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 LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OP 
 CALIFORNIA 
 SAN 0IE6O
 
 V3
 
 H. DE BALZAC 
 
 COMEDIE HUMAINE 
 
 Edited by 
 GEORGE SAINTSBURY 
 
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 All rights reserved
 
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 H; DE BALZAC 
 
 ^ THE 
 
 ATHEIST'S MASS 
 
 AND OTHER STORIES 
 
 {La Messe de r Athee) 
 
 Translated by 
 
 CLARA BELL 
 
 loUh a Preface by 
 
 GEORGE SAINTSBURY 
 
 LONDON 
 J. M. DENT AND COMPANY 
 
 NEW YORK : MACMILLAN &' CO., LTD, 
 MDCCCXCVI
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PREFACE 
 
 7 HE ATHEIST'S MASS .... 
 
 HONORINE 
 
 COLONEL CHABERT .... 
 7HE COMMISSION IN LUNACY (Vlnterdiction) 
 PIERRE GRASSOU .... 
 
 PAGE 
 
 xi 
 
 21 
 109 
 182 
 267
 
 LIST OF ETCHINGS 
 
 THIS AUDACIOUS SCOFFER KNEELING HUMBLY . . Frontispiece 
 
 PAGE 
 
 I COULD NOT TIRE OF ADMIRING HER AS SHE SHAPED 
 A FLOWER FROM THE MATERIALS SORTED BEFORE 
 HER ....... 73 
 
 ' CURSE THE MONEY ! TO THINK 1 HAVEn't GOT 
 
 any!' ....... 142 
 
 Drawn and Etched by T). Murray-Smitli.
 
 PREFACE 
 
 The volume which has its chief constituent in Honorine 
 contains some of the author's very best w^ork ; indeed, it 
 contains very Httle that is much below his best. The 
 opening story — with its bold statement that ' On trouve 
 partout quelque chose de meilleur que I'Angleterre 
 [which, be it remembered, M. Honore de Balzac had 
 never seen] tandis qu'il est excessivement difficile de 
 retrouver loin de la France les charmes de la France ' — 
 may draw a smile from Englishmen. But just as it is only 
 a very fooHsh lover who finds fault with any one else for 
 preferring the charms of his own love, so it is only a very 
 weak-minded and weak-kneed patriot who questions the 
 idolatry of a patriotism that is not his own. For the 
 rest, Honorine contains some of Balzac's profoundest 
 observations, better stated than is usual, or at least in- 
 variable, with him. The best of all are certain axioms, 
 disputed rather than disputable, as to the difference of 
 men's and women's love. The book suffers to some 
 extent from that artistic fault of the recitation, rather 
 than the story proper, to which he was so prone, and 
 perhaps a little from the other proneness — so constantly 
 to be noted in any complete critique of him — to exagge- 
 rate and idealise good as well as ill. But it is, as his 
 abomination Sainte-Beuve said of another matter, an essai 
 noble ; and it is not, as Sainte-Beuve also said of that
 
 Xll 
 
 Preface 
 
 matter which had nothing to do with Balzac, an essai 
 pale. 
 
 Le Colonel Chahert^ which would well have deserved a 
 place in those Scenes de la Vie Militaire^ so scantily repre- 
 sented in the Comedie^ has other attractions. It reminds 
 us of Balzac's sojourn in the tents of Themis, and of 
 the knowledge that he brought therefrom j it gives an 
 example of his affection for the idee fixe^ for the man 
 with a mania ; and it is also no inconsiderable example 
 of his pathos. 
 
 But it, in like wise with Honorine^ must give way to 
 the two tales which follow, and which, by the common 
 consent of competent judges, practically take rank, though 
 in very different ways, with the novelist's very best work. 
 Of the two. La Afesse de PJthee is the greatest. Its 
 extreme brevity makes it almost impossible for the author 
 to indulge in those digressions from which he never could 
 entirely free himself when he allowed himself much room. 
 We do not hear more of the inward character of Desplein 
 than is necessary to make us appreciate the touching 
 history which is the centre of the anecdote ; the thing 
 in general could not be presented at greater advantage 
 than it is. Nor in itself could it be much, if at all, 
 better. As usual, it is more or less of a personal con- 
 fession. Balzac, it must always be remembered, was 
 himself pretty definitely 'on the side of the angels.' As 
 a Frenchman, as a man with a strong eighteenth-century 
 tincture in him, as a student of Rabelais, as one not too 
 much given to regard nature and fate through rose- 
 coloured spectacles, as a product of more or less godless 
 education (for his school-days came before the neo- 
 catholic revival), and in manv other ways, he was not
 
 Preface xiii 
 
 exactly an orthodox person. But he had no ideas foreign 
 to orthodoxy; and neither in his novels, nor in his letters, 
 nor elsewhere, would it be possible to find a private ex- 
 pression of unbelief And such a story as this is worth 
 a bookseller's warehouse full of tracts, coming as it does 
 from Honore de Balzac. 
 
 U Interdiction is sufficiently different, but it is almost 
 equally good in its own way. It is indeed impossible to 
 say that there is not in the manner, though perhaps there 
 may be none in the fact, of the Marquis d'Espard's resti- 
 tution and the rest of it a Httle touch of the madder side 
 of Quixotism ; and one sees all the speculative and planning 
 Balzac in that notable scheme of the great work on 
 China, which brought in far, far more, I fear, than any 
 work on China ever has or is likely to bring in to its 
 devisers. But the conduct of Popinot, in his interview 
 with the Marquise, is really admirable. The great scenes 
 of fictitious finesse do not always ' come off' ; we do not 
 invariably find ourselves experiencing that sense of the 
 ability of his characters which the novelist appears to 
 entertain, and expects us to entertain likewise. But this 
 is admirable ; it is, with Charles de Bernard's Le Gendre^ 
 perhaps the very best thing of the kind to be found any- 
 where. And it is thoroughly well framed in what 
 comes before and after ; nor is it, as is too common in 
 Balzac, spoilt by intrusion or accumulation of things 
 irrelevant. These two stories, U Interdiction and La 
 Messe de P Jthee^ would, if they existed entirely by 
 themselves, and if we knew nothing else of their author's, 
 and nothing else about him, suffice to show any intelli- 
 gent critic that genius of no ordinary kind had passed by 
 there.
 
 XIV 
 
 Preface 
 
 Pierre Grassou is much slighter and smaller ; it is 
 not even on a level with Honorine or Le Colonel Chabert. 
 But it is good in itself j it is very characteristic of its 
 time, and it is specially happy as giving the volume a 
 touch of comedy, which is grateful, and which makes it 
 as a whole rather superior to most of Balzac's volumes, — 
 volumes apt to be ' fagoted ' rather than composed. 
 The figure of the ^iVXASt-bourgeois^ neither Bohemian nor 
 buveur tfeau^ is excellently hit off, and the thing leaves us 
 with all the sense of a pleasant afterpiece. 
 
 Honorine was rather a late book. It appeared in 
 La Presse in the spring of 1 843 with a motto from 
 Mademoiselle de Adaupin^ and in six headless chapters ; a 
 year later it was published in two volumes by Potter, with 
 forty headed chapters or sections ; and in 1845 it took 
 rank in the Scenes de la Vie Privee and the Comedie. It 
 was then, as it is now, accompanied by the three tales 
 which follow it here, though they do not in the Edition 
 Definitive. Le Colonel Chabet't is a capital example of 
 Balzac's mania for ' pulling about ' his stories. It is as 
 old as the spring of 1832, when it appeared in the Artiste 
 with the title of La Transaction^ and in four parts. Before 
 the year was out it formed part of a collection of tales 
 called Le Salmigondis^ but was now called Le Comte 
 Chabert. In 1835 it became a Sc}ne de la Vie Parisienne 
 (the Comedie was not yet) as La Comtesse a deux 
 Afarisj and in three parts. It was shifted to the Vie 
 Privee afterwards, with its present title and no divisions ; 
 and Balzac, for some reason, altered the date from 1832 
 to 1840 in the text. La Messe de r Athee appeared 
 first in the Chronique de Paris for January 4, 1836 ; next 
 year joined the other Etudes Philosophiques ; and in 1844
 
 Preface 
 
 XV 
 
 the Vie Privee and the Comedie. V Interdiction^ making its 
 bow in the same year and the same paper, was earlier 
 separated from the Etudes Philosophiques to be a Scene de 
 la Vie Parisienne. Pierre Grassou was first printed in a 
 miscellany named Babel in the year 1840, was republished 
 with Pierrette in the same year, and joined the ' Maison 
 de Balzac' in 1844. 
 
 G. S.
 
 THE ATHEIST'S MASS 
 
 This is dedicated to August e Borget by his friend 
 De Balzac 
 
 BiANCHON, a physician to whom science owes a fine 
 system of theoretical physiology, and who, while still 
 young, made himself a celebrity in the medical school of 
 Paris, that central luminary to which European doctors do 
 homage, practised surgery for a long time before he took 
 up medicine. His earliest studies were guided by one of 
 the greatest of French surgeons, the illustrious Desplein, 
 who flashed across science like a meteor. By the con- 
 sensus even of his enemies, he took with him to the tomb 
 an incommunicable method. Like all men of genius, he 
 had no heirs ; he carried everything in him, and carried 
 it away with him. The glory of a surgeon is like that 
 of an actor : they live only so long as they are alive, and 
 their talent leaves no trace when they are gone. Actors 
 and surgeons, like great singers too, like the executants 
 who by their performance increase the power of music 
 tenfold, are all the heroes of a moment. 
 
 Desplein is a case in proof of this resemblance in the 
 destinies of such transient genius. His name, yesterday 
 so famous, to-day almost forgotten, will survive in his 
 special department without crossing its limits. For must 
 there not be some extraordinary circumstances to exalt 
 the name of a professor from the history of Science to 
 the general history of the human race ? Had Desplein 
 that universal command of knowledge which makes a 
 
 A
 
 2 The Atheist's Mass 
 
 man the living word, the great figure of his age ? 
 Desplein had a godlike eye ; he saw into the sufferer 
 and his malady by an intuition, natural or acquired, 
 which enabled him to grasp the diagnostics peculiar to 
 the individual, to determine the very time, the hour, 
 the minute when an operation should be performed, 
 making due allowance for atmospheric conditions and 
 peculiarities of individual temperament. To proceed thus, 
 hand in hand with nature, had he then studied the constant 
 assimilation by living beings, of the elements contained 
 in the atmosphere, or yielded by the earth to man who 
 absorbs them, deriving from them a particular expression 
 of life ? Did he work it all out by the power of deduc- 
 tion and analogy, to which we owe the genius of Cuvier ? 
 Be this as it may, this man was in all the secrets of the 
 human frame ; he knew it in the past and in the future, 
 emphasising the present. 
 
 But did he epitomise all science in his own person as 
 Hippocrates did and Galen and Aristotle ? Did he guide 
 a whole school towards new worlds ? No. Though it 
 is impossible to deny that this peristent observer of human 
 chemistry possessed the antique science of the Mages, 
 that is to say, knowledge of the elements in fusion, the 
 causes of life, life antecedent to life, and what it must be 
 in its incubation or ever it /V, it must be confessed that, 
 unfortunately, everything in him was purely personal. 
 Isolated during his life by his egoism, that egoism is now 
 suicidal of his glory. On his tomb there is no proclaim- 
 ing statue to repeat to posterity the mysteries which 
 genius seeks out at its own cost. 
 
 But perhaps Desplein's genius was answerable for his 
 beliefs, and for that reason mortal. To him the terres- 
 trial atmosphere was a generative envelope ; he saw the 
 earth as an egg within its shell ; and not being able to 
 determine whether the egg or the hen first was, he 
 would not recognise either the cock or the egg. He 
 believed neither in the antecedent animal nor the surviv-
 
 The Atheist's Mass 3 
 
 ing spirit of man. Desplein had no doubts ; he was 
 positive. His bold and unqualified atheism was like that 
 of many scientific men, the best men in the world, but 
 invincible atheists — atheists such as religious people de- 
 clare to be impossible. This opinion could scarcely exist 
 otherwise in a man who was accustomed from his youth 
 to dissect the creature above all others — before, during, 
 and after life; to hunt through all his organs without 
 ever finding the individual soul, which is indispensable to 
 religious theory. When he detected a cerebral centre, a 
 nervous centre, and a centre for aerating the blood — the 
 two first so perfectly complementary that in the latter years 
 of his life he came to a conviction that the sense of hear- 
 ing is not absolutely necessary for hearing, nor the sense 
 of sight for seeing, and that the solar plexus could supply 
 their place without any possibility of doubt — Desplein, thus 
 finding two souls in man, confirmed his atheism by this 
 fact, though it is no evidence against God. This man 
 died, it is said, in final impenitence, as do, unfortunately, 
 many noble geniuses, whom God may forgive. 
 
 The life of this man, great as he was, was marred by 
 many meannesses, to use the expression employed by his 
 enemies, who were anxious to diminish his glory, but 
 which it would be more proper to call apparent con- 
 tradictions. Envious people and fools, having no know- 
 ledge of the determinations by which superior spirits are 
 moved, seize at once on superficial inconsistencies, to 
 formulate an accusation and so to pass sentence on them. 
 If, subsequently, the proceedings thus attacked are 
 crowned with success, showing the correlation of the 
 preliminaries and the results, a few of the vanguard of 
 calumnies always survive. In our own day, for in- 
 stance. Napoleon was condemned by our contemporaries 
 when he spread his eagle's wings to alight in England : 
 only 1822 could explain 1804 and the flat boats at 
 Boulogne. 
 
 As, in Desplein, his glory and science were invulner-
 
 4 The Atheist's Mass 
 
 able, his enemies attacked his odd moods and his temper, 
 whereas, in fact, he was simply characterised by what the 
 English call eccentricity. Sometimes very handsomely 
 dressed, like Crebillon the tragical, he would suddenly 
 affect extreme indifference as to what he wore ; he was 
 sometimes seen in a carriage, and sometimes on foot. By 
 turns rough and kind, harsh and covetous on the surface, 
 but capable of offering his whole fortune to his exiled 
 masters — who did him the honour of accepting it for a 
 few days — no man ever gave rise to such contradictory 
 judgments. Although to obtain a black ribbon, which 
 physicians ought not to intrigue for, he was capable of 
 dropping a prayer-book out of his pocket at Court, in his 
 heart he mocked at everything ; he had a deep contempt 
 for men, after studying them from above and below, after 
 detecting their genuine expression when performing the 
 most solemn and the meanest acts of their lives. 
 
 The qualities of a great man are often federative. If 
 among these colossal spirits one has more talent than 
 wit, his wit is still superior to that of a man of whom it 
 is simply stated that 'he is witty.' Genius always pre- 
 supposes moral insight. This insight may be applied to 
 a special subject ; but he who can see a flower must be 
 able to see the sun. The man who on hearing a 
 diplomate he had saved ask, ' How is the Emperor ? ' 
 could say, 'The courtier is alive ; the man will follow ! ' 
 — that man is not merely a surgeon or a physician, he is 
 prodigiously witty also. Hence a patient and diligent 
 student of human nature will admit Desplein's exorbitant 
 pretensions, and believe — as he himself believed — that he 
 might have been no less great as a minister than he was 
 as a surgeon. 
 
 Among the riddles which Desplein's life presents to 
 many of his contemporaries, we have chosen one of the 
 most interesting, because the answer is to be found at 
 the end of the narrative, and will avenge him for some 
 foolish charges.
 
 The Atheist's Mass 5 
 
 Of all the students in Desplein's hospital, Horace 
 Bianchon was one of those to whom he most warmly- 
 attached himself. Before being a house surgeon at the 
 Hotel-Dieu, Horace Bianchon had been a medical student 
 lodging in a squalid boarding-house in the ^uartier 
 Latin^ known as the Maison Vauquer. This poor 
 young man had felt there the gnawing of that burning 
 poverty which is a sort of crucible from which great talents 
 are to emerge as pure and incorruptible as diamonds, which 
 may be subjected to any shock without being crushed. 
 In the fierce fire of their unbridled passions they acquire 
 the most impeccable honesty, and get into the habit of 
 fighting the battles which await genius with the constant 
 work by which they coerce their cheated appetites. 
 
 Horace was an upright young fellow, incapable of 
 tergiversation on a matter of honour, going to the point 
 without waste of words, and as ready to pledge his cloak 
 for a friend as to give him his time and his night hours. 
 Horace, in short, was one of those friends who are never 
 anxious as to what they may get in return for what they 
 give, feeling sure that they will in their turn get more 
 than they give. Most of his friends felt for him that 
 deeply-seated respect which is inspired by unostentatious 
 virtue, and many of them dreaded his censure. But 
 Horace made no pedantic display of his qualities. He 
 was neither a puritan nor a preacher ; he could swear 
 with a grace as he gave his advice, and was always ready 
 for a jollification when occasion offered. A jolly com- 
 panion, not more prudish than a trooper, as frank and 
 outspoken — not as a sailor, for nowadays sailors are wily 
 diplomates- — but as an honest man who has nothing in 
 his life to hide, he walked with his head erect, and a 
 mind content. In short, to put the facts into a word, 
 Horace was the Pylades of more than one Orestes — 
 creditors being regarded as the nearest modern equivalent 
 to the Furies of the ancients. 
 
 He carried his poverty with the cheerfulness which is
 
 6 The Atheist's Mass 
 
 perhaps one of the chief elements of courage, and, Hke 
 all people who have nothing, he made very few debts. 
 As sober as a camel and active as a stag, he was steadfast 
 in his ideas and his conduct. 
 
 The happy phase of Bianchon's life began on the day 
 when the famous surgeon had proof of the qualities and the 
 defects which, these no less than those, make Doctor Horace 
 Bianchon doubly dear to his friends. When a leading 
 clinical practitioner takes a young man to his bosom, that 
 young man has, as they say, his foot in the stirrup, 
 Desplein did not fail to take Bianchon as his assistant 
 to wealthy houses, where some complimentary fee almost 
 always found its way into the student's pocket, and where 
 the mysteries of Paris life were insensibly revealed to the 
 young provincial ; he kept him at his side when a con- 
 sultation was to be held, and gave him occupation ; 
 sometimes he would send him to a watering-place with 
 a rich patient ; in fact, he was making a practice for 
 him. The consequence was that in the course of time 
 the Tyrant of surgery had a devoted ally. These two 
 men — one at the summit of honour and of his science, 
 enjoying an immense fortune and an immense reputation ; 
 the other a humble Omega, having neither fortune nor 
 fame — became intimate friends. 
 
 The great Desplein told his house surgeon everything ; 
 the disciple knew whether such or such a woman had sat 
 on a chair near the master, or on the famous couch in 
 Desplein's surgery, on which he slept ; Bianchon knew 
 the mysteries of that temperament, a compound of the 
 lion and the bull, which at last expanded and enlarged 
 beyond measure the great man's torso, and caused his 
 death by degeneration of the heart. He studied the 
 eccentricities of that busy life, the schemes of that sordid 
 avarice, the hopes of the politician who lurked behind the 
 man of science ; he was able to foresee the mortifications 
 that awaited the only sentiment that lay hid in a heart 
 that was steeled, but not of steel.
 
 The Atheist's Mass 7 
 
 One day Bianchon spoke to Desplein of a poor water- 
 carrier of the Saint-Jacques district, who had a horrible 
 disease caused by fatigue and want ; this wretched 
 Auvergnat had had nothing but potatoes to eat during 
 the dreadful winter of 1821. Desplein left all his visits, 
 and at the risk of killing his horse, he rushed off, followed 
 by Bianchon, to the poor man's dwelling, and saw, him- 
 self, to his being removed to a sick house, founded by the 
 famous Dubois in the Faubourg Saint-Denis. Then he 
 went to attend the man, and when he had cured him he 
 gave him the necessary sum to buy a horse and a water- 
 barrel. This Auvergnat distinguished himself by an 
 amusing action. One of his friends fell ill, and he took 
 him at once to Desplein, saying to his benefactor, ' I 
 could not have borne to let him go to any one else ! ' 
 
 Rough customer as he was, Desplein grasped the 
 water-carrier's hand, and said, ' Bring them all to me.' 
 
 He got the native of Cantal into the Hotel-Dieu, 
 where he took the greatest care of him. Bianchon had 
 already observed in his chief a predilection for Auvergnats, 
 and especially for water-carriers ; but as Desplein took a 
 sort of pride in his cures at the Hotel-Dieu, the pupil 
 saw nothing very strange in that. 
 
 One day, as he crossed the Place Saint-Sulpice, 
 Bianchon caught sight of his master going into the church 
 at about nine in the morning. Desplein, who at that 
 time never went a step without his cab, was on foot, and 
 slipped in by the door in the Rue du Petit-Lion, as if he 
 were stealing into some house of ill fame. The house 
 surgeon, naturally possessed by curiosity, knowing his 
 master's opinions, and being himself a rabid follower of 
 Cabanis [Cabaniste en dyahle^ with the y^ which in 
 Rabelais seems to convey an intensity of devilry) — 
 Bianchon stole into the church, and was not a little 
 astonished to see the great Desplein, the atheist, who 
 had no mercy on the angels — who give no work to the 
 lancet, and cannot suffer from fistula or gastritis — in short.
 
 8 The Atheist's Mass 
 
 this audacious scoffer kneeling humbly, and where ? 
 In the Lady Chapel, where he remained through the 
 mass, giving alms for the expenses of the service, alms for 
 the poor, and looking as serious as though he were superin- 
 tending an operation. 
 
 ' He has certainly not come here to clear up the 
 question of the Virgin's delivery,' said Bianchon to him- 
 self, astonished beyond measure. ' If I had caught him 
 holding one of the ropes of the canopy on Corpus Christi 
 day, it would be a thing to laugh at ; but at this hour, 
 alone, with no one to see — it is surely a thing to marvel 
 at ! ' 
 
 Bianchon did not wish to seem as though he were 
 spying the head surgeon of the Hotel-Dieu ; he went 
 away. As it happened, Desplein asked him to dine with 
 him that day, not at his own house, but at a restaurant. 
 At dessert Bianchon skilfully contrived to talk of the 
 mass, speaking of it as mummery and a farce. 
 
 ' A farce,' said Desplein, 'which has cost Christendom 
 more blood than all Napoleon's battles and all Broussais' 
 leeches. The mass is a papal invention, not older than 
 the sixth century, and based on the Hoc est corpus. 
 What floods of blood were shed to establish the Fete- 
 Dieu, the Festival of Corpus Christi — the institution by 
 which Rome established her triumph in the question of 
 the Real Presence, a schism which rent the Church during 
 three centuries ! The wars of the Count of Toulouse 
 against the Albigenses were the tail end of that dispute. 
 The Vaudois and the Albigenses refused to recognise this 
 innovation. 
 
 In short, Desplein was delighted to disport himself in 
 his most atheistical vein ; a flow of Voltairian satire, or, 
 to be accurate, a vile imitation of the Citateur. 
 
 ' Hallo ! where is my worshipper of this morning ? ' 
 said Bianchon to himself. 
 
 He said nothing ; he began to doubt whether he had 
 really seen his chief at Saint-Sulpice. Desplein would
 
 The Atheist's Mass 9 
 
 not have troubled himself to tell Bianchon a lie, they 
 knew each other too well ; they had already exchanged 
 thoughts on quite equally serious subjects, and discussed 
 systems de natura rerum^ probing or dissecting them with 
 the knife and scalpel of incredulity. 
 
 Three months went by. Bianchon did not attempt to 
 follow the matter up, though it remained stamped on his 
 memory. One day that year, one of the physicians of 
 the Hotel-Dieu took Desplein by the arm, as if to question 
 him, in Bianchon's presence. 
 
 'What were you doing at Saint-Sulpice, my dear 
 master ? ' said he. 
 
 ' I went to see a priest who has a diseased knee-bone, 
 and to whom the Duchesse d'Angouleme did me the 
 honour to recommend me,' said Desplein. 
 
 The questioner took this defeat for an answer ; not so 
 Bianchon. 
 
 ' Oh, he goes to see damaged knees in church ! — He 
 went to mass,' said the young man to himself. 
 
 Bianchon resolved to watch Desplein. He remembered 
 the day and hour when he had detected him going into 
 Saint-Sulpice, and resolved to be there again next year on 
 the same day and at the same hour, to see if he should 
 find him there again. In that case the periodicity ot 
 his devotions would justify a scientific investigation ; for 
 in such a man there ought to be no direct antagonism of 
 thought and action. 
 
 Next year, on the said day and hour, Bianchon, who 
 had already ceased to be Desplein's house surgeon, saw 
 the great man's cab standing at the corner of the Rue 
 de Tournon and the Rue du Petit-Lion, whence his 
 friend jesuitically crept along by the wall of Saint-Sulpice, 
 and once more attended mass in front of the Virgin's 
 altar. It was Desplein, sure enough ! The master- 
 surgeon, the atheist at heart, the worshipper by chance. 
 The mystery was greater than ever ; the regularity of 
 the phenomenon complicated it. When Desplein had
 
 lo The Atheist's Mass 
 
 left, Bianchon went to the sacristan, who took charge of 
 the chapel, and asked him whether the gentleman were a 
 constant worshipper. 
 
 ' For twenty years that I have been here,' replied the 
 man, ' M. Desplein has come four times a year to 
 attend this mass. He founded it.' 
 
 ' A mass founded by him ! ' said Bianchon, as he went 
 away. ' This is as great a mystery as the Immaculate 
 Conception- — an article which alone is enough to make 
 a physician an unbeliever.' 
 
 Some time elapsed before Doctor Bianchon, though so 
 much his friend, found an opportunity of speaking to 
 Desplein of this incident of his life. Though they met in 
 consultation, or in society, it was difficult to find an hour 
 of confidential solitude when, sitting with their feet on 
 the fire-dogs and their head resting on the back of an 
 arm-chair, two men tell each other their secrets. At 
 last, seven years later, after the Revolution of 1830, 
 when the mob invaded the Archbishop's residence, when 
 Republican agitators spurred them on to destroy the gilt 
 crosses which flashed like streaks of lightning in the 
 immensity of the ocean of houses ; when Incredulity 
 flaunted itself in the streets, side by side with Rebellion, 
 Bianchon once more detected Desplein going into Saint- 
 Sulpice. The doctor followed him, and knelt down by 
 him without the slightest notice or demonstration of 
 surprise from his friend. They both attended this mass of 
 his founding. 
 
 *WiIl you tell me, my dear fellow,' said Bianchon, as 
 they left the church, ' the reason for your fit of monkish- 
 
 ness ? I have caught you three times going to mass 
 
 You ! You must account to me for this mystery, 
 explain such a flagrant disagreement between your 
 opinions and your conduct. You do not believe in God, 
 and yet you attend mass ? My dear master, you are 
 bound to give me an answer.' 
 
 ' I am like a great many devout people, men who on
 
 The Atheist's Mass 1 1 
 
 the surface are deeply religious, but quite as much atheists 
 as you or I can be.' 
 
 And he poured out a torrent of epigrams on certain 
 political personages, of whom the best known gives us, 
 in this century, a new edition of Moliere's Tartufe. 
 
 *■ All that has nothing to do with my question,' retorted 
 Bianchon. ' I want to know the reason for what you 
 have just been doing, and why you founded this mass.' 
 
 ' Faith ! my dear boy,' said Desplein, ' I am on the 
 verge of the tomb ; I may safely tell you about the 
 beginning of my life.' 
 
 At this moment Bianchon and the great man were in 
 the Rue des Quatre-Vents, one of the worst streets in 
 Paris. Desplein pointed to the sixth floor of one of the 
 houses looking like obelisks, of which the narrow door 
 opens into a passage with a winding staircase at the end, 
 with windows appropriately termed 'borrowed lights' — or, 
 in French, y'oarj de souffrance. It was a greenish structure ; 
 the ground floor occupied by a furniture dealer, while each 
 floor seemed to shelter a different and independent form 
 of misery. Throwing up his arm with a vehement 
 gesture, Desplein exclaimed — 
 
 ' I lived up there for two years.' 
 
 ' I know ; Arthez lived there ; I went up there 
 almost every day during my first youth ; we used to call 
 it then the pickle-jar of great men ! What then ? ' 
 
 ' The mass I have just attended is connected with 
 some events which took place at the time when I lived in 
 the garret where you say Arthez lived ; the one with the 
 window where the clothes line is hanging with linen 
 over a pot of flowers. My early life was so hard, my 
 dear Bianchon, that I may dispute the palm of Paris 
 suffering with any man living. I have endured every- 
 thing : hunger and thirst, want of money, want of 
 clothes, of shoes, of linen, every cruelty that penury can 
 inflict. I have blown on my frozen fingers in that 
 pickle-jar of great men^ which I should like to see again,
 
 12 The Atheist's Mass 
 
 now, with you. I worked through a whole winter, 
 seeing my head steam, and perceiving the atmosphere 
 of my own moisture as we see that of horses on a frosty 
 day. I do not know where a man finds the fulcrum 
 that enables him to hold out against such a life. 
 
 ' I was alone, with no one to help me, no money to 
 buy books or to pay the expenses of my medical training ; 
 I had not a friend ; my irascible, touchy, restless temper 
 was against me. No one understood that this irritability 
 was the distress and toil of a man who, at the bottom of 
 the social scale, is struggling to reach the surface. Still, 
 I had, as I may say to you, before whom I need wear no 
 draperies, I had that ground-bed of good feeling and keen 
 sensitiveness which must always be the birthright of any 
 man who is strong enough to climb to any height what- 
 ever, after having long trampled in the bogs of poverty. 
 I could obtain nothing from my family, nor from my 
 home, beyond my inadequate allowance. In short, at 
 that time, I breakfasted off a roll which the baker in the 
 Rue du Petit-Lion sold me cheap because it was left from 
 yesterday or the day before, and I crumbled it into milk ; 
 thus my morning meal cost me but two sous. I dined 
 only every other day in a boarding-house where the meal 
 cost me sixteen sous. You know as well as I what care I 
 must have taken of my clothes and shoes. I hardly know 
 whether in later life we feel grief so deep when a colleague 
 plays us false, as we have known, you and I, on detect- 
 ing the mocking smile of a gaping seam in a shoe, or 
 hearing the armhole of a coat split, I drank nothing but 
 water ; I regarded a cafe with distant respect. Zoppi's 
 seemed to me a promised land where none but the 
 LucuUus of the pays Latin had a right of entry. " Shall 
 I ever take a cup of coffee there with milk in it ? " said 
 I to myself, " or play a game of dominoes ? " 
 
 ' I threw into my work the fury I felt at my misery. 
 I tried to master positive knowledge so as to acquire the 
 greatest personal value, and merit the position I should
 
 The Atheist's Mass 13 
 
 hold as soon as I could escape from nothingness. I con- 
 sumed more oil than bread ; the light I burned during 
 these endless nights cost me more than food. It was 
 a long duel, obstinate, with no sort of consolation. I 
 found no sympathy anywhere. To have friends, must 
 we not form connections with young men, have a few 
 sous so as to be able to go tippling with them and meet 
 them where students congregate ? And I had nothing ! 
 And no one in Paris can understand that nothing means 
 nothing. When I even thought of revealing my beggary, 
 I had that nervous contraction of the throat which makes 
 a sick man believe that a ball rises up from the oesophagus 
 into the larynx. 
 
 ' In later life I have met people born to wealth who, 
 never having wanted for anything, had never even heard 
 this problem in the rule of three : A young man is to 
 crime as a five-franc piece is to x. — These gilded idiots 
 say to me, " Why did you get into debt ? Why did you 
 involve yourself in such onerous obligations ? " They 
 remind me of the princess who, on hearing that the 
 people lacked bread, said, " Why do not they buy cakes?" 
 I should like to see one of these rich men, who complain 
 that I charge too much for an operation, — yes, I should 
 like to see him alone in Paris without a sou, without a 
 friend, without credit, and forced to work with his five 
 fingers to live at all ! What would he do ? Where 
 would he go to satisfy his hunger ? 
 
 ' Bianchon, if you have sometimes seen me hard and 
 bitter, it was because I was adding my early sufferings 
 on to the insensibility, the selfishness of which I have 
 seen thousands of instances in the highest circles ; or, 
 perhaps, I was thinking of the obstacles which hatred, 
 envy, jealousy, and calumny raised up between me and 
 success. In Paris, when certain people see you ready to 
 set your foot in the stirrup, some pull your coat-tails, 
 others loosen the buckle of the strap that you may fall 
 and crack your skull ; one wrenches off your horse's shoes,
 
 14 The Atheist's Mass 
 
 another steals your whip, and the least treacherous of 
 them all is the man whom you see coming to fire his 
 pistol at you point blank. 
 
 ' You yourself, my dear boy, are clever enough to 
 make acquaintance before long with the odious and 
 incessant warfare waged by mediocrity against the 
 superior man. If you should drop five-and-twenty 
 louis one day, you will be accused of gambling on the 
 next, and your best friends will report that you have lost 
 twenty-five thousand. If you have a headache, you will 
 be considered mad. If you are a little hasty, no one can 
 live with you. If, to make a stand against this armament 
 of pigmies, you collect your best powers, your best friends 
 will cry out that you want to have everything, that you 
 aim at domineering, at tyranny. In short, your good points 
 will become your faults, your faults will be vices, and 
 your virtues crimes. 
 
 ' If you save a man, you will be said to have killed 
 him ; if he reappears on the scene, it will be positive that 
 you have secured the present at the cost of the future. 
 If he is not dead, he will die. Stumble, and you fall ! 
 Invent anything of any kind and claim your rights, you 
 will be crotchety, cunning, ill-disposed to rising younger 
 men. 
 
 ' So, you see, my dear fellow, if I do not believe in God, 
 I believe still less in man. But do not you know in me 
 another Desplein, altogether different from the Desplein 
 whom every one abuses ? — However, we will not stir that 
 mud-heap. 
 
 ' Well, I was living in that house, I was working hard 
 to pass my first examination, and I had no money at all. 
 You know. I had come to one of those moments of 
 extremity when a man says, " I will enlist." I had one 
 hope. I expected from my home a box full of linen, a 
 present from one of those old aunts who, knowing nothing 
 of Paris, think of your shirts, while they imagine that 
 their nephew with thirty francs a month is eating
 
 The Atheist's Mass 15 
 
 ortolans. The box arrived while I was at the schools ; 
 it had cost forty francs for carriage. The porter, a 
 German shoemaker living in a loft, had paid the money 
 and kept the box. I walked up and down the Rue des 
 Fosses-Saint-Germain-des-Pres and the Rue de I'Ecole de 
 Medecine without hitting on any scheme which would 
 release my trunk without the payment of the forty francs, 
 which of course I could pay as soon as I should have sold 
 the linen. My stupidity proved to me that surgery was 
 my only vocation. My good fellow, refined souls, whose 
 powers move in a lofty atmosphere, have none of that 
 spirit of intrigue that is fertile in resource and device ; 
 their good genius is chance ; they do not invent, things 
 come to them. 
 
 ' At night I went home, at the very moment when 
 my fellow lodger also came in — a water-carrier named 
 Bourgeat, a native of Saint-Flour. We knew each other 
 as two lodgers do who have rooms off the same landing, 
 and who hear each other sleeping, coughing, dressing, and 
 so at last become used to one another. My neighbour 
 informed me that the landlord, to whom I owed three- 
 quarters' rent, had turned me out ; I must clear out next 
 morning. He himself was also turned out on account of 
 his occupation. I spent the most miserable night of my 
 life. Where was I to get a messenger who could carry 
 my few chattels and my books ? How could I pay him 
 and the porter ? Where was I to go ? I repeated these 
 unanswerable questions again and again, in tears, as 
 madmen repeat their tunes. I fell asleep ; poverty has 
 for its friend heavenly slumbers full of beautiful dreams. 
 
 ' Next morning, just as I was swallowing my little 
 bowl of bread soaked in milk, Bourgeat came in and said 
 to me in his vile Auvergne accent — 
 
 ' " Mouchieur V Etudlant^ I am a poor man, a found- 
 ling from the hospital at Saint-Flour, without either 
 father or mother, and not rich enough to marry. You 
 are not fertile in relations either, nor well supplied
 
 1 6 The Atheist's Mass 
 
 with the ready ? Listen, I have a hand-cart downstairs 
 which I have hired for two sous an hour ; it will hold 
 all our goods ; if you like, we will try to find lodgings 
 together, since we are both turned out of this. It is not 
 the earthly paradise, when all is said and done." 
 
 *"I know that, my good Bourgeat," said I. " But I 
 am in a great fix. I have a trunk downstairs with a 
 hundred francs' worth of linen in it, out of which I could 
 pay the landlord and all I owe to the porter, and I have 
 not a hundred sous." 
 
 ' " Pooh ! I have a few dibs," replied Bourgeat joyfully, 
 and he pulled out a greasy old leather purse. " Keep 
 your linen." 
 
 ' Bourgeat paid up my arrears and his own, and settled 
 with the porter. Then he put our furniture and my box 
 of linen in his cart, and pulled it along the street, 
 stopping in front of every house where there was a notice 
 board. I went up to see whether the rooms to let would 
 suit us. At midday we were still wandering about the 
 neighbourhood without having found anything. The 
 price was the great difficulty. Bourgeat proposed that 
 we should eat at a wine shop, leaving the cart at the 
 door. Towards evening I discovered, in the Cour de 
 Rohan, Passage du Commerce, at the very top of a house 
 next the roof, two rooms with a staircase between them. 
 Each of us was to pay sixty francs a year. So there 
 we were housed, my humble friend and I. We dined 
 together. Bourgeat, who earned about fifty sous a day, 
 had saved a hundred crowns or so ; he would soon be 
 able to gratify his ambition by buying a barrel and a 
 horse. On learning my situation — for he extracted my 
 secrets with a quiet craftiness and good nature, of which 
 the remembrance touches my heart to this day, he gave 
 up for a time the ambition of his whole life ; for twenty- 
 two years he had been carrying water in the street, 
 and he now devoted his hundred crowns to my future 
 prospects.'
 
 The Atheist's Mass 17 
 
 Desplein at these words clutched Bianchon's arm 
 tightly. ' He gave me the money for my examination 
 fees ! That man, my friend, understood that I had a 
 mission, that the needs of my intellect were greater than 
 his. He looked after me, he called me his boy, he lent 
 me money to buy books, he would come in softly some- 
 times to watch me at work, and took a mother's care in 
 seeing that I had wholesome and abundant food, instead 
 of the bad and insufficient nourishment I had been 
 condemned to. Bourgeat, a man of about forty, had a 
 homely, mediaeval type of face, a prominent forehead, a 
 head that a painter might have chosen as a model for 
 that of Lycurgus. The poor man's heart was big with 
 affections seeking an object ; he had never been loved 
 but by a poodle that had died some time since, of which 
 he would talk to me, asking whether I thought the 
 Church would allow masses to be said for the repose of 
 its soul. His dog, said he, had been a good Christian, 
 who for twelve years had accompanied him to church, 
 never barking, listening to the organ without opening his 
 mouth, and crouching beside him in a way that made it 
 seem as though he were praying too. 
 
 ' This man centred all his affections in me ; he looked 
 upon me as a forlorn and suffering creature, and he 
 became, to me, the most thoughtful mother, the most 
 considerate benefactor, the ideal of the virtue which 
 rejoices in its own work. When I met him in the 
 street, he would throw me a glance of intelligence full 
 of unutterable dignity ; he would affect to walk as 
 though he carried no weight, and seemed happy in 
 seeing me in good health and well dressed. It was, in 
 fact, the devoted affection of the lower classes, the love of 
 a girl of the people transferred to a loftier level. Bour- 
 geat did all my errands, woke me at night at any fixed 
 hour, trimmed my lamp, cleaned our landing ; as good 
 as a servant as he was as a father, and as clean as 
 an English girl. He did all the housework. Like 
 
 B
 
 1 8 The Atheist's Mass 
 
 Philopoemen, he sawed our wood, and gave to all he did 
 the grace of simplicity while preserving his dignity, for 
 he seemed to understand that the end ennobles every act. 
 
 ' When I left this good fellow, to be house surgeon at 
 the Hotel-Dicu, I felt an indescribable, dull pain, knowing 
 that he could no longer live with me ; but he comforted 
 himself with the prospect of saving up money enough 
 for me to take my degree, and he made me promise to 
 go to see him whenever I had a day out : Bourgeat was 
 proud of me. He loved me for my own sake, and for 
 his own. If you look up my thesis, you will see that I 
 dedicated it to him. 
 
 ' During the last year of my residence as house surgeon 
 I earned enough to repay all I owed to this worthy 
 Auvergnat by buying him a barrel and a horse. He was 
 furious with rage at learning that I had been depriving 
 myself of spending my money, and yet he was delighted 
 to see his wishes fulfilled ; he laughed and scolded, he 
 looked at his barrel, at his horse, and wiped away a tear, 
 as he said, " It is too bad. What a splendid barrel ! 
 You really ought not. Why, that horse is as strong as 
 an Auvergnat ! " 
 
 ' I never saw a more touching scene. Bourgeat insisted 
 on buying for me the case of instruments mounted in 
 silver which you have seen in my room, and which is to 
 me the most precious thing there. Though enchanted 
 with my first success, never did the least sign, the least 
 word, escape him which might imply, " This man owes 
 all to me ! " And yet, but for him, I should have died of 
 want ; he had eaten bread rubbed with garlic that I 
 might have coffee to enable me to sit up at night. 
 
 * He fell ill. As you may suppose, I passed my nights 
 by his bedside, and the first time I pulled him through ; 
 but two years after he had a relapse ; in spite of the 
 utmost care, in spite of the greatest exertions of science, 
 he succumbed. No king was ever nursed as he was. 
 Yes, Bianchon, to snatch that man from death I tried
 
 The Atheist's Mass 
 
 19 
 
 unheard-of things. I wanted him to live long enough to 
 show him his work accomplished, to realise all his hopes, 
 to give expression to the only need for gratitude that ever 
 filled my heart, to quench a fire that burns in me to this 
 day. 
 
 ' Bourgeat, my second father, died in my arms,' 
 Desplein went on, after a pause, visibly moved. ' He 
 left me everything he possessed by a will he had had 
 made by a public scrivener, dating from the year when 
 we had gone to live in the Cour de Rohan. 
 
 ' This man's faith was perfect ; he loved the Holy 
 Virgin as he might have loved his wife. He was an 
 ardent Catholic, but never said a word to me about my 
 want of religion. When he was dying he entreated me 
 to spare no expense that he might have every possible 
 benefit of clergy. I had a mass said for him every day. 
 Often, in the night, he would tell me of his fears as to 
 his future fate ; he feared his life had not been saintly 
 enough. Poor man ! he was at work from morning till 
 night. For whom, then, is Paradise — if there be a 
 Paradise ? He received the last sacrament like the saint 
 that he was, and his death was worthy of his life. 
 
 ' I alone followed him to the grave. When I had laid 
 my only benefactor to rest, I looked about to see how I 
 could pay my debt to him ; I found he had neither family 
 nor friends, neither wife nor child. But he believed. He 
 had a religious conviction ; had I any right to dispute it ? 
 He had spoken to me timidly of masses said for the repose 
 of the dead ; he would not impress it on me as a duty, 
 thinking that it would be a form of repayment for his 
 services. As soon as I had money enough I paid to 
 Saint-Sulpice the requisite sum for four masses every year. 
 As the only thing I can do for Bourgeat is thus to satisfy 
 his pious wishes, on the days when that mass is said, at 
 the beginning of each season of the year, I go for his sake 
 and say the required prayers ; and I say with the good 
 faith of a sceptic — " Great God, if there is a sphere
 
 20 The Atheist's Mass 
 
 which Thou hast appointed after death for those who 
 have been perfect, remember good Bourgeat ; and if he 
 should have anything to suffer, let me suffer it for him, 
 that he may enter all the sooner into what is called 
 Paradise." 
 
 'That, my dear fellow, is as much as a man who holds 
 my opinions can allow himself. But God must be a 
 good fellow ; He cannot owe me any grudge. I swear 
 to you, I would give my whole fortune if faith such as 
 Bourgeat's could enter my brain.' 
 
 Bianchon, who was with Desplein all through his last 
 illness, dares not affirm to this day that the great surgeon 
 died an atheist. Will not those who believe like to fancy 
 that the humble Auvergnat came to open the gate of 
 heaven to his friend, as he did that of the earthly temple 
 on whose pediment we read the words — 'A grateful 
 country to its great men.' 
 
 Paris, "January 1836.
 
 HONORINE 
 
 To Monsieur j^chille Deveria. 
 An affectionate remembrance from the Author. 
 
 If the French have as great an aversion for travelling 
 as the English have a propensity for it, both English and 
 French have perhaps sufficient reasons. Something better 
 than England is everyvi^here to be found ; whereas it is 
 excessively difficult to find the charms of France outside 
 France. Other countries can show admirable scenery, 
 and they frequently offer greater comfort than that of 
 France, which makes but slow progress in that particular. 
 They sometimes display a bewildering magnificence, 
 grandeur, and luxury ; they lack neither grace nor noble 
 manners ; but the life of the brain, the talent for conver- 
 sation, the ' Attic salt ' so familiar at Paris, the prompt 
 apprehension of what one is thinking, but does not say, 
 the spirit of the unspoken, which is half the French 
 language, is nowhere else to be met with. Hence a 
 Frenchman, whose raillery, as it is, finds so little compre- 
 hension, would wither in a foreign land like an uprooted 
 tree. Emigration is counter to the instincts of the 
 French nation. Many Frenchmen, of the kind here in 
 question, have owned to pleasure at seeing the custom- 
 house officers of their native land, which may seem the 
 most daring hyberbole of patriotism. 
 
 This little preamble is intended to recall to such 
 Frenchmen as have travelled the extreme pleasure they 
 have felt on occasionally finding their native land, like
 
 12 Honorine 
 
 an oasis, in the drawing-room of some diplomate : a 
 pleasure hard to be understood by those who have never 
 left the asphalte of the Boulevard des Italiens, and 
 to whom the Quais of the left bank of the Seine are 
 not really Paris. To find Paris again ! Do you know 
 what that means, O Parisians ? It is to find — not 
 indeed the cookery of the Rocher de Cancale as Borel 
 elaborates it for those who can appreciate it, for that 
 exists only in'the Rue Montorgueil — but a meal which 
 reminds you of it ! It is to find the wines of France, 
 which out of France are to be regarded as myths, and as 
 rare as the woman of whom I write ! It is to find — not 
 the most fashionable pleasantry, for it loses its aroma 
 between Paris and the frontier — but the witty, under- 
 standing, the critical atmosphere in which the French 
 live, from the poet down to the artisan, from the duchess 
 to the boy in the street. 
 
 In 1836, when the Sardinian Court was residing at 
 Genoa, two Parisians, more or less famous, could fancy 
 themselves still in Paris when they found themselves in a 
 palazzo, taken by the French Consul-General, on the hill 
 forming the last fold of the Apennines between the gate 
 of San Tomaso and the well-known lighthouse, which is 
 to be seen in all the keepsake views of Genoa. This 
 palazzo is one of the magnificent villas on which Genoese 
 nobles were wont to spend millions at the time when the 
 aristocratic republic was a power. 
 
 If the early night is beautiful anywhere, it surely is at 
 Genoa, after it has rained as it can rain there, in torrents, 
 all the morning : when the clearness of the sea vies with 
 that of the sky ; when silence reigns on the quay and in 
 the groves of the villa, and over the marble heads with 
 yawning jaws, from which water mysteriously flows ; 
 when the stars are beaming ; when the waves of the 
 Mediterranean lap one after another like the avowal of a 
 woman, from whom you drag it word by word. It must 
 be confessed, that the moment when the perfumed air
 
 Honorine 23 
 
 brings fragrance to the lungs and to our day-dreams ; when 
 voluptuousness, made visible and ambient as the air, 
 holds you in your easy-chair ; when, a spoon in your hand, 
 you sip an ice or a sorbet, the town at your feet and fair 
 women opposite — such Boccaccio hours can be known 
 only in Italy and on the shores of the Mediterranean. 
 
 Imagine to yourself, round the table, the Marquis di 
 Negro, a knight hospitaller to all men of talent on their 
 travels, and the Marquis Damaso Pareto, two Frenchmen 
 disguised as Genoese, a Consul-General with a wife as 
 beautiful as a Madonna, and two silent children — silent 
 because sleep has fallen on them — the French Ambassador 
 and his wife, a secretary to the Embassy who believes 
 himself to be crushed and mischievous ; finally, two 
 Parisians, who have come to take leave of the Consul's 
 wife at a splendid dinner, and you will have the picture 
 presented by the terrace of the villa about the middle of 
 May — a picture in which the predominant figure was that 
 of a celebrated woman, on whom all eyes centred now 
 and again, the heroine of this improvised festival. 
 
 One of the two Frenchmen was the famous landscape 
 painter, Leon de Lora ; the other a well-known critic, 
 Claude Vignon. They had both come with this lady, 
 one of the glories of the fair sex. Mademoiselle des 
 Touches, known in the literary world by the name of 
 Camille Maupin. 
 
 Mademoiselle des Touches had been to Florence on 
 business. With the charming kindness of which she is 
 prodigal, she had brought with her Leon de Lora to show 
 him Italy, and had gone on as far as Rome that he might 
 see the Campagna. She had come by the Simplon, and 
 was returning by the Cornice road to Marseilles. She had 
 stopped at Genoa, again on the landscape painter's account. 
 The Consul-General had, of course, wished to do the 
 honours of Genoa, before the arrival of the Court, to a 
 woman whose wealth, name, and position recommend her 
 no less than her talents. Camille Maupin, who knew
 
 24 Honorine 
 
 her Genoa down to its smallest chapels, had left her land- 
 scape painter to the care of the diplomate and the two 
 Genoese marquises, and was miserly of her minutes. 
 Though the ambassador was a distinguished man of 
 letters, the celebrated lady had refused to yield to his 
 advances, dreading what the English call an exhibition ; 
 but she had drawn in the claws of her refusals when it was 
 proposed that they should spend a farewell day at the 
 Consul's villa. Leon de Lora had told Camille that her 
 presence at the villa was the only return he could make 
 to the Ambassador and his wife, the two Genoese noble- 
 men, the Consul and his wife. So Mademoiselle des 
 Touches had sacrificed one of those days of perfect free- 
 dom, which are not always to be had in Paris by those on 
 whom the world has its eye. 
 
 Now, the meeting being accounted for, it is easy to 
 understand that etiquette had been banished, as well as a 
 great many women even of the highest rank, who were 
 curious to know whether Camille Maupin's manly talent 
 impaired her grace as a pretty woman, and to see, in a 
 word, whether the trousers showed below her petticoats. 
 After dinner till nine o'clock, when a collation was 
 served, though the conversation had been gay and grave 
 by turns, and constantly enlivened by Leon de Lora's 
 sallies — for he is considered the most roguish wit of Paris 
 to-day — and by the good taste which will surprise no one 
 after the list of guests, literature had scarcely been men- 
 tioned. However, the butterfly Sittings of this French 
 tilting match were certain to come to it, were it only to 
 flutter over this essentially French subject. But before 
 coming to the turn in the conversation which led the 
 Consul-General to speak, it will not be out of place to 
 give some account of him and his family. 
 
 This diplomate, a man of four-and-thirty, who had 
 been married about six years, was the living portrait of 
 Lord Byron. The familiarity of that face makes a 
 aescription of the Consul's unnecessary. It may, how-
 
 Honorine 25 
 
 ever, be noted that there was no affectation in his dreamy 
 expression. Lord Byron was a poet, and the Consul was 
 poetical ; women know and recognise the difference, 
 which explains without justifying some of their attach- 
 ments. His handsome face, thrown into relief by a 
 delightful nature, had captivated a Genoese heiress. A 
 Genoese heiress ! the expression might raise a smile at 
 Genoa, where, in consequence of the inability of daugh- 
 ters to inherit, a woman is rarely rich ; but Onorina 
 Pedrotti, the only child of a banker without heirs male, 
 was an exception. Notwithstanding all the flattering 
 advances prompted by a spontaneous passion, the Consul- 
 General had not seemed to wish to marry. Nevertheless, 
 after living in the town for two years, and after certain 
 steps taken by the Ambassador during his visits to the 
 Genoese Court, the marriage was decided on. The 
 young man withdrew his former refusal, less on account 
 of the touching affection of Onorina Pedrotti than by 
 reason of an unknown incident, one of those crises of 
 private life which are so instantly buried under the daily 
 tide of interests that, at a subsequent date, the most 
 natural actions seem inexplicable. 
 
 This involution of causes sometimes affects the most 
 serious events of history. This, at any rate, was the 
 opinion of the town of Genoa, where, to some women, 
 the extreme reserve, the melancholy of the French 
 Consul could be explained only by the word passion. It 
 may be remarked, in passing, that women never complain 
 of being the victims of a preference ; they are very ready 
 to immolate themselves for the common weal. Onorina 
 Pedrotti, who might have hated the Consul if she had 
 been altogether scorned, loved her sposo no less, and per- 
 haps more, when she knew that he had loved. Women 
 allow precedence in love affairs. All is well if other 
 women are in question. 
 
 A man is not a diplomate with impunity : the sposo 
 was as secret as the grave — so secret that the merchants of
 
 26 Honorine 
 
 Genoa chose to regard the young Consul's attitude as 
 premeditated, and the heiress might perhaps have slipped 
 through his fingers if he had not played his part of a love- 
 sick malade imaginaire. If it was real, the w^omen thought 
 it too degrading to be believed. 
 
 Pedrotti's daughter gave him her love as a consolation ; 
 she lulled these unknown griefs in a cradle of tenderness 
 and Italian caresses. 
 
 II Signor Pedrotti had indeed no reason to complain of 
 the choice to which he was driven by his beloved child. 
 Powerful protectors in Paris watched over the young 
 diplomate's fortunes. In accordance with a promise 
 made by the Ambassador to the Consul-General's father- 
 in-law, the young man was created Baron and Commander 
 of the Legion of Honour. Signor Pedrotti himself was 
 made a Count by the King of Sardinia. Onorina's dower 
 was a million of francs. As to the fortune of the Casa 
 Pedrotti, estimated at two millions, made in the corn 
 trade, the young couple came into it within six months 
 of their marriage, for the first and last Count Pedrotti 
 died in January 1831. 
 
