, in the hope of interesting, 
 if it were possible, in his love affairs, one of these souls ab- 
 sorbed in money and trade, to whom a genuine passion 
 must appear a quite monstrous speculation, a thing unheard 
 of. Nothing, meanwhile, was altered at the sign of the Cat 
 and Racket. If Augustine was absent-minded, if, against 
 all obedience to the domestic code, she stole up to her room 
 to make signals by means of a jar of flowers, if she sighed, 
 if she were lost in thought, no one observed it, not even her 
 mother. This will cause some surprise to those who have 
 entered into the spirit of the household, where an idea tainted 
 with poetry would be in startling contrast to persons and 
 things, where no one could venture on a gesture or a look 
 which would not be seen and analyzed. Nothing, however, 
 could be more natural: the quiet bark that navigated the 
 stormy waters of the Paris Exchange, under the flag of the 
 Cat and Racket, was just now in the toils of one of these 
 tempests which, returning periodically, might be termed 
 equinoctial. For the last fortnight the five men forming the 
 crew, with Mme. Guillaume and Mile. Virginie, had been 
 devoting themselves to the hard labor known as stock- 
 taking. 
 
 Every bale was turned over, and the length verified to 
 ascertain the exact value of the remnant. The ticket at- 
 tached to each parcel was carefully examined to see at what 
 time the piece had been bought. The retail price was fixed. 
 M. Guillaume, always on his feet, his pen behind his ear, 
 was like a captain commanding the working of the ship. 
 His sharp tones, spoken through a trap-door, to inquire into 
 the depths of the hold in the cellar-store, gave utterance to 
 the barbarous formulas of trade-jargon, which find expression 
 only in cipher. "How much H.N.Z. .? »— " All sold."— 
 " What is left of Q.X..? "— " Two ells."—" At what price.? "
 
 £2 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 — " Fifty-five three."—" Set down A. at three, with all of 
 J. J., all of M.P., and what is left of V.D.O."— A hundred 
 other injunctions equally intelligible were spouted over the 
 counters like verses of modern poetry, quoted by romantic 
 . spirits, to excite each other's enthusiasm for one of their 
 poets. In the evening Guillaume, shut up with his assistant 
 and his wife, balanced his accounts, carried on the balance, 
 wrote to debtors in arrears, and made out bills. All three 
 were busy over this enormous labor, of which the r-esult could 
 be stated on a sheet of foolscap, proving to the head of the 
 house that there was so much to the good in hard cash, so 
 much in goods, so much in bills and notes ; that he did not 
 owe a sou ; that a hundred or two hundred thousand francs 
 were owing to him ; that the capital had been increased ; that 
 the farmlands, the houses, or the investments were extended, 
 or repaired, or doubled. Whence it became necessary to 
 begin again with increased ardor, to accumulate more crown- 
 pieces, without its ever entering the brain of these laborious 
 ants to ask — " To what end .'' " 
 
 Favored by this annual turmoil, the happy Augustine 
 escaped the investigations of her Argus-eyed relations. At 
 last, one Saturday evening, the stock-taking was finished. 
 The figures of the sum-total shoAved a row of Os long enough 
 to allow Guillaume for once to relax the stern rule as to 
 dessert which reigned throughout the year. The shrewd old 
 draper rubbed his hands, and allowed his assistants to remain 
 at table. The members of the crew had hardly swallowed 
 their thimbleful of some home-made liqueur, when the rumble 
 of a carriage was heard. The family party were going to 
 see Cendrillon at the Varietes, while the two younger appren- 
 tices each received a crown of six francs, with permission 
 to go wherever they chose, provided they were in by mid- 
 night. 
 
 Notwithstanding this debauch, the old cloth-merchant was 
 shaving himself at six next morning, put on his maroon- 
 colored coat, of which the glowing lights afi^orded him 
 perennial enjoyment, fastened a pair of gold buckles on the 
 knee-straps of his ample satin breeches ; and then, at about 
 seven o'clock, while all were still sleeping in the house, he
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 23- 
 
 made his way to the little office adjoining the shop on the 
 first floor. Daylight came in through a window, fortified 
 by iron bars, and looking out on a small yard surrounded 
 by such black walls that it was very like a well. The old 
 merchant opened the iron-lined shutters, which were so famil- 
 iar to him, and threw up the lower half of the sash window. 
 The icy air of the courtyard came in to cool the hot atmos- 
 phere of the little room, full of the odor peculiar to offices. 
 The merchant remained standing, his hand resting on the 
 greasy arm of a large cane chair lined with morocco, of 
 which the original hue had disappeared ; he seemed to hesitate 
 as to seating himself. He looked with affection at the double 
 desk, where his wife's seat, opposite his own, was fitted into 
 a little niche in the wall. He contemplated the numbered 
 boxes, the files, the implements, the cash box — objects all 
 of immemorial origin, and fancied himself in the room with 
 the shade of Master Chevrel. He even pulled out the high 
 stool on which he had once sat in the presence of his departed 
 master. This stool, covered with black leather, the horse- 
 hair showing at every corner — as it had long done, without, 
 however, coming out — he placed with a shaking hand on 
 the very spot where his predecessor had put it, and then, 
 with an emotion difficult to describe, he pulled a bell, which 
 rang at the head of Joseph Lebas's bed. When this decisive 
 blow had been struck, the old man, for whom, no doubt, 
 these reminiscences were too much, took up three or four 
 bills of exchange, and looked at them without seeing them. 
 
 Suddenly Joseph Lebas stood before him. 
 
 " Sit down there," said Guillaume, pointing to the stool. 
 
 As the old master draper had never yet bid his assistant 
 be seated in his presence, Joseph Lebas was startled. 
 
 " What do you think of these notes? " asked Guillaume. 
 
 " They will never be paid." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 « Well, I heard that the day before yesterday Etienne & 
 Co. had made their payments in gold." 
 
 "Oh, oh!" said the draper. "Well, one must be very 
 
 ill to show one's bile. Let us speak of something else. 
 
 Joseph, the stock-taking is done."
 
 24 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 " Yes, monsieur, and the dividend is one of the best you 
 have ever made." 
 
 " Do not use new-fangled words. Say the profits, Joseph. 
 Do you know, my boy, that this result is partly owing to 
 you.'' And I do not intend to pay you a salary any longer. 
 Mme. Guillaume has suggested to me to take you into 
 partnership. — ' Guillaume and Lebas ' ; will not that make 
 a good business name.'' We might add, ' and Co.' to round 
 off the firm's signature." 
 
 Tears rose to the eyes of Joseph Lebas, who tried to 
 hide them. 
 
 " Oh, M. Guillaume, how have I deserved such kindness ? 
 I only do my duty. It was so much already that you should 
 take an interest in a poor orph " 
 
 He was brushing the cuff of his left sleeve with his 
 right hand, and dared not look at the old man, who smiled 
 as he thought that this modest young fellow no doubt needed, 
 as he had needed once on a time, some encouragement to 
 complete his explanations. 
 
 " To be sure," said Virginie's father, " you do not alto- 
 gether deserve this favor, Joseph. You have not so much 
 confidence in me as I have in you. (The young man looked 
 up quickly.) You know all the secrets of the cash-box. For 
 the last two years I have told you of almost all my concerns. 
 I have sent you to travel in our goods. In short, I have 
 nothing on my conscience as regards you. But you — you 
 have a soft place, and you have never breathed a word of it." 
 Joseph Lebas blushed. " Ah, ha ! " cried Guillaume, " so 
 you thought you could deceive an old fox like me.'' \^^len 
 you knew that I had scented the Lecocq bankruptcy .'' " 
 
 " What, monsieur.'* " replied Joseph Lebas, looking at 
 his master as keenly as his master looked at him, " you knew 
 that I was in love.'' " 
 
 " I know everything, you rascal," said the worthy and 
 cunning old merchant, pulling the assistant's ear. " And I 
 forgive you — I did the same myself." 
 
 " And you will give her to me ? " 
 
 " Yes — ^with fifty thousand crowns ; and I will leave you 
 as much by will, and we will start on our new career under
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 25 
 
 the name of a new firm. We will do good business yet, my 
 boy ! " added the old man, getting up and flourishing his 
 arms. " I tell you, son-in-law, there is nothing like trade. 
 Those who ask what pleasure is to be found in it are simple- 
 tons. To be on the scent of a good bargain, to hold your 
 own on 'Change, to watch as anxiously as at the gaming table 
 whether Etienne & Co. will fail or no, to see a regiment 
 of Guards march past all dressed in your cloth, to trip 
 your neighbor up — honestly, of course! — to make the goods 
 cheaper than others can ; then to carry out an undertaking 
 which you have planned, which begins, grows, totters, and 
 succeeds ! to know the workings of every house of business as 
 well as a minister of police, so as never to make a mistake; 
 to hold up your head in the midst of wrecks, to have friends 
 by correspondence in every manufacturing town ; is not that 
 a perpetual game, Joseph ? That is life, that is ! I shall 
 die in that harness, like old Chevrel, but taking it easy now, 
 all the same." 
 
 In the heat of his eager rhetoric, old Guillaume had scarcely 
 looked at his assistant, who was weeping copiously. " Why, 
 Joseph, my poor boy, what is the matter.-' " 
 
 " Oh, I love her so ! M. Guillaume, that my heart fails 
 me; I believe " 
 
 " Well, well, boy," said the old man, touched, " you are 
 happier than you know, by Gad! For she loves you. I 
 know it." 
 
