mmmmm ,:':::;:::::;;.;::■:■::,.::,,::■;:!■ :::■•:):: ;;;jf!|?;i;-;.i; Pre.ien Date /■( j\ro THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES GIFT OF Fr.nuanAct Galifomia State Library SEcrioN I books issued Legislature, < If any persoi pafs'd :,i nil A the Bsion. he shall forfeit and pay to the Librarian, for the benefit of the Library three times the value thereof; and before the Controller shall issue his warrant in favor of any member or orticer of the Legislature, or of this btate, for his per diem, allowance, or salary, he shall be satisfied that such member or officer has returned all books taken out of the Library by hmi, and has settled al) accounts for injuring such books or otherwise. Sec 15. Books may be taken from the Library by the members of the Legislature and its officers during the session of the same, and at any time by the Governor and the officers of the Executive Department of this State who are required to keep their offices at the seat of government the Justices of the Supreme Court, the Attorney-General and the Trustee! of the Library. th 0» ROUGE ET NOIR. % m\h of Diulcn-Dadcu. FROM THE FRENCH OF EDMOND ABOUT, BY £1. fto ^^'\i'^ PHILADELPHIA: CLAXTON, EEMSEN & HAFFELFINGER. 624, 626 & 628 MARKET STREET. 1873. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1873, by CLAXTON, REMSEN & IIAFFELFINGER, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington. STEREOTTPEB DT J. FAaAN k BON, PHILADELPHIA. TO) CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAQB Captain Bitterlin 13 CHAPTER 11. Emma • 25 CHAPTER HI. Meo 39 CHAPTER IV. Innocent Dkeamings 51 CHAPTER V. The Play-Bills 64 CHAPTER VI. The Eighth Passenger 90 CHAPTER VII. A Tour in Switzerland 101 CHAPTER VIII. Baden 119 zi «i V XU CONTENTS. CHAPTER IX. AUKELIA loo CHAPTER X. Rouge et Noir 148 CHAPTER XL M. SiLIVERGO 161 CHAPTER Xn. The Cafe of the Musketeers 175 CHAPTER XIH. How Meo Refused Emma's Hand 191 CHAPTER XIV. Preparations ' . . . 206 CHAPTER XV. Battle! 218 CHAPTER XVI. Postscript 231 ROUGE ET NOIR. CHAPTER I. CAPTAIN BITTERLIIT. WHEN he was asked to fill up the last census- papers, he wrote it all down himself, in a little, dry scratch of a hand, bristling like a stubble-field : " Jean Pierre Bitterlin, of Luneville ; 60 years old, 35 years of active service, 11 campaigns, 2 wounds; Captain in 1834, Chevalier in 183G, retired in 1847, a Saint Helena medal-man." His short, thick-set frame was stiff as buckram — perhaps more from habits of commanding than even from years. He had never been what the seamstresses call a fine-looking man ; but in 1858 he wanted a line or two of the regulation height. I am rather inclined to the opinion that his body had sunh by degrees on the marches, from putting one foot before the other : one, two! His feet were short and his hands big. His face — always red, and as full of little wrinkles as a frill — had preserved an expression of firmness. • That bold Roman nose, which cut it in two as the Apen- nines divide Italy, must have broken some hearts in 1820. His moustache had lost all its pliability; in 2 13 14 ROUGE ET NOIR. fact, no Rowland's Macassar had virtue enough to con- quer it : it might be called a. tooth-brush stuck on his upper lip. It M'as always as black as jet fi'om Sun- day morning till Wednesday evening. If it grizzled a little towards the end of the week, it is because the art of the dyer has not yet reached perfection. As to his hair, it was quite another thing ; it had been always black, and the line glossy color lasted to the day of his death — the hair-dresser had guaranteed it. His age was so cleverly concealed that it betrayed itself only by a few long, Avhite hairs escai)ing out of his ears, and by the puckers of a face more corrugated than a lake under the first puffs of the morning breeze. His dress was that of a dandy of 1828 — a narrow- brimmed hat, a black stock nearly reaching his ears, a frock-coat buttoned under the chin, wide pantaloons with great plaits. The gloves he had a preference for were of white cotton ; the red ribbon in his button- hole glowed splendidly like a pink in the month of June. Ilis voice was quick, imperious, and of a very crusty, surly tone. He drawled towards the middle of his sentences, and stopped with a sudden jerk at the end, as if he was drilling his men. He .siid. How do you — DO? in the same tone that he would have said. Present — arms ! .His disposition was tiie most candid, the most honest, the most delicate, but at the same time the sourest, the Grossest, and the grumpiest in the world. The spirits of a man of sixty are nearly always such as they have been made by his previous life. Young people are just as nature has formed tiiem ; the old are fashioned by the hands, often rough and a\A kward, of CAPTAIN ETTTERLIX. 15 society. Jean Pierre Bitterlin had been the prettiest of druraraer-boys and the merriest of Frenchmen at the battle of Leipsic. Fortune, who treated him like a spoiled child, had made him a corporal at sixteen, and at seventeen a sergeant. Like many another, he had dreamed of starry epaulets, marshals' batons, and per- haps something better. Tlie word " impossible " had been rubbed out of the army's dictionary. A bold young fellow, without birth, and hardly able to write his name, might aspire to anything, if opportunity would only give him a lift. Bitterlin had attracted attention from the first by his steadiness, his cool courage, his activity, and all those other secondary qualities that are the small change of the French soldier. He merited, his first epaulet at Waterloo, but he did not receive it till nine years after- wards in Spain. In the interim he had been tempted a hundred times to quit the service and go plant his cab- bages at Luneville; but he never gave his superiors any trouble, though discontented and a sergeant. Mechanically and without relish he continued in a pro- fession that he had embraced with enthusiasm. Between the coffee-house, the drill, the reading of the Constitu- tionnel, and the pretty eyes of a milliner of Toulouse, the hours of this discouraged warrior sped along slowly enough. He read over and over again the Military An- nual, to count the names of all his comrades who had been passed over' his shoulders, and such reading soured his temper. Still some one thing or another kept him in his regiment, and he followed his flag as a dog fol- lows his master. In this growling resignation there is something too sublime for mere civilians to admire. Bitterlin detested the Bourbons; but no one served 16 BOUGE ET NOIR. tlieni more faitlifully. If lie did not get himself killed on their account in 1830, he came at least very near it. He was carried to the hospital with a piece of lead in liis leg. When he recovered his senses, after fifteen days of fever and delirium, he was rejoiced to hear that the government was changed a little. His craving to se^ his family, that is to say his regiment, hastened his recovery. He expected that the time of the great wars wjis coming back again, and, like all true soldiers, he dreamed of nothing less than the conflagration of Eu- rope. But it all ended in a few fire-works, and even these Bitterlin was not ordered to extinguish. He was appointed captain by right of seniority, " when the fool's turn came," as he himself expressed it, with a bitter grunt. His colonel, who encouraged him occasionally, proved to him clearly that he should not despair. A captain at thirty-six, he still had Africa before him. He crossed the Mediterranean, took the field, but caught the dysentery before getting the first sight at an enemy. He was sent to Briangon, in the High Alps, to recover. Winter seven months long, and torrents in the middle of the street! There, to kill time, he married a coffee- house-keeper's daughter. He was hardly married when he was ordered to start for Strasburg with the regiment. His wife followed him on the baggage- wagon. In 1839 he became father of a daughter, who was born between the three hundred and tenth and the three hundred and eleventh mile -stone on the road from Strasburer to Paris. The child prospered, and the Captain began to indulge the hope that the pleasures of domestic life would console him for all his mischances. Unfortu- nately, his wife was pretty, and a coquette. Without CAPTAIN BITTERLIN. 17 heflecting on the consequences, slie liked admiration and sought it; and the Captain now experienced a worse kind of jealousy than he had known while reading the Ililitary Annual. He kept himself at home, closed his cioors, and commenced growling. He could never be seen except on matters of business. He began to affect a refined politeness, as all men do whose superior skill in arms is generally recognized ; but he could bear no joking. The young captains, however, would have their fun. He practised two or three grains of patience before he burst out against a comrade Mdio had carried the fun too far; and he was so unfortunate as to kill him. Nobody said he was wrong. Everything had been done strictly en regie. However, he retired from the service at the age of forty-nine. His pension, his inheritance, and his wife's little dower, amounted in all to about five thousand francs ($1000) a year, with which he came to spend the remainder of his days at ' Paris. He took up his quarters in the Marais, not far from the Place Royale, sent the little girl off to the convent-school at St. Denis, and shut himself up tete-a- tete with his wife. The loneliness killed Madame Bitter- lin in less than four years. The angels themselves would have grown weary of feeding the Captain in his wilderness. The evening he returned to his dwelling, spattered knee-deep with the thick mud so abundant in cemeteries, he reflected an hour or two on chance, on Providence, on the prospects and final fate of that two-legged, feath- erless animal called man ; and then he seriously proposed to himself one of those pretty problems that are only finally resolved by a pull at the trigger. However, he 2* B 18 ROUGE ET NOIR. did not kill liiniself. He had been alive so loner that he' ended by getting used to it. His servant came to tell him dinner M'as ready ; he sat down and contrived to swallow a few morsels. " Eat, sir, eat," said stout Agatha, shedding a torrent of tears over the mutton stew. " You must take courage and strength, now that there's only two of us in the world, besides Mademoiselle at St. Denis." Stout Agatha was a mountaineer of Dauphiny, de- formed and lame. The coffee-house keeper of Brian9oa had sent her to his daughter by way of a New Year's gift, as an inestimable family treasure. The poor crea- ture, with limited intelligence but with the heart of a hero, rose at dawn in summer, with candle-light in winter, breakfasted on an early Mass and a piece of dry bread, hurried to market for provisions, and fought the market-women with a spirit equal to their own ; went after water as soon as the street-fountains were opened, washed, ironed, and mended the family linen, scrubbed the red-tiled jfloors, polished the furniture as bright as a looking-glass, and amused herself in her lei- sure moments by scouring her pots and pans till they shone like silver. Her whole thoughts were on the housekeeping, and, during the few hours that she snatched for sleep, she dreamed regularly that the lather was too blue, or that an army of cockroaches was plun- dering the pantry. But Agatha's talents as well as her virtues were all a sealed book to M. Bitterlin. He accepted her services M'ith misanthropical contempt. In his heart he thought himself an exceedingly generous felloAV, because he did not turn out of doors a creature so useless and ugly. CAPTAIN EITTERLTlSr. 19 He slirugged his shoulders on every occasion, distrust- fully wiped his glass though it sparkled like polished crystal, and ate with the tips of his teeth. He never disputed about the household expenses ; but every time he examined the bills, he would say, with some bitterness : " My good girl, I don't think you rob me. But when I was lieutenant, my board cost me fifty francs a month, and I fared better." Then poor Agatha would burst into tears, thank her master for the confidence he had reposed in her, and promise to be more economical in future. This unappreciating master seldom kept himself at home the moment he no longer had a wife to watch. As soon as he had made his toilet, and growled over the Moniteur de VArmee, he would breakfast at the corner of the table, take his hat and gloves, and pace the streets of Paris till six o'clock in the evening. He would often stop in the Champs Elysees to look at the bowlers, and if he only had an opportunity to ridicule some awkward player, he went away happy. Sometimes he would en- ter a fencing-school in the 3Iarais, belonging to an old comrade of his regiment, who always received him with marks of the highest respect. He never deigned to touch a foil himself, but he was always ready to prove that the scholars and amateurs were miserable bunglers. His favorite place of resort, however, was the Champ de liars. The sight of the uniforms gave him a kind of bitter amusement, of which he was never weary. The fine movements gave him pleasure, far less, however, than the blunders. Every time an officer made a mis- take, he rubbed his hands hard enough to take the skin off, and licked his moustache like a goat licking a tender 20 ROUGE ET NOIR. branch. Every night after dinner he went to read the papers in the Caf6 of the Musketeers, near the Boulevard Beaumarchais. The waiters gave hi in the best coffee and the oldest brandy, because he was the most disagree- al?le and hardest to be pleased of all their customers. He gave advice to the billiard-players, the draught- players, and the piquet-players, and was not at all sparing of doubtful compliments. But nobody minded him, for his disposition was W(;ll known. When invited to take a hand, he answered drily, that he never did anything of the kind, such were not his principles. Strange ! His coffee-house acquaintances, the only ones he had in Paris, treated him with a deference precisely proportioned to his want of deference towards them- selves. So it is all the world over. The more we despise the crowd, the more it honors us; the more merit we arrogate to ourselves, the more mankind is disposed to give. The Captain's sour temper was not much sweetened by an ill turn done him one day by his old comrades : they took Sebastopol without him. The first time the Crimean war was talked about, he gave stout Agatha a formal exposition of his views on the situation of France. " My good girl," said he, " of course you know nothing about these things, and I 'm sure I don't know why I talk to you concerning them. But there are moments when a man would talk to his boot-jack ! France is going to have another tussle with Russia. That 's an old idea of ours ; I might say, of mine. In 1811, when only thirteen years of age, I said: 'We must take Russia I' Russia knows me, Agatha; I have run over Russia from one end to the other. I measured CAPTAIN BITTERLTJSr. 21 sworcls with her at Moscow. I have spoken her language, I don't forget it all yet: Niet! Da! Karacho! If the Russians saw me landing" in the Crimea, there would be more than one to cry out: 'Hello! there's that little Bitterlin again ! Stand from under ! ' This being the case, what will the Minister of War do? Do you think he will send for me ? Oh yes, indeed ! Of course ! " No Frenchman took a deeper interest in the successes and reverses of the Allied Troops. His old regiment, after covering itself with glory at the siege of Rome, had started among the first for the East. Bitterlin, with a profound sentiment of envy, kept his eyes fixed on all the brilliant achievements of the gallant 104th. He passed Avhole days poring over maps of the Crimea, and in running his pencil through the fortifications of Se- bastopol. Morning, noon, and night, he was lecturing the commanders of the expedition, in the person of Agatha. Whenever he thought a general was too dila- tory at a critical moment, he thrust him back into the reserve, mounted his horse in his place, slashed right and left, and went to bed Marshal of France. When- ever the tidings were bad, he walked through the streets of Paris shrugging his shoulders. Five or six fre- quenters of the Caf^ of the Musketeers firmly believed that the Crimean war was never to be ended, because the right men were not there. The day the news came that the Malakoif was taken, the Captain's heart was the scene of another terrible bat- tle. On one side were ranged the glory of his beloved old flag, the honor of the French name, the delightful thrill that runs through an old soldier, at the far-off sound of victory; on the other, the agony of being 99 ROUGE ET NOIR. nothing, and having done nothing, at a moment when crosses, promotions, and titles were showering like hail on the heads of the conquerors. All these contradictory sentiments attacked him at once, and with such violence that he actually shed tears, without well knowing him- self whether it was through joy or grief. Stout Agatha, who did not quite understand politics, asked him inno- cently, if it was from him that they had taken the Mala- kolf, and whether, in consequence of the loss, she should be obliged to omit the second dish at dimier. From time to time, the Captain remembered that he was a father, and this idea, in itself a consoling one, only still more exSsperated his incorrigible sullenness. Paternity reminded him of marriage, and his marriage liad been anything but a happy one. This man, naiTOW in his views, always running into extremes, and imbued with the most exaggerated ideas regarding honor, still continued to believe himself interested in findins: out if Madame Bitterlin had been faithful to her marriage vows. An absurd doubt, but it awoke the Captain moi'e than once in the middle of the night. His jealousy had not expired with his wife; it often returned like fits of periodical fever. The unhappy man had often remained a quarter of an hour stand ing^before his look- ing-glass, examining his counteuaixce, trying to find out whether it looked like that of a deceived husband. He was continually revolving in his sick brain all the cir- cumstances that had excited his suspicious ; every day he opened court with stupid gravity over an interminable case. When his wife's innocence seemed put beyond all doubt, he hurried off to the cemetery and begged pardon of the poor woman for all the harm he had ever done CAPTAIN BITTERLIN. 