 Onorina Pedrotti is one of those beautiful Genoese 
 women who, when they are beautiful, are the most 
 magnificent creatures in Italy. Michael Angelo took 
 his models in Genoa for the tomb of Giuliano. Hence 
 the fulness and singular placing of the breast in the figures 
 of Day and Night, which so many critics have thought 
 exaggerated, but which is peculiar to the women of 
 Liguria. A Genoese beauty is no longer to be found 
 excepting under the mez-zaro^ as at Venice it is met 
 with only under the fazzioli. This phenomenon is 
 observed among all fallen nations. The noble type 
 survives only among the populace, as after the burning of 
 a town coins are found hidden in the ashes. And 
 Onorina, an exception as regards her fortune, is no less 
 an exceptional patrician beauty. Recall to mind the figure 
 of Night which Michael Angelo has placed at the feet of
 
 Honorine 27 
 
 the Pensieroso^ dress her in modern garb, twist that long 
 hair round the magnificent head, a Httle dark in com- 
 plexion, set a spark of fire in those dreamy eyes, throw a 
 scarf about the massive bosom, see the long dress, white, 
 embroidered with flowers, imagine the statue sitting 
 upright, with her arms folded like those of Mademoiselle 
 Georges, and you will see before you the Consul's wife, 
 with a boy of six, as handsome as a mother's desire, and a 
 little girl of four on her knees, as beautiful as the type of 
 childhood so laboriously sought out by the sculptor David 
 to grace a tomb. 
 
 This beautiful family was the object of Camille's secret 
 study. It struck Mademoiselle des Touches that the 
 Consul looked rather too absent-minded for a perfectly 
 happy man. 
 
 Although, throughout the day, the husband and wife 
 had offered her the pleasing spectacle of complete happi- 
 ness, Camille wondered why one of the most superior 
 men she had ever met, and whom she had seen too in 
 Paris drawing-rooms, remained as Consul-General at 
 Genoa when he possessed a fortune of a hundred odd 
 thousand francs a year. But, at the same time, she had 
 discerned, by many of the little nothings which women 
 perceive with the intelligence of the Arab sage in Zadig^ 
 that the husband was faithfully devoted. These two 
 handsome creatures would no doubt love each other with- 
 out a misunderstanding till the end of their days. So 
 Camille said to herself alternately, ' What is wrong ? — 
 Nothing is wrong,' following the misleading symptoms of 
 the Consul's demeanour ; and he, it may be said, had the 
 absolute calmness of Englishmen, of savages, of Orientals, 
 and of consummate diplomatists. 
 
 In discussing literature, they spoke of the perennial 
 stock-in-trade of the republic of letters — woman's sin. 
 And they presently found themselves confronted by two 
 opinions : When a woman sins, is the man or the woman 
 to blame? The three women present — the Ambassadress,
 
 28 Honorine 
 
 the Consul's wife, and Mademoiselle des Touches, women, 
 of course, of blameless reputations — were without pity for 
 the woman. The men tried to convince these three fair 
 flowers of their sex that some virtues might remain in a 
 woman after she had fallen. 
 
 * How long are we going to play at hide-and-seek in 
 this way ? ' said Leon de Lora. 
 
 ' Cara vita^ go and put your children to bed, and send 
 me by Gina the little black pocket-book that lies on my 
 Boule cabinet,' said the Consul to his wife. 
 
 She rose without a reply, which shows that she loved 
 her husband very truly, for she already knew French 
 enough to understand that her husband was getting rid of 
 her. 
 
 * I will tell you a story in which I played a part, and 
 after that we can discuss it, for it seems to me childish to 
 practise with the scalpel on an imaginary body. Begin 
 by dissecting a corpse.' 
 
 Every one prepared to listen, with all the greater 
 readiness because they had all talked enough, and this is 
 the moment to be chosen for telling a story. This, then, 
 is the Consul-General's tale : — 
 
 'When I was two-and-twenty, and had taken my 
 degree in law, my old uncle, the Abbe Loraux, then 
 seventy-two years old, felt it necessary to provide me 
 with a protector, and to start me in some career. This 
 excellent man, if not indeed a saint, regarded each 
 year of his life as a fresh gift from God. I need not tell 
 you that the father confessor of a Royal Highness had no 
 difficulty in finding a place for a young man brought up 
 by himself, his sister's only child. So one day, towards 
 the end of the year 1824, this venerable old man, who 
 for five years had been Cure of the White Friars at Paris, 
 came up to the room I had in his house, and said — 
 
 '"Get yourself dressed, my dear boy; I am going to 
 introduce you to some one who is willing to engage you 
 as secretary. If I am not mistaken, he may fill my place
 
 Honorine 29 
 
 in the event of God's taking me to Himself. I shall have 
 finished mass by nine o'clock ; you have three-quarters 
 of an hour before you. Be ready." 
 
 ' " What, uncle ! must I say good-bye to this room, 
 where for four years I have been so happy ? ' 
 
 ' " I have no fortune to leave you," said he. 
 
 ' " Have you not the reputation of your name to leave 
 me, the memory of your good vi^orks ? " 
 
 ' " We need say nothing of that inheritance," he replied, 
 smiling. " You do not yet know enough of the world to 
 be aware that a legacy of that kind is hardly likely to be 
 paid, whereas by taking you this morning to M. le 
 Comte — Allow me,' said the Consul, interrupting him- 
 self, ' to speak of my protector by his Christian name 
 only, and to call him Comte Octave. — By taking you 
 this morning to M. le Comte Octave, I hope to secure you 
 his patronage, which, if you are so fortunate as to please 
 that virtuous statesman — as I make no doubt you can — 
 will be worth, at least, as much as the fortune I might 
 have accumulated for you, if my brother-in-law's ruin and 
 my sister's death had not fallen on me like a thunder-bolt 
 from a clear sky." 
 
 * " Are you the Count's director ? " 
 
 " ' If I were, could I place you with him ? What priest 
 could be capable of taking advantage of the secrets which 
 he learns at the tribunal of repentance ? No ; you owe 
 this position to his Highness, the Keeper of the Seals. 
 My dear Maurice, you will be as much at home there as 
 in your father's house. The Count will give you a salary 
 of two thousand four hundred francs, rooms in his house, 
 and an allowance of twelve hundred francs in lieu of 
 feeding you. He will not admit you to his table, nor 
 give you a separate table, for fear of leaving you to the 
 care of servants. I did not accept the offer when it was 
 made to me till I was perfectly certain that Comte Octave's 
 secretary was never to be a mere upper servant. You 
 will have an immense amount of work, for the Count is a
 
 JO Honorine 
 
 great worker ; but when you leave him, you will be 
 qualified to fill the highest posts. I need not warn you 
 to be discreet ; that is the first virtue of any man who 
 hopes to hold public appointments." 
 
 ' You may conceive of my curiosity. Comte Octave, 
 at that time, held one of the highest legal appointments ; 
 he was in the confidence of Madame the Dauphiness, 
 who had just got him made a State Minister; he led such 
 a life as the Comte de Serizy, whom you all know, I 
 think ; but even more quietly, for his house was in the 
 Marais, Rue Payenne, and he hardly ever entertained. 
 His private life escaped public comment by its hermit-like 
 simplicity and by constant hard work. 
 
 ' Let me describe my position to you in a few words. 
 Having found in the solemn headmaster of the College 
 Saint-Louis a tutor to whom my uncle delegated his 
 authority, at the age of eighteen I had gone through all 
 the classes ; I left school as innocent as a seminarist, full 
 of faith, on quitting Saint-Sulpice. My mother, on her 
 deathbed, had made my uncle promise that I should not 
 become a priest, but I was as pious as though I had to 
 take orders. On leaving college, the Abbe Loraux took 
 me into his house and made me study law. During the 
 four years of study requisite for passing all the examina- 
 tions, I worked hard, but chiefly at things outside the 
 arid fields of jurisprudence. Weaned from literature as I 
 had been at college, where I lived in the headmaster's 
 house, I had a thirst to quench. As soon as I had read a few 
 modern masterpieces, the works of all the preceding ages 
 were greedily swallowed. I became crazy about the 
 theatre, and for a long time I went every night to the play, 
 though my uncle gave me only a hundred francs a month. 
 This parsimony, to which the good old man was com- 
 pelled by his regard for the poor, had the effect of keeping 
 a young man's desires within reasonable limits. 
 
 ' When I went to live with Comte Octave I was not 
 indeed an innocent, but I thought of my rare escapades as
 
 Honorine 3 1 
 
 crimes. My uncle was so truly angelic, and I was so 
 much afraid of grieving him, that in all those four years I 
 had never spent a night out. The good man would wait 
 till I came in to go to bed. This maternal care had more 
 power to keep me within bounds than the sermons and 
 reproaches with which the life of a young man is diversified 
 in a puritanical home. I was a stranger to the various 
 circles which make up the world of Paris society ; I only 
 knew some women of the better sort, and none of the 
 inferior class but those I saw as I walked about, or in the 
 boxes at the play, and then only from the depths of the 
 pit where I sat. If, at that period, any one had said to 
 me, " You will see Canalis, or Camille Maupin," I should 
 have felt hot coals in my head and in my bowels. Famous 
 people were to me as gods, who neither spoke, nor walked, 
 nor ate like other mortals. 
 
 ' How many tales of the Thousand-and-one Nights are 
 comprehended in the ripening of a youth ! How many 
 wonderful lamps must we have rubbed before we under- 
 stand that the True Wonderful Lamp is either luck, or 
 work, or genius. In some men this dream of the aroused 
 spirit is but brief; mine has lasted until now ! In those 
 days I always went to sleep as Grand Duke of Tuscany, 
 — as a millionaire, — as beloved by a princess, — or famous ! 
 So to enter the service of Comte Octave, and have a 
 hundred louis a years, was entering on independent life. 
 I had ghmpses of some chance of getting into society, 
 and seeking for what my heart desired most, a protectress, 
 who would rescue me from the paths of danger, which a 
 young man of two-and-twenty can hardly help treading, 
 however prudent and well brought up he may be. I 
 began to be afraid of myself. 
 
 'The persistent study of other people's rights into which 
 I had plunged was not always enough to repress painful 
 imaginings. Yes, sometimes in fancy I threw myself 
 into theatrical life ; I thought I could be a great actor ; 
 I dreamed of endless triumphs and loves, knowing nothing
 
 32 
 
 Honorine 
 
 of the disillusion hidden behind the curtain, as everywhere 
 else — for every stage has its reverse behind the scenes. I 
 have gone out sometimes, my heart boiling, carried zvfzy 
 by an impulse to rush hunting through Paris, to attach 
 myself to some handsome u^oman I might meet, to follow^ 
 her to her door, watch her, write to her, throw myself on 
 her mercy, and conquer her by sheer force of passion. 
 My poor uncle, a heart consumed by charity, a child of 
 seventy years, as clear-sighted as God, as guileless as a 
 man of genius, no doubt read the tumult of my soul ; for 
 when he felt the tether by which he held me strained 
 too tightly and ready to break, he would never fail to say, 
 " Here, Maurice, you too are poor ! Here are twenty 
 francs; go and amuse yourself, you are not a priest!" 
 And if you could then have seen the dancing light that 
 gilded his grey eyes, the smile that relaxed his fine lips, 
 puckering the corners of his mouth, the adorable expression 
 of that august face, whose native ugliness was redeemed 
 by the spirit of an apostle, you would understand the 
 feeling; which made me answer the Cure of White Friars 
 only with a kiss, as if he had been my mother. 
 
 ' " In Comte Octave you will find not a master, but a 
 friend," said my uncle on the way to the Rue Payenne. 
 " But he is distrustful, or to be more exact, he is cautious. 
 The statesman's friendship can be won only with time ; 
 for in spite of his deep insight and his habit of gauging 
 men, he was deceived by the man you are succeeding, 
 and nearly became a victim to his abuse of confidence. 
 This is enough to guide you in your behaviour to him." 
 ' When we knocked at the enormous outer door of a 
 house as large as the Hotel Carnavalet, with a courtyard 
 in front and a garden behind, the sound rang as in a 
 desert. While my uncle inquired of an old porter in 
 livery if the Count were at home, I cast my eyes, seeing 
 everything at once, over the courtyard where the cobble- 
 stones were hidden in grass, the blackened walls where 
 little gardens were flourishing above the decorations of
 
 Honorinc 
 
 33 
 
 the elegant architecture, and on the roof, as high as that 
 of the Tuileries. The balustrade of the upper balconies 
 was eaten away. Through a magnificent colonnade I 
 could see a second court on one side, where were the 
 offices ; the door was rotting. An old coachman was 
 there cleaning an old carriage. The indifferent air of 
 this servant allowed me to assume that the handsome 
 stables, where of old so many horses had whinnied, now 
 sheltered two at most. The handsome facade of the 
 house seemed to me gloomy, like that of a mansion 
 belonging to the State or the Crown, and given up to 
 some public office. A bell rang as we walked across, my 
 uncle and I, from the porter's lodge — Enquire of the 
 Porter was still written over the door — towards the 
 outside steps, where a footman came out in a livery like 
 that of Labranche at the Theatre Fran^ais in the old 
 stock plays. A visitor was so rare that the servant was 
 putting his coat on when he opened a glass door with 
 small panes, on each side of which the smoke of a lamp 
 had traced patterns on the walls. 
 
 'A hall so magnificent as to be worthy of Versailles 
 ended in a staircase such as will never ao-ain be built in 
 France, taking up as much space as the whole of a 
 modern house. As we went up the marble steps, as cold 
 as tombstones, and wide enough for eight persons to walk 
 abreast, our tread echoed under sonorous vaulting. The 
 banister charmed the eye by its miraculous workmanship — 
 goldsmith's work in iron — wrought by the fancy of an 
 artist of the time of Henri iii. Chilled as by an icy mantle 
 that fell on our shoulders, we went through ante-rooms, 
 drawing-rooms opening one out of the other, with 
 carpetless parquet floors, and furnished with such splendid 
 antiquities as from thence would find their way to the 
 curiosity dealers. At last we reached a large study in a 
 cross wing, with all the windows looking into an immense 
 garden. 
 
 * " Monsieur le Cure of the White Friars, and his 
 
 c
 
 34 Honorine 
 
 nephew, Monsieur de L'Hostal," said Labranche, to 
 whose care the other theatrical servant had consigned us 
 in the first antechamber. 
 
 * Comte Octave, dressed in long trousers and a grey 
 flannel morning coat, rose from his seat by a huge 
 writing-table, came to the fireplace, and signed to me to 
 sit down, while he went forward to take my uncle's 
 hands, which he pressed. 
 
 '"Though I am in the parish of Saint-Paul," said he, 
 *' I could scarcely have failed to hear of the Cure of the 
 White Friars, and I am happy to make his acquaintance." 
 
 ' " Your Excellency is most kind," replied my uncle. 
 " I have brought to you my only remaining relation. 
 While I believe that I am offering a good gift to your 
 Excellency, I hope at the same time to give my nephew 
 a second father." 
 
 * " As to that, I can only reply. Monsieur I'Abbe, when 
 we shall have tried each other," said Comte Octave. 
 " Your name ? " he added, to me. 
 
 '"Maurice." 
 
 ' " He has taken his doctor's degree in law," my uncle 
 observed. 
 
 ' " Very good, very good ! " said the Count, looking at 
 me from head to foot. " Monsieur I'Abbe, I hope that 
 for your nephew's sake in the first instance, and then for 
 mine, you will do me the honour of dining here every 
 Monday. That will be our family dinner, our family 
 party." 
 
 ' My uncle and the Count then began to talk of 
 religion from the political point of view, of charitable 
 institutes, the repression of crime, and I could at my 
 leisure study the man on whom my fate would henceforth 
 depend. The Count was of middle height ; it was 
 impossible to judge of his build on account of his dress, 
 but he seemed to me to be lean and spare. His face was 
 harsh and hollow ; the features were refined. His mouth, 
 which was rather large, expressed both irony and kindliness.
 
 Honorine 
 
 35 
 
 His forehead, perhaps too spacious, was as intimidating as 
 that of a madman, all the more so from the contrast of the 
 lower part of the face, which ended squarely in a short 
 chin very near the lower lip. Small eyes, of turquoise 
 blue, were as keen and bright as those of the Prince de 
 Talleyrand — which I admired at a later time — and 
 endowed, like the Prince's, with the faculty of becoming 
 expressionless to the verge of gloom ; and they added to 
 the singularity of a face that was not pale but yellow. 
 This complexion seemed to bespeak an irritable temper 
 and violent passions. His hair, already silvered, and 
 carefully dressed, seemed to furrow his head with streaks 
 of black and white alternately. The trimness of this head 
 spoiled the resemblance I had remarked in the Count to 
 the wonderful monk described by Lewis after Schedoni 
 in the Confessional of the Black Penitents ( The Italian)^ a 
 a superior creation, as it seems to me, to 77!^ Monk. 
 
 *The Count was already shaved, having to attend 
 early at the law courts. Two candelabra with four 
 lights, screened by lamp-shades, were still burning at the 
 opposite ends of the writing-table, and showed plainly 
 that the magistrate rose long before daylight. His hands, 
 which I saw when he took hold of the bell-pull to sum- 
 mon his servant, were extremely fine, and as white as a 
 
 woman's. 
 
 ' As I tell you this story,' said the Consul-General, 
 interrupting himself, ' I am altering the titles and the 
 social position of this gentleman, while placing him in 
 circumstances analogous to what his really were. His 
 profession, rank, luxury, fortune, and style of living were 
 the same ; all these details are true, but I will not be 
 false to my benefactor, nor to my usual habits of discretion. 
 
 ' Instead of feeling — as I really was, socially speaking — 
 an insect in the presence of an eagle,' the narrator went 
 on after a pause, ' I felt I know not what indefinable 
 impression from the Count's appearance, which, however, 
 I can now account for. Artists of genius ' (and he
 
 36 Honorine 
 
 bowed gracefully to the Ambassador, the distinguished 
 lady, and the two Frenchmen), ' real statesmen, poets, a 
 general who has commanded armies — in short, all really 
 great minds are simple, and their simplicity places you on 
 a level with themselves. — You who are all of superior 
 minds,' he said, addressing his guests, ' have perhaps 
 observed how feeling can bridge over the distances 
 created by society. If we are inferior to you in intellect, 
 we can be your equals in devoted friendship. By the 
 temperature — allow me the word — of our hearts 1 felt 
 myself as near my patron as I was far below him in rank. 
 In short, the soul has its clairvoyance ; it has presenti- 
 ments of suffering, grief, joy, antagonism, or hatred in 
 others. 
 
 ' I vaguely discerned the symptoms of a mystery, from 
 recognising in the Count the same effects of physiognomy 
 as I had observed in my uncle. The exercise of virtue, 
 serenity of conscience, and purity of mind had transfigured 
 my uncle, who from being ugly had become quite 
 beautiful. I detected a metamorphosis of a reverse kind 
 in the Count's face ; at the first glance I thought he was 
 about fifty-five, but after an attentive examination I 
 found youth entombed under the ice of a great sorrow, 
 under the fatigue of persistent study, under the glowing 
 hues of some suppressed passion. At a word from my 
 uncle the Count's eyes recovered for a moment the 
 softness of the periwinkle flower, and he had an admiring 
 smile, which revealed what I believed to be his real age, 
 about forty. These observations I made, not then but 
 afterwards, as I recalled the circumstances of my visit. 
 
 'The man-servant came in carrying a tray with his 
 master's breakfast on it. 
 
 '"I did not ask for breakfast," remarked the Count ; 
 " but leave it, and show Monsieur to his rooms." 
 
 ' I followed the servant, who led the way to a complete 
 set of pretty rooms, under a terrace, between the great 
 courtyard and the servants' quarters, over a corridor of
 
 Honorine 37 
 
 communication between the kitchens and the grand 
 staircase. When I returned to the Count's study, I 
 overheard, before opening the door, my uncle pronouncing 
 this judgment on me — 
 
 ' " He may do wrong, for he has strong feelings, and 
 we are all liable to honourable mistakes ; but he has no 
 vices." 
 
 ' " Well," said the Count, with a kindly look, " do you 
 like yourself there ? Tell me. There are so many 
 rooms in this barrack that, if you were not comfortable, 
 I could put you elsewhere." 
 
 ' " At my uncle's I had but one room," replied I. 
 
 ' " Well, you can settle yourself this evening," said the 
 Count, " for your possessions, no doubt, are such as all 
 students own, and a hackney coach will be enough to 
 convey them. To-day we will all three dine together," 
 and he looked at my uncle. 
 
 ' A splendid library opened from the Count's study, 
 and he took us in there, showing me a pretty little recess 
 decorated with paintings, which had formerly served, no 
 doubt, as an oratory. 
 
 ' " This is your cell," said he. " You will sit there 
 when you have to work with me, for you will not be 
 tethered by a chain ; " and he explained in detail the 
 kind and duration of my employment with him. As I 
 listened I felt that he was a great political teacher. 
 
 *■ It took me about a month to familiarise myself with 
 people and things, to learn the duties of my new office, 
 and accustom myself to the Count's methods. A secretary 
 necessarily watches the man who makes use of him. 
 That man's tastes, passions, temper, and manias become 
 the subject of involuntary study. The union of their 
 two minds is at once more and less than a mar- 
 riage. 
 
 * During these months the Count and I reciprocally 
 studied each other. I learned with astonishment that 
 Comte Octave was but thirty-seven years old. The
 
 38 Honorine 
 
 merely superficial peacefulness of his life and the propriety 
 of his conduct were the outcome not solely of a deep 
 sense of duty and of stoical reflection ; in my constant 
 intercourse with this man — an extraordinary man to 
 those who knew him well — I felt vast depths beneath 
 his toil, beneath his acts of politeness, his mask of 
 benignity, his assumption of resignation, which so closely 
 resembled calmness that it was easy to mistake it. Just 
 as when walking through forest-lands certain soils give 
 forth under our feet a sound which enables us to guess 
 whether they are dense masses of stone or a void ; so 
 intense egoism, though hidden under the flowers of 
 politeness, and subterranean caverns eaten out by sorrow 
 sound hollow under the constant touch of familiar life. 
 It was sorrow and not despondency that dwelt in that 
 really great soul. The Count had understood that 
 action, deeds, are the supreme law of social man. And 
 he went on his way in spite of secret wounds, looking to 
 the future with a tranquil eye, like a martyr full of faith. 
 'His concealed sadness, the bitter disenchantment from 
 which he suffered, had not led him into philosophical 
 deserts of incredulity ; this brave statesman was religious, 
 but without ostentation ; he always attended the earliest 
 mass at Saint-Paul's for pious workmen and servants. 
 Not one of his friends, no one at Court, knew that he so 
 punctually fulfilled the practice of religion. He was 
 addicted to God as some men are addicted to a vice, with 
 the greatest mystery. Thus one day I came to find the 
 Count at the summit of an Alp of woe much higher than 
 that on which many are who think themselves the most 
 tried ; who laugh at the passions and the beliefs of others 
 because they have conquered their own ; who play varia- 
 tions in every key of irony and disdain. He did not 
 mock at those who still follow hope into the swamps 
 whither she leads, nor those who climb a peak to be 
 alone, nor those who persist in the fight, reddening the 
 arena with their blood and strewing it with their illusions.
 
 Honorine 39 
 
 He looked on the world as a whole ; he mastered its 
 beliefs; he listened to its complaining ; he was doubtful 
 of affection, and yet more of self-sacrifice ; but this great 
 and stern judge pitied them, or admired them, not with 
 transient enthusiasm, but with silence, concentration, and 
 the communion of a deeply-touched soul. He was a sort 
 of catholic Manfred, and unstained by crime, carrying 
 his choiceness into his faith, melting the snows by the 
 fires of a sealed volcano, holding converse with a star 
 seen by himself alone ! 
 
 * I detected many dark riddles in his ordinary Hfe. He 
 evaded my gaze not like a traveller who, following a 
 path, disappears from time to time in dells or ravines 
 according to the formation of the soil, but like a sharp- 
 shooter who is being watched, who wants to hide himself, 
 and seeks a cover. I could not account for his frequent 
 absences at the times when he was working the hardest, 
 and of which he made no secret from me, for he would 
 say, " Go on with this for me," and trust me with the 
 work in hand. 
 
 'This man, wrapped in the threefold duties of the 
 statesman, the judge, and the orator, charmed me by a 
 taste for flowers, which shows an elegant mind, and which 
 is shared by almost all persons of refinement. His garden 
 and his study were full of the rarest plants, but he always 
 bought them half-withered. Perhaps it pleased him to see 
 such an image of his own fate ! He was faded like these 
 dying flowers, whose almost decaying fragrance mounted 
 strangely to his brain. The Count loved his country ; 
 he devoted himself to public interests with the frenzy of 
 a heart that seeks to cheat some other passion ; but the 
 studies and work into which he threw himself were not 
 enough for him ; there were frightful struggles in his 
 mind, of which some echoes reached me. Finally, he 
 would give utterance to harrowing aspirations for happi- 
 ness, and it seemed to me he ought yet to be happy ; 
 but what was the obstacle ? Was there a woman he
 
 40 Honorlne 
 
 loved ? This was a question I asked myself. You may 
 imagine the extent of the circles of torment that my 
 mind had searched before coming to so simple and so 
 terrible a question. Notwithstanding his efforts, my 
 patron did not succeed in stifling the movements of his 
 heart. Under his austere manner, under the reserve of 
 the magistrate, a passion rebelled, though coerced with 
 such force that no one but I who lived with him ever 
 guessed the secret. His motto seemed to be, " I suffer, 
 and am silent." The escort of respect and admiration 
 which attended him ; the friendship of workers as valiant 
 as himself — Grandville and Serizy, both presiding judges 
 — had no hold over the Count : either he told them 
 nothing, or they knew all. Impassible and lofty in 
 public, the Count betrayed the man only on rare inter- 
 vals when, alone in his garden or his study, he supposed 
 himself unobserved ; but then he was a child again, he 
 gave course to the tears hidden beneath the toga, to the 
 excitement which, if wrongly interpreted, might have 
 damaged his credit for perspicacity as a statesman. 
 
 ' When all this had become to me a matter of certainty, 
 Comte Octave had all the attractions of a problem, and 
 won on my affection as much as though he had been my 
 own father. Can you enter into the feeling of curiosity, 
 tempered by respect ? What catastrophe had blasted 
 this learned man, who, like Pitt, had devoted himself 
 from the age of eighteen to the studies indispensable to 
 power, while he had no ambition ; this judge, who 
 thoroughly knew the law of nations, political law, civil 
 and criminal law, and who could find in these a weapon 
 against every anxiety, against every mistake ; this pro- 
 found legislator, this serious writer, this pious celibate 
 whose life sufficiently proved that he was open to no 
 reproach ? A criminal could not have been more hardly 
 punished by God than was my master ; sorrow had robbed 
 him of half his slumbers ; he never slept more than four 
 hours. What struggle was it that went on in the depths
 
 Honorine 41 
 
 of these hours apparently so calm, so studious, passing 
 without a sound or a murmur, during which I often 
 detected him, when the pen had dropped from his fingers, 
 with his head resting on one hand, his eyes like two fixed 
 stars, and sometimes wet with tears ? How could the 
 waters of that living spring flow over the burning strand 
 without being dried up by the subterranean fire ? Was 
 there below it, as there is under the sea, between it and 
 the central fires of the globe, a bed of granite ? And 
 would the volcano burst at last ? 
 
 ' Sometimes the Count would give me a look of that 
 sagacious and keen-eyed curiosity by which one man 
 searches another when he desires an accomplice ; then 
 he shunned my eye as he saw it open a mouth, so to 
 speak, insisting on a reply, and seeming to say, '' Speak 
 first ! " Now and then Comte Octave's melancholy was 
 surly and gruff. If these spurts of temper offended me, 
 he could get over it without thinking of asking my 
 pardon ; but then his manners were gracious to the 
 point of Christian humility. 
 
 ' When I became attached like a son to this man — to 
 me such a mystery, but so intelligible to the outer world, 
 to whom the epithet eccentric is enough to account for 
 all the enigmas of the heart — I changed the state of the 
 house. Neglect of his own interests was carried by the 
 Count to the length of folly in the management of his 
 affairs. Possessing an income of about a hundred and 
 sixty thousand francs, without including the emoluments 
 of his appointments — three of which did not come under 
 the law against plurality — he spent sixty thousand, of 
 which at least thirty thousand went to his servants. By 
 the end of the first year I had got rid of all these rascals, 
 and begged His Excellency to use his influence in helping 
 me to get honest servants. By the end of the second 
 year the Count, better fed and better served, enjoyed the 
 comforts of modern life ; he had fine horses, supplied by a 
 coachman to whom I paid so much a month for each
 
 42 Honorine 
 
 horse ; his dinners on his reception days, furnished by 
 Chevet at a price agreed upon, did him credit ; his daily 
 meals were prepared by an excellent cook found by my 
 uncle, and helped by two kitchenmaids. The expendi- 
 ture for housekeeping, not including purchases, was no 
 more than thirty thousand francs a year ; we had two 
 additional men-servants, whose care restored the poetical 
 aspect of the house ; for this old palace, splendid even 
 in its rust, had an air of dignity which neglect had 
 dishonoured. 
 
 ' " I am no longer astonished," said he, on hearing of 
 these results, " at the fortunes made by my servants. In 
 seven years I have had two cooks, who have become rich 
 restaurant-keepers." 
 
 * '* And in seven years you have lost a hundred thousand 
 francs," replied I. " You, a judge, who in your court 
 sign summonses against crime, encouraged robbery in 
 your own house." 
 
 * Early in the year 1826 the Count had, no doubt, 
 ceased to watch me, and we were as closely attached as 
 two men can be when one is subordinate to the other. 
 He had never spoken to me of my future prospects, but 
 he had taken an interest, both as a master and as a father, 
 in training me. He often required me to collect 
 materials for his most arduous labours ; I drew up some 
 of his reports, and he corrected them, showing the 
 difference between his interpretation of the law, his 
 views and mine. When at last I had produced a docu- 
 ment which he could give in as his own he was delighted ; 
 this satisfaction was my reward, and he could see that I 
 took it so. This little incident produced an extraordinary 
 effect on a soul which seemed so stern. The Count 
 pronounced sentence on me, to use a legal phrase, as 
 supreme and royal judge ; he took my head in his hands, 
 and kissed me on the forehead. 
 
 '"Maurice," he exclaimed, ''you are no longer my 
 apprentice ; I know not yet what you will be to me —
 
 Honorine 43 
 
 but if no change occurs in my life, perhaps you will take 
 the place of a son." 
 
 * Comte Octave had introduced me to the best houses 
 in Paris, whither I went in his stead, with his servants 
 and carriage, on the too frequent occasions when, on the 
 point of starting, he changed his mind, and sent for a 
 hackney cab to take him — Where ? — that was the 
 mystery. By the welcome I met with I could judge of 
 the Count's feelings towards me, and the earnestness of 
 his recommendations. He supplied all my wants with 
 the thoughtfulness of a father, and with all the greater 
 liberality because my modesty left it to him always 
 to think of me. Towards the end of January 1827, at 
 the house of the Comtesse de Serizy, I had such persistent 
 ill-luck at play that I lost two thousand francs, and I 
 would not draw them out of my savings. Next morning 
 I asked myself, " Had I better ask my uncle for the 
 money, or put my confidence in the Count ? " 
 
 ' I decided on the second alternative. 
 
 * " Yesterday," said I, when he was at breakfast, " I 
 lost persistently at play ; I was provoked, and went on ; 
 I owe two thousand francs. Will you allow me to draw 
 the sum on account of my year's salary ? " 
 
 ' " No," said he, with the sweetest smile ; " when a 
 man plays in society, he must have a gambling purse. 
 Draw six thousand francs ; pay your debts. Henceforth 
 we must go halves ; for since you are my representative 
 on most occasions, your self-respect must not be made to 
 suffer for it." 
 
 *I made no speech of thanks. Thanks would have 
 been superfluous between us. This shade shows the 
 character of our relations. And yet we had not yet 
 unlimited confidence in each other ; he did not open 
 to me the vast subterranean chambers which I had 
 detected in his secret life ; and I, for my part, never said 
 to him, "What ails you ? From what are you suffering ? " 
 
 'What could he be doing during those long evenings?
 
 44 Honorine 
 
 He would often come in on foot or in a hackney cab 
 when I returned in a carriage — I, his secretary ! Was 
 so pious a man a prey to vices hidden under hypocrisy ? 
 Did he expend all the powers of his mind to satisfy a 
 jealousy more dexterous than Othello's ? Did he live 
 with some woman unworthy of him ? One morning, 
 on returning from I have forgotten what shop, where 1 
 had just paid a bill, between the Church of Saint-Paul and 
 the Hotel de Ville, I came across Comte Octave in such 
 eager conversation with an old woman that he did not 
 see me. The appearance of this hag filled me with 
 strange suspicions, suspicions that were all the better 
 founded because I never found that the Count invested 
 his savings. Is it not shocking to think of? I was 
 constituting myself my patron's censor. At that time I 
 knew that he had more than six hundred thousand francs 
 to invest ; and if he had bought securities of any kind, his 
 confidence in me was so complete in all that concerned 
 his pecuniary interests, that I certainly should have 
 known it. 
 
 ' Sometimes, in the morning, the Count took exercise in 
 his garden, to and fro, like a man to whom a walk is the 
 hippogryph ridden by dreamy melancholy. He walked 
 and walked ! And he rubbed his hands enough to rub 
 the skin ofF. And then, if I met him unexpectedly as he 
 came to the angle of a path, I saw his face beaming. 
 His eyes, instead of the hardness of a turquoise, had that 
 velvety softness of the blue periwinkle, which had so much 
 struck me on the occasion of my first visit, by reason of 
 the astonishing contrast in the two different looks : the 
 look of a happy man, and the look of an unhappy man. 
 Two or^three times at such a moment he had taken me 
 by the arm and led me on; then he had said, "What 
 have you come to ask ? " instead of pouring out his joy 
 into my heart that opened to him. But more often, 
 especially since I could do his work for him and write his 
 reports, the unhappy man would sit for hours staring at
 
 Honorine 45 
 
 the gold fish that swarmed in a handsome marble basin 
 in the middle of the garden, round which grew an amphi- 
 theatre of the finest flowers. He, an accomplished 
 statesman, seemed to have succeeded in making a passion 
 of the mechanical amusement of crumbling bread to 
 fishes. 
 
 'This is how the drama was disclosed of this second 
 inner life, so deeply ravaged and storm-tossed, where, in 
 a circle overlooked by Dante in his Inferno^ horrible joys 
 had their birth.' 
 
 The Consul-General paused. 
 
 * On a certain Monday,' he resumed, ' as chance would 
 have it, M. le President de Grandville and M. de Serizy 
 (at that time Vice-President of the Council of State) had 
 come to hold a meeting at Comte Octave's house. They 
 formed a committee of three, of which I was the secre- 
 tary. The Count had already got me the appointment 
 of Auditor to the Council of State. All the docu- 
 ments requisite for their inquiry into the political matter 
 privately submitted to these three gentlemen were laid 
 out on one of the long tables in the library. MM. 
 de Grandville and de Serizy had trusted to the Count 
 to make the preliminary examination of the papers 
 relating to the matter. To avoid the necessity for 
 carrying all the papers to M. de Serizy, as president of 
 the commission, it was decided that they should meet 
 first in the Rue Payenne. The Cabinet at the Tuileries 
 attached great importance to this piece of work, of which 
 the chief burthen fell on me — and to which I owed my 
 appointment, in the course of that year, to be Master 
 of Appeals. 
 
 'Though the Comtes de Grandville and de Serizy, 
 whose habits were much the same as my patron's, never 
 dined away from home, we were still discussing the 
 matter at a late hour, when we were startled by the 
 man-servant calling me aside to say, " MM. the Cures of
 
 46 Honorine 
 
 Saint-Paul and of the White Friars have been waiting in 
 the drawing-room for two hours." 
 
 ' It was nine o'clock. 
 
 ' " Well, gentlemen, you find yourselves compelled to 
 dine with priests," said Comte Octave to his colleagues. 
 " I do not know whether Grandville can overcome his 
 horror of a priest's gown " 
 
 ' " It depends on the priest." 
 
 * " One of them is my uncle, and the other is the Abbe 
 Gaudron," said I. " Do not be alarmed ; the Abbe Fon- 
 tanon is no longer second priest at Saint- Paul " 
 
 ' " Well, let us dine," replied the President de Grand- 
 ville. "A bigot frightens me, but there is no one so 
 cheerful as a truly pious man." 
 
 ' We went into the drawing-room. The dinner was 
 delightful. Men of real information, politicians to whom 
 business gives both consummate experience and the prac- 
 tice of speech, are admirable story-tellers, when they tell 
 stories. With them there is no medium ; they are either 
 heavy, or they are sublime. In this delightful sport Prince 
 Metternich is as good as Charles Nodier. The fun of a 
 statesman, cut in facets like a diamond, is sharp, sparkling, 
 and full of sense. Being sure that the proprieties would 
 be observed by these three superior men, my uncle allowed 
 his wit full play, a refined wit, gentle, penetrating, and 
 elegant, like that of all men who are accustomed to con- 
 ceal their thoughts under the black robe. And you may 
 rely upon it, there was nothing vulgar nor idle in this 
 light talk, which I would compare, for its effect on the 
 soul, to Rossini's music. 
 
 ' The Abbe Gaudron was, as M. de Grandville said, a 
 Saint Peter rather than a Saint Paul, a peasant full of 
 faith, as square on his feet as he was tall, a sacerdotal of 
 whose ignorance in matters of the world and of literature 
 enlivened the conversation by guileless amazement and 
 unexpected questions. They came to talking of one of 
 the plague spots of social life, of which we were just now
 
 Honorine 
 
 47 
 
 speaking — adultery. My uncle remarked on the contra- 
 diction which the legislators of the Code, still feeling the 
 blows of the revolutionary storm, had established between 
 civil and religious law, and which he said was at the 
 root of all the mischief. 
 
 ' " In the eyes of the Church," said he, " adultery is a 
 crime ; in those of your tribunals it is a misdemeanour. 
 Adultery drives to the police court in a carriage instead 
 of standing at the bar to be tried. Napoleon's Council 
 of State, touched with tenderness towards erring women, 
 was quite inefficient. Ought they not in this case to 
 have harmonised the civil and the religious law, and have 
 sent the guilty wife to a convent, as of old ? " 
 
 ' " To a convent ! " said M. de Serizy. " They must 
 first have created convents, and in those days monasteries 
 were being turned into barracks. Besides, think of what 
 you say, M. I'Abbe — give to God what society would 
 have none of ? " 
 
 ' " Oh ! " said the Comte de Grandville, " you do not 
 know France. They were obliged to leave the husband 
 free to take proceedings : well, there are not ten cases of 
 adultery brought up in a year." 
 
 ' " M. I'Abbe preaches for his own saint, for it was 
 Jesus Christ who invented adultery," said Comte Octave. 
 " In the East, the cradle of the human race, woman was 
 merely a luxury, and there was regarded as a chattel ; no 
 virtues were demanded of her but obedience and beauty. 
 By exalting the soul above the body, the modern family 
 in Europe — a daughter of Christ — invented indissoluble 
 marriage, and made it a sacrament." 
 
 '" Ah ! the Church saw all the difficulties," exclaimed 
 M. de Grandville. 
 
 ' " This institution has given rise to a new world," the 
 Count went on with a smile. " But the practices of that 
 world will never be that of a climate where women are 
 marriageable at seven years of age, and more than old at 
 five-and-twenty. The Catholic Church overlooked the
 
 48 Honorine 
 
 needs of half the globe. — So let us discuss Europe 
 
 only. 
 
 ' " Is woman our superior or our inferior ? That is the 
 real question so far as we are concerned. If woman is 
 our inferior, by placing her on so high a level as the 
 Church does, fearful punishments for adultery were 
 needful. And formerly that was what was done. The 
 cloister or death sums up early legislation. But since 
 then practice has modified the law, as is always the case. 
 The throne served as a hotbed for adultery, and the 
 increase of this inviting crime marks the decline of the 
 dogmas of the Catholic Church. In these days, in cases 
 where the Church now exacts no more than sincere 
 repentance from the erring wife, society is satisfied with a 
 brand-mark instead of an execution. The law still con- 
 demns the guilty, but it no longer terrifies them. In 
 short, there are two standards of morals : that of the 
 world, and that of the Code. Where the Code is weak, 
 as I admit with our dear Abbe, the world is audacious 
 and satirical. There are so few judges who would not 
 gladly have committed the fault against which they hurl 
 the rather stolid thunders of their * Inasmuch.' The 
 world, which gives the lie to the law alike in its rejoicings, 
 in its habits, and in its pleasures, is severer than the Code 
 and the Church ; the world punishes a blunder after en- 
 couraging hypocrisy. The whole economy of the law on 
 marriage seems to me to require reconstruction from the 
 bottom to the top. The French law would be perfect 
 perhaps if it excluded daughters from inheriting." 
 
 '"We three among us know the quesrion very 
 thoroughly," said the Comte de Grandville with a laugh. 
 " I have a wife I cannot live with. Serizy has a wife 
 who will not live with him. As for you, Octave, 
 yours ran away from you. So we three represent every 
 case of the conjugal conscience, and, no doubt, if 
 ever divorce is brought in again, we shall form the 
 
 committee."
 
 Honorine 49 
 
 ' Octave's fork dropped on his glass, broke it, and 
 broke his plate. He had turned as pale as death, and 
 flashed a thunderous glare at M. de Grandville, by 
 which he hinted at my presence, and which I caught. 
 
 '"Forgive me, my dear fellow. I did not see 
 Maurice," the President went on. " Serizy and I, after 
 being the witnesses to your marriage, became your 
 accomplices ; I did not think I was committing an 
 indiscretion in the presence of these two venerable 
 priests." 
 
 ' M. de Serizy changed the subject by relating all he 
 had done to please his wife without ever succeeding. 
 The old man concluded that it was impossible to regulate 
 human sympathies and antipathies ; he maintained that 
 social law was never more perfect than when it was 
 nearest to natural law. Now, Nature takes no account 
 of the affinities of souls ; her aim is fulfilled by the pro- 
 pagation of the species. Hence, the Code, in its present 
 form, was wise in leaving a wide latitude to chance. The 
 incapacity of daughters to inherit so long as there were 
 male heirs was an excellent provision, whether to hinder 
 the degeneration of the race, or to make households 
 happier by abolishing scandalous unions and giving the 
 sole preference to moral qualities and beauty. 
 
 '"But then,"" he exclaimed, lifting his hand with a 
 gesture of disgust, " how are we to perfect legislation in 
 a country which insists on bringing together seven or 
 eight hundred legislators ! — After all, if I am sacrificed," 
 he added, " I have a child to succeed me." 
 
 ' " Setting aside all the religious question," my uncle 
 said, " I would remark to your Excellency that Nature 
 only owes us life, and that it is society that owes us 
 happiness. Are you a father ? " asked my uncle. 
 
 '" And I — have I any children ? " said Comte Octave 
 in a hollow voice, and his tone made such an impression 
 that there was no more talk of wives or marriage. 
 
 ' When coffee had been served, the two Counts and the 
 
 D
 
 so 
 
 Honorine 
 
 two priests stole away, seeing that poor Octave had fallen 
 into a fit of melancholy, which prevented his noticing 
 their disappearance. My patron was sitting in an arm- 
 chair by the fire, in the attitude of a man crushed. 
 
 '"You now know the secret of my Hfe," said he to 
 me on noticing that we were alone. " After three years 
 of married life, one evening when I came in I found a 
 letter in which the Countess announced her flight. 
 The letter did not lack dignity, for it is in the nature of 
 women to preserve some virtues even when committing 
 that horrible sin. — The story now is that my wife went 
 abroad in a ship that was wrecked ; she is supposed to be 
 dead. I have lived alone for seven years ! — Enough for 
 this evening, Maurice. We will talk of my situation 
 when I have grown used to the idea of speaking of it to 
 you. When we suffer from a chronic disease, it needs 
 time to become accustomed to improvement. That 
 improvement often seems to be merely another aspect of 
 the complaint." 
 
 ' I went to bed greatly agitated ; for the mystery, far 
 from being explained, seemed to me more obscure than 
 ever. I foresaw some strange drama indeed, for I under- 
 stood that there could be no vulgar difference between 
 the woman the Count could choose and such a character 
 as his. The events which had driven the Countess to 
 leave a man so noble, so amiable, so perfect, so loving, 
 so worthy to be loved, must have been singular, to say 
 the least. M. de Grandville's remark had been like a 
 torch flung into the caverns over which I had so long 
 been walking ; and though the flame lighted them but 
 dimly, my eyes could perceive their wide extent ! I 
 could imagine the Count's sufferings without knowing 
 their depth or their bitterness. That sallow face, those 
 parched temples, those overwhelming studies, those 
 moments of absent-mindedness, the smallest details of the 
 life of this married bachelor, all stood out in luminous 
 relief during the hour of mental questioning, which is, as
 
 Honor! ne 5 1 
 
 it were, the twilight before sleep, and to which any man 
 would have given himself up, as I did. 
 
 ' Oh ! how I loved my poor master ! He seemed to 
 me sublime. I read a poem of melancholy, I saw 
 perpetual activity in the heart I had accused of being 
 torpid. Must not supreme grief always come at last 
 to stagnation ? Had this judge, who had so much in his 
 power, ever revenged himself? Was he feeding himself 
 on her long agony ? Is it not a remarkable thing in 
 Paris to keep anger always seething for ten years ? What 
 had Octave done since this great misfortune — for the 
 separation of husband and wife is a great misfortune in 
 our day, when domestic life has become a social question, 
 which it never was of old ? 
 
 ' We allowed a few days to pass on the watch, for 
 great sorrows have a diffidence of their own ; but at last, 
 one evening, the Count said in a grave voice — 
 
 '"Stay." 
 
 ' This, as nearly as may be, is his story. 
 
 '"My father had a ward, rich and lovely, who was 
 sixteen at the time when I came back from college to live 
 in this old house. Honorine, who had been brought 
 up by my mother, was just awaking to life. Full of 
 grace and of childlike ways, she dreamed of happiness 
 as she would have dreamed of jewels ; perhaps happiness 
 seemed to her the jewels of the soul. Her piety was not 
 free from puerile pleasures; for everything, even religion, 
 was poetry to her ingenuous heart. She looked to the 
 future as a perpetual fete. Innocent and pure, no 
 delirium had disturbed her dream. Shame and grief had 
 never tinged her cheek nor moistened her eye. She did 
 not even inquire into the secret of her involuntary 
 emotions on a fine spring day. And then, she felt that 
 she was weak and destined to obedience, and she awaited 
 marriage without wishing for it. Her smiling imagina- 
 tion knew nothing of the corruption — necessary perhaps
 
 52 Honorine 
 
 — which literature imparts by depicting the passions ; she 
 knew nothing of the world, and was ignorant of all the 
 dangers of society. The dear child had suffered so little 
 that she had not even developed her courage. In short, 
 her guilelcssncss would have led her to walk fearless 
 among serpents, like the ideal figure of Innocence a 
 painter once created. We lived together like two 
 brothers. 
 
 '"At the end of a year I said to her one day, in the 
 garden of this house, by the basin, as we stood throwing 
 crumbs to the fish— 
 
 t « i Would you like that we should be married ? With 
 me you could do whatever you please, while another man 
 would make you unhappy.' 
 
 ' " ' Mamma,' said she to my mother, who came out to 
 join us, ' Octave and I have agreed to be married ' 
 
 '"'What! at seventeen?' said my mother. 'No; 
 vou must wait eighteen months ; and if eighteen months 
 hence you like each other, well, your birth and fortunes 
 are equal, you can make a marriage which is* suitable, as 
 well as being a love match.' 
 
 ' " When I was six-and-twenty, and Honorine nineteen, 
 we were married. Our respect for my father and mother, 
 old folks of the Bourbon Court, hindered us from making 
 this house fashionable, or renewing the furniture ; we 
 lived on, as we had done in the past, as children. How- 
 ever, I went into society ; I initiated my wife into the 
 world of fashion ; and I regarded it as one of my duties to 
 instruct her. 
 
 ' " I recognised afterwards that marriages contracted 
 under such circumstances as ours bear in themselves a 
 rock against which many affections are wrecked, many 
 prudent calculations, many lives. The husband becomes 
 a pedagogue, or, if you like, a professor, and love 
 perishes under the rod which, sooner or later, gives pain ; 
 for a young and handsome wife, at once discreet and 
 laughter-loving, will not accept any superiority above that
 
 Honorine ^^ 
 
 with which she is endowed by nature. Perhaps I was 
 in the wrong? During the .difficult beginnings of a 
 household I, perhaps, assumed a magisterial tone ? On 
 the other hand, I may have made the mistake of trusting 
 too entirely to that artless nature ; I kept no watch 
 over the Countess, in whom revolt seemed to me im- 
 possible ? Alas ! neither in politics nor in domestic life 
 has it yet been ascertained whether empires and happiness 
 are wrecked by too much confidence or too much severity ! 
 Perhaps, again, the husband failed to realise Honorine's 
 girlish dreams ? Who can tell, while happy days last, 
 what precepts he has neglected ? " 
 
 * I remember only the broad outlines of the reproaches 
 the Count addressed to himself, with all the good faith of 
 an anatomist seeking the cause of a disease which might 
 be overlooked by his brethren ; but his merciful indul- 
 gence struck me then as really worthy of that of Jesus 
 Christ when He rescued the woman taken in adultery. 
 
 ' " It was eighteen months after my father's death — my 
 mother followed him to the tomb in a few months — when 
 the fearful night came which surprised me by Honorine's 
 farewell letter. What poetic delusion had seduced my 
 wife ? Was it through her senses ? Was it the magnetism 
 of misfortune or of genius ? Which of these powers had 
 taken her by storm or misled her ? — I would not know. 
 The blow was so terrible, that for a month I remained 
 stunned. Afterwards, reflection counselled me to con- 
 tinue in ignorance, and Honorine's misfortunes have since 
 taught me too much about all these things. — So far, 
 Maurice, the story is commonplace enough ; but one 
 word will change it all : I love Honorine, I have never 
 ceased to worship her. From the day when she left me 
 I have lived on memory ; one by one I recall the pleasures 
 for which Honorine no doubt had no taste. 
 
 '"Oh !" said he, seeing the amazement in my eyes, 
 " do not make a hero of me, do not think me such a fool, 
 as a Colonel of the Empire would say, as to have sought
 
 54 Honorine 
 
 no diversion. Alas, my boy ! I was either too young or 
 too much in love ; I have not in the whole world met 
 with another woman. After frightful struggles with my- 
 self, I tried to forget; money in hand, I stood on the very 
 threshold of infidelity, but there the memory of Honorine 
 rose before me like a white statue. As I recalled the 
 infinite delicacy of that exquisite skin, through which the 
 blood might be seen coursing and the nerves quivering ; 
 as I saw in fancy that ingenuous face, as guileless on the 
 eve of my sorrows as on the day when I said to her, 
 ' Shall we marry ? ' as I remembered a heavenly fragrance, 
 the very odour of virtue, and the light in her eyes, the 
 prettiness of her movements, I fled like a man preparing 
 to violate a tomb, who sees emerging from it the trans- 
 figured soul of the dead. At consultations, in Court, by 
 night, I dream so incessantly of Honorine that only by 
 excessive strength of mind do I succeed in attending to 
 what I am doing and saying. This is the secret of my 
 labours. 
 
 '"Well, I felt no more anger with her than a father 
 can feel on seeing his beloved child in some danger it has 
 imprudently rushed into. I understood that I had made 
 a poem of my wife — a poem I delighted in with such 
 intoxication, that I fancied she shared the intoxication. 
 Ah ! Maurice, an indiscriminating passion in a husband 
 is a mistake that may lead to any crime in a wife. I had 
 no doubt left all the faculties of this child, loved as a child 
 entirely unemployed ; I had perhaps wearied her with 
 my love before the hour of loving had struck for her ! 
 Too young to understand that in the constancy of the 
 wife lies the germ of the mother's devotion, she mistook 
 this first test of marriage for life itself, and the refractory 
 child cursed life, unknown to me, not daring to complain 
 to me, out of sheer modesty perhaps ! In so cruel a 
 position she would be defenceless against any man who 
 stirred her deeply. — And I, so wise a judge as they say — 
 I, who have a kind heart, but whose mind was absorbed
 
 Honorine 55 
 
 — I understood too late these unwritten laws of the 
 woman's code, I read them by the light of the fire that 
 wrecked my roof. Then I constituted my heart a 
 tribunal by virtue of the law, for the law makes the 
 husband a judge : I acquitted my wife, and I condemned 
 myself. But love took possession of me as a passion, the 
 mean, despotic passion which comes over some old men. 
 At this day I love the absent Honorine as a man of sixty 
 loves a woman whom he must possess at any cost, and 
 yet I feel the strength of a young man. I have the 
 insolence of the old man and the reserve of a boy. — My 
 dear fellow, society only laughs at such a desperate con- 
 jugal predicament. Where it pities a lover, it regards a 
 husband as ridiculously inept ; it makes sport of those 
 who cannot keep the woman they have secured under 
 the canopy of the Church, and before the Maire's scarf 
 of office. And I had to keep silence. 
 
 ' " Serizy is happy. His indulgence allows him to see 
 his wife ; he can protect and defend her ; and, as he 
 adores her, he knows all the perfect joys of a benefactor 
 whom nothing can disturb, not even ridicule, for he 
 pours it himself on his fatherly pleasures. ' I remain 
 married only for my wife's sake,' he said to me one day 
 on coming out of court. 
 
 '"But I — I have nothing; I have not even to face 
 ridicule, I who live solely on a love which is starving ! 
 I who can never find a word to say to a woman of the 
 world ! I who loathe prostitution ! I who am faithful 
 under a spell ! — But for my religious faith, I should have 
 killed myself. I have defied the gulf of hard work ; I 
 have thrown myself into it, and come out again alive, 
 fevered, burning, bereft of sleep ! " 
 
 ' I cannot remember all the words of this eloquent 
 man, to whom passion gave an eloquence indeed so far 
 above that of the pleader that, as I listened to him, I, 
 like him, felt my cheeks wet with tears. You may 
 conceive of my feelings when, after a pause, during which
 
 ^6 Honorine 
 
 we dried them away, he finished his story with this 
 revelation — 
 
 '"This is the drama of my soul, but it is not the 
 actual living drama which is at this moment being acted 
 in Paris ! The interior drama interests nobody. I 
 know it ; and you will one day admit that it is so, you, 
 who at this moment shed tears with me ; no one can 
 burden his heart or his skin with another's pain. The 
 measure of our sufferings is in ourselves. — You even 
 understand my sorrows only by very vague analogy. 
 Could you see me calming the most violent frenzy of 
 despair by the contemplation of a miniature in which I 
 can see and kiss her brow, the smile on her lips, the shape 
 of her face, can breathe the whiteness of her skin ; which 
 enables me almost to feel, to play with the black masses 
 of her curling hair ? Could you see me when I leap 
 with hope — when I writhe under the myriad darts of 
 despair — when I tramp through the mire of Paris to quell 
 my irritation by fatigue ? I have fits of collapse com- 
 parable to those of a consumptive patient, moods of wild 
 hilarity, terrors as of a murderer who meets a sergeant of 
 police. In short, my life is a continual paroxysm of 
 fears, joy, and dejection. 
 