 And he blinked his little green eyes as he looked at the 
 young man. 
 
 " Mile. Augustine ! Mile. Augustine ! " exclaimed Joseph 
 Lebas in his rapture. 
 
 He was about to rush out of the room when he felt himself 
 clutched by a hand of iron, and his astonished master spun 
 him round in front of him once more. 
 
 " What has Augustine to do with this matter? " he asked, 
 in a voice which instantly froze the luckless Joseph. 
 
 " Is it not she that — that — I love ? " stammered the assist- 
 ant. 
 
 Much put out by his own want of perspicacity, Guillaume 
 sat down again, and rested his long head in his hands to
 
 26 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 consider the perplexing situation in which he found himself. 
 Joseph Lebas, shamefaced and in despair, remained standing. 
 
 " Joseph," the draper said with frigid dignity, " I was 
 speaking of Virginie. Love cannot be made to order, I 
 know. I know, too, that you can be trusted. We will 
 forget all this. I will not let Augustine marry before Vir- 
 ginie. — Your interest will be ten per cent." 
 
 The young man, to whom love gave I know not what 
 power of courage and eloquence, clasped his hand, and spoke 
 in his turn — spoke for a quarter of an hour, with so much 
 warmth and feeling, that he altered the situation. If the 
 question had been a matter of business, the old tradesman 
 would have had fixed principles to guide his decision ; but, 
 tossed a thousand miles from commerce, on the ocean of 
 sentiment, without a compass, he floated, as he told himself, 
 undecided in the face of such an unexpected event. Carried 
 away by his fatherly kindness, he began to beat about the 
 bush. 
 
 " Deuce take it, Joseph, you must know that there are 
 ten years between my two children. Mile. Chevrel was no 
 beauty, still she has had nothing to complain of in me. Do 
 as I did. Come, come, don't cry. Can you be so silly? 
 What is to be done? It can be managed perhaps. There 
 is always some way out of a Scrape. And we men are not 
 always devoted Celadons to our wives — you understand? 
 Mme. Guillaume is very pious. . . . Come. By Gad, 
 boy, give your arm to Augustine this morning as we go 
 to Mass." 
 
 These were the phrases spoken at random by the old 
 draper, and their conclusion made the lover happy. He was 
 already thinking of a friend of his as a match for Mile. 
 Virginie, as he went out of the smoky office, pressing his 
 future father-in-law's hand, after saying with a knowing 
 look that all would turn out for the best. 
 
 "What will Mme. Guillame say to it?" was the idea 
 that greatly troubled the worthy merchant when he found 
 himself alone. 
 
 At breakfast Mme. Guillaume and Virginie, to whom the 
 draper had not as yet confided his disappointment, cast mean-
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 27 
 
 ing glances at Joseph Lebas, who was extremely embarrassed. 
 The young assistant's bashfulness commended him to his 
 mother-in-law's good graces. The matron became so cheer- 
 ful that she smiled as she looked at her husband, and allowed 
 herself some little pleasantries of time-honored acceptance 
 in such simple families. She wondered whether Joseph or 
 Virginie were the taller, to ask them to compare their height. 
 This preliminary fooling brought a cloud to the master's 
 brow, and he even made such a point of decorum that he 
 desired Augustine to take the assistant's arm on their way 
 to Saint-Leu. Mme. Guillaume, surprised at this manly del- 
 icacy, honored her husband with a nod of approval. So 
 the procession left the house in such order as to suggest no 
 suspicious meaning to the neighbors. 
 
 " Does it not seem to you. Mile. Augustine," said the 
 assistant, and he trembled, " that the wife of a merchant 
 whose credit is as good as M. Guillaume's, for instance, 
 might enjoy herself a little more than madame your mother 
 does.? Might wear diamonds — or keep a carriage.? For 
 my part, if I were to marry, I should be glad to take 
 all the work, and see ray wife happy. I would not put her 
 into the counting-house. In the drapery business, you see, 
 a woman is not so necessary now as formerly. M. Guillaume 
 was quite right to act as he did — and besides, his wife liked 
 it. But so long as a woman knows how to turn her hand to 
 the bookkeeping, the correspondence, the retail business, 
 the orders, and her housekeeping, so as not to sit idle, that 
 is enough. At seven o'clock, when the shop is shut, I shall 
 take my pleasures, go to the play, and into company. — But 
 you are not listening to me." 
 
 " Yes, indeed, M. Joseph. What do you think of paint- 
 ing.'' That is a fine calling." 
 
 " Yes. I know a master house-painter, M. Lourdois. He 
 is well-to-do." 
 
 Thus conversing, the family reached the Church of Saint- 
 Leu. There Mme. Guillaume reasserted her rights, and, for 
 the first time, placed Augustine next to herself, Virginie 
 taking her place on the fourth chair, next to Lebas. During 
 the sermon all went well between Augustine and Theodore,
 
 g8 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 who, standing behind a pillar, worshiped his Madonna with 
 fervent devotion; but at the elevation of the Host, Mme. 
 Guillaume discovered, rather late, that her daughter Augus- 
 tine was holding her prayer-book upside down. She was 
 about to speak to her strongly, when, lowering her veil, 
 she interrupted her own devotions to look in the direction 
 where her daughter's eyes found attraction. By the help 
 of her spectacles she saw the young artist, whose fashionable 
 elegance seemed to proclaim him a cavalry officer on leave 
 rather than a tradesman of the neighborhood. It is difficult 
 to conceive of the state of violent agitation in which Mme. 
 Guillaume found herself — she, who flattered herself on having 
 brought up her daughters to perfection — on discovering in 
 Augustine a clandestine passion of which her prudery and 
 ignorance exaggerated the perils. She believed her daughter 
 to be cankered to the core. 
 
 " Hold your book right way up, miss," she muttered in 
 a low voice, tremulous with wrath. She snatched away the 
 telltale prayer-book and returned it with the letter-press 
 right way up. " Do not allow your eyes to look anywhere 
 but at your prayers," she added, " or I shall have something 
 to say to you. Your father and I will talk to you after 
 church." 
 
 These words came like a thunderbolt on poor Augustine. 
 She felt faint; but, torn between the distress she felt and 
 the dread of causing a commotion in church, she bravely 
 concealed her anguish. It was, however, easy to discern 
 the stormy state of her soul from the trembling of her 
 prayer-book, and the tears which dropped on every page 
 she turned. From the furious glare shot at him by Mme. 
 Guillaume the artist saw the peril into which his love affair 
 had fallen; he went out, with a raging soul, determined to 
 venture all. 
 
 " Go to your room, miss ! " said Mme. Guillaume, on 
 their return home ; " we will send for you, but take care 
 not to quit it." 
 
 The conference between the husband and wife was con- 
 ducted so secretly that at first nothing was heard of it. 
 Virginie, however, who had tried to give her sister courage
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 29 
 
 by a variety of gentle remonstrances, carried her good nature 
 so far as to listen at the door of her mother's bedroom, where 
 the discussion was held, to catch a word or two. The first 
 time she went down to the lower floor she heard her father 
 exclaim, " Then, madame, do you wish to kill your daugh- 
 ter? " 
 
 " My poor dear ! " said Virginie, in tears, " papa takes 
 your part." 
 
 " And what do they want to do to Theodore.'' " asked the 
 innocent girl. 
 
 Virginie, inquisitive, went down again ; but this time she 
 stayed longer ; she learned that Joseph Lebas loved Augustine. 
 It was written that on this memorable day, this house, 
 generally so peaceful, should be a hell. M. Guillaume 
 brought Joseph Lebas to despair by telling him of Augus- 
 tine's love for a stranger. Lebas, who had advised his 
 friend to become a suitor for Mile. Virginie, saw all his 
 hopes wrecked. Mile. Virginie, overcome by hearing that 
 Joseph had, in a way, refused her, had a sick headache. 
 The dispute that had arisen from the discussion between 
 M. and Mme. Guillaume, when, for the third time in their 
 lives, they had been of antagonistic opinions, had shown 
 itself in a terrible form. Finally, at half-past four in the 
 afternoon, Augustine, pale, trembling, and with red eyes, was 
 haled before her father and mother. The poor child art- 
 lessly related the too brief tale of her love. Reassured by a 
 speech from her father, who promised to listen to her in 
 silence, she gathered courage as she pronounced to her par- 
 ents the name of Theodore de Sommervieux, with a mis- 
 chievous little emphasis on the aristocratic de. And yield- 
 ing to the unknown charm of talking of her feelings, she was 
 brave enough to declare with innocent decision that she loved 
 M. de Sommervieux, that she had written to him, and she 
 added, with tears in her eyes : " To sacrifice me to another 
 man would make me wretched." 
 
 " But, Augustine, you cannot surely know what a painter 
 is.** " cried her mother with horror. 
 
 " Mme. Guillaume ! " said the old man, compelling her 
 to silence. — " Augustine," he went on, " artists are generally
 
 30 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 little better than beggars. They are too extravagant not 
 to be always a bad sort. I served the late M. Joseph Vemet, 
 the late M. Lekain, and the late M. Noverre. Oh, if you 
 could only know the tricks played on poor Father Chevrel 
 by that M. Noverre, by the Chevalier de Saint-Georges, and 
 especially by M. Philidor ! They are a set of rascals ; I 
 know them well! They all have a gab and nice manners. 
 Ah, your M. Sumer , Somm " 
 
 " De Sommervieux, papa." 
 