23 her. But if at that moment even the lightest doubt crossed his mind, he shook his fist at the ashes in the tomb, and wished that his wife woukl come to life again in order to feel his vengeance. He had forbidden the stone-cutter to engrave the regular words Good Wife in the epitaph : the place remained vacant till further in- formation. This painful though groundless uncertainty never permitted him to enjoy a real paternal pleasure in hig intercourse with his daughter. Although he had not the slightest shadow of a reason for supposing that somebody else was her father, he remarked with in- creasing displeasure that not one of little Emma's fea- tures would ever resemble his. Whenever he went to St. Denis to see her, he considered her extremely ugly in the old-fashioned uniform of the Convent. He kissed her coldly on the forehead ; he did not caress her with the fondness characteristic of real fathers. On her side, she came to the parlor as she went to class. M. Bitter- lin acted towards her like a severe schoolmaster; he corrected her from motives of duty. They passed the vacations together at Auteuil. M. Bitterlin, Agatha, and the little one put themselves and their trunks into a yellow omnibus, and got out again before a Boarding Institution, a vast republican hive, composed of two hundred and fifty apartments and as many gardens. The Bitterlins occupied rooms in the third story, which commanded a glimpse of the country. Their garden was so extensive that you could not take twelve steps in it in any direction. The Captain con- sidered such a place an absurd humbug ; but neverthe- less he went there regularly year after year, just for the 24 ROUGE ET NOIR. pleasure of abusing it. Seated on the grass-bank under his only tree, he would smoke his cent-cigar,. chewing the half of it, and gaze at Emma playing in the alley, which served as a corridor for all the gardens of the establishment. And he would often ask himself what there was in common between him, Bitterlin, Marshal of France that ought to be, and that little raw-boned girl, with the red hands, running up and down so wildly, and gesticulating so strangely with her feet and arras. The period of green, awkward girlhood prolonged itself in Mademoiselle Bitterlin's case far beyond the usual limits. At full fifteen years she was still, if not actually ugly, at least perfectly insignificant, and the Captain never scruj^led to say in her presence, 'that the men were never going to make fools of themselves for her beauty. But when she had completed her education, and returned for good to the paternal roof (it was, if I am not mistaken, at the vacation of 1856), — when she had changed the sober uniform of the Legion of Honor for a pretty summer dress of a more modern cut, — the Captain was actually astounded and alarmed at the transformation that had taken place in her regard. He swore that her beauty was indecent, and he made up his mind at once that a new series of tribulations was iu store for his old days. EMMA. 25 CHAPTER II. EMMA. THE Captain's terror, though of course somewhat exaggerated, was not quite unreasonable. It can be very readily understood by those to whom nature has assigned the bootless part of the dragon of the Hes- perides. When we are guarding oranges which we cannot eat ourselves, it is only natural for us to regret that they are so fine and tempting. A husband's case is different : first, the oranges are his own ; then, he can eat them all himself, if he be so disposed and his teeth good enough. This is the reason why the dreary drudg- ery that would prematurely wrinkle the brow of a father or of an elder brother, becomes an enchanting pastime to all young husbands. Captain Bitterlin, who had imagined himself capable of taking Sebastopol, entertained serious apprehensions regarding his ability to defend Emma. It was not by any means that the poor child seemed weak enough to let herself be captured by the first assailant, but because she was possessed of that irresistible seduction which calls into play all the cupidity of the aggressive sex. The guardians of museums, of libraries, and of all col- lections public and private, will tell you that there is in every gallery some picture, or book, or cast, whose manifest destiny it is to be stolen some day or other, while all the rest are perfectly safe. Here, it is an El- zevir or an Aldus, just the size for your pocket, and bound so congenially that your hand stretches for it 3 26 ROUGE ET NOIR. as naturally as it would for a ripe apple. There, it is some little antique figure whose wicked beauty actu- ally invites you to steal it. Elsewhere, it is a little picture, a faultless gem, that not only fascinates dis- honest people, but tempts even a saint himself to slip it under his cloak. President De Brosses was not per- haps altogether a saint, but he Avas a very good man, and a judge into the bargain. Still one day he was very near forgetting all his virtue in the presence of a little Correggio, which was ogling him in the gallery of some lioman prince. Emma seemed to be marked out for the same fate as the little Elzevir, the little bronze, or the little Correggio. Correggio never painted anything fresher, more velvety, more savory. Her face was be- dewed with that impalpable down which nature sheds on peaches and on the wings of butterflies : the down of youth and innocence, which the first love efFaces, and which faded beauty tries in vain to rc])lace by all the powders of the drug-store. Doubly a woman — for she was a blonde — under her long brown eyelashes she half shaded two large blue eyes, joyous as a summer sky. The dainty lines of her pretty mouth, the lustre of her cherry lips, the whiteness of her little teeth, slightly separated like those of children, the exquisite desiern of her two little ears, which half lost themselves in the golden shadow of her hair, all the harmonious perfections of her countenance, formed a whole not ex- actly of angelical, but of most provoking virginity. It is not thus that Sasso Ferrato and Carlo Dolci painted the Madonna; but it is thus that all painters would wish to represent Eve, and that all men would wish to meet her. EMMA. . 27 The Captain's epithet had been too coarse to express the real character of his daughter's beauty. Nothing is more diverse than the beauty of women, except the im- pression that it produces on men. There are heroic beauties who inspire us with lofty thoughts and chival- rous sentiments ; melancholy beauties that lull us to gentle reverie ; seraphic beauties that fling us into mys- ticism and lead us to heaven by the steepest kind of roads; seductive beauties that jiluuge us into crime and lead.us quickly enough "the other way"; homelike beauties that inspire us with an uncontrollable desire to become heads of families and city councillors ; bacchana- lian beauties that remind us of balls and champagne ; pastoral beauties that set us a-thinking about tending sheep and drinking milk. With Van Ostade's women, a man would like to be selling cloth; with those of Teniers, he might resign himself even to smoking a pipe ; with those of Rubens, he might bring himself to regard with complacency the idea of being the father of two or three dozen of chubby children ; with those of Vandyke, he might reconcile himself to the trouble of being a king ; with those of Watteau, he would like to eat ice-cream out of rosewood saucers. But in the pres- ence of Emma Bitterlin, as before certain portraits by Titian and by Raphael, he would forget every interest, every duty, every ambition, every consideration, in order to think of nothing but love. How had the awkward girl, who used to straddle about at Auteuil like a big daddy-long-legs, become in less than a year the prettiest woman in Paris ? Nature keeps to herself with jealous care the secret of such metamorphoses. One fine morning a young girl issues 28 EOUGE ET NOIR. out of Iier cliiklhood, as if out of a shell, not a vestige of which remains. All the sharp angles with which the little Emma had been bristling all over, disa|)i)cared in a few months. Her arms filled out, iier waist rounded, lier bust modelled itself as if it had been in a statuary's mould, her features grew beautiful and fell into place. If her hands continued red, it was only to save the prin- ciple and to maintain the color of virtue; nothing but a little hasty whitening was wanting to make them the j^rettiest hands in the world. The change was so great that even her companions who saw her every day could remark it. They experienced the same astonishment as bewilders the traveller who arrives at night in a strange country, when, next morning, the rising sun discloses to his view forests, rocks, rivers, and a charm- ing landscape, the existence of which he had not even susjieeted the evening before. The girl soon found out that she was pretty : the wonder would be if she was the last to perceive such things. There was no looking-glass so small that she could not admire herself in it. In her own mind she compared herself to Cinderella, and she by no means despaired of seeing some evening the grand gold car- riage drive up, drawn by six mouse-gray horses. Why not ? She smiled at her neat little foot, thinking of the fairy tale. Her first vocation had been that of teach- ing, the last resource of women who are unprovided with either beauty or fortune. Within the four walls of the Convent at St. Denis she had expected to per- form her voyage of life. But the Sisters had not much trouble in combating this idea. She was not long in convincing herself that she had a face altogether too worldly for the austere duties of instruction. EMMA. 29 Her father's reception surprised her a little : she had expected a regular domestic ovation. Agatha alone was loud in her admiration and told her that she was to marry some king's son. Unfortunately however, king's sons were not likely to come to visit her in the Rue de Vosges, in the Ilarais, and her father did not at all seem disposed to take her into society. He had no society to take her into but the Cafe of the Musketeers. The old fellow, selfish and surly, had sur- rounded himself with a wall of China ; and now when he saw that he had a treasure to guard, he only thought of fortifying himself the more strongly. He dreaded lest this little being so seducing, so pretty, so portable, Bhould become the prey of some robber; the idea of making ii present of her to some respectable man never once came into his head. He had a sovereign contempt for that policy of the English and of all prudent mammas which consists in finding an outlet for their home pro- ductions. As greedy of his blood as of his money, he considered it perfectly natural to save up his daughter and his crowns for his old days. His first measure was to leave Auteuil ; he dreaded the young men of the boarding-house and the liberty of country life. He told his daughter that he would never let her out of his sight, and that she was not to go to the window unless in his company. Emma took this menace of her father's, and indeed all his severities, in very good part. Little birds are quite comfortable in the cage as long as they can't fly, and we don't trouble ourselves much about liberty until such time as we know how to employ it. She accepted without a murmur all the laws that the Captain thought 30 ROUGE ET NOIR. proper to proclaim in his house. She let herself be put under lock and key, she consented to see nobody, she played the part of the princess shut up in the tower, without once suspecting that at this kind of game she might win the epaulets of an old maid. The only thing that troubled her was her father's bad humor. It hurt her to be surrounded by so morose a personage, and she felt it to be her duty to tame him a little. In fact, she considered it a point of honor to do something of the kind. Tlie desire to please, innate in all women, was dominant in her, and to such a degree, that if even a total stranger had looked at her without smiling, she would have felt it as little short of an insult. She had commenced her ap])renticeship in the art of pleasing in those days when she had to get her face excused ; and after the metamorphosis, she did not understand why she should be looked at crossly by a man who was neither deaf nor blind, and who was her own father into the bargain. She began then to surround the Captain with a net of little attentions and caressing ways that would have surely entrapped any one else. She waited on him continually, she fondled him, she anticipated all his wants; in short, she exhausted on him alone all the love that a girl of seventeen expends as well as she can, in embracing little cats and in kissing little birds. But the more affectionately she treated the old boy, the more churlish he showed himself. All these filial blandish- ments reminded the Captain of other caresses quite as captivating, but of the sincerity of which he was by no means convinced. Emma resembled her mother even in her embraces, though the poor woman had never given her any lessons. Every graceful gesture, every EMMA. 31 sprightly expression of the girl, woke up the old jealousy of the husband and the surly prudence of the father. He actually suffered severely whenever he re- cognized in his daughter some of those winning ways that he had so much deplored in her mother ; he even confided to stout Agatha, who did not understand a word he said, his serious apprehensions of being dishonored over again. In his fits of misanthropy he would often reproach the poor child with her " eternal smile " and her " fawn- ing ways." One evening, noticing her to be a little thoughtful before dinner, — " Attention ! " he suddenly exclaimed ; " you 're setting your cap at the decanter ! " Another time, as she was putting her arms around his neck to embrace him, he repulsed her roughly, and forgot himself so far as to say, " You 're too light ! You '11 end badly ! " Without comprehending the exact meaning of these words, Emma felt the sensitive deli- cacy of her soul wounded, and for the first time she re- plied Avith a spirit somewhat mutinous, " I don't know how I shall end, but I do not commence very well." The length of the days was terrible in this way of living, where the company was close without being inti- mate. They arose early through habit,. never reflecting that doing so only gave them a few hours more to kill. Emma dressed herself for the whole day very simply, but with such exceeding neatness that the Captain often grumbled at it and called it affectation. He made war on sponges and scented soaps, asserting seriously that with women cleanliness is the mother of all the vices. After breakfast the father smoked, walked up and down the room, scolded, opened and shut the windows, and 32 ROUGE ET NOIR. ttii^pcd at llie barometer. Emma hemmed a handker- . cliief or embroidered a collar, or sang a song or two at the upright piano, which her mother had left her. Sometimes she read. The Ca])tain saw no harm in that, and gave her free use of his library, which consisted of the following works ranged in the following order : The Rural Retreat, Dorat, The Thirty-Seven Codes, Victories and Conquests of the French Arms, Voltaire, Fouquet's Edition ; The Works of the AbbS Raijnal, Do- mestic Medicine, The History of Napoleon, by Norvins ; Tlie Ruins, by Yolney; and The Imitation of Christ, bound in. black and bearing the letters of Madame Bit- terliu's name. Emma was neither a silly simpleton nor a George Sand, but she had a pretty little feminine mind of her own, candid, cheerful, inquiring, intelligent, and trained in the best school we have in France. Naturally enough, then, her flUher's books wearied her to death, for not a single one of them excited her curiosity or gratified her taste. At four o'clock every evening, the military hour, the Captain trotted her out as a groom does his horses. He took her to the Place Roy ale, or to the Jar din des Flantes, only seldom to the Boulevard Beaumarchais. On Sundays she was treated to a little trip to Vincennes, or to Bievre, or to some other tranquil retreat where the sight of a pretty woman does not make the promenaders turn about to gaze. Father and daughter always got home at six o'clock precisely, and they dined together as they had breakfasted. After the dessert, idleness and weariness asserted their rights, until sleep was the con- sequence. During one of those dreary hours, Emma took the courage to ask her flithcr, one evening, if he EMMA. 33 would not teach her some amusing game, or if he was never going to take her to the play? This innocent question sounded in the ears of the house-tyrant like an appeal to the barricades. An amusing game? Did she know what she meant? Games and gaming, they were all the same — all bad; the scourge of the soldier, the curse of the regiments ; gaming was the source of all debts, of all crimes ; a model officer, as he flattered him- self he had always been, never played at any game ; ac- cordingly, in all his thirty-five years of service, he had never lost a cent in gambling, nor had incurred fifteen minutes punishment. As for the theatre, he took no pleasure in such places himself, and he considered them to be dangerous for his daughter. She might meet some young blood there foolish enough to fall in love with her, and to tell her so, " in which case," added the Cap- tain, " I would make no bones at all about it. I 'd kill him as mercilessly as I'd sjoit a lark — always, how- ever, strictly complying with the established codes of honor." It was by indulging in amplifications of this style that the Captain undertook to train the mind and heart of his daughter during the weary hours that crawled along so slowly from after dinner till bed-time. In consequence, the poor child saw with terror the approach of the moment for removing the table-cloth, and when- ever there were any nuts for dessert, she remained pick- ing at them as long as possible. One evening, when stout Agatha came to bid them good-night, Emma said to her in a whisper, " I dare not complain, but I 'm tired to death. Cry over me a little in your room." Towards the middle of December, the Captain received C 34 ROUGE ET NOIR. a letter addressed to liis daughter. He opened it at once and read as follows : "My DEAR LITTLE Desire-to-Please : — Here I am back from the country; Henrietta ditto, Julia and Caroline ditto, ditto. The gentle Madeline informs me that she will be ditto to-morrow. With you — and without you nothing can be good — the number of the immortal six will be complete. Mamma has decided that the first reunion of the Inseparables is to take place at our house. What a glorious day ! The idea makes me leap with joy. Don't you blame anything else for the big blot that has just fallen right in the centre of my letter. It is to be Monday morning. Ask the Papa- Wolf to have you taken to the Rue St. Arnaud, No. 4, before daybreak ; we shall send you back safe to your den in the evening. "SV^e shall dance, perhaps, but certainly we shall chat and gabble, and of course laugh like crazy people, and that 's the best part of it. AVe are talking about making arrangements for our winter amusements on a grand scale, as our poor dear old Pro- fessor used to say. I hope we shall see each other every day till we are married, and afterwards too for that mat- ter. You see it is the regular plan of the campaign we have to sketch out; but my brother the soldier, just ar- rived on leave of absence, will aid us with his invalu- able experience. He won't believe that you are a hun- dred times prettier than I ; these Lieutenants of the En- gineers are incredulous to a degree that is positively siiocking. . Monday! Monday! Monday! Another blot ! A regular pie this time. No matter. The pie- •nyxker embraces you with all her heart. " Louise de Marannes." E M M A . 