 '"As to the drama — it is this. You imagine that I 
 am occupied with the Council of State, the Chamber, 
 the Courts, Politics. — Why, dear me, seven hours at 
 night are enough for all that, so much are my faculties 
 overwrought by the life I lead ! Honorine is my real 
 concern. To recover my wife is my only study ; to guard 
 her in her cage, without her suspecting that she is in 
 my power ; to satisfy her needs, to supply the little 
 pleasure she allows herself, to be always about her like a 
 sylph without allowing her to see or to suspect me, for if 
 she did, the future would be lost, — that is my life, my 
 true life. — For seven years I have never gone to bed 
 without going first to see the light of her night-lamp, or 
 her shadow on the window curtains.
 
 Honorine 57 
 
 * " She left my house, choosing to take nothing but 
 the dress she wore that day. The child carried her 
 magnanimity to the point of folly ! Consequently, 
 eighteen months after her flight she was deserted by her 
 lover, who was appalled by the cold, cruel, sinister, and 
 revolting aspect of poverty — the coward ! The man 
 had, no doubt, counted on the easy and luxurious life in 
 Switzerland or Italy which fine ladies indulge in when 
 they leave their husbands. Honorine has sixty thousand 
 francs a year of her own. The wretch left the dear 
 creature expecting an infant, and without a penny. In 
 the month of November 1820 I found means to persuade 
 the best accoucheur in Paris to play the part of a humble 
 suburban apothecary. I induced the priest of the parish 
 in which the Countess was living to supply her needs as 
 though he were performing an act of charity. Then to 
 hide my wife, to secure her against discovery, to find her 
 a housekeeper who would be devoted to me and be my 
 intelligent confidante — it was a task worthy of Figaro ! 
 You may suppose that to discover where my wife had 
 taken refuge I had only to make up my mind to it. 
 
 ' " After three months of desperation rather than 
 despair, the idea of devoting myself to Honorine with 
 God only in my secret, was one of those poems which 
 occur only to the heart of a lover through life and death ! 
 Love must have its daily food. And ought I not to 
 protect this child, whose guilt was the outcome of my 
 imprudence, against fresh disaster — to fulfil my part, in 
 short, as a guardian angel ? — At the age of seven months 
 her infant died, happily for her and for me. For nine 
 months more my wife lay between life and death, 
 deserted at the time when she most needed a manly arm ; 
 but this arm," said he, holding out his own with a 
 gesture of angelic dignity, " was extended over her head. 
 Honorine was nursed as she would have been in her own 
 home. When, on her recovery, she asked how and by 
 whom she had been assisted, she was told — * By the
 
 58 Honorine 
 
 Sisters of Charity in the neighbourhood — by the Maternity 
 Society — by the parish priest, who took an interest in her.' 
 
 ' " This woman, whose pride amounts to a vice, has 
 shown a power of resistance in misfortune, which on 
 some evenings I call the obstinacy of a mule. Honorine 
 was bent on earning her living. My wife works ! For 
 five years past I have lodged her in the Rue Saint-Maur, 
 in a charming little house, where she makes artificial 
 flowers and articles of fashion. She believes that she 
 sells the product of her elegant fancy-work to a shop, 
 where she is so well paid that she makes twenty francs a 
 day, and in these six years she has never had a moment's 
 suspicion. She pays for everything she needs at about 
 the third of its value, so that on six thousand francs a 
 year she lives as if she had fifteen thousand. She is 
 devoted to flowers, and pays a hundred crowns to a 
 gardener, who costs me twelve hundred in wages, and 
 sends me in a bill for two thousand francs every three 
 months. I have promised the man a market-garden with 
 a house on it close to the porter's lodge in the Rue Saint- 
 Maur. I hold this ground in the name of a clerk of the 
 law courts. The smallest indiscretion would ruin the 
 gardener's prospects. Honorine has her little house, a 
 garden, and a splendid hothouse, for a rent of five hundred 
 francs a year. There she lives under the name of her 
 housekeeper, Madame Gobain, the old woman of im- 
 peccable discretion whom I was so lucky as to find, and 
 whose affection Honorine has won. But her zeal, like 
 that of the gardener, is kept hot by the promise of reward 
 at the moment of success. The porter and his wife cost 
 me dreadfully dear for the same reasons. However, for 
 three years Honorine has been happy, believing that she 
 owes to her own toil all the luxury of flowers, dress, and 
 comfort. 
 
 ' " Oh ! I know what you are about to say," cried the 
 Count, seeing a question in my eyes and on my lips. 
 " Yes, yes ; I have made the attempt. My wife was
 
 Honorine 59 
 
 formerly living in the Faubourg Saint-Antoine. One 
 day when, from what Gobain told me, I believed in some 
 chance of a reconciliation, I wrote by post a letter, in 
 which I tried to propitiate my wife — a letter written and 
 re-written twenty times ! I will not describe my agonies. 
 I went from the Rue Payenne to the Rue de Reuilly 
 like a condemned wretch going from the Palais de 
 Justice to his execution, but he goes on a cart, and I was 
 on foot. It was dark — there was a fog ; I went to meet 
 Madame Gobain, who was to come and tell me what my 
 wife had done. Honorine, on recognising my writing, 
 had thrown the letter into the fire without reading it. — 
 ' Madame Gobain,' she had exclaimed, ' I leave this to- 
 morrow.' 
 
 * *' What a dagger-stroke was this to a man who found 
 inexhaustible pleasure in the trickery by which he gets 
 the finest Lyons velvet at twelve francs a yard, a 
 pheasant, a fish, a dish of fruit, for a tenth of their value, 
 for a woman so ignorant as to believe that she is paying 
 ample wages with two hundred and fifty francs to 
 Madame Gobain, a cook fit for a bishop. 
 
 ' " You have sometimes found me rubbing my hands 
 in the enjoyment of a sort of happiness. Well, I had 
 just succeeded in some ruse worthy of the stage. I had 
 just deceived my wife — I had sent her by a purchaser of 
 wardrobes an Indian shawl, to be offered to her as the 
 property of an actress who had hardly worn it, but in 
 which I — the solemn lawyer whom you know — had 
 wrapped myself for a night ! In short, my life at this 
 day may be summed up in the two words which express 
 the extremes of torment — I love, and I wait ! I have in 
 Madame Gobain a faithful spy on the heart I worship. 
 I go every evening to chat with the old woman, to hear 
 from her all that Honorine has done during the day, the 
 lightest word she has spoken, for a single exclamation 
 might betray to me the secrets of that soul which is 
 wilfully deaf and dumb. Honorine is pious ; she attends
 
 6o Honorine 
 
 the Church services and prays, but she has never been 
 to confession or taken the Communion ; she foresees 
 what a priest would tell her. She will not listen to the 
 advice, to the injunction, that she should return to me. 
 This horror of me overwhelms me, dismays me, for I 
 have never done her the smallest harm. I have always 
 been kind to her. Granting even that I may have been 
 a little hasty when teaching her, that my man's irony 
 may have hurt her legitimate girlish pride, is that a 
 reason for persisting in a determination which only the 
 most implacable hatred could have inspired ? Honorine 
 has never told Madame Gobain who she is ; she keeps 
 absolute silence as to her marriage, so that the worthy 
 and respectable woman can never speak a word in my 
 favour, for she is the only person in the house who 
 knows my secret. The others know nothing ; they live 
 under the awe caused by the name of the Prefect of 
 Police, and their respect for the power of a Minister. 
 Hence it is impossible for me to penetrate that heart ; 
 the citadel is mine, but I cannot get into it. I have not 
 a single means of action. An act of violence would 
 ruin me for ever. 
 
 ' " How can I argue against reasons of which I know 
 nothing ? Should I write a letter, and have it copied by 
 a public writer, and laid before Honorine ? But that 
 would be to run the risk of a third removal. The last 
 cost me fifty thousand francs. The purchase was made 
 in the first instance in the name of the secretary whom 
 you succeeded. The unhappy man, who did not know 
 how lightly I sleep, was detected by me in the act of 
 opening the box in which I had put the private agree- 
 ment ; I coughed, and he was seized with a panic ; next 
 day I compelled him to sell the house to the man in 
 whose name it now stands, and I turned him out. 
 
 ' " If it were not that I feel all my noblest faculties as 
 a man satisfied, happy, expansive; if the part I am 
 playing were not that of divine fatherhood ; if I did not
 
 Honorine 6i 
 
 drink in delight by every pore, there are moments when 
 I should believe that I wzs a monomaniac. Sometimes 
 at night I hear the jingling bells of madness. I dread 
 the violent transitions from a feeble hope, vi^hich some- 
 times shines and flashes up, to complete despair, falling 
 as low as man can fall. A few days since I was seriously 
 considering the horrible end of the story of Lovelace and 
 Clarissa Harlowe, and saying to myself. If Honorine 
 were the mother of a child of mine, must she not neces- 
 sarily return under her husband's roof? 
 
 '"And I have such complete faith in a happy future, 
 that ten months ago I bought and paid for one of the 
 handsomest houses in the Faubourg Saint-Honore. If I 
 win back Honorine, I will not allow her to see this house 
 again, nor the room from which she fled. I mean to 
 place my idol in a new temple, where she may feel that 
 life is altogether new. That house is being made a 
 marvel of elegance and taste. I have been told of a poet 
 who, being almost mad with love for an actress, bought 
 the handsomest bed in Paris without knowing how the 
 actress would reward his passion. Well, one of the 
 coldest of lawyers, a man who is supposed to be the 
 gravest adviser of the Crown, was stirred to the depths of 
 his heart by that anecdote. The orator of the Legislative 
 Chamber can understand the poet who fed his ideal on 
 material possibilities. Three days before the arrival of 
 Maria Louisa, Napoleon flung himself on his wedding 
 bed at Compiegne. All stupendous passions have the 
 same impulses. I love as a poet — as an emperor ! " 
 
 *As I heard the last words, I believed that Comte 
 Octave's fears were realised ; he had risen, and was 
 walking up and down, and gesticulating, but he stopped 
 as if shocked by the vehemence of his own words. 
 
 '"I am very ridiculous," he added, after a long pause, 
 looking at me, as if craving a glance of pity. 
 
 ' " No, Monsieur, you are very unhappy." 
 
 ' " Ah yes ! " said he, taking up the thread of his
 
 62 Honorine 
 
 confidences. "From the violence of my speech you 
 may, you must believe in the intensity of a physical 
 passion which for nine years has absorbed all my faculties; 
 but that is nothing in comparison with the worship I feel 
 for the soul, the mind, the heart, all in that woman that 
 is not mere woman ; the enchanting divinities in the 
 train of Love, with whom we pass our life, and who form 
 the daily poem of a fugitive delight. By a phenomenon 
 of retrospection I see now the graces of Honorine's mind 
 and heart, to which I paid little heed in the time of my 
 happiness — like all who are happy. From day to day I 
 have appreciated the extent of my loss, discovering the 
 exquisite gifts of that capricious and refractory young 
 creature who has grown so strong and so proud under the 
 heavy hand of poverty and the shock of the most 
 cowardly desertion. And that heavenly blossom is fading 
 in solitude and hiding ! — Ah ! The law of which we 
 were speaking," he went on with bitter irony, " the law 
 is a squad of gendarmes — my wife seized and dragged 
 away by force ! Would not that be to triumph over a 
 corpse ? Religion has no hold on her ; she craves its 
 poetry, she prays, but she does not listen to the command- 
 ments of the Church. I, for my part, have exhausted 
 everything in the way of mercy, of kindness, of love ; I 
 am at my wits' end. Only one chance of victory is 
 left to me : the cunning and patience with which bird- 
 catchers at last entrap the wariest birds, the swiftest, the 
 most capricious, and the rarest. Hence, Maurice, when 
 M. de Grandville's indiscretion betrayed to you the secret 
 of my life, I ended by regarding this incident as one of 
 the decrees of fate, one of the utterances for which 
 gamblers listen and pray in the midst of their most 
 impassioned play. . . . Have you enough affection for 
 me to show me romantic devotion ? " 
 
 '" I see what you are coming to. Monsieur le Comte," 
 said I, interrupting him; "I guess your purpose. Your 
 first secretary tried to open your deed box. I know the
 
 Honorinc 6;^ 
 
 heart of your second — he might fall in love with your 
 wife. And can you devote him to destruction by sending 
 him into the fire ? Can any one put his hand into a 
 brazier without burning it ? " 
 
 '"You are a foolish boy," replied the Count. "I will 
 send you well gloved. It is no secretary of mine that 
 will be lodged in the Rue Saint-Maur in the little garden- 
 house which I have at his disposal. It is my distant 
 cousin, Baron de L'Hostal, a lawyer high in office . . ." 
 
 ' After a moment of silent surprise, I heard the 
 gate bell ring, and a carriage came into the courtyard. 
 Presently the footman announced Madame de Courte- 
 ville and her daughter. The Count had a large family 
 connection on his mother's side. Madame de Courteville, 
 his cousin, was the widow of a judge on the bench of the 
 Seine division, who had left her a daughter and no fortune 
 whatever. What could a woman of nine-and-twenty be 
 in comparison with a young girl of twenty, as lovely as 
 imagination could wish for an ideal mistress ? 
 
 ' " Baron, and Master of Appeals, till you get something 
 better, and this old house settled on her, — would not you 
 have enough good reasons for not falling in love with 
 the Countess ? " he said to me in a whisper, as he took 
 me by the hand and introduced me to Madame de 
 Courteville and her daughter. 
 
 ' I was dazzled, not so much by these advantages of 
 which I had never dreamed, but by Amelie de Courte- 
 ville, whose beauty was thrown into relief by one of 
 those well-chosen toilets which a mother can achieve for 
 a daughter when she wants to see her married.' 
 
 'But I will not talk of myself,' said the Consul after 
 a pause. 
 
 ' Three weeks later I went to live in the gardener's 
 cottage, which had been cleaned, repaired, and furnished 
 with the celerity which is explained by three words : 
 Paris ; French workmen ; money ! I was as much in 
 love as the Count could possibly desire as a security.
 
 64 Honorine 
 
 Would the prudence of a young man of five-and-twenty 
 be equal to the part I was undertaking, involving a 
 friend's happiness ? To settle that matter, I may confess 
 that I counted very much on my uncle's advice ; for I 
 had been authorised by the Count to take him into 
 confidence in any case where I deemed his interference 
 necessary. I engaged a garden ; I devoted myself to 
 horticulture ; I worked frantically, like a man whom 
 nothing can divert, turning up the soil of the market- 
 garden, and appropriating the ground to the culture of 
 flowers. Like the maniacs of England, or of Holland, I 
 gave it out that I was devoted to one kind of flower, and 
 especially grew dahlias, collecting every variety. You 
 will understand that my conduct, even in the smallest 
 details, was laid down for me by the Count, whose whole 
 intellectual powers were directed to the most trifling 
 incidents of the tragi-comedy enacted in the Rue Saint- 
 Maur. As soon as the Countess had gone to bed, at 
 about eleven at night. Octave, Madame Gobain, and I sat 
 in council. I heard the old woman's report to the Count of 
 his wife's least proceedings during the day. He inquired 
 into everything : her meals, her occupations, her frame 
 of mind, her plans for the morrow, the flowers she 
 proposed to imitate. I understood what love in despair 
 may be when it is the threefold passion of the heart, the 
 mind, and the senses. Octave lived only for that hour. 
 
 ' During two months, while my work in the garden 
 lasted, I never set eyes on the little house where my 
 fair neighbour dwelt. I had not even inquired whether I 
 had a neighbour, though the Countess's garden was 
 divided from mine by a paling, along which she had 
 planted cypress trees already four feet high. One fine 
 morning Madame Gobain announced to her mistress, as a 
 disastrous piece of news, the intention, expressed by an 
 eccentric creature who had become her neighbour, of 
 building a wall between the two gardens, at the end of 
 the year. I will say nothing of the curiosity which
 
 Honorine 6^ 
 
 consumed me to see the Countess ! The wish almost extin- 
 guished my budding love for Amelie de Courteville. My 
 scheme for building a wall was indeed a serious threat. 
 There would be no more fresh air for Honorine, whose 
 garden would then be a sort of narrow alley shut in 
 between my wall and her own little house. This 
 dwelling, formerly a summer villa, was like a house of 
 cards ; it was not more than thirty feet deep, and 
 about a hundred feet long. The garden front, painted in 
 the German fashion, imitated a trellis with flowers up 
 to the second floor, and was a really charming example of 
 the Pompadour style, so well called rococo. A long 
 avenue of limes led up to it. The gardens of the 
 pavilion and my plot of ground were in the shape of a 
 hatchet, of which this avenue was the handle. My 
 wall would cut away three-quarters of the hatchet. 
 
 'The Countess was in despair. 
 
 ' " My good Gobain," said she, " what sort of man is 
 this florist ? " 
 
 ' " On my word," said the housekeeper, " I do not 
 know whether it will be possible to tame him. He 
 seems to have a horror of women. He is the nephew of 
 a Paris cure. I have seen the uncle but once ; a fine 
 old man of sixty, very ugly, but very amiable. It is 
 quite possible that this priest encourages his nephew, as 
 they say in the neighbourhood, in his love of flowers, that 
 nothing worse may happen " 
 
 ' « Why— what ? " 
 
 '"Well, your neighbour is a little cracked!" said 
 Gobain, tapping her head ! 
 
 ' Now a harmless lunatic is the only man whom no 
 woman ever distrusts in the matter of sentiment. You 
 will see how wise the Count had been in choosing this 
 disguise for me. 
 
 '"What ails him then ? " asked the Countess. 
 
 ' " He has studied too hard," replied Gobain ; " he 
 has turned misanthropic. And he has his reasons for 
 
 £
 
 66 Honorine 
 
 disliking women — well, if you want to know all that 
 is said about him " 
 
 * " Well," said Honorine, " madmen frighten me less 
 than sane folks ; I will speak to him myself! Tell him 
 that I beg him to come here. If I do not succeed, I 
 will send for the cure." 
 
 'The day after this conversation, as I was walking 
 along my gravelled path, I caught sight of the half-opened 
 curtains on the first floor of the little house, and of a 
 woman's face curiously peeping out. Madame Gobain 
 called me. I hastily glanced at the Countess's house, 
 and by a rude shrug expressed, " What do I care for 
 your mistress ! " 
 
 ' " Madame," said Gobain, called upon to give an 
 account of her errand, " the madman bid me leave him in 
 peace, saying that even a charcoal seller is master in his 
 own premises, especially when he has no wife." 
 
 '" He is perfectly right," said the Countess. 
 
 ' " Yes, but he ended by saying, ' I will go,' when I 
 told him that he would greatly distress a lady living in retire- 
 ment, who found her greatest solace in growing flowers." 
 
 ' Next day a signal from Gobain informed me that 
 I was expected. After the Countess's breakfast, when 
 she was walking to and fro in front of her house, I 
 broke out some palings, and went towards her. I had 
 dressed myself like a countryman, in an old pair of grey 
 flannel trousers, heavy wooden shoes, and shabby shooting 
 coat, a peaked cap on my head, a ragged bandana round 
 my neck, hands soiled with mould, and a dibble in my 
 hand.' 
 
 ' " Madame," said the housekeeper, " this good man is 
 your neighbour." 
 
 * The Countess was not alarmed. I saw at last the 
 woman whom her own conduct and her husband's confi- 
 dences had made me so curious to meet. It was in the 
 early days of May. The air was pure, the weather serene ; 
 the verdure of the first foliage, the fragrance of spring
 
 Honorine 67 
 
 formed a setting for this creature of sorrow. As I then 
 saw Honorine I understood Octave's passion and the 
 truthfulness of his description, " A heavenly flower ! " 
 
 'Her pallor was what first struck me by its peculiar tone 
 of white — for there are as many tones of white as of red 
 or blue. On looking at the Countess, the eye seemed 
 to feel that tender skin, where the blood flowed in the 
 blue veins. At the slightest emotion the blood mounted 
 under the surface in rosy flushes like a cloud. When we 
 met, the sunshine, filtering through the light foliage of 
 the acacias, shed on Honorine the pale gold, ambient 
 glory in which Raphael and Titian, alone of all painters, 
 have been able to enwrap the Virgin. Her brown eyes 
 expressed both tenderness and vivacity ; their brightness 
 seemed reflected in her face through the long downcast 
 lashes. Merely by lifting her delicate eyelids, Honorine 
 could cast a spell; there was so much feeling, dignity, 
 terror, or contempt in her way of raising or dropping 
 those veils of the soul. She could freeze or give life by a 
 look. Her light-brown hair, carelessly knotted on her 
 head, outlined a poet's brow, high, powerful, and dreamy. 
 The mouth was wholly voluptuous. And to crown all 
 by a grace, rare in France, though common in Italy, all 
 the lines and forms of the head had a stamp of nobleness 
 which would defy the outrages of time. 
 
 ' Though slight, Honorine was not thin, and her figure 
 struck me as being one that might revive love when it 
 believed itself exhausted. She perfectly represented the 
 idea conveyed by the word mignonney for she was one of 
 those pliant little women who allow themselves to be taken 
 up, petted, set down, and taken up again like a kitten. 
 Her small feet, as I heard them on the gravel, made a 
 light sound essentially their own, that harmonised with 
 the rustle of her dress, producing a feminine music which 
 stamped itself on the heart, and remained distinct from the 
 footfall of a thousand other women. Her gait bore all the 
 quarterings of her race with so much pride, that, in
 
 68 Honorine 
 
 the street, the least respectful working man would have 
 made way for her. Gay and tender, haughty and imposing, 
 it was impossible to understand her, excepting as gifted 
 with these apparently incompatible qualities, which, never- 
 theless, had left her still a child. But it was a child who 
 might be as strong as an angel ; and, like the angel, once 
 hurt in her nature, she would be implacable. 
 
 ' Coldness on that face itiust no doubt be death to those 
 on whom her eyes had smiled, for whom her set lips had 
 parted, for those whose soul had drunk in the melody of 
 that voice, lending to her words the poetry of song by its 
 peculiar intonation. Inhaling the perfume of violets that 
 accompanied her, I understood how the memory of 
 this wife had arrested the Count on the threshold of 
 debauchery, and how impossible it would be ever to 
 forget a creature who really was a flower to the touch, 
 a flower to the eye, a flower of fragrance, a heavenly 
 flower to the soul. . . . Honorine inspired devotion, 
 chivalrous devotion, regardless of reward. A man on 
 seeing her must say to himself — 
 
 '"Think, and I will divine your thought ; speak, and 
 I will obey. If my life, sacrificed in torments, can pro- 
 cure you one day's happiness, take my life ; I will smile 
 like a martyr at the stake, for I shall offer that day to 
 God, as a token to which a father responds on recognis- 
 ing a gift to his child." Many women study their 
 expression, and succeed in producing effects similar to 
 those which would have struck you at first sight of the 
 Countess ; only, in her, it all was the outcome of a 
 delightful nature, that inimitable nature went at once 
 to the heart. If I tell you all this, it is because her 
 soul, her thoughts, the exquisiteness of her heart, are all 
 we arc concerned with, and you would have blamed me 
 if I had not sketched them for you. 
 
 ' I was very near forgetting my part as a half-crazy 
 lout, clumsy, and by no means chivalrous. 
 
 ' " I am told, Madame, that you are fond of flowers ? "
 
 Honorine 69 
 
 ' " I am an artificial flower-maker," said she. " After 
 growing flowers, I imitate them, Hke a mother who is 
 artist enough to have the pleasure of painting portraits of 
 her children. . . , That is enough to tell you that I 
 am poor and unable to pay for the concession I am 
 anxious to obtain from you ? " 
 
 ' " But how," said I, as grave as a judge, " can a lady 
 of such rank as yours would seem to be, ply so humble 
 a calling ? Have you, like me, good reasons for 
 employing your fingers so as to keep your brains from 
 working ? " 
 
 ' " Let us stick to the question of the wall," said she, 
 with a smile. 
 
 ' " Why, we have begun at the foundations," said I. 
 " Must not I know which of us ought to yield to the other 
 in behalf of our suffering, or, if you choose, of our mania ? 
 — Oh ! what a charming clump of narcissus ! They 
 are as fresh as this spring morning ! " 
 
 ' I assure you, she had made for herself a perfect 
 museum of flowers and shrubs, which none might see 
 but the sun, and of which the arrangement had been 
 prompted by the genius of an artist ; the most heartless 
 of landlords must have treated it with respect. The 
 masses of plants, arranged according to their height, or 
 in single clumps, were really a joy to the soul. This 
 retired and solitary garden breathed comforting scents, 
 and suggested none but sweet thoughts and graceful, 
 nay, voluptuous pictures. On it was set that inscrutable 
 sign-manual, which our true character stamps on every- 
 thing, as soon as nothing compels us to obey the various 
 hypocrisies, necessary as they are, which Society insists 
 on. I looked alternately at the mass of narcissus and at 
 the Countess, aff'ecting to be far more in love with the 
 flowers than with her, to carry out my part. 
 
 ' " So you are very fond of flowers ? " said she. 
 
 *"They are," I replied, " the only beings that never 
 disappoint our cares and affection." And I went on to
 
 70 Honorine 
 
 deliver such a diatribe while comparing botany and the 
 world, that we ended miles away from the dividing wall, 
 and the Countess must have supposed me to be a 
 wretched and wounded sufferer worthy of her pity. 
 However, at the end of half an hour my neighbour 
 naturally brought me back to the point ; for women, 
 when they are not in love, have all the cold blood of an 
 experienced attorney. 
 
 ' " If you insist on my leaving the paling," said I, " you 
 will learn all the secrets of gardening that I want to 
 hide ; I am seeking to grow a blue dahlia, a blue rose ; I 
 am crazy for blue flowers. Is not blue the favourite 
 colour of superior souls ? We are neither of us really at 
 home ; we might as well make a little door of open 
 railings to unite our gardens. . . . You, too, are fond 
 of flowers ; you will see mine, I shall see yours. If you 
 receive no visitors at all, I, for my part, have none but 
 my uncle, the Cure of the White Friars." 
 
 '" No," said she, "I will give you the right to come 
 into my garden, my premises, at any hour. Come and 
 welcome ; you will always be admitted as a neighbour 
 with whom I hope to keep on good terms. But I like 
 my solitude too well to burden it with any loss of 
 independence.' 
 
 *■ " As you please," said I, and with one leap I was over 
 the paling. 
 
 ' " Now, of what use would a door be ? " said I, from my 
 own domain, turning round to the Countess, and mocking 
 her with a madman's gesture and grimace. 
 
 * For a fortnight I seemed to take no heed of my 
 neighbour. Towards the end of May, one lovely even- 
 ing, we happened both to be out on opposite sides of the 
 paling, both walking slowly. Having reached the end, 
 we could not help exchanging a few civil words; she 
 found me in such deep dejection, lost in such painful 
 meditations, that she spoke to me of hopefulness, in brief 
 sentences that sounded like the songs with which
 
 Honorine 7 1 
 
 nurses lull their babies. I then leaped the fence, and 
 found myself for the second time at her side. The 
 Countess led me into the house, wishing to subdue my 
 sadness. So at last I had penetrated the sanctuary where 
 everything was in harmony with the woman I have tried 
 to describe to you. 
 
 ' Exquisite simplicity reigned there. The interior of 
 the little house was just such a dainty box as the art of 
 the eighteenth century devised for the pretty profligacy 
 of a fine gentleman. The dining-room, on the ground 
 floor, was painted in fresco, with garlands of flowers, 
 admirably and marvellously executed. The staircase 
 was charmingly decorated in monochrome. The little 
 drawing-room, opposite the dining-room, was very much 
 faded ; but the Countess had hung it with panels of 
 tapestry of fanciful designs, taken off old screens. A 
 bath-room came next. Upstairs there was but one bed- 
 room, with a dressing-room, and a library which she used 
 as her workroom. The kitchen was beneath in the 
 basement on which the house was raised, for there was 
 a flight of several steps outside. The balustrade of a 
 balcony in garlands a la Pompadour concealed the roof; 
 only the lead cornices were visible. In this retreat one 
 was a hundred leagues from Paris. 
 
 ' But for the bitter smile which occasionally played on 
 the beautiful red lips of this pale woman, it would have 
 been possible to believe that this violet buried in her 
 thicket of flowers was happy. In a few days we had 
 reached a certain degree of intimacy, the result of our 
 close neighbourhood and of the Countess's conviction 
 that I was indifferent to women. A look would have 
 spoilt all, and I never allowed a thought of her to be 
 seen in my eyes. Honorine chose to regard me as an 
 old friend. Her manner to me was the outcome of a 
 kind of pity. Her looks, her voice, her words, all showed 
 that she was a hundred miles away from the coquettish 
 airs which the strictest virtue might have allowed under
 
 72 Honorine 
 
 such circumstances. She soon gave me the right to go 
 into the pretty workshop where she made her flowers, 
 a retreat full of books and curiosities, as smart as a 
 boudoir where elegance emphasised the vulgarity of the 
 tools of her trade. The Countess had in the course of 
 time poetised, as I may say, a thing which is at the 
 antipodes to poetry — a manufacture. 
 
 ' Perhaps of all the work a woman can do, the making 
 of artificial flowers is that of which the details allow her 
 to display most grace. For colouring prints she must 
 sit bent over a table and devote herself, with some atten- 
 tion, to this half painting. Embroidering tapestry, as 
 diligently as a woman must who is to earn her living by 
 it, entails consumption or curvature of the spine. Engrav- 
 ing music is one of the most laborious, by the care, the 
 minute exactitude, and the intelligence it demands. 
 Sewing and white embroidery do not earn thirty sous a 
 day. But the making of flowers and light articles of 
 wear necessitates a variety of movements, gestures, ideas 
 even, which do not take a pretty woman out of her 
 sphere ; she is still herself ; she may chat, laugh, sing, or 
 think. 
 
 ' There was certainly a feeling for art in the way in 
 which the Countess arranged on a long deal table the 
 myriad-coloured petals which were used in composing 
 the flowers she was to produce. The saucers of colour 
 were of white china, and always clean, arranged in such 
 order that the eye could at once see the required shade in 
 the scale of tints. Thus the aristocratic artist saved 
 time. A pretty little cabinet with a hundred tiny 
 drawers, of ebony inlaid with ivory, contained the little 
 steel moulds in which she shaped the leaves and some 
 forms of petals. A fine Japanese bowl held the paste, 
 which was never allowed to turn sour, and it had a fitted 
 cover with a hinge so easy that she could lift it with a 
 finger-tip. The wire, of iron and brass, lurked in a little 
 drawer of the table before her.
 
 ^^^Jlvfftl^triflV^
 
 Honorine 73 
 
 ' Under her eyes, in a Venetian glass, shaped liice a 
 flower-cup on its stem, was the living model she strove 
 to imitate. She had a passion for achievement ; she 
 attempted the most difficult things, close racemes, the 
 tiniest corollas, heaths, nectaries of the most variegated 
 hues. Her hands, as swift as her thoughts, went from the 
 table to the flower she was making, as those of an accom- 
 plished pianist fly over the keys. Her fingers seemed to 
 be fairies, to use Perrault's expression, so infinite were the 
 different actions of twisting, fitting, and pressure needed 
 for the work, all hidden under grace of movement, while 
 she adapted each motion to the result with the lucidity 
 an instinct. 
 
 ' I could not tire of admiring her as she shaped a flower 
 from the materials sorted before her, padding the wire 
 stem and adjusting the leaves. She displayed the genius 
 of a painter in her bold attempts ; she copied faded 
 flowers and yellowing leaves ; she struggled even with 
 wildflowers, the most artless of all, and the most elaborate 
 in their simplicity. 
 
 ' " This art," she would say, " is in its infancy. If the 
 women of Paris had a little of the genius which the 
 slavery of the harem brings out in Oriental women, they 
 would lend a complete language of flowers to the wreaths 
 they wear on their head. To please my own taste as 
 an artist I have made drooping flowers with leaves of the 
 hue of Florentine bronze, such as are found before or 
 after the winter. Would not such a crown on the head 
 of a young woman whose life is a failure have a certain 
 poetical fitness ? How many things a woman might 
 express by her head-dress ! Are there not flowers for 
 drunken Bacchantes, flowers for gloomy and stern bigots, 
 pensive flowers for women who are bored ? Botany, I 
 believe, may be made to express every sensation and 
 thought of the soul, even the most subtle ? " 
 
 ' She would employ me to stamp out the leaves, cut up 
 material, and prepare wires for the stems. My affected
 
 74 
 
 Honor! ne 
 
 desire for occupation made me soon skilful. We talked 
 as we worked. When I had nothing to do, I read new 
 books to her, for I had my part to keep up as a man weary 
 of life, worn out with griefs, gloomy, sceptical, and 
 soured. My person led to adorable banter as to my 
 purely physical resemblance — with the exception of his 
 club foot — to Lord Byron. It was tacitly acknowledged 
 that her own troubles, as to which she kept the most 
 profound silence, far outweighed mine, though the 
 causes I assigned for my misanthropy might have satisfied 
 Young or Job. 
 
 * I will say nothing of the feelings of shame which 
 tormented me as I inflicted on my heart, like the beggars 
 in the street, false wounds to excite the compassion of 
 that enchanting woman. I soon appreciated the extent 
 of my devotedness by learning to estimate the baseness 
 of a spy. The expressions of sympathy bestowed on me 
 would have comforted the greatest grief. This charm- 
 ing creature, weaned from the world, and for so many 
 years alone, having, besides love, treasures of kindliness to 
 bestow, offered these to me with childlike effusiveness 
 and such compassion as would inevitably have filled with 
 bitterness any profligate who should have fallen in love 
 with her ; for, alas, it was all charity, all sheer pity. Her 
 renunciation of love, her dread of what is called happiness 
 for women, she proclaimed with equal vehemence and 
 candour. These happy days proved to me that a woman's 
 friendship is far superior to her love. 
 
 ' I suffered the revelations of my sorrows to be 
 dragged from me with as many grimaces as a young 
 lady allows herself before sitting down to the piano, so 
 conscious are they of the annoyance that will follow. As 
 you may imagine, the necessity for overcoming my dis- 
 like to speak had induced the Countess to strengthen 
 the bonds of our intimacy ; but she found in me so 
 exact a counterpart of her own antipathy to love, that I 
 fancied she was well content with the chance which had
 
 Honorine 75 
 
 brought to her desert island a sort of Man Friday. 
 Solitude was perhaps beginning to weigh on her. At 
 the same time, there was nothing of the coquette in her ; 
 nothing survived of the woman ; she did not feel that she 
 had a heart, she told me, excepting in the ideal world 
 where she found refuge. I involuntarily compared these 
 two lives — hers and the Count's : — his, all activity, agita- 
 tion, and emotion ; hers, all inaction, quiescence, and 
 stagnation. The woman and the man were admirably 
 obedient to their nature. My misanthropy allowed me 
 to utter cynical sallies against men and women both, and 
 I indulged in them, hoping to bring Honorine to the 
 confidential point ; but she was not to be caught in any 
 trap, and I began to understand that mulish obstinacy 
 which is commoner among women than is generally 
 supposed. 
 
 ' " The Orientals are right," I said to her one evening, 
 " when they shut you up and regard you merely as the 
 playthings of their pleasure. Europe has been well pun- 
 ished for having admitted you to form an element of 
 society and for accepting you on an equal footing. In 
 my opinion, woman is the most dishonourable and 
 cowardly being to be found. Nay, and that is where 
 her charm lies. Where would be the pleasure of 
 hunting a tame thing ? When once a woman has 
 inspired a man's passion, she is to him for ever sacred ; 
 in his eyes she is hedged round by an imprescriptible 
 prerogative. In men gratitude for past delights is 
 eternal. Though he should find his mistress grown old 
 or unworthy, the woman still has rights over his heart ; 
 but to you women the man you have loved is as nothing 
 to you ; nay, more, he is unpardonable in one thing — he 
 lives on ! You dare not own it, but you all have in 
 your hearts the feeling which that popular calumny 
 called tradition ascribes to the Lady of the Tour de 
 Nesle : ' What a pity it is that we cannot live on love as 
 we live on fruit, and that when we have had our fill.
 
 -76 Honorine 
 
 nothing should survive but the remembrance of plea- 
 sure ! " 
 
 ' " God has, no doubt, reserved such perfect bliss for 
 Paradise," said she. "But," she added, "if your argu- 
 ment seems to you very witty, to me it has the 
 disadvantage of being false. What can those women be 
 who give themselves up to a succession of loves ? " she 
 asked, looking at me as the Virgin in Ingres' picture looks 
 at Louis XIII. offering her his kingdom. 
 
 ' " You are an actress in good faith," said I, " for you 
 gave me a look just now which would make the fame of 
 an actress. Still, lovely as you are, you have loved ; ergo^ 
 you forget." 
 
 '"I!" she exclaimed, evading my question, "lam 
 not a woman. I am a nun, and seventy-two years old ! " 
 
 ' " Then, how can you so positively assert that you feel 
 more keenly than I ? Sorrow has but one form for 
 women. The only misfortunes they regard are dis- 
 appointments of the heart." 
 
 'She looked at me sweetly, and, Hke all women when 
 stuck between the issues of a dilemna, or held in the 
 clutches of truth, she persisted, nevertheless, in her wil- 
 fulness. 
 
 ' " I am a nun," she said, " and you talk to me of a 
 world where I shall never again set foot." 
 
 '- " Not even in thought ? " said I. 
 
 ' " Is the world so much to be desired ? " she replied. 
 " Oh ! when my mind wanders, it goes higher. The 
 angel of perfection, the beautiful angel Gabriel, often 
 sings in my heart. If I were rich, I should work, all the 
 same, to keep me from soaring too often on the many- 
 tinted wings of the angel, and wandering in the world of 
 fancy. There are meditations which are the ruin of us 
 women ! I owe much peace of mind to my flowers, 
 though sometimes they fail to occupy me. On some 
 days I find my soul invaded by a purposeless expectancy ; 
 I cannot banish some idea which takes possession of me.
 
 Honorine 77 
 
 which seems to make my fingers clumsy. I feel 
 that some great event is impending, that my life is about 
 to change ; I listen vaguely, I stare into the darkness, I 
 have no liking for my v^^ork, and after a thousand 
 fatigues I find life once more — everyday life. Is this a 
 warning from heaven ? I ask myself " 
 
 * After three months of this struggle between two 
 diplomates, concealed under the semblance of youthful 
 melancholy, and a woman whose disgust of life made her 
 invulnerable, I told the Count that it was impossible to 
 drag this tortoise out of her shell ; it must be broken. 
 The evening before, in our last quite friendly discussion, 
 the Countess had exclaimed — 
 
 ' '* Lucretia's dagger wrote in letters of blood the 
 watchword of woman's charter : Liberty ! " 
 
 * From that moment the Count left me free to act. 
 '"I have been paid a hundred francs for the flowers 
 
 and caps I made this week ! " Honorine exclaimed glee- 
 fully one Saturday evening when I went to visit her in 
 the little sitting-room on the ground floor, which the 
 unavowed proprietor had had regilt. 
 
 ' It was ten o'clock. The twilight of July and a 
 glorious moon lent us their misty light. Gusts of mingled 
 perfumes soothed the soul ; the Countess was clinking in 
 her hand the five gold pieces given to her by a supposi- 
 titious dealer in fashionable frippery, another of Octave's 
 accomplices found for him by a judge, M. Popinot. 
 
 '"I earn my living by amusing myself," said she ; "I 
 am free, when men, armed with their laws, have tried 
 to make us slaves. Oh, I have transports of pride every 
 Saturday ! In short, I like M. Gaudissart's gold pieces as 
 much as Lord Byron, your double, liked Mr. Murray's." 
 
 ' " This is not becoming in a woman," said I. 
 
 * " Pooh ! Am I a woman ? I am a boy gifted with 
 a soft soul, that is all ; a boy whom no woman can 
 torture " 
 
 ' " Your life is the negation of your whole being," I
 
 78 Honorine 
 
 replied. "What? You, on whom God has lavished His 
 choicest treasures of love and beauty, do you never 
 wish ? " 
 
 '"For what?" said she, somewhat disturbed by a 
 speech which, for the first time, gave the lie to the part I 
 had assumed. 
 
 '" For a pretty little child with curling hair, running, 
 playing among the flowers, like a flower itself of life and 
 love, and calling you mother ! " 
 
 ' I waited for an answer. A too prolonged silence led 
 me to perceive the terrible effect of my words, though 
 the darkness at first concealed it. Leaning on her sofa, 
 the Countess had not indeed fainted, but frozen under a 
 nervous attack of which the first chill, as gentle as every- 
 thing that was part of her, felt, as she afterwards said, like 
 the influence of a most insidious poison. I called Madame 
 Gobain, who came and led away her mistress, laid her on 
 her bed, unlaced her, undressed her, and restored her, not 
 to life, it is true, but to the consciousness of some dreadful 
 suff^ering. I meanwhile walked up and down the path 
 behind the house, weeping, and doubting my success. I 
 only wished to give up this part of the bird-catcher which 
 I had so rashly assumed. Madame Gobain, who came 
 down and found me with my face wet with tears, hastily 
 went up again to say to the Countess — 
 
 ' " What has happened, madame ? Monsieur Maurice 
 is crying like a child." 
 
 ' Roused to action by the evil interpretation that 
 might be put on our mutual behaviour, she summoned 
 superhuman strength to put on a wrapper and come down 
 to me. 
 
 ' " You are not the cause of this attack," said she. " I 
 am subject to these spasms, a sort of cramp of the 
 heart " 
 
 '"And you will not tell me of your troubles?" said 
 I, in a voice which cannot be affected, as I wiped away 
 my tears. " Have you not just now told me that you
 
 Honorine 
 
 79 
 
 have been a mother, and have been so unhappy as to lose 
 your child ? " 
 
 '"Marie!" she called as she rang the bell. Gobain 
 came in. 
 
 '"Bring lights and some tea," said she, with the calm 
 decision of a Mylady clothed in the armour of pride by 
 the dreadful English training vi^hich you know^ too -weW. 
 
 ' When the housekeeper had lighted the tapers and 
 closed the shutters, the Countess showed me a mute 
 countenance ; her indomitable pride and gravity, worthy 
 of a savage, had already reasserted their mastery. She 
 said — 
 
 ' " Do you know why I like Lord Byron so much ? 
 It is because he suffered as animals do. Of what use 
 are complaints when they are not an elegy like Manfred's, 
 nor bitter mockery like Don Juan's, nor a reverie like 
 Childe Harold's ? Nothing shall be known of me. My 
 heart is a poem that I lay before God." 
 
 ' " If I chose " said I. 
 
 '"If? " she repeated. 
 
 ' " I have no interest in anything," I replied, " so I 
 cannot be inquisitive ; but, if I chose, I could know all 
 your secrets by to-morrow." 
 
 '"I defy you!" she exclaimed, with ill-disguised 
 uneasiness. 
 
 '"Seriously?" 
 
 ' " Certainly," said she, tossing her head. " If such a 
 crime is possible, I ought to know it." 
 
 ' " In the first place, madame," I went on, pointing to 
 her hands, " those pretty fingers, which are enough to 
 show that you are not a mere girl — were they made for 
 toil ? Then you call yourself Madame Gobain, you, 
 who, in my presence the other day on receiving a letter, 
 said to Marie : ' Here, this is for you ? ' Marie is the real 
 Madame Gobain ; so you conceal your name behind that 
 of your housekeeper. — Fear nothing, madame, from me. 
 You have in me the most devoted friend you will ever
 
 8o Honorine 
 
 have : Friend, do you understand me ? I give this word 
 its sacred and pathetic meaning, so profaned in France, 
 where we apply it to our enemies. And your friend, 
 who will defend you against everything, only wishes that 
 you should be as happy as such a woman ought to be. 
 Who can tell whether the pain I have involuntarily 
 caused you was not a voluntary act ? " 
 
 '"Yes," replied she with threatening audacity, "I 
 insist on it. Be curious, and tell me all that you can find 
 out about me ; but," and she held up her finger, " you 
 must also tell me by what means you obtain your infor- 
 mation. The preservation of the small happiness I enjoy 
 here depends on the steps you take." 
 
 *"That means that you will fly " 
 
 ' " On wings ! " she cried, " to the New World " 
 
 "'Where you will be at the mercy of the brutal 
 passions you will inspire," said I, interrupting her. " Is it 
 not the very essence of genius and beauty to shine, to 
 attract men's gaze, to excite desires and evil thoughts ? 
 Paris is a desert with Bedouins ; Paris is the only place in 
 the world where those who must work for their livelihood 
 can hide their life. What have you to complain of? 
 Who am I ? An additional servant — M. Gobain, that 
 is all. If you have to fight a duel, you may need a 
 second." 
 
 ' " Never mind ; find out who I am. I have already 
 said that I insist. Now, I beg that you will," she went 
 on, with the grace which you ladies have at command,' 
 said the Consul, looking at the ladies. 
 
 '"Well, then, to-morrow, at the same hour, I will tell 
 you what I may have discovered," replied I. " But do 
 not therefore hate me ! Will you behave like other 
 women ? " 
 
 ' *' What do other women do ? " 
 
 '"They lay upon us immense sacrifices, and when we 
 have made them, they reproach us for it some time later 
 as if it were an injury."
 
 Honorine 8 1 
 
 C (C 
 
 They are right if the thing required appears to be 
 a sacrifice ! " replied she pointedly. 
 
 ' " Instead of sacrifices, say efforts and " 
 
 * " It would be an impertinence," said she. 
 
 * " Forgive me," said I. " I forgot that woman and 
 the Pope are infallible." 
 
 ' " Good heavens ! " said she after a long pause, " only 
 two words would be enough to destroy the peace so 
 dearly bought, and which I enjoy like a fraud " 
 
 ' She rose and paid no further heed to me. 
 
 ' " Where can I go ? " she said. " What is to become 
 of me ? — Must I leave this quiet retreat that I had 
 arranged with such care to end my days in ? " 
 
 ' " To end your days ! " exclaimed I with visible 
 alarm. " Has it never struck you that a time would 
 come when you could no longer work, when competi- 
 tion will lower the price of flowers and articles of 
 lashion ? " 
 
 ' " I have already saved a thousand crowns," she said. 
 
 ' " Heavens ! what privations such a sum must repre- 
 sent ! " I exclaimed. 
 
 *" Leave me," said she, " till to-morrow. This even- 
 ing I am not myself; I must be alone. Must I not save 
 my strength in case of disaster ? For, if you should 
 learn anything, others besides you would be informed, 
 and then — Good-night," she added shortly, dismissing me 
 with an imperious gesture. 
 
 '"The battle is to-morrow, then," I replied with a 
 smile, to keep up the appearance of indifference I had 
 given to the scene. But as I went down the avenue I 
 repeated the words — 
 
 ' " The battle is to-morrow." 
 
 ' Octave's anxiety was equal to Honorine's. The 
 Count and I remained together till two in the morning, 
 walking to and fro by the trenches of the Bastille, like 
 two generals who, on the eve of a battle, calculate all 
 the chances, examine the ground, and perceive that the 
 
 F
 
 8 2 Honorine 
 
 victory must depend on an opportunity to be seized 
 half-way through the fight. These two divided beings 
 would each lie awake, one in the hope, the other in 
 agonising dread of reunion. The real dramas of life are 
 not in circumstances, but in feelings; they are played in the 
 heart, or, if you please, in that vast realm which we ought 
 to call the Spiritual World. Octave and Honorine 
 moved and lived altogether in the world of lofty spirits. 
 
 ' I was punctual. At ten next evening I was, for the 
 first time, shown into a charming bedroom furnished 
 with white and blue — the nest of this wounded dove. 
 The Countess looked at me, and was about to speak, but 
 was stricken dumb by my respectful demeanour. 
 
 '"Madame la Comtesse," said I with a grave smile. 
 
 ' The poor woman, who had risen, dropped back into 
 her chair and remained there, sunk in an attitude of grief, 
 which I should have liked to see perpetuated by a great 
 painter. 
 
 '"You are," I went on, "the wife of the noblest and 
 most highly respected of men ; of a man v^^ho is ac- 
 knowledged to be great, but who is far greater in his 
 conduct to you than he is in the eyes of the world. You 
 and he are two lofty natures. — Where do you suppose 
 yourself to be living ? " I asked her. 
 
 ' " In my own house," she replied, opening her eyes 
 with a wide stare of astonishment. 
 
 ' " In Count Octave's," I replied. " You have been 
 tricked. M. Lenormand, the usher of the Court, is not 
 the real owner ; he is only a screen for your husband. 
 The delightful seclusion you enjoy is the Count's v^^ork, 
 the money you earn is paid by him, and his protection 
 extends to the most trivial details of your existence. 
 Your husband has saved you in the eyes of the world ; he 
 has assigned plausible reasons for your disappearance ; he 
 professes to hope that you were not lost in the wreck of 
 the Cecile, the ship in which you sailed for Havannah to 
 secure the fortune to be left to you by an old aunt, who
 
 Honorine 83 
 
 might have forgotten you ; you embarked, escorted by 
 two ladies of her family and an old man-servant. The 
 Count says that he has sent agents to various spots, and 
 received letters which give him great hopes. He takes 
 as many precautions to hide you from all eyes as you 
 take yourself. In short, he obeys you ..." 
 
 ' " That is enough," she said. " I want to know but 
 one thing more. From whom have you obtained all 
 these details ? " 
 
 ' " Well, madame, my uncle got a place for a penniless 
 youth as secretary to the Commissary of police in this 
 part of Paris. That young man told me everything. If 
 you leave this house this evening, however stealthily, your 
 husband will know where you are gone, and his care will 
 follow you everywhere. — How could a woman so clever 
 as you are believe that shopkeepers buy flowers and caps 
 as dear as they sell them ? Ask a thousand crowns for a 
 bouquet, and you will get it. No mother's tenderness 
 was ever more ingenious than your husband's ! I have 
 learned from the porter of this house that the Count often 
 comes behind the fence when all are asleep, to see the 
 glimmer of your night-light ! Your large cashmere 
 shawl cost six thousand francs — your old-clothes-seller 
 brings you, as second hand, things fresh from the best 
 makers. In short, you are living here like Venus in the 
 toils of Vulcan ; but you are alone in your prison by the 
 devices of a sublime magnanimity, sublime for seven 
 years past, and at every hour." 
 
 ' The Countess was trembling as a trapped swallow 
 trembles while, as you hold it in your hand, it strains its 
 neck to look about it with wild eyes. She shook with a 
 nervous spasm, studying me with a defiant look. Her 
 dry eyes glittered with a light that was almost hot : 
 still, she was a woman ! The moment came when her 
 tears forced their way, and she wept — not because she 
 was touched, but because she was helpless ; they were 
 tears of desperation. She had believed herself independent
 
 84 Honorine 
 
 and free ; marriage weighed on her as the prison cell does 
 on the captive. 
 
 '"I will go!" she cried through her tears. "He 
 forces me to it ; I will go where no one certainly will 
 come after me." 
 
 ' " What," I said, "you would kill yourself? — Madame, 
 you must have some very powerful reasons for not wish- 
 ing to return to Comte Octave." 
 
 '"Certainly I have!" 
 
 ' " Well, then, tell them to me ; tell them to my uncle. 
 In us you will find two devoted advisers. Though in the 
 confessional my uncle is a priest, he never is one in a draw- 
 ing-room. We will hear you ; we will try to find a solution 
 of the problems you may lay before us; and if you are the 
 dupe or the victim of some misapprehension, perhaps we can 
 clear the matter up. Your soul, I believe, is pure ; but if 
 you have done wrong, your fault is fully expiated. . . . At 
 any rate, remember that in me you have a most sincere 
 friend. If you should wish to evade the Count's tyranny, 
 I will find you the means ; he shall never find you." 
 
 ' " Oh ! there is always a convent ! " said she. 
 
 ' " Yes. But the Count, as Minister of State, can pro- 
 cure your rejection by every convent in the world. Even 
 though he is powerful, I will save you from him — ; 
 but — only when you have demonstrated to me that you 
 cannot and ought not to return to him. Oh ! do not 
 fear that you would escape his power only to fall into 
 mine," I added, noticing a glance of horrible suspicion, 
 full of exaggerated dignity. " You shall have peace, soli- 
 tude, and independence j in short, you shall be as free 
 and as little annoyed as if you were an ugly, cross old 
 maid, I myself would never be able to see you without 
 your consent." 
 
 ' " And how ? By what means ? " 
 
 * " That is my secret. I am not deceiving you, of 
 that you may be sure. Prove to me that this is the only 
 life you can lead, that it is preferable to that of the
 
 Honorine 85 
 
 Comtesse Octave, rich, admired, in one of the finest 
 houses in Paris, beloved by her husband, a happy mother 
 . . . and I will decide in your favour." 
 
 *"But," said she, "will there never be a man who 
 understands me ? " 
 
 ' " No. And that is why I appeal to religion to 
 decide between us. The Cure of the White Friars is a 
 saint, seventy-five years of age. My uncle is not a 
 Grand Inquisitor, he is Saint John ; but for you he will 
 be Fenelon — the Fenelon who said to the Due de Bour- 
 gogne : " Eat a calf on a Friday by all means, Mon- 
 seigneur. But be a Christian." 
 
 ' " Nay, nay, monsieur, the convent is my last hope 
 and my only refuge. There is none but God who can 
 understand me. No man, not Saint Augustine himself, 
 the tenderest of the Fathers of the Church, could enter 
 into the scruples of my conscience, which are to me as 
 the circles of Dante's hell, whence there is no escape. 
 Another than my husband, a different man, however 
 unworthy of the offering, has had all my love. No, he 
 has not had it, for he did not take it ; I >gave it him as a 
 mother gives her child a wonderful toy, which it breaks. For 
 me there never could be two loves. In some natures love 
 can never be on trial ; it is, or it is not. When it comes, 
 when it rises up, it is complete. — Well, that life of eigh- 
 teen months was to me a life of eighteen years ; I threw 
 into it all the faculties of my being, which were not 
 impoverished by their effusiveness ; they were exhausted 
 by that delusive intimacy in which I alone was genuine. 
 For me the cup of happiness is not drained, nor empty ; 
 and nothing can refill it, for it is broken. I am out of 
 the fray ; I have no weapons left. Having thus utterly 
 abandoned myself, what am I ? — the leavings of a feast. 
 I had but one name bestowed on me, Honorine, as I had 
 but one heart. My husband had the young girl, a worth- 
 less lover had the woman — there is nothing left ! — Then 
 let myself be loved ! that is the great idea you mean to
 
 86 Honorlne 
 
 utter to me. Oh ! but I still am something, and I 
 rebel at the idea of being a prostitute ! Yes, by the 
 light of the conflagration I saw clearly ; and I tell you — 
 well, I could imagine surrendering to another's man's 
 love, but to Octave's ? — No, never." 
 
 ' " Ah ! you love him," I said. 
 