 " Well, well, de Sommervieux, well and good. He can 
 never have been half so sweet to you as M. le Chevalier de 
 Saint-Georges was to me the day I got a verdict of the 
 consuls against him. And in those days they were gentlemen 
 of quality." 
 
 " But, father, M. Theodore is of good family, and he 
 wrote me that he is rich; his father was called Chevalier de 
 Sommervieux before the Revolution." 
 
 At these words M. Guillaume looked at his terrible better- 
 half, who, like an angry woman, sat tapping the floor with 
 her foot while keeping sullen silence; she avoided even cast- 
 ing wrathful looks at Augustine, appearing to leave to M. 
 Guillaume the whole responsibility in so grave a matter, 
 since her opinion was not listened to. Nevertheless, in spite 
 of her apparent self-control, when she saw her husband giving 
 way so mildly under a catastrophe which had no concern 
 with business, she exclaimed — 
 
 " Really, monsieur, you are so weak with your daughters ! 
 However " 
 
 The sound of a carriage, which stopped at the door, 
 interrupted the rating which the old draper already quaked 
 at. In a minute Mme. Roquin was standing in the middle 
 of the room, and looking at the actors in this domestic 
 scene : " I know all, my dear cousin," said she, with a patron- 
 izing air. 
 
 Mme. Roquin made the great mistake of supposing that 
 a Paris notary's wife could play the part of a favorite of 
 fashion. 
 
 " I know all," she repeated, " and I have come into Noah's 
 Ark, like the dove, with the olive-branch. I read that allegory
 
 THE CAT AND EACKET 31 
 
 in the Genie du Christianisme" she added, turning to Mme. 
 Guillaume ; " the allusion ought to please you, cousin. Do 
 you know," she went on, smiling at Augustine, " that M. de 
 Sommervieux is a charming man? He gave me my portrait 
 this morning, painted by a master's hand. It is worth at 
 least six thousand francs." And at these words she patted 
 M. Guillaume on the arm. The old draper could not help 
 making a grimace with his lips which was peculiar to him. 
 
 " I know M. de Sommervieux very well," the Dove ran 
 on. " He has come to my evenings this fortnight past, and 
 made them delightful. He has told me all his woes, and 
 commissioned me to plead for him. I know since this morn- 
 ing that he adores Augustine, and he shall have her. Ah, 
 cousin, do not shake your head in refusal. He will be created 
 Baron, I can tell you, and has just been made Chevalier of 
 the Legion of Honor, by the Emperor himself, at the Salon. 
 Roquin is now his lawyer, and knows all his affairs. Well! 
 M. Sommervieux has twelve thousand francs a year in good 
 landed estate. Do you know that the father-in-law of such 
 a man may get a rise in life — be mayor of his arrondisse- 
 ment, for instance. Have we not seen M. Dupont become 
 a Count of the Empire, and a senator, all because he went 
 as mayor to congratulate the Emperor on his entry into 
 Vienna.'* Oh, this marriage must take place! For my part, 
 I adore the dear young man. His behavior to Augustine is 
 only met with in romances. Be easy, little one, you shall be 
 happy, and every girl will wish she were in your place. Mme. 
 la Duchesse de Carigliano, who comes to my ' At Homes,' 
 raves about M. de Sommervieux. Some spiteful people say 
 she only comes to me to meet him ; as if a duchess of yester- 
 day was doing too much honor to a Chevrel, whose family 
 have been respected citizens these hundred years ! 
 
 " Augustine," Mme. Roquin went on, after a short pause, 
 *' I have seen the portrait. Heavens ! How lovely it is ! 
 Do you know that the Emperor wanted to have it? He 
 laughed, and said to the deputy high constable that if there 
 were many women like that at his Court while all the kings 
 visited it, he should have no difficulty about preserving the 
 peace of Europe. Is not that a compliment? "
 
 32 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 The tempests with which the day had begitn were to re- 
 semble those of Nature, by ending in clear and serene weather. 
 Mme. Roquin displayed so much address in her harangue, 
 she was able to touch so many strings in the dry hearts of 
 M. and Mme. Guillaume, that at last she hit on one which 
 she could work upon. At this strange period commerce and 
 finance were more than ever possessed by the crazy mania for 
 seeking alliance with rank; and the generals of the Empire 
 took full advantage of this desire. M. Guillaume, as a singu- 
 lar exception, opposed this deplorable craving. His favorite 
 axioms were that, to secure happiness, a woman must marry 
 a man of her own class; that everyone was punished soonef 
 or later for having climbed too high ; that love could so little 
 endure under the worries of a household, that both husband 
 and wife needed sound good qualities to be happy; that it 
 would not do for one to be far in advance of the other, 
 because, above everything, they must understand each other; 
 if a man spoke Greek and his wife Latin, they might come 
 to die of hunger. He had himself invented this sort of adage. 
 And he compared such marriages to old-fashioned materials 
 of mixed silk and wool, in which the silk always at last 
 wore through the wool. Still, there is so much vanity at 
 the bottom of man's heart that the prudence of the pilot 
 who steered the Cat and Racket so wisely gave way before 
 Mme. Roquin's aggressive volubility. Austere Mme. Guil- 
 laume was the first to see in her daughter's affection a reason 
 for abdicating her principles and for consenting to receive 
 M. de Sommervieuj, whom she promised herself she would 
 put under severe inquisition. 
 
 The old draper went to look for Joseph Lebas, and inform 
 him of the state of affairs. At half-past six, the dining-room 
 immortalized by the artist saw, united under its skylight, 
 M. and Mme. Roquin, the young painter and his charming 
 Augustine, Joseph Lebas, who found his happiness in pa- 
 tience, and Mile. Virginie, convalescent from her headache. 
 M. and Mme. Guillaume saw in perspective both their chil- 
 dren married, and the fortunes of the Cat and Racket once 
 more in skillful hands. Their satisfaction was at its height 
 when, at dessert, Theodore made them a present of the
 
 THE CAT AND EACKET 83 
 
 wonderful picture which they had failed to see, representing 
 the interior of the old shop, and to which thej all owed so 
 much happiness. 
 
 " Isn't it pretty ! " cried Guillaume. " And to think that 
 anyone would pay thirty thousand francs for that ! " 
 
 " Because you can see my lappets in it," said Mme. Guil- 
 laume. 
 
 " And the cloth unrolled ! " added Lebas ; " you might take 
 it up in your hand." 
 
 " Drapery always comes out well," replied the painter. 
 *' We should be only too happy, we modern artists, if we 
 could touch the perfection of antique drapery." 
 
 " So you like drapery ! " cried old Guillaume. " Well, 
 then, by Gad ! shake hands on that, my young friend. Since 
 you can respect trade, we shall understand each other. And 
 why should it be despised? The world began with trade, 
 since Adam sold Paradise for an apple. He did not strike 
 a good bargain though ! " And the old man roared with 
 honest laughter, encouraged by the champagne, which he 
 sent round with a liberal hand. The band that covered the 
 young artist's eyes was so thick that he thought his future 
 parents amiable. He was not above enlivening them by a 
 few jests in the best taste. So he too pleased everyone. 
 In the evening, when the drawing-room, furnished with what 
 Mme. Guillaume called " everything handsome," was deserted, 
 and while she flitted from the table to the chimney-piece, from 
 the candelabra to the tall candlesticks, hastily blowing out 
 the wax-lights, the worthy draper, who was always clear- 
 sighted when money was in question, called Augustine to him, 
 and seating her on his knee, spoke as follows : — 
 
 " My dear child, you shall marry your Sommervieux since 
 you insist ; you may, if you like, risk your capital in happi- 
 ness. But I am not going to be hoodwinked by the thirty 
 thousand francs to be made by spoiling good canvas. Money 
 that is lightly earned is lightly spent. Did I not hear that 
 hare-brained youngster declare this evening that money was 
 made round that it might roll. If it is round for spend- 
 thrifts, it is flat for saving folks who pile it up. Now, my 
 child, that fine gentleman talks of giving you carriages and
 
 34 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 diamonds ! He has money, let him spend it on you ; so be it. 
 It is no concern of mine. But as to what I can give you, I 
 will not have the cro^Ti-pieces I have picked up with so much 
 toil wasted in carriages and frippery. Those who spend too 
 fast never grow rich. A hundred thousand crowns, which 
 is your fortune, will not buy up Paris. It is all very wci^ 
 to look forward to a few hundred thousand francs to be 
 yours some day ; I shall keep you waiting for them as long 
 as possible, by Gad ! So I took your lover aside, and a 
 man who managed the Lecocq bankruptcy had not much 
 difficulty in persuading the artist to marry under a settle- 
 ment of his wife's money on herself. I will keep an eye on 
 the marriage contract to see that what he is to settle on you 
 is safely tied up. So now, my child, I hope to be a grand- 
 father, by Gad ! I will begin at once to lay up for my 
 grandchildren ; but swear to me, here and now, never to sign 
 any papers relating to money without my advice; and if I 
 go soon to join old Father Chevrel, promise to consult young 
 Lebas, your brother-in-law." 
 