35 The Captain, who had once been a young man, and an amiable one too, answered Emma's companion as a dog would a rabbit. " Mademoiselle: — I have received the letter which you have done me the honor to address to my daughter, and beg to state in reply that, though much honored by the invitation therein included, I think I neither over- step my rights nor fall short of my duties when I inform you that Emma never goes to any house where her father does not likewise go, and that her father finds himself much more comfortable at his own house than anywhere else. She eats and laughs at home just as much as her health requires, and never bestows a thought on those (Questions regarding marriage, from the discussion of which no young lady can keep herself too much aloof, however little regard she may have for her reputation. In short, Captain Bitterlin's daughter is not in the habit of being reviewed by lieutenants, even if they do have the advantage of belonging to the Engineers. " I have the honor to be. Mademoiselle, your very humble, most devoted, and obedient servant." A few days after, Emma said to her father : " I am surprised that Louise does not write to me ; she must certainly have returned from the country." The Captain replied with a frown : " She has written to you." "Ah ! " " Yes, all kinds of trash. But I have answered her as she ought to be answered, and I'll warrant you shall not hear from her again in a hurry." 36 ROUGE ET NOIR. In fact, that was the end of the correspondence ; and three or four other freaks of the Captain soon isolated his daughter as perfectly as if she had never set her foot in a board in'g-school. So she lived for eighteen months in this overwhelm- ing loneliness, tcte-a-tete with the most crossgraiued of mortals. Her health, however, did not suffer, and even her temper experienced no ill effects from the ordeal. Oh ! blessed privilege of youth ! It stands the rudest shocks of life with impunity. Just as children knock their heads against all the sharp corners of the furniture and never bear away a scar to tell it. The only friend she had now left was stout Agatha, whose resources, however, out of her kitchen, were rather limited. This poor creature had a religious ven-, eration for her young mistress's beauty. In her she found points of resemblance with all the beautifully colored saintly virgins that she kept between the leaves of her prayer-book. Whenever she was permitted to escort Emma to high Mass on Sundays, or on some little shopping matter two or three steps from the house, she felt so proud that she grew a foot taller. She said to her, one day as they were coming out of church : " I don't know what I shall do when you get married. The old gentleman won't allow me to leave him, and I can't live away from you. If I could only make two halves of myself!" " Do you think, then, that Papa has any notion of getting me married?" asked Emma. "Do I? Of course he has. Girls are made for nothing else, unless when one happens to be a scare-crow like myself." EMMA. 37 " Perhaps Louise is married by this time." "Quite possible. To-day one, to-morrow another. Not later than yesterday, seven couple were married at St. Paul's." " But Papa don't know any one in Paris." " That is likely enough,! grant, still I guess he has his ideas. Ask him, if you want to know ; he won't eat you." " Oh ! Agatha, I would n't do such a thing for the world ! Besides, I 'm in no hurry. Men are so cross." "Not all of them." The same day, on removmg the table-cloth, Agatha put the question to her master point-blank. " Is n't it true, sir, that you 're sometimes thinking of getting our young lady married ? " The Captain's answer was so rude that I shall not dare to write it down. If he did not beat the poor creature black and blue, it was simply because he was able to find in the vocabulary of the French language a litany of oaths that were just as good as so many blows. His conclusion was that all women were shame- less, all servants were go-betweens, all men were rascals without law or honor, and that he had not raised his daughter with so much care for the purpose of throwing her away on any scoundrel of the kind. This profession of faith Avas made in so loud a voice that all the other inhabitants of the house, the porter included, went to bed certain that Mademoiselle Bit- terlin should die an old maid. From that day, poor Agatha did her best to prove to her young mistress the superiority of single blessedness. " Had n't she cveiy thing in the world that she wanted? 4t 38 ROUGE ET NOIR. A goofl father, a devoted servant, a lovely little room with blue curtains, a comfortable bed nicely tucked in every night, and every day the best cofiee in Paris, and permission to play on the piano as long as she liked? It was a regular paradise on earth, and another man in the family would only be an incumbrance. And what great things were men, after all ? She herself, Agatha, had jogged her way through the world for forty years without as much as ever touching a man's arm, and she felt none the worse for it, quite the contrary ! " To these arguments Emma had no reply to make, for she was not in love. MEO. 39 CHAPTER HI. MEO. THE Marais is a peaceable quarter of Paris, but it would be much more so if it had fewer boardiiio;- schools. Quiet people, who have removed out towards the Rue St. Antoine in search of repose, are liable to encounter four times a day some one or other of those noisy caravans of students that are on their way to the Charlemagne Lyceum. These unlicked youths are the hope of their country and the terror of their neighbor- hood. It would not do to tell this to their parents. Their mothers and sisters would never believe that a boy who is gentle and jjolite at home can become coarse and impertinent among his comrades. Nevertheless, every bourgeois offering the slightest opportunity for a remark or a laugh, every man with a peculiar nose, and all women without exception, go a mile regularly out of their way to avoid having their ears saluted with boarding-school slang. Agatha forgot this important precaution, one morn- ing that she had gone out with Emma. She had taken her to the famous store called " The Ladies' Paradise," Hue St. Antoine, to buy a dress for summer. On her way back, she saw a crowd of students hastening as fast as they could towards the Lyceum. To avoid meeting them, she turned thoughtlessly into the first street, and there she found herself caught between the endless ranks of two other schools, as "if between two parallel walls. The poor girls got along pretty well till 40 R O U G E E T X O I K . about half-way ; the little boys, who led the march, jDerhaps made some observations about Emma's nursy. But before they reached No. 4, near the end of the street, they found themselves right in the midst of a crowd of the grown-up students ; and the young logi- cians, and the rhetoricians, reinforced by a squad of the mathematicians, immediately began to assail them with their Avell-known refined and original gallantries. " Mademoiselle, had n't I the honor of dancing with you at the Closerie des Lilas f '^ " Mademoiselle, only I 'm afraid of compromising you, I 'd offer you a cent's worth of gingerbread." " Mademoiselle, do accept my arm as far as the board- ing-school." "Mademoiselle, ask the Prefect for my hand; he won't refuse you." "Mademoiselle, come see me in the parlor on Thurs- day ; my name is Samajou." "That ain't true, Mademoiselle; his name is Ca- boche ! " I can't tell what in the world the Prefects were think- ing of at the time. One of them, I know, was watching the early swallows, and the other was eying the counter of a neighboring store; whilst poor Emma, red as a cherry, struggled with her elbows to cut her way throuo;h the enemy, and Ag;atha's fists fell hot and heavy among the crowd. " I know who you arc, fair mask," said a metaphy- sician to the servant. " You are Vulcan disguised as a woman to accompany Venus to Paris." Another repeated some passage from Rabelais, which, from the boisterous applause of the crowd, must have been of brilliant wit and exceedingly apropos. MEO. 41 But all at once a shower of cuffs and blows, that seemed to fall from heaven, scattered the assailants and set the prisoners at liberty. Emma, exhausted with fatigue and terror, and more dead than alive, felt her- self suddenly cari'ied, rather than supported, by a tall young man wdth a black beard. She heard confusedly around her a deafening chorus of angry exclamations : " Oh ! Ah ! Big coward ! Disgusting animal ! Cursed pig ! " She saw a cascade of books falling on the street; then her eyes closed and she saw no more. On coming to her senses she found herself in a strange room. Agatha was holding a smelling-bottle to her nose ; and a young man, beautiful as the day, or rather as the night, was kneeling before her and striking her hands. Her eyes wandered over the four walls of the room, and she saw herself surrounded by ever so many fine ladies and gentlemen in splendid gilt frames. " Where am I ? " said she at last. Her deliverer replied, in a soft, grave voice, with a foreign accent : " In my room. Mademoiselle ; excuse the liberty of my conduct and the poverty of my abode." Perceiving that her dress was slightly disordered, she sprang up quickly, with the idea of arranging it in the next room. The young man guessed her intention. " This is the only chamber I have," said he, " and it is entirely at your service. I am only too happy if you condescend to consider it your own for a moment. It is on the ground floor, so I can easily wait your con- venience in the yard outside." He disappeared ; and Emma immediately threw her- self on Agatha's neck. 4* 42 ROUGE ET NOIR. "What an adventure!" she exclaimed; "only I hope Papa will never hear of it!" She looked ground for a looking-glass to arrange her hair in, but could find nothing except a little one about the size of her hand. " Our friend is no dandy," she observed. " ]\Iy own f)pinion is that he 's not very rich," replied Agatha, i)ointing at the straw-bottom chairs, the un- painted deal-table, and the boarding-school bed. " The whole room does not contain two hundred franes' worth of furniture, except the pictures which once must have cost a nice penny. But now that you 're through, w^e can call him in." She opened the door and called out, "Come in, young gentleman; we're finished." The stranger was a fine specimen of the Italian type in all its beauty and all its strength. He was, however, no mere stripling, but a man of full thirty years well counted, tall, dark-complexioned, brawny-shouldered ; his face radiant with health and vigor. His eyes, his teeth, his well-polished nails, and some little jewelry that he wore, formed so many luminous points to dazzle and charm a girl of Emma's age. The elegance of his dress, like the beauty of his pictures, seemed altogether incom- patible with the modesty of his furniture ; nor did his distinguished manners and refined language form a less violent contrast with this poor room of sixty dollars a year, situated on the ground floor and facing the street, like a porter's lodge. He asked his proteg(^es If they wanted anything. " Excuse us," said stout Agatha, " but we want to make off right away, before master hears of our doings. Emma, thank the young man; we are very much oblig-ed to him indeed." M E o . 43 " I am more than paid," he replied with a smile, " so let us hear no more about a service which I am almost ashamed of having rendered. I wish I had killed somebody, if it w^ould only make me agreeable to Mademoiselle ! " " I should be very sorry for it/' said Emma, stand- ing in the doorway, " whereas at present I depart very happy to have met you." He escorted her to the street with a multitude of bows by no means ungraceful, and at the moment of bidding her adieu, as the young girl was repeating her thanks for the last time, he looked at her sadly, and said : " Perhaps this is a great misfortune for me ; for I am no longer in a position to obtain your hand, and I feel that I shall love you for the rest of my life." Emma started violently at hearing this abrupt decla- ration let off without warning, point-blank on the side- walk. " Don't do anything of the kind, I entreat you," she replied, hurrying away ; " it would be as much as your life is worth ! " The Italian pursued her with his eyes as far as the end of the street, but without an idea of following her. He remained for some time at the door, plunged in thought, and bareheaded, like a man who cares very little about what lookers-on may say. All at once re- membering that he neither knew Emma's name nor address, he started after her, but it was too late. Returning back in a quarter of an hour, he found his room still wide open, and sitting down immediately, he wrote three letters, which I wish to present here because 4-1 ROUGE ET NOIR. tliev give a most fuitliful description of the state of his feelings. In the translation, permit me to preserve as much of all the Italian simplicity as I can. "To THE Noble Count Marsoni, at his Palace, Bologna. " ]\IosT Esteemed Friend : — To your last very affectionate letter I have not written a line in reply, because I had nothing to communicate. I have been vegetating rather than living, and nobody writes the liistory of a plant. But to-day, for the first time in my life, I feel myself to be a man, for it is to-day that I have begun to love. Yes, I 'ra in love ! The great say is said : you may reveal it to all your friends, to the entire universe, to Heaven itself — I only wish it would go so far. That fellow Meo, colder though less virtuous than Hippolytus, that same Meo, whom you used to accuse of having a heart as frdzen as an Eng- lishman's, is now burning with all the fires of love. He has at last experienced the violent commotion which upsets the most deep-rooted ideas and the most unbend- ing resolutions. Shall I draw you a portrait of her whom I love ? No. Go look at the sun the first time he rises among the fleecy clouds of morning, and be persuaded that in comparison with her he is far from brilliant. Don't ask me if she is rich and noble. I believe she belongs to the middle class — the most in- telligent, the most honorable, and really the first in this country. ]3nt were she even the daughter of a beggar, you know that obstacles of such a nature should never stand in our way when we are in love. But there are others that I foresee, which she herself has warned me MEO. 45 of. ' It would cost you your life/ said she. Perhaps it is some rival ! Let him come ! I will teach him what my friends and enemies know equally well, namely, that fire and sword are only playthings to the sons of the Plouse of Miranda. But this name, which I have no longer the right to bear, recalls me to busi- ness matters (I won't say serious business matters, for there is nothing more serious than love), to tiresome business matters. Send me back the thousand crowns which I have been remitting you, a penny at a time, during the last five years, and which, together with my future savings, were to be employed in buying back the lands and title of Miranda. This money is absolutely necessary to me just now, for of course you foresee that Meo in love is no longer going to degrade himself by working. Add to it as much as you can of your own, without forgetting, however, that I may never be per- haps in a condition to pay you back a cent. In short, aid me to be happy; that is all to which henceforth aspires, " Your most faithful and devoted friend, Bartolomeo Naeni, who is not in a fair way of ever becoming again The Count of Miranda." The next letter was addressed to M. Silivergo, Direc- tor of the Franco-Italian printing-house at Paris. " Most Eespected Sir : — I should be the most ub- grateful and the vilest of men if I could ever forget the generous readiness with which you supplied me with the means of existence that day when, an exile and with- 46 ROUGE ET NOIR. out resources, I knocked at your door for the first time. By giv'ing me, in spite of my acknowledged inexperi- ence, the very honorable and sufficiently lucrative post of proofreader, you literally put bread into my mouth. Be assured, then, my very dear sir, that if I leave you to-day, without warning and without preparation, now that my services have become somewhat valuable to you, it is not through a cowardly desire to avoid paying a debt of gratitude, but rather because I am no longer master of myself, a force superior to my will having assumed an absolute sway over my soul. Of this irre- sistible force need I mention the name? No one has ever arrived at your age, my dear and excellent sir, Avithout experiencing at least once all the violence of love. Ah ! if I could only show you the divine little liand which I pressed in mine hardly an hour ago, you would be the first to encourage me in my desertion of work and in my resolution to give up everything for my passion. I am aware that I leave the printing-office greatly embarrassed by my departure, and that, occur- ring as it does at a moment when you are overcrowded with work, my absence will cost you some money ; but can money be Aveighed in the balance against happiness ? Put yourself in the place of a man who has never been in love before, and who is now really in love for the first time of his life. How could he apply himself se- riously to anything but his love ? " Accept, then, my dear sir, my resignation of the post which you have been so kind as to confer upon me, and believe in the eternal gratitude of your much devoted B. Naeni." MEO. 47 He wrote these two letters