 '"I esteem him, respect him, venerate him ; he never has 
 done me the smallest hurt ; he is kind, he is tender; but 
 I can never more love him. However," she went on, 
 " let us talk no more of this. Discussion makes every- 
 thing small. I will express my notions on this subject in 
 writing to you, for at this moment they are suffocating 
 me ; I am feverish, my feet are standing in the ashes of 
 my Paraclete. All that I see, these things which I 
 believed I had earned by my labour, now remind me of 
 everything I wish to forget. Ah ! I must fly from 
 hence as I fled from my home." 
 
 * " Where will you go ? " I asked. " Can a woman 
 exist unprotected ? At thirty, in all the glory of your 
 beauty, rich in powers of which you have no suspicion, 
 full of tenderness to be bestowed, are you prepared to 
 live in the wilderness where I could hide you ? — Be quite 
 easy. The Count, who for nine years has never allowed 
 himself to be seen here, will never go there without 
 your permission. You have his sublime devotion of nine 
 years as a guarantee for your tranquillity. You may 
 therefore discuss the future in perfect confidence with 
 my uncle and me. My uncle has as much influence 
 as a Minister of State. So compose yourself; do not 
 exaggerate your misfortune. A priest whose hair has 
 grown white in the exercise of his functions is not a boy ; 
 you will be understood by him to whom every passion 
 has been confided for nearly fifty years now, and who 
 weighs in his hands the ponderous heart of kings and 
 princes. If he is stern under his stole, in the presence of 
 your flowers he will be as tender as they are, and as 
 indulgent as his Divine Master."
 
 Honorine 87 
 
 ' I left the Countess at midnight ; she was apparently 
 calm, but depressed, and had some secret purpose which 
 no perspicacity could guess. I found the Count a few 
 paces off, in the Rue Saint- Maur. Drawn by an irresist- 
 ible attraction, he had quitted the spot on the Boulevards 
 where we had agreed to meet. 
 
 '"What a night my poor child will go through ! " he 
 exclaimed, when I had finished my account of the scene 
 that had just taken place. "Supposing I were to go to 
 her ! " he added ; " supposing she were to see me sud- 
 denly ? " 
 
 ' " At this moment she is capable of throwing herself 
 out of the window," I replied. " The Countess is one 
 of those Lucretias who could not survive any violence, 
 even if it were done by a man into whose arms she could 
 throw herself." 
 
 ' " You are young," he answered ; " you do not know 
 that in a soul tossed by such dreadful alternatives the will 
 is like waters of a lake lashed by a tempest ; the wind 
 changes every instant, and the waves are driven now to 
 one shore, now to the other. During this night the 
 chances are quite as great that on seeing me Honorine 
 might rush into my arms as that she should throw herself 
 out of the window." 
 
 '"And you would accept the equal chances," said I. 
 
 ' " Well, come," said he, " I have at home, to enable 
 me to wait till to-morrow, a dose of opium which 
 Desplein prepared for me to send me to sleep without 
 any risk ! " 
 
 ' Next day at noon Gobain brought me a letter, telling 
 me that the Countess had gone to bed at six, worn out 
 with fatigue, and that, having taken a soothing draught 
 prepared by the chemist, she had now fallen asleep. 
 
 ' This is her letter, of which I kept a copy — for 
 you, mademoiselle,' said the Consul, addressing Camille, 
 ' know all the resources of art, the tricks of style, and 
 the efforts made in their compositions by writers who do
 
 8 8 Honorine 
 
 not lack skill ; but you will acknowledge that literature 
 could never find such language in its assumed pathos ; 
 there is nothing so terrible as truth. Here is the letter 
 written by this woman, or rather by this anguish : — 
 
 ' " Monsieur Maurice, — 
 
 '"I know all -your uncle could say to me; he is 
 not better informed than my own conscience. Con- 
 science is the interpreter of God to man. I know that 
 if I am not reconciled to Octave, I shall be damned ; 
 that is the sentence of religious law. Civil law con- 
 demns me to obey, cost what it may. If my husband 
 does not reject me, the world will regard me as pure, as 
 virtuous, whatever I may have done. Yes, that much is 
 sublime in marriage : society ratifies the husband's for- 
 giveness ; but it forgets that the forgiveness must be 
 accepted. Legally, religiously, and from the world's 
 point of view I ought to go back to Octave. Keeping 
 only to the human aspect of the question, is it not cruel 
 to refuse him happiness, to deprive him of children, to 
 wipe his name out of the Golden Book and the list of 
 peers ? My sufferings, my repugnance, my feelings, all 
 my egoism — for I know that 1 am an egoist — ought to 
 be sacrificed to the family. I shall be a mother ; the 
 caresses of my child will wipe away many tears ! I shall 
 be very happy ; I certainly shall be much looked up to. 
 I shall ride, haughty and wealthy, in a handsome car- 
 riage ! I shall have servants and a fine house, and be 
 the queen of as many parties as there are weeks in the 
 year. The world will receive me handsomely. I shall 
 not have to climb up again to the heaven of aristocracy, 
 I shall never have come down from it. So God, the law, 
 society are all in accord. 
 
 t « ' What are you rebelling against ? ' I am asked from 
 the height of heaven, from the pulpit, from the judge's 
 bench, and from the throne, whose august intervention 
 may at need be invoked by the Count. Your uncle, indeed,
 
 Honorine 89 
 
 at need, would speak to me of a certain celestial grace 
 which will flood my heart when I know the pleasure of 
 doing my duty. 
 
 ' " God, the law, the world, and Octave all wish me 
 to live, no doubt. Well, if there is no other difficulty, 
 my reply cuts the knot : I will not live. I will become 
 quite white and inoocent again ; for I will lie in my 
 shroud, white with the blameless pallor of death. This 
 is not in the least 'mulish obstinacy.' That mulish 
 obstinacy of which you jestingly accused me is in a 
 woman the result of confidence, of a vision of the future. 
 Though my husband, sublimely generous, may forget 
 all, I shall not forget. Does forgetfulness depend on our 
 will ? When a widow re-marries, love makes a girl of 
 her ; she marries a man she loves. But I cannot love 
 the Count. It all lies in that, do not you see ? 
 
 ' " Every time my eyes met his I should see my sin in 
 them, even when his were full of love. The greatness 
 of his generosity would be the measure of the greatness 
 of my crime. My eyes, always uneasy, would be for 
 ever reading an invisible condemnation. My heart would 
 be full of confused and struggling memories ; marriage 
 can never move me to the cruel rapture, the mortal 
 delirium of passion. I should kill my husband by my 
 coldness, by comparisons which he would guess, though 
 hidden in the depths of my conscience. Oh ! on the 
 day when I should read a trace of involuntary, even of 
 suppressed reproach in a furrow on his brow, in a sad- 
 dened look, in some imperceptible gesture, nothing could 
 hold me : I should be lying with a fractured skull on the 
 pavement, and find that less hard than my husband. It 
 might be my own over-susceptibility that would lead me 
 to this horrible but welcome death ; I might die the 
 victim of an impatient mood in Octave caused by some 
 matter of business, or be deceived by some unjust sus- 
 picion. Alas ! I might even mistake some proof of 
 love for a sign of contempt !
 
 90 
 
 Honorine 
 
 * " What torture on both sides ! Octave would be 
 always doubting me, I doubting him. I, quite involun- 
 tarily, should give him a rival wholly unworthy of him, 
 a man whom I despise, but with whom I have known 
 raptures branded on me with fire, which are my shame, 
 but which I cannot forget. 
 
 * " Have I shown you enough of my heart ? No one, 
 monsieur, can convince me that love may be renewed, 
 for I neither can nor will accept love from any one. A 
 young bride is like a plucked flower ; but a guilty wife 
 is like a flower that had been walked over. You, who 
 are a florist, you know whether it is ever possible to 
 restore the broken stem, to revive the faded colours, to 
 make the sap flow again in the tender vessels of which 
 the whole vegetative function lies in their perfect rigidity. 
 If some botanist should attempt the operation, could his 
 genius smooth out the folds of the bruised corolla ? If 
 he could remake a flower, he would be God ! God 
 alone can remake me ! I am drinking the bitter cup of 
 expiation ; but as I drink it I painfully spell out this 
 sentence : Expiation is not annihilation. 
 
 ' " In my little house, alone, I eat my bread soaked in 
 tears ; but no one sees me eat nor sees me weep. If I 
 go back to Octave, I must give up my tears — they would 
 off'end him. Oh ! Monsieur, how many virtues must a 
 woman tread under foot, not to give herself, but to restore 
 herself to a betrayed husband ? Who could count them ? 
 God alone ; for He alone can know and encourage the 
 horrible refinements at which the angels must turn pale. 
 Nay, I will go further. A woman has courage in the 
 presence of her husband if he knows nothing ; she shows 
 a sort of fierce strength in her hypocrisy ; she deceives 
 him to secure him double happiness. But common know- 
 ledge is surely degrading. Supposing I could exchange 
 humiliation for ecstasy ? Would not Octave at last feel 
 that my consent was sheer depravity ? Marriage is based 
 on esteem, on sacrifices on both sides ; but neither Octave
 
 Honorine 9 1 
 
 nor I could esteem each other the day after our reunion. 
 He would have disgraced me by a love like that of an old 
 man for a courtesan, and I should for ever feel the shame 
 of being a chattel instead of a lady. I should represent 
 pleasure, and not virtue, in his house. These are the 
 bitter fruits of such a sin. I have made myself a bed 
 where I can only toss on burning coals, a sleepless 
 pillow. 
 
 ' " Here, when I suffer, I bless my sufferings ; I say to 
 God, ' I thank Thee ! ' But in my husband's house I 
 should be full of terror, tasting joys to which I have no 
 right. 
 
 *"A11 this. Monsieur, is not argument; it is the 
 feeling of a soul made vast and hollow by seven years 
 of suffering. Finally, must I make a horrible confession ? 
 I shall always feel at my bosom the lips of a child con- 
 ceived in rapture and joy, and in the belief in happiness, 
 of a child I nursed for seven months, that I shall bear in 
 my womb all the days of my life. If other children 
 should draw their nourishment from me, they would drink 
 in tears mingling with the milk, and turning it sour. I 
 seem a light thing, you regard me as a child — Ah yes ! 
 I have a child's memory, the memory which returns to 
 us on the verge of the tomb. So, you see, there is not a 
 situation in that beautiful life to which the world and my 
 husband's love want to recall me, which is not a false 
 position, which docs not cover a snare or reveal a preci- 
 pice down which I must fall, torn by pitiless rocks. For 
 five years now I have been wandering in the sandy desert 
 of the future without finding a place convenient to repent 
 in, because my soul is possessed by true repentance. 
 
 ' " Religion has its answers ready to all this, and I 
 know them by heart. This suffering, these difficulties, 
 are my punishment she says, and God will give me 
 strength to endure them. This, monsieur, is an argu- 
 ment to certain pious souls gifted with an energy which 
 I have not. I have made my choice between this hell,
 
 g2 Honorine 
 
 where God does not forbid my blessing Him, and the 
 hell that awaits me under Count Octave's roof. 
 
 * " One word more. If I were still a girl, with the 
 experience I now have, my husband is the man. I should 
 choose ; but that is the very reason of my refusal. I 
 could not bear to blush before that man. What ! I 
 should be always on my knees, he always standing 
 upright ; and if we were to exchange positions, I should 
 scorn him ! I will not be better treated by him in con- 
 sequence of my sin. The angel who might venture 
 under such circumstances on certain liberties which are 
 permissible when both are equally blameless, is not on 
 earth ; he dwells in heaven ! Octave is full of delicate 
 feeling, I know ; but even in his soul (which, however 
 generous, is a man's soul after all) there is no guarantee 
 for the new life I should lead with him. 
 
 * " Come, then, and tell me where I may find the 
 solitude, the peace, the silence, so kindly to irreparable 
 woes, which you promised me," 
 
 ' After making this copy of the letter to preserve it 
 complete, I went to the Rue Payenne. Anxiety had 
 conquered the power of opium. Octave was walking 
 up and down his garden like a madman. 
 
 ' " Answer that ! " said I, giving him his wife's letter. 
 " Try to reassure the modesty of experience. It is rather 
 more difficult than conquering the modesty of ignorance, 
 which curiosity helps to betray." 
 
 * " She is mine ! " cried the Count, whose face ex- 
 pressed joy as he went on reading the letter. 
 
 ' He signed to me with his hand to leave him to 
 himself. I understood that extreme happiness and ex- 
 treme pain obey the same laws : I went in to receive 
 Madame de Courteville and Amelie, who were to dine 
 with the Count that day. However handsome Made- 
 moiselle de Courteville might be, I felt, on seeing her 
 once more, that love has three aspects, and that the
 
 Honorine 93 
 
 women who can inspire us with perfect love are very 
 rare. As I involuntarily compared Amelie with Honorine, 
 I found the erring wife more attractive than the pure 
 girl. To Honorine's heart fidelity had not been a duty, 
 but the inevitable ; while Amelie would serenely pro- 
 nounce the most solemn promises without knowing their 
 purport or to what they bound her. The crushed, the 
 dead woman, so to speak, the sinner to be reinstated, 
 seemed to me sublime ; she incited the special generosi- 
 ties of a man's nature ; she demanded all the treasures 
 of the heart, all the resources of strength ; she filled his 
 life and gave the zest of a conflict to happiness ; whereas 
 Amelie, chaste and confiding, would settle down into 
 the sphere of peaceful motherhood, where the common- 
 place must be its poetry, and where my mind would find 
 no struggle and no victory. 
 
 ' Of the plains of Champagne and the snowy, storm- 
 beaten but sublime Alps, what young man would choose 
 the chalky, monotonous level ? No ; such comparisons 
 are fatal and wrong on the threshold of the Mairie. 
 Alas ! only the experience of life can teach us that mar- 
 riage excludes passion, that a family cannot have its 
 foundation on the tempests of love. After having 
 dreamed of impossible love, with its infinite caprices, 
 after having tasted the tormenting delights of the ideal, 
 I saw before me modest reality. Pity me, for what 
 could be expected ! At five-and-twenty I did not trust 
 myself; but I took a manful resolution. 
 
 ' I went back to the Count to announce the arrival of 
 his relations, and I saw him grown young again in the 
 reflected light of hope. 
 
 ' " What ails you, Maurice ? " said he, struck by my 
 changed expression. 
 
 ' " Monsieur le Comte " 
 
 * " No longer Octave ? You, to whom I shall owe 
 my life, my happiness ' 
 
 ' " My dear Octave, if you should succeed in bringing
 
 94 Honorine 
 
 the Countess back to her duty, I have studied her well " 
 — (he looked at me as Othello must have looked at lago 
 vi^hen lago first contrived to insinuate a suspicion into 
 the Moor's mind) — " she must never see me again ; she 
 must never know^ that Maurice was your secretary. 
 Never mention my name to her, or all will be undone. 
 . . . You have got me an appointment as Maitre des 
 Requetes — well, get me instead some diplomatic post 
 abroad, a consulship, and do not think of my marrying 
 Amelie. — Oh ! do not be uneasy," I added, seeing 
 him draw himself up, " I will play my part to the 
 end." 
 
 * " Poor boy ! " said he, taking my hand, which he 
 pressed, while he kept back the tears that were starting 
 to his eyes. 
 
 ' " You gave me gloves," I said, laughing, " but I have 
 not put them on ; that is all." 
 
 ' We then agreed as to what I was to do that evening 
 at Honorine's house, whither I presently returned. It 
 was now August ; the day had been hot and stormy, but 
 the storm hung overhead, the sky was like copper ; the 
 scent of the flowers was heavy, I felt as if I were in an 
 oven, and caught myself wishing that the Countess might 
 have set out for the Indies ; but she was sitting on a 
 wooden bench shaped like a sofa, under an arbour, in a 
 loose dress of white muslin fastened with blue bows, her 
 hair unadorned in waving bands over her cheeks, her feet 
 on a small wooden stool, and showing a little way beyond 
 her skirt. She did not rise ; she showed me with her 
 hand to the seat by her side, saying — 
 
 '" Now, is not life at a deadlock for me ? " 
 
 '"Life as you have made it," I replied. "But not 
 the life I propose to make for you ; for, if you choose, 
 you may be very happy. . . ." 
 
 ' " How ? " said she ; her whole person was a 
 question. 
 
 ' " Your letter is in the Count's hands."
 
 Honor ine 95 
 
 ' Honorine started like a frightened doe, sprang to a 
 few paces off, walked down the garden, turned about, 
 remained standing for some minutes, and finally went in 
 to sit alone in the drawing-room, where I joined her, 
 after giving her time to get accustomed to the pain of 
 this poniard thrust. 
 
 ' " You — a friend ? Say rather a traitor ! A spy, 
 perhaps, sent by my husband." 
 
 'Instinct in women is as strong as the perspicacity of 
 great men. 
 
 ' " You wanted an answer to your letter, did not 
 you ? And there was but one man in the world who 
 could write it. You must read the reply, my dear 
 Countess ; and if after reading it you still find that your 
 life is a deadlock, the spy will prove himself a friend ; I 
 will place you in a convent whence the Count's power 
 cannot drag you. But, before going there, let us con- 
 sider the other side of the question. There is a law, 
 alike divine and human, which even hatred affects to 
 obey, and which commands us not to condemn the 
 accused without hearing his defence. Till now you 
 have passed condemnation, as children do, with your 
 ears stopped. The devotion of seven years has its claims. 
 So you must read the answer your husband will send 
 you. I have forwarded to him, through my uncle, a 
 copy of your letter, and my uncle asked him what his 
 reply would be if his wife wrote him a letter in such 
 terms. Thus you are not compromised. He will himself 
 bring the Count's answer. In the presence of that saintly 
 man, and in mine, out of respect for your own dignity, 
 you must read it, or you will be no better than a wilful, 
 passionate child. You must make this sacrifice to the 
 world, to the law, and to God." 
 
 ' As she saw in this concession no attack on her 
 womanly resolve, she consented. All the labour of four 
 or five months had been building up to this moment. 
 But do not the Pyramids end in a point on which a bird
 
 96 
 
 Honorine 
 
 may perch ? The Count had set all his hopes on this 
 supreme instant, and he had reached it. 
 
 ' In all my life I remember nothing more formidable 
 than my uncle's entrance into that little Pompadour 
 drawing-room, at ten that evening. The fine head, with 
 its silver hair thrown into relief by the entirely black 
 dress, and the divinely calm face, had a magical effect on 
 the Comtesse Honorine ; she had the feeling of cool 
 balm on her wounds, and beamed in the reflection of that 
 virtue which gave light without knowing it. 
 
 ' " Monsieur the Cure of the White Friars," said old 
 Gobain. 
 
 ' " Are you come, uncle, with a message of happiness 
 and peace ? " said I. 
 
 ' " Happiness and peace are always to be found in 
 obedience to the precepts of the Church," replied my 
 uncle, and he handed the Countess the following letter : — 
 
 ' " My dear Honorine, — 
 
 ' " If you had but done me the favour of trusting me, 
 if you had read the letter I wrote to you five years 
 since, you would have spared yourself five years of useless 
 labour, and of privations which have grieved me deeply. 
 In it 1 proposed an arrangement of which the stipula- 
 tions will relieve all your fears, and make our domestic 
 life possible. I have much to reproach myself with, and 
 in seven years of sorrow I have discovered all my errors. 
 I misunderstood marriage. I failed to scent danger when 
 it threatened you. An angel was in my house. The 
 Lord bid me guard it well ! The Lord has punished me 
 for my audacious confidence. 
 
 ' " You cannot give yourself a single lash without 
 striking me. Have mercy on me, my dear Honorine. I 
 so fully appreciated your susceptibilities that I would not 
 bring you back to the old house in the Rue Payenne, 
 where I can live without you, but which I could not 
 bear to see again with you. I am decorating, with great
 
 Honorine 97 
 
 pleasure, another house, in the Faubourg Saint-Honore, 
 to which, in hope, I conduct not a wife whom I owe to 
 her ignorance of Hfe, and secured to me by law, but a 
 sister who will allow me to press on her brow such a kiss 
 as a father gives the daughter he blesses every day. 
 
 ' " Will you bereave me of the right I have conquered 
 from your despair — that of watching more closely over 
 your needs, your pleasures, your life even ? Women 
 have one heart always on their side, always abounding in 
 excuses — their mother's ; you never knew any mother 
 but my mother, who would have brought you back to 
 me. But how is it that you never guessed that I had for 
 you the heart of a mother, both of my mother and of 
 your own ? Yes, dear, my affection is neither mean nor 
 grasping ; it is one of those which will never let any 
 annoyance last long enough to pucker the brow of the 
 child it worships. What can you think of the com- 
 panion of your childhood, Honorine, if you believe him 
 capable of accepting kisses given in trembling, of living 
 between delight and anxiety ? Do not fear that you will 
 be exposed to the laments of a suppliant passion ; I 
 would not want you back until I felt certain of my own 
 strength to leave you in perfect freedom. 
 
 '"Your solitary pride has exaggerated the difficulties. 
 You may, if you will, look on at the life of a brother, or 
 of a father, without either suffering or joy ; but you will 
 find neither mockery nor indifference, nor have any doubt 
 as to his intentions. The warmth of the atmosphere in 
 which you live will be always equable and genial, without 
 tempests, without a possible squall. If, later, when you 
 feel secure that you are as much at home as in your own 
 little house, you desire to try some other elements of 
 happiness, pleasures, or amusements, you can expand 
 their circle at your will. The tenderness of a mother 
 knows neither contempt nor pity. What is it ? Love 
 without desire. Well, in me admiration shall hide every 
 sentiment in which you might see an offence. 
 
 G
 
 98 Honorine 
 
 ' " Thus, living side by side, we may both be magnani- 
 mous. In you the kindness of a sister, the affectionate 
 thoughtfulness of a friend, will satisfy the ambition of 
 him who wishes to be your life's companion ; and you 
 may measure his tenderness by the care he will take to 
 conceal it. Neither you nor I will be jealous of the 
 past, for we may each acknowledge that the other has 
 sense enough to look only straight forward. 
 
 ' " Thus you will be at home in your new house 
 exactly as you are in the Rue Saint-Maur ; unapproach- 
 able, alone, occupied as you please, living by your own 
 law ; but having in addition the legitimate protection, of 
 which you are now exacting the most chivalrous labours 
 of love, with the consideration which lends so much 
 lustre to a woman, and the fortune which will allow of 
 your doing many good works. Honorine, when you long 
 for an unnecessary absolution, you have only to ask for 
 it ; it will not be forced upon you by the Church or by 
 the Law ; it will wait on your pride, on your own impul- 
 sion. My wife might indeed have to fear all the things 
 you dread ; but not my friend and sister, towards whom 
 I am bound to show every form and refinement of 
 politeness. To see you happy is enough happiness for 
 me ; I have proved this for these seven years past. The 
 guarantee for this, Honorine, is to be seen in all the 
 flowers made by you, carefully preserved, and watered 
 by my tears. Like the quipos, the tally cords of the 
 Peruvians, they are the record of our sorrows. 
 
 * " If this secret compact does not suit you, my child, I 
 have begged the saintly man who takes charge of this 
 letter not to say a word in my behalf. I will not owe 
 your return to the terrors threatened by the Church, nor 
 to the bidding of the Law. I will not accept the simple 
 and quiet happiness that I ask from any one but your- 
 self. If you persist in condemning me to the lonely life, 
 bereft even of a fraternal smile, which I have led for nine 
 years, if you remain in your solitude and show no sign.
 
 Honorine 99 
 
 my will yields to yours. Understand me perfectly : you 
 shall be no more troubled than you have been until this 
 day. I will get rid of the crazy fellow who has meddled 
 in your concerns, and has perhaps caused you some annoy- 
 ance ..." 
 
 '"Monsieur," said Honorine, folding up the letter, 
 which she placed in her bosom, and looking at my uncle, 
 " thank you very much. I will avail myself of Monsieur 
 le Comte's permission to remain here " 
 
 '"Ah!" I exclaimed. 
 
 ' This exclamation made my uncle look at me uneasily, 
 and won from the Countess a mischievous glance, which 
 enlightened me as to her motives. 
 
 ' Honorine had wanted to ascertain whether I were an 
 actor, a bird snarer ; and I had the melancholy satisfaction 
 of deceiving her by my exclamation, which was one of 
 those cries from the heart which women understand so 
 well. 
 
 * " Ah, Maurice," said she, " you know how to 
 love." 
 
 ' The light that flashed in my eyes was another reply 
 which would have dissipated the Countess's uneasiness if 
 she still had any. Thus the Count found me useful to 
 the very last. 
 
 ' Honorine then took out the Count's letter again to 
 finish reading it. My uncle signed to me, and I rose. 
 
 '" Let us leave the Countess," said he. 
 
 ' " You are going already, Maurice ? " she said, without 
 looking at me. 
 
 ' She rose, and still reading, followed us to the door. 
 On the threshold she took my hand, pressed it very 
 affectionately, and said, " We shall meet again ..." 
 
 ' " No," I replied, wringing her hand, so that she cried 
 out. " You love your husband. I leave to-morrow." 
 
 'And I rushed away, leaving my uncle, to whom she 
 said —
 
 loo Honorine 
 
 '" Why, what is the matter with your nephew ? " 
 ' The good Abbe completed my work by pointing to 
 his head and heart, as much as to say, " He is mad, madame ; 
 you must forgive him ! " and with all the more truth, 
 because he really thought it. 
 
 'Six days after, I set out with an appointment as vice- 
 consul in Spain, in a large commercial town, where I 
 could quickly qualify to rise in the career of a consul, to 
 which I now restricted my ambition. After I had 
 established myself there, I received this letter from the 
 Count : — 
 
 '"My dear Maurice, — 
 
 ' " If I were happy, I should not write to you, but I 
 have entered on a new life of suffering. I have grown 
 voung again in my desires, with all the impatience of a 
 man of forty, and the prudence of a diplomatist, who has 
 learned to moderate his passion. When you left I had 
 not yet been admitted to the pavilion in the Rue Saint- 
 Maur, but a letter had promised me that I should have 
 permission — the mild and melancholy letter of a woman 
 who dreaded the agitations of a meeting. After waiting 
 for more than a month, I made bold to call, and desired 
 Gobain to inquire whether I could be received. I sat 
 down in a chair in the avenue near the lodge, my head 
 buried in my hands, and there I remained for almost an 
 hour. 
 
 ""Madame had to dress,' said Gobain, to hide 
 Honorine's hesitancy under a pride of appearance which 
 was flattering to me. 
 
 ' " During a long quarter of an hour we both of us were 
 possessed by an involuntary nervous trembling as great 
 as that which seizes a speaker on the platform, and we 
 spoke to each other in scared phrases, like those of persons 
 taken by surprise who ' make believe ' a conversation. 
 
 ' " ' You see, Honorine,' said I, my eyes full of tears, 
 ' the ice is broken, and I am so tremulous with happiness
 
 Honorine loi 
 
 that you must forgive the incoherency of my language. 
 It will be so for a long time yet.' 
 
 c tc t Xhere is no crime in being in love vi^ith your wife,' 
 said she with a forced smile. 
 
 *" ' Do me the favour,' said I, * no longer to work as 
 you do. I have heard from Madame Gobain that for 
 three weeks you have been living on your savings ; you 
 have sixty thousand francs a year of your own, and if you 
 cannot give me back your heart, at least do not abandon 
 your fortune to me,' 
 
 ""I have long known your kindness,' said she. 
 
 c cc c Xhough you should prefer to remain here,' said I, 
 * and to preserve your independence ; though the most 
 ardent love should find no favour in your eyes, still, do 
 not toil.' 
 
 '"I gave her three certificates for twelve thousand 
 francs a year each ; she took them, opened them languidly, 
 and after reading them through she gave me only a look 
 as my reward. She fully understood that I was not 
 off'ering her money, but freedom. 
 
 '"'I am conquered,' said she, holding out her hand, 
 which I kissed. ' Come and see me as often as you like.' 
 
 '"So she had done herself a violence in receiving me. 
 Next day I found her armed with affected high spirits, 
 and it took two months of habit before I saw her in her 
 true character. But then it was like a delicious May, a 
 springtime of love that gave me ineff'able bliss ; she was 
 no longer afraid ; she was studying me. Alas ! when I 
 proposed that she should go to England to return osten- 
 sibly to me, to our home, that she should resume her 
 rank and live in our new residence, she was seized with 
 alarm. 
 
 < « ' Why not live always as we are ? ' she said. 
 
 "'I submitted without saying a word. 
 
 * " ' Is she making an experiment ? ' I asked myself as I 
 left her. On my way from my own house to the Rue 
 Saint- Maur thoughts of love had swelled in my heart, and
 
 I02 Honorine 
 
 1 had said to myself, like a young man, ' This evening 
 she will yield.' 
 
 ' " All my real or affected force was blown to the 
 winds by a smile, by a command from those proud, calm 
 eyes, untouched by passion. I remembered the terrible 
 words you once quoted to me, ' Lucretia's dagger wrote 
 in letters of blood the watchword of woman's charter — 
 Liberty ! ' and they froze me. I felt imperatively how 
 necessary to me was Honor ine's consent, and how im- 
 possible it was to wring it from her. Could she guess 
 the storms that distracted me when I left as when I 
 came ? 
 
 '"At last I painted my situation in a letter to her, 
 giving up the attempt to speak of it. Honorine made no 
 answer, and she was so sad that I made as though I had 
 not written. I was deeply grieved by the idea that I 
 could have distressed her ; she read my heart and forgave 
 me. And this was how. Three days ago she received me, 
 for the first time, in her own blue-and-white room. It 
 was bright with flowers, dressed, and lighted up. 
 Honorine was in a dress that made her bewitching. Her 
 hair framed that face that you know in its light curls ; 
 and in it were some sprays of Cape heath ; she wore a 
 white muslin gown, a white sash with long floating ends. 
 You know what she is in such simplicity, but that day 
 she was a bride, the Honorine of long past days. My 
 joy was chilled at once, for her face was terribly grave ; 
 there were fires beneath the ice. 
 
 ' " ' Octave,' she said, ' I will return as your wife 
 when you will. But understand clearly that this sub- 
 mission has its dangers. I can be resigned ' 
 
 ' " I made a movement. 
 
 ' " ' Yes,' she went on, ' I understand : resignation 
 offends you, and you want what I cannot give — Love. 
 Religion and pity led me to renounce my vow of soli- 
 tude ; you are here ! ' She paused. 
 
 ""At first,' she went on, * you asked no more. Now
 
 Honorine 1 03 
 
 you demand your wife. Well, here I give you Honorine, 
 such as she is, without deceiving you as to what she 
 will be. — What shall I be ? A mother ? I hope it. 
 Believe me, I hope it eagerly. Try to change me ; you 
 have my consent ; but if I should die, my dear, do not 
 curse my memory, and do not set down to obstinacy what 
 I should call the worship of the Ideal, if it were not more 
 natural to call the indefinable feeling which must kill me 
 the worship of the Divine ! The future will be nothing to 
 me ; it will be your concern ; consult your own mind.' 
 
 ' " And she sat down in the calm attitude you used to 
 admire, and watched me turning pale with the pain she 
 had inflicted. My blood ran cold. On seeing the effect 
 of her words she took both my hands, and, holding them 
 in her own, she said — 
 
 ' " ' Octave, I do love you, but not in the way you wish 
 to be loved. I love your soul. . . . Still, understand 
 that I love you enough to die in your service like an 
 Eastern slave, and without a regret. It will be my 
 expiation.' 
 
 ' " She did more ; she knelt before me on a cushion, and 
 in a spirit of sublime charity she said — 
 
 ' " ' And perhaps I shall not die ! ' 
 
 ' " For two months now I have been struggling with 
 myself. What shall I do ? My heart is too full ; I 
 therefore seek a friend, and send out this cry, 'What 
 shall I do ? ' " 
 
 ' I did not answer this letter. Two months later the 
 newspapers announced the return on board an English 
 vessel of the Comtesse Octave, restored to her family 
 after adventures by land and sea, invented with sufficient 
 probability to arouse no contradiction. 
 
 ' When I moved to Genoa I received a formal 
 announcement of the happy event of the birth of a son 
 to the Count and Countess. I held that letter in my 
 hand for two hours, sitting on this terrace — on this
 
 I ©4 Honorine 
 
 bench. Two months after, urged by Octave, by M. de 
 Grandville, and Monsieur de Serizy, my kind friends, and 
 broken by the death of my uncle, I agreed to take a wife. 
 'Six months after the revolution of July I received this 
 letter, which concludes the story of this couple : — 
 
 '"Monsieur Maurice, — I am dying though I am a 
 mother — perhaps because I am a mother. I have played 
 my part as a wife well; I have deceived my husband. 
 I have had happiness not less genuine than the tears 
 shed by actresses on the stage. I am dying for society, 
 for the family, for marriage, as the early Christians died 
 for God ! I know not of what I am dying, and I am 
 honestly trying to find out, for I am not perverse ; but 
 I am bent on explaining my malady to you — you who 
 brought that heavenly physician your uncle, at whose 
 word I surrendered. He was my director ; I nursed 
 him in his last illness, and he showed me the way to 
 heaven, bidding me persevere in my duty. 
 
 ' " And I have done my duty. 
 
 ' " I do not blame those who forget. I admire them 
 as strong and necessary natures ; but I have the malady 
 of memory ! I have not been able twice to feel that 
 love of the heart which identifies a woman with the man 
 she loves. To the last moment, as you know, I cried 
 to your heart, in the confessional, and to my husband, 
 ' Have mercy ! ' But there was no mercy. Well, 
 and I am dying, dying with stupendous courage. No 
 courtesan was ever more gay than I. My poor Octave 
 is happy ; I let his love feed on the illusions of my heart. 
 I throw all my powers into this terrible masquerade ; the 
 actress is applauded, feasted, smothered in flowers ; but 
 the invisible rival comes every day to seek its prey — 
 a fragment of my life. I am rent and I smile. I smile 
 on two children, but it is the elder, the dead one, that 
 will triumph ! I told you so before. The dead child 
 calls me, and I am going to him.
 
 Honorine 105 
 
 * " The intimacy of marriage without love is a position 
 in which my soul feels degraded every hour. I can 
 never weep or give myself up to dreams but when I am 
 alone. The exigencies of society, the care of my child, 
 and that of Octave's happiness never leave me a moment 
 to refresh myself, to renew my strength, as I could in my 
 solitude. The incessant need for watchfulness startles my 
 heart with constant alarms. I have not succeeded in im- 
 planting in my soul the sharp-eared vigilance that lies 
 with facility, and has the eyes of a lynx. It is not the 
 lip of one I love that drinks my tears and kisses my eye- 
 lids ; it is a handkerchief that dries them ; my burning 
 eyes are cooled with water, and not with tender lips. It 
 is my soul that acts a part, and that perhaps is why I am 
 dying ! I lock up my griefs with so much care that 
 nothing is to be seen of it ; it must eat into something, 
 and it has attacked my life. 
 
 * " I said to the doctors, who discovered ro.y secret, 
 * Make me die of some plausible complaint, or I shall 
 drag my husband with me.' 
 
 '"So it is quite understood by M. Desplein, Bianchon, 
 and myself that I am dying of the softening of some 
 bone which science has fully described. Octave believes 
 that I adore him, do you understand ? So I am afraid 
 lest he should follow me. I now write to beg you in 
 that case to be the little Count's guardian. You will 
 find with this a codicil in which I have expressed my 
 wish ; but do not produce it excepting in case of need, 
 for perhaps I am fatuously vain. My devotion may 
 perhaps leave Octave inconsolable but willing to live. — 
 Poor Octave ! I wish him a better wife than I am, for 
 he deserves to be well loved. 
 
 ' " Since my spiritual spy is married, I bid him re- 
 member what the florist of the Rue Saint-Maur hereby 
 bequeaths to him as a lesson : May your wife soon be a 
 mother ! Fling her into the vulgarest materialism of 
 household life ; hinder her from cherishing in her heart
 
 io6 Honorine 
 
 the mysterious flower of the Ideal — of that heavenly 
 perfection in which I believed, that enchanted blossom 
 with glorious colours, and whose perfume disgusts us 
 with reality. I am a Saint-Theresa who has not been 
 suffered to live on ecstasy in the depths of a convent, 
 with the Holy Infant, and a spotless winged angel to 
 come and go as she wished. 
 
 ' " You saw me happy among my beloved flowers. 
 I did not tell you all : I saw love budding under your 
 affected madness, and I concealed from you my thoughts, 
 my poetry ; I did not admit you to my kingdom of 
 beauty. Well, well ; you will love my child for love of 
 me if he should one day lose his poor father. Keep my 
 secrets as the grave will keep them. Do not mourn for 
 me ; I have been dead this many a day, if Saint Bernard 
 was right in saying that where there is no more love there 
 is no more life." ' 
 
 'And the Countess died,' said the Consul, putting 
 away the letters and locking the pocket-book. 
 
 * Is the Count still living ? ' asked the Ambassador, 
 ' for since the revolution of July he has disappeared from 
 the political stage.' 
 
 ' Do you remember. Monsieur de Lora,' said the 
 Consul-General, 'having seen me going to the steam- 
 boat with ' 
 
 ' A white-haired man ! an old man ? ' said the painter. 
 
 ' An old man of forty-five, going in search of health 
 and amusement in Southern Italy. That old man was 
 my poor friend, my patron, passing through Genoa to 
 take leave of me and place his will in my hands. He 
 appoints me his son's guardian. I had no occasion to 
 tell him of Honorine's wishes.' 
 
 ' Does he suspect himself of murder ? ' said Made- 
 moiselle des Touches to the Baron de L'Hostal. 
 
 ' He suspects the truth,' replied the Consul, ' and that 
 is what is killing him. I remained on board the steam
 
 Honorine 107 
 
 packet that was to take him to Naples till it was out of 
 the roadstead ; a small boat brought me back. We sat 
 for some little time taking leave of each other — for ever, 
 I fear. God only knows how much we love the confi- 
 dant of our love when she who inspired it is no more. 
 
 ' " That man," said Octave, " holds a charm and 
 wears an aureole." The Count went to the prow and 
 looked down on the Mediterranean. It happened to 
 be fine, and, moved no doubt by the spectacle, he spoke 
 these last words : " Ought we not, in the interests of 
 human nature, to inquire what is the irresistible power 
 which leads us to sacrifice an exquisite creature to the 
 most fugitive of all pleasures, and in spite of our reason ? 
 In my conscience I heard cries. Honorine was not 
 alone in her anguish. And yet I would have it ! . . . 
 I am consumed by remorse. In the Rue Payenne I was 
 dying of the joys I had not ; now I shall die in Italy 
 of the joys I have had. . . . Wherein lay the discord 
 between two natures, equally noble, I dare assert ? " ' 
 
 For some minutes profound silence reigned on the 
 terrace. 
 
 Then the Consul, turning to the two women, asked, 
 ' Was she virtuous ? ' 
 
 Mademoiselle des Touches rose, took the Consul's arm, 
 went a few steps away, and said to him — 
 
 'Are not men wrong too when they come to us and 
 make a young girl a wife while cherishing at the bottom 
 of their heart some angelic image, and comparing us to 
 those unknown rivals, to perfections often borrowed from 
 a remembrance, and always finding us wanting ? ' 
 
 'Mademoiselle, you would be right if marriage were 
 based on passion ; and that was the mistake of those two, 
 who will soon be no more. Marriage with heart-deep 
 love on both sides would be Paradise.' 
 
 Mademoiselle des Touches turned from the Consul, 
 and was immediately joined by Claude Vignon, who said 
 in her ear —
 
 io8 Honorine 
 
 'A bit of a coxcomb is M. de L'Hostal.' 
 
 ' No,' replied she, whispering to Claude these words : 
 * for he has not yet guessed that Honorine would have 
 loved him. — Oh ! ' she exclaimed, seeing the Consul's 
 wife approaching, 'his wife was listening! Unhappy 
 man ! ' 
 
 Eleven was striking by all the clocks, and the guests 
 went home on foot along the seashore. 
 
 'Still, that is not life,' said Mademoiselle des Touches. 
 ' That woman was one of the rarest, and perhaps the most 
 extraordinary exceptions in intellect — a pearl ! Life is 
 made up of various incidents, of pain and pleasure alter- 
 nately. The Paradise of Dante, that sublime expression 
 of the ideal, that perpetual blue, is to be found only in 
 the soul ; to ask it of the facts of life is a luxury against 
 which nature protests every hour. To such souls as those 
 the six feet of a cell, and the kneeling chair are all they 
 need.' 
 
 'You are right,' said Leon de Lora ; 'but good-for- 
 nothing as I may be, I cannot help admiring a woman 
 who is capable, as that one was, of living by the side of a 
 studio, under a painter's roof, and never coming down, 
 nor seeing the world, nor dipping her feet in the street 
 mud.' 
 
 'Such a thing has been known — for a few months,' 
 said Claude Vignon, with deep irony. 
 
 ' Comtesse Honorine is not unique of her kind,' 
 replied the Ambassador to Mademoiselle des Touches. 
 ' A man, nay, and a politician, a bitter writer, was the 
 object of such a passion ; and the pistol shot which killed 
 him hit not him alone j the woman who loved lived like 
 a nun ever after.' 
 
 ' Then there are yet some great souls in this age I ' 
 said Camille Maupin, and she stood for some minutes 
 pensively leaning on the balustrade of the quay. 
 
 Pakis, January 1843.
 
 COLONEL CHABERT 
 
 To Madame la Comtesse Ida de Bocarme nee 
 du Chasteler. 
 
 '■ Hullo ! There is that old Box-coat again ! ' 
 
 This exclamation was made by a lawyer's clerk of the 
 class called in French offices a gutter-jumper — a messen- 
 ger in fact — who at this moment was eating a piece of 
 dry bread with a hearty appetite. He pulled off a mor- 
 sel of crumb to make into a bullet, and fired it gleefully 
 through the open pane of the window against which he 
 was leaning. The pellet, well aimed, rebounded almost 
 as high as the window, after hitting the hat of a stranger 
 who was crossing the courtyard of a house in the Rue 
 Vivienne, where dwelt Maitre Derville, attorney-at-law. 
 ' Come, Simonnin, don't play tricks on people, or I 
 will turn you out of doors. However poor a client may 
 be, he is still a man, hang it all ! ' said the head clerk, 
 pausing in the addition of a bill of costs. 
 
 The lawyer's messenger is commonly, as was Simonnin, 
 a lad of thirteen or fourteen, who, in every office, is 
 under the special jurisdiction of the managing clerk, 
 whose errands and billets-doux keep him employed on his 
 way to carry writs to the bailiffs and petitions to the 
 Courts. He is akin to the street boy in his habits, and 
 to the pettifogger by fate. The boy is almost always 
 ruthless, unbroken, unmanageable, a ribald rhymester, 
 impudent, greedy, and idle. And yet, almost all these 
 clerklings have an old mother lodging on some fifth floor 
 with whom they share their pittance of thirty or forty 
 francs a month. 
 
 109
 
 no Colonel Chabert 
 
 ' If he is a man, why do you call him old Box-coat ? ' 
 asked Simonnin, with the air of a schoolboy who has 
 caught out his master. 
 
 And he went on eating his bread and cheese, leaning 
 his shoulder against the window jamb ; for he rested 
 standing like a cab-horse, one of his legs raised and 
 propped against the other, on the toe of his shoe. 
 
 * What trick can we play that cove ? ' said the third 
 clerk, whose name was Godeschal, in a low voice, paus- 
 ino- in the middle of a discourse he was extemporising 
 in an appeal engrossed by the fourth clerk, of which 
 copies were being made by two neophytes from the pro- 
 vinces. 
 
 Then he went on improvising — 
 
 ' But^ in his noble and beneficent wisdom^ his Majesty^ 
 Louis the Eighteenth — (write it at full length, heh ! 
 Desroches the learned — you, as you engross it !) — when he 
 resumed the reins of Government^ understood — (what did 
 that old nincompoop ever understand ?) — the high mission 
 to which he had been called hy Divine Providence ! — (a note 
 of admiration and six stops. They are pious enough 
 at the Courts to let us put six) — and his first thought^ as is 
 proved by the date of the order hereinafter designated^ was 
 to repair the misfortunes caused by the terrible and sad disas- 
 ters of the revolutionary times, by restoring to his numerous 
 and faithful adherents — ('numerous' is flattering,and ought 
 to please the Bench) — all their unsold estates, whether within 
 our realm, or in conquered or acquired territory, or in the 
 endowments of public institutions, for we are, and proclaim 
 ourselves competent to declare, that this is the spirit and 
 yyieaning of the famous, truly loyal order given in — Stop,' 
 said Godeschal to the three copying clerks, 'that ras- 
 cally sentence brings me to the end of my page.— Well,' 
 he went on, wetting the back fold of the sheet with his 
 tongue, so as to be able to fold back the page of thick 
 stamped paper, ' well, if you want to play him a trick, 
 tell him that the master can only see his clients between
 
 Colonel Chabert 1 1 1 
 
 two and three in the morning ; we shall see if he comes, 
 the old ruffian ! ' 
 
 And Godeschal took up the sentence he was dictating 
 — ^ given in — Are you ready ? ' 
 
 'Yes,' cried the three writers. 
 
 It all went on together, the appeal, the gossip, and the 
 conspiracy. 
 
 ' Given in — Here, Daddy Boucard, what is the date of 
 the order ? We must dot our /'s and cross our ^'s, by 
 Jingo ! It helps to fill the pages.' 
 
 * By Jingo ! ' repeated one of the copying clerks before 
 Boucard, the head clerk, could reply. 
 
 ' What ! have you written by Jingo ? ' cried Godeschal, 
 looking at one of the novices, with an expression at once 
 stern and humorous. 
 
 ' Why, yes,' said Desroches, the fourth clerk, leaning 
 across his neighbour's copy, * he has written " IVe must 
 dot our i'j " and spelt it by Gingo ! ' 
 
 All the clerks shouted with laughter. 
 
 ' Why ! Monsieur Hure, you take "By Jingo" for a law 
 term, and you say you come from Mortagne ! ' exclaimed 
 Simonnin. 
 
 ' Scratch it cleanly out,' said the head clerk. ' If the 
 judge, whose business it is to tax the bill, were to 
 see such things, he would say you were laughing at 
 the whole boiling. You would hear of it from the 
 chief! Come, no more of this nonsense. Monsieur 
 Hure ! A Norman ought not to write out an 
 appeal without thought. It is the " Shoulder arms ! " 
 of the law.' 
 
 ' Given in — in ? ' asked Godeschal. — ' Tell me when, 
 Boucard.' 
 
 'June 1 814,' replied the head clerk, without looking 
 up from his work. 
 
 A knock at the office door interrupted the circumlocu- 
 tions of the prolix document. Five clerks with rows of 
 hungry teeth, bright, mocking eyes, and curly heads.
 
 1 1 2 Colonel Chabert 
 
 lifted their noses towards the door, after crying all together 
 in a singing tone, ' Come in ! ' 
 
 Boucard kept his face buried in a pile of papers — 
 broutilles (odds and ends) in French law jargon — and went 
 on drawing out the bill of costs on which he was busy. 
 
 The office was a large room furnished with the tradi- 
 tional stool which is to be seen in all these dens of law- 
 quibbling. The stove pipe crossed the room diagonally 
 to the chimney of a briclced-up fireplace ; on the marble 
 chimney-piece were several chunks of bread, triangles of 
 Brie cheese, pork cutlets, glasses, bottles, and the head 
 clerk's cup of chocolate. The smell of these dainties 
 blended so completely with that of the immoderately 
 overheated stove and the odour peculiar to offices and 
 old papers, that the trail of a fox would not have been 
 perceptible. The floor was covered with mud and snow, 
 brought in by the clerks. Near the window stood the 
 desk with a revolving lid, where the head clerk worked, 
 and against the back of it was the second clerk's table. 
 The second clerk was at this moment in Court. It was 
 between eight and nine in the morning. 
 
 The only decoration of the office consisted in huge 
 yellow posters, announcing seizures of real estate, sales, 
 settlements under trust, final or interim judgments, — all 
 the glory of a lawyer's office. Behind the head clerk 
 was an enormous stack of pigeon-holes from the top to 
 the bottom of the room, of which each division was 
 crammed with bundles of papers with an infinite number of 
 tickets hanging from them at the ends of red tape, which 
 give a peculiar physiognomy to law-papers. The lower 
 rows were filled with cardboard boxes, yellow with use, 
 on which might be read the names of the more important 
 clients whose cases were juicily stewing at this present 
 time. The dirty window-panes admitted but little day- 
 light. Indeed, there are very few offices in Paris where 
 it is possible to write without lamplight before ten in 
 the morning in the month of February, for they are all
 
 Colonel Chabert 1 1 3 
 
 left to very natural neglect ; every one comes and no one 
 stays ; no one has any personal interest in a scene of mere 
 routine — neither the attorney, nor the counsel, nor the 
 clerks, trouble themselves about the appearance of a place 
 which, to the youths, is a schoolroom ; to the clients, a 
 passage ; to the chief, a laboratory. The greasy furniture 
 is handed down to successive owners with such scrupu- 
 lous care, that in some offices may still be seen boxes of 
 remainders.^ machines for twisting parchment gut, and 
 bags left by the prosecuting parties of the Chatelet (abbre- 
 viated to Chlet) — a Court which, under the old order of 
 things, represented the present Court of First Instance 
 (or County Court). 
 
 So in this dark office, thick with dust, there was, as in 
 all its fellows, something repulsive to the clients — some- 
 thing which made it one of the most hideous monstrosities 
 of Paris. Nay, were it not for the mouldy sacristies 
 where prayers are weighed out and paid for like groceries 
 and for the old-clothes shops, where flutter the rags that 
 blight all the illusions of life by showing us the last end 
 of all our festivities — an attorney's office would be, of all 
 social marts, the most loathsome. But we might say 
 the same of the gambling-hell, of the Law Court, of the 
 lottery office, of the brothel. 
 
 But why ? In these places, perhaps, the drama being 
 played in a man's soul makes him indifferent to acces- 
 sories, which would also account for the single-minded- 
 ness of great thinkers and men of great ambitions. 
 
 ' Where is my penknife ? ' 
 
 ' I am eating my breakfast.' 
 
 ' You go and be hanged ! here is a blot on the copy.' 
 
 ' Silence, gentlemen ! ' 
 
 These various exclamations were uttered simul- 
 taneously at the moment when the old client shut the 
 door with the sort of humility which disfigures the move- 
 ments of a man down on his luck. The stranger tried 
 to smile, but the muscles of his face relaxed as he vainly 
 
 H
 
 114 Colonel Chabert 
 
 looked for some symptoms of amenity on the inexorably 
 indifferent faces of the six clerks. Accustomed, no doubt, 
 to gauge men, he very politely addressed the gutter-jumper, 
 hoping to get a civil answer from this boy of all vi^ork. 
 
 ' Monsieur, is your master at home ? ' 
 
 The pert messenger made no reply, but patted his ear 
 with the fingers of his left hand, as much as to say, ' I 
 
 am deaf.' 
 
 'What do you want, sir?' asked Godeschal, swallowing 
 as he spoke a mouthful of bread big enough to charge a 
 four-pounder, flourishing his knife and crossing his legs, 
 throwing up one foot in the air to the level of his eyes. 
 
 'This is the fifth time I have called,' repHed the 
 victim. * I wish to speak to M. Derville.' 
 
 ' On business ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, but I can explain it to no one but ' 
 
 ' M. Derville is in bed ; if you want to consult him on 
 some difficulty, he does no serious work till midnight. 
 But if you will lay the case before us, we could help you 
 just as well as he can to ' 
 
 The stranger was unmoved ; he looked timidly about 
 him, like a dog who has got into a strange kitchen and 
 expects a kick. By grace of their profession, lawyers' 
 clerks have no fear of thieves ; they did not suspect the 
 owner of the box-coat, and left him to study the place, 
 where he looked in vain for a chair to sit on, for he 
 was evidently tired. Attorneys, on principle, do not have 
 many chairs in their offices. The inferior client, being 
 kept waiting on his feet, goes away grumbling, but then 
 he does not waste time, which, as an old lawyer once 
 said, is not allowed for when the bill is taxed. 
 
 'Monsieur,' said the old man, 'as I have already told 
 you, I cannot explain my business to any one but M. 
 Derville. I will wait till he is up.' 
 
 Boucard had finished his bill. He smelt the fragrance 
 of his chocolate, rose from his cane arm-chair, went to 
 the chimney-piece, looked the old man from head to foot,
 
 Colonel Chabert 115 
 
 stared at his coat, and made an indescribable grimace. He 
 probably reflected that whichever way this client might 
 be wrung, it would be impossible to squeeze out a 
 centime, so he put in a few brief words to rid the office 
 of a bad customer. 
 
 ' It is the truth, monsieur. The chief only works at 
 night. If your business is important, I recommend you 
 to return at one in the morning.' The stranger looked at 
 the head clerk with a bewildered expression, and remained 
 motionless for a moment. The clerks, accustomed to 
 every change of countenance, and the odd whimsicalities 
 to which indecision or absence of mind gives rise in 
 ' parties,' went on eating, making as much noise with 
 their jaws as horses over a manger, and paying no further 
 heed to the old man, 
 
 ' I will come again to-night,' said the stranger at 
 length, with the tenacious desire, peculiar to the unfor- 
 tunate, to catch humanity at fault. 
 
 The only irony allowed to poverty is to drive Justice 
 and Benevolence to unjust denials. When a poor 
 wretch has convicted Society of falsehood, he throws 
 himself more eagerly on the mercy of God. 
 
 ' What do you think of that for a cracked pot ? ' said 
 Simonnin, without waiting till the old man had shut the 
 door. 
 
 ' He looks as if he had been buried and dug up again,' 
 said a clerk. 
 
 ' He is some Colonel who wants his arrears of pay,' said 
 the head clerk. 
 
 ' No, he is a retired concierge,' said Godeschal. 
 
 ' I bet you he is a nobleman,' cried Boucard. 
 
 ' I bet you he has been a porter,' retorted Godeschal. 
 ' Only porters are gifted by nature with shabby box-coats, 
 as worn and greasy and frayed as that old body's. And 
 did you see his trodden-down boots that let the water in, 
 and his stock which serves for a shirt ? He has slept in 
 a dry arch.'
 
 ii6 Colonel Chabert 
 
 ' He may be of noble birth, and yet have pulled the 
 door-latch,' cried Desroches. * It has been known ! ' 
 
 ' No,' Boucard insisted, in the midst of laughter, ' I 
 maintain that he was a brewer in 1789, and a Colonel in 
 the time of the Republic' 
 
 * I bet theatre tickets round that he never was a 
 soldier,' said Godeschal. 
 
 ' Done with you,' answered Boucard. 
 
 ' Monsieur ! Monsieur ! ' shouted the little messenger, 
 opening the window. 
 
 ' What are you at now, Simonnet ? ' asked Boucard. 
 
 'I am calling him that you may ask him whether he is 
 a Colonel or a porter ; he must know.' 
 