 " Yes, father, I swear it." 
 
 At these words, spoken in a gentle voice, the old man 
 kissed his daughter on both cheeks. That night the lovers 
 slept as soundly as M. and Mme. Guillaume. 
 
 Some few months after this memorable Sunday the high 
 altar of Saint-Leu was the scene of two very different 
 weddings. Augustine and Theodore appeared in all the radi- 
 ance of happiness, their eyes beaming with love, dressed 
 with elegance, while a fine carriage waited for them. Vir- 
 ginie, who had come in a good hired fly with the rest of the 
 family, humbly followed her younger sister, dressed in the 
 simplest fashion, like a shadow necessary to the harmony of 
 the picture. M. Guillaume had exerted himself to the utmost 
 in the church to get Virginie married before Augustine, but 
 the priests, high and low, persisted in addressing the more 
 elegant of the two brides. He heard some of his neighbors 
 highly approving the good sense of Mile. Virginie, who was 
 making, as they said, the more substantial match, and re- 
 maining faithful to the neighborhood; while they fired a
 
 THE CAT AND EACKET U 
 
 few taunts, prompted by envy of Augustine, who was marry- 
 ing an artist and a man of rank ; adding, with a sort of 
 dismay, that if the Guillaumes were ambitious, there was an 
 end to the business. An old fan-maker having remarked 
 that such a prodigal would soon bring his wife to beggary. 
 Father Guillaume prided himself in petto for his prudence 
 in the matter of marriage settlements. In the evening, after 
 a splendid ball, followed by one of those substantial suppers 
 of which the memory is dying out in the present generation, 
 M. and Mme. Guillaume remained in a fine house belonging 
 to them in the Rue du Colombier, where the wedding had been 
 held ; M. and Mme. Lebas returned in their fly to the old home 
 in the Rue Saint-Denis, to steer the good ship Cat and Racket. 
 The artist, intoxicated with happiness, carried ofi^ his beloved 
 Augustine, and eagerly lifting her out of their carriage when 
 it reached the Rue des Trois-Freres, led her to an apartment 
 embellished by all the arts. 
 
 The fever of passion which possessed Theodore made a 
 year fly over the young couple without a single cloud to 
 dim the blue sky under which they lived. Life did not hang 
 heavy on the lovers' hands. Theodore lavished on every 
 day inexhaustible fioriture of enjoyment, and he delighted 
 to vary the transports of passion by the soft languor of those 
 hours of repose when souls soar so high that they seem 
 to have forgotten all bodily union. Augustine was too happy 
 for reflection ; she floated on an undulating tide of rapture ; 
 she thought she could not do enough by abandoning herself 
 to sanctioned and sacred married love; simple and artless,, 
 she had no coquetry, no reserves, none of the dominion which 
 a worldly-minded girl acquires over her husband by ingenious 
 caprice; she loved too well to calculate for the future, and 
 never imagined that so exquisite a life could come to an end. 
 Happy in being her husband's sole delight, she believed that 
 her inextinguishable love would always be her greatest grace 
 in his eyes, as her devotion and obedience would be a peren- 
 nial charm. And, indeed, the ecstasy of love had made her 
 so brilliantly lovely that her beauty filled her with pride, 
 and gave her confidence that she could always reign over a 
 man so easy to kindle as M. de Sommervieux. Thus her
 
 S6 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 position as a wife brought her no knowledge but the lessons 
 of love. 
 
 In the midst of her happiness, she was still the simple 
 child who had lived in obscurity in the Rue Saint-Denis, and 
 she never thought of acquiring the manners, the information, 
 the tone of the world she had to live in. Her words being 
 the words of love, she revealed in them, no doubt, a certain 
 pliancy of mind and a certain refinement of speech; but she 
 used the language common to all women when they find them- 
 selves plunged in passion, which seems to be their element. 
 When, by chance, Augustine expressed an idea that did not 
 harmonize with Theodore's, the young artist laughed, as we 
 laugh at the first mistakes of a foreigner, though they end 
 by annoying us if they are not corrected. 
 
 In spite of all this love-making, by the end of this year, 
 as delightful as it was swift, Sommervieux felt one morning 
 the need for resuming his work and his old habits. His wife 
 was expecting their first child. He saw some friends again. 
 During the tedious discomforts of the year when a young 
 wife is nursing an infant for the first time, he worked, no 
 doubt, with zeal, but he occasionally sought diversion in the 
 fashionable world. The house which he was best pleased to 
 frequent was that of the Duchesse de Carigliano, who had 
 at last attracted the celebrated artist to her parties. When 
 Augustine was quite well again, and her boy no longer re- 
 ■quired the assiduous care which debars a mother from social 
 pleasures, Theodore had come to the stage of wishing to 
 know the joys of satisfied vanity to be found in society by a 
 man who shows himself with a handsome woman, the object 
 ,of envy and admiration. 
 
 To figure in drawing-rooms with the reflected luster of 
 her husband's fame, and to find other women envious of 
 ;her, was to Augustine a new harvest of pleasures ; but it was 
 ihe last gleam of conjugal happiness. She first wounded 
 her husband's vanity when, in spite of vain efforts, she 
 betrayed her ignorance, the inelegance of her language, and 
 the narrowness of her ideas. Sommervieux's nature, subju- 
 gated for nearly two years and a half by the first transports 
 pf love, now, in the calm of less new possession, recovered
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 37 
 
 its bent and habits, for a while diverted from their channels. 
 Poetry, painting, and the subtle joys of imagination have 
 inalienable rights over a lofty spirit. These cravings of a 
 powerful soul had not been starved in Theodore during these 
 two years ; they had only found fresh pasture. As soon as 
 the meadows of love had been ransacked, and the artist had 
 gathered roses and cornflowers as the children do, so greedily 
 that he did not see that his hands could hold no more, the 
 scene changed. When the painter showed his wife the 
 sketches for his finest compositions he heard her exclaim, as 
 her father had done, " How pretty ! " This tepid admiration 
 was not the outcome of conscientious feeling, but of her 
 faith on the strength of love. 
 
 Augustine cared more for a look than for the finest picture. 
 The only sublime she knew was that of the heart. At last 
 Theodore could not resist the evidence of the cruel fact — 
 his wife was insensible to poetry, she did not dwell in his 
 sphere, she could not follow him in all his vagaries, his 
 inventions, his joys and his sorrows; she walked groveling 
 in the world of reality, while his head was in the skies. 
 Common minds cannot appreciate the perennial sufferings 
 of a being who, while bound to another by the most intimate 
 affections, is obliged constantly to suppress the dearest flights 
 of his soul, and to thrust down into the void those images 
 which a magic power compels him to create. To him the 
 torture is all the more intolerable because his feeling towards 
 his companion enjoins, as its first law, that they should have 
 no concealments, but mingle the aspirations of their thought 
 as perfectly as the effusions of their soul. The demands of 
 Nature are not to be cheated. She is as inexorable as neces- 
 sity, which is, indeed, a sort of social nature. Sommervieux 
 took refuge in the peace and silence of his studio, hoping 
 that the habit of living with artists might mold his wife 
 and develop in her the dormant germs of lofty intelligence 
 which some superior minds suppose must exist in every being. 
 But Augustine was too sincerely religious not to take fright 
 at the tone of artists. At the first dinner Theodore gave, 
 she heard a young painter say, with the childlike lightness, 
 which to her was unintelligible, and which redeems a jest from
 
 38 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 the taint of profanity, " But, madame, your Paradise cannot 
 be more beautiful than Raphael's Transfiguration ! — Well, and 
 I got tired of looking at that." 
 
 Thus Augustine came among this sparkling set in a spirit 
 of distrust which no one could fail to see. She was a re- 
 straint on their freedom. Now, an artist who feels restraint 
 is pitiless ; he stays away, or laughs it to scorn. Mme. 
 Guillaume, among other absurdities, had an excessive notion 
 of the dignity she considered the prerogative of a married 
 woman ; and Augustine, though she had often made fun of 
 it, could not help a slight imitation of her mother's primness. 
 This extreme propriety, which virtuous wives do not always 
 avoid, suggested a few epigrams in the form of sketches, in 
 which the harmless jest was in such good taste that Sommer- 
 vieux could not take offense ; and even if they had been more 
 severe, these pleasantries were after all only reprisals from 
 his friends. Still, nothing could seem a trifle to a spirit 
 so open as Theodore's to impressions from without. A cold- 
 ness insensibly crept over him, and inevitably spread. To 
 attain conjugal happiness we must climb a hill whose summit 
 is a narrow ridge, close to a steep and slippery descent ; the 
 painter's love was falling down it. He regarded his wife 
 as incapable of appreciating the moral considerations which 
 justified him in his o^^n eyes for his singular behavior to her, 
 and believed himself quite innocent in hiding from her 
 thoughts she could not enter into, and peccadilloes outside 
 the jurisdiction of a bourgeois conscience. Augustine 
 wrapped herself in sullen and silent grief. These uncon- 
 fessed feelings placed a shroud between the husband and 
 wife which could not fail to grow thicker day by day. 
 Though her husband never failed in consideration for her, 
 Augustine could not help trembling as she saw that he kept 
 for the outer world those treasures of wit and grace that 
 he formerly would lay at her feet. She soon began to find 
 a sinister meaning in the jocular speeches that are current 
 in the world as to the inconstancy of men. She made no 
 complaints, but her demeanor conveyed reproach. 
 