without hesitating, or seek- ing for a Avord, letting his pen run freely under the sen- timent of the moment ; nor was he a jot more embar- rassed while scribbling off the following curiosity : " To THE Illustrissima Signora Aurelia, Italian Opera, Paris. "Dearest Aurelia : — Do you remember tcllino; me often that I was colder than ice, and that I knew nothing at all about love? Still I fancied I was in love with you, and suffered so much at seeing you incredu- lous, that to convince you I got by heart all the most violent expressions ever used by the poets for the pur- pose of painting the passion. Now at last I feel that you Avere right, and your, reproaches just, for I have just experienced a new and strange sensation, the like of which, in all the previous course of my life, I never so much as guessed at. I am burning and freezing at the same time ; my heart beats furiously, and then of a sudden seems to lose all movement. I feel myself at once as bold as a lion and as timid as a lamb ; in short, I 'm another man altogether. You could easily under- stand my madness if you had only seen its cause. How beautiful she is ! What heavenly eyes ! What an en- chanting voice ! Her whole person exhales, as it were, innocence and candor. She is an anMl. From this moment my life is in her hands, for if I do not succeed in marrying her, I will quit this world at once, rather than see her wedded to another. Thus I am at the same time the happiest and the most miserable of men. Sliall I not go talk to you about my pleasures and my suffer- ings ? Why should not a good friendship exist between 48 ROUGE ET NOIR. ns? If you really love me, as you say you do, and as I firmly believe, you will interest yourself in a. matter M'hich has become the only and final aim of all my as[)i- rations. I will speak to you about her; you will con- sole me in my troubles; you will counsel me in my dangers ; you will even aid me if aid be necessary. It is a part worthy of such a heart as yours. In return, rely forever on the sincere friendship and eternal devo- tion of yours most affectionately, Meo." Tie mIio thus laid bare his soul with the simple ego- tism and unthinking sincerity of a child, was one of the boldest and most distinguished men of young Italy. Bartoloraeo, or more familiarly Meo, Narni, citizen of the noble city of Bologna, was the last scion of a family as old as the Caetani or the Pepoli. In the grand hall of his old palace, Annibal Caracci has painted the three Kings of the East prostrated before the arms of -the Mirandas (a golden star on an azure field), with this heroic device — Miranda JReglbus. The inconie of this illustrious house amounted, even in 1850, to seven or eight thousand dollars a year, and Meo, young, brilliant, edut;ated in one of the best schools in Piedmont, cut a great figure in the eyes of his fellow-citizens. His dis- tinguished name, his generous disposition, the spirit with which he expressed the fashionable ideas of the time, all marked him out, in spite of his extreme youth, for the suffrages of the Bolognese. He was elected member of that Assembly in Rome, which Prime Minister Rossi, to his own misfortune, had convoked. He was also made a Deputy under the " Roman Re- public," but the honor of representing the people cost MEO. 49 him all his property. However, he ruined himself, hon- orably enough, in the ancient Roman style, by distribut- ing bread and shoes among the people. The general misery was great : the strangers, who enable the poorer classes in Rome to exist, ran out of Italy as out of a conflagration ; money was so scarce that the government issued coins worth about half a cent each and called them eight-cent pieces. Poor Meo's eight thousand dollars were not a mouthful to the hungry people. This generous freak, of course, rendered him odious to the monarchical party, suspected by the Republicans, ridiculous in the eyes of many, and dear to some few poor wretches. But he had followed his fancy, which is much for an Italian. When the French appeared before Rome, he mounted the tribune and proved very eloquently that resistance was impossible ; then, his proposal being re- jected, he fought like a man who has not the last cent to lose. The city being taken, he was accused before the French general as a plunderer of palaces and churches. He had been neither the one nor the other, but on this charge he was led before the council of war. Seated on the bench of the accused, he forgot that he was on his trial, and made a fine speech on the future of Italy. When asked for his witnesses, " I want none," said he ; " those on the other side will do." The officers honorably acquitted the young madman, and could not help admiring his courage, candor, and loyalty. However, as he had made himself too remarkable to be included in the general amnesty, he was obliged to expatriate himself as soon as he had settled his affairs. The latter operation did not require a very long time. His creditors seized on everything he had in the world. 50 ROUGE ET NOIR. A corn-speculator, named Giacomo Filippo, had the lands and the title of Miranda assigned him for eighty, thou- sand francs. For this last lot alone did our madcap bethink himself of stipulating for the right of redemp- tion ; not because the land was worth double the price paid for it, but because whoever had the land had the title too. When all his accounts were squared, he found himself as bare as St. JoH\i in the desert. Thus comfortably settled in the Avorld, he started for France, where he knew nobody, and he passed the best years of his youth in eating dry bread on the streets of Paris. In 1852, an honest printer furnished him with the means of living, at a moment when the portraits of his ancestors were his last resource. Thanks to good . old Silivergo, twenty-four generations of the Mirandas were saved from the picture-dealers as miraculously as Moses from the waters of the Nile. You know the rest of the story. An incredible part of it is, that a young man who earned less than six hundred dollars a year, could have managed to save the sum of a thousand dollars in five years. But the Italians, high and low, can exercise at a pinch the most heroic self-denial. These salad- and macaroni-eaters have received from nature a simplicity of taste which is in itself at once riches and independence. Unhappy is the man who has Avants ! The superb Meo, who in his time had rev- elled in fortune's smiles as joyously as another, easily accustomed himself to live on a little. He took his meals in some hole unknown to gods and men ; but he was always dressed like a lord, drank his coft'ee now and then at Tortoni's, and was never without some small change to give the poor. It was the only way he ever thought of getting rid of them. INNOCENT DREAMINGS. 61 CHAPTER IV. INNOCENT DREAMINGS. WHEN a man at the age for falling in love, that is to say from fifteen to seventy-five, has met in the theatre or at a ball a woman who has pleased him, he carries away in the bottom of his heart a little stock of pleasure which is not used up in a single day. For a whole week, sometimes even longer, he is haunted by an after-taste of tenderness ; he looks on the world ^vith a more sympathizing eye ; and he finds in the most in- different objects something that reminds him of the delicious aroma of love. With day-dreamers this state of indolent enjoyment lasts longest ; they who relish it most are those secluded and languisliing hearts that take a month to digest the perfume of a rose. They abandon themselves without an effort to the current of a sweetly pensive hope ; in memory's magic mirror they gaze with delight on the enchanting and well remembered face; and to make the most of their charming dream, they obstinately shut their eyes against the glaring light of reality. But this very face, which we had stowed away so preciously in the depths of our heart, which had been at first so bright and clear and sharply outlined, after a few days begins to change. It grows blurred and dis- torted, and the imagination invests it with a thousand capricious features. It is soon as faint and shadowy as the form of the early angler that we discover through the mists of morning at the other end of the meadow. 62 ROUGE ET NOIK. A secret instinct warns us that it is about to disappear. We grasp at it and try to retain it, but our efforts are vain. Our hands are as empty as those of Ulysses when he tried to seize the fleeting pliantoms of his old friends. At last it vanishes forever, unless some lucky meeting once more brings before our eyes the bright original of the faded portrait. It was thus that Meo came very near losing the image of the fjiir Emma. For a whole month he had aban- doned himself quietly to the mere pleasure of loving, which exists in us all. He fancied somehow or other that she did not live very far off, and he calmly waited for some opportunity of seeing her again. This oppor- tunity he made no efforts whatever to seek ; you would have said that he made a scruple of forcing chance to be in his favor. Every time that he closed his eyes and saw the sunny locks on Emma's pretty little head, the veins of his neck swelled, just, in fact, as if Cupid had seized him by the throat. He told his love to every- body — • friends and strangers were alike regaled with the overflowings of his heart; but he felt no immediate necessity for repeating to Euima what he had once said ^ to her. If some one came and said, "You will never see her again!" it might perhaps have given him a mortal shock; still he was not very impatient to see her immediately. He loved passively, just as we feel heat or cold. It was only the thought of danger that aroused in any way the vigor of his character. He imagined he had a rival, and, so thinking, he was always provided with an excellent dagger. He was one of the most peaceful of men, but he had his own Italian idea about INNOCENT DREA MINGS. 53 the removing of obstacles. If his rival had been pointed out to liini in the street, he would consider it a mere matter of course to kill him on the spot, not from jeal- ousy or wounded vanity, but simply to have a rival no longer. In the midst of these thoughts, he became aware one mornino; that the ima^e of the beautiful Unknown was not nearly as distinct in his memory as usual. This surprised him. He closed his eyes to examine the better, but the features of the enchanting countenance began to float about as confusedly as the reflection of a castle in the rapid current of the Rhine. The colors were as bright as ever, but the outline was gone. All his efforts to fix it only helped to efface it still more. He was like the awkward fellow who, wishing to get a better look at the little water-color painting, cleaned it off* very nicely with his sleeve. Then he was seized with despair, and he moaned and lamented as bitterly over his illusi5n as if it were dead, because he felt it to be dying. But at the same time he set the springs of his will in motion, and he began to scour Paris like a wood to see if he could beat up Emma. On her side. Mademoiselle Bitterlin had carried away in the bottom of her heart a tender little remembrance, weak and puny as an infant picked up under an arch, and she nourished it secretly. On her return home, after the great adventure of her life, her only and ab- sorbing sentiment was fear. She trembled lest the Cap- tain's eye should read what was written in her soul, and the fact of the matter is that her tell-tale countenance was absolutely as transparent as crystal. The day, she thought, would never come to an end, and she tried to 6* 64 ROUGE ET NOIR. hurry throuj^h it by doing a hundred diiferent things. She bustled about more than usual ; she could hardly bear to sit still a moment ; she was like a little bird in the wood, jumping from limb to limb. She tried to sing, but the tone of her voice was no longer natural ; instead of soft and sweet, it sounded harsh and metallic. She dared not look at her father or at her accomplice Agatha. She was so much in dread of the Captain's familiar question, "What are you thinking of?" that in his presence she was afraid of thinking at all. Her heart was like a hiding-place where we have secreted some ill - gotten treasure ; we are afraid even to look towards it ourselves, for fear that doing so might render it suspected by the eyes of justice. Her father took her to the Jardin des Plantes. She had not been there for a long time, and in her ab- sence, spring had made some progress. The sun was warm, and fragrant blossoms clothed the early trees. The Captain railed at the mud, abused the little boys that drove their hoops between his legs, and execrated the stale odor of the lilacs, which gave him the head- ache. But his daughter inhaled with delight these light perfumes of the young year ; she tripped over the moist earth as lightly as over a velvet carpet ; she even thought the candy moustaches of the children made them look prettier. The white bear wagged his head wearily over his trough of dirty water. Emma looked with compassion on the poor melancholy exile, and considered his countenance quite interesting. But the girl, who hitherto had been a regular little babbler, and always accustomed to think aloud, now forgot to impart a single thought to her father. Only the previous evening, she INNOCENT D RE A MINGS. 66 had been as lavish of her ideas as those prodigals are of their money who give it to everybody and keep noth- ing for themselves. But the moment that we begin to lay something by, is the moment when we begin to re- trench our expenditure. Night came at last. After a dinner passed in silence, and an evening more gloomy than usual, Emma, safe and sound in her room, hurried through her even- ing toilet, slipped shivering into her little blue bed, ex- tinguished the candle, and said to herself, almost aloud, " Now I 'm at home ! " It was then that she cautiously groped her way down into the most secret recesses of her soul, and, curious to know all about it, she began to dissipate the light clouds tliat kept troubling the se- renity of her conscience. The ideas that she had been putting off ever since the morning, now came crowding on her all at once, and, in the tumultuous assemblage, she did not know where to begin. The fine lords and ladies in the gilt frames, the bewildered countenance of poor Agatha, the beautiful young man, the impudent school-boys, her father the Captain, and the white bear — what a legion ! How could she entertain so many visitors ai once? But, little by little, the secondary personages withdrew into the background, and the young man of the Rue St. Catherine remained stand- ing alone in a grand blaze of light, like some glorious saint of Raphael, whose radiant nimbus illuminates the whole picture. Emma was not yet quite certain that he was good- looking, and that a woman might be proud of appear- ing in the street on his arm. She had been dazzled by his brilliancy, and that was all she could remember. 56 EOUGE ET NOIR. The poor cliild was only a novice in the ways of the world. Slie had not the practised glance of the experienced damsels of society, Avho measure a man from head to foot, note all the strong and weak points of his charac- ter, and, in short, enable themselves to write out his passport, without once even looking at him or even taking their eyes off their embroidery. This talent, like that of the sporting gentleman who never makes any- thing but winning bets, demands a series of studies in the science of comparison, and cannot be acquired with- out passing a few years in the " ring." But Emma, having never set foot in a ball-room, of course had never witnessed a race between those young steeds that the great Cellarius trains to run for a prize, and who are married oif as soon as possible when they can run no more. She could not tell whether his ligure was fine, his hair well set, his eye bright, or his leg well-shaped. She had been so poorly raised that she had no idea of what we call a well-made man. She knew little more of the opposite sex than that she had always avoided thein on the sidewalk. But she remembered that tlie stranger was young and poor, brave and respectful, kind and melancholy. Slie felt grateful to him for having defended her, and for not having followed her. Above all, she remembered these words, which had flashed through her heart like an electric shock, "I will love you all my life ! " This sentence rang continually in her ears, and whatever efforts she made to drive it away, it always returned, more importunate and more harmo- nious. An invisible orchestra played infinite variations on this monotonous but charming theme. '^ lie is surely INNOCENT DREAMINGS. 57 crazy/' she thought ; " people don't fall in love this way at first sight. Of course he was only joking. Yet the poor fellow looked more like crying. But suppose he was really in earnest ! What a terrible misfortune ! Papa would never forgive him — and then he can't ex- pect me to fall in love with him, though of course I don't hate him either — people must not be ungrateful. Fortunately, he don't know who I am nor where I live. He won't make love to me, and Pa won't cut his head off. Keally Pa is a most astonishing man. That all men are not like him, I need not go far for a proof! No matter, it is nice to think that you have a man somewhere in Paris who will love you all his life ! " She nestled her little head luxuriously on the pillow, and softly murmuring the three words, " all his life" she closed her eyes, caressing the sweet illusion, as little girls sometimes fall asleep embracing their dolls. Next day, and for some days following, she never went to the window without a certain uneasiness. When- ever she went out with her father, she looked back every now and then, dreading lest the poor madman of the Hue St. Catherine should come and betray himself in the presence of the terrible Captain. But no one ap- peared, and by degrees she began to take courage, though not without a little surprise. All the men that she saw at a distance resenibled the beautiful stranger. One day she passed before his house in company with the Captain. The window was open; she looked in with a searching glance, but she saw nothing but por- traits. " That is his room, however," she thought. " What can he be doing ? I would bet a hundred to one that he does not give me a thought. Well, so much 58 ROUGE ET NOIR. the better!" I am rather inclined to think, however, that she bit her lips at the words, "so much the better ! " Plad she been surrounded by the pleasui-es of her age, no doubt she would have forgotten in a week this stran- ger, who was really nothing to her. But it is dangerous to isolate a young girl, -and to shut her up within her- self, particularly if in company with something to re- member. Her father, seeing her thoughtful one day, said : " What ails you ? " " Nothing ; why do you ask ? " "You're so quiet. Do you want amusement?" " Not at all, papa; I have amusement enough all to myself." She kept her thoughts to herself, not sharing them even with stout Agatha ; indeed she considered them too absurd to be talked about. She even carefully avoided touching on the subject at all with her, as if poor Agatha had not long ago forgotten every single particle of the adventure. One morning that the Captain had left them together, Agatha said : " Mademoiselle ! " "Hold your tongue," replied Emma, putting her hand on the servant's mouth. " I order you not to say one word about it." " But about what ? " " About what you wanted to talk about." " You don't want me to tell you that my stone-grate is burned ! I tell you I must have a new one : it saves coal." INNOCENT DREAMINGS. 