 All the clerks laughed. As to the old man, he was 
 already coming upstairs again. 
 
 ' What can we say to him ? ' cried Godeschal. 
 
 * Leave it to me,' replied Boucard. 
 
 The poor man came in nervously, his eyes cast down, 
 perhaps not to betray how hungry he was by looking 
 too greedily at the eatables. 
 
 ' Monsieur,' said Boucard, ' will you have the kindness 
 to leave your name, so that M. Derville may know ' 
 
 ' Chabert.' 
 
 ' The Colonel who was killed at Eylau ? ' asked Hure, 
 who, having so far said nothing, was jealous of adding a 
 jest to all the others. 
 
 'The same, Monsieur,' replied the good man, with 
 antique simplicity. And he went away. 
 
 'Whew!' 
 
 ' Done brown ! ' 
 
 'Poof!' 
 
 'Oh!' 
 
 ' Ah ! ' 
 
 ' Boum ! ' 
 
 ' The old rogue ! ' 
 
 ' Ting-a-ring-ting 
 
 ' Sold again ! '
 
 Colonel Chabert 117 
 
 * Monsieur Desroches, you are going to the play with- 
 out paying,' said Hure to the fourth clerk, giving him a 
 slap on the shoulder that might have killed a rhinoceros. 
 
 There was a storm of cat-calls, cries, and exclamations, 
 which all the onomatopeia of the language would fail to 
 represent. 
 
 ' Which theatre shall we go to ? ' 
 
 ' To the opera,' cried the head clerk. 
 
 'In the first place,' said Godeschal, 'I never mentioned 
 which theatre. I might, if I chose, take you to see 
 Madame Saqui.' 
 
 * Madame Saqui is not the play.' 
 
 ' What is a play ? ' replied Godeschal. ' First, we 
 must define the point of fact. What did I bet, gentle- 
 men ? A play. What is a play ? A spectacle. What 
 is a spectacle ? Something to be seen ' 
 
 'But on that principle you would pay your bet by 
 taking us to see the water run under the Pont Neuf!' 
 cried Simonnin, interrupting him. 
 
 ' To be seen for money,' Godeschal added. 
 
 ' But a great many things are to be seen for money 
 that are not plays. The definition is defective,' said 
 Desroches. 
 
 'But do listen to me ! ' 
 
 'You are talking nonsense, my dear boy,' said Boucard. 
 
 ' Is Curtius' a play ? ' said Godeschal. 
 
 'No,' said the head clerk, 'it is a collection of figures 
 — but it is a spectacle.' 
 
 'I bet you a hundred francs to a sou,' Godeschal 
 resumed, ' that Curtius' Waxworks forms such a show 
 as might be called a play or theatre. It contains a thing 
 to be seen at various prices, according to the place you 
 choose to occupy.' 
 
 ' And so on, and so forth ! ' said Simonnin. 
 
 ' You mind I don't box your ears ! ' said Godeschal. 
 
 The clerks shrugged their shoulders. 
 
 ' Besides, it is not proved that that old ape was not
 
 1 1 8 Colonel Chabert 
 
 making game of us,' he said, dropping his argument, 
 which was drowned in the laughter of the other clerks. 
 ' On my honour, Colonel Chabert is really and truly dead. 
 His wife is married again to Comte Ferraud, Councillor 
 of State. Madame Ferraud is one of our clients.' 
 
 'Come, the case is remanded till to-morrow,' said 
 Boucard. ' To work, gentlemen. The deuce is in it ; 
 we get nothing done here. Finish copying that appeal ; 
 it must be handed in before the sitting of the Fourth 
 Chamber, judgment is to be given to-day. Come, on 
 you go ! ' 
 
 ' If he really were Colonel Chabert, would not that 
 impudent rascal Simonnin have felt the leather of his 
 boot in the right place when he pretended to be deaf?' 
 said Desroches, regarding this remark as more con- 
 clusive than Godeschal's. 
 
 'Since nothing is settled,' said Boucard, 'let us all 
 agree to go to the upper boxes of the Fran^ais and see 
 Talma in " Nero." Simonnin may go to the pit.' 
 
 And thereupon the head clerk sat down at his table, 
 and the others followed his example. 
 
 ' Given in yune eighteen hundred and fourteen (in 
 words),' said Godeschal. ' Ready ? ' 
 
 ' Yes,' replied the two copying clerks and the en- 
 grosser, whose pens forthwith began to creak over the 
 stamped paper, making as much noise in the office as a 
 hundred cockchafers imprisoned by schoolboys in paper 
 cages. 
 
 ' Jnd we hope that my lords on the Bench^ the extem- 
 porising clerk went on. ' Stop ! I must read my sentence 
 through again. I do not understand it myself.' 
 
 'Forty-six (that must often happen) and three forty- 
 nines,' said Boucard. 
 
 ' We hope^ Godeschal began again, after reading all 
 through the document, ' that my lords on the Bench will 
 not be less magnanimous than the august author of the decree, 
 and that they will do justice against the miserable claims of
 
 Colonel Chabert 1 1 9 
 
 the acting committee of the chief Board of the Legion of 
 Honour by interpreting the law in the wide sense we have 
 here set forth ' 
 
 ' Monsieur Godeschal, wouldn't you like a glass of 
 water ? ' said the little messenger. 
 
 'That imp of a boy ! ' said Boucard. ' Here, get on 
 your double-soled shanks-mare, take this packet, and 
 spin off to the Invalides.' 
 
 ^Here setforth^ Godeschal went on. ' Add in the interest 
 of Madame la Vicomtesse (at full length) de Grandlieu^ 
 
 'What !' cried the chief, 'are you thinking of drawing 
 up an appeal in the case of Vicomtesse de Grandlieu 
 against the Legion of Honour — a case for the office to 
 stand or fall by ? You are something like an ass ! Have 
 the goodness to put aside your copies and your notes ; 
 you may keep all that for the case of Navarreins against 
 the Hospitals. It is late ; I will draw up a little petition 
 myself, with a due allowance of "inasmuch," and go to 
 the Courts myself.' 
 
 This scene is typical of the thousand delights which, 
 when we look back on our youth, make us say, ' Those 
 were good times.' 
 
 At about one in the morning Colonel Chabert, self- 
 styled, knocked at the door of Maitre Derville, attorney 
 to the Court of First Instance in the Department of the 
 Seine. The porter told him that Monsieur Derville had 
 not yet come in. The old man said he had an appoint- 
 ment, and was shown upstairs to the rooms occupied by 
 the famous lawyer, who, notwithstanding his youth, 
 was considered to have one of the longest heads in Paris. 
 
 Having rung, the distrustful applicant was not a little 
 astonished at finding the head clerk busily arranging in 
 a convenient order on his master's dinino--room table 
 the papers relating to the cases to be tried on the morrow. 
 The clerk, not less astonished, bowed to the Colonel and 
 begged him to take a seat, which the client did.
 
 1 20 Colonel Chabert 
 
 ' On my word, Monsieur, I thought you were joking 
 yesterday when you named such an hour for an interview,' 
 said the old man, with the forced mirth of a ruined man, 
 who does his best to smile. 
 
 ' The clerks were joking, but they were speaking the 
 truth too,' replied the man, going on with his work. 
 ' M. Derville chooses this hour for studying his cases, 
 taking stock of their possibilities, arranging how to 
 conduct them, deciding on the line of defence. His 
 prodigious intellect is freer at this hour — the only time 
 when he can have the silence and quiet needed for the 
 conception of good ideas. Since he entered the pro- 
 fession, you are the third person to come to him for a 
 consultation at this midnight hour. After coming in 
 the chief will discuss each case, read everything, spend 
 four or five hours perhaps over the business, then he 
 will ring for me and explain to me his intentions. In 
 the morning from ten till two he hears what his clients 
 have to say, then he spends the rest of his day in appoint- 
 ments. In the evening he goes into society to keep iip 
 his connections. So he has only the night for under- 
 mining his cases, ransacking the arsenal of the Code, and 
 laying his plan of battle. He is determined never to lose 
 a case ; he loves his art. He will not undertake every 
 case, as his brethren do. That is his life, an exception- 
 ally active one. And he makes a great deal of money.' 
 
 As he listened to this explanation, the old man sat 
 silent, and his strange face assumed an expression so 
 bereft of intelligence, that the clerk, after looking at him, 
 thought no more about him. 
 
 A few minutes later Derville came in, in evening 
 dress ; his head clerk opened the door to him, and went 
 back to finish arranging the papers. The young lawyer 
 paused for a moment in amazement on seeing in the dim 
 light the strange client who awaited him. Colonel 
 Chabert was as absolutely immovable as one of the wax 
 figures in Curtius' collection to which Godeschal had
 
 Colonel Chabert 121 
 
 proposed to treat his fellow-clerks. This quiescence 
 would not have been a subject for astonishment if it had 
 not completed the supernatural aspect of the man's whole 
 person. The old soldier was dry and lean. His forehead, 
 intentionally hidden under a smoothly combed wig, gave 
 him a look of mystery. His eyes seemed shrouded in a 
 transparent film ; you would have compared them to 
 dingy mother-of-pearl with a blue iridescence changing 
 in the gleam of the wax-lights. His face, pale, livid, and 
 as thin as a knife, if I may use such a vulgar expression, 
 was as the face of the dead. Round his neck was a tight 
 black silk stock. 
 
 Below the dark line of this rag the body was so com- 
 pletely hidden in shadow that a man of imagination 
 might have supposed the old head was due to some 
 chance play of light and shade, or have taken it for a 
 portrait by Rembrandt, without a frame. The brim of 
 the hat which covered the old man's brow cast a black 
 line of shadow on' the upper part of the face. This 
 grotesque effect, though natural, threw into relief by 
 contrast the white furrows, the cold wrinkles, the colour- 
 less tone of the corpse-like countenance. And the 
 absence of all movement in the figure, of all fire in the 
 eye, were in harmony with a certain look of melancholy 
 madness, and the deteriorating symptoms characteristic of 
 senility, giving the face an indescribably ill-starred look 
 which no human words could render. 
 
 But an observer, especially a lawyer, could also have 
 -ead in this stricken man the signs of deep sorrow, the 
 traces of grief which had worn into this face, as drops of 
 water from the sky falling on fine marble at last destroy 
 its beauty. A physician, an author, or a judge might 
 have discerned a whole drama at the sight of its sublime 
 horror, while the least charm was its resemblance to the 
 grotesques which artists amuse themselves by sketching 
 on a corner of the lithographic stone while chatting with 
 a friend.
 
 122 Colonel Chabert 
 
 On seeing the attorney, the stranger started, with the 
 convulsive thrill that conies over a poet vi^hen a sudden 
 noise rouses him from a fruitful reverie in silence and at 
 night. The old man hastily removed his hat and rose to 
 bow to the young man ; the leather lining of his hat was 
 doubtless very greasy ; his wig stuck to it without his 
 noticing it, and left his head bare, showing his skull 
 horribly disfigured by a scar beginning at the nape of the 
 neck and ending over the right eye, a prominent seam 
 all across ihis head. The sudden removal of the dirty 
 wig which the poor man wore to hide this gash gave the 
 two lawyers no inclination to laugh, so horrible to 
 behold was this riven skull. The first idea suggested by 
 the sight of this old wound was, 'His intelligence must 
 have escaped through that cut.' 
 
 ' If this is not Colonel Chabert, he is some thorough- 
 going trooper ! ' thought Boucard. 
 
 * Monsieur,' said Derville, 'to whom have I the 
 honour of speaking ? ' 
 ' To Colonel Chabert.' 
 'Which?' 
 
 ' He who was killed at Eylau,' replied the old man. 
 On hearing this strange speech, the lawyer and his 
 clerk glanced at each other, as much as to say, ' He is 
 mad.' 
 
 ' Monsieur,' the Colonel went on, ' I wish to confide 
 to you the secret of my position.' 
 
 A thing well worthy of note is the natural intrepidity 
 of lawyers. Whether from the habit of receiving a 
 great many persons, or from the deep sense of the 
 protection conferred on them by the law, or from confi- 
 dence in their mission, they enter everywhere, fearing 
 nothing, like priests and physicians. Derville signed to 
 Boucard, who vanished. 
 
 ' During the day, sir,' said the attorney, ' I am not so 
 miserly of my time, but at night every minute is pre- 
 cious. So be brief and concise. Go to the facts without
 
 Colonel Chabert 123 
 
 digression. I will ask for any explanations I may con- 
 sider necessary. Speak.' 
 
 Having bid his strange client to be seated, the young 
 man sat down at the table ; but while he gave his atten- 
 tion to the deceased Colonel, he turned over the bundles 
 of papers. 
 
 'You know, perhaps,' said the dead man, 'that I 
 commanded a cavalry regiment at Eylau. I was of 
 important service to the success of Murat's famous 
 charge which decided the victory. Unhappily for me, 
 my death is a historical fact, recorded in Victoires et 
 Conquetes, where it is related in full detail. We cut 
 through the three Russian lines, which at once closed up 
 and formed again, so that we had to repeat the movement 
 back again. At the moment when we were nearing the 
 Emperor, after having scattered the Russians, I came 
 against a squadron of the enemy's cavalry. I rushed at 
 the obstinate brutes. Two Russian officers, perfect 
 giants, attacked me both at once. One of them gave 
 me a cut across the head that crashed through every- 
 thing, even a black silk cap I wore next my head, and 
 cut deep into the skull. I fell from my horse. Murat 
 came up to support me ; he rode over my body, he and 
 all his men, fifteen hundred of them — there might have 
 been more ! My death was announced to the Emperor, 
 who as a precaution — for he was fond of me, was the 
 Master — wished to know if there were no hope of saving 
 the man he had to thank for such a vigorous attack. 
 He sent two surgeons to identify me and bring me into 
 Hospital, saying, perhaps too carelessly, for he was very 
 busy, ' Go and see whether by any chance poor Chabert 
 is still alive.' These rascally saw-bones, who had just 
 seen me lying under the hoofs of the horses of two regi- 
 ments, no doubt did not trouble themselves to feel my 
 pulse, and reported that I was quite dead. The certifi- 
 cate of death was probably made out in accordance with 
 the rules of military jurisprudence.'
 
 124 Colonel Chabert 
 
 As he heard his visitor express himself with complete 
 lucidity, and relate a story so probable though so strange, 
 the young lawyer ceased fingering the papers, rested his 
 left elbow on the table, and with his head on his hand 
 looked steadily at the Colonel. 
 
 * Do you know. Monsieur, that I am lawyer to the 
 Comtesse Ferraud,' he said, interrupting the speaker, 
 * Colonel Chabert's widow ? ' 
 
 * My wife — yes. Monsieur. Therefore, after a hundred 
 fruitless attempts to interest lawyers, who have all thought 
 me mad, I made up my mind to come to you. I will 
 tell you of my misfortunes afterwards ; for the present, 
 allow me to prove the facts, explaining rather how things 
 must have fallen out rather than how they did occur. 
 Certain circumstances, known, I suppose, to no one but 
 the Almighty, compel me to speak of some things as 
 hypothetical. The wounds I had received must pre- 
 sumably have produced tetanus, or have thrown me into 
 a state analogous to that of a disease called, I believe, 
 catalepsy. Otherwise how is it conceivable that I should 
 have been stripped, as is the custom in time of war, and 
 thrown into the common grave by the men ordered to 
 bury the dead ? 
 
 ' Allow me here to refer to a detail of which I could 
 know nothing till after the event, which, after all, I must 
 speak of as my death. At Stuttgart, in 1814, I met an 
 old quarter-master of my regiment. This dear fellow, 
 the only man who chose to recognise me, and of whom I 
 will tell you more later, explained the marvel of my pre- 
 servation, by telling me that my horse was shot in the 
 flank at the moment when I was wounded. Man and 
 beast went down together, like a monk cut out of card- 
 paper. As I fell, to the right or to the left, I was no 
 doubt covered by the body of my horse, which protected 
 me from being trampled to death or hit by a ball. 
 
 ' When I came to myself. Monsieur, I was in a position 
 and an atmosphere of which I could give you no idea if
 
 Colonel Chabcrt 125 
 
 I talked till to-morrow. The little air there was to 
 breathe was foul. I wanted to move, and found no 
 room. I opened my eyes, and saw nothing. The most 
 alarming circumstance was the lack of air, and this 
 enlightened me as to my situation. I understood that 
 no fresh air could penetrate to me, and that I must die. 
 This thought took off the sense of intolerable pain which 
 had aroused me. There was a violent singing in my 
 ears. I heard — or I thought I heard, I will assert 
 nothing — groans from the world of dead among whom I 
 was lying. Some nights I still think I hear those stifled 
 moans ; though the remembrance of that time is very 
 obscure, and my memory very indistinct, in spite of my 
 impressions of far more acute suffering I was fated to go 
 through, and which have confused my ideas. 
 
 ' But there was something more awful than cries ; 
 there was a silence such as I have never known elsewhere 
 — literally, the silence of the grave. At last, by raising 
 my hands and feeling the dead, I discerned a vacant space 
 between my head and the human carrion above. I could 
 thus measure the space, granted by a chance of which I 
 knew not the cause. It would seem that, thanks to the 
 carelessness and the haste with which we had been pitched 
 into the trench, two dead bodies had leaned across and 
 against each other, forming an angle like that made by 
 two cards when a child is building a card castle. Feeling 
 about me at once, for there was no time for play, I 
 happily felt an arm lying detached, the arm of a Her- 
 cules ! A stout bone, to which I owed my rescue. But 
 for this unhoped-for help, I must have perished. But 
 with a fury you may imagine, I began to work my way 
 through the bodies which separated me from the layer of 
 earth which had no doubt been thrown over us — I say 
 us, as if there had been others living ! I worked with a 
 will. Monsieur, for here I am ! Bat to this day I do not 
 know how I succeeded in getting through the pile of 
 flesh which formed a barrier between me and life. You
 
 126 Colonel Chabert 
 
 will say I had three arms. This crowbar, which I used 
 cleverly enough, opened out a little air between the 
 bodies I moved, and I economised my breath. At last I 
 saw daylight, but through snow ! 
 
 ' At that moment I perceived that my head was cut 
 open. Happily my blood, or that of my comrades, or 
 perhaps the torn skin of my horse, who knows, had in 
 coagulating formed a sort of natural plaister. But, in 
 spite of it, I fainted away when my head came into contact 
 with the snow. However, the little warmth left in me 
 melted the snow about me ; and when I recovered con- 
 sciousness, I found myself in the middle of a round hole, 
 where I stood shouting as long as I could. But the sun 
 was rising, so. I had very little chance of being heard. 
 Was there any one in the fields yet ? I pulled myself up, 
 using my feet as a spring, resting on one of the dead, 
 whose ribs were firm. You may suppose that this was 
 not the moment for saying, " Respect courage in mis- 
 fortune ! " In short, Monsieur, after enduring the anguish, 
 if the word is strong enough for my frenzy of seeing for 
 a long time, yes, quite a long time, those cursed Germans 
 flying from a voice they heard where they could see no 
 one, I was dug out by a woman, who was brave or 
 curious enough to come close to my head, which must 
 have looked as though it had sprouted from the ground 
 like a mushroom. This woman went to fetch her 
 husband, and between them they got me to their poor 
 hovel. 
 
 ' It would seem that I must have again fallen into a 
 catalepsy — allow me to use the word to describe a state 
 of which I have no idea, but which, from the account 
 given by my hosts, I suppose to have been the effect of 
 that malady. I remained for six months between life and 
 death ; not speaking, or, if I spoke, talking in delirium. 
 At last, my hosts got me admitted to the hospital at 
 Heilsberg. 
 
 ' You will understand, Monsieur, that I came out of
 
 Colonel Chabert 
 
 127 
 
 the womb of the grave as naked as I came from my 
 mother's ; so that six months afterwards, when I remem- 
 bered, one fine morning, that I had been Colonel Chabert, 
 and when, on recovering my wits, I tried to exact from my 
 nurse rather more respect than she paid to any poor devil, 
 all my companions in the ward began to laugh. Luckily 
 for me, the surgeon, out of professional pride, had 
 answered for my cure, and was naturally interested in 
 his patient. When I told him coherently about my 
 former life, this good man, named Sparchmann, signed a 
 deposition, drawn up in the legal form of his country, 
 giving an account of the miraculous way in which I had 
 escaped from the trench dug for the dead, the day and 
 hour when I had been found by my benefactress and her 
 husband, the nature and exact spot of my injuries, 
 adding to these documents a description of my person. 
 
 ' Well, Monsieur, I have neither these important pieces 
 of evidence, nor the declaration I made before a notary 
 at Heilsberg, with a view to establishing my identity. 
 From the day when I was turned out of that town by 
 the events of war, I have wandered about like a vagabond, 
 begging my bread, treated as a madman when I have told 
 my story, without ever having found or earned a sou to 
 enable me to recover the deeds which would prove my 
 statements, and restore me to society. My sufferings 
 have often kept me for six months at a time in some 
 little town, where every care was taken of the invalid 
 Frenchman, but where he was laughed at to his face as 
 soon as he said he was Colonel Chabert. For a long 
 time that laughter, those doubts, used to put me into 
 rages which did me harm, and which even led to my 
 being locked up at Stuttgart as a madman. And, indeed, 
 as you may judge from my story, there was ample reason 
 for shutting a man up. 
 
 *At the end of two years' detention, which I was 
 compelled to submit to, after hearing my keepers say a 
 thousand times, " Here is a poor man who thinks he is
 
 128 Colonel Chabert 
 
 Colonel Chabert " to people who would reply, " Poor 
 fellow !" I became convinced of the impossibility of my 
 own adventure. I grew melancholy, resigned, and quiet, 
 and gave up calling myself Colonel Chabert, in order to 
 get out of my prison, and see France once more. Oh, 
 Monsieur ! To see Paris again was a delirium which 
 I ' 
 
 Without finishing his sentence. Colonel Chabert fell 
 into a deep study, which Derville respected. 
 
 ' One fine day,' his visitor resumed, ' one spring day, 
 they gave me the key of the fields, as we say, and ten 
 thalers, admitting that I talked quite sensibly on all 
 subjects, and no longer called myself Colonel Chabert. 
 On my honour, at that time, and even to this day, some- 
 times I hate my name. I wish I were not myself. The 
 sense of my rights kills me. If my illness had but 
 deprived me of all memory of my past life, I could be 
 happy. I should have entered the service again under 
 any name, no matter what, and should, perhaps, have 
 been made Field-Marshal in Austria or Russia. Who 
 knows ? ' 
 
 * Monsieur,' said the attorney, ' you have upset all my 
 ideas. I feel as if I heard you in a dream. Pause for a 
 moment, I beg of you.' 
 
 ' You are the only person,' said the Colonel, with a 
 melancholy look, ' who ever listened to me so patiently. 
 No lawyer has been willing to lend me ten napoleons 
 to enable me to procure from Germany the necessary 
 documents to begin my lawsuit ' 
 
 ' What lawsuit ?' said the attorney, who had forgotten 
 his client's painful position in listening to the narrative of 
 his past sufferings. 
 
 ' Why, Monsieur, is not the Comtesse Ferraud my 
 wife ? She has thirty thousand francs a year, which 
 belong to me, and she will not give me a sou. When I 
 tell lawyers these things — men of sense ; when I propose 
 — I, a beggar — to bring an action against a Count and
 
 Colonel Chabert 129 
 
 Countess ; when I — a dead man — bring up as against a 
 certificate of death a certificate of marriage and registers 
 of births, they show me out, either with the air of cold 
 politeness, which you all know how to assume to rid your- 
 selves of a hapless wretch, or brutally, like men who 
 think they have to deal with a swindler or a madman — it 
 depends on their nature. I have been buried under the 
 dead ; but now I am buried under the living, under 
 papers, under facts, under the whole of society, which 
 wants to shove me underground again !' 
 
 ' Pray resume your narrative,' said Derville. 
 
 ' " Pray resume it ! " ' cried the hapless old man, taking 
 the young lawyer's hand. ' That is the first polite word 
 I have heard since ' 
 
 The Colonel wept. Gratitude choked his voice. 
 The appealing and unutterable eloquence that lies in the 
 eyes, in a gesture, even in silence, entirely convinced 
 Derville, and touched him deeply. 
 
 ' Listen, Monsieur,' said he ; ' I have this evening won 
 three hundred francs at cards. I may very well lay out 
 half that sum in making a man happy. I will begin the 
 inquiries and researches necessary to obtain the documents 
 of which you speak, and until they arrive I will give you 
 five francs a day. If you are Colonel Chabert, you will 
 pardon the smallness of the loan as coming from a young 
 man who has his fortune to make. Proceed.' 
 
 The Colonel, as he called himself, sat for a moment 
 motionless and bewildered ; the depth of his woes had 
 no doubt destroyed his powers of belief. Though he was 
 eager in pursuit of his military distinction, of his fortune, 
 of himself, perhaps it was in obedience to the inexplicable 
 feeling, the latent germ in every man's heart, to which 
 we owe the experiments of alchemists, the passion for 
 glory, the discoveries of astronomy and of physics, every- 
 thing which prompts man to expand his being by multi- 
 plying himself through deeds or ideas. In his mind the 
 Ego was now but a secondary object, just as the vanity 
 
 I
 
 130 Colonel Chabert 
 
 of success or the pleasure of winning become dearer to 
 the gambler than the object he has at stake. The young 
 lawyer's words were as a miracle to this man, for ten 
 years repudiated by his wife, by justice, by the whole 
 social creation. To find in a lawyer's office the ten gold 
 pieces which had so long been refused him by so many 
 people, and in so many ways ! The Colonel was like 
 the lady who, having been ill of a fever for fifteen years, 
 fancied she had some fresh complaint when she was 
 cured. There are joys in which we have ceased to 
 believe ; they fall on us, it is like a thunderbolt ; they 
 burn us. The poor man's gratitude was too great to find 
 utterance. To superficial observers he seemed cold, but 
 Derville saw complete honesty under this amazement. 
 A swindler would have found his voice. 
 
 ' Where was I ? ' said the Colonel, with the simplicity 
 of a child or of a soldier, for there is often something of 
 the child in a true soldier, and almost always something 
 of the soldier in a child, especially in France. 
 
 * At Stuttgart. You were out of prison,' said Derville. 
 'You know my wife ? ' asked the Colonel. 
 
 ' Yes,' said Derville, with a bow. 
 
 ' What is she like ? ' 
 
 ' Still quite charming.' 
 
 The old man held up his hand, and seemed to be 
 swallowing down some secret anguish with the grave and 
 solemn resignation that is characteristic of men who have 
 stood the ordeal of blood and fire on the battlefield. 
 
 * Monsieur,' said he, with a sort of cheerfulness — for 
 he breathed again, the poor Colonel ; he had again risen 
 from the grave ; he had just melted a covering of snow 
 less easily thawed than that which had once before 
 frozen his head ; and he drew a deep breath, as if he had 
 just escaped from a dungeon — 'Monsieur, if I had been 
 a handsome young fellow, none of my misfortunes would 
 have befallen me. Women believe in men when they 
 flavour their speeches with the word Love. They hurry
 
 Colonel Chabert 131 
 
 then, they come, they go, they are everywhere at once ; 
 they intrigue, they assert facts, they play the very devil 
 for a man who takes their fancy. But how could I 
 interest a woman ? I had a face like a Requiem. I 
 was dressed like a sans-cuktte. I was more like an 
 Esquimaux than a Frenchman — I, who had formerly 
 been considered one of the smartest of fops in 1799 ! — 
 I, Chabert, Count of the Empire. 
 
 'Well, on the very day when I was turned out into 
 the streets like a dog, I met the quartermaster of whom 
 I just now spoke. This old soldier's name was Boutin. 
 The poor devil and I made the queerest pair of broken- 
 down hacks I ever set eyes on. I met him out walking ; 
 but though I recognised him, he could not possibly guess 
 who I was. We went into a tavern together. In there, 
 when I told him my name, Boutin's mouth opened from 
 ear to ear in a roar of laughter, like the bursting of a 
 mortar. That mirth. Monsieur, was one of the keenest 
 pangs I have known. It told me without disguise how 
 great were the changes in me ! I was, then, unrecog- 
 nisable even to the humblest and most grateful of my 
 former friends ! 
 
 ' I had once saved Boutin's life, but it was only the 
 repayment of a debt I owed him. I need not tell you 
 how he did me this service ; it was at Ravenna, in Italy. 
 The house where Boutin prevented my being stabbed 
 was not extremely respectable. At that time I was not 
 a colonel, but, like Boutin himself, a common trooper. 
 Happily there were certain details of this adventure 
 which could be known only to us two, and when I 
 recalled them to his mind his incredulity diminished. I 
 then told him the story of my singular experiences. 
 Although my eyes and my voice, he told me, were 
 strangely altered, although I had neither hair, teeth, nor 
 eyebrows, and was as colourless as an Albino, he at last 
 recognised his Colonel in the beggar, after a thousand 
 questions, which T answered triumphantly.
 
 132 Colonel Chabert 
 
 ' He related his adventures ; they were not less extra- 
 ordinary than my own ; he had lately come back from 
 the frontiers of China, which he had tried to cross after 
 escaping from Siberia. He told me of the catastrophe of 
 the Russian campaign, and of Napoleon's first abdica- 
 tion. That news was one of the things which caused 
 me most anguish ! 
 
 'We were two curious derelicts, having been rolled 
 over the globe as pebbles are rolled by the ocean when 
 storms bear them from shore to shore. Between us we 
 had seen Egypt, Syria, Spain, Russia, Holland, Ger- 
 many, Italy and Dalmatia, England, China, Tartary, 
 Siberia ; the only thing wanting was that neither of us 
 had been to America or the Indies. Finally, Boutin, 
 who still was more locomotive than I, undertook to go 
 to Paris as quickly as might be to inform my wife of the 
 predicament in which I was. I wrote a long letter full 
 of details to Madame Chabert. That, Monsieur, was 
 the fourth ! If I had had any relations, perhaps nothing 
 of all this might have happened ; but, to be frank with 
 you, I am but a workhouse child, a soldier, whose sole 
 fortune was his courage, whose sole family is mankind at 
 large, whose country is France, whose only protector is 
 the Almighty. — Nav, I am wrong ! I had a father — 
 the Emperor ! Ah ! if he were but here, the dear man ! 
 If he could see his Chabert^ as he used to call me, in the 
 state in which I am now, he would be in a rage ! What 
 is to be done ? Our sun is set, and we are all out in the 
 cold now. After all, political events might account for 
 my wife's silence ! 
 
 ' Boutin set out. He was a lucky fellow ! He had 
 two bears, admirably trained, which brought him in a 
 living. I could not go with him ; the pain I suffered 
 forbade my walking long stages. I wept. Monsieur, 
 when we parted, after I had gone as far as my state 
 allowed in company with him and his bears. At Carls- 
 ruhe I had an attack of neuralgia in the head, and lay
 
 Colonel Chabert 133 
 
 for six weeks on straw in an inn. — I should never have 
 ended if I were to tell you all the distresses of my life as 
 a beggar. Moral suftering, before which physical suffer- 
 ing pales, nevertheless excites less pity, because it is not 
 seen. I remember shedding tears, as I stood in front of 
 a fine house in Strassburg where I once had given an 
 entertainment, and where nothing was given me, not 
 even a piece of bread. Having agreed with Boutin on 
 the road I was to take, I went to every post-office to ask 
 if there were a letter or some money for me. I arrived 
 at Paris without having found either. What despair I 
 had been forced to endure ! " Boutin must be dead ! " 
 I told myself, and in fact the poor fellow was killed at 
 Waterloo. I heard of his death later, and by mere chance. 
 His errand to my wife had, of course, been fruitless. 
 
 ' At last I entered Paris — with the Cossacks. To me 
 this was grief on grief. On seeing the Russians in 
 France, I quite forgot that I had no shoes on my feet nor 
 money in my pocket. Yes, Monsieur, my clothes were 
 in tatters. The evening before I reached Paris I was 
 obliged to bivouac in the woods of Claye. The chill 
 of the night air no doubt brought on an attack of some 
 nameless complaint which seized me as I was crossing 
 the Faubourg Saint-Martin. I dropped almost sense- 
 less at the door of an ironmonger's shop. When I 
 recovered I was in a bed in the Hotel-Dieu. There 
 I stayed very contentedly for about a month. I was 
 then turned out ; I had no money, but I was well, and 
 my feet were on the good stones of Paris. With what 
 delight and haste did I make my way to the Rue du 
 Mont-Blanc, where my wife should be living in a house 
 belonging to me ! Bah ! the Rue du Mont-Blanc was 
 now the Rue de la Chaussee d'Antin ; I could not find 
 my house ; it had been sold and pulled down. Specu- 
 lators had built several houses over my gardens. Not 
 knowing that my wife had married M. Ferraud, I could 
 obtain no information.
 
 134 Colonel Chabert 
 
 ' At last I went to the house of an old lawyer who had 
 been in charge of my affairs. This worthy man was 
 dead, after selling his connection to a younger man. 
 This gentleman informed me, to my great surprise, of 
 the administration of my estate, the settlement of the 
 moneys, of my wife's marriage, and the birth of her two 
 children. When I told him that I was Colonel Chabert, 
 he laughed so heartily that I left him without saying 
 another word. My detention at Stuttgart had suggested 
 possibilities of Charenton, and I determined to act with 
 caution. Then, Monsieur, knowing where my wife 
 lived, I went to her house, my heart high with hope. — 
 Well,' said the Colonel, with a gesture of concentrated 
 fury, ' when I called under an assumed name I was not 
 admitted, and on the day when I used my own I was 
 turned out of doors. 
 
 ' To see the Countess come home from a ball or the 
 play in the early morning, I have sat whole nights 
 through, crouching close to the wall of her gateway. 
 My eyes pierced the depths of the carriage, which flashed 
 past me with the swiftness of lightning, and I caught a 
 glimpse of the woman who is my wife and no longer 
 mine. Oh, from that day I have lived for vengeance ! ' 
 cried the old man in a hollow voice, and suddenly 
 standing up in front of Derville, ' She knows that I am 
 alive ; since my return she has had two letters written 
 with my own hand. She loves me no more ! — I — I 
 know not whether I love or hate her. I long for her 
 and curse her by turns. To me she owes all her fortune, 
 all her happiness ; well, she has not sent me the very 
 smallest pittance. Sometimes I do not know what will 
 become of me ! ' 
 
 With these words the veteran dropped on to his chair 
 again and remained motionless. Derville sat in silence, 
 studying his client. 
 
 ' It is a serious business,' he said at length, mechani- 
 cally. 'Even granting the genuineness of the documents
 
 Colonel Chabert 
 
 35 
 
 to be procured from Heilsberg, it is not proved to me 
 that we can at once win our case. It must go before 
 three tribunals in succession. I must think such a 
 matter over with a clear head ; it is quite exceptional.' 
 
 ' Oh,' said the Colonel, coldly, with a haughty jerk 
 of his head, ' if I fail, I can die — but not alone.' 
 
 The feeble old man had vanished. The eyes were 
 those of a man of energy, lighted up with the spark of 
 desire and revenge. 
 
 ' We must perhaps compromise,' said the lawyer. 
 
 ' Compromise ! ' echoed Colonel Chabert. ' Am I 
 dead, or am I alive ? ' 
 
 ' I hope. Monsieur,' the attorney went on, * that you 
 will follow my advice. Your cause is mine. You will 
 soon perceive the interest I take in your situation, almost 
 unexampled in judicial records. For the moment I will 
 give you a letter to my notary, who will pay you to your 
 order fifty francs every ten days. It would be unbecoming 
 for you to come here to receive alms. If you are Colonel 
 Chabert, you ought to be at no man's mercy. I shall 
 regard these advances as a loan ; you have estates to 
 recover ; you are rich.' 
 
 This delicate compassion brought tears to the old 
 man's eyes. Derville rose hastily, for it was perhaps not 
 correct for a lawyer to show emotion ; he went into the 
 adjoining room, and came back with an unsealed letter, 
 which he gave to the Colonel. When the poor man 
 held it in his hand, he felt through the paper two gold 
 pieces. 
 
 ' Will you be good enough to describe the documents, 
 and tell me the name of the town, and in what kingdom ? ' 
 said the lawyer. 
 
 The Colonel dictated the information, and verified the 
 spelling of the names of places ; then he took his hat in 
 one hand, looked at Derville, and held out the other — a 
 horny hand, saying with much simplicity — 
 
 ' On my honour, sir, after the Emperor, you are the
 
 ij6 Colonel Chabert 
 
 man to whom I shall owe most. You are a splendid 
 fellow ! ' 
 
 The attorney clapped his hand into the Colonel's, saw 
 him to the stairs, and held a light for him. 
 
 ' Boucard,' said Derville to his head clerk, ' I have just 
 listened to a tale that may cost me five-and-twenty louis. 
 If I am robbed, I shall not regret the money, for I shall 
 have seen the most consummate actor of the day.' 
 
 When the Colonel was in the street and close to a 
 lamp, he took the two twenty-franc pieces out of the 
 letter and looked at them for a moment under the light. 
 It was the first gold he had seen for nine years. 
 
 ' I may smoke cigars ! ' he said to himself. 
 
 About three months after this interview, at night, in 
 Derville's room, the notary commissioned to advance the 
 half-pay on Derville's account to his eccentric client, 
 came to consult the attorney on a serious matter, and 
 began by begging him to refund the six hundred francs 
 that the old soldier had received. 
 
 'Are you amusing yourself with pensioning the old 
 army ? ' said the notary, laughing — a young man named 
 Crottat, who had just bought up the office in which he 
 had been head clerk, his chief having fled in consequence 
 of a disastrous bankruptcy. 
 
 ' I have to thank you, my dear sir, for reminding me 
 of that affair,' replied Derville. 'My philanthropy will 
 not carry me beyond twenty-five louis ; I have, I fear, 
 already been the dupe of my patriotism.' 
 
 As Derville finished the sentence, he saw on his desk 
 the papers his head clerk had laid out for him. His eye 
 was struck by the appearance of the stamps — long, 
 square, and triangular, in red and blue ink, which dis- 
 tinguished a letter that had come through the Prussian, 
 Austrian, Bavarian, and French post-offices. 
 
 ' Ah ha ! ' said he with a laugh, ' here is the last act of 
 the comedy j now we shall see if I have been taken in ! '
 
 Colonel Chabert 137 
 
 He took up the letter and opened it ; but he could not 
 read it ; it was written in German. 
 
 ' Boucard, go yourself and have this letter translated, 
 and bring it back immediately,' said Derville, half opening 
 his study door, and giving the letter to the head clerk. 
 
 The notary at Berlin, to whom the lawyer had written, 
 informed him that the documents he had been requested 
 to forward would arrive within a few days of this note 
 announcing them. They were, he said, all perfectly 
 regular and duly witnessed, and legally stamped to serve 
 as evidence in law. He also informed him that almost all 
 the witnesses to the facts recorded under these affidavits 
 were still to be found at Eylau, in Prussia, and that the 
 woman to whom M. le Comte Chabert owed his life was 
 still living in a suburb of Heilsberg. 
 
 ' This looks like business,' cried Derville, when Bou- 
 card had given him the substance of the letter. 'But 
 look here, my boy,' he went on, addressing the notary, 
 ' I shall want some information which ought to exist in 
 your office. Was it not that old rascal Roguin .? ' 
 
 ' We will say that unfortunate, that ill-used Roguin,' 
 interrupted Alexandre Crottat with a laugh. 
 
 'Well, was it not that ill-used man who has just 
 carried ofF eight hundred thousand francs of his clients' 
 money, and reduced several families to despair, who 
 effected the settlement of Chabert's estate ? I fancy I 
 have seen that in the documents in our case of Ferraud.' 
 
 ' Yes,' said Crottat. ' It was when I was third clerk ; 
 I copied the papers and studied them thoroughly. Rose 
 Chapotel, wife and widow of Hyacinthe, called Chabert, 
 Count of the Empire, grand officer of the Legion of 
 Honour. They had married without settlement ; thus, 
 they held all the property in common. To the best of 
 my recollection, the personalty was about six hundred 
 thousand francs. Before his marriage, Comte Chabert 
 had made a will in favour of the hospitals of Paris, by 
 which he left them one-quarter of the fortune he might
 
 138 Colonel Chabert 
 
 possess at the time of his decease, the State to take the 
 other quarter. The will was contested, there was a 
 forced sale, and then a division, for the attorneys went at 
 a pace. At the time of the settlement the monster who 
 was then governing France handed over to the widow, 
 by special decree, the portion bequeathed to the treasury.' 
 
 *So that Comte Chabert's personal fortune was no 
 more than three hundred thousand francs ? ' 
 
 * Consequently so it was, old fellow ! ' said Crottat. 
 ' You lawyers sometimes are very clear-headed, though 
 you are accused of false practices in pleading for one side 
 or the other.' 
 
 Colonel Chabert, whose address was written at the 
 bottom of the first receipt he had given the notary, 
 was lodging in the Faubourg Saint-Marceau, Rue du 
 Petit-Banquier, with an old quartermaster of the Imperial 
 Guard, now a cowkeeper, named Vergniaud. Having 
 reached the spot, Derville was obliged to go on foot in 
 search of his client, for his coachman declined to drive 
 along an unpaved street, where the ruts were rather too 
 deep for cab wheels. Looking about him on all sides, 
 the lawyer at last discovered at the end of the street 
 nearest to the boulevard, between two walls built of 
 bones and mud, two shabby stone gate-posts, much 
 knocked about by carts, in spite of two wooden stumps 
 that served as blocks. These posts supported a cross 
 beam with a pent-house coping of tiles, and on the beam, 
 in red letters, were the words, ' Vergniaud, dairyman.' To 
 the right of this inscription were some eggs, to the left a 
 cow, all painted in white. The gate was open, and no 
 doubt remained open all day. Beyond a good-sized yard 
 there was a house facing the gate, if indeed the name of 
 house may be applied to one of the hovels built in the 
 neighbourhood of Paris, which are like nothing else, not 
 even the most wretched dwellings in the country, of 
 which they have all the poverty without their poetry. 
 
 Indeed, in the midst of fields, even a hovel may have
 
 Colonel Chabert 139 
 
 a certain grace derived from the pure air, the verdure, the 
 open country — a hill, a serpentine road, vineyards, quick- 
 set hedges, moss-grown thatch and rural implements; but 
 poverty in Paris gains dignity only by horror. Though 
 recently built, this house seemed ready to fall into ruins. 
 None of its materials had found a legitimate use ; they had 
 been collected from the various demolitions which are 
 going on every day in Paris. On a shutter made of the 
 boards of a shop-sign Derville read the words, 'Fancy 
 Goods.' The windows were all mismatched and gro- 
 tesquely placed. The ground floor, which seemed to be 
 the habitable part, was on one side raised above the soil, 
 and on the other sunk in the rising ground. Between the 
 gate and the house lay a puddle full of stable litter, into 
 which flowed the rain-water and house waste. The 
 back wall of this frail construction, which seemed rather 
 more solidly built than the rest, supported a row of 
 barred hutches, where rabbits bred their numerous families. 
 To the right of the gate was the cowhouse, with a loft 
 above for fodder ; it communicated with the house 
 through the dairy. To the left was a poultry yard, with 
 a stable and pig-styes, the roofs finished, like that of the 
 house, with rough deal boards nailed so as to overlap, and 
 shabbily thatched with rushes. 
 
 Like most of the places where the elements of the 
 huge meal daily devoured by Paris are every day pre- 
 pared, the yard Derville now entered showed traces of the 
 hurry that comes of the necessity for being ready at a 
 fixed hour. The large pot-bellied tin cans in which milk 
 is carried, and the little pots for cream, were flung pell- 
 mell at the dairy door, with their linen-covered stoppers. 
 The rags that were used to clean them, fluttered in the 
 sunshine, riddled with holes, hanging to strings fastened 
 to poles. The placid horse, of a breed known only to 
 milk-women, had gone a few steps from the cart, and 
 was standing in front of the stable, the door being shut. 
 A goat was munching the shoots of a starved and dusty
 
 140 Colonel Chabert 
 
 vine that clung to the cracked yellow wall of the house. 
 A cat, squatting on the cream jars, was licking them 
 over. The fowls, scared by Derville's approach, scuttered 
 away screaming, and the watch-dog barked. 
 
 ' And the man who decided the victory at Eylau is to 
 be found here ! ' said Derville to himself, as his eyes took 
 in at a glance the general effect of the squalid scene. 
 
 The house had been left in charge of three little boys. 
 One, who had climbed to the top of a cart loaded with 
 hay, was pitching stones into the chimney of a neigh- 
 bouring house, in the hope that they might fall into a 
 saucepan ; another was trying to get a pig into a cart 
 by the back board, which rested on the ground ; while 
 the third, hanging on in front, was waiting till the pig 
 had got into the cart, to hoist it by making the whole 
 thing tilt. When Derville asked them if M. Chabert 
 lived there, neither of them replied, but all three looked 
 at him with a sort of bright stupidity, if I may combine 
 those two words. Derville repeated his questions, but 
 without success. Provoked by the saucy cunning of 
 these three imps, he abused them with the sort of 
 pleasantry which young men think they have a right to 
 address to little boys, and they broke the silence with a 
 horse-laugh. Then Derville was angry. 
 
 The Colonel, hearing him, now came out of a little 
 low room, close to the dairy, and stood on the threshold 
 of his doorway with indescribable military coolness. He 
 had in his mouth a very finely coloured pipe — a technical 
 phrase to a smoker — a humble, short clay pipe of the 
 kind called '• hrule-gueule .'' He lifted the peak of a 
 dreadfully greasy cloth cap, saw Derville, and came 
 straight across the midden to join his benefactor the 
 sooner, calling out in friendly tones to the boys — 
 
 ' Silence in the ranks ! ' 
 
 The children at once kept a respectful silence, which 
 showed the power the old soldier had over them. 
 
 * Why did you not write to me ? ' he said to Derville.
 
 Colonel Chabert 141 
 
 * Go along by the cowhouse ! There — the path is 
 paved there,' he exclaimed, seeing the lawyer's hesitancy, 
 for he did not wish to wet his feet in the manure heap. 
 
 Jumping from one dry spot to another, Derville 
 reached the door by which the Colonel had come out. 
 Chabert seemed but ill pleased at having to receive him 
 in the bedroom he occupied ; and, in fact, Derville found 
 but one chair there. The Colonel's bed consisted of 
 some trusses of straw, over which his hostess had spread 
 two or three of those old fragments of carpet, picked up 
 heaven knows where, which milk-women use to cover 
 the seats of their carts. The floor was simply the trodden 
 earth. The walls, sweating saltpetre, green with mould, 
 and full of cracks, were so excessively damp that on the 
 side where the Colonel's bed was a reed mat had been 
 nailed. The famous box-coat hung on a nail. Two 
 pairs of old boots lay in a corner. There was not a sign 
 of linen. On the worm-eaten table the Bulletins de la 
 Grande Armee^ reprinted by Plancher, lay open, and 
 seemed to be the Colonel's reading ; his countenance 
 was calm and serene in the midst of this squalor. His 
 visit to Derville seemed to have altered his features ; the 
 lawyer perceived in them traces of a happy feeling, a 
 particular gleam set there by hope. 
 
 ' Does the smell of a pipe annoy you ? ' he said, placing 
 the dilapidated straw-bottomed chair for his lawyer. 
 
 'But, Colonel, you are dreadfully uncomfortable 
 here ! ' 
 
 The speech was wrung from Derville by the distrust 
 natural to lawyers, and the deplorable experience which 
 they derive early in life from the appalling and obscure 
 tragedies at which they look on. 
 
 ' Here,' said he to himself, ' is a man who has of course 
 spent my money in satisfying a trooper's three theologi- 
 cal virtues — play, wine, and women ! ' 
 
 ' To be sure. Monsieur, we are not distinguished for 
 luxury here. It is a camp lodging, tempered by friend-
 
 142 Colonel Chabert 
 
 ship, but ' And the soldier shot a deep glance at the 
 
 man of law — ' I have done no one wrong, I have never 
 turned my back on anybody, and I sleep in peace.' 
 
 Derville reflected that there would be some want of 
 delicacy in asking his client to account for the sums of 
 money he had advanced, so he merely said — 
 
 ' But why would you not come to Paris, where you 
 might have lived as cheaply as you do here, but where 
 you would have been better lodged ? ' 
 
 ' Why,' replied the Colonel, ' the good folks with 
 whom I am living had taken me in and fed me gratis for 
 a year. How could I leave them just when I had a little 
 money. Besides, the father of those three pickles is an 
 old Egyptian 
 
 ' An Egyptian ! ' 
 
 *We give that name to the troopers who came back 
 from the expedition into Egypt, of which I was one. 
 Not merely are all who get back brothers ; Vergniaud 
 was in my regiment. We have shared a draught of 
 water in the desert ; and besides, I have not yet finished 
 teaching his brats to read.' 
 
 ' He might have lodged you better for your money,' 
 said Derville. 
 
 * Bah ! ' said the Colonel, ' his childreen sleep on the 
 straw as I do. He and his wife have no better bed ; 
 they are very poor, you see. They have taken a bigger 
 business than they can manage. But if I recover my 
 fortune . . . However, it does very well.' 
 
 'Colonel, to-morrow, or next day, I shall receive your 
 papers from Heilsberg. The woman who dug you out 
 is still alive ! ' 
 
 * Curse the money ! To think I haven't got any ! ' 
 he cried, flinging his pipe on the ground. 
 
 Now, a well-coloured pipe is to a smoker a precious 
 possession ; but the impulse was so natural, the emotion 
 so generous, that every smoker, and the excise office 
 itself, would have pardoned this crime of treason to
 
 Colonel Chabert 143 
 
 tobacco. Perhaps the angels may have picked up the 
 pieces. 
 
 'Colonel, it is an exceedingly complicated business,' 
 said Derville as they left the room to walk up and down 
 in the sunshine. 
 
 'To me,' said the soldier, 'it appears exceedingly 
 simple. I was thought to be dead, and here I am ! Give 
 me back my wife and my fortune ; give me the rank of 
 General, to which I have a right, for I was made Colonel 
 of the Imperial Guard the day before the battle of 
 Eylau.' 
 
 'Things are not done so in the legal world,' said Der- 
 ville. ' Listen to me. You are Colonel Chabert, I am 
 glad to think it ; but it has to be proved judicially to 
 persons whose interest it will be to deny it. Hence, 
 your papers will be disputed. That contention will 
 give rise to ten or twelve preliminary inquiries. Every 
 question will be sent under contradiction up to the 
 supreme court, and give rise to so many costly suits, which 
 will hang on for a long time, however eagerly I may 
 push them. Your opponents will demand an inquiry, 
 which we cannot refuse, and which may necessitate the 
 sending of a commission of investigation to Prussia. But 
 even if we hope for the best; supposing that justice 
 should at once recognise you as Colonel Chabert — can 
 we know how the questions will be settled that will arise 
 out of the very innocent bigamy committed by the Com- 
 tesse Ferraud ? 
 
 ' In your case, the point of law is unknown to the 
 Code, and can only be decided as a point in equity, as 
 a jury decides in the delicate cases presented by the social 
 eccentricities of some criminal prosecutions. Now, you 
 had no children by your marriage ; M. le Comte Ferraud 
 has two. The judges might pronounce against the 
 marriage where the family ties are weakest, to the confir- 
 mation of that where they are stronger, since it was con- 
 tracted in perfect good faith. Would you be in a very
 
 144 Colonel Chabert 
 
 becoming moral position if you insisted, at your age, and 
 in your present circumstances, in resuming your rights 
 over a woman who no longer loves you ? You will have 
 both your wife and her husband against you, two impor- 
 tant persons who might influence the Bench. Thus, 
 there are many elements which would prolong the case ; 
 you will have time to grow old in the bitterest regrets.' 
 
 ' And my fortune ? ' 
 
 ' Do you suppose you had a fine fortune ? ' 
 
 ' Had I not thirty thousand francs a year ? ' 
 
 ' My dear Colonel, in 1 799 you made a will before your 
 marriage, leaving one-quarter of your property to 
 hospitals.' 
 
 ' That is true.' 
 
 ' Well, when you were reported dead, it was necessary 
 to make a valuation, and have a sale, to give this 
 quarter away. Your wife was not particular about 
 honesty to the poor. The valuation, in which she no 
 doubt took care not to include the ready money or 
 jewelry, or too much of the plate, and in which the 
 furniture would be estimated at two-thirds of its actual 
 cost, either to benefit her, or to lighten the succession 
 duty, and also because a valuer can be held respon- 
 sible for the declared value — the valuation thus made 
 stood at six hundred thousand francs. Your wife had a 
 right to half for her share. Everything was sold and 
 bought in by her ; she got something out of it all, and the 
 hospitals got their seventy-five thousand francs. Then, 
 as the remainder went to the State, since you had made 
 no mention of your wife in your will, the Emperor 
 restored to your widow by decree the residue which 
 would have reverted to the Exchequer. So, now, what 
 can you claim ? Three hundred thousand francs, no 
 more, and minus the costs.' 
 
 'And you call that justice!' said the Colonel, in 
 dismay. 
 
 ' Why, certainly '
 
 Colonel Chabert 145 
 
 'A pretty kind of justice ! ' 
 
 ' So it is, my dear Colonel. You see, that what you 
 thought so easy is not so. Madame Ferraud might 
 even choose to keep the sum given to her by the 
 Emperor.' 
 
 * But she was not a widow. The decree is utterly 
 void ' 
 
 * I agree with you. But every case can get a hearing. 
 Listen to me. I think that under these circumstances a 
 compromise would be both for her and for you the best 
 solution of the question. You will gain by it a more 
 considerable sum than you can prove a right to.' 
 
 ' That would be to sell my wife ! ' 
 
 'With twenty-four thousand francs a year you could 
 find a woman who, in the position in which you are, 
 would suit you better than your own wife, and make you 
 happier. I propose going this very day to see the Com- 
 tesse Ferraud and sounding the ground ; but I would 
 not take such a step without giving you due notice.' 
 
 ' Let us go together.' 
 
 'What, just as you are?' said the lawyer. 'No, 
 my dear Colonel, no. You might lose your case on 
 the spot.' 
 
 ' Can I possibly gain it ? ' 
 
 ' On every count,' replied Derville. ' But, my dear 
 Colonel Chabert, you overlook one thing. I am not 
 rich ; the price of my connection is not wholly paid up. 
 If the bench should allow you a maintenance, that is to 
 say, a sum advanced on your prospects, they will not do 
 so till you have proved that you are Comte Chabert, 
 grand officer of the Legion of Honour.' 
 
 ' To be sure, I am a grand officer of the Legion of 
 Honour ; I had forgotten that,' said he simply. 
 