 Three years after her marriage this pretty young woman, 
 who dashed past in her handsome carriage, and lived in a
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 39 
 
 sphere of glory and riches to the envy of heedless folk 
 incapable of taking a just view of the situations of life, was 
 a prey to intense grief. She lost her color; she reflected; 
 she made comparisons ; then sorrow unfolded to her the first 
 lessons of experience. She determined to restrict herself 
 bravely within the round of duty, hoping that by this gener- 
 ous conduct she might sooner or later win back her husband's 
 love. But it was not so. When Sommervieux, tired with 
 work, came in from his studio, Augustine did not put away 
 her work so quickly but that the painter might find his wife 
 mending the household linen, and his own, with all the care 
 of a good housewife. She supplied generously and without a 
 murmur the money needed for his lavishness; but in her 
 anxiety to husband her dear Theodore's fortune, she was 
 strictly economical for herself and in certain details of 
 domestic management. Such conduct is incompatible with 
 the easy-going habits of artists, who, at the end of their life, 
 have enjoyed it so keenly that they never inquire into the 
 causes of their ruin. 
 
 It is useless to note every tint of shadow by which the 
 brilliant hues of their honeymoon were overcast till they 
 were lost in utter blackness. One evening poor Augustine, 
 who had for some time heard her husband speak with en- 
 thusiasm of the Duchesse de Carigliano, received from a 
 friend certain malignantly charitable warnings as to the 
 nature of the attachment which Sommervieux had formed for 
 this celebrated flirt of the Imperial Court. At one-and- 
 twenty, in all the splendor of youth and beauty, Augustine 
 saw herself deserted for a woman of six-and-thirty. Feeling 
 herself so wretched in the midst of a world of festivity which 
 to her was a blank, the poor little thing could no longer 
 understand the admiration she excited, or the envy of which 
 she was the object. Her face assumed a diff^erent expression. 
 Melancholy tinged her features with the sweetness of resigna- 
 tion and the pallor of scorned love. Erelong she too was 
 courted by the most fascinating men ; but she remained lonely 
 and virtuous. Some contemptuous words which escaped her 
 husband filled her with incredible despair. A sinister flash 
 showed her the breaches which, as a result of her sordid
 
 40 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 education, hindered the perfect union of her soul with 
 Theodore's ; she loved him well enough to absolve him and 
 condemn herself. She shed tears of blood, and perceived, 
 too late, that there are mesalliances of the spirit as well as 
 of rank and habits. As she recalled the early raptures of 
 their union, she understood the full extent of that lost happi- 
 ness, and accepted the conclusion that so rich a harvest of 
 love was in itself a whole life, which only sorrow could pay 
 for. At the same time, she loved too truly to lose all hope. 
 At one-and-twenty she dared undertake to educate herself, 
 and make her imagination, at least, worthy of that she ad- 
 mired, " If I am not a poet," thought she, " at any rate, I 
 will understand poetry." 
 
 Then, with all the strength of will, all the energy which 
 every woman can display when she loves, Mme. de Sommer- 
 vieux tried to alter her character, her manners, and her 
 habits; but by dint of devouring books and learning un- 
 dauntedly, she only succeeded in becoming less ignorant. 
 Lightness of wit and the graces of conversation are a gift 
 of nature, or the fruit of education begun in the cradle. She 
 could appreciate music and enjoy it, but she could not sing 
 with taste. She understood literature and the beauties of 
 poetry, but it was too late to cultivate her refractory memory. 
 She listened with pleasure to social conversation, but she 
 could contribute nothing brilliant. Her religious notions 
 and home-grown prejudices were antagonistic to the complete 
 emancipation of her intelligence. Finally, a foregone con- 
 clusion against her had stolen into Theodore's mind, and 
 this she could not conquer. The artist would laugh at 
 those who flattered him about his wife, and his irony had 
 some foundation ; he so overawed the pathetic young creature 
 that, in his presence, or alone with him, she trembled. 
 Hampered by her too eager desire to please, her wits and 
 her knowledge vanished in one absorbing feeling. Even 
 her fidelity vexed the unfaithful husband, who seemed to bid 
 her do wrong by stigmatizing her virtue as insensibility. 
 Augustine tried in vain to abdicate her reason, to yield to 
 her husband's caprices and whims, to devote herself to the 
 selfishness of his vanity. Her sacrifices bore no fruit. Per-
 
 THE CAT AND EACKET 41 
 
 haps they had both let the moment slip when souls may meet 
 in comprehension. One day the young wife's too sensitive 
 heart received one of those blows which so strain the bonds 
 of feeling that they seem to be broken. She withdrew into 
 solitude. But before long a fatal idea suggested to her 
 to seek counsel and comfort in the bosom of her family. 
 
 So one morning she made her way towards the grotesque 
 fa9ade of the humble, silent home where she had spent her 
 childhood. She sighed as she looked up at the sash-window, 
 whence one day she had sent her first kiss to him who now 
 shed as much sorrow as glory on her life. Nothing was 
 changed in the cavern, where the drapery business had, how- 
 ever, started on a new life. Augustine's sister filled her 
 mother's old place at the desk. The unhappy young woman 
 met her brother-in-law with his pen behind his ear; he 
 hardly listened to her, he was so full of business. The formi- 
 dable symptoms of stock-taking were visible all round him; 
 he begged her to excuse him. She was received coldly enough 
 by her sister, who owed her a grudge. In fact, Augustine, 
 in her finery, and stepping out of a handsome carriage, 
 had never been to see her but when passing by. The wife 
 of the prudent Lebas, imagining that want of money was 
 the prime cause of this early call, tried to keep up a tone 
 of reserve which more than once made Augustine smile. 
 The painter's wife perceived that, apart from the cap and 
 lappets, her mother had found in Virginie a successor who 
 could uphold the ancient honor of the Cat and Racket. At 
 breakfast she observed certain changes in the management 
 of the house which did honor to Lebas's good sense; the 
 assistants did not rise before dessert; they were allowed to 
 talk, and the abundant meal spoke of ease without luxury. 
 The fashionable woman found some tickets for a box at the 
 Fran9ais, where she remembered having seen her sister from 
 time to time. Mme. Lebas had a cashmere shawl over her 
 shoulders, of which the value bore witness to her husband's 
 generosity to her. In short, the couple were keeping pace 
 with the times. During the two-thirds of the day she spent 
 there, Augustine was touched to the heart by the equable 
 happiness, devoid, to be sure, of all emotion, but equally free
 
 4St AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 from storms, enjoyed by this well-matched couple. They 
 had accepted life as a commercial enterprise, in which, above 
 all, they must do credit to the business. Not finding any 
 great love in her husband, Virginie had set to work to create 
 it. Having by degrees learned to esteem and care for his 
 wife, the time that his happiness had taken to germinate was 
 to Joseph Lebas a guarantee of its durability. Hence, when 
 Augustine plaintively set forth her painful position, she 
 had to face the deluge of commonplace morality which the 
 traditions of the Rue Saint-Denis furnished to her sister. 
 
 " The mischief is done, wife," said Joseph Lebas ; " we 
 must try to give our sister good advice." Then the clever 
 tradesman ponderously analyzed the resources which law 
 and custom might offer Augustine as a means of escape 
 at this crisis ; he ticketed every argument, so to speak, and 
 arranged them in their degrees of weight under various 
 categories, as though they were articles of merchandise of 
 different qualities ; then he put them in the scale, weighed 
 them, and ended by showing the necessity for his sister-in- 
 law's taking violent steps which could not satisfy the love 
 she still had for her husband ; and, indeed, the feeling had 
 revived in all its strength when she heard Joseph Lebas speak 
 of legal proceedings. Augustine thanked them, and returned 
 home even more undecided than she had been before con- 
 sulting them. She now ventured to go to the house in the 
 Rue du Colombier, intending to confide her troubles to her 
 father and mother; for she was like a sick man who, in his 
 desperate plight, tries every prescription, and even puts faith 
 in old wives' remedies. 
 