59 Emma, nevertheless, remained quite persuaded tliat Agatha had been trying to open the door for confiden- tial disclosures, and she admired herself for having kept her secret. X month later, of her own accord, she broke this profound silence. She was going to church one morning in company with Agatha, for the Captain took her everywhere but there. The amiable man was on bad terms with the other world as well as with this. Emma stopped a moment, and said, looking straight into the servant's eyes : "You've no longer any confidence in me, then? Why don't you talk to me about our lover?" " What lover?" asked Agatha. " Why, our protector, you know, with the black beard; him who said he was going to love us all his life." " Are you thinking of him ? " " I ? no more than he is of us ! But tell me, Agatha, wdiy do men amuse themselves in telling us stories that they forget the moment after? What do they gain by it? Who, do they think, are fooled by their stories ? " "I don't know, I'm sure," rej)lied Agatha. "Men have never told me any stories. But I can understand how a man can fall dead in love with you. Good rea- son for it ! " " Oh ! I give them all permission to fall dead in love with me, if they 're not more troublesome than the first one." "Really, then, you are thinking about him?" "I should not know him if I met him." As she said these words, all the blood of her heart crimsoned her face, as if to give her the lie. She had 60 ROUGE ET NOIR. just seen Meo standing on the stops of St. PauVs. "At last, then !" she thought. He was lookhig for her evi- dently, but he had not yet seen her. Women's eyes are quicker than ours, and when we cross glances with them, the man is the first hit. Emma profited by her advantage to examine with attention that fine face which had commenced to become rather indistinct in her memory. She found it less florid, more sombre, and far more interesting than on the first day. But sud- denly it lit up ; the eyes sparkled ; the recognition had been mutual. The stranger saluted her eagerly, and with such demonstrations of joy that Emma was afraid she should sec him make a dash for her ri<»;ht throuo;h the crowd. She hurried stout Agatha along, and flung herself into the church as into an asylum, while Meo, too much excited to stir a foot, remained nailed to the spot. The two women threw themselves kneelina; on the chairs, poor lame Agatha ready to drop from such un- usual exertion. " What on earth ails you ? " said she to her mistress. " Did n't you see him ? He was standing before the church. He is pursuing us." "Who?" " He, I tell you. There 's not two of them. How stupid you are ! " " Oh ! now I understand," said Agatha, who really had not the least idea of Mdiat was going on. Emma read her Mass that morning with unusual fer- vor. She was no devotee, having little more piety than is generally acquired in good boarding-schools ; but at the least appearance of danger, timid souls take INNOCEXT DREAMINGS. 61 refuge in prayer. If you had seen her move her lips, close her eyes, throw back her head in a sort of half ecstasy, you would have been very much edified, I am perfectly certain. But while her lips murmured broken sentences of the Latin text, two tears of emotion glit- tered in her long eyelashes — charming tears, which the angels sought not to collect, but allowed to fall to earth, because very probably they had not been intended for heaven. It all went on very well till the reading of the gospel. But, at the xery first verse, the young girl was seized W"ith a strange uneasiness, which was not however with- out its charm. She found it as difficult to read as if a sun-ray had come to dance on the pages of- her missal. In spite of her reverence for the holy place she was in, she felt herself assailed at once by every roguish imp that waits on Cupid ; by the one Avho slips the portrait of an absent person in between our closed eyelids; 'by the one who flutters around our ears, always murmuring the same name ; by the -one that forces us to turn our head towards those that we don't want to see ; by the one that makes a lover lose his way in the park, until he is brought up, in spite of himself, before the door he detests ; by the one that waves under our nose an invisi- ble feather, fragrant with the perfumes of adored ring- lets ; by the one that guides our hands when we write things that prudence absolutely forbids. Attacked on all sides by this buzzing multitude, poor Emma tried to recollect herself, but in vain. In spite of all her ef- forts to direct her thoughts inwardly, a secret agitation impelled her towards external objects. She felt some- times as if the baud of winged imps had made their way 62 ROUGE ET NOIR. into her brain, as into an ill-gnardcd chamber, and that they were throwinj^ the furnitiu'e out of the windows. For nothinir in the world would she have turned her head around, so great was her fear of finding herself face to face with the stranger. But raising her eyes, she saw Meo standing in the shadow of a pillar and admir- ing her quite at his ease. In certain Assumptions of the Spanish school, you must have seen a group of disciples on their knees be- fore the miracle. Murillo has best rendered the ecstatic transport of these believing souls. Holy faith sparkles in their eyes; their swarthy faces seem to be interiorly burning with the mystic fires of divine love. Such pretty nearly was Meo before the Captain's daughter ; he was absolutely worshipping her. A woman should have a sino-ular turn of mind indeed to feel offended at such worship as that; and Emma naturally looked two or tliree times Mithout much malevolence at the man who rendered her such discreet homage. She saw him again on leaving the church, and she made no scruple whatever in acknowledging his bow as he saluted her and disappeared. Every Sunday after that she saw him in the same place. She sometimes saw him on the sidewalk in the street before her windows. He always passed like a man in a hurry, and even the Captain himself could have never guessed what the im- portant business was. The first consequence of these comings and goings was that the young people thought of nothing but each other during the rest of the week ; and as each of them deserved to be loved, they were not long in doing each other justice. The Captain's watchfulness and their own timidity kept them a proper INXOCENT DREAMINGS. 63 distance apart, but when their eyes met, it was like an embrace. Innocent young hearts ! I have heard a witty lady from Dauphiny say that love is fed like silkworms. A little tender mulberry-leaf satisfies them while yonno;, but when full-grown they eat up everything, even to the very joists of the floor. Emma said one day to her father, when he was almost in good humor: "Dear little papa, are we going to live this way always?" The old man made a grimace, and answered in a tone half kind, half bitter, "Dear little daughter, we're not going to live always, seeing that we are not immor- tal. Patience, child ! One of these fine mornings, the undertaker will rid you of your poor old shred of a father." EmmaAvept seven days and seven nights, like Jephtha's daughter, and her father pretended not to see it. But he gave stout Agatha an awful scolding, and ended by threatening to turn her out of doors if she continued to be filling her young mistress's head with ideas. " Oh ! the dear good heaven, is it possible ! " cried the poor creature, horror-struck at such an accusation. " Ideas ! I 'm blessed if I know what in the living earth an idea is ! " 64 ROUGE ET NOIR. CHAPTER V. THE PLAY-BILLS. MEO, without a friend, and Avithout a sou, was the liuppiest of men. His old patron, M. Silivergo, had answered him in round terms, " You are an ingrate ; ingratitude is the worst of vices, and the Egyptians in the good old times did right in punishing it with death. I only hope some day or other you will want me again. I luxuriate in the idea of shutting the door in your face. Should desire or necessity ever impel you again to seek employment, I would advise you to apply elsewhere. In short, I take advantage of the opportunity to swear that henceforth I will never oblige anybody again. Henceforward, I shall never interest myself in the case of any unfortunate man, however great his merits may seem, and your conduct is the cause of the whole of it." The .same day, his countrywoman, Signora Aurelia, had hastened in a carriage to the Rue St Catherine. She came do^vn on No. 4 like an avalanche, which in fact she really was; but, not finding her old friend at home, she could not have the consolation of tearing his eyes out. Falling back on the porter's lodge, she there told all her sorrows to Monsieur and JNIadame Ride, Avhom she saw for the first time. These good folks in- terrupted their dinner to listen to her lamentations. She had thrown herself on a cliair with a familiarity thoroughly Italian; she called the porter "my dear THE PLAY-BILLS. 65 friend," and his wife " my dear ; " in fact, had they been her father and mother she could have scarcely made her- self more at home. She showed them how her soul was tortured, her life laid waste, her hopes dead, her sun extinct. In the midst of her tears, she picked out the nicest bits in the bowl, taking them with her fingers, and not even raising her pagoda sleeves. The sight of grief so real, and of manners so utterly un-Frenchlike, made the two old people laugh and cry by turns. Au- relia had no hesitation in commissioning them as am- bassadors to Meo. She charged them to tell him that all was over forever, even friendship ; that she had no wish whatever to listen to any of his confidential dis- closures, and that, if he dared to present himself before her, she would tear his eyes out. She even showed them a little dagger that she had bought for the express purpose ; for she took words literally, and never trou- bled herself about the subtleties of the French language. Three weeks later, Meo's friend wrote him from Bo- logna the following letter : " ]My Dear and Esteemed Friend : — -.It is indeed very true that love consoles us for everything. Every day's delightful experience convinces me of the truth of this maxim. In vain am I unrelentingly persecuted by jealous fate; the little Marchioness's love gives me more pleasure than all other things can give me trouble. The two last harvests have been so bad, that my poor tenants ask me for money instead of bringing it. The family law-suit is slowly dragging along in its third stage. I have obtained eleven favorable decisions, and 6* E 66 ROUGEETNOIR. oiu- aflversaries only ten. If the appeal which they have lodged as a last resource is not granted by the Rota, I shall have gained my suit, provided, of course, that the Ser/natura does not reverse the decision. The twenty-one decisions rendered by the Rota, for and against us, have cost me a thousand Roman crowns apiece; the whole suit then will have cost me twenty- one thousand crowns if I gain it, and if I lose it I am irretrievably ruined. But what are riches or poverty to a heart really happy ? For fifteen years, not a cloud has disturbed the serenity of our love. It is in vain that the jealous Marquis tries to frustrate our plans ten times a week ; we contrive to see each other every day in public, but very seldom in private. The man would tie poor Hersilia to the leg of his arm-chair, if he dared ; you know yourself that he never left her chain very long. His infirmities serve him as a pretext for keep- ing her in the house; he is quite hyppish. The worst of it is, no one can tell when he is going to get well ; he may bury us all yet. Hersilia waits on him with a sub- lime devotion. Many a woman in her place woulil rather help him to his grave. I have free access to the house on all occasions, though the Marquis, I am sure, regards me with secret hostility. Very often in his very presence, in his room, near his arm-chair, a glance from Hersilia or a pleasant word supplies me with happiness for the rest of the day. In the masked war that I j^a- tiently wage against him, on his own ground, I have on my side Hersilia, the servants, and the whole city ; his only ally is his great booby of a son whom we shall soon get rid of, please goodness, by means of a good marriage. In spite of all troubles, all opjiositions, all jealousies, THE PLAY-BILLS. 67 I actually live in paradise, for not a moment passes without reminding me that I love and am beloved. Dear Meo, once in the early period of our happiness, you were our confidant. Why can't I have you here now to share with you my pleasures and my pains ! Hersilia is becoming dearer and dearer to me every day. Do you remember how pretty she was sixteen years ago at Marchetti's ball, in 1842? At present, since nature has put the finishing touch to her beauty, she is really divine. What a sweet harmony unites our souls ! We understand each other without uttering a single word, as if Xature had placed within us the two halves of the same heart. Why are you not here ? I ask again. I should so like to tell you about her, and to recite for you with living, burning words this sweet love-poem that the pen is wholly powerless to write. Well ! Man does not command fate. But, near or distant, remember that I am your other self, and as such I remain, with my person and all my worldly goods unreservedly at your disposal.- G. Marsoxi. " P. S. I had almost forgotten all about that miser- able gold of yours. In conformity with your desire, I have put it at six per cent, on the first mortgage. It will be due, with accrued interest, on January 1st, 1862.'' M^o required ho further encouragement to begin sell- ing his ancestors. His cash was all gone ; his furniture, long since reduced to what was absolutely necessary, could not keep him alive a month ; as for his jewels, he and they were inseparable — they formed a part of him. Meo without jewels would be Meo no longer. Pardon him this little weakness. Nothinar was left C8 ROUGE ET Nom. tlien but his family portraits, which he had smuggled into Paris out of Italy. He did not know exactly what the whole collection might be worth, but he did know that the list bore the names of the greatest masters of the Bolognese school, from Oderigi, a contemporary of Dante, down to Pasinelli, the Romulus- Augustulus of that long dynasty. Among other rare pieces, it con- tained a Francia (which the Louvre has not), and a hidy's portrait painted by Albano in 1600, when that artist was in his twenty-second year, and used to paint large pictures for churches. The three Caracci, Domeni- chino, and Guercino daubed with black, lived there on friendly terras with Guido of the rosy fingers. I don't speak of the twenty or thirty others, tolerable, bad, or miserable, which of course were to be found there as well as in all other portrait galleries. Meo coolly re- viewed the sacred legion of his ancestors, like a shepherd selectino; from a flock the animals that he wants to sell. He reserved the oldest and the latest portraits; the former, because they proved the antiquity of his family ; the latter, because they reminded him of some relations that he had known and loved. Five or six others he also laid aside, because they represented the most cele- brated personages of the house of Miranda, or those with whom he felt most sympathy. General Augusto Narni, for instance, who was killed in 1525 at the battle of Pavia, and likewise the beautiful Olympia, who took poison sooner than marry a Bentivoglio, were exempted from the sale. The rest were packed straight off to JJatlf/nolles, to the curiosity-shop of a Milanese picture- dealer, who traded in old originals and manufactured them too. Meo knew him but slightly, whereas the THE PLAY-BILLS. 69 other was veiy well acquainted with the Miranda gallery. As soon as the young man had acquainted him with his resolution, the old rogue says to him : " You can make fifty thousand francs out of your pic- tures, or five hundred, just as you please. Shall we take the whole collection to the City Auction Rooms, with- out omitting a single one, not even the portrait of your father the Count? In that case we shall get out im- mense posters all over Paris, announcing the sale of the Miranda gallery, complete and unreserved. Your col- lection is well known: amateurs will come; plenty of money will come too. But what you bring me here is neither complete nor authenticated. Signatures prove nothing out of a celebrated gallery. Every week I sign a picture with the name of some old master." '' But the pictures are good ! " exclaimed Meo. " I don't deaiy it, but they '11 bring nothing if you don't listen to me. Such amateurs as buy, don't care a jot for ' good pictures ; ' a celebrated gallery is all they trouble themselves about. Your Francia, which is worth ten thousand francs in a collection, won't brino; a hundred and fifty if sold separately." But Meo was too proud to stick up the Miranda family on bills at the street-corners, and well the dealer knew it. The poor fellow's sensitiveness and his utter ignorance of business matters left him, bound neck and lieels, completely at the tender mercy of the cunning Milanese. He acknowledged innocently that he was in love, could not bear to work, and had not a single re- source left in the world; for the present, a crust of bread sufficed him; for his future, he trusted altogether to luck, being utterly ignorant in what quarter anything 70 ROUGE ET NOIR. could turn up in his favor ; still he would not consent on any account that his family should be exposed to a public sale. He bargained more timidly than a thief in a receiver's den higgling over the plate he has stolen ; and he took two thousand francs ($400) for a treasure well worth twenty or thirty times as much. A certain instinct of self-defence, however, inspired him with the idea of stipulating for the right of redemption, as he had done when selling his title; to this the broker readily consented, his mind being quite easy as to the brilliancy of poor Meo's prospects. It was then agreed upon and drawn uj) in writing that M. Bartolomeo !Narui, formerly Count of Miranda, could redeem his ancestors at any time within two years, on the payment of one thousand Roman crowns (about $1000). What- ever might happen, the purchaser Avas pretty sure of having made a good investment. • To a crazy fellow who lived altogether in the present moment, the sum of two thousand francs in ready money was quite a fortune, for it enabled him to exist a whole year without bestowing a thought on anything but his love. I have already told you how he employed the first leisure moments that he had obtained by the sale of his family. To meet Emma at church or in the street, to see her at her window, to send her occasionally a look full of fire, to receive in return a little glance not over-cruel in its expression, such were the elements of the contemplative felicity that satisfied him for a long time. If from contemplation he passed one morning to ac- tion, M. Bitterlin alone was the cause. The very day after that on which the Captain had threatened to turn THE PLAY-BILLS. 