 ' Well, until then,' Derville went on, ' will you not 
 have to engage pleaders, to have documents copied, to 
 keep the underlings of the law going, and to support 
 yourself? The expenses of the preliminary inquiries 
 
 K
 
 146 Colonel Chabert 
 
 will, at a rough guess, amount to ten or twelve thousand 
 francs. I have not so much to lend you — I am crushed 
 as it is by the enormous interest I have to pay on the 
 money I borrowed to buy my business ; and you ? — 
 Where can you find it ? ' 
 
 Large tears gathered in the poor veteran's faded eyes, 
 and rolled down his withered cheeks. This outlook of 
 difficulties discouraged him. The social and the legal 
 world weighed on his breast like a nightmare. 
 
 ' I will go to the foot of the Vendome column ! ' he 
 cried. * I will call out : " 1 am Colonel Chabert who rode 
 through the Russian square at Eylau ! " — The statue — he 
 — he will know me.' 
 
 ' And you will find yourself in Charenton.' 
 
 At this terrible name the soldier's transports col- 
 lapsed. 
 
 ' And will there be no hope for me at the Ministry of 
 War ? ' 
 
 * The war office ! ' said Derville. ' Well, go there j but 
 take a formal legal opinion with you, nullifying the cer- 
 tificate of your death. The government offices would 
 be only too glad if they could annihilate the men of the 
 Empire.' 
 
 The Colonel stood for a while, speechless, motionless, 
 his eyes fixed, but seeing nothing, sunk in bottomless 
 despair. MiHtary justice is ready and swift ; it decides 
 with Turk-like finahty, and almost always rightly. This 
 was the only justice known to Chabert. As he saw the 
 labyrinth of difficulties into which he must plunge, and 
 how much money would be required for the journey, the 
 poor old soldier was mortally hit in that power peculiar 
 to man, and called the Will. He thought it would be 
 impossible to live as party to a lawsuit ; it seemed a 
 thousand times simpler to remain poor and a beggar, 
 or to enlist as a trooper if any regiment would pass 
 him. 
 
 His physical and mental sufferings had already im-
 
 Colonel Chabert 147 
 
 paired his bodily health in some of the most important 
 organs. He was on the verge of one of those maladies for 
 which medicine has no name, and of which the seat is in 
 some degree variable, like the nervous system itself, the 
 part most frequently attacked of the whole human machine 
 — a malady which may be designated as the heart-sickness 
 of the unfortunate. However serious this invisible but 
 real disorder might already be, it could still be cured 
 by a happy issue. But a fresh obstacle, an unexpected 
 incident, would be enough to wreck this vigorous con- 
 stitution, to break the weakened springs, and produce 
 the hesitancy, the aimless, unfinished movements, which 
 physiologists know well in men undermined by grief. 
 
 Derville, detecting in his client the symptoms of 
 extreme dejection, said to him — 
 
 ' Take courage ; the end of the business cannot fail to 
 be in your favour. Only, consider whether you can give 
 me your whole confidence and blindly accept the result 
 I may think best for your interests.' 
 
 ' Do what you will,' said Chabert. 
 
 'Yes, but you surrender yourself to me like a man 
 marching to his death.' 
 
 * Must I not be left to five without a position, without 
 a name ? Is that endurable ? ' 
 
 'That is not my view of it,' said the lawyer. 'We 
 will try a friendly suit, to annul both your death certificate 
 and your marriage, so as to put you in possession of your 
 rights. You may even, by Comte Ferraud's inter- 
 vention, have your name replaced on the army-list as 
 general, and no doubt you will get a pension.' 
 
 ' Well, proceed then,' said Chabert. ' I put myself 
 entirely in your hands.' 
 
 ' I will send you a power of attorney to sign,' said 
 Derville. * Good-bye. Keep up your courage. If you 
 want money, rely on me.' 
 
 Chabert warmly wrung the lawyer's hand, and remained 
 standing with his back against the wall, not having the
 
 148 Colonel Chabert 
 
 energy to follow him excepting with his eyes. Like all 
 men who know but little of legal matters, he was 
 frightened by this unforeseen struggle. 
 
 During their interview, several times, the figure of a 
 man posted in the street had come forward from behind 
 one of the gate-pillars, watching for Derville to depart, 
 and he now accosted the lawyer. He was an old man, 
 wearing a blue waistcoat and a white-pleated kilt, like a 
 brewer's ; on his head was an otter-skin cap. His face 
 was tanned, hollow-cheeked, and wrinkled, but ruddy 
 on the cheek-bones by hard work and exposure to the 
 open air. 
 
 'Asking your pardon, sir,' said he, taking Derville by 
 the arm, 'if I take the liberty of speaking to you. But 
 I fancied, from the look of you, that you were a friend of 
 our General's. 
 
 ' And what then ? ' replied Derville. ' What concern 
 have you with him ? — But who are you ? ' said the 
 cautious lawyer. 
 
 * I am Louis Vergniaud,' he at once replied. * I have 
 two words to say to you.' 
 
 ' So you are the man who has lodged Comte Chabert 
 as I have found him ? ' 
 
 ' Asking your pardon, sir, he has the best room. I 
 would have given him mine if I had had but one ; I 
 could have slept in the stable. A man who has suffered 
 as he has, who teaches my kids to read, a general, an 
 Egyptian, the first lieutenant I ever served under — What 
 do you think ? — Of us all, he is best served. I shared 
 what I had with him. Unfortunately, it is not much 
 to boast of — bread, milk, eggs. Well, well ; it 's neigh- 
 bours' fare, sir. And he is heartily welcome. — But he 
 has hurt our feelings.' 
 
 'He?' 
 
 * Yes, sir, hurt our feelings. To be plain with you, I 
 have taken a larger business than I can manage, and he 
 saw it. Well, it worried him j he must needs mind the
 
 Colonel Chabert 149 
 
 horse ! I says to him, " Really, General " "Bah ! " 
 
 says he, "I am not going to eat my head ofF doing 
 nothing. I learned to rub a horse down many a year 
 ago." — I had some bills out for the purchase money of 
 my dairy — a fellow named Grados — Do you know him, 
 sir ? ' 
 
 *But, my good man, I have not time to listen to your 
 story. Only tell me how the Colonel offended you.' 
 
 ' He hurt our feelings, sir, as sure as my name is Louis 
 Vergniaud, and my wife cried about it. He heard from 
 our neighbours that we had not a sou to begin to meet 
 the bills with. The old soldier, as he is, he saved up 
 all you gave him, he watched for the bill to come in, and 
 he paid it. Such a trick ! While my wife and me, we 
 knew he had no tobacco, poor old boy, and went without. 
 — Oh ! now — yes, he has his cigar every morning ! I 
 would sell my soul for it — No, we are hurt. Well, so 1 
 wanted to ask you — for he said you were a good sort — 
 to lend us a hundred crowns on the stock, so that we 
 may get him some clothes, and furnish his room. He 
 thought he was getting us out of debt, you see ? Well, 
 it 's just the other way ; the old man is running us into 
 debt — and hurt our feelings ! — He ought not to have 
 stolen a march on us like that. And we his friends, too ! 
 — On my word as an honest man, as sure as my name is 
 Louis Vergniaud, I would sooner sell up and enlist than 
 fail to pay you back your money ' 
 
 Derville looked at the dairyman, and stepped back a 
 few paces to glance at the house, the yard, the manure- 
 pool, the cowhouse, the rabbits, the children. 
 
 ' On my honour, I believe it is characteristic of virtue 
 to have nothing to do with riches ! ' thought he. 
 
 ' All right, you shall have your hundred crowns, and 
 more. But I shall not give them to you ; the Colonel 
 will be rich enough to help, and I will not deprive him 
 of the pleasure.' 
 
 * And will that be soon ? '
 
 150 Colonel Chabert 
 
 'Why, yes.' 
 
 ' Ah, dear God ! how glad my wife will be ! ' and the 
 cowkeeper's tanned face seemed to expand. 
 
 ' Now,' said Derville to himself, as he got into his cab 
 again, ' let us call on our opponent. We must not show 
 our hand, but try to see hers, and win the game at one 
 stroke. She must be frightened. She is a woman. 
 Now, what frightens women most ? A woman is afraid 
 of nothing but . . .' 
 
 And he set to work to study the Countess's position, 
 falling into one of those brown studies to which great 
 politicians give themselves up when concocting their own 
 plans and trying to guess the secrets of a hostile Cabinet. 
 Are not attorneys, in a way, statesmen in charge of 
 private affairs ? 
 
 But a brief survey of the situation in which the Comte 
 Ferraud and his wife now found themselves is necessary 
 for a comprehension of the lawyer's cleverness. 
 
 Monsieur le Comte Ferraud was the only son of a 
 former Councillor in the old Parlement of Paris, who had 
 emigrated during the Reign of Terror, and so, though he 
 saved his head, lost his fortune. He came back under 
 the Consulate, and remained persistently faithful to the 
 cause of Louis xviii., in whose circle his father had moved 
 before the Revolution. He thus was one of the party in 
 the Faubourg Saint-Germain which nobly stood out 
 against Napoleon's blandishments. The reputation for 
 capacity gained by young Count — then simply called 
 Monsieur Ferraud — made him the object of the 
 Emperor's advances, for he was often as well pleased at 
 his conquests among the aristocracy as at gaining a 
 battle. The Count was promised the restitution of his 
 title, of such of his estates as had not been sold, and 
 he was shown in perspective a place in the ministry or as 
 senator. 
 
 The Emperor fell. 
 
 At the time of Comte Chabert's death, M. Ferraud
 
 Colonel Chabert 151 
 
 was a young man of six-and-twenty, without fortune, of 
 pleasing appearance, who had had his successes, and 
 whom the Faubourg Saint-Germain had adopted as doing 
 it credit ; but Madame la Comtesse Chabert had managed 
 to turn her share of her husband's fortune to such good 
 account that, after eighteen months of widowhood, she 
 had about forty thousand francs a year. Her marriage 
 to the young Count was not regarded as news in the 
 circles of the Faubourg Saint-Germain. Napoleon, 
 approving of this union, which carried out his idea of 
 fusion, restored to Madame Chabert the money falling to 
 the Exchequer under her husband's will ; but Napoleon's 
 hopes were again disappointed. Madame Ferraud was not 
 only in love with her lover ; she had also been fascinated 
 by the notion of getting into the haughty society which, 
 in spite of its humiliation, was still predominant at the 
 Imperial Court. By this marriage all her vanities were 
 as much gratified as her passions. She was to become a 
 real fine lady. When the Faubourg Saint-Germain 
 understood that the young Count's marriage did not 
 mean desertion, its drawing-rooms were thrown open to 
 his wife. 
 
 Then came the Restoration. The Count's political 
 advancement was not rapid. He understood the exi- 
 gencies of the situation in which Louis xviii. found 
 himself; he was one of the inner circle who waited till 
 the ' Gulf of Revolution should be closed ' — for this phrase 
 of the King's, at which the Liberals laughed so heartily, 
 had a political sense. The order quoted in the long 
 lawyer's preamble at the beginning of this story had, 
 however, put him in possession of two tracts of forest, 
 and of an estate which had considerably increased in value 
 during its sequestration. At the present moment, though 
 Comte Ferraud was a Councillor of State, and a Director- 
 General, he regarded his position as merely the first step 
 of his political career. 
 
 Wholly occupied as he was by the anxieties of con-
 
 152 Colonel Chabert 
 
 suming ambition, he had attached to himself, as secretary, 
 a ruined attorney named Delbecq, a more than clever 
 man, versed in all the resources of the law^, to v^^hom he 
 left the conduct of his private affairs. This shrewd 
 practitioner had so well understood his position with the 
 Count as to be honest in his own interest. He hoped to 
 get some place by his master's influence, and he made 
 the Count's fortune his first care. His conduct so 
 effectually gave the lie to his former life, that he was 
 regarded as a slandered man. The Countess, with the 
 tact and shrewdness of which most women have a share 
 more or less, understood the man's motives, watched him 
 quietly, and managed him so well, that she had made 
 good use of him for the augmentation of her private 
 fortune. She had contrived to make Delbecq believe 
 that she ruled her husband, and had promised to get him 
 appointed President of an inferior Court in some im- 
 portant provincial town, if he devoted himself entirely to 
 her interests. 
 
 The promise of a place, not dependent on changes of 
 ministry, which would allow of his marrying advan- 
 tageously, and rising subsequently to a high political 
 position, by being chosen Depute, made Delbecq the 
 Countess's abject slave. He had never allowed her to 
 miss one of those favourable chances which the fluctua- 
 tions of the Bourse and the increased value of property 
 afforded to clever financiers in Paris during the first 
 three years after the Restoration. He had trebled his 
 protectress's capital, and all the more easily because the 
 Countess had no scruples as to the means which might 
 make her an enormous fortune as quickly as possible. 
 The emoluments derived by the Count from the places he 
 held she spent on the housekeeping, so as to reinvest her 
 dividends ; and Delbecq lent himself to these calculations 
 of avarice without trying to account for her motives. 
 People of that sort never trouble themselves about any 
 secrets of which the discovery is not necessary to their own
 
 Colonel Chabert 
 
 ^53 
 
 interests. And, indeed, he naturally found the reason in 
 the thirst for money, which taints almost every Parisian 
 woman ; and as a fine fortune was needed to support the 
 pretensions of Comte Ferraud, the secretary sometimes 
 fancied that he saw in the Countess's greed a consequence 
 of her devotion to a husband with whom she still was in 
 love. The Countess buried the secrets of her conduct at 
 the bottom of her heart. There lay the secrets of life 
 and death to her, there lay the turning-point of this 
 history. 
 
 At the beginning of the year i8i8 the Restoration 
 was settled on an apparently immovable foundation ; its 
 doctrines of government, as understood by lofty minds, 
 seemed calculated to bring to France an era of renewed 
 prosperity, and Parisian society changed its aspect. 
 Madame la Comtesse Ferraud found that by chance she 
 had achieved for love a marriage that had brought 
 her fortune and gratified ambition. Still young and 
 handsome, Madame Ferraud played the part of a 
 woman of fashion, and lived in the atmosphere of the 
 Court. Rich herself, with a rich husband who was cried 
 up as one of the ablest men of the royalist party, and, as 
 a friend of the King, certain to be made Minister, she 
 belonged to the aristocracy, and shared its magnificence. 
 In the midst of this triumph she was attacked by a 
 moral canker. There are feelings which women guess 
 in spite of the care men take to bury them. On the 
 first return of the King, Comte Ferraud had begun to 
 regret his marriage. Colonel Chabert's widow had not 
 been the means of allying him to anybody ; he was alone 
 and unsupported in steering his way in a course full of 
 shoals and beset by enemies. Also, perhaps, when he 
 came to judge his wife coolly, he may have discerned in 
 her certain vices of education which made her unfit to 
 second him in his schemes. 
 
 A speech he made, a propos of Talleyrand's marriage, 
 enlightened the Countess, to whom it proved that if he had
 
 154 Colonel Chabert 
 
 still been a free man she would never have been Madame 
 P'erraud. What w^oman could forgive this repentance ? 
 Docs it not include the germs of every insult, every crime, 
 every form of repudiation ? But what a wound must it 
 have left in the Countess's heart, supposing that she lived 
 in the dread of her first husband's return ? She had known 
 that he still lived, and she had ignored him. Then 
 during the time when she had heard no more of him, she 
 had chosen to believe that he had fallen at Waterloo 
 with the Imperial Eagle, at the same time as Boutin. 
 She resolved, nevertheless, to bind the Count to her by 
 the strongest of all ties, by a chain of gold, and vowed to be 
 so rich that her fortune might make her second marriage 
 indissoluble, if by chance Colonel Chabert should ever 
 reappear. And he had reappeared ; and she could not 
 explain to herself why the struggle she dreaded had not 
 already begun. Suffering, sickness, had perhaps delivered 
 her from that man. Perhaps he was half mad, and 
 Charenton might yet do her justice. She had not 
 chosen to take either Delbecq or the police into her con- 
 fidence, for fear of putting herself in their power, or of 
 hastening the catastrophe. There are in Paris many 
 women who, like the Countess Ferraud, live with an 
 unknown moral monster, or on the brink of an abyss ; a 
 callus forms over the spot that tortures them, and they 
 can still laugh and enjoy themselves. 
 
 'There is something very strange in Comte Ferraud's 
 position,' said Derville to himself, on emerging from his 
 long reverie, as his cab stopped at the door of the Hotel 
 Ferraud in the Rue de Varennes. ' How is it that he, 
 so rich as he is, and such a favourite with the King, is 
 not yet a peer of France ? It may, to be sure, be true 
 that the King, as Mme. de Grandlieu was telling me, 
 desires to keep up the value of the pairie by not bestowing 
 it right and left. And, after all, the son of a Councillor 
 of the Parlement is not a Crillon nor a Rohan. A Comte 
 Ferraud can only get into the Upper Chamber surrep-
 
 Colonel Chabert 155 
 
 titiously. But if his marriage were annulled, could he 
 not get the dignity of some old peer who has only 
 daughters transferred to himself, to the King's great 
 satisfaction ? At any rate this will be a good bogey to 
 put forward and frighten the Countess,' thought he as he 
 went up the steps. 
 
 Derville had without knowing it laid his finger on the 
 hidden wound, put his hand on the canker that con- 
 sumed Madame Ferraud. 
 
 She received him in a pretty winter dining-room, 
 where she was at breakfast, while playing with a monkey 
 tethered by a chain to a little pole with'climbing bars of 
 iron. The Countess was in an elegant wrapper ; the 
 curls of her hair, carelessly pinned up, escaped from a 
 cap, giving her an arch look. She was fresh and smiling. 
 Silver, gilding, and mother-of-pearl shone on the table, 
 and all about the room were rare plants growing in mag- 
 nificent china jars. As he saw Colonel Chabert's wife, 
 rich with his spoil, in the lap of luxury and the height of 
 fashion, while he, poor wretch, was living with a poor 
 dairyman among the beasts, the lawyer said to himself — 
 
 ' The moral of all this is that a pretty woman will 
 never acknowledge as her husband, nor even as a lover, 
 a man in an old box-coat, a tow wig, and boots with 
 holes in them.' 
 
 A mischievous and bitter smile expressed the feelings, 
 half philosophical and half satirical, which such a man 
 was certain to experience — a man well situated to know 
 the truth of things in spite of the lies behind which most 
 families in Paris hide their mode of Hfe. 
 
 ' Good morning. Monsieur Derville,' said she, giving 
 the monkey some cofFee to drink. 
 
 ' Madame,' said he, a little sharply, for the light tone 
 in which she spoke jarred on him, ' I have come to speak 
 with you on a very serious matter.' 
 
 ' I am so grieved J M. le Comte is away ' 
 
 ' I, Madame, am delighted. It would be grievous if
 
 156 Colonel Chabert 
 
 he could be present at our interview. Besides, I am 
 informed through M. Delbecq that you like to manage 
 your own business without troubling the Count.' 
 *Then I will send for Delbecq,' said she. 
 
 * He would be of no use to you, clever as he is,' replied 
 Derville. ' Listen to me, Madame ; one word will be 
 enough to make you grave. Colonel Chabert is alive ! ' 
 
 'Is it by telling me such nonsense as that that you 
 think you can make me grave ? ' said she with a shout of 
 laughter. But she was suddenly quelled by the singular 
 penetration of the fixed gaze which Derville turned on 
 her, seeming to read to the bottom of her soul. 
 
 * Madame,' he said, with cold and piercing solemnity, 
 'you know not the extent of the danger which threatens 
 you. I need say nothing of the indisputable authenticity 
 of the evidence nor of the fulness of proof which testifies 
 to the identity of Comte Chabert. I am not, as you know, 
 the man to take up a bad cause. If you resist our pro- 
 ceedings to show that the certificate of death was false, 
 you will lose that first case, and that matter once settled, 
 we shall gain every point.' 
 
 ' What, then, do you wish to discuss with me ? ' 
 ' Neither the Colonel nor yourself. Nor need I allude 
 to the briefs which clever advocates may draw up when 
 armed with the curious facts of this case, or the advantage 
 they may derive from the letters you received from your 
 first husband before your marriage to your second.' 
 
 ' It is false,' she cried, with the violence of a spoilt 
 woman. ' I never had a letter from Comte Chabert ; 
 and if some one is pretending to be the Colonel, it is 
 some swindler, some returned convict, like Coignard 
 perhaps. It makes me shudder only to think of it. 
 Can the Colonel rise from the dead. Monsieur ? Bona- 
 parte sent an aide-de-camp to inquire for me on his death, 
 and to this day I draw the pension of three thousand 
 francs granted to his widow by the Government. I 
 have been perfectly in the right to turn away all the
 
 Colonel Chabert 157 
 
 Chaberts who have ever come, as I shall all who may 
 
 come.' 
 
 ' Happily we are alone, Madame. We can tell lies at 
 our ease,' said he coolly, and finding it amusing to lash 
 up the Countess's rage so as to lead her to betray herself, 
 by tactics familiar to lawyers, who are accustomed to 
 keep cool when their opponents or their clients are in a 
 passion. ' Well, then, we must fight it out,' thought he, 
 instantly hitting on a plan to entrap her and show her 
 her weakness. 
 
 * The proof that you received the first letter, Madame, 
 is that it contained some securities ' 
 
 ' Oh, as to securities — that it certainly did not.' 
 ' Then you received the letter,' said Derville, smiling. 
 * You are caught, Madame, in the first snare laid for 
 you by an attorney, and you fancy you could fight against 
 
 Justice ' 
 
 The Countess coloured, and then turned pale, hiding 
 her face in her hands. Then she shook off her shame, 
 and retorted with the natural impertinence of such 
 women, ' Since you are the so-called Chabert's attorney, 
 be so good as to ' 
 
 * Madame,' said Derville, 'I am at this moment as 
 much your lawyer as 1 am Colonel Chabert's. Do you 
 suppose I want to lose so valuable a client as you are ? — 
 But you are not listening.' 
 
 ' Nay, speak on. Monsieur,' said she graciously. 
 
 * Your fortune came to you from M. le , Comte 
 Chabert, and you cast him off. Your fortune is im- 
 mense, and you leave him to beg. An advocate can be 
 very eloquent when a cause is eloquent in itself; there 
 are here circumstances which might turn public opinion 
 strongly against you.' 
 
 * But, Monsieur,' said the Comtesse, provoked by the 
 way in which Derville turned and laid her on the grid- 
 iron, ' even if I grant that your M. Chabert is living, the 
 law will uphold my second marriage on account of the
 
 158 Colonel Chabert 
 
 children, and I shall get ofF with the restitution of 
 two hundred and twenty-five thousand francs to M. 
 Chabert.' 
 
 ' It is impossible to foresee what view the Bench may 
 take of the question. If on one side we have a mother 
 and children, on the other we have an old man crushed 
 by sorrows, made old by your refusals to know him. 
 Where is he to find a wife ? Can the judges contravene 
 the law ? Your marriage with Colonel Chabert has 
 priority on its side and every legal right. But if you 
 appear under disgraceful colours, you might have an 
 unlooked-for adversary. That, Madame, is the danger 
 against which I would warn you.' 
 
 ' And who is he ? ' 
 
 ' Comte Ferraud.' 
 
 ' Monsieur Ferraud has too great an affection for me, 
 too much respect for the mother of his children ' 
 
 'Do not talk of such absurd things,' interrupted Der- 
 ville, ' to lawyers, who are accustomed to read hearts to 
 the bottom. At this instant Monsieur Ferraud has not 
 the slightest wish to annul your union, and I am quite 
 sure that he adores you ; but if some one were to tell 
 him that his marriage is void, that his wife will be called 
 before the bar of public opinion as a criminal ' 
 
 ' He would defend me, Monsieur.' 
 
 ' No, Madame.' 
 
 ' What reason could he have for deserting me, Mon- 
 sieur ? ' 
 
 ' That he would be free to marry the only daughter of 
 a peer of France, whose title would be conferred on him 
 by patent from the King." 
 
 The Countess turned pale. 
 
 ' A hit ! ' said Derville to himself. ' I have you on 
 the hip ; the poor Colonel's case is won.' — ' Besides, 
 Madame,' he went on aloud, ' he would feel all the less 
 remorse because a man covered with glory — a General, 
 Count, Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour — is not
 
 Colonel Chabert 159 
 
 such a bad alternative ; and if that man insisted on his 
 wife's returning to him ' 
 
 ' Enough, enough, Monsieur ! ' she exclaimed. ' I will 
 never have any lawyer but you. What is to be done ? ' 
 
 ' Compromise ! ' said Derville. 
 
 * Does he still love me ? ' she said. 
 
 ' Well, I do not think he can do otherwise.' 
 
 The Countess raised her head at these words. A flash 
 of hope shone in her eyes ; she thought perhaps that she 
 could speculate on her first husband's affection to gain 
 her cause by some feminine cunning. 
 
 ' I shall await your orders, Madame, to know whether 
 I am to report our proceedings to you, or if you will 
 come to my office to agree to the terms of a compromise,' 
 said Derville, taking leave. 
 
 A week after Derville had paid these two visits, on a 
 fine morning in June, the husband and wife, who had 
 been separated by an almost supernatural chance, started 
 from the opposite ends of Paris to meet in the office of 
 the lawyer who was engaged by both. The supplies 
 liberally advanced by Derville to Colonel Chabert had 
 enabled him to dress as suited his position in life, and the 
 dead man arrived in a very decent cab. He wore a wig 
 suited to his face, was dressed in blue cloth with white 
 linen, and wore under his waistcoat the broad red ribbon 
 of the higher grade of the Legion of Honour. In resum- 
 ing the habits of wealth he had recovered his soldierly 
 style. He held himself up ; his face, grave and mysterious- 
 looking, reflected his happiness and all his hopes, and 
 seemed to have acquired youth and impasto, to borrow a 
 picturesque word from the painter's art. He was no 
 more like the Chabert of the old box-coat than a cart- 
 wheel double sou is like a newly coined forty-franc piece. 
 The passer-by, only to see him, would have recognised 
 at once one of the noble wrecks of our old army, one of 
 the heroic men on whom our national glory is reflected,
 
 i6o Colonel Chabert 
 
 as a splinter of ice on which the sun shines seems to 
 reflect every beam. These veterans are at once a picture 
 and a book. 
 
 When the Count jumped out of his carriage to go into 
 Derville's office, he did it as lightly as a young man. 
 Hardly had his cab moved off, when a smart brougham 
 drove up, splendid with coats of arms. Madame la Com- 
 tesse Ferraud stepped out in a dress which, though 
 simple, was cleverly designed to show how youthful her 
 figure was. She wore a pretty drawn bonnet lined with 
 pink, which framed her face to perfection, softening its 
 outlines and making it look younger. 
 
 If the clients were rejuvenescent, the office was un- 
 altered, and presented the same picture as that described 
 at the beginning of this story. Simonnin was eating his 
 breakfast, his shoulder leaning against the window, which 
 was then open, and he was staring up at the blue sky in the 
 opening of the courtyard enclosed by four gloomy houses. 
 
 ' Ah, ha ! ' cried the little clerk, ' who will bet an 
 evening at the play that Colonel Chabert is a General, 
 and wears a red ribbon ? ' 
 
 ' The chief is a great magician,' said Godeschal. 
 
 ' Then there is no trick to play on him this time ? ' 
 asked Desroches. 
 
 ' His wife has taken that in hand, the Comtesse 
 Ferraud,' said Boucard. 
 
 ' What next ? ' said Godeschal. ' Is Comtesse Fer- 
 raud required to belong to two men ? ' 
 
 ' Here she is,' answered Simonnin. 
 
 At this moment the Colonel came in and asked for 
 Derville. 
 
 ' He is at home, sir,' said Simonnin. 
 
 * So you are not deaf, you young rogue ! ' said Chabert, 
 taking the gutter-jumper by the ear and twisting it, to 
 the delight of the other clerks, who began to laugh, look- 
 ing at the Colonel with the curious attention due to so 
 singular a personage.
 
 Colonel Chabert i6i 
 
 Comte Chabert was in Derville's private room at the 
 moment when his wife came in by the door of the 
 office. 
 
 ' I say, Boucard, there is going to be a queer scene in 
 the chiefs room ! There is a woman who can spend 
 her days alternately, the odd with Comte Ferraud, and 
 the even with Comte Chabert,' 
 
 ' And in leap year,' said Godeschal, ' they must settle 
 the count between them.' 
 
 ' Silence, gentlemen, you can be heard ! ' said Boucard 
 severely. ' I never was in an office where there was so 
 much jesting as there is here over the clients.' 
 
 Derville had made the Colonel retire to the bedroom 
 when the Countess was admitted. 
 
 'Madame,' he said, 'not knowing whether it would 
 be agreeable to you to meet M. le Comte Chabert, I 
 have placed you apart. If, however, you should wish 
 it ' 
 
 ' It is an attention for which I am obliged to you.' 
 
 ' I have drawn up the memorandum of an agreement 
 of which you and M. Chabert can discuss the conditions, 
 here, and now. I will go alternately to him and to you, 
 and explain your views respectively.' 
 
 ' Let me see. Monsieur,' said the Countess im- 
 patiently. 
 
 Derville read aloud — 
 
 ' " Between the undersigned : 
 
 ' " M. Hyacinthe Chabert, Count, Marechal de Camp, 
 and Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour, living in 
 Paris, Rue du Petit Banquier, on the one part ; 
 
 ' "And Madame Rose Chapotel,wife of the aforesaid M. 
 le Comte Chabert, nee " ' 
 
 ' Pass over the preliminaries,' said she. ' Come to the 
 conditions.' 
 
 'Madame,' said the lawyer, ' the preamble briefly sets 
 forth the position in which you stand to each other. 
 Then, by the first clause, you acknowledge, in the pre- 
 
 L
 
 1 62 Colonel Chabert 
 
 sence of three witnesses, of whom two shall be notaries, 
 and one the dairyman with whom your husband has been 
 lodging, to all of whom your secret is known, and who 
 will be absolutely silent — you acknowledge, I say, that 
 the individual designated in the documents subjoined to 
 the deed, and whose identity is to be further proved by 
 an act of recognition prepared by your notary, Alexandre 
 Crottat, is your first husband, Comte Chabert. By the 
 second clause Comte Chabert, to secure your happiness, 
 will undertake to assert his rights only under certain cir- 
 cumstances set forth in the deed. — And these,' said Der- 
 ville, in a parenthesis, * are none other than a failure to 
 carry out the conditions of this secret agreement. — M. 
 Chabert, on his part, agrees to accept judgment on a 
 friendly suit, by which his certificate of death shall be 
 annulled, and his marriage dissolved.' 
 
 * That will not suit me in the least,' said the Countess 
 with surprise. ' I will be a party to no suit; you know why.' 
 
 'By the third clause,' Derville went on, with imper- 
 turbable coolness, you pledge yourself to secure to Hya- 
 cinthe Comte Chabert an income of twenty-four thousand 
 francs on government stock held in his name, to revert 
 to you at his death ' 
 
 'But it is much too dear ! ' exclaimed the Countess. 
 
 ' Can you compromise the matter cheaper ? ' 
 
 ' Possibly.' 
 
 'But what do you want, Madame ? ' 
 
 'I want — I will not have a lawsuit. I want ' 
 
 'You want him to remain dead ? ' said Derville, inter- 
 rupting her hastily. 
 
 ' Monsieur,' said the Countess, ' if twenty-four thou- 
 sand francs a year are necessary, we will go to law ' 
 
 ' Yes, we will go to law,' said the Colonel in a deep 
 voice, as he opened the door and stood before his wife, 
 with one hand in his waistcoat and the other hanging by 
 his side — an attitude to which the recollection of his 
 adventure gave horrible significance.
 
 Colonel Chabert 163 
 
 * It is he,' said the Countess to herself. 
 
 * Too dear ! ' the old soldier exclaimed. ' I have given 
 you near on a million, and you are cheapening my mis- 
 fortunes. Very well ; now I will have you — you and 
 your fortune. Our goods are in common, our marriage 
 is not dissolved ' 
 
 ' But Monsieur is not Colonel Chabert ! ' cried the 
 Countess, in feigned amazement. 
 
 * Indeed ! ' said the old man, in a tone of intense irony. 
 ' Do you want proofs i* I found you in the Palais 
 Royal ' 
 
 The Countess turned pale. Seeing her grow white 
 under her rouge, the old soldier paused, touched by the 
 acute suffering he was inflicting on the woman he had 
 once so ardently loved ; but she shot such a venomous 
 glance at him that he abruptly went on — 
 
 * You were with La ' 
 
 ' Allow me. Monsieur Derville,' said the Countess to 
 the lawyer. ' You must give me leave to retire. I did 
 not come here to listen to such dreadful things.' 
 
 She rose and went out. Derville rushed after her ; but 
 the Countess had taken wings, and seemed to have flown 
 from the place. 
 
 On returning to his private room, he found the Colonel 
 in a towering rage, striding up and down. 
 
 'In those times a man took his wife where he chose,' 
 said he. ' But I was fooHsh, and chose badly j I trusted 
 to appearances. She has no heart.' 
 
 'Well, Colonel, was I not right to beg you not to 
 come ? — I am now positive of your identity ; when you 
 came in, the Countess gave a little start, of which the 
 meaning was unequivocal. But you have lost your 
 chances. Your wife knows that you are unrecognis- 
 able.' 
 
 'I will kill her!' 
 
 ' Madness ! you will be caught and executed like any 
 common wretch. Besides, you might miss ! That would
 
 164 Colonel Chabert 
 
 be unpardonable. A man must not miss his shot when 
 he wants to kill his wife. — Let me set things straight ; 
 you are only a big child. Go now. Taice care of your- 
 self; she is capable of setting some trap for you and 
 shutting you up in Charenton. I will notify her of our 
 proceedings to protect you against a surprise.' 
 
 The unhappy Colonel obeyed his young benefactor, 
 and went away, stammering apologies. He slowly went 
 down the dark staircase, lost in gloomy thoughts, and 
 crushed perhaps by the blow just dealt him — the most 
 cruel he could feel, the thrust that could most deeply 
 pierce his heart — when he heard the rustle of a woman's 
 dress on the lowest landing, and his wife stood before him. 
 'Come, Monsieur,' said she, taking his arm with a 
 o-esture like those familiar to him of old. Her action 
 and the accent of her voice, which had recovered its 
 graciousness, were enough to allay the Colonel's wrath, 
 and he allowed himself to be led to the carriage. 
 
 ' Well, get in ! ' said she, when the footman had let 
 down the step. 
 
 And as if by magic, he found himself sitting by his 
 wife in the brougham. 
 
 ' Where to ? ' asked the servant. 
 'To Groslay,' said she. 
 
 The horses started at once, and carried them all across 
 Paris. 
 
 ' Monsieur,' said the Countess, in a tone of voice which 
 betrayed one of those emotions which are rare in our 
 lives, and which agitate every part of our being. At 
 such moments the heart, fibres, nerves, countenance, soul, 
 and body, everything, every pore even, feels a thrill. 
 Life no longer seems to be within us ; it flows out, 
 springs forth, is communicated as by contagion, trans- 
 mitted by a look, a tone of voice, a gesture, impressing 
 our will on others. The old soldier started on hearing 
 this single word, this first, terrible 'Monsieur!' But 
 still it was at once a reproach and a pardon, a hope and
 
 Colonel Chabert 165 
 
 a despair, a question and an answer. This word included 
 them all ; none but an actress could have thrown so much 
 eloquence, so many feelings into a single word. Truth 
 is less complete in its utterance ; it does not put 
 everything on the outside ; it allows us to see what 
 is within. The Colonel was filled with remorse for 
 his suspicions, his demands, and his anger ; he looked 
 down not to betray his agitation. 
 
 ' Monsieur,' repeated she, after an imperceptible pause, 
 * I knew you at once.' 
 
 'Rosine,' said the old soldier, 'those words contain 
 the only balm that can help me to forget my misfortunes.' 
 
 Two large tears rolled hot on to his wife's hands, 
 which he pressed to show his paternal affection. 
 
 ' Monsieur,' she went on, ' could you not have guessed 
 what it cost me to appear before a stranger in a position 
 so false as mine now is ? If I have to blush for it, at 
 least let it be in the privacy of my family. Ought not 
 such a secret to remain buried in our hearts ? You will 
 forgive me, I hope, for my apparent indifference to the 
 woes of a Chabert in whose existence I could not possibly 
 believe. I received your letters,' she hastily added, seeing 
 in his face the objection it expressed, ' but they did not 
 reach me till thirteen months after the battle of Eylau. 
 They were opened, dirty, the writing was unrecognisable ; 
 and after obtaining Napoleon's signature to my second 
 marriage contract, I could not help believing that some 
 clever swindler wanted to make a fool of me. There- 
 fore, to avoid disturbing Monsieur Ferraud's peace of 
 mind, and disturbing family ties, I was obliged to take 
 precautions against a pretended Chabert. Was I not 
 right, I ask you ? ' 
 
 'Yes, you were right. It was I who was the idiot, 
 the owl, the dolt, not to have calculated better what the 
 consequences of such a position might be. — But where 
 are we going ? ' he asked, seeing that they had reached 
 the barrier of La Chapelle.
 
 1 66 Colonel Chabert 
 
 'To my country house near Groslay, in the valley of 
 Montmorency. There, Monsieur, we will consider the 
 steps to be taken. I know my duties. Though I am 
 yours by right, I am no longer yours in fact. Can you 
 wish that we should become the talk of Paris ? We need 
 not inform the public of a situation, which for me has 
 its ridiculous side, and let us preserve our dignity. You 
 still love me,' she said, with a sad, sweet gaze at the 
 Colonel, ' but have not I been authorised to form other 
 ties ? In so strange a position, a secret voice bids me 
 trust to your kindness, which is so well known to me. 
 Can I be wrong in taking you as the sole arbiter of my 
 fate ? Be at once judge and party to the suit. I trust in 
 your noble character j you will be generous enough to 
 forgive me for the consequences of faults committed 
 in innocence. I may then confess to you : I love M. 
 Ferraud, I believed that I had a right to love him. I 
 do not blush to make this confession to you ; even if it 
 offends you, it does not disgrace us. I cannot conceal 
 the facts. When fate made me a widow, I was not a 
 mother.' 
 
 The Colonel with a wave of his hand bid his wife be 
 silent, and for a mile and a half they sat without speaking 
 a single word. Chabert could fancy he saw the two 
 little ones before him. 
 
 ' Rosine.' 
 
 ' Monsieur ? ' 
 
 ' The dead are very wrong to come to life again.' 
 
 ' Oh, Monsieur, no, no ! Do not think me ungrate- 
 ful. Only, you find me a lover, a mother, while you 
 left me merely a wife. Though it is no longer in my 
 power to love, I know how much I owe you, and I can 
 still offer you all the affection of a daughter.' 
 
 'Rosine,' said the old man in a softened tone, 'I no 
 longer feel any resentment against you. We will forget 
 everything,' he added, with one of those smiles which 
 always reflect a noble soul j ' I have not so little delicacy
 
 Colonel Chabert 167 
 
 as to demand the mockery of love from a wife who no 
 longer loves me.' 
 
 The Countess gave him a flashing look full of such 
 deep gratitude that poor Chabert would have been 
 glad to sink again into his grave at Eylau. Some men 
 have a soul strong enough for such self-devotion, of 
 which the whole reward consists in the assurance that 
 they have made the person they love happy. 
 
 * My dear friend, we will talk all this over later when 
 our hearts have rested,' said the Countess. 
 
 The conversation turned to other subjects, for it was 
 impossible to dwell very long on this one. Though the 
 couple came back again and again to their singular 
 position, either by some allusion or of serious purpose, 
 they had a delightful drive, recalling the events of their 
 former life together and the times of the Empire. The 
 Countess knew how to lend peculiar charm to her reminis- 
 cences, and gave the conversation the tinge of melancholy 
 that was needed to keep it serious. She revived his 
 love without awakening his desires, and allowed her 
 first husband to discern the mental wealth she had acquired 
 while trying to accustom him to moderate his pleasure to 
 that which a father may feel in the society of a favourite 
 daughter. 
 
 The Colonel had known the Countess of the Empire ; 
 he found her a Countess of the Restoration. 
 
 At last, by a cross-road, they arrived at the entrance to 
 a large park lying in the little valley which divides the 
 heights of Margency from the pretty village of Groslay. 
 The Countess had there a delightful house, where the 
 Colonel on arriving found everything in readiness for 
 his stay there, as well as for his wife's. Misfortune is a 
 kind of talisman whose virtue consists in its power to 
 confirm our original nature ; in some men it increases 
 their distrust and malignancy, just as it improves the 
 goodness of those who have a kind heart. 
 
 Sorrow had made the Colonel even more helpful and
 
 1 68 Colonel Chabert 
 
 good than he had always been, and he could understand 
 some secrets of womanly distress which are unrevealed to 
 most men. Nevertheless, in spite of his loyal trustful- 
 ness, he could not help saying to his wife — 
 
 ' Then you felt quite sure you would bring me here ? ' 
 
 'Yes,' replied she, 'if I found Colonel Chabert in 
 Derville's client.' 
 
 The appearance of truth she contrived to give to 
 this answer dissipated the slight suspicions which the 
 Colonel was ashamed to have felt. For three days the 
 Countess was quite charming to her first husband. By 
 tender attentions and unfailing sweetness she seemed 
 anxious to wipe out the memory of the sufferings he had 
 endured, and to earn forgiveness for the woes which, as 
 she confessed, she had innocently caused him. She 
 delighted in displaying for him the charms she knew he 
 took pleasure in, while at the same time she assumed a 
 kind of melancholy ; for men are more especially accessible 
 to certain ways, certain graces of the heart or of the 
 mind which they cannot resist. She aimed at interesting 
 him in her position, and appealing to his feelings so far 
 as to take possession of his mind and control him 
 despotically. 
 
 Ready for anything to attain her ends, she did not yet 
 know what she was to do with this man ; but at any rate 
 she meant to annihilate him socially. On the evening 
 of the third day she felt that in spite of her efforts she 
 could not conceal her uneasiness as to the results of 
 her manoeuvres. To give herself a minute's reprieve she 
 went up to her room, sat down before her writing- 
 table, and laid aside the mask of composure which she 
 wore in Chabert's presence, like an actress who, return- 
 ing to her dressing-room after a fatiguing fifth act, drops 
 half dead, leaving with the audience an image of herself 
 which she no longer resembles. She proceeded to finish 
 a letter she had begun to Delbecq, whom she desired to 
 go in her name and demand of Derville the deeds
 
 Colonel Chabert 169 
 
 relating to Colonel Chabert, to copy them, and to come 
 to her at once to Groslay. She had hardly finished when 
 she heard the Colonel's step in the passage ; uneasy at 
 her absence, he had come to look for her. 
 
 ' Alas ! ' she exclaimed, ' I wish I were dead ! My 
 position is intolerable . . .' 
 
 ' Why, what is the matter ? ' asked the good man. 
 ' Nothing, nothing ! ' she repHed. 
 She rose, left the Colonel, and went down to speak 
 privately to her maid, whom she sent off to Paris, im- 
 pressing on her that she was herself to deliver to Delbecq 
 the letter just written, and to bring it back to the writer 
 as soon as he had read it. Then the Countess went out 
 to sit on a bench sufficiently in sight for the Colonel to 
 join her as soon as he might choose. The Colonel, who 
 was looking for her, hastened up and sat down by her. 
 ' Rosine,' said he, ' what is the matter with you ? ' 
 She did not answer. 
 
 It was one of those glorious, calm evenings in the 
 month of June, whose secret harmonies infuse such 
 sweetness into the sunset. The air was clear, the still- 
 ness perfect, so that far away in the park they could hear 
 the voices of some children, which added a kind of 
 melody to the sublimity of the scene. 
 
 ' You do not answer me ? ' the Colonel said to his 
 wife. 
 
 'My husband ' said the Countess, who broke off, 
 
 started a little, and with a blush stopped to ask him, 
 ' What am I to say when I speak of M. Ferraud ? ' 
 
 ' Call him your husband, my poor child,' replied the 
 Colonel, in a kind voice. ' Is he not the father ot your 
 children ? ' 
 
 ' Well, then,' she said, ' if he should ask what I came 
 here for, if he finds that I came here, alone, with a 
 stranger, what am I to say to him ? Listen, Monsieur,' 
 she went on, assuming a dignified attitude, 'decide my 
 fate, I am resigned to anything '
 
 170 Colonel Chabert 
 
 ' My dear,' said the Colonel, taking possession of his 
 wife's hands, ' I have made up my mind to sacrifice 
 myself entirely for your happiness ' 
 
 * That is impossible!' she exclaimed, with a sudden 
 spasmodic movement. ' Remember that you would have 
 to renounce your identity, and in an authenticated form.' 
 
 ' What ? ' said the Colonel. ' Is not my word enough 
 for you ? ' 
 
 The word 'authenticated' fell on the old man's heart, 
 and roused involuntary distrust. He looked at his wife in 
 a way that made her colour, she cast down her eyes, and 
 he feared that he might find himself compelled to despise 
 her. The Countess was afraid lest she had scared the shy 
 modesty, the stern honesty, of a man whose generous 
 temper and primitive virtues were known to her. 
 Though these feelings had brought the clouds to their 
 brow, they immediately recovered their harmony. This 
 was the way of it. A child's cry was heard in the 
 distance. 
 
 'Jules, leave your sister in peace,' the Countess called 
 out. 
 
 ' What, are your children here ? ' said Chabert. 
 
 ' Yes, but I told them not to trouble you.' 
 
 ■'5 
 
 The old soldier understood the delicacy, the womanly 
 tact of so gracious a precaution, and took the Countess's 
 hand to kiss it. 
 
 'But let them come,' said he. 
 
 The little girl ran up to complain of her brother. 
 
 ' Mamma ! ' 
 
 ' Mamma ! ' 
 
 ' It was Jules ' 
 
 * It was her ' 
 
 Their little hands were held out to their mother, and 
 the two childish voices mingled ; it was an unexpected 
 and charming picture. 
 
 ' Poor little things ! ' cried the Countess, no longer 
 restraining her tears, ' I shall have to leave them. To
 
 Colonel Chabert 171 
 
 whom will the law assign them ? A mother's heart 
 cannot be divided ; I want them, I want them.' 
 
 ' Arc you making mamma cry ? ' said Jules, looking 
 fiercely at the Colonel. 
 
 'Silence, Jules ! ' said the mother in a decided tone. 
 
 The two children stood speechless, examining their 
 mother and the stranger with a curiosity which it is 
 impossible to express in words. 
 
 ' Oh yes ! ' she cried. ' If I am separated from the 
 Count, only leave me my children, and I will submit to 
 anything . . .' 
 
 This was the decisive speech which gained all that 
 she had hoped from it. 
 
 * Yes,' exclaimed the Colonel, as if he were ending a 
 sentence already begun in his mind, ' I must return 
 underground again. I had told myself so already.' 
 
 'Can I accept such a sacrifice?' replied his wife. 
 ' If some men have died to save a mistress's honour, they 
 gave their life but once. But in this case you would be 
 giving your hfe every day. No, no. It is impossible. 
 If it were only your life, it would be nothing ; but to 
 sign a declaration that you are not Colonel Chabert, 
 to acknowledge yourself an impostor, to sacrifice your 
 honour, and live a lie every hour of the day ! Human 
 devotion cannot go so far. Only think ! — No. But for 
 my poor children I would have fled with you by this 
 time to the other end of the world.' 
 
 ' But,' said Chabert, ' cannot I live here in your little 
 lodge as one of your relations ! I am as worn out as a 
 cracked cannon ; I want nothing but a little tobacco and 
 the Constitutionnel.'' 
 
 The Countess melted into tears. There was a contest 
 of generosity between the Comtesse Ferraud and Colonel 
 Chabert, and the soldier came out victorious. One 
 evening, seeing this mother with her children, the soldier 
 was bewitched by the touching grace of a family picture 
 in the country, in the shade and the silence ; he made a
 
 lyi Colonel Chabert 
 
 resolution to remain dead, and, frightened no longer at 
 the authentication of a deed, he asked what he was to do 
 to secure beyond all risk the happiness of this family. 
 
 ' Do exactly as you like,' said the Countess. ' I declare 
 to you that I will have nothing to do with this affair. I 
 ought not.' 
 
 Delbecq had arrived some days before, and in obedience 
 to the Countess's verbal instructions, the intendant had 
 succeeded in gaining the old soldier's confidence. So on 
 the following morning Colonel Chabert went with the 
 erewhile attorney to Saint-Leu-Taverny, where Delbecq 
 had caused the notary to draw up an affidavit in such 
 terms that, after hearing it read, the Colonel started up 
 and walked out of the office. 
 
 ' Turf and thunder ! What a fool you must think 
 me! Why, I should make myself out a swindler ! ' he 
 exclaimed. 
 
 ' Indeed, Monsieur,' said Delbecq, ' I should advise 
 you not to sign in haste. In your place I would get at 
 least thirty thousand francs a year out of the bargain. 
 Madame would pay them.' 
 
 After annihilating this scoundrel emeritus by the 
 lio-htnins; look of an honest man insulted, the Colonel 
 rushed off", carried away by a thousand contrary emotions. 
 He was suspicious, indignant, and calm again by turns. 
 
 Finally he made his way back into the park of Groslay 
 by a gap in a fence, and slowly walked on to sit down 
 and rest, and meditate at his ease, in a little room under 
 a gazebo, from which the road to Saint-Leu could be 
 seen. The path being strewn with the yellowish sand 
 which is used instead of river-gravel, the Countess, who 
 was sitting in the upper room of this little summer- 
 house, did not hear the Colonel's approach, for she was 
 too much preoccupied with the success of her business 
 to pay the smallest attention to the slight noise made by 
 her husband. Nor did the old man notice that his wife 
 was in the room over him.
 
 Colonel Chabert 173 
 
 * Well, Monsieur Delbecq, has he signed ? ' the 
 Countess asked her secretary, whom she saw alone on 
 the road beyond the hedge of a haha. 
 
 ' No, Madame. I do not even know what has become 
 of our man. The old horse reared.' 
 
 ' Then we shall be obliged to put him into Charen- 
 ton,' said she, ' since we have got him.' 
 
 The Colonel, who recovered the elasticity of youth to 
 leap the haha, in the twinkling of an eye was standing in 
 front of Delbecq, on whom he bestowed the two finest 
 slaps that ever a scoundrel's cheeks received. 
 
 ' And you may add that old horses can kick ! ' said he. 
 
 His rage spent, the Colonel no longer felt vigorous 
 enough to leap the ditch. He had seen the truth in all 
 its nakedness. The Countess's speech and Delbecq's 
 reply had revealed the conspiracy of which he was to be 
 the victim. The care taken of him was but a bait to 
 entrap him in a snare. That speech was like a drop of 
 subtle poison, bringing on in the old soldier a return of 
 all his sufferings, physical and moral. He came back to 
 the summer-house through the park gate, walking slowly 
 like a broken man. 
 
 Then for him there was to be neither peace nor truce ! 
 From this moment he must begin the odious warfare 
 with this woman of which Derville had spoken, enter on a 
 life of litigation, feed on gall, drink every morning of the 
 cup of bitterness. And then — fearful thought ! where was 
 he to find the money needful to pay the cost of the first pro- 
 ceedings ? He felt such disgust of life, that if there had 
 been any water at hand he would have thrown himself into 
 it J that if he had had a pistol, he would have blown out 
 his brains. Then he relapsed into the indecision of mind 
 which, since his conversation with Derville at the dairy- 
 man's, had changed his character. 
 
 At last, having reached the kiosque, he went up to the 
 gazebo, where little rose-windows afforded a view over 
 each lovely landscape of the valley, and where he found
 
 174 Colonel Chabert 
 
 his wife seated on a chair. The Countess was gazing at 
 the distance, and preserved a calm countenance, showing 
 that impenetrable face which women can assume when 
 resolved to do their worst. She wiped her eyes as if she 
 had been weeping, and played absently with the pink 
 ribbons of her sash. Nevertheless, in spite of her 
 apparent assurance, she could not help shuddering 
 slightly when she saw before her her venerable benefac- 
 tor, standing with folded arms, his face pale, his brow 
 stern. 
 
 * Madame,' he said, after gazing at her fixedly for a 
 moment and compelling her to blush, * Madame, I do not 
 curse you — I scorn you. I can now thank the chance 
 that has divided us. I do not feel even a desire for 
 revenge ; I no longer love you. I want nothing from 
 you. Live in peace on the strength of my word ; it is 
 worth more than the scrawl of all the notaries in Paris. 
 I will never assert my claim to the name I perhaps have 
 made illustrious. I am henceforth but a poor devil 
 named Hyacinthe, who asks no more than his share of 
 the sunshine. — Farewell ! ' 
 
 The Countess threw herself at his feet ; she would 
 have detained him by taking his hands, but he pushed 
 her away with disgust, saying — 
 
 * Do not touch me ! ' 
 
 The Countess's expression when she heard her hus- 
 band's retreating steps is quite indescribable. Then, 
 with the deep perspicacity given only by utter villainy, 
 or by fierce worldly selfishness, she knew that she might 
 live in peace on the word and the contempt of this loyal 
 veteran. 
 
 Chabert, in fact, disappeared. The dairyman failed 
 in business, and became a hackney-cab driver. The 
 Colonel, perhaps, took up some similar industry for a 
 time. Perhaps, like a stone flung into a chasm, he went 
 falling from ledge to ledge, to be lost in the mire of rags 
 that seethes through the streets of Paris.
 
 Colonel Chabert 175 
 
 Six months after this event, Derville, hearing no more 
 of Colonel Chabert or the Comtesse Ferraud, supposed 
 that they had no doubt come to a compromise, which the 
 Countess, out of revenge, had had arranged by some other 
 lawyer. So one morning he added up the sums he had 
 advanced to the said Chabert with the costs, and begged 
 the Comtesse Ferraud to claim from M. le Comte 
 Chabert the amount of the bill, assuming that she would 
 know where to find her first husband. 
 
 The very next day Comte Ferraud's man of business, 
 lately appointed President of the County Court in a 
 town of some importance, wrote this distressing note to 
 Derville : — 
 
 ' Monsieur, — 
 
 * Madame la Comtesse Ferraud desires me to inform 
 you that your client took complete advantage of your 
 confidence, and that the individual calling himself 
 Comte Chabert has acknowledged that he came forward 
 under false pretences. — Yours etc., Delbecq^' 
 
 * One comes across people who are, on my honour, too 
 stupid by half,' cried Derville. ' They don't deserve to 
 be Christians ! Be humane, generous, philanthropical, 
 and a lawyer, and you are bound to be cheated ! There 
 is a piece of business that will cost me two thousand- 
 franc notes ! ' 
 
 Some time after receiving this letter, Derville went to 
 the Palais de Justice in search of a pleader to whom he 
 wished to speak, and who was employed in the Police 
 Court. As chance would have it, Derville went into 
 Court Number 6 at the moment when the Presiding 
 Magistrate was sentencing one Hyacinthe to two months' 
 imprisonment as a vagabond, and subsequently to be taken 
 to the Mendicity House of Detention, a sentence which, 
 by magistrate's law, is equivalent to perpetual imprison- 
 ment. On hearing the name of Hyacinthe, Derville looked
 
 176 Colonel Chabert 
 
 at the delinquent, sitting between two gendarmes on the 
 bench for the accused, and recognised in the condemned 
 man his false Colonel Chabert. 
 