 The old people received their daughter with an effusiveness 
 that touched her deeply. Her visit brought them some little 
 change, and that to them was worth a fortune. For the 
 last four years they had gone their way in life like navigators 
 without a goal or a compass. Sitting by the chimney comer, 
 they would talk over their disasters under the old law of 
 maximum, of their great investments in cloth, of the way they 
 had weathered bankruptcies, and, above all, the famous failure 
 of Lecocq, M. Guillaume's battle of Marengo. Then, when 
 they had exhausted the tale of lawsuits, they recapitulated
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 43 
 
 the sums-total of their most profitable stock-takings, and told 
 each other old stories of the Saint-Denis quarter. At two 
 o'clock old Guillaume went to cast an eye on the business 
 at the Cat and Racket; on his way back he called at all 
 the shops, formerly the rivals of his own, where the young 
 proprietors hoped to inveigle the old draper into some risky 
 discount, which, as was his wont, he never refused point- 
 blank. Two good Normandy horses were dying of their own 
 fat in the stables of the big house; Mme. Guillaume never 
 used them but to drag her on Sundays to High Mass at the 
 parish church. Three times a week the worthy couple kept 
 open house. By the influence of his son-in-law Sommervieux, 
 M. Guillaume had been named a member of the Consulting 
 Board for the Clothing of the Army. Since her husband 
 had stood so high in office, Mme. Guillaume had decided that 
 she must receive; her rooms were so crammed with gold and 
 silver ornaments, and furniture, tasteless but of undoubted 
 value, that the simplest room in the house looked like a 
 chapel. Economy and expense seemed to be struggling for 
 the upper hand in every accessory. It was as though M. 
 Guillaume had looked to a good investment, even in the 
 purchase of a candlestick. In the midst of this bazaar, where 
 splendor revealed the owners' want of occupation, Sommer- 
 vieux's famous picture filled the place of honor, and in it 
 M. and Mme. Guillaume found their chief consolation, turn- 
 ing their eyes, harnessed with eye-glasses, twenty times a 
 day on this presentment of their past life, to them so active 
 and amusing. The appearance of this mansion and these 
 rooms, where everything had an aroma of staleness and 
 mediocrity, the spectacle off"ered by these two beings, cast 
 away, as it were, on a rock far from the world and the ideas 
 which are life, startled Augustine ; she could here contemplate 
 the sequel of the scene of which the first part had struck 
 her at the house of Lebas — a life of stir without movement, 
 a mechanical and instinctive existence like that of the beaver ; 
 and then she felt an indefinable pride in her troubles, as she 
 reflected that they had their source in eighteen months of 
 such happiness as, in her eyes, was worth a thousand lives 
 like this; its vacuity seemed to her horrible. However, she
 
 U AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 concealed this not very charitable feeling, and displayed for 
 her parents her newly-acquired accomplishments of mind, 
 and the ingratiating tenderness that love had revealed to her, 
 disposing them to listen to her matrimonial grievances. Old 
 people have a weakness for this kind of confidences. Mme. 
 Guillaume wanted to know the most trivial details of that 
 alien life, which to her seemed almost fabulous. The travels 
 of Baron de la Houtan, which she began again and again 
 and never finished, told her nothing more unheard-of con- 
 cerning the Canadian savages. 
 
 " What, child, your husband shuts himself into a room 
 with naked women ! And you are so simple as to believe 
 that he draws them? " 
 
 As she uttered this exclamation, the grandmother laid her 
 spectacles on a little work-table, shook her skirts, and clasped 
 her hands on her knees, raised by a foot-warmer, her favorite 
 pedestal. 
 
 *' But, mother, all artists are obliged to have models." 
 
 *' He took good care not to tell us that when he asked 
 leave to marry you. If I had known it, I would never have 
 given my daughter to a man who followed such a trade. 
 Religion forbids such horrors ; they are immoral. And at 
 what time of night do you say he comes home? " 
 
 " At one o'clock — two '* 
 
 The old folks looked at each other in utter amazement. 
 
 " Then he gambles ? " said M. Guillaume. " In my day 
 only gamblers stayed out so late." 
 
 Augustine made a face that scorned the accusation. 
 
 *' He must keep you up through dreadful nights waiting 
 for him," said Mme. Guillaume. " But you go to bed, don't 
 you? And when he has lost, the wretch wakes you." 
 
 " No, mamma, on the contrary, he is sometimes in very 
 good spirits. Not unfrequently, indeed, when it is fine, he 
 suggests that I should get up and go into the woods." 
 
 "The woods! At that hour? Then have you such a 
 small set of rooms that his bedroom and his sitting-rooms 
 are not enough, and that he must run about? But it is just 
 to give you cold that the wretch proposes such expeditions. 
 He wants to get rid of you. Did one ever hear of a man
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 45 
 
 settled in life, a well-behaved,^quiet man galloping about like 
 a warlock? " 
 
 " But, my dear mother, you do not understand that he 
 must have excitement to fire his genius. He is fond of scenes 
 which " 
 
 " I would make scenes for him, fine scenes ! " cried Mme. 
 Guillaume, interrupting her daughter. " How can you show 
 any consideration to such a man? In the first place, I don't 
 like his drinking water only ; it is not wholesome. Why does 
 he object to see a woman eating? What queer notion is that? 
 But he is mad. All you tell us about him is impossible. A 
 man cannot leave his home without a word, and never come 
 back for ten days. And then he tells you he has been to 
 Dieppe to paint the sea. As if anyone painted the sea ! He 
 crams you with a pack of tales that are too absurd." 
 
 Augustine opened her lips to defend her husband; but 
 Mme. Guillaume enjoined silence with a wave of her hand, 
 which she obeyed by a survival of habit, and her mother 
 went on in harsh tones : " Don't talk to me about the man ! 
 He never set foot in a church excepting to see you and to 
 be married. People without religion are capable of anything. 
 Did Guillaume ever dream of hiding anything from me, of 
 spending three days without saying a word to me, and of 
 chattering afterwards like a blind magpie? " 
 
 " My dear mother, you judge superior people too severely. 
 If their ideas were the same as other folks', they would not 
 be men of genius." 
 
 " Very well, then let men of genius stop at home and not 
 get married. What! A man of genius is to make his wife 
 miserable? And because he is a genius it is all right! 
 Genius, genius! It is not so very clever to say black one 
 minute and white the next, as he does, to interrupt other 
 ■ people, to dance such rigs at home, never to let you know 
 which foot you are to stand on, to compel his wife never to 
 be amused unless my lord is in gay spirits, and to be dull 
 when he is dull." 
 
 " But, mother, the very nature of such imaginations " 
 
 " What are such * imaginations '? " Mme. Guillaume went 
 on, interrupting her daughter again. " Fine ones his are,
 
 46 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 my word! What possesses a man that all on a sudden, 
 without consulting a doctor, he takes it into his head to eat 
 nothing but vegetables? If indeed it were from religious 
 motives, it might do him some good — but he has no more 
 religion than a Huguenot. Was there ever a man known 
 who, like him, loved horses better than his fellow-creatures, 
 had his hair curled like a heathen, laid statues under muslin 
 coverlets, shut his shutters in broad day to work by lamp- 
 light? There, get along; if he were not so grossly immoral, 
 he would be fit to shut up in a lunatic asylum. Consult M. 
 Loraux, the priest at Saint-Sulpice, ask his opinion about 
 it all, and he will tell you that your husband does not behave 
 like a Christian." 
 • *' Oh, mother, can you believe ? '* 
 
 " Yes, I do believe. You loved him, and you can see none 
 of these things. But I can remember in the early days after 
 your marriage. I met him in the Champs-Elysees. He was 
 on horseback. Well, at one minute he was galloping as 
 hard as he could tear, and then pulled up to a walk. I said 
 to myself at that moment, * There is a man devoid of judg- 
 ment.' " 
 
 " Ah, ha ! " cried M. Guillaume, " how wise I was to have 
 your money settled on yourself with such a queer fellow for 
 a husband ! " 
 
 * When Augustine was so imprudent as to set forth her 
 serious grievances against her husband, the two old people 
 were speechless with indignation. But the word '' divorce " 
 was erelong spoken by Mme. Guillaume. At the sound of 
 the word divorce the apathetic old draper seemed to wake 
 up. Prompted by his love for his daughter, and also by 
 the excitement which the proceedings would bring into his 
 uneventful life, Father Guillaume took up the matter. He 
 made himself the leader of the application for a divorce, 
 laid down the lines of it, almost argued the case ; he offered 
 to be at all the charges, to see the lawyers, the pleaders, 
 the judges, to move heaven and earth. Mme. de Sommervieux 
 was frightened, she refused her father's services, said she 
 would not be separated from her husband even if she were 
 ten times as unhappy, and talked no more about her sorrows.
 
 THE CAT AND KACKET 4T 
 
 After being overwhelmed by her parents with all the little 
 wordless and consoling kindnesses by which the old couple 
 tried in vain to make up to her for her distress of heart, 
 Augustine went away, feeling the impossibility of making a 
 superior mind intelligible to weak intellects. She had learned 
 that a wife must hide from everyone, even from her parents, 
 woes for which it is so difficult to find sympathy. The storms 
 and sufferings of the upper spheres are appreciated only 
 by the lofty spirits who inhabit there. In every circumstanqe 
 we can only be judged by our equals. 
 
 Thus poor Augustine found herself thrown back on the 
 horror of her meditations, in the cold atmosphere of her 
 home. Study was indifferent to her, since study had not 
 brought her back her husband's heart. Initiated into the 
 secret of these souls of fire, but bereft of their resources, 
 she was compelled to share their sorrows without sharing 
 their pleasures. She was disgusted with the world, which 
 to her seemed mean and small as compared with the incidents 
 of passion. In short, her life was a failure. 
 
 One evening an idea flashed upon her that lighted up her 
 dark grief like a beam from heaven. Such an idea could 
 never have smiled on a heart less pure, less virtuous than 
 hers. She determined to go to the Duchesse de Carigliano, 
 not to ask her to give her back her husband's heart, but to 
 learn the arts by which it had been captured; to engage 
 the interest of this haughty fine lady for the mother of her 
 lover's children; to appeal to her and make her the instru- 
 ment of her future happiness, since she was the cause of her 
 present wretchedness. 
 