71 Agatha out of doors, Meo met the two women on their way to church, and he saw by their eyes that they liad been weeping. His first movement was to accost them unceremoniously, the natural consequence of which was that they sprang back as shrinkingly as if they had trodden on a serpent. But he was too much affected by their sorrow to mind their alarm, and he said to Emma, without any preamble and as if continuing the mute conversation that they had been holdino; too-ether duriuf the last month : " My angel, my life, my love, who is the man that has made you weep ? Shall I kill him ? Say the word, and it is done ! " Startled at the sudden meeting and at such an address, trembling lest her father had followed her, and quite beside herself both from surprise and fear, the young girl replied as she hurried away, hardly knowing what she said : " But, sir, you 're mad ! I don't know you ! Kill my father ! It is he who has made us weep. He will uevei> consent to our marriage. He detests every- body, — you, me, Agatha: he has talked of turning her out of doors ! If he saw us together, we should be all undone. In the name of heaven then, sir, go away ! " She redoubled her speed and ran off to the church without once stopping to take breath, and without being aware that she was all the time mechanically clinging to Meo's arm. Her astonishment was inexpressible when she found herself seated, in a side-chapel of St. PauVs, between Agatha and the good-looking stranger. The Mass which they heard that day was not entered to their credit in the ledger of Paradise. Meo, as an Italian, considered it quite natural to carry on a love-affair in church ; Emma, a far better 72 ROUGE ET NOIR. Christian, yielded finally, but. not without a severe struggle. At one time, reproaching herself for the im- pious levity of her conduct, she would take refuge in her prayer-book and pray with such feverish devotion that she heard no other sound than the murmur of her own lips; at another time, she could hardly help yield- ing to the pleasure of hearing Meo's poetic, passionate, and extrtivagaut lanouage. A Avoman a few vears older and of a riper understanding would have perhaps laughed at such a flood of incoherent and inflated words, comically seasoned by a foreign accent and a rather ca- pricious grammar; but the infatuation of love, the most contagious thing in the world, by degrees gained the young heart that was already so well prepared for its reception. Meo was not a man of very great sense — ■ of that the history of his youth is proof enough ; he could not even ring any changes on the little silver bell which the French call wit. But all the wit and all the sense in the world have not, in the eyes of young girls of nineteen, half the value of one grain of genuine bona fide passion. The most distrustful and the most marble- hearted of them all, thinks more of a good-sized silly tear dropping from the nose of a man of heart, than of the most elegantly expressed phrases in the most beauti- ful and studied declaration. To a cool listener, Meo's language would have ap- peared not only absurd, but perhaps even sinful and wicked. When a man without position and without prospects assails a young girl condemned to celibacy by the wish of her father ; Avhcn he stuns her ears by the violence of his sentiments; when he swears that he loves her to madness, and that he will die if he cannot THE PLAY-BILLS. 73 obtain her hand, reason bhimes him for plunging raslily into a blind enterprise, and morality severely condemns him for dragging into danger a being feebler than him- self. All that can be said in the great simpleton's defence, is, that in his whole proceeding he was impelled by the instincts of an honorable, guileless, uncalculating nature, and that he was acting Mathout fixed plan, premedita- tion, or forethought of any kind. Ijoving Emma with all his heart and soul, he simply wanted to have her for his wedded wife, though how such a desirable consum- mation could be possibly brought about he neither knew nor tried to know. He rushed headlonac, not knowino* whither, with all the impetuosity of an indomitable temperament, A crow picking at a nutshell, a May-bug plumping against the window-pane, were, in comparison with this poor human creature, strictly responsible and rigidly logical beings. Into whatever excess the frenzy of the first impulse might have led him, a jury of the Seven Wise Men of Greece could have hardly found him guilty. Had he taken Emma in his arms and carried her up to the top of a mountain, or to the sixth story of a house, the severest judge would be satisfied with the verdict : "Abduction without malice prepense." At this outburst of love, the young girl felt like a person who from a window j)erceives the lava-torrents rushing down the sides of a distant volcano. She was amazed at such an explosion of genuine passion, but, though woman is instinctively always on the defence, she did not consider that it threatened her with any danger. Through the whole storm of emotion Meo's noble and loyal nature shone out like a light-house. 7 74 ROUGE ET NOIR. Agatha, who, not being quick-witted, ought to have been suspicious, yielded as blindly as her mistress. " Don't be uneasy, dear cihild," said she, in a whisper, to Emma ; " there 's no sin in listening to good words ; it is n't every day we have a holiday. While you listen, I '11 pray double, so the dear good God will be no loser." Meo escorted them as far back as the corner of the Rue des Vosges, and that was the end to all dread of the Ca])tain or his thunderbolts. From that moment, the weeks, hitherto so long, passed like lightning, in the expectation of Sunday. ]\Ieo discovered a way to make them still shorter, by inventing a kind of correspon- dence. The arcade running from the Hue des Vosges to the Place Royale is a famous spot for play-bills. Every morning at half past eleven the Italian came there, and, pulling a pencil out of his pocket, he underlined a printed letter here and there, so that the whole formed words, sentences, and quite an epistle for Emma. Such a job requires patience, and is not always very easy ; but he had served his apprenticeship at it in the days of his grand misery, when he used to correspond with his friends in Bologna by means of an old number of the Debats. Emma, walking out with her father, naturally stopped to read the bills announcing the amusements of the day. What pretext could the Captain invent for refusing her a gratification so innocent ? On the first bill appeared : COMEDIE FKAXgAISE. Jeudi, 25 mai, 1858. Les comediens ordinaires de I'Empereur donneront : GABRIELLE. THE PLAY-BILLS. 76 Emma had no difficulty in reading off, Ma joUe (my pretty one), and in tlic other bills she made out the rest of the letter. This same arcade was a favorite resort for the Cap- tain himself. He too cast his eye, his eagle eye, over the play-bills and always contrived to render them use- ful in teaching Emma some lesson in morality. He made her remark how the play- writers are reduced to give their productions the most absurd names for the purpose of attracting the public to the theatre ; of the plays themselves he spoke with contempt, and assured her that the French nation was sick of them. ''You are very happy indeed," said he, "in knowing no more of such stuff than their titles. Just look at that. Le Fils Natiirel! Why, it is scandalous. Le Fruit de- fendu! Absolutely immoral. La joie fait -peur ! What wretched nonsense ! Les Lionnes pauvres ! What does all that consist of? Why, ridiculous stories without head or tail, and even indecencies very probably. The rabble that write such trash don't earn enough to keep body and soul together, and I 'm glad of it. Are you coming?" Emma, who had got through her reading, touched the corner of the last bill with the dusty tip of her parasol, and the light mark showed Meo that his letter had reached its destination. How the Captain would have sworn if he had even suspected that the very daughter he guarded so carefully was actually cor- responding with her lover, and that too even before his. own eyes ! Towards the end of June, Emma had become so de- cidedly captivated that her only thought henceforth was Meo. All her ideas ran on him, every nerve iu her 76 ROUGE ET NOIR. heart beat for liira. The brilliant Italian had become in her eyes a sort of demigod. She knew neither his birth, his rank, nor his fortune; but it is when we know the least that Ave love the best. Had Meo been one of those unscrupulous lovers who consider everything they find in their net as their own, the poor, innocent, mother- less girl would have no more resisted him than the women of mythology resisted Jupiter. But the honest fellow no more thought of even pressing her hand than you do of plucking to pieces a beautiful rose, or of crushing between your fingers the amber calyx of a magnolia. Accordingly, this secret and very imprudent intercourse ■was of an ideal purity. Chance and sympathy had wedded two hearts, but it was like one of those unions which diplomacy used to effect long ago between two royal children still in their infancy. Stout Agatha, however, with her good home-spun common-sense, said to them from time to time, " All this is very fair and good, but what is it all to end in ? You must marry some time or other, and Master will never give his consent." '' How do you know that ? " replied Meo. " He does not know who I am. I 've a strong notion of going into the house with vou and asking his consent. If he refuses me, I shall be very much surprised, indeed." But Emma screamed with horror at such a proposi- tion, and that was the end of it. One morning Meo said to them, " I have my idea. We shall enter the church together, and go straight to a priest. I shall say to him, '.This is my wife ! ' and you will add, *' This is my husband ! ' He wall give us his blessing anyhow. Such a thing is often done in THE PLAY-BILLS. 77 Italy." Emma did not exactly say no, but Agatha assured them that such a marriage would be good for nothino; in France. Another day, Agatha informed the lovers that they were rich. She had been counting up M. Bitterlin's income. His yearly pension was eighteen hundred francs; his inheritance brought him two thousand francs a year ; Emma's mother's dowry was the regu- lar twelve hundred francs a year, without which no woman is permitted to marry a captain ; in short, the total income was about five thousand francs ($1000) a year, and the Captain had been saving at least two thou- sand francs a year since 1848. "What of that?" said Meo. "I don't want any money." " You have enough of your own then ?" asked Agatha. " No ; but I don't want any." " It i^ true," added Emma. " What is the use of money ? I 've never had any money, and what have I been the worse for it ? " Meo, in France, now began to study the laws — in his own country he had helped to make them. He turned over the "Thirty-Seven Codes" in a reading-room. He learned from this investigation that Emma could marry without her father's consent, but not before she had arrived at the age of twenty-one, and had thrice respectfully demanded permission. He thought it too lono; to wait. Emma wished to examine the same sub- ject herself, and with her own little hands she carefully rummaged throuo-h her father's law-books. She dis- covered that her happiness absolutely depended on the Captain for two years and some months longer. 7* 78 ROUGE ET XOIR. This gloomy prospect inspired her witli to an inoffensive traveller who was dis- cussing with very good appetite some duck and onion- sauce. "Sir," said he, "are you really eating that fodder?" "Why, sir — " " Perhaps you would even tell me that it is a delicious dish?" " Sir ! — " " Well, I don't object to your saying so. Speech is free; particularly here where the animals of these cantons have been so luxurious as to treat themselves to a republic ! But you will allow me to observe in my turn that a man must have a taste very false, very per- verted, very trivial in fact (excuse the expression), who can eat and relish such a mess as that." Then turning towards the steward, who was now staring at him with ey.es as big as saucers, he said : " Well, then, making due allowance for everything, give us for breakfast whatever you please, and whenever you please! At war, let it be war ! " They showed him to a table. Emma, much morti- fied at such a display on tlie part of her father, sat down opposite him, casting a melancholy glance in the direc- tion of Meo. The waiter approached and asked what wine they preferred. The Captain replied : " Can you p-ive me the wine I drink at home in the Rue desVosges ? A TOUR IN SWITZERLAND. 105 Of course you can't. Well, that is the only wine I like. Let us have water." The good folks of the hotel served him up a repast abundant, savory, varied, — such, in fact, as can be found only in that country flowing with milk and honey. He complained that the butter was riot fresh. Not fresh in Switzerland ! Thinking that a plate looked rather suspicious, he flung it at the waiter's head, adding by way of commentary : " I am not hard to please. I've drunk horse-soup out of a trooper's helmet. But here I represent the grand army of France. AVhoever fails in respect to me, insults it. You see that river out there flowing under the walls of your barrack ? That river has been mine ! I con- quered it with my comrades. So you 'd better look sharp how you conduct yourself, my good fellow ! " Meo was eagerly watching for an opjDortunity to in- terfere on behalf of his father-in-law, but, to tell the truth, he did not consider the present moment favor- able. All he could decently do was to offer him a \vord of consolation as soon as he saw him at the dessert. Pass- ing near him as if by chance, he greeted him with his sweetest smile, and said, " I 'm very much afraid, sir, that you 've made a bad breakfast in this miserable place." M. Bitterlin lifted his head, and answered, with a su- percilious air, " Miserable place, sir ! Miserable your- self! If it were a miserable place, I Avould not have been in it." " I mean — yes — it is true enough," stammered Meo. " I was even surprised myself. I should have never expected to find such tolerable cookery among the lub- bers of this country." 10(3 ROUGE ET NOIR. "Sir," said tlie Captain, getting up from the table, "all the lubbers in the world are not Swiss. I have the honor to wish you a very pleasant journey." Meo was profuse in his expressions of gratitude for the in- terest thus manifested in his behalf; but the Captain turned his back on him without adding another word. An hour afterwards, though they had by no means made any mutual arrangement on the subject, the whole party found themselves together once more in the Basel Museum. Each one walked about for himself, pretend- ing not to recognize the others. This, you know, is what well-bred travellers always do. The young Ger- man couple succeeded in stealing a kiss on the sly behind one of M. Calame's pictures. The fat English- man admired a pretty little statue of the ^Middle Ages so much that he broke off a finger and put it in his pocket- book by way of a souvenir. The American, unwilling to be outdone, carried off the whole of the mutilated hand together with a part of the forearm. The Parisian stopped before Holbein's masterpieces. He was of the opinion that this divine master somewhat resembled M. Courbet of Paris, only his style was decidedly better. Meo's greatest attraction was a young girl's head, framed in Emma's straw bonnet. As to M. Bitterlin, his pleasure consisted in proving to his pretty compan- ion that the galleries wanted order and the catalogues clearness. And so every one felt perfectly satisfied. When the custodian of the Museum opened the door to let them out, Meo thought to make himself agreeable by paying for the whole party ; but the Captain, feeling his nerves begin to trouble him, asked him stiffly what he meant by taking such an unwarrantable liberty. A TOUR IN SWITZERLAND. 