 The old soldier was placid, motionless, almost absent- 
 minded. In spite of his rags, in spite of the misery 
 stamped on his countenance, it gave evidence of noble 
 pride. His eye had a stoical expression which no magis- 
 trate ought to have misunderstood; but as soon as a man 
 has fallen into the hands of justice, he is no more than 
 a moral entity, a matter of law or of fact, just as to 
 statists he has become a zero. 
 
 When the veteran was taken back to the lock-up, to 
 be removed later with the batch of vagabonds at that 
 moment at the bar, Derville availed himself of the privi- 
 lege accorded to lawyers of going wherever they please 
 in the Courts, and followed him to the lock-up, where he 
 stood scrutinising him for some minutes, as well as the 
 curious crew of beggars among whom he found himself. 
 The passage to the lock-up at that moment afforded one 
 of those spectacles which, unfortunately, neither legisla- 
 tors, nor philanthropists, nor painters, nor writers come 
 to study. Like all the laboratories of the law, this ante- 
 room is a dark and malodorous place ; along the walls 
 runs a wooden seat, blackened by the constant presence 
 there of the wretches who come to this meeting-place of 
 every form of social squalor, where not one of them is 
 missing. 
 
 A poet might say that the day was ashamed to light 
 up this dreadful sewer through which so much misery 
 flows ! There is not a spot on that plank where some 
 crime has not sat, in embryo or matured ; not a corner 
 where a man has never stood who, driven to despair by the 
 blight which justice has set upon him after his first fault, 
 has not there begun a career, at the end of which looms 
 the guillotine or the pistol-snap of the suicide. All who 
 fall on the pavement of Paris rebound against these 
 yellow-grey walls, on which a philanthropist who was not
 
 Colonel Chabert 177 
 
 a speculator, might read a justification of the numerous 
 suicides complained of by hypocritical writers who are 
 incapable of taking a step to prevent them — for that 
 justification is written in that ante-room, like a preface 
 to the dramas of the Morgue, or to those enacted on the 
 Place de la Greve, 
 
 At this moment Colonel Chabert was sitting among 
 these men — men with coarse faces, clothed in the horrible 
 livery of misery, and silent at intervals, or talking in a 
 low tone, for three gendarmes on duty paced to and fro, 
 their sabres clattering on the floor. 
 
 ' Do you recognise me ? ' said Derville to the old man, 
 standing in front of him. 
 
 ' Yes, sir,' said Chabert, rising. 
 
 ' If you are an honest man,' Derville went on in an 
 undertone, ' how could you remain in my debt ? ' 
 
 The old soldier blushed as a young girl might when 
 accused by her mother of a clandestine love affair. 
 
 ' What ! Madame Ferraud has not paid you ? ' cried he 
 in a loud voice. 
 
 *Paid me?' said Derville. 'She wrote to me that 
 you were a swindler.' 
 
 The Colonel cast up his eyes in a sublime impulse of 
 horror and imprecation, as if to call heaven to witness to 
 this fresh subterfuge. 
 
 'Monsieur,' said he, in a voice that was calm by sheer 
 huskiness, 'get the gendarmes to allow me to go into 
 the lock-up, and I will sign an order which will certainly 
 be honoured.' 
 
 At a word from Derville to the sergeant he was 
 allowed to take his client into the room, where 
 Hyacinthe wrote a few lines, and addressed them to the 
 Comtesse Ferraud. 
 
 ' Send her that,' said the soldier, ' and you will be paid 
 your costs and the money you advanced. Believe me, 
 Monsieur, if I have not shown you the gratitude I owe 
 you for your kind offices, it is not the less there,' and he 
 
 M
 
 178 Colonel Chabert 
 
 laid his hand on his heart. 'Yes, it is there, deep and 
 sincere. But what can the unfortunate do ? They live, 
 and that is all.' 
 
 ' What ! ' said Derville. ' Did you not stipulate for 
 an allowance ? ' 
 
 ' Do not speak of it ! ' cried the old man. ' You can- 
 not conceive how deep my contempt is for the outside 
 life to which most men cling. I was suddenly attacked 
 by a sickness — disgust of humanity. When I think that 
 Napoleon is at Saint Helena, everything on earth is a 
 matter of indifference to me. I can no longer be a 
 soldier; that is my only real grief. After all,' he added 
 with a gesture of childish simplicity, 'it is better to 
 enjoy luxury of feeling than of dress. For my part, I 
 fear nobody's contempt.' 
 
 And the Colonel sat down on his bench again. 
 
 Derville went away. On returning to his office, he 
 sent Godeschal, at that time his second clerk, to the 
 Comtesse Ferraud, who, on reading the note, at once 
 paid the sum due to Comte Chabert's lawyer. 
 
 In 1840, towards the end of June, Godeschal, now 
 himself an attorney, went to Ris with Derville, to whom 
 he had succeeded. When they reached the avenue 
 leading from the high road to Bicetre, they saw, under one 
 of the elm-trees by the wayside, one of those old, broken, 
 and hoary paupers who have earned the Marshal's staf^' 
 among beggars by living on at Bicetre as poor women 
 live on at la Salpetriere. This man, one of the two 
 thousand poor creatures who are lodged in the infirmary 
 for the aged, was seated on a corner-stone, and seemed to 
 have concentrated all his intelligence on an operation well 
 known to these pensioners, which consists in drying their 
 snufFy pocket-handkerchiefs in the sun, perhaps to save 
 washing them. This old man had an attractive coun- 
 tenance. He was dressed in the reddish cloth wrapper- 
 coat which the workhouse affords to its inmates, a sort 
 of horrible livery.
 
 Colonel Chabert 
 
 '79 
 
 ' I say, Derville,' said Godeschal to his travelling com- 
 panion, ' look at that old fellow. Isn't he like those 
 grotesque carved figures we get from Germany ? And 
 it is alive, perhaps it is happy.' 
 
 Derville looked at the poor man through his eyeglass, 
 and with a little exclamation of surprise he said — 
 
 ' That old man, my dear fellow, is a whole poem, or, 
 as the romantics say, a drama. — Did you ever meet the 
 Comtesse Ferraud ? ' 
 
 ' Yes ; she is a clever woman, and agreeable ; but 
 rather too pious,' said Godeschal. 
 
 ' That old Bicetre pauper is her lawful husband, Comte 
 Chabert, the old Colonel. She has had him sent here, 
 no doubt. And if he is in this workhouse instead of 
 living in a mansion, it is solely because he reminded 
 the pretty Countess that he had taken her, like a hackney 
 cab, on the street. I can remember now the tiger's glare 
 she shot at him at that moment.' 
 
 This opening having excited Godeschal's curiosity, 
 Derville related the story here told. 
 
 Two days later, on Monday morning, as they re- 
 turned to Paris, the two friends looked again at Bicetre, 
 and Derville proposed that they should call on Colonel 
 Chabert. Half-way up the avenue they found the old 
 man sitting on the trunk of a felled tree ; with his stick 
 in one hand, he was amusing himself with drawing lines 
 in the sand. On looking at him narrowly, they perceived 
 that he had been breakfasting elsewhere than at Bicetre. 
 
 ' Good morning, Colonel Chabert,' said Derville. 
 
 '■ Not Chabert ! not Chabert ! My name is Hyacinthe,' 
 replied the veteran. ' I am no longer a man, I am No. 
 164, Room 7,' he added, looking at Derville with timid 
 anxiety, the fear of an old man and a child. — ' Are you 
 going to visit the man condemned to death ? ' he asked 
 after a moment's silence. ' He is not married ! He is 
 very lucky ! ' 
 
 ' Poor fellow ! ' said Godeschal. ' Would you like 
 something to buy snufF? '
 
 i8o Colonel Chabert 
 
 With all the simplicity of a street Arab, the Colonel 
 eagerly held out his hand to the two strangers, who each 
 gave him a twenty-franc piece j he thanked them with a 
 puzzled look, saying — 
 
 ' Brave troopers ! ' 
 
 He ported arms, pretended to take aim at them, and 
 shouted with a smile — 
 
 ' Fire ! both arms ! Vive Napoleon ! ' And he drew a 
 flourish in the air with his stick. 
 
 ' The nature of his wound has no doubt made him 
 childish,' said Derville. 
 
 ' Childish ! he ? ' said another old pauper, who was 
 looking on. 'Why, there are days when you had better 
 not tread on his corns. He is an old rogue, full of 
 philosophy and imagination. But to-day, what can you 
 expect ! He has had his Monday treat. — He was here. 
 Monsieur, so long ago as 1820. At that time a Prussian 
 officer, whose chaise was crawling up the hill of 
 Villejuif, came by on foot. We two were together, 
 Hyacinthe and I, by the roadside. The officer, as he 
 walked, was talking to another, a Russian, or some 
 animal of the same species, and when the Prussian saw 
 the old boy, just to make fun, he said to him, ' Here is 
 an old cavalry man who must have been at Rossbach.' — 
 *I was too young to be there,' said Hyacinthe. 'But I 
 was at Jena.' And the Prussian made off pretty quick, 
 without asking any more questions.' 
 
 'What a destiny !' exclaimed Derville. 'Taken out 
 of the Foundling Hospital to die in the Infirmary for the 
 Aged, after helping Napoleon between whiles to conquer 
 Egypt and Europe. — Do you know, my dear fellow,' 
 Derville went on after a pause, ' there are in modern 
 society three men who can never think well of the 
 world — the priest, the doctor, and the man of law ? And 
 they wear black robes, perhaps because they are in 
 mourning for every virtue and every illusion. The most 
 hapless of the three is the lawyer. When a man comes
 
 Colonel Chabert i8i 
 
 in search of the priest, he is prompted by repentance, by 
 remorse, by beliefs which make him interesting, which 
 elevate him and comfort the soul of the intercessor whose 
 task will bring him a sort of gladness ; he purifies, repairs, 
 and reconciles. But we lawyers, we see the same evil 
 feelings repeated again and again, nothing can correct 
 them ; our offices are sewers which can never be cleansed. 
 
 ' How many things have I learned in the exercise of 
 my profession ! I have seen a father die in a garret, 
 deserted by two daughters, to whom he had given forty 
 thousand francs a year ! I have known wills burnt ; I 
 have seen mothers robbing their children, wives killing 
 their husbands, and working on the love they could 
 inspire to make the men idiotic or mad, that they might 
 live in peace with a lover. I have seen women teaching 
 the child of their marriage such tastes as must bring it 
 to the grave in order to benefit the child of an illicit 
 affection. I could not tell you all I have seen, for I 
 have seen crimes against which justice is impotent. In 
 short, all the horrors that romancers suppose they have 
 invented are still below the truth. — You will know 
 something of these pretty things ; as for me, I am going 
 to live in the country with my wife. I have a horror of 
 Paris.' 
 
 ' I have seen plenty of them already in Desroches' 
 office,' replied Godeschal. 
 
 Paris, February-March 1832.
 
 THE COMMISSION IN LUNACY 
 
 Dedicated to Monsieur le Contre-Amiral Bazoche^ Governor 
 of the hie of Bourhon^ by the grateful writer^ 
 
 De Balzac. 
 
 In 1828, at about one o'clock one morning, two persons 
 came out of a large house in the Rue du Faubourg 
 Saint-Honore, near the Elysee-Bourbon. One was a 
 famous doctor, Horace Bianchon ; the other was one of 
 the most elegant men in Paris, the Baron de Rastignac ; 
 they were friends of long standing. Each had sent away 
 his carriage, and no cab was to be seen in the street ; but 
 the night was fine, and the pavement dry. 
 
 'We will walk as far as the Boulevard,' said Eugene 
 de Rastignac to Bianchon. 'You can get a hackney 
 cab at the club ; there is always one to be found there 
 till daybreak. Come with me as far as my house.' 
 
 'With pleasure.' 
 
 'Well, and what have you to say about it ? ' 
 
 ' About that woman ? ' said the doctor coldly. 
 
 ' There I recognise my Bianchon ! ' exclaimed Ras- 
 tignac. 
 
 ' Why, how ? ' 
 
 'Weil, my dear fellow, you speak of the Marquise 
 d'Espard as if she were a case for your hospital.' 
 
 ' Do you want to know what I think, Eugene ? If 
 you throw over Madame de Nucingen for this Marquise, 
 you will swop a one-eyed horse for a blind one.' 
 
 182
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 183 
 
 * Madame de Nucingen is six-and-thirty, Bianchon.' 
 
 ' And this woman is three-and-thirty,' said the doctor 
 quickly. 
 
 ' Her worst enemies only say six-and-twenty.' 
 
 'My dear boy, when you really want to know a 
 woman's age, look at her temples and the tip of her nose. 
 Whatever women may achieve with their cosmetics, 
 they can do nothing against those incorruptible witnesses 
 to their experiences. ^ There each year of life has left its 
 stigmata. When a woman's temples are flaccid, seamed, 
 withered in a particular way ; when at the tip of her 
 nose you see those minute specks, which look like the 
 imperceptible black smuts which are shed in London by 
 the chimneys in which coal is burnt. . . . Your servant, 
 sir ! That woman is more than thirty. She may be 
 handsome, witty, loving — whatever you please, but she 
 is past thirty, she is arriving at maturity. I do not 
 blame men who attach themselves to that kind of 
 woman ; only, a man of your superior distinction must 
 not mistake a winter pippin for a little summer apple, 
 smiling on the bough, and waiting for you to crunch it. 
 Love never goes to study the registers of birth and 
 marriage; no one loves a woman because she is hand- 
 some or ugly, stupid or clever ; we love because we love.' 
 
 ' Well, for my part, I love for quite other reasons. 
 She is Marquise d'Espard ; she was a Blamont-Chauvry ; 
 she is the fashion ; she has soul ; her foot is as pretty as 
 the Duchesse de Berri's ; she has perhaps a hundred 
 thousand francs a year — some day, perhaps, I may marry 
 her ! In short, she will put me into a position which 
 will enable me to pay my debts.' 
 
 ' I thought you were rich,' interrupted Bianchon. 
 
 ' Bah ! I have twenty thousand francs a year — ^just 
 enough to keep up my stables. I was thoroughly done, 
 my dear fellow, in that Nucingen business ; I will tell 
 you about that. — I have got my sisters married ; that is 
 the clearest profit I can show since we last met ; and I
 
 184 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 would rather have them provided for than have five 
 hundred thousand francs a year. Now, what would you 
 have me do ? I am ambitious. To what can Madame 
 de Nucingen lead ? A year more and I shall be shelved, 
 stuck in a pigeon-hole like a married man. I have all 
 the discomforts of marriage and of single life, without the 
 advantages of either ; a false position, to which every 
 man must come who remains tied too long to the same 
 apron-string.' 
 
 ' So you think you will come upon a treasure here ? ' 
 said Bianchon. ' Your Marquise, my dear fellow, does 
 not hit my fancy at all.' 
 
 ' Your liberal opinions blur your eyesight. If Madame 
 d'Espard were a Madame Rabourdin . . .' 
 
 ' Listen to me. Noble or simple, she would still have 
 no soul J she would still be a perfect type of selfishness. 
 Take my word for it, medical men are accustomed to 
 judge of people and things ; the sharpest of us read the 
 soul while we study the body. In spite of that pretty 
 boudoir where we have spent this evening, in spite of 
 the magnificence of the house, it is quite possible that 
 Madame la Marquise is in debt.' 
 
 * What makes you think so ? ' 
 
 ' I do not assert it ; I am supposing. She talked of 
 her soul as Louis xviii. used to talk of his heart. I tell 
 you this : That fragile, fair woman, with her chestnut 
 hair, who pities herself that she may be pitied, enjoys an 
 iron constitution, an appetite like a wolf's, and the strength 
 and cowardice of a tiger. Gauze, and silk, and muslin 
 were never more cleverly twisted round a lie ! Ecco^ 
 
 ' Bianchon, you frighten me ! You have learned a 
 good many things, then, since we lived in the Maison 
 Vauquer ?' 
 
 ' Yes ; since then, my boy, I have seen puppets, both 
 dolls and mannikins. I know something of the ways of 
 the fine ladies whose bodies we attend to, saving that which 
 is dearest to them, their child — if they love it — or their
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 185 
 
 pretty faces, which they always worship. A man spends 
 his nights by their pillow, wearing himself to death to 
 spare them the slightest loss of beauty in any part ; 
 he succeeds, he keeps their secret like the dead ; they 
 send to ask for his bill, and think it horribly exorbitant. 
 Who saved them ? Nature. Far from recommending 
 him, they speak ill of him, fearing lest he should become 
 the physician of their best friends. 
 
 ' My dear fellow, those women of whom you say, 
 " They are angels ! " I — I — have seen stripped of the little 
 grimaces under which they hide their soul, as well as 
 of the frippery under which they disguise their defects — 
 without manners and without stays ; they are not 
 beautiful. 
 
 ' We saw a great deal of mud, a great deal of dirt, 
 under the waters of the world when we were aground for 
 a time on the shoals of the Maison Vauquer. — What we 
 saw there was nothing. Since I have gone into higher 
 society, I have seen monsters dressed in satin, Michon- 
 neaus in white gloves, Poirets bedizened with orders, 
 fine gentlemen doing more usurious business than old 
 Gobseck ! To the shame of mankind, when I have 
 wanted to shake hands with Virtue, I have found her 
 shivering in a loft, persecuted by calumny, half starving 
 on an income or a salary of fifteen hundred francs a year, 
 and regarded as crazy, or eccentric, or imbecile. 
 
 'In short, my dear boy, the Marquise is a woman of 
 fashion, and I have a particular horror of that kind of 
 woman. Do you want to know why ? A woman who 
 has a lofty soul, fine taste, gentle wit, a generously warm 
 heart, and who lives a simple life, has not a chance of 
 being the fashion. Ergo: A woman of fashion and a 
 man in power are analogous ; but there is this difference : 
 the qualities by which a man raises himself above others 
 ennoble him and are a glory to him ; whereas the quali- 
 ties by which a woman gains power for a day are hideous 
 vices ; she belies her nature to hide her character, and to
 
 1 86 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 live the militant life of the world she must have iron 
 strength under a frail appearance. 
 
 ' I, as a physician, knovv^ that a sound stomach excludes 
 a good heart. Your woman of fashion feels nothing ; her 
 rage for pleasure has its source in a longing to heat up 
 her cold nature, a craving for excitement and enjoyment, 
 like an old man who stands night after night by the foot- 
 lights at the opera. As she has more brain than heart, 
 she sacrifices genuine passion and true friends to her 
 triumph, as a general sends his most devoted subalterns 
 to the front in order to win a battle. The woman of 
 fashion ceases to be a woman ; she is neither mother, 
 nor wife, nor lover. She is, medically speaking, sex in 
 the brain. And your Marquise, too, has all the charac- 
 teristics of her monstrosity, the beak of a bird of prey, 
 the clear, cold eye, the gentle voice — she is as polished 
 as the steel of a machine, she touches everything except 
 the heart.' 
 
 * There is some truth in what you say, Bianchon.' 
 ' Some truth ? ' replied Bianchon. ' It is all true. Do 
 you suppose that I was not struck to the heart by the 
 insulting politeness by which she made me measure the 
 imaginary distance which her noble birth sets between 
 us ? That I did not feel the deepest pity for her cat-like 
 civilities when I remembered what her object was ? A 
 year hence she will not write one word to do me the 
 slightest service, and this evening she pelted me with 
 smiles, believing that I can influence my uncle Popinot, 
 
 on whom the success of her case ' 
 
 ' Would you rather she should have played the fool 
 with you, my dear fellow ? — I accept your diatribe 
 against women of fashion ; but you are beside the mark. 
 I should always prefer for a wife a Marquise d'Espard to 
 the most devout and devoted creature on earth. Marry 
 an angel ! you would have to go and bury your happi- 
 ness in the depths of the country ! The wife of a 
 politician is a governing machine, a contrivance that
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 187 
 
 makes compliments and curtseys. She is the most im- 
 portant and most faithful tool which an ambitious man 
 can use ; a friend, in short, who may compromise herself 
 without mischief, and whom he may belie without harmful 
 results. Fancy Mahomet in Paris in the nineteenth 
 century ! His wife would be a Rohan, a Duchesse de 
 Chevreuse of the Fronde, as keen and as flattering as an 
 Ambassadress, as wily as Figaro. Your loving wives 
 lead nowhere ; a woman of the world leads to every- 
 thing ; she is the diamond with which a man cuts every 
 window when he has not the golden key which unlocks 
 every door. Leave humdrum virtues to the humdrum, 
 ambitious vices to the ambitious. 
 
 'Besides, my dear fellow, do you imagine that the love 
 of a Duchesse de Langeais, or de Maufrigneuse, or of a 
 Lady Dudley does not bestow immense pleasure ? If 
 only you knew how much value the cold, severe style of 
 such women gives to the smallest evidence of their affec- 
 tion ! What a delight it is to see a periwinkle piercing 
 through the snow ! A smile from below a fan contra- 
 dicts the reserve of an assumed attitude, and is worth all 
 the unbridled tenderness of your middle-class women 
 with their mortgaged devotion ; for, in love, devotion is 
 nearly akin to speculation. 
 
 ' And, then, a woman of fashion, a Blamont-Chauvry, 
 has her virtues too ! Her virtues are fortune, power, effect, 
 a certain contempt of all that is beneath her ' 
 
 ' Thank you ! ' said Bianchon. 
 
 ' Old curmudgeon ! ' said Rastignac, laughing. 'Come 
 — do not be common ; do like your friend Desplein ; be 
 a Baron, a Knight of Saint-Michael ; become a peer of 
 France, and marry your daughters to dukes.' 
 
 'I ! May the five hundred thousand devils ' 
 
 ' Come, come ! Can you be superior only in medi- 
 cine ? Really, you distress me . . .' 
 
 'I hate that sort of people ; I long for a revolution to 
 deliver us from them for ever.'
 
 1 88 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 * And so, my dear Robespierre of the lancet, you will 
 not go to-morrow to your uncle Popinot ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, I will,' said Bianchon j ' for you I would go to 
 hell to fetch water . . .' 
 
 ' My good friend, you really touch me. I have sworn 
 that a commission shall sit on the Marquis. Why, here 
 is even a long-saved tear to thank you.' 
 
 ' But,' Bianchon went on, ' I do not promise to succeed 
 as you wish with Jean-Jules Popinot. You do not know 
 him. However, I will" take him to see your Marquise 
 the day after to-morrow ; she may get round him if she 
 can. I doubt it. If all the truffles, all the Duchesses, 
 all the mistresses, and all the charmers in Paris were there 
 in the full bloom of their beauty ; if the King promised 
 him the pairie^ and the Almighty gave him the Order of 
 Paradise with the revenues of Purgatory, not one of all 
 these powers would induce him to transfer a single straw 
 from one saucer of his scales into the other. He is a 
 judge, as Death is Death.' 
 
 The two friends had reached the office of the Minister 
 for Foreign Affairs, at the corner of the Boulevard des 
 Capucines. 
 
 ^ Here you are at home,' said Bianchon, laughing, as 
 he pointed to the ministerial residence. ' And here is 
 my carriage,' he added, calling a hackney cab. 'And 
 these — express our fortune.' 
 
 * You will be happy at the bottom of the sea, while I 
 am still struggling with the tempests on the surface, till 
 I sink and go "to ask you for a corner in your grotto, old 
 fellow ! ' 
 
 ' Till Saturday,' replied Bianchon. 
 
 * Agreed,' said Rastignac. * And you promise me 
 Popinot ? ' 
 
 ' I will do all my conscience will allow. Perhaps this 
 appeal for a commission covers some little dramorama, 
 to use a word of our good bad times.' 
 
 ' Poor Bianchon ! he will never be anything but a
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 189 
 
 good fellow,' said Rastignac to himself as the cab 
 drove off. 
 
 ' Rastignac has given me the most difficult negotiation 
 in the world,' said Bianchon to himself, remembering, as 
 he rose next morning, the delicate commission intrusted 
 to him. ' However, I have never asked the smallest ser- 
 vice from my uncle in Court, and have paid more than 
 a thousand visits gratis for him. And, after all, we are 
 not apt to mince matters between ourselves. He will 
 say Yes or No, and there an end.' 
 
 After this little soliloquy the famous physician bent 
 his steps, at seven in the morning, towards the Rue 
 du Fouarre, where dwelt Monsieur Jean-Jules Popinot, 
 judge of the Lower Court of the Department of the 
 Seine. The Rue du Fouarre — an old word meaning 
 straw — was in the thirteenth century the most important 
 street in Paris. There stood the Schools of the Uni- 
 versity, where the voices of Abelard and of Gerson were 
 heard in the world of learning. It is now one of the 
 dirtiest streets of the Twelfth Arrondissement, the poorest 
 quarter of Paris, that in which two-thirds of the popula- 
 tion lack firing in winter, which leaves most brats at 
 the gate of the Foundling Hospital, which sends most 
 beggars to the poorhouse, most rag-pickers to the street 
 corners, most decrepit old folks to bask against the walls 
 on which the sun shines, most delinquents to the police 
 courts. 
 
 Half-way down this street, which is always damp, and 
 where the gutter carries to the Seine the blackened waters 
 from some dye-works, there is an old house, restored no 
 doubt under Francis i., and built of bricks held together 
 by a few courses of masonry. That it is substantial 
 seems proved by the shape of its front wall, not un- 
 commonly seen in some parts of Paris. It bellies, so to 
 speak, in a manner caused by the protuberance of its first 
 floor, crushed under the weight of the second and third.
 
 190 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 but upheld by the strong wall of the ground floor. At 
 first sight it would seem as though the piers between the 
 windows, though strengthened by the stone mullions, 
 must give way ; but the observer presently perceives 
 that, as in the tower at Bologna, the old bricks and old 
 time-eaten stones of this house persistently preserve their 
 centre of gravity. 
 
 At every season of the year the solid piers of the 
 ground floor have the yellow tone and the imperceptible 
 sweating surface that moisture gives to stone. The 
 passer-by feels chilled as he walks close to this wall, where 
 worn corner-stones inefi^ectually shelter him from the 
 wheels of vehicles. As is alwavs the case in houses built 
 before carriages were in use, the vault of the doorway 
 forms a very low archway not unlike the barbican of a 
 prison. To the right of this entrance there are three 
 windows, protected outside by iron gratings of so close 
 a pattern, that the curious cannot possibly see the use 
 made of the dark, damp rooms within, and the panes too 
 are dirty and dusty; to the left are two similar windows, 
 one of which is sometimes open, exposing to view the 
 porter, his wife, and his children ; swarming, working, 
 cooking, eating, and screaming, in a floored and wains- 
 coted room where everything is dropping to pieces, and 
 into which you descend two steps — a depth which seems 
 to suggest the gradual elevation of the soil of Paris. 
 
 If on a rainy day some foot-passenger takes refuge 
 under the long vault, with projecting lime-washed beams, 
 which leads from the door to the staircase, he will hardly 
 fail to pause and look at the picture presented by the 
 interior of this house. To the left is a square garden- 
 plot, allowing of not more than four long steps in each 
 direction, a garden of black soil, with trellises bereft of 
 vines, and where, in default of vegetation under the shade 
 of two trees, papers collect, old rags, potsherds, bits of 
 mortar fallen from the roof; a barren ground, where time 
 has shed on the walls, and on the trunks and branches of
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 191 
 
 the trees, a powdery deposit like cold soot. The two parts 
 of the house, set at a right angle, derive light from this 
 garden-court shut in by two adjoining houses built on 
 wooden piers, decrepit and ready to fall, where on each 
 floor some grotesque evidence is to be seen of the craft 
 pursued by the lodger within. Here long poles are hung 
 with immense skeins of dyed worsted put out to dry ; 
 there, on ropes, dance clean-washed shirts j higher up, 
 on a shelf, volumes display their freshly marbled edges ; 
 women sing, husbands whistle, children shout ; the 
 carpenter saws his planks, a copper-turner makes the 
 metal screech ; all kinds of industries combine to pro- 
 duce a noise which the number of instruments renders 
 distracting. 
 
 The general system of decoration in this passage, 
 which is neither courtyard, garden, nor vaulted way, 
 though a little of all, consists of wooden pillars resting 
 on square stone blocks, and forming arches. Two arch- 
 ways open on to the little garden ; two others, facing 
 the front gateway, lead to a wooden staircase, with an 
 iron balustrade that was once a miracle of smith's work, 
 so whimsical are the shapes given to the metal; the worn 
 steps creak under every tread. The entrance to each 
 flat has an architrave dark with dirt, grease, and dust, and 
 outer doors, covered with Utrecht velvet set with brass 
 nails, once gilt, in a diamond pattern. These relics of 
 splendour show that in the time of Louis xiv. the house 
 was the residence of some Councillor to the Parlement, 
 some rich priests, or some treasurer of the ecclesiastical 
 revenue. But these vestiges of former luxury bring a 
 smile to the lips by the artless contrast of past and present. 
 
 M. Jean-Jules Popinot lived on the first floor of this 
 house, where the gloom, natural to all first floors in Paris 
 houses, was increased by the narrowness of the street. 
 This old tenement was known to all the twelfth 
 arrondissement^ on which Providence had bestowed this 
 lawyer, as it gives a beneficent plant to cure or alleviate
 
 192 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 every malady. Here is a sketch of the man whom the 
 brilliant Marquise d'Espard hoped to fascinate. 
 
 M. Popinot, as is seemly for a magistrate, was always 
 dressed in black — a style which contributed to make him 
 ridiculous in the eyes of those who were in the habit of 
 judging everything from a superficial examination. Men 
 who are jealous of maintaining the dignity required by 
 this colour ought to devote themselves to constant and 
 minute care of their person ; but our dear M. Popinot 
 was incapable of forcing himself to the puritanical cleanli- 
 ness which black demands. His trousers, always thread- 
 bare, looked like camlet — the stuff of which attorneys' 
 gowns are made ; and his habitual stoop set them, in 
 time, in such innumerable creases, that in places they 
 were traced with lines, whitish, rusty, or shiny, betray- 
 ing either sordid avarice, or the most unheeding poverty. 
 His coarse worsted stockings were twisted anyhow in his 
 ill-shaped shoes. His linen had the tawny tinge acquired 
 by long sojourn in a wardrobe, showing that the late 
 lamented Madame Popinot had had a mania for much 
 linen ; in the Flemish fashion, perhaps, she had given her- 
 self the trouble of a great wash no more than twice a year. 
 The old man's coat and waistcoat were in harmony with 
 his trousers, shoes, stockings, and linen. He always had 
 the luck of his carelessness ; for, the first day he put on 
 a new coat, he unfailingly matched it with the rest of 
 his costume by staining it with incredible promptitude. 
 The good man waited till his housekeeper told him that 
 his hat was too shabby before buying a new one. His 
 necktie was always crumpled and starchless, and he 
 never set his dog's-eared shirt collar straight after his 
 judge's bands had disordered it. He took no care of his 
 grey hair, and shaved but twice a week. He never wore 
 gloves, and generally kept his hands stuffed into his 
 empty trousers' pockets ; the soiled pocket-holes, almost 
 always torn, added a final touch to the slovenliness of his 
 person.
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 193 
 
 Any one who knows the Palais de Justice at Paris, 
 where every variety of black attire may be studied, can 
 easily imagine the appearance of M. Popinot. The habit 
 of sitting for days at a time modifies the structure of the 
 body, just as the fatigue of hearing interminable pleadings 
 tells on the expression of a magistrate's face. Shut up as 
 he is in courts ridiculously small, devoid of architectural 
 dignity, and where the air is quickly vitiated, a Paris judge 
 inevitably acquires a countenance puckered and seamed 
 by reflection, and depressed by weariness ; his complexion 
 turns pallid, acquiring an earthy or greenish hue according 
 to his individual temperament. In short, within a given 
 time the most blooming young man is turned into an 
 ' inasmuch ' machine — an instrument which applies the 
 Code to individual cases with the indifference of clock- 
 work. 
 
 Hence, nature having bestowed on M. Popinot a not 
 too pleasing exterior, his life as a lawyer had not im- 
 proved it. His frame was graceless and angular. His 
 thick knees, huge feet, and broad hands formed a con- 
 trast with a priest-like face having a vague resemblance 
 to a calf's head, meek to unmeaningness, and but little 
 brightened by divergent, bloodless eyes, divided by a 
 straight flat nose, surmounted by a flat forehead, flanked 
 by enormous ears, flabby and graceless. His thin, weak 
 hair showed the baldness through various irregular 
 partings. 
 
 One feature only commended this face to the physi- 
 ognomist. This man had a mouth to whose lips divine 
 kindness lent its sweetness. They were wholesome, full, 
 red lips, finely wrinkled, sinuous, mobile, by which nature 
 had given expression to noble feeling ; lips which spoke 
 to the heart and proclaimed the man's intelligence and 
 lucidity, a gift of second sight, and a heavenly temper j and 
 you would have judged him wrongly from looking merely 
 at his sloping forehead, his fireless eyes, and his shambling 
 gait. His life answered to his countenance ; it was full of 
 
 N
 
 194 "^he Commission in Lunacy 
 
 secret labour, and hid the virtue of a saint. His superior 
 knowledge of law proved so strong a recommendation at 
 the time when Napoleon was reorganising it in 1808 and 
 181 1, that, by the advice of Cambaceres, he was onci of 
 the first men named to sit on the Imperial High Court 
 of Justice at Paris. Popinot was no schemer. When- 
 ever any demand was made, any request preferred for an 
 appointment, the Minister would overlook Popinot, who 
 never set foot in the house of the High Chancellor or 
 the Chief Justice. From the High Court he was sent 
 down to the Common Court, and pushed to] the lowest 
 rung of the ladder by active struggling men. There 
 he was appointed supernumerary judge. There was a 
 general outcry among the lawyers : ' Popinot a super- 
 numerary ! ' Such injustice struck the legal world with 
 dismay — the attorneys, the registrars, everybody but 
 Popinot himself, who made no complaint. The first 
 clamour over, everybody was satisfied that all was for the 
 best in the best of" all possible worlds, which must cer- 
 tainly be the legal world. Popinot remained super- 
 numerary judge till the day when the most famous Great 
 Seal under the Restoration avenged the oversights heaped 
 on this modest and uncomplaining man by the Chief 
 Justices of the Empire. After being a supernumerary 
 for twelve years, M. Popinot would no doubt die a 
 puisne judge of the Court of the Seine. 
 
 To account for the obscure fortunes of one of the 
 superior men of the legal profession, it is necessary to 
 enter here into some details which will serve to reveal 
 his life and character, and which will, at the same time, 
 display some of the wheels of the great machine known 
 as Justice. M. Popinot was classed by the three 
 Presidents who successively controlled the Court of the 
 Seine under the category of possible judges, the stuff of 
 which judges are made. Thus classified, he did not 
 achieve the reputation for capacity which his previous 
 labours had deserved. Just as a painter is invariably
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 195 
 
 included in a category as a landscape painter, a portrait 
 painter, a painter of history, of sea pieces, or of genre, by 
 a public consisting of artists, connoisseurs, and simpletons, 
 who, out of envy, or critical omnipotence, or preju- 
 dice, fence in his intellect, assuming, one and all, that 
 there are ganglions in every brain — a narrow judgment 
 which the world applies to writers, to statesmen, 
 to everybody who begins with some specialty before 
 being hailed as omniscient ; so Popinot's fate was sealed, 
 and he was hedged round to do a particular kind of 
 work. Magistrates, attorneys, pleaders, all who pas- 
 ture on the legal common, distinguish two elements in 
 every case — law and equity. Equity is the outcome of 
 facts, law is the application of principles to facts. A man 
 may be right in equity but wrong in law, without any 
 blame to the judge. Between his conscience and the 
 facts there is a whole gulf of determining reasons 
 unknown to the judge, but which condemn or legitimise 
 the act. A judge is not God ; his duty is to adapt facts 
 to principles, to judge cases of infinite variety while 
 measuring them by a fixed standard. 
 
 France employs about six thousand judges; no 
 generation has six thousand great men at her command, 
 much less can she find them in the legal profession. 
 Popinot, in the midst of the civilisation of Paris, was 
 just a very clever cadi, who, by the character of his 
 mind, and by dint of rubbing the letter of the law into 
 the essence of facts, had learned to see the error of spon- 
 taneous and violent decisions. By the help of his 
 judicial second sight he could pierce the double casing of 
 lies in which advocates hide the heart of a trial. He 
 was a judge, as the great Desplein was a surgeon ; he 
 probed men's consciences as the anatomist probed their 
 bodies. His Hfe and habits had led him to an exact 
 appreciation of their most secret thoughts by a thorough 
 study of facts. 
 
 He sifted a case as Cuvier sifted the earth's crust.
 
 196 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 Like that great thinker, he proceeded from deduction to 
 deduction before drawing his conclusions, and recon- 
 structed the past career of a conscience as Cuvier 
 reconstructed an Anoplotherium. When considering a 
 brief he would often wake in the night, startled by a 
 gleam of truth suddenly sparkling in his brain. Struck 
 by the deep injustice, which is the end of these contests, 
 in which everything is against the honest man, every- 
 thing to the advantage of the rogue, he often summed 
 up in favour of equity against law in such cases as bore 
 on questions of what may be termed divination. Hence 
 he was regarded by his colleagues as a man not of a 
 practical mind ; his arguments on two lines of deduction 
 made their deliberations lengthy. When Popinot 
 observed their dislike to listening to him he gave his 
 opinion briefly ; it was said that he was not a good 
 judge in this class of cases ; but as his gift of discrimina- 
 tion was remarkable, his opinion lucid, and his penetra- 
 tion profound, he was considered to have a special 
 aptitude for the laborious duties of an examining judge. 
 So an examining judge he remained during the greater 
 part of his legal career. 
 
 Although his qualifications made him eminently fitted 
 for its difficult functions, and he had the reputation of 
 being so learned in criminal law that his duty was a pleasure 
 to him, the kindness of his heart constantly kept him in 
 torture, and he was nipped as in a vice between his 
 conscience and his pity. The services of an examining 
 judge are better paid than those of a judge in civil actions, 
 but they do not therefore prove a temptation ; they are 
 too onerous. Popinot, a man of modest and virtuous 
 learning, without ambition, an indefatigable worker, 
 never complained of his fate ; he sacrificed his tastes and 
 his compassionate soul to the public good, and allowed 
 himself to be transported to the noisome pools of criminal 
 examinations, where he showed himself alike severe 
 and beneficent. His clerk sometimes would give the
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 197 
 
 accused some money to buy tobacco, or a warm winter 
 garment, as he led him back from the judge's office to 
 the Souricierej the mouse-trap — the House of Detention 
 where the accused are kept under the orders of the 
 Examining Judge. He knew how to be an inflexible 
 judge and a charitable man. And no one extracted a 
 confession so easily as he without having recourse to 
 judicial trickery. He had, too, all the acumen of an 
 observer. This man, apparently so foolishly good- 
 natured, simple, and absent-minded, could guess all the 
 cunning of a prison wag, unmask the astutest street 
 hussy, and subdue a scoundrel. Unusual circumstances 
 had sharpened his perspicacity ; but to relate these we 
 must intrude on his domestic history, for in him the 
 judge was the social side of the man ; another man, 
 greater and less known, existed within. 
 
 Twelve years before the beginning of this story, in 
 1816, during the terrible scarcity which coincided dis- 
 astrously with the stay in France of the so-called Allies, 
 Popinot was appointed President of the Commission 
 Extraordinary formed to distribute food to the poor of 
 his neighbourhood, just when he had planned to move 
 from the Rue du Fouarre, which he as little liked to live 
 in as his wife did. The great lawyer, the clear-sighted 
 criminal judge, whose superiority seemed to his colleagues 
 a form of aberration, had for five years been watching 
 legal results without seeing their causes. As he 
 scrambled up into lofts, as he saw the poverty, as he 
 studied the desperate necessities which gradually bring the 
 poor to criminal acts, as he estimated their long struggles, 
 compassion filled his soul. The judge then became 
 the Saint Vincent de Paul of these grown-up children, 
 these sufi^ering toilers. The transformation was not 
 immediately complete. Beneficence has its temptations 
 as vice has. Charity consumes a saint's purse, as roulette 
 consumes the possessions of a gambler, quite gradually. 
 Popinot went from misery to misery, from charity to
 
 198 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 charity ; then, by the time he had lifted all the rags which 
 cover public pauperism, like a bandage under which an 
 inflamed wound lies festering, at the end of a year he had 
 become the Providence incarnate of that quarter of the 
 town. He was a member of the Benevolent Committee 
 and of the Charity Organisation. Wherever any gratui- 
 tous services were needed he was ready, and did every- 
 thing without fuss, like the man with the short cloak^ who 
 spends his life in carrying soup round the markets and 
 other places where there are starving folks. 
 
 Popinot was fortunate in acting on a larger circle and 
 in a higher sphere ; he had an eye on everything, he 
 prevented crime, he gave work to the unemployed, he 
 found a refuge for the helpless, he distributed aid with 
 discernment wherever danger threatened, he made himself 
 the counsellor of the widow, the protector of homeless 
 children, the sleeping partner of small traders. No one 
 at the Courts, no one in Paris, knew of this secret life of 
 Popinot's. There are virtues so splendid that they 
 necessitate obscurity ; men make haste to hide them 
 under a bushel. As to those whom the lawyer succoured, 
 they, hard at work all day and tired at night, were little 
 able to sing his praises ; theirs was the gracelessness of 
 children, who can never pay because they owe too much. 
 There is such compulsory ingratitude ; but what heart 
 that has sown good to reap gratitude can think itself 
 great ? 
 
 By the end of the second year of his apostolic work, 
 Popinot had turned the storeroom at the bottom of his 
 house into a parlour, lighted by the three iron-barred win- 
 dows. The walls and ceiling of this spacious room were 
 white-washed, and the furniture consisted of wooden 
 benches like those seen in schools, a clumsy cupboard, a 
 walnut-wood writing-table, and an armchair. In the 
 cupboard were his registers of donations, his tickets for 
 orders for bread, and his diary. He kept his ledger like a 
 tradesman, that he might not be ruined by kindness.
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 199 
 
 All the sorrows of the neighbourhood were entered and 
 numbered in a book, where each had its little account, as 
 merchants' customers have theirs. When there was any 
 question as to a man or a family needing help, the 
 lawyer could always command information from the 
 police. 
 
 Lavienne, a man made for his master, was his aide-de- 
 camp. He redeemed or renewed pawn-tickets, and 
 visited the districts most threatened with famine, while 
 his master was in court. 
 
 From four till seven in the morning in summer, from 
 six till nine in winter, this room was full of women, chil- 
 dren, and paupers, while Popinot gave audience. There 
 was no need for a stove in winter ; the crowd was so 
 dense that the air was warmed ; only Lavienne strewed 
 straw on the wet floor. By long use the benches were 
 as polished as varnished mahogany ; at the height of a 
 man's shoulders the wall had a coat of dark, indescribable 
 colour, given to it by the rags and tattered clothes of 
 these poor creatures. The poor wretches loved Popinot 
 so well that when they assembled before his door was 
 opened, before daybreak on a winter's morning, the 
 women warming themselves with their foot-brasiers, the 
 men swinging their arms for circulation, never a sound had 
 disturbed his sleep. Rag-pickers and other toilers of the 
 night knew the house, and often saw a light burning in 
 the lawyer's private room at unholy hours. Even thieves, 
 as they passed by, said, * That is his house,' and respected 
 it. The morning he gave to the poor, the mid-day 
 hours to criminals, the evening to law work. 
 
 Thus the gift of observation that characterised Popinot 
 was necessarily bifrons ; he could guess the virtues of 
 a pauper — good feelings nipped, fine actions in embryo, 
 unrecognised self-sacrifice, just as he could read at the 
 bottom of a man's conscience the faintest outlines of a 
 crime, the slenderest threads of wrongdoing, and infer 
 all the rest.
 
 200 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 Popinot's inherited fortune was a thousand crowns a 
 year. His wife, sister to M. Bianchon senior^ a doctor 
 at Sancerre, had brought him about twice as much. She, 
 dying five years since, had left her fortune to her husband. 
 As the salary of a supernumerary judge is not large, and 
 Popinot had been a fully salaried judge only for four 
 years, we may guess his reasons for parsimony in all that 
 concerned his person and mode of life, when we consider 
 how small his means were and how great his beneficence. 
 Besides, is not such indifference to dress as stamped 
 Popinot an absent-minded man, a distinguishing mark of 
 scientific attainment, of art passionately pursued, of a 
 perpetually active mind ? To complete this portrait, it 
 will be enough to add that Popinot was one of the few 
 judges of the Court of the Seine on whom the ribbon of 
 the Legion of Honour had not been conferred. 
 
 Such was the man who had been instructed by the 
 President of the Second Chamber of the Court — to which 
 Popinot had belonged since his reinstatement among the 
 judges in civil law — to examine the Marquis d'Espard 
 at the request of his wife, who sued for a Commission in 
 Lunacy. 
 
 The Rue du Fouarre, where so many unhappy wretches 
 swarmed in the early morning, would be deserted by nine 
 o'clock, and as gloomy and squalid as ever. Bianchon 
 put his horse to a trot in order to find his uncle in the 
 midst of his business. It was not without a smile that 
 he thought of the curious contrast the judge's appearance 
 would make in Madame d'Espard's room ; but he pro- 
 mised himself that he would persuade him to dress in a 
 way that should not be too ridiculous. 
 
 ' If only my uncle happens to have a new coat ! ' said 
 Bianchon to himself, as he turned into the Rue du 
 Fouarre, where a pale light shone from the parlour 
 windows. ' I shall do well, I believe, to talk that over 
 with Lavienne.' 
 
 At the sound of wheels half a score of startled paupers
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 201 
 
 came out from under the gateway, and took off their 
 hats on recognising Bianchon ; for the doctor, who 
 treated gratuitously the sick recommended to him by 
 the lawyer, was not less well known than he to the poor 
 creatures assembled there. 
 
 Bianchon found his uncle in the middle of the parlour, 
 where the benches were occupied by patients present- 
 ing such grotesque singularities of costume as would 
 have made the least artistic passer-by turn round -to 
 gaze at them. A draughtsman — a Rembrandt, if there 
 were one in our day — might have conceived of one of his 
 finest compositions from seeing these children of misery, 
 in artless attitudes, and all silent. 
 
 Here was the rugged countenance of an old man with 
 a white beard and an apostolic head — a Saint Peter ready 
 to hand ; his chest, partly uncovered, showed salient 
 muscles, the evidence of an iron constitution which had 
 served him as a fulcrum to resist a whole poem of sorrows. 
 There a young woman was suckling her youngest-born 
 to keep it from crying, while another of about five stood 
 between her knees. Her white bosom, gleaming amid 
 rags, the baby with its transparent flesh- tints, and the 
 brother, whose attitude promised a street arab in the 
 future, touched the fancy with pathos by its almost 
 graceful contrast with the long row of faces crimson 
 with cold, in the midst of which sat this family group. 
 Further away, an old woman, pale and rigid, had the 
 repulsive look of rebellious pauperism, eager to avenge 
 all its past woes in one day of violence. 
 
 There, again, was the young workman, weakly and 
 indolent, whose brightly intelligent eye revealed fine 
 faculties crushed by necessity struggled with in vain, 
 saying nothing of his sufferings, and nearly dead for lack 
 of an opportunity to squeeze between the bars of the vast 
 stews where the wretched swim round and round and 
 devour each other. 
 
 The majority were women ; their husbands, gone to
 
 101 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 their work, left it to them, no doubt, to plead the cause 
 of the family with the ingenuity which characterises the 
 woman of the people, who is almost always queen in her 
 hovel. You would have seen a torn bandana on every 
 head, on every form a skirt deep in mud, ragged kerchiefs, 
 worn and dirty jackets, but eyes that burnt like Hve coals. 
 It was a horrible assemblage, raising at first sight a 
 feeling of disgust, but giving a certain sense of terror the 
 instant you perceived that the resignation of these souls, 
 all engaged in the struggle for every necessary of life, was 
 purely fortuitous, a speculation on benevolence. The 
 two tallow candles which lighted the parlour flickered 
 in a sort of fog caused by the fetid atmosphere of the ill- 
 ventilated room. 
 
 The magistrate himself was not the least picturesque 
 figure in the midst of this assembly. He had on his 
 head a rusty cotton night-cap ; as he had no cravat, his 
 neck was visible, red with cold and wrinkled, in contrast 
 with the threadbare collar of his old dressing-gown. His 
 worn face had the half-stupid look that comes of absorbed 
 attention. His lips, like those of all men who work, 
 were puckered up like a bag with the strings drawn tight. 
 His knitted brows seemed to bear the burden of all the 
 sorrows confided to him : he felt, analysed, and judged 
 them all. As watchful as a Jew money-lender, he never 
 raised his eyes from his books and registers but to look 
 into the very heart of the persons he was examining, 
 with the flashing glance by which a miser expresses his 
 alarm. 
 
 Lavienne, standing behind his master, ready to carry 
 out his orders, served no doubt as a sort of police, and 
 welcomed new-comers by encouraging them to get over 
 their shyness. When the doctor appeared there was a 
 stir on the benches. Lavienne turned his head, and was 
 strangely surprised to see Bianchon. 
 
 ' Ah ! It is you, old boy ! ' exclaimed Popinot, stretch- 
 ing himself. ' What brings you so early ? '
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 203 
 
 'I was afraid lest you should make an official visit 
 about which I wish to speak to you before I could see 
 you.' 
 
 'Well,' said the lawyer, addressing a stout Httle woman 
 who was still standing close to him, 'if you do not tell 
 me what it is you want, I cannot guess it, child.' 
 
 ' Make haste,' said Lavienne. ' Do not waste other 
 people's time.' 
 
 ' Monsieur,' said the woman at last, turning red, and 
 speaking so low as only to be heard by Popinot and 
 Lavienne, ' I have a green-grocery truck, and I have my 
 last baby out at nurse, and I owe for his keep. Well, I 
 had hidden my httle bit of money ' 
 
 ' Yes ; and your man took it ? ' said Popinot, guessing 
 the sequel. 
 
 ' Yes, sir.' 
 
 ' What is your name ? ' 
 
 'La Pomponne.' 
 
 ' And your husband's ? ' 
 
 ' Toupinet.' 
 
 ' Rue du Petit-Banquier ? ' said Popinot, turning over 
 his register. ' He is in prison,' he added, reading a note 
 at the margin of the section in which this family was 
 described. 
 
 ' For debt, my kind Monsieur.' 
 
 Popinot shook his head. 
 
 ' But I have nothing to buy any stock for my truck ; 
 the landlord came yesterday and made me pay up ; other- 
 wise I should have been turned out.' 
 
 Lavienne bent over his master, and whispered in his 
 ear. 
 
 'Well, how much do you want to buy fruit in the 
 market ? ' 
 
 ' Why, my good Monsieur, to carry on my business, I 
 should want — Yes, I should certainly want ten francs.' 
 
 Popinot signed to Lavienne, who took ten francs out 
 of a large bag, and handed them to the woman, while
 
 -204 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 the lawyer made a note of the loan in his ledger. As he 
 saw the thrill of delight that made the poor hawker 
 tremble, Bianchon understood the apprehensions that 
 must have agitated her on her way to the lawyer's house. 
 
 * You next,' said Lavienne to the old man with the 
 white beard. 
 
 Bianchon drew the servant aside, and asked him how 
 long this audience would last. 
 
 * Monsieur has had two hundred persons this morning, 
 and there are eighty to be turned off,' said Lavienne. 
 'You will have time to pay your early visit, sir.' 
 
 * Here, my boy,' said the lawyer, turning round and 
 taking Horace by the arm ; ' here are two addresses near 
 this — one in the Rue de Seine, and the other in the Rue 
 de I'Arbalete. Go there at once. Rue de Seine, a 
 young girl has just asphyxiated herself; and Rue de 
 I'Arbalete, you will find a man to remove to your 
 hospital. I will wait breakfast for you.' 
 
 Bianchon returned an hour later. The Rue du 
 Fouarre was deserted j day was beginning to dawn there; 
 his uncle had gone up to his rooms; the last poor wretch 
 whose misery the judge had relieved was departing, and 
 Lavienne's money bag was empty. 
 
 * Well, how are they going on ? ' asked the old lawyer, 
 as the doctor came in. 
 
 'The man is dead,' replied Bianchon; 'the girl will 
 get over it.' 
 
 Since the eye and hand of a woman had been lacking, 
 the flat in which Popinot lived had assumed an aspect in 
 harmony with its master's. The indifference of a man 
 who is absorbed in one dominant idea had set its stamp 
 of eccentricity on everything. Everywhere lay uncon- 
 querable dust, every object was adapted to a wrong 
 purpose with a pertinacity suggestive of a bachelor's 
 home. There were papers in the flower vases, empty ink- 
 bottles on the tables, plates that had been forgotten, 
 matches used as tapers for a minute when something had
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 205 
 
 to be found, drawers or boxes half turned out and left 
 unfinished ; in short, all the confusion and vacancies 
 resulting from plans for order never carried out. The 
 lawyer's private room, especially disordered by this 
 incessant rummage, bore witness to his unresting pace, the 
 hurry of a man overwhelmed with business, hunted by 
 contradictory necessities. The bookcase looked as if it 
 had been sacked ; there were books scattered over every- 
 thing, some piled up open, one on another, others on the 
 floor face downwards ; registers of proceedings laid on 
 the floor in rows, lengthwise, in front of the shelves ; and 
 that floor had not been polished for two years. 
 
 The tables and shelves were covered with ex votes, the 
 offerings of the grateful poor. On a pair of blue glass 
 jars which ornamented the chimney-shelf there were 
 two glass balls, of which the core was made up of 
 many coloured fragments, giving them the appearance 
 of some singular natural product. Against the wall hung 
 frames of artificial flowers, and decorations in which 
 Popinot's initials were surrounded by hearts and everlast- 
 ing flowers. Here were boxes of elaborate and useless 
 cabinet work ; there letter-weights carved in the style 
 of work done by convicts in penal servitude. These 
 masterpieces of patience, enigmas of gratitude, and 
 withered bouquets gave the lawyer's room the appearance 
 of a toyshop. The good man used these works of art as 
 hiding-places which he filled with bills, worn-out pens, 
 and scraps of paper. All these pathetic witnesses to his 
 divine charity were thick with dust, dingy, and faded. 
 
 Some birds, beautifully stuffed, but eaten by moth, 
 perched in this wilderness of trumpery, presided over by 
 an Angora cat, Madame Popinot's pet, restored to her 
 no doubt with all the graces of life by some impecunious 
 naturalist, who thus repaid a gift of charity with a 
 perennial treasure. Some local artist whose heart had 
 misguided his brush had painted portraits of M. and 
 Madame Popinot. Even in the bedroom there were
 
 2o6 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 embroidered pin-cushions, landscapes in cross-stitch, and 
 crosses in folded paper, so elaborately cockled as to show 
 the senseless labour they had cost. 
 