 So one day Augustine, timid as she was, but armed with 
 supernatural courage, got into her carriage at two in the 
 afternoon to try for admittance to the boudoir of the famous 
 coquette, who was never visible till that hour. Mme. de 
 Sommervieux had not yet seen any of the ancient and mag- 
 nificent mansions of the Faubourg Saint-Germain. As she 
 made her way through the stately corridors, the handsome 
 staircases, the vast drawing-rooms — full of flowers, though 
 it was in the depth of winter, and decorated with the taste 
 peculiar to women bom to opulence or to the elegant habits
 
 48 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 of the aristocracy, Augustine felt a terrible clutch at her 
 heart; she coveted the secrets of an elegance of which she 
 had never had an idea ; she breathed an air of grandeur which 
 explained the attraction of the house for her husband. When 
 she reached the private rooms of the Duchesse she was filled 
 with jealousy and a sort of despair, as she admired the 
 luxurious arrangement of the furniture, the draperies, and 
 the hangings. Here disorder was a grace, here luxury 
 affected a certain contempt of splendor. The fragrance 
 that floated in the warm air flattered the sense of smell 
 without offending it. The accessories of the rooms were 
 in harmony with a view, through plate-glass windows, of 
 the lawns in a garden planted with evergreen trees. It was 
 all bewitching, and the art of it was not perceptible. The 
 whole spirit of the mistress of these rooms pervaded the 
 drawing-room where Augustine awaited her. She tried to 
 divine her rival's character from the aspect of the scattered 
 objects ; but there was here something as impenetrable in 
 the disorder as in the symmetry, and to the simple-minded 
 young wife all was a sealed letter. All that she could dis- 
 cern was that, as a woman, the Duchesse was a superior 
 person. Then a painful thought came over her. 
 
 " Alas ! And is it true," she wondered, " that a simple 
 and loving heart is not all-sufficient to an artist; that to 
 balance the weight of these powerful souls they need a union 
 with feminine souls of a strength equal to their own.'' If I 
 had been brought up like this siren, our weapons at least 
 might have been equal in the hour of struggle." 
 
 " But I am not at home ! " The sharp, harsh words, 
 though spoken in an undertone in the adjoining boudoir, were 
 heard by Augustine, and her heart beat violently. 
 
 " The lady is in there," replied the maid. 
 
 " You are an idiot ! Show her in," replied the Duchesse, 
 whose voice was sweeter, and had assumed the dulcet tones 
 of politeness. She evidently now meant to be heard. 
 
 Augustine shyly entered the room. At the end of the 
 dainty boudoir she saw the Duchesse lounging luxuriously 
 on an ottoman covered with brown velvet and placed in the 
 center of a sort of apse outlined by soft folds of white muslin
 
 THE CAT AND EACKET 49 
 
 over a yellow lining. Ornaments of gilt bronze, arranged 
 with exquisite taste, enhanced this sort of dais, under which 
 the Duchesse reclined like a Greek statue. The dark hue 
 of the velvet gave relief to every fascinating charm. A sub- 
 dued light, friendly to her beauty, fell like a reflection rather 
 than a direct illumination. A few rare flowers raised their 
 perfumed heads from costly Sevres vases. At the moment 
 when this picture was presented to Augustine's astonished 
 eyes, she was approaching so noiselessly that she caught a 
 glance from those of the enchantress. This look seemed to 
 say to someone whom Augustine did not at first perceive, 
 " Stay ; you will see a pretty woman, and make her visit less 
 of a bore." 
 
 On seeing Augustine, the Duchesse rose and made her sit 
 down by her. 
 
 " And to what do I owe the pleasure of this visit, 
 madame? " she said with a most gracious smile. 
 
 " Why all this falseness ? " thought Augustine, replying 
 only with a bow. 
 
 Her silence was compulsory. The young woman saw be- 
 fore her a superfluous witness of the scene. This personage 
 was, of all the colonels in the army, the youngest, the most 
 fashionable, and the finest man. His face, full of life and 
 youth, but already expressive, was further enhanced by a 
 small mustache twirled up into points, and as black as jet, 
 by a full Imperial, by whiskers carefully combed, and a forest 
 of black hair in some disorder. He was whisking a riding 
 whip with an air of ease and freedom which suited his self- 
 satisfied expression and the elegance of his dress ; the ribbons 
 attached to his buttonhole were carelessly tied, and he seemed 
 to pride himself much more on his smart appearance than 
 on his courage. Augustine looked at the Duchesse de 
 Carigllano, and Indicated the colonel by a sidelong glance. 
 All its mute appeal was understood. 
 
 " Good-by, then, M. d'AIglemont, we shall meet in the 
 Bois de Boulogne." 
 
 These words were spoken by the siren as though they were 
 the result of an agreement made before Augustine's arrival, 
 and she winged them with a threatening look that the officer
 
 50 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 deserved perhaps for the admiration he showed in gazing^ 
 at the modest flower, which contrasted so well with the 
 haughty Duchesse. The young fop bowed in silence, turned 
 on the heels of his boots, and gracefully quitted the boudoir. 
 At this instant, Augustine, watching her rival, whose eyes 
 seemed to follow the brilliant officer, detected in that glance 
 a sentiment of which the transient expression is known to 
 every woman. She perceived with the deepest anguish that 
 her visit would be useless ; this lady, full of artifice, was too 
 greedy of homage not to have a ruthless heart. 
 
 " Madame," said Augustine in a broken voice, " the step 
 I am about to take will seem to you very strange ; but 
 there is a madness of despair which ought to excuse an3thing. 
 I understand only too well why Theodore prefers your house 
 to any other, and why your mind has so much power over his. 
 Alas! I have only to look into myself to find more than 
 ample reasons. But I am devoted to my husband, madame. 
 Two years of tears have not eflPaced his image from my 
 heart, though I have lost him. In my folly I dared to dream 
 of a contest with you ; and I have come to you to ask you 
 by what means I may triumph over yourself. Oh, nuulame," 
 cried the young wife, ardently seizing the hand which her 
 rival allowed her to hold, " I will never pray to God for 
 my own happiness with so much fervor as I will beseech 
 Him for yours, if you will help me win back Sommervieux's 
 regard — I will not say his love. I have no hope but in you. 
 Ah! tell me how you could please him, and make him forget 
 
 the first days " At these words Augustine broke down, 
 
 suffocated with sobs she could not suppress. Ashamed of 
 her weakness, she hid her face in her handkerchief, which 
 she bathed with tears. 
 
 " What a child you are, my dear little beauty ! " said the 
 Duchesse, carried away by the novelty of such a scene, and 
 touched, in spite of herself, at receiving such homage from 
 the most perfect virtue perhaps in Paris. She took the 
 young wife's handkerchief, and herself wiped the tears from 
 her eyes, soothing her by a few monosyllables murmured with 
 gracious compassion. After a moment's silence the Duchesse, 
 grasping poor Augustine's hands in both her own — hands
 
 THE CAT AND EACKET 51 
 
 that had a rare character of dignity and powerful beauty — 
 said in a gentle and friendly voice : " My first warning is 
 to advise you not to weep so bitterly; tears are disfiguring. 
 We must learn to deal firmly with the sorrows that make 
 us ill, for love does not linger long by a sickbed. Melancholy, 
 at first, no doubt, lends a certain attractive grace, but it 
 ends by dragging the features and blighting the loveliest face. 
 And besides, our tyrants are so vain as to insist that their 
 slaves should be always cheerful." 
 
 *' But, madame, it is not in my power not to feel. How 
 is it possible, without suffering a thousand deaths, to see 
 the face which once beamed with love and gladness turn chill, 
 colorless, and indifferent? I cannot control my heart! " 
 
 " So much the worse, sweet child. But I fancy I know 
 all your story. In the first place, if your husband is un- 
 faithful to you, understand clearly that I am not his accom- 
 plice. If I was anxious to have him in my drawing-room, it 
 was, I own, out of vanity ; he was famous, and he went 
 nowhere. I like you too much already to tell you all the 
 mad things he has done for my sake. I will only reveal 
 one, because it may perhaps help us to bring him back to 
 you, and to punish him for the audacity of his behavior to 
 me. He will end by compromising me. I know the world 
 too well, my dear, to abandon myself to the discretion of 
 a too superior man. You should know that one may allow 
 them to court one, but marry them — that is a mistake ! We 
 women ought to admire men of genius, and delight in them 
 as a spectacle, but as to living with them? Never. — No, no. 
 It is like wanting to find pleasure in inspecting the machinery 
 of the Opera instead of sitting in a box to enjoy its brilliant 
 illusions. But this misfortune has fallen on you, my poor 
 child, has it not? Well, then, you must try to arm yourself 
 against tyranny." 
 
 " Ah, madame, before coming in here, only seeing you as 
 I came in, I already detected some arts of which I had no 
 suspicion." 
 
 " Well, come and see me sometimes, and it will not be long 
 before you have mastered the knowledge of these trifles, 
 important, too, in their way. Outward things are, to fools.
 
 52 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 half of life; and in that matter more than one clever man 
 is a fool, in spite of all his talent. But I dare wager you 
 never could refuse your Theodore anything ! " 
 
 " How refuse anything, madame, if one loves a man ? " 
 
 " Poor innocent, I could adore you for your simplicity. 
 You should know that the mort we love the less we should 
 allow a man, above all, a husband, to see the whole extent 
 of our passion. The one who loves most is tyrannized over, 
 and, which is worse, is sooner or later neglected. The one 
 who wishes to rule should " 
 
 *' What, madame, must I then dissimulate, calculate, be- 
 come false, form an artificial character, and live in it.'' How 
 is it possible to live in such a way.'' Can you " she hesi- 
 tated; the Duchesse smiled. 
 