107 This old codger of a Captain had not known Meo's face for quite twenty-four hours, but his antipatliy towards liini was ah-cady full-grown. On the other hand, he had taken rather a liking for the Parisian, who however treated him roughly enough. Morose tempers are often subject to such anomalies. Switzerland is quite up to the demands of the nine- teenth century ; the mountains that bristle around it are no barriers against progress. Tell's lakes reflect the fluttering of steamboat flags. Telegraph poles are to be met amid the wildest gorges. Lightning-rods protect the chalets, and the whistle of the locomotive has begun to unite its blast almost at every turn with the grand voices of nature. Meo always availed himself of the telegraph to bespeak a room for himself, and also two for the Bitterlin family. It cost him twenty-five words and twenty cents. At this price he was sure of dining and sleeping not far from Emma. The Captain saw himself served as if by enchantment, but he only fumed against the invisible providence that envied him the pleasure of domineering. The Italian's everlasting presence was becoming more and more disagreeable to him every day. Whatever pains he took to avoid him, he met him in every carriage and in every inn. Often, he would let him enter one carriage, and then run off as fast as he could with his daughter to take seats in another at the far end of the train. Useless manoeuvre ! Ten minutes afterwards Meo would be seated at his side, and pointing him out the beauties of the scenery. The construction of the Swiss carriages renders such a proceeding comparatively easy. As in America, they are united together by a kind of platform, by means of 108 ROUGE ET NOm. wliicli the passengers can pass without danger from one end of tlie train to tlie other. On Saturday night, our whole party slept at Olten, a great central point of the Swiss railroads. When the hotel-keeper presented his register to the travellers, the eight ])ersonages with whoni the reader is already ac- quainted, inscribed themselves as follows : "Bitterlin, Captain of the first class, Chevalier of the Legion of Honor, etc., etc. ; Paris. With his daughter." " Bartolonieo Narni, an exile ; Paris. Happy from travelling in good company." "Arthur Le Roy, property - holder ; Paris. Oh! Love, thou hast ruined Troy!" " Frederic Moring, private gentleman ; Berlin. Trav- elling with his dearest heart-treasure : "O monnthins, lakes of blue! O daisies -spanpled sheen! O tuneful nightingale ! and oh, my own Christine ! " " Thomas Plum, London." " George Wreck, Esq., New York." Having written their names, each one stole back, un- known to the rest, to acquaint himself with the name and standing of his companions. When stout Mr. Plum saw that the American had given himself the title of Esquire in an hotel- register, his fancy was so highly tickled, and he burst into such a fit of violent laughter, that the two lower buttons of his waistcoat flew oif at right angles, and were never found again. They retired to their rooms without looking at the neighborhood. The sky was dark and gloomy. It was raining in the valley, and snowing on the mountains. M. Bitterlin had stuffed cotton into his ears; still, A TOUR IN SWITZERLAND. 109 before he fell asleep, he heard a fine barytone voice, with an unmistakable accent, singing : " In vain you resist me, You fly me in vain, For the kind Fates assist me Your heart to obtain," Next day they breakfasted at the " Swiss Hotel," in Lucerne, on the shores of the Lake of the Four Cantons. The weather had become fine again. The medieval outline of the pretty little city stood out sharply defined against a lovely azure sky. Steamboats moved over the blue waters. Herds of stately cattle grazed on the rich after-grass of the green banks. Snow-capped moun- tains shut in the scene. Good bisr-footed Switzer-folk promenaded before the hotel in their holiday attire, and some pretty English girls, as they ran up to their rooms, gave occasional glimpses of their red petticoats. M. Arthur Le Roy thought that the country somewhat re- sembled the Bois de Boulogne, only that the style was decidedly better. The Captain stormed about the trout, which he swore pursued him all over the country. Emma and Meo ate with their eyes, and never com- plained of the breakfast. M. M()ring and his pretty bride, becoming frisky from the effects of a bottle of Rhine-wine, chased each other up and down stairs, with all that boisterous gaiety of which Germany alone has contrived to keep the secret. Even long after their door was shut, the whole house resounded with their screams of laughter. Mr. Plum entered the store of national curiosities, which is attached to the hotel. Buvino- a long iron-tipped pole surmounted with a chamois-horn, 10 110 ROUGE ET NOIR. he got tlic names of all the mountains of Switzerland cut on it. Mr. Wreck followed his example; only, un- willing to be outdone, to the already long list he added the names of Vesuvius, Dhawalaghiri, and Cotopaxi. These monumental trophies, trutiiful as obelisks, were destined for nothing more than the humble ascent of the Ilighi. All started in the steamboat about two o'clock, and they soon landed at Weggis, at the foot of the moun- tain. Thanks to the fine weather, our little trooj) of travellers had now swelled to about a score, and they all made a grand assemblage in the little jjort of Weggis. The guides, who compose the whole population of the village, had run up with all the litters and horses at their disposal, but one glance told them that the supply would fall far short of the demand. Violent disputes arose immediately, in which all the languages of Europe took a part; some canes fell down rather heavily on some hats, and Meo for a moment indulged the fond hope that he was about to have an opportunity of de- fending M. Bitterlin. But the Captain was one of those that give blows, not get them ; and of course he was accommodated long before anybody else. He sprang on a charger and galloped over the battlefield, brandishino; his umbrella as if it was a sword of Charlc- inagne. He even tried once or twice to make the poor beast prance a little, thinking of Gerard's famous picture of Napoleon crossing the Alps. His daughter was safely installed in a litter by the exertions of Meo and M. Arthur Le Roy. This duty performed, the two knights plunged into the thick of the fight, and they were soon seen, seated on English saddles, towering A TOUli IN SWITZERLAND. Ill high" above their rivals. Moring and liis bride had retired apart, and, seated side by side on one of tlie hotel benches, they contemplated from afar the spectacle of men's clashing passions: doves never take part in the war of vultures. Unfortunately, having no Avings to climb the mountain, they had to walk. The English- man and the American appeared to be condemned to the same fate, and Mr. Plum had already begun to per- spire at the very idea. fie gazed despondingly on his rival's long legs, and sighed at the idea that Old England was about to be left behind by the savages of the New World. But four students from Leipsic, who had reasons of their own for walking, spied one of their countrymen on one of the best horses of Weggis. Un- able to bear such a sight, they seized the aristocrat by the legs and tugged at him so vigorously that he was soon unseated. Mr. Plum closely watched this popular commotion, and taking advantage of a favorable mo- ment, he jumped like india-rubber into the middle of the crowd, and was soon in the saddle in place of the young stranger. This is the way that the English always feather their nest by the Continental revolutions. The American only shrugged his shoulders and started off with a light foot : he wanted no horse to reach the mountain summit before a fat, puffy John Bull. The horsemen, footmen, and litters started on their march in picturesque order, up an easy and safe road. Every Frenchman that can read knows all about the Righi ; M. Alexander Dumas has made it the scene of one of the prettiest sketches in his masterly work. Still the charming author of the " Impressions de Voyage " has probably exaggerated the dangers of the ascent and 112 ROUGE ET NOIR. tliG majesty of the view. To speak exactly, it is oiily a hill about a mile high, set right ia the middle of au amphitheatre of mountains : it is a regular dress-circle to see the sun rise from, but the stairway leading to it is not at all difficult. M. Bitterlin curveted along at the head of his com- pany, as all good captains do. Meo followed him closely, imitating as well as he could all his splendid feats of high horsemanship. As the magnificent scenery opened around them, he trusted that admiration, that bond of sympathy between all noble hearts, would win for him at last the friendship of the intractable old man. Besides, he still had his hopes of being soon favored with an opportunity to pluck him from the brink of some terrible precipice. But danger was very slow in coming, and M. Bitterlin seemed to be in no admiring humor. Whenever the guide brought his caravan to a halt at some spot famous for its commanding view, the Captain growled between his teeth: "Humbug of a. country ! though it 's not the only one I 've seen." Meo was sincerely ecstatic. His soul had been already fully prepared to relish the spectacle in all its grandeur, for lovers are the most indulgent of critics, and they wish well to everything on the face of nature. But every time that he tried to express his sentiments, the Captain whistled and sneered and hammered away with his heels at the flanks of his old horse. Emma closed the march with five or six other ladies. In all the charming land- scape the only thing that the poor child could see, was her father's back turned to her lover's face. After a march of four hours, they came in sight of the llighi-Kulm, that is to say, the tip top of the Righi. A TOUR IN SWITZERLAND. 113 Two wooden buikiings occupy this summit: one is where M. Alexander Dumas in company with the iUus- trious Alcide Jollivet got such a poor dinner; the other is an additional structure twice as large as the first. Here three hundred tourists can obtain food and lodging, and an English nobleman is no longer in danger of getting killed for eating an extra lark. So much, at least, for the progress of our century ! The only scourge that still reigns on those steep sum- mits, is the cold. M. Bitterlin's big nose, reddened vis- ibly as he approached the hotel, and his horse slipped every now and then on a path not yet quite free from occasional patches of snow. More than once, too, a dense mist, cold as ice, would envelop him, and then he would commence a sneezing as loud as the trumpets of Jericho. Meo, in his wisdom, thought this would be a favorable moment to soften this living rock. " My dear old gentleman," he began, " I feel quite exhilarated at trav- elling with you over these sublime heights. Happy the man who could live here, far from the world, between a father bowed by experience on the one side, and an adored wife on the other ! My ambition has never as- pired after more. INIoney and honors have no charms for me. Such a felicity would suffice me for all my life. I swear it by your venerable locks ! " " Zounds ! sir," exclaimed the Captain, in an excited tone, " I 'm not quite a mummy yet, so you had better keep your compliments to yourself. You have a very disagreeable way* of talking, young sir." " But, my dear sir — " " Once for all, do me the favor to explain such liber- ties ! My dear sir ! dear sir ! It is very easy to say 10 * II Ill ROUGE ET NOIR. dear sir! But liow Imve I come to be your clear sir? ] [:ive we ever mailc; war together ? Have yoii ever served in the Fourth Company of the Second Battalion of the One llundicd and Fourth Regiment? I don't know you. This is the first time I have ever^een you. We 're not even of the same country ! In such a case, then — " "Sir," stammered Mco, "affection is not to be com- manded. Regard, friendship, love — I mean grati- tude—" " Gratitude for what? I could understand your pro- ceedings easily enough if you had any notion about — Ah ! I understand. In fact, it is likely enough, though it is only to rae that you pay the attentions. Could you have got it into your head to — ? If that be the case, you had better say so right off." "Sir—" " Yes, better say so right off, for my only answer would be to hurl you down headlong into that ravine beneath us, without a.s much as giving you time to bless yourself! " Meo protested that he did not understand what he meant, and he resumed, in the most feeling tones he could command ; " Sir, I comprehend your trouble, and compassionate your sufferings. Doubtless, misfortune has embittered you against the world. The first time I had the honor of meeting you, I discovered in you one of those woe-worn souls where grief has left its mark in lines that cannot be effaced. Your merits must have been passed over, your services forgotten, and your confidence betrayed ! " At this last expression the Captain rose up on his A TOUR IN SWITZERLAND. 115 stirrups and cast a searching glance into the very depths of Meo's eyes. " Young man," he exclaimed, " I call on you to explain yourself! What do you know? What have you heard ? Who has been trying to cover me with ridicule ? If I only thought — but no, he is too stupid ; he don't know himself what he 's saying. However — Sir, have you ever been at Briangon ? " " No, sir." "Or Strasburg?" " No, sir, never." . " How long have you been living in Paris"? " "Sir, I came there in 1850." " Have you known the late Madame Bitterlin ? " " No, sir ; I swear that I have never had that honor." " Why do you swear ? W^as there any harm in know- ing her?" " Sir, I don't know, I 'm sure. I — " " How ! You don't know ! You 're doubtful, too ! I must be a very odd-looking husband, then ? " Poor Meo bewildered himself in protestations of re- spect, took off his hat, tore out his hair in handfuls, shed tears even ; but he arrived at the hotel without having advanced a single step in M. Bitterliu's friendship. They found two hundred people assembled on the summit of the Righi to adore the sun. The god of the silver bow, the god of Zoroaster and of Chryses, has not in all Europe a temple more frequented. Pilgrims come there from the four quarters of the universe, and the hotel-keeper piously collects their offerings. Such is the ardor of the faithful, that more than one worship- per has been seen there trudging about in the snow and rain for a week at a time, just to catch one glimpse of 116 ROUGE ET NOIR. the god. Our caravan had not to wait so long. The sun, who had not sliown himself for the lost four days, condescended to retire to his couch in their presence. M. Bitterlin was only slightly moved by the sight, one of the most imposing spectacles that nature offers to poets for a description. He was thinking of his de- ceased wife, and such thoughts always put too much black into his colors. Emma and Meo watched the clouds as they chased each other over the Captain's Olympian brow. Mr. Wreck was marching around with trreat strides to show Mr. Plum that his walk had not made him tired, while Mr. Plum smiled with an air which seemed to say, " No matter, I have made America go on foot ! " M. Arthur Le Roy was gazing quite pensively at the kitchen-chimneys, and, amid the eternal silence of the mountains, his ear was anxiously on the watch for the dinner-bell. The young German and his bride, wrapped up in the same plaid, were dis- cussing metapliysically the aesthetics of the globe. '' Beloved," said the young wife, " whence comes it that the Infinite overwhelms mo? When we gazed on the sea at Osteud, I considered it rather small. Yet the ocean is likewise infinite." " Who can tell ? " replied the husband. " It is per- haps'because the Infinite in height brings us nearer to the great All ; whereas the Horizontal, howsoever far it may extend, can never leave the surface of the earth. Beyond the limits of the ocean we find earth again ; but above the mountains, heaven." " May it not rather be because the sea has submitted to the yoke of man, so that the ships we see in the dis- tance are only so many tokens of bondage?" A TOUR IN SWITZERLAND. 117 " It may, my clear love. Perhaps also it is because the infinite is subjective, which would exj^lain every- thing." " Do you really think so, darling ? Subjective ? If the infinite were subjective, it would be circumscribed within the limits of the Me; therefore it would be sub- jective no longer." The other travellers were tramping about actively in the melted snow, and uttering loud cries of admiration, to keep their feet warm. The bell rang at last for dinner, and the two hundred guests raced • to the refectory. The only incident of the evening was the scolding that M. Bitterlin gave to one of the waiters. " Do you want to' make a fool of me ? " cried the Captain. " You brought me trout yesterday morning in the hotel at Basel ; well, I ate them. Yes- terday evening, trout again at Olten ; but I said nothing. This morning at Lucerne, a third dish of trout ; I com- mented upon it ; and here you are again with them this evening ! Have you taken a solemn oath to turn me into a trout ? Is that all the attention you pay to my observations ? " The poor domestic stood before him holding the dish with a bewildered air, and pouring every drop of the gravy over a Swedish general's coat, for he did not un- derstand a word of French. Meo, who was acquainted with both sides of the case, did not judge this a favor- able moment to interfere in M. Bitterliu's behalf. M. Moring and his bride emptied between them a bottle of Liebfrauenmilch. It is a much - esteemed Rhine wine ; but M. Arthur Le Roy did not look at it in a serious light. He said to Meo in a whisper : 118 ROUGE ET NO I It. " Xobodv but a German coukl ever think of baptizing wine with a name so absurd ! It seems to me tlia't Ger- many is painted to tlie life in this mixture of wine, love, and milk. Liehfrauenmikh ! I've been in love occa- sionally, as La Fontaine says ; but I '11 be hanged if I 'd ever hanker after tasting Liehfraueniidlrh at its natural source ! " jNIr. Wreck dinetl in I'ront of Mr. Plum. The Eng- lishman ordered a bottle of claret ; the American did the same. Plum immediately considered it a point of honor to call for a bottle of Chamhertin.. Wreck at once accepted the challenge; he also drank a bottle of Chamhertin. Plum replied by a bottle of Champagne. Wreck drank a bottle of Champagne, too, without wink- ing. When the others rose from the table, each of the two rivals was trying to empty a flask of Tokay. Plura_ had inscribed himself in the register as "Sir Thomas Plum." Wreck signed himself" Count George Wreck." All retired to bed at an early hour. Plum slept under the dinner-table. Wreck, from national pride, slept on it. The two hundred guests of the Righi, scattered through their little rooms, were just beginning to snore in unison, when a mighty voice was heard thundering through the house, shaking it to its very foundation. It was M. Bitterlin who, with a tricolored silk hand- kerchief for a night-cap, was exclaiming to the German chambermaid : " Yes, yes, you don't understand a word of French. Go off, then, and tell a servant that does, to come here immediately and make my bed over again !" BADEN. 