 The window-curtains were black with smoke, and 
 the hangings absolutely colourless. Between the fire- 
 place and the large square table at which the magistrate 
 worked, the cook had set two cups of coffee on a small 
 table, and two arm-chairs, in mahogany and horsehair, 
 awaited the uncle and nephew. As daylight, darkened 
 by the windows, could not penetrate to this corner, the 
 cook had left two dips burning, whose unsnuffed wicks 
 showed a sort of mushroom growth, giving the red light 
 which promises length of life to the candle from slow- 
 ness of combustion — a discovery due to some miser. 
 
 ' My dear uncle, you ought to wrap yourself more 
 warmly when you go down to that parlour.' 
 
 ' I cannot bear to keep them waiting, poor souls ! — 
 Well, and what do you want of me ? ' 
 
 ' I have come to ask you to dine to-morrow with the 
 Marquise d'Espard.' 
 
 ' A relation of ours ? ' asked Popinot, with such genuine 
 absence of mind that Bianchon laughed. 
 
 ' No, uncle ; the Marquise d'Espard is a high and 
 puissant lady, who has laid before the Courts a petition 
 desiring that a Commission in Lunacy should sit on her 
 husband, and you are appointed ' 
 
 ' And you want me to dine with her ! Are you mad ?' 
 said the lawyer, taking up the code of proceedings. 
 * Here, only read this article, prohibiting any magistrate's 
 eating or drinking in the house of either of two parties 
 whom he is called upon to decide between. Let her 
 come and see me, your Marquise, if she has anything to 
 say to me. I was in fact to go to examine her husband 
 to-morrow, after working the case up to-night.' 
 
 He rose, took up a packet of papers that lay under a 
 weight where he could see it, and after reading the title, 
 he said —
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 207 
 
 ' Here is the affidavit. Since you take an interest in 
 this high and puissant lady, let us see what she wants.' 
 
 Popinot wrapped his dressing-gown across his body, 
 from which it was constantly slipping and leaving his 
 chest bare ; he sopped his bread in the half-cold coffee, 
 and opened the petition, which he read, allowing himself 
 to throw in a parenthesis now and then, and some dis- 
 cussions, in which his nephew took part : — 
 
 '"To Monsieur the President of the Civil Tribunal 
 of the Lower Court of the Department of the Seine, 
 sitting at the Palais de Justice. 
 
 ' " Madame Jeanne Clementine Athenais de Blamont- 
 Chauvry, wife of M. Charles Maurice Marie Andoche, 
 Comte de Negrepelisse, Marquis d'Espard " — a very good 
 family — " landowner, the said Mme. d'Espard living 
 in the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honore, No. 104, and 
 the said M. d'Espard in the Rue de la Montagne-Sainte- 
 Genevieve, No. 22." — to be sure, the President told 
 me he lived in this part of the town — " having for her 
 solicitor Maitre Desroches " — Desroches ! a pettifogging 
 jobber, a man looked down upon by his brother lawyers, 
 and who does his cHents no good ' 
 
 ' Poor fellow ! ' said Bianchon, ' unluckily he has no 
 money, and he rushes round like the devil in holy water 
 — That is all.' 
 
 ' " Has the honour to submit to you, Monsieur the 
 President, that for a year past the moral and intellectual 
 powers of her husband, M. d'Espard, have undergone 
 so serious a change, that at the present day they have 
 reached the state of dementia and idiotcy provided for 
 by Article 448 of the Civil Code, and require the applica- 
 tion of the remedies set forth by that article, for the 
 security of his fortune and his person, and to guard the 
 interest of his children whom he keeps to live with 
 him. 
 
 '"That, in point of fact, the mental condition of M. 
 d'Espard, which for some years has given grounds for
 
 2o8 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 alarm based on the system he has pursued in the 
 management of his affairs, has reached, during the last 
 twelvemonth, a deplorable depth of depression ; that his 
 infirm will was the first thing to show the results of 
 the malady; and that its effete state leaves M. the Marquis 
 d'Espard exposed to all the perils of his incompetency, as 
 is proved by the following facts : — 
 
 '"For a long time all the income accruing from 
 M. d'Espard's estates are paid, without any reason- 
 able cause, or even temporary advantage, into the hands 
 of an old woman, whose repulsive ugliness is generally 
 remarked on, named Madame Jeanrenaud, living some- 
 times in Paris, Rue de la Vrilliere, No. 8, sometimes at 
 Villeparisis, near Claye, in the Department of Seine et 
 Marne, and for the benefit of her son, aged thirty-six, 
 an officer in the ex-Imperial Guards, whom the Marquis 
 d'Espard has placed by his influence in the King's 
 Guards, as Major in the First Regiment of Cuirassiers. 
 These two persons, who in 1814 were in extreme 
 poverty, have since then purchased house-property of 
 considerable value ; among other items, quite recently, 
 a large house in the Grande Rue Verte, where the said 
 Jeanrenaud is laying out considerable sums in order to 
 settle there with the woman Jeanrenaud, intending to 
 marry ; these sums amount already to more than a 
 hundred thousand francs. The marriage has been 
 arranged by the intervention of M. d'Espard with his 
 banker, one Mongenod, whose niece he has asked in 
 marriage for the said Jeanrenaud, promising to use his 
 influence to procure him the title and dignity of Baron. 
 This has in fact been secured by his Majesty's letters 
 patent, dated December 29th of last year, at the request 
 of the Marquis d'Espard, as can be proved by his 
 Excellency the Keeper of the Seals, if the Court should 
 think proper to require his testimony. 
 
 ' " That no reason, not even such as morality and the 
 law would concur in disapproving, can justify the influence
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 209 
 
 which the said Mme. Jeanrenaud exerts over M. 
 d'Espard, who, indeed, sees her very seldom ; nor account 
 for his strange affection for the said Baron Jeanrenaud, 
 Major, with whom he has but httle intercourse. And 
 yet their power is so considerable, that whenever they 
 need money, if only to gratify a mere whim, this lady 
 or her son — — " Heh, heh ! no reason even such as morality 
 and the law concur in disapproving ! What does the 
 clerk or the attorney mean to insinuate ? ' said Popinot. 
 
 Bianchon laughed. 
 
 ' " This lady, or her son, obtain whatever they ask of 
 the Marquis d'Espard without demur ; and if he has not 
 ready money, M. d'Espard draws bills to be paid by the 
 said Mongenod, who has offered to give evidence to that 
 effect for the petitioner. 
 
 *"That, moreover, in further proof of these facts, 
 lately, on the occasion of the renewal of the leases on 
 the Espard estate, the farmers having paid a considerable 
 premium for the renewal of their leases on the old terms, 
 M. Jeanrenaud at once secured the payment of it into 
 his own hands. 
 
 *" That the Marquis d'Espard parts with these sums 
 of money so little of his own free-will, that when he was 
 spoken to on the subject he seemed to remember nothing 
 of the matter ; that whenever anybody of any weight 
 has questioned him as to his devotion to these two 
 persons, his replies have shown so complete an absence of 
 ideas and of sense of his own interests, that there obviously 
 must be some occult cause at work to which the 
 petitioner begs to direct the eye of justice, inasmuch as 
 it is impossible but that this cause should be criminal, 
 malignant, and wrongful, or else of a nature to come 
 under medical jurisdiction ; unless this influence is of 
 the kind which constitutes an abuse of moral power — 
 
 such as can only be described by the word possession " 
 
 The devil ! ' exclaimed Popinot. * What do you say to 
 that, doctor ? These are strange statements.' 
 
 o
 
 2IO The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 ' They might certainly,' said Bianchon, ' be an effect 
 of magnetic force.' 
 
 ' Then do you believe in Mesmer's nonsense, and his 
 tub, and seeing through walls ? ' 
 
 'Yes, uncle,' said the doctor gravely. 'As I heard 
 you read that petition I thought of that, I assure you 
 that I have verified, in another sphere of action, several 
 analogous facts proving the unlimited influence one man 
 may acquire over another. In contradiction to the 
 opinion of my brethren, I am perfectly convinced of the 
 povi^er of the will regarded as a motor force. All collu- 
 sion and charlatanism apart, I have seen the results of such 
 a possession. Actions promised during sleep by a mag- 
 netised patient to the magnetiser have been scrupulously 
 performed on waking. The will of one had become the 
 will of the other.' 
 
 ' Every kind of action ? ' 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 ' Even a criminal act ? ' 
 ' Even a crime.' 
 
 ' If it were not from you, I would not listen to such a 
 thing.' 
 
 ' I will make you witness it,' said Bianchon. 
 'Hm, hm,' muttered the lawyer. 'But supposing 
 that this so-called possession fell under this class of facts, 
 it would be difficult to prove it as legal evidence.' 
 
 ' If this woman Jeanrenaud is so hideously old and 
 ugly, I do not see what other means of fascination she 
 can have used,' observed Bianchon. 
 
 'But,' observed the lawyer, 'in 1814, the time at 
 which this fascination is supposed to have taken place, 
 this woman was fourteen years younger ; if she had been 
 connected with M. d'Espard ten years before that, these 
 calculations take us back four-and-twenty years, to a 
 time when the lady may have been young and pretty, 
 and have won for herself and her son a power over M. 
 d'Espard which some men do not know how to evade.
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 2 1 1 
 
 Though the source of this power is reprehensible in the 
 sight of justice, it is justifiable in the eye of nature. 
 Madame Jeanrenaud may have been aggrieved by the 
 marriage, contracted probably at about that time, between 
 the Marquis d'Espard and Mademoiselle de Blamont- 
 Chauvry, and at the bottom of all this there may be 
 nothing more than the rivalry of two women, since the 
 Marquis has for a long time lived apart from Mme. 
 d'Espard.' 
 
 * But her repulsive ugliness, uncle.' 
 
 * Power of fascination is in direct proportion to ugli- 
 ness,' said the lawyer ; ' that is an old story. And then 
 think of the smallpox, doctor. But to proceed.' 
 
 '"That so long ago as in 1815, in order to supply the 
 sums of money required by these two persons, the 
 Marquis d'Espard went with his two children to live in 
 the Rue de la Montagne-Sainte-Genevieve, in rooms 
 quite unworthy of his name and rank" — well, we may 
 live as we please — " that he keeps his two children there, 
 the Comte Clement d'Espard and Vicomte Camille 
 d'Espard, in a style of living quite unsuited to their 
 future prospects, their name and fortune ; that he often 
 wants money, to such a point, that not long since the 
 landlord, one Mariast, put in an execution on the furni- 
 ture in the rooms ; that when this execution was carried 
 out in his presence, the Marquis d'Espard helped the 
 bailiff, whom he treated like a man of rank, paying him 
 all the marks of attention and respect which he would 
 have shown to a person of superior birth and dignity to 
 himself" ' 
 
 The uncle and nephew glanced at each other and 
 laughed. 
 
 ' " That, moreover, every act of his life, besides the facts 
 with reference to the widow Jeanrenaud and the Baron 
 Jeanrenaud, her son, are those of a madman ; that for 
 nearly ten years he has given his thoughts exclusively to 
 China, its customs, manners, and history ; that he refers
 
 2 12 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 everything to a Chinese origin ; that when he is ques- 
 tioned on the subject, he confuses the events of the day 
 and the business of yesterday with facts relating to China ; 
 that he censures the acts of the Government and the con- 
 duct of the King, though he is personally much attached 
 to him, by comparing them with the politics of China; 
 '"That this monomania has driven the Marquis 
 d'Espard to conduct devoid of all sense: against the 
 customs of men of rank, and, in opposition to his own 
 professed ideas as to the duties of the nobility, he has 
 joined a commercial undertaking, for which he constantly 
 draws bills which, as they fall due, threaten both his 
 honour and his fortune, since they stamp him as a trader, 
 and in default of payment may lead to his being declared 
 insolvent ; that these debts, which are owing to stationers, 
 printers, lithographers, and print-colourists, who have 
 supplied the materials for his publication, called J Pictur- 
 esque History of China, now coming out in parts, are so 
 heavy that these tradesmen have requested the petitioner 
 to apply for a Commission in Lunacy with regard to the 
 Marquis d'Espard in order to save their own credit." ' 
 'The man is mad ! ' exclaimed Bianchon. 
 ' You think so, do you ? ' said his uncle. ' If you 
 listen to only one bell, you hear only one sound.' 
 
 ' But it seems to me ' said Bianchon. 
 
 'But it seems to me,' said Popinot, ' that if any rela- 
 tion of mine wanted to get hold of the management of 
 my affairs, and if, instead of being a humble lawyer, 
 whose colleagues can, any day, verify what his condition 
 is, I were a duke of the realm, an attorney with a little 
 cunning, like Desroches, might bring just such a petition 
 against me.' 
 
 '"That his children's education has been neglected for 
 this monomania ; and that he has taught them, against 
 all the rules of education, the facts of Chinese history, 
 which contradict the tenets of the Catholic Church. He 
 also has them taught the Chinese dialects." '
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 21 j 
 
 * Here Desroches strikes me as funny,' said Bianchon. 
 
 'The petition is drawn up by his head clerk Godeschal, 
 who, as you know, is not strong in Chinese,' said the 
 lawyer. 
 
 '"That he often leaves his children destitute of the 
 most necessary things ; that the petitioner, notwithstand- 
 ing her entreaties, can never see them ; that the said 
 Marquis d'Espard brings them to her only once a year ; 
 that, knowing the privations to which they are exposed, 
 she makes vain efforts to give them the things most 
 
 necessary for their existence, and which they require " 
 
 Oh ! Madame la Marquise, this is preposterous. By 
 proving too much you prove nothing. — My dear boy,' 
 said the old man, laying the document on his knee, 
 'where is the mother who ever lacked heart and wit and 
 yearning to such a degree as to fall below the inspira- 
 tions suggested by her animal instinct ? A mother is as 
 cunning to get at her children as a girl can be in the 
 conduct of a love intrigue. If your Marquise really 
 wanted to give her children food and clothes, the Devil 
 himself would not have hindered her, heh ? That is 
 rather too big a fable for an old lawyer to swallow ! — To 
 proceed.' 
 
 '" That at the age the said children have now attained 
 it is necessary that steps should be taken to preserve 
 them from the evil effects of such an education ; that 
 they should be provided for as beseems their rank, and 
 that they should cease to have before their eyes the sad 
 example of their father's conduct ; 
 
 ' " That there are proofs In support of these allegations 
 which the Court can easily order to be produced. Many 
 times has M. d'Espard spoken of the judge of the Twelfth 
 Arrondissement as a mandarin of the third class ; he 
 often speaks of the professors of the College Henri iv. as 
 ' men of letters ' " — and that offends them ! " In speaking 
 of the simplest things, he says, ' They were not done so 
 in China ' ; in the course of the most ordinary conversa-
 
 214 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 tion he will sometimes allude to Madame Jeanrenaud, 
 or sometimes to events which happened in the time of 
 Louis XIV,, and then sit plunged in the darkest melan- 
 choly ; sometimes he fancies he is in China. Several of 
 his neighbours, among others one Edmc Becker, medical 
 student, and Jean Baptiste Fremiot, a professor, living 
 under the same roof, are of opinion, after frequent inter- 
 course with the Marquis d'Espard, that his monomania 
 with regard to everything Chinese is the result of a 
 scheme laid by the said Baron Jeanrenaud and the widow 
 his mother to bring about the deadening of all the 
 Marquis d'Espard's mental faculties, since the only 
 service which Mme. Jeanrenaud appears to render M. 
 d'Espard is to procure him everything that relates to the 
 Chinese Empire ; 
 
 '"Finally, that the petitioner is prepared to show to 
 the Court that the moneys absorbed by the said Baron 
 and Mme. Jeanrenaud between 1814 and 1828 amount 
 to not less than one million francs. 
 
 ' " In confirmation of the facts herein set forth, the 
 petitioner can bring the evidence of persons who are in 
 the habit of seeing the Marquis d'Espard, whose names 
 and professions are subjoined, many of whom have urged 
 her to demand a commission in lunacy to declare M. 
 d'Espard incapable of managing his own affairs, as being 
 the only way to preserve his fortune from the effects of 
 his maladministration and his children from his fatal 
 influence. 
 
 * " Taking all this into consideration, M. le President, 
 and the affidavits subjoined, the petitioner desires that it 
 may please you, inasmuch as the foregoing facts suffi- 
 ciently prove the insanity and incompetency of the 
 Marquis d'Espard herein described with his titles and 
 residence, to order that, to the end that he may be 
 declared incompetent by law, this petition and the docu- 
 ments in evidence may be laid before the king's public 
 prosecutor j and that you will charge one of the judges
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 215 
 
 of this Court to make his report to you on any day you 
 may be pleased to name, and thereupon to pronounce 
 judgment," etc. 
 
 'And here,' said Popinot, *is the President's order in- 
 structing me ! — Well, what does the Marquise d'Espard 
 want with me ? I know everything. But I shall go 
 to-morrow with my registrar to see M. le Marquis, for 
 this does not seem at all clear to me.' 
 
 ' Listen, my dear uncle, I have never asked the least 
 little favour of you that had to do with your legal func- 
 tions ; well, I now beg you to show Madame d'Espard 
 the kindness which her situation deserves. If she came 
 here, you would listen to her ? ' 
 
 'Yes.' 
 
 ' Well, then, go and listen to her in her own house. 
 Madame d'Espard is a sickly, nervous, delicate woman, 
 who would faint in your rat's hole of a place. Go in the 
 evening, instead of accepting her dinner, since the law 
 forbids your eating or drinking at your client's expense.' 
 
 ' And does not the law forbid you from taking any 
 legacy from your dead ? ' said Popinot, fancying that he 
 saw a touch of irony on his nephew's lips. 
 
 'Come, uncle, if it were only to enable you to get at 
 the truth of this business, grant my request. You will 
 come as the examining judge, since matters do not seem 
 to you very clear. Deuce take it ! It is as necessary to 
 cross-question the Marquise as it is to examine the 
 Marquis.' 
 
 'You are right,' said the lawyer. 'It is quite possible 
 that it is she who is mad. I will go.' 
 
 ' I will call for you. Write down in your engage- 
 ment book : " To-morrow evening at nine, Madame 
 d'Espard." — Good ! ' said Bianchon, seeing his uncle 
 make a note of the engagement. 
 
 Next evening at nine Bianchon mounted his uncle's 
 dusty staircase, and found him at work on the statement
 
 2i6 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 of some complicated judgment. The coat Lavienne 
 had ordered of the tailor had not been sent, so Popinot 
 put on his old stained coat, and was the Popinot un- 
 adorned whose appearance made those laugh who did not 
 know the secrets of his private life. Bianchon, however, 
 obtained permission to pull his cravat straight, and to 
 button his coat, and he hid the stains by crossing the 
 breast of it with the right side over the left, and so dis- 
 playing the new front of the cloth. But in a minute 
 the judge rucked the coat up over his chest by the way 
 in which he stuffed his hands into his pockets, obeying 
 an irresistible habit. Thus the coat, deeply wrinkled 
 both in front and behind, made a sort of hump in the 
 middle of the back, leaving a gap between the waistcoat 
 and trousers through which his shirt showed. Bianchon, 
 to his sorrow, only discovered this crowning absurdity 
 at the moment when his uncle entered the Marquise's 
 room. 
 
 A brief sketch of the person and the career of the lady 
 in whose presence the doctor and the judge now found 
 themselves is necessary for an understanding of her 
 interview with Popinot. 
 
 Madame d'Espard had, for the last seven years, been 
 very much the fashion in Paris, where Fashion can raise 
 and drop by turns various personages who, now great 
 and now small, that is to say, in view or forgotten, are 
 at last quite intolerable — as discarded ministers are, and 
 every kind of decayed sovereignty. These flatterers of 
 the past, odious with their stale pretensions, know every- 
 thing, speak ill of everything, and, like ruined profligates, 
 are friends with all the world. Since her husband had 
 separated from her in 1815, Madame d'Espard must 
 have married in the beginning of 1812. Her children, 
 therefore, were aged respectively fifteen and thirteen. 
 By what luck was the mother of a family, about three- 
 and-thirty years of age, still the fashion ? 
 
 Though Fashion is capricious, and no one can foresee
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 217 
 
 who shall be her favourites, though she often exalts a 
 banker's wife, or some woman of very doubtful elegance 
 and beauty, it certainly seems supernatural when Fashion 
 puts on constitutional airs and gives promotion for age. 
 But in this case Fashion had done as the world did, 
 and accepted Madame d'Espard as still young. 
 
 The Marquise, who was thirty-three by her register of 
 birth, was twenty-two in a drawing-room in the evening. 
 But by what care, what artifice ! Elaborate curls shaded 
 her temples. She condemned herself to live in twilight, 
 affecting illness so as to sit under the protecting tones of 
 light filtered through muslin. Like Diane de Poitiers, 
 she used cold water in her bath, and, like her again, the 
 Marquise slept on a horsehair mattress, with morocco- 
 covered pillows to preserve her hair ; she ate very little, 
 only drank water, and observed monastic regularity in 
 the smallest actions of her life. 
 
 This severe system has, it is said, been carried so far 
 as to the use of ice instead of water, and nothing but 
 cold food, by a famous Polish lady of our day who spends 
 a life, now verging on a century old, after the fashion of 
 a town belle. Fated to live as long as Marion Delorme, 
 whom history has credited with surviving to be a 
 hundred and thirty, the old vice-queen of Poland, at the 
 age of nearly a hundred, has the heart and brain of youth, 
 a charming face, an elegant shape ; and in her conver- 
 sation, sparkling with brilliancy like faggots in the fire, 
 she can compare the men and books of our literature 
 with the men and books of the eighteenth century. 
 Living in Warsaw, she orders her caps of Herbault in 
 Paris. She is a great lady with the amiability of a mere 
 girl ; she swims, she runs like a schoolboy, and can 
 sink on to a sofa with the grace of a young coquette ; 
 she mocks at death, and laughs at life. After having 
 astonished the Emperor Alexander, she can still amaze 
 the Emperor Nicholas by the splendour of her enter- 
 tainments. She can still bring tears to the eyes of a
 
 2 1 8 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 youthful lover, for her age is whatever she pleases, and 
 she has the exquisite self-devotion of a grisette. In 
 short, she is herself a fairy tale, unless, indeed, she is a 
 fairy. 
 
 Had Madame d'Espard knovi^n Madame Zayonseck ? 
 Did she mean to imitate her career ? Be that as it may, 
 the Marquise proved the merits of the treatment ; her 
 complexion was clear, her brow unwrinlcled, her figure, 
 like that of Henri ii.'s lady-love, preserved the lithe- 
 ness, the freshness, the covered charms which bring a 
 woman love and keep it alive. The simple precautions 
 of this course, suggested by art and nature, and per- 
 haps by experience, had met in her with a general 
 system which confirmed the results. The Marquise 
 was absolutely indifferent to everything that was not 
 herself: men amused her, but no man had ever caused 
 her those deep agitations which stir both natures to their 
 depths, and wreck one on the other. She knew neither 
 hatred nor love. When she was offended, she avenged 
 herself coldly, quietly, at her leisure, waiting for the 
 opportunity to gratify the ill-will she cherished against 
 anybody who dwelt in her unfavourable remembrance. 
 She made no fuss, she did not excite herself j she talked, 
 because she knew that by two words a woman may 
 cause the death of three men. 
 
 She had parted from M. d'Espard with the greatest 
 satisfaction. Had he not taken with him two children 
 who at present were troublesome, and in the future would 
 stand in the way of her pretensions ? Her most intimate 
 friends, as much as her least persistent admirers, seeing 
 about her none of Cornelia's jewels, who come and go, 
 and unconsciously betray their mother's age, took her 
 for quite a young woman. The two boys, about whom 
 she seemed so anxious in her petition, were, like their 
 father, as unknown in the world as the north-west 
 passage is unknown to navigators. M. d'Espard 
 was supposed to be an eccentric personage who had
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 219 
 
 deserted his wife without having the smallest cause for 
 complaint against her. 
 
 Mistress of herself at two-and-twenty, and mistress of 
 her fortune of twenty-six thousand francs a year, the 
 Marquise hesitated long before deciding on a course of 
 action and ordering her life. Though she tvsnefited 
 by the expenses her husband had incurred in his house, 
 though she had all the furniture, the carriages, the 
 horses, in short, all the details of a handsome establish- 
 ment, she lived a retired life during the years 181 6, 17, 
 and 18, a time when families were recovering from the 
 disasters resulting from political tempests. She belonged 
 to one of the most important and illustrious families of the 
 Faubourg Saint-Germain, and her parents advised her to 
 live with them as much as possible after the separation 
 forced upon her by her husband's inexplicable caprice. 
 
 In 1820 the Marquise roused herself from her 
 lethargy ; she went to Court, appeared at parties, and 
 entertained in her own house. From 1821 to 1827 she 
 lived in great style, and made herself remarked for her 
 taste and her dress ; she had a day, an hour, for receiv- 
 ing visits, and ere long she had seated herself on the 
 throne, occupied before her by Madame la Vicomtesse 
 de Beauseant, the Duchesse de Langeais, and Madame 
 Firmiani — who on her marriage with M. de Camps had 
 resigned the sceptre in favour of the Duchesse 
 de Maufrigneuse, from whom Madame d'Espard 
 snatched it. The world knew nothing beyond this of 
 the private life of the Marquise d'Espard. She seemed 
 likely to shine for long on the Parisian horizon, like the 
 sun near its setting, but which will never set. 
 
 The Marquise was on terms of great intimacy with a 
 duchess as famous for her beauty as for her attachment 
 to a prince just now in banishment, but accustomed to 
 play a leading part in every prospective government. 
 Madame d'Espard was also the friend of a foreign lady, 
 with whom a famous and very wily Russian diplomate
 
 2 20 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 was in the habit of discussing public affairs. And then 
 an antiquated countess, who was accustomed to shuffle 
 the cards for the great game of politics, had adopted her 
 in a maternal fashion. Thus, to any man of high 
 ambitions, Madame d'Espard was preparing a covert but 
 very real influence to follow the public and frivolous 
 ascendency she now owed to fashion. Her drawing- 
 room was acquiring political individuality : * What do 
 they say at Madame d'Espard's ? ' ' Are they against the 
 measure in Madame d'Espard's drawing-room ? ' were 
 questions repeated by a sufficient number of simpletons 
 to give the flock of the faithful who surrounded her the 
 importance of a coterie. A few damaged politicians 
 whose wounds she had bound up, and whom she flattered, 
 pronounced her as capable in diplomacy as the wife of 
 the Russian ambassador to London. The Marquise 
 had indeed several times suggested to deputies or to 
 peers words and ideas that had rung through Europe. 
 She had often judged correctly of certain events on which 
 her circle of friends dared not express an opinion. The 
 principal persons about the Court came in the evening to 
 play whist in her rooms. 
 
 Then she also had the qualities of her defects ; she 
 was thought to be — and she was — discreet. Her friend- 
 ship seemed to be staunch ; she worked for her proteges 
 with a persistency which showed that she cared less for 
 patronage than for increased influence. This conduct 
 was based on her dominant passion : Vanity. Conquests 
 and pleasure, which so many women love, to her seemed 
 only means to an end ; she aimed at living on every 
 point of the largest circle that life can describe. 
 
 Among the men still young, and to whom the future 
 belonged, who crowded her drawing-room on great 
 occasions, were to be seen MM. de Marsay and de Ron- 
 querolles, de Montriveau, de la Rochc-Hugon, de Serizy, 
 Ferraud, Maxime de Trailles, de Listomere, the two 
 Vandenesses, du Chatelet, and others. She would
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 221 
 
 frequently receive a man whose wife she would not 
 admit, and her power was great enough to induce certain 
 ambitious men to submit to these hard conditions, such 
 as two famous royalist bankers, M. de Nucingen and 
 Ferdinand du Tillet. She had so thoroughly studied the 
 strength and the weakness of Paris life, that her conduct 
 had never given any man the smallest advantage over her. 
 An enormous price might have been set on a note or 
 letter by which she might have compromised herself, 
 without one being produced. 
 
 If an arid soul enabled her to play her part to the life, 
 her person was no less available for it. She had a youth- 
 ful figure. Her voice was, at will, soft and fresh, or 
 clear and hard. She possessed in the highest degree the 
 secret of that aristocratic pose by which a woman wipes 
 out the past. The Marquise knew well the art of setting 
 an immense space between herself and the sort of man who 
 fancies he may be familiar after some chance advances. 
 Her imposing gaze could deny everything. In her con- 
 versation fine and beautiful sentiments and noble 
 resolutions flowed naturally, as it seemed, from a pure 
 heart and soul ; but in reality she was all self, and quite 
 capable of blasting a man who was clumsy in his nego- 
 tiations, at the very time when she was shamelessly 
 making a compromise for the benefit of her own interest. 
 
 Rastignac, in trying to fasten on to this woman, had 
 discerned her to be the cleverest of tools, but he had 
 not yet used it ; far from handling it, he was already 
 finding himself crushed by it. This young Condot- 
 tiere of the brain, condemned, like Napoleon, to give 
 battle constantly, while knowing that a single defeat 
 would prove the grave of his fortunes, had met a 
 dangerous adversary in his protectress. For the first 
 time in his turbulent Hfe, he was playing a game with a 
 partner worthy of him. He saw a place as Minister in 
 the conquest of Madame d'Espard, so he was her tool 
 till he could make her his — a perilous beginning.
 
 222 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 The Hotel d'Espard needed a large household, and the 
 Marquise had a great number of servants. The grand 
 receptions were held in the ground-floor rooms, but she 
 lived on the first floor of the house. The perfect order 
 of a fine staircase splendidly decorated, and rooms fitted 
 in the dignified style which formerly prevailed at Ver- 
 sailles, spoke of an immense fortune. When the judge 
 saw the carriage gates thrown open to admit his nephew's 
 cab, he took in with a rapid glance the lodge, the 
 porter, the courtyard, the stables, the arrangement of the 
 house, the flowers that decorated the stairs, the perfect 
 cleanliness of the banisters, walls, and carpets, and 
 counted the footmen in livery who, as the bell rang, 
 appeared on the landing. His eyes, which only yesterday 
 in his parlour had sounded the dignity of misery under 
 the muddy clothing of the poor, now studied with the 
 same penetrating vision the furniture and splendour of 
 the rooms he passed through, to pierce to the misery of 
 grandeur. 
 
 ' M. Popinot.— M. Bianchon.' 
 
 The two names were pronounced at the door of the 
 boudoir where the Marquise was sitting, a pretty room 
 recently refurnished, and looking out on the garden 
 behind the house. At the moment Madame d'Espard 
 was seated in one of the old rococo armchairs of which 
 Madame had set the fashion. Rastignac was at her left 
 hand on a low chair, in which he looked settled like an 
 Italian lady's ' cousin.' A third person was standing by 
 the corner of the chimney-piece. As the shrewd doctor 
 had suspected, the Marquise was a woman of a parched 
 and wiry constitution. But for her regimen her com- 
 plexion must have taken the ruddy tone that is produced 
 by constant heat ; but she added to the effect of her 
 acquired pallor by the strong colours of the stuffs she 
 hung her rooms with, or in which she dressed. Reddish- 
 brown, marone, bistre with a golden light in it, suited 
 her to perfection. Her boudoir, copied from that of a
 
 The Commissio in Lunacy 223 
 
 famous lady then at the height of fashion in London, 
 was in tan-coloured velvet ; but she had added various 
 details of ornament which moderated the pompous 
 splendour of this royal hue. Her hair was dressed like a 
 girl's in bands ending in curls, which emphasised the 
 rather long oval of her face j but an oval face is as 
 majestic as a round one is ignoble. The mirrors, cut 
 with facets to lengthen or flatten the face at will, amply 
 prove the rule as applied to the physiognomy. 
 
 On seeing Popinot, who stood in the doorway craning 
 his neck like a startled animal, with his left hand in his 
 pocket, and the right hand holding a hat with a greasy 
 lining, the Marquise gave Rastignac a look where lay 
 a germ of mockery. The good man's rather foolish 
 appearance was so completely in harmony with his 
 grotesque figure and scared looks, that Rastignac, catch- 
 ing sight of Bianchon's dejected expression of humilia- 
 tion through his uncle, could not help laughing, and 
 turned away. The Marquise bowed a greeting, and 
 made a great effort to rise from her seat, falling back 
 again, not without grace, with an air of apologising for 
 her incivility by affected weakness. 
 
 At this instant the person who was standing between 
 the fireplace and the door bowed slightly, and pushed 
 forward two chairs, which he offered by a gesture to the 
 doctor and the judge ; then, when they had seated them- 
 selves, he leaned against the wall again, crossing his arms. 
 
 A word as to this man. There is living now, in our 
 day, a painter — Decamps — who possesses in the very 
 highest degree the art of commanding your interest in 
 everything he sets before your eyes, whether it be a stone 
 or a man. In this respect his pencil is more skilful than 
 his brush. He will sketch an empty room and leave a 
 broom against the wall. If he chooses, you shall shudder ; 
 you shall believe that this broom has just been the 
 instrument of crime, and is dripping with blood ; it 
 shall be the broom which the widow Bancal used to
 
 224 ^^^ Commission in Lunacy 
 
 clean out the room where Fualdes was murdered. Yes, 
 the painter will touzle that broom like a man in a rage ; 
 he will make each hair of it stand on end as though it 
 were on your own bristling scalp ; he will make it the 
 interpreter between the secret poem of his imagination 
 and the poem that shall have its birth in yours. After 
 terrifying you by the aspect of that broom, to-morrow he 
 will draw another, and lying by it a cat, asleep, but 
 mysterious in its sleep, shall tell you that this broom is 
 that on which the wife of a German cobbler rides ofF to 
 the Sabbath on the Brocken. Or it will be a quite 
 harmless broom, on which he will hang the coat of a 
 clerk in the Treasury. Decamps had in his brush what 
 Paganini had in his bow — a magnetically communicative 
 power. 
 
 Well, I should have to transfer to my style that 
 
 striking genius, that marvellous knack of the pencil, to 
 
 depict the upright, tall, lean man dressed in black, with 
 
 black hair, who 'stood there without speaking a word. 
 
 This gentleman had a face like a knife-blade, cold and 
 
 harsh, with a colour like Seine water when it is muddy 
 
 and strewn with fragments of charcoal from a sunken 
 
 barge. He looked at the floor, listening and passing 
 
 judgment. His attitude was terrifying. He stood there 
 
 like the dreadful broom to which Decamps has given the 
 
 power of revealing a crime. Now and then, in the 
 
 course of conversation, the Marquise tried to get some 
 
 tacit advice ; but however eager her questioning, he was 
 
 as grave and as rigid as the statue of the Commendatore. 
 
 The worthy Popinot, sitting on the edge of his chair 
 
 in front of the fire, his hat between his knees, stared at 
 
 the gilt chandeliers, the clock, and the curiosities with 
 
 which the chimney-shelf was covered, the velvet and 
 
 trimmings of the curtains, and all the costly and elegant 
 
 nothings that a woman of fashion collects about her. 
 
 He was roused from his homely meditations by Madame 
 
 d'Espard, who addressed him in a piping tone —
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 225 
 
 ' Monsieur, I owe you a million thanks ' 
 
 'A million thanks,' thought he to himself, *that is 
 too many ; it does not mean one.' 
 
 ' For the trouble you condescend ' 
 
 ' Condescend ! ' thought he ; ' she is laughing at me.' 
 
 ' To take in coming to see an unhappy client, who is 
 too ill to go out ' 
 
 Here the lawyer cut the Marquise short by giving her 
 an inquisitorial look, examining the sanitary condition of 
 the unhappy client. 
 
 ' As sound as a bell,' said he to himself. 
 
 'Madame,' said he, assuming a respectful mien, 'you 
 owe me nothing. Although my visit to you is not in 
 strict accordance with the practice of the Court, we 
 ought to spare no pains to discover the truth in cases of 
 this kind. Our judgment is then guided less by the 
 letter of the law than by the promptings of our con- 
 science. Whether I seek the truth here or in my own 
 consulting-room, so long as I find it, all will be well.' 
 
 While Popinot was speaking, Rastignac was shaking 
 hands with Bianchon ; the Marquise welcomed the 
 doctor with a little bow full of gracious significance. 
 
 ' Who is that ? ' asked Bianchon in a whisper of 
 Rastignac, indicating the dark man. 
 
 ' The Chevalier d'Espard, the Marquis's brother.' 
 
 ' Your nephew told me,' said the Marquise to Popinot, 
 ' how much you are occupied, and I know too that you 
 are so good as to wish to conceal your kind actions, so 
 as to release those whom you oblige from the burden 
 of gratitude. The work in Court is most fatiguing, 
 it would seem. Why have they not twice as many 
 judges ? ' 
 
 ' Ah, Madame, that would not be difficult ; we should 
 be none the worse if they had. But when that happens, 
 fowls will cut their teeth ! ' 
 
 As he heard this speech, so entirely in character with 
 the lawyer's appearance, the Chevalier measured him 
 
 P
 
 226 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 from head to foot, out of one eye, as much as to say, 
 ' We shall easily manage him ! ' 
 
 The Marquise looked at Rastignac, who bent over 
 her. 'That is the sort of man,' murmured the dandy in 
 her ear, ' who is trusted to pass judgments on the life 
 and interests of private individuals.' 
 
 Like most men who have grown old in a business, 
 Popinot readily ilet himself follow the habits he had 
 acquired, more particularly habits of mind. His con- 
 versation was all of ' the shop.' He was fond of ques- 
 tioning those he talked to, forcing them to unexpected 
 conclusions, making them tell more than they wished to 
 reveal. Pozzo di Borgo, it is said, used to amuse himself 
 by discovering other folks' secrets, and entangling them 
 in his diplomatic snares, and thus, by invincible habit, 
 showed how his mind was soaked in wiliness. As soon 
 as Popinot had surveyed the ground, so to speak, on 
 which he stood, he saw that it would be necessary to 
 have recourse to the cleverest subtleties, the most elabo- 
 rately wrapped up and disguised, which were in use in the 
 Courts, to detect the truth. 
 
 Bianchon sat cold and stern, as a man who has made 
 up his mind to endure torture without revealing his 
 sufferings ; but in his heart he wished that his uncle 
 could only trample on this woman as we trample on a 
 viper — a comparison suggested to him by the Marquise's 
 long dress, by the curve of her attitude, her long neck, 
 small head, and undulating movements. 
 
 'Well, Monsieur,' said Madame d'Espard, 'however 
 great my dislike to be or seem selfish, I have been suffer- 
 ing too long not to wish that you may settle matters at 
 once. Shall I soon get a favourable decision ? ' 
 
 ' Madame, I will do my best to bring matters to a 
 conclusion,' said Popinot, with an air of frank good- 
 nature. 'Are you ignorant of the reason which made 
 the separation necessary which now subsists between you 
 and the Marquis d'Espard ? '
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 227 
 
 ' Yes, Monsieur,' she replied, evidently prepared with 
 a story to tell. 'At the beginning of 1816 M. d'Espard, 
 whose temper had completely changed within three 
 months or so, proposed that we should go to live on one 
 of his estates near Brian^on, without any regard for my 
 health, which that climate would have destroyed, or for 
 my habits of life ; I refused to go. My refusal gave rise 
 to such unjustifiable reproaches on his part, that from 
 that hour I had my suspicions as to the soundness of his 
 mind. On the following day he left me, leaving me his 
 house and the free use of my own income, and he went 
 to live in the Rue de la Montagne-Saint-Genevieve, 
 taking with him my two children ' 
 
 ' One moment, Madame,' said the lawyer, interrupting 
 her. ' What was that income ? ' 
 
 ' Twenty-six thousand francs a year,' she replied paren- 
 thetically. ' I at once consulted old M. Bordin as to 
 what I ought to do,' she went on ; ' but it seems that 
 there are so many difficulties in the way of depriving a 
 father of the care of his children, that I was forced to 
 resign myself to remaining alone at the age of twenty- 
 two — an age at which many young women do very 
 foolish things. You have read my petition, no doubt. 
 Monsieur ; you know the principal facts on which I 
 rely to procure a Commission in Lunacy with regard to 
 M. d'Espard ? ' 
 
 * Have you ever applied to him, Madame, to obtain the 
 care of your children ? ' 
 
 ' Yes, Monsieur ; but in vain. It is very hard on a 
 mother to be deprived of the affection of her children, 
 particularly when they can give her such happiness as 
 every woman clings to.' 
 
 'The elder must be sixteen,' said Popinot. 
 
 ' Fifteen,' said the Marquise eagerly. 
 
 Here Bianchon and Rastignac looked at each other. 
 Madame d'Espard bit her lips. 
 
 'What can the age of my children matter to you ? '
 
 2 28 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 * Well, Madame,' said the lawyer, without seeming to 
 attach any importance to his words, ' a lad of fifteen and 
 his brother, of thirteen, I suppose, have legs and their 
 wits about them ; they might come to see you on the 
 sly. If they do not, it is because they obey their father, 
 and to obey him in that matter they must love him very 
 dearly.' 
 
 * I do not understand,' said the Marquise. 
 
 * You do not know, perhaps,' replied Popinot, ' that in 
 your petition your attorney represents your children as 
 being very unhappy with their father ? ' 
 
 Madame d'Espard replied with charming innocence — 
 
 'I do not know what my attorney may have put into 
 my mouth.' 
 
 ' P'orgive my inferences,' said Popinot, ' but Justice 
 weighs everything. What I ask you, Madame, is sug- 
 gested by my wish thoroughly to understand the matter. 
 By your account M. d'Espard deserted you on the most 
 frivolous pretext. Instead of going to Brian^on, where 
 he wished to take you, he remained in Paris. This point 
 is not clear. Did he know this Madame Jeanrenaud 
 before his marriage ? ' 
 
 ' No, Monsieur,' replied the Marquise, with some 
 asperity, visible only to Rastignac and the Chevalier 
 d'Espard. 
 
 She was offended at being cross-questioned by this 
 lawyer when she had intended to beguile his judgment ; 
 but as Popinot still looked stupid from sheer absence of 
 mind, she ended by attributing his interrogatory to the 
 Questioning Spirit of Voltaire's bailiff. 
 
 ' My parents,' she went on, ' married me at the age of 
 sixteen to M. d'Espard, whose name, fortune, and mode 
 of life were such as my family looked for in the man who 
 was to be my husband. M. d'Espard was then six-and- 
 twenty ; he was a gentleman in the English sense of the 
 word ; his manners pleased me, he seemed to have plenty 
 of ambition, and I like ambitious people,' she added.
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 229 
 
 looking at Rastignac. ' If M. d'Espard had never met 
 that Madame Jeanrenaud, his character, his learning, his 
 acquirements would have raised him — as his friends then 
 believed — to high office in the Government. King 
 Charles x., at that time Monsieur, had the greatest 
 esteem for him, and a peer's seat, an appointment at 
 Court, some important post certainly would have been 
 his. That woman turned his head, and has ruined all 
 the prospects of my family.' 
 
 ' What were M. d'Espard's religious opinions at that 
 time ? ' 
 
 ' He was, and is still, a very pious man.' 
 
 ' You do not suppose that Madame Jeanrenaud may 
 have influenced him by mysticism ? ' 
 
 ' No, Monsieur.' 
 
 ' You have a very fine house, Madame,' said Popinot 
 suddenly, taking his hands out of his pockets, and rising 
 to pick up his coat-tails and warm himself. 'This 
 boudoir is very nice, those chairs are magnificent, the 
 whole apartment is sumptuous. You must indeed be 
 most unhappy when, seeing yourself here, you know 
 that your children are ill lodged, ill clothed, and ill fed. 
 I can imagine nothing more terrible for a mother.' 
 
 'Yes, indeed. I should be so glad to give the poor 
 httle fellows some amusement, while their father keeps 
 them at work from morning till night at that wretched 
 history of China.' 
 
 'You give handsome balls; they would enjoy them, 
 but they might acquire a taste for dissipation. However, 
 their father might send them to you once or twice in the 
 course of the winter.' 
 
 ' He brings them here on my birthday and on New 
 Year's Day. On those days M. d'Espard does me the 
 favour of dining here with them.' 
 
 'It is very singular behaviour,' said the judge, with an 
 air of conviction. ' Have you ever seen this Dame 
 Jeanrenaud ? '
 
 230 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 ' My brother-in-law one day, out of interest in his 
 brother ' 
 
 ' Ah ! Monsieur is M. d'Espard's bother ? ' said the 
 lawyer, interrupting her. 
 
 The Chevalier bowed, but did not speak. 
 
 'M. d'Espard, who has watched this affair, took me to 
 the Oratoire, where this woman goes to sermon, for she 
 is a Protestant. I saw her ; she is not in the least attrac- 
 tive ; she looks like a butcher's wife, extremely fat, 
 horribly marked with the smallpox ; she has feet and 
 hands like a man's, she squints, in short, she is mon- 
 strous ! ' 
 
 *It is inconceivable,' said the judge, looking like the 
 most imbecile judge in the whole kingdom. 'And this 
 creature lives near here, Rue Verte, in a fine house ? 
 There are no plain folks left, it would seem ? ' 
 
 ' In a mansion on which her son has spent absurd sums.' 
 
 'Madame,' said Popinot, 'I live in the Faubourg 
 Saint-Marceau ; I know nothing of such expenses. 
 What do you call absurd sums ? ' 
 
 ' Well,' said the Marquise, 'a stable with five horses 
 and three carriages, a phaeton, a brougham, and a 
 cabriolet.' 
 
 ' That costs a large sum, then ? ' asked Popinot in 
 surprise. 
 
 ' Enormous sums ! ' said Rastignac, intervening. 
 'Such an establishment would cost, for the stables, the 
 keeping the carriages in order, and the liveries for the 
 men, between fifteen and sixteen thousand francs a year.' 
 
 'Should you think so, Madame?' said the judge, 
 looking much astonished. 
 
 ' Yes, at least,' replied the Marquise. 
 
 'And the furniture, too, must have cost a lot of 
 money ? ' 
 
 ' More than a hundred thousand francs,' replied 
 Madame d'Espard, who could not help smiHng at the 
 lawyer's vulgarity.
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 231 
 
 'Judges, Madame, are apt to be incredulous; it is 
 what they are paid for, and I am incredulous. The 
 Baron Jeanrenaud and his mother must have fleeced M. 
 d'Espard most preposterously, if what you say is correct. 
 There is a stable establishment which, by your account, 
 costs sixteen thousand francs a year. Housekeeping, 
 servants' wages, and the gross expenses of the house 
 itself must run to twice as much ; that makes a total of 
 from fifty to sixty thousand francs a year. Do you sup- 
 pose that these people, formerly so extremely poor, can 
 have so large a fortune ? A million yields scarcely forty 
 thousand a year.' 
 
 ' Monsieur, the mother and son invested the money 
 given them by M. d'Espard in the funds when they were 
 at 60 to 80. I should think their income must be more 
 than sixty thousand francs. And then the son has fine 
 appointments.' 
 
 ' If they spend sixty thousand francs a year,' said the 
 judge, ' how much do you spend ? ' 
 
 'Well,' said Madame d'Espard, 'about the same.' 
 The Chevalier started a little, the Marquise coloured ; 
 Bianchon looked at Rastignac ; but Popinot preserved 
 an expression of simplicity which quite deceived Madame 
 d'Espard. The Chevalier took no part in the conversa- 
 tion ; he saw that all was lost. 
 
 ' These people, Madame, might be indicted before the 
 superior Court,' said Popinot. 
 
 ' That was my opinion,' exclaimed the Marquise, en- 
 chanted. ' If threatened with the police, they would have 
 come to terms.' 
 
 ' Madame,' said Popinot, 'when M. d'Espard left you, 
 did he not give you a power of attorney enabling you to 
 manage and control your own affairs ? ' 
 
 ' I do not understand the object of all these ques- 
 tions,' said the Marquise with petulance. 'It seems 
 to me that if you would only consider the state in 
 which I am placed by my husband's insanity, you 
 
 i«2»
 
 232 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 ought to be troubling yourself about him, and not about 
 me.' 
 
 ' We are coming to that, Madame,' said the judge. 
 'Before placing in your hands, or in any others, the 
 control of M. d'Espard's property, supposing he were 
 pronounced incapable, the Court must inquire as to how 
 you have managed your own. If M. d'Espard gave you 
 power, he would have shown confidence in you, and the 
 Court would recognise the fact. Had you any power 
 from him ? You might have bought or sold house pro- 
 perty or invested money in business ? ' 
 
 * No, Monsieur, the Blamont-Chauvrys are not in the 
 habit of trading,' said she, extremely nettled in her pride 
 as an aristocrat, and forgetting the business in hand. 
 ' My property is intact, and M. d'Espard gave me no 
 power to act.' 
 
 The Chevalier put his hand over his eyes not to 
 betray the vexation he felt at his sister-in-law's short- 
 sightedness, for she was ruining herself by her answers. 
 Popinot had gone straight to the mark in spite of his 
 apparent doublings. 
 
 * Madame,' said the lawyer, indicating the Chevalier, 
 ' this gentleman, of course, is your near connection ? 
 May we speak openly before these other gentlemen i* ' 
 
 'Speak on,' said the Marquise, surprised at this 
 caution. 
 
 'Well, Madame, granting that you spend only sixty 
 thousand francs a year, to any one who sees your stables, 
 your house, your train of servants, and a style of house- 
 keeping which strikes me as far more luxurious than 
 that of the Jeanrenauds, that sum would seem well laid 
 
 out.' 
 
 The Marquise bowed an agreement. 
 
 'But,' continued the judge, 'if you have no more 
 than twenty-six thousand francs a year, you may have a 
 hundred thousand francs of debts. The Court would 
 therefore have a right to imagine that the motives which
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 2^2 
 
 prompt you to ask that your husband may be deprived of 
 the control of his property are complicated by self-interest 
 and the need for paying your debts — if — you — have — 
 any. The requests addressed to me have interested 
 me in your position ; consider fully and make your 
 confession. If my suppositions have hit the truth, there 
 is yet time to avoid the blame which the Court would 
 have a perfect right to express in the saving clauses of 
 the verdict if you could not show your attitude to be 
 absolutely honourable and clear. 
 
 * It is our duty to examine the motives of the appli- 
 cant as well as to listen to the plea of the witness under 
 examination, to ascertain whether the petitioner may 
 not have been prompted by passion, by a desire for 
 money, which is unfortunately too common ' 
 
 The Marquise was on Saint Laurence's gridiron. 
 
 ' And I must have explanations on this point. Madame, 
 I have no wish to call you to account ; I only want to 
 know how you have managed to live at the rate of sixty 
 thousand francs a year, and that for some years past. 
 There are plenty of women who achieve this in their 
 housekeeping, but you are not one of those. Tell me, 
 you may have the most legitimate resources, a royal 
 pension, or some claim on the indemnities lately granted ; 
 but even then you must have had your husband's autho- 
 rity to receive them.' 
 
 The Marquise did not speak. 
 
 'You must remember,' Popinot went on, 'that M. 
 d'Espard may wish to enter a protest, and his counsel 
 will have a right to find out whether you have any 
 creditors. This boudoir is newly furnished, your rooms 
 are not now furnished with the things left to you by M. 
 d'Espard in 18 16. If, as you did me the honour of 
 informing me, furniture is costly for the Jeanrenauds, 
 it must be yet more so for you, who are a great lady. 
 Though I am a judge, I am but a man ; I may be 
 wrong — tell me so. Remember the duties imposed on
 
 234 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 me by the law, and the rigorous inquiries it demands, 
 when the case before it is the suspension from all his 
 functions of the father of a family in the prime of life. 
 So you will pardon me, Madame la Marquise, for laying 
 all these difficulties before you ; it will be easy for you to 
 give me an explanation. 
 
 'When a man is pronounced incapable of the control 
 of his own affairs, a trustee has to be appointed. Who 
 will be the trustee ? ' 
 
 ' His brother,' said the Marquise. 
 
 The Chevalier bowed. There was a short silence, 
 very uncomfortable for the five persons who were present. 
 The judge, in sport as it were, had laid open the 
 woman's sore place. Popinot's countenance of common, 
 clumsy good-nature, at which the Marquise, the Cheva- 
 lier, and Rastignac had been inclined to laugh, had 
 gained importance in their eyes. As they stole a look at 
 him, they discerned the various expressions of that 
 eloquent mouth. The ridiculous mortal was a judge of 
 acumen. His studious notice of the boudoir was 
 accounted for : he had started from the gilt elephant 
 supporting the chimney-clock, examining all this luxury, 
 and had ended by reading this woman's soul. 
 
 ' If the Marquis d'Espard is mad about China, I see 
 that you are not less fond of its products,' said Popinot, 
 looking at the porcelain on the chimney-piece. 'But 
 perhaps it was from M. le Marquis that you had these 
 charming Oriental pieces,' and he pointed to some precious 
 trifles. 
 
 This irony, in very good taste, made Bianchon smile, and 
 petrified Rastignac, while the Marquise bit her thin lips. 
 
 ' Instead of being the protector of a woman placed in 
 a cruel dilemna — an alternative between losing her 
 fortune and her children, and being regarded as her 
 husband's enemy,' she said, 'you accuse me, Monsieur ! 
 You suspect my motives ! You must own that your 
 conduct is strange ! '
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 235 
 
 'Madame,' said the judge eagerly, 'the caution exer- 
 cised by the Court in such cases as these might have given 
 you, in any other judge, a perhaps less indulgent critic 
 than I am. — And do you suppose that M. d'Espard's 
 lawyer will show you anv great consideration ? Will he 
 not be suspicious of motives which may be perfectly pure 
 and disinterested ? Your life will be at his mercy ; he 
 will inquire into it without qualifying his search by the 
 respectful deference I have for you.' 
 
 ' I am much obliged to you. Monsieur,' said the Mar- 
 quise satirically. ' Admitting for the moment that I 
 owe thirty thousand, or fifty thousand francs, in the first 
 place, it would be a mere trifle to the d'Espards and the 
 de Blamont-Chauvrys. But if my husband is not in 
 the possession of his mental faculties, would that prevent 
 his being pronounced incapable ? ' 
 
 ' No, Madame,' said Popinot. 
 
 'Although you have questioned me with a sort of 
 cunning which I should not have expected in a judge, 
 and under circumstances where straightforwardness would 
 have answered your purpose,' she went on, ' I will tell 
 you without subterfuge that my position in the world, 
 and the efforts I have to make to keep up my connection, 
 are not in the least to my taste. I began my life by a 
 long period of solitude ; but my children's interest 
 appealed to me ; I felt that I must fill their father's 
 place. By receiving my friends, by keeping up all this 
 connection, by contracting these debts, I have secured 
 their future welfare ; I have prepared for them a