 " My dear child," the great lady went on in a serious 
 tone, " conjugal happiness has in all times been a specula- 
 tion, a business demanding particular attention. If you 
 persist in talking passion while I am talking marriage, we 
 shall soon cease to understand each other. Listen to me," 
 she went on, assuming a confidential tone. " I have been 
 in the way of seeing some of the superior men of our day. 
 Those who have married have for the most part chosen 
 quite insignificant wives. Well, those wives governed them, 
 as the Emperor governs us ; and if they were not loved, they 
 were at least respected. I like secrets — especially those which 
 concern women — well enough to have amused myself by seek- 
 ing the clew to the riddle. Well, my sweet child, those 
 worthy women had the gift of analyzing their husbands' 
 nature ; instead of taking fright, like you, at their superiority, 
 they very acutely noted the qualities they lacked, and either 
 by possessing those qualities, or by feigning to possess them, 
 they found means of making such a handsome display of 
 them in their husbands' eyes that in the end they impressed 
 them. Also, I must tell you, all these souls which appear 
 so lofty have just a speck of madness in them, which we 
 ought to know how to take advantage of. By firmly re- 
 solving to have the upper hand and never deviating from 
 that aim, by bringing all our actions to bear on it, all our 
 ideas, our cajolery, we subjugate these eminently capricious
 
 THE CAT AND RACKET 53 
 
 natures, which, by the very mutability of their thoughts, 
 lend us the means of influencing them." 
 
 " Good Heavens ! " cried the young wife in dismay. " And 
 this is life. It is a warfare " 
 
 "In which we must always. threaten," said the Duchesse, 
 laughing. " Our power is wholly factitious. And we must 
 never allow a man to despise us; it is impossible to recover 
 from such a descent but by odious maneuvering. Come," she 
 added, " I will give you a means of bringing your husband 
 to his senses." 
 
 She rose with a smile to guide the young and guileless 
 apprentice to conjugal arts through the labyrinth of her 
 palace. They came to a back-staircase, which led up to the 
 reception rooms. As Mme. de Carigliano pressed the secret 
 spring-lock of the door she stopped, looking at Augustine 
 with an inimitable gleam of shrewdness and grace. " The 
 Due de Carigliano adores me," said she. " Well, he dare 
 not enter by this door without my leave. And he is a man 
 in the habit of commanding thousands of soldiers. He knows 
 how to face a battery, but before me — he is afraid ! " 
 
 Augustine sighed. They entered a sumptuous gallery, 
 where the painter's wife was led by the Duchesse up to the 
 portrait painted by Theodore of Mile. Guillaume. On seeing 
 it, Augustine uttered a cry. 
 
 " I knew it was no longer in my house," she said, " but — 
 here !" 
 
 " My dear child, I asked for it merely to see what pitch 
 of idiocy a man of genius may attain to. Sooner or later 
 I should have returned it to you, for I never expected the 
 pleasure of seeing the original here face to face with the 
 copy. While we finish our conversation I will have it carried 
 down to your carriage. And if, armed with such a talisman, 
 you are not your husband's mistress for a hundred years, 
 you are not a woman, and you deserve your fate." 
 
 Augustine kissed the Duchesse's hand, and the lady clasped 
 her to her heart, with all the more tenderness because she 
 would forget her by the morrow. This scene might perhaps 
 have destroyed forever the candor and purity of a less 
 virtuous woman than Augustine, for the astute politics of
 
 54 AT THE SIGN OF 
 
 the higher social spheres were no more consonant to Augus- 
 tine than the narrow reasoning of Joseph Lebas, or Mrae. 
 Guillaume's vapid morality. Strange are the results of the 
 false positions into which we may be brought by the slightest 
 mistake in the conduct of life ! Augustine was like an Alpine 
 cowherd surprised by an avalanche; if he hesitates, if he 
 listens to the shouts of his comrades, he is almost certainly 
 lost. In such a crisis the heart steels itself or breaks. 
 
 Mme. de Sommervieux returned home a prey to such agita- 
 tion as it is difficult to describe. Her conversation with the 
 Duchesse de Carigliano had roused in her mind a crowd of 
 contradictory thoughts. Like the sheep in the fable, full of 
 courage in the wolf's absence, she preached to herself, and 
 laid down admirable plans of conduct ; she devised a thousand 
 coquettish stratagems ; she even talked to her husband, find- 
 ing, away from him, all the springs of true eloquence which 
 never desert a woman ; then, as she pictured to herself Theo- 
 dore's clear and steadfast gaze, she began to quake. When 
 she asked whether monsieur were at home her voice shook. 
 On learning that he would not be in to dinner, she felt an 
 unaccountable thrill of joy. Like a criminal who has ap- 
 pealed against sentence of death, a respite, however short, 
 seemed to her a lifetime. She placed the portrait in her 
 room, and waited for her husband in all the agonies of hope. 
 That this venture must decide her future life, she felt too 
 keenly not to shiver at every sound, even the low ticking of 
 the clock, which seemed to aggravate her terrors by doling 
 them out to her. She tried to cheat time by various devices. 
 The idea struck her of dressing in a way which would make 
 her exactly like the portrait. Then, knowing her husband's 
 restless temper, she had her room lighted up with unusual 
 brightness, feeling sure that when he came in curiosity would 
 bring him there at once. Midnight had struck when, at 
 the call of the groom, the street gate was opened, and the 
 artist's carriage rumbled in over the stones of the silent 
 courtyard. 
 
 " What is the meaning of this illumination ? " asked Theo- 
 dore in glad tones, as he came into her room. 
 
 Augustine skillfully seized the auspicious moment; she
 
 THE CAT AND EACKET 56 
 
 threw herself into her husband's arms, and pointed to the por- 
 trait. The artist stood rigid as a rock, and his eyes turned 
 alternately on Augustine, on the accusing dress. The 
 frightened wife, half-dead, as she watched her husband's 
 changeful brow — that terrible brow — saw the expressive fur- 
 rows gathering like clouds ; then she felt her blood curdling 
 in her veins when, with a glaring look, and in a deep hollow 
 voice, he began to question her — 
 
 " Where did you find that picture ? " 
 
 " The Duchesse de Carigliano returned it to me." 
 
 " You asked her for it .'* " 
 
 " I did not know that she had it." 
 
 The gentleness, or rather the exquisite sweetness of this 
 angel's voice, might have touched a cannibal, but not an 
 artist in the clutches of wounded vanity. 
 
 " It is worthy of her ! " exclaimed the painter in a voice 
 of thunder. " I will be revenged ! " he cried, striding up 
 and down the room. " She shall die of shame ; I will paint 
 her! Yes, I will paint her as Messalina stealing out at night 
 from the palace of Claudius." 
 
 " Theodore ! " said a faint voice. 
 
 " I will kill her." 
 
 « My dear " 
 
 " She is in love with that little cavalry colonel, because 
 he rides well " 
 
 " Theodore ! " 
 
 " Let me be ! " said the painter in a tone almost like a roar. 
 
 It would be odious to describe the whole scene. In the end 
 the frenzy of passion prompted the artist to acts and words 
 which any woman not so young as Augustine would have 
 ascribed to madness. 
 
 At eight o'clock next morning Mme. Guillaume, surprising 
 her daughter, found her pale, with red eyes, her hair in 
 disorder, holding a handkerchief soaked with tears, while 
 she gazed at the floor strewn with the torn fragments of 
 a dress and the broken pieces of a large gilt picture-frame. 
 Augustine, almost senseless with grief, pointed to the wreck 
 with a gesture of deep despair. 
 
 " I don't know that the loss is very great ! " cried the old
 
 56 AT SIGN OF THE CAT AND RACKET 
 
 mistress of the Cat and Racket. " It was like you, no doubt ; 
 but I am told that there is a man on the boulevard who 
 paints lovely portraits for fifty crowns." 
 
 " Oh, mother ! " 
 
 " Poor child, you are quite right," replied Mme. Guil- 
 laume, who misinterpreted the expression of her daughter's 
 glance at her. " True, my child, no one ever can love you 
 as fondly as a mother. My darling, I guess it all; but 
 confide your sorrows to me, and I will comfort you. Did I 
 not tell you long ago that the man was mad ! Your maid 
 has told me pretty stories. Why, he must be a perfect 
 monster ! " 
 
 Augustine laid a finger on her white lips, as if to implore 
 a moment's silence. During this dreadful night misery had 
 led her to that patient resignation which in mothers and 
 loving wives transcends in its effects all human energy, and 
 perhaps reveals in the heart of women the existence of certain 
 chords which God has withheld from men. 
 
 An inscription engraved on a broken column in the ceme- 
 tery at Montmartre states that Mme. de Sommervieux died 
 at the age of twenty-seven. In the simple words of this 
 epitaph one of the timid creature's friends can read the last 
 scene of a tragedy. Every year, on the second of November, 
 the solemn day of the dead, he never passes this youthful 
 monument without wondering whether it does not need a 
 stronger woman than Augustine to endure the violent em- 
 brace of genius.'' 
 
 " The humble and modest flowers that bloom in the valley,'* 
 he reflects, " perish perhaps when they are transplanted too 
 near the skies, to the region where storms gather and the 
 sun is scorching."
 
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