119 CHAPTER VIII. BADEN. THE Swiss tour lasted two weeks, over lakes and mountains, under the generalship of M. Bitterlin. The little caravan, augmented by a few intruders of no consequence, admired in succession the beautiful meadow-lands, the glorious old forests, the sunrises and the rain-storms, the waterfalls and the glaciers. They gathered a few bouquets of Alp-roses. Meo even took courage to present one to the Captain, who put it into his pocket, with a dry " thank you." They met no chamois, ate no beefsteak of bear ; nor did they ascend Mont Blanc for the pleasure of seeing the wrong side of the clouds, which has a singular resemblance to the right side. They stopped twice a day in hotels that were delightfully clean ; they took good meals off tables of snowy whiteness and fragrant odor ; they slept in beds of incomparable comfort. The traveller who travels for the sake of travelling, that is to say, to eat well, to journey comfortably, and to rest at night with- out being tired in the morning, should give the prefer- ence to Switzerland. Even the Captain himself ac- knowledged this, whenever he happened not to be in a bad humor. All the towns they went through resem- bled each other more or less. They are of all sizes : some big, some little, some overhanging the Rhine, some seated on the shore of a blue lake. They contain many new houses and some old churches, stylish build- ings of equivocal taste, varied horizons, rapid waters, 120 ROUGE ET NOIR. autl j)oivcUiiii ])ipes. Every time tliat the caravan passed before a pretty cottage embosomed in gardens, Meo turned back his head, and always met Emma's respon- sive ghince. Young Madame Miiring did better : she made her husband put his head out of the window and kissed him outside the carriage. Poor Meo ! He had not even the consohition of rubbing his moustache against the Captain's. One day, however, he came very near possessing the happiness he had been so long dreaming about. It was at Schaffhauscu before the Falls of the Rhine. The Captain, who despised beaten paths, ventured too near the edge and lost his footing. " At last ! " thought Meo, and oif he dashed to save his fatlier-in-law. But his zeal carried him too far — a little beyond the branch which M. Bitterlin had grasped. So the savior had the mortification of being saved himself by the very man to whose assistance he had run ; and when he tried to express his gratitude, he was told that for such fool- hardiness he richly deserved to have broken his neck. As he was brushing the dust oif in a corner in a very melancholy manner, M. Arthur Le Roy, his faithful confederate, joined him, saying: "My poor fellow, you're too awkward to live. Two chances ! and to lose them both ! " "Two?" "Yes, two: a good one and a middling one. First, you had the chance of seizing the old gentleman by the arm and restoring him to his fellow-citizens. This, however, I consider only a middling chance, seeing that old Bitterlin will never prove anything else than an im- possible father-in-law. Secondly, you had the chance BADEN. 121 of seizing him only by the wig, and this I consider the good one." — " Why so ?" — " Why, the wig would have remained in your hands, the Captain would have gone headforemost fishing for trout, and then you could marry his daughter, who would feel that that was the least re- turn she could make you." Meo answered with a heavy sigh : " You take nothing seriously." " I don't ! I certainly treat the situation with all the gravity it admits of And, look here! to show how willing I am to serve you, I am going to carry you off to-day." " You 're leaving us then ! " " O gracious, yes ; I 'm starting off, horse and foot. It seems the bank down there in Baden is just now in fine bleeding humor. They talk about an Austrian who burst it two or three times one day." "Well?" " Well, I 'm going to enter the lists in my turn, and my battle-cry shall be, ' Saute pour Le Roy ! ' Allow me my little joke. Ha! ha! ha!" " But what shall become of me if you go ? " " Why, you 're coming with me ! Listen. I 'm no longer a schoolboy, I know the world a little, and I want no spectacles to see what a man has in his bag. Your old Bitterlin is a bear of the bad kind, of the kind they don't tame. For the last two weeks you have been stroking him on the back, saying, ' Poor fellow ! good fellow ! ' What have you gained by it ? " " Well, he is rather familiar with me ; he snubs me a little, and gives me an occasional hard rap on the knuckles : that counts for something, you know." 11 122 EOUOEETXOIR. " Push on, keep moving! as somebody says. At that rate you '11 begin to have a chance somewhere about 1958." " No matter, I can't leave her. I '11 follow her to the last. And then, who knows ? perhaps M. Bitterlin will be moved with my perseverance. What if every- thing he does is only done just to try me?" " You might as well say that the cannon-balls plunge through the ranks only just to try the soldiers. The man is a brute : if you don't like the word, we will only say he is brutified. Pie don't like you ; he don't like his daughter ; he likes nothing in the world, not even the trout ; and if you ever get anything out of him, it won't be by attacking him on his sentimental side. I have said my say." " But, in the name of heaven, how should I attack him then ? " "How the deuce can I tell you? I don't know any- thing about the handling of hedgehogs. My education, you see, has in some points been very much neglected ! " Such were the last consolations that Meo received from his friend. Towards the end of breakfast, M. Le Roy announced his intention of starting immediately for Baden. The Captain replied, quite graciously : " Pleasant journey, gentlemen." " But," stammered Meo, " we are not going — excuse me — the gentleman is going alone — however, if there is no objection — " " What difference does it make to us ? " replied the Captain. " Every one for himself in travelling. The gentleman has his business, he goes to his business ; others do nothing at all ; well, then, let them do as they please ! " BADEN. 123 "Oh! as for that matter," said the Parisian, " my business is very simple. I 'm going to pay ten thou- sand francs to a worthy man who won't trouble me with a receipt. It is the fashion in Paris. Since the dis- covery of California, Australia, and all kinds of coun- tries ending in ia, gold arrives in such abundance, that we no longer know where to stow it. It incommodes us, it wearies us, it tears our pockets, it gives our hands the fidgets. There's no standing it, on my word of honor ! What do we do then ? We go to Baden for the waters, and we come away perfectly cured." M. Bitterlin's brow grew as black as night. " You are a gambler?" said he. "I should have readily believed that of many other people, — of this gentleman for instance, — but never of you. As for me, Vv'henever I am asked to take a hand, it has been always ray uni- form habit to reply, ' I 'm neither poor enough to be in want of your money, nor rich enough to make you a present of mine.' " " But, sir, I have had rich uncles enough to make me win without pleasure and lose without regret. I com- menced at Paris by playing cards among a set of rich young fellows. It is well understood that when friends have dined together, the best way to get sober again is by exchanging bits of painted pasteboard. This kind of soda-water cost me a good deal more than the apothecary's. Sometimes I lost, sometimes I won ; but as there were ladies always in the party, I generally got home without a cent, tired out with a stupid night, my nails dirty, ray head heavy, and my face sallow. I slept next day till five o'clock in the afternoon, endless ghosts of Right Bowers and Left Bowers fluttering 124 ROUGE ETNOIK. arouncl my pillow. After two or three years of practice of this kind, which had gained for me no enviable repu- tation, I at last formed quite an heroic resolution. I dug a channel for my vice. Gaming cost me on an average five hundred napoleons a year, without counting health, reputation, temjier, and all my friends, whom I never saw again because I lent them money. I find it prefer- able every way to lose ten thousand francs once a year at Baden : it is less compromising, less tiresome, more healthy, and sooner over. I am always sure that the Bank has no trumps hid away in his sleeve, and I 'm perfectly certain that he won't borrow twenty-five louis of me to pay for a carriage at six o'clock in the morn- ing. If, in spite of every impossibility, I should happen to win, I can pocket the stakes without shame, and without the consciousness of carrying: off the bread be- longing to some poor family. The Bank is a bodiless Personage; you can swoop on fifty thousand of his francs at Rouge et Noir without being afraid of hearing next day that he has blown his brains out. If, on the* contrary, it is the Bank that snaps up my money, there 's no danger of any one going to brag about it in the four quarters of Paris, and destroying ray credit by asserting that I 'm ruined. These are my reasons." " What, sir ! " replied the Captain, " you are young, intelligent, well-bred, far better bred than this gentle- man for instance, and yet you 've got no better way to spend your time and money than that? You should try to do something ! Yes, confound it, you should do something ! " "Alas! sir, ray studies don't qualify rac to be a ma- chinist, a hatter, nor a professor in the Sorbonne. I BADEN. 125 miglit Indeed have begged for some government employ- ment, as well as any other fool that dances attendance in the ante-chambers of the administration. Bat no, thank you, that kind of sport don't suit me ; it is too uncer- tain. I might have gambled in the stocks, and so I Avould too, only I could never learn the rules of the game. Besides, at such a play I could easily lose more than I 'm worth, and I should not be pleased to find my honor gone with the rest some fine morning. At last, my only resource left was to get married. But of all gambling speculations, perhaps the very worst is matri- mony. Not only is it likely that you don't win the prize you want, but the great probability is that you do win the prize you don't want, and that for a lifetime too ! So then. Captain, that is the reason why I invite you to drink a glass of Chartreuse to the good city of Baden and to M. Benazet, its prophet." " You '11 excuse me," said the Captain. " My opin- ions on the subject are unalterable, and with heart and soul do I support the noble idea of the statesman who succeeded in putting down public gambling in Paris." "Of course! He did well! Who maintains the contrary ? Paris is swarming with young men, who are continually carrying backwards and forwards bags of money for their employers. If we still had a " 113" or a " Frascati" these poor fellows would come back empty-handed, and France could never get galleys enough to lodge them comfortably. But Baden is a hundred and fifty leagues from Paris ; it costs something to get there, something to lodge there, something to eat twice a day there ; and when a man has the means 11* 120 ROUGE ET NOIR. of supporting all this expense, the green table does him very little harm in relieving him of his extra money." The Captain blew his nose with great solemnity, and then replied : *' You have no difficulty in expressing yourself, sir. You and your friend here belong to a society that is destined to come to a bad end some day or other by its love for paradox. But an officer arrived at my age never denies the principles that have been his guide through life. Gaming, like every other means of ac- quiring riches without labor, is in itself morally wrong. I have forbidden it to my subalterns and my soldiers, I have forbidden it to myself, and I would sooner re- nounce the name of Bitterlin forever than deviate one jot or tittle from the line that honor has traced out for me. ' Strait-laced ' and ' innocent ' as much as you like ! But it is with strait-laced innocents like me that Lycur- gus the Spartan conquered the world ! " " But did he conquer the world ? " "Yes, sir, of course he did. I shall not have the pleasure of seeing you again at Baden. That locality had been included in my route, but now that you have acquainted me with the kind of life led there, Baden will have to provide means to do without my pres- ence ! " Little Madame Moring, who seldom spoke to any one but her husband, now exclaimed loudly against such a resolution. " My good gracious ! then, sir, you 're very wrong," said she. "Before I married my dear Fritz, I spent a season at Baden, and I never so much as heard one word spoken about play. It is a delightful country, BADEHr. 127 shady, sylvan, verdant, poetic as one of our Gessner's idyls. You meet the best society in Germany there ; aulic councillors, canon esses of noble blood, knights of the Eed Eagle, and even reigning Highnesses. Half of our time was passed in excursions through the Black Forest, in picnics up in the Old Castle, at the ' Bear,' or at the ^Horn;' the rest went in concerts, horse- races, balls, and plays. We had French actors, and pieces written expressly for us by the first authors of Paris. I spent three months there, and the only play- ing I ever saw was at the theatre or the opera." She finished her little speech suifused with blushes, and kissed her husband's hand to keep herself in coun- tenance. "Madame tells the truth," replied M. Le Roy. "Nine-tenths of the travellers who lose their money at Baden are attracted there by such baits. The landscapes of the Black Forest, — baits ! The Highnesses of Ger- many, — baits ! Eaces, hunts, plays, concerts, — baits, baits, baits! I have remarked that all the walks in the Park sloped down gently towards the green table in the Conversations Haus. I have met Highnesses out promenading, and, without thinking of it, they led me straight to the roulette-table. I have run a steeple- chase in a puce-colored jacket, and even wou a prize of two thousand francs ; but I was not long in losing it back again, and twi-ce as much besides, at Rouge et Noir. I only just changed my dress, and, presto! my money had changed masters. Our artists go there to draw the public from other resorts, but they are requested to sing false so as to send their audience to the gaming-table. Our celebrated authors write plays for Baden, but they 128 BOUOE ET NOIR. are ordered to make them as tiresome as possible, so that the crowds, attracted by the name, are repelled by the piece. Now and then a stag is hunted in the Black Forest, but still, with a sharp eye for business, the beast is hardly cold before the hunters are shelled out. For my part, however, I don't complain, for I know very •well what I 'm going to do at Baden. It is not the bait that draws me there but the hook." " Yes," added M. INIori ng, with a keen, quiet smile. " Great is the difference between the country we are in and the country we are going to. Excuse me, if I express myself badly in a language not my own. It seems to me that Mother Switzerland is a good, stout old lady, who gives us plenty to eat and drink in a splendid hotel, where the wall-jiaper is painted with moun- tains, waterfalls, and chalets. She is the widow, she says, of a celebrated man that nobody has ever seen, and whose very existence is contested ; still she puts his por- trait on every chimney-piece in the house, an apple in one of his hands, and a bow in the other. You are not com- pelled to believe everything she chooses to tell about the deceased ; but as she is a kind, good soul, and has treated you well, you kiss her on both cheeks at parting, and you promise to yourself to return. As for Mademoiselle Baden, she is a young lady, very brilliant, very well dressed ; she rides on horseback, she hunts, she dances, she sings, she acts comedy, all in the perfection of fash- !ion; but she makes free with her friends' purses and sends them away empty-handed. She is, however, none the less pretty for all that." The conversation now became general, as usually hap- pens at a tabic d'hote when one of the guests has begun BADEX. 129 to speak aloud. Out of the twenty-two persons who breakfasted together that morning at the Falls of the Rhine, fourteen had become acquainted with Baden by- losing money there. These competent judges unani- mously decided, that to avoid Baden was easy enough, but that, once there, a saint himself would be compelled by iron necessity to empty his pockets. " Yes, sir," said M. Moriug to the Captain, " you do well to change your route. However great may be your firmness, it would bend like an iron rod in the furnace. I '11 not cite you my own personal experience, for when- ever I had to pass through Baden, I always provided myself beforehand with an extra sum for roulette. But here's a little anecdote which may perhaps aid you somewhat in your reflections. A pastor of my country, the venerable M. Leuckel, went to Baden in 1854, to collect materials for a great sermon against gambling. He was accompanied by his wife and his two daughters. I saw the whole four of them myself, the second day after their arrival, with a little card in' one hand and a pin in the other, seated around the Rouge et Noir table. Tlie little family had already lost as much as fifteen hundred florins." "And the sermon?" asked M. Le Roy. " I heard it the following winter. It was magnifi- cent, sir. It moved the whole audience to tears, par- ticularly Madame Leuckel." " What does all that prove ? " observed the Captain, roughly. " Just that your pastor was no man of prin- ciple. Now," he added, modestly lowering his voice, " I am a man of principle — " " But even the just man falls seven times a day." 130 ROUGE ET NOIR. "Never in tlie regiment, sir. What authority could I liave exercised over my men, if I had not always preached by example? There's no better preacher liv- ing than an officer without a fault, as I flatter myself I have been, I know all kinds of games, and I am even a pretty keen hand at them. At piquet, at dominoes, at billiards, the very best of you might find me an ugly customer ; but nobody can boast of having ever seen me win or lose anything, not even so much as a glass of absinthe or a cup of coffee ! " "No matter for that," said M. Le Roy, "you do well to keep clear of Baden. The best means of avoiding sin is to fly from temptation." " What temptation ? For me it would be no tempta- tion whatever ! — " Loud expressions of dissent came from all sides. "No," he resumed, "not the least temptation in the world, and here's my proof. I will continue my route the same as if nothing had happened. I will go straight to Baden. I will pass a whole day at the gaming-table with money in my pockets, and you will see if I ven- ture even a ten-cent piece." " Will you take a bet on it?" " No, sir. In the first place, it would be robbing you of your money ; and in the second place, I am a man of principle, and betting is gambling." The Captain spoke so loud and with such decision, that public opinion veered round a little. M. Le Roy certainly was a little too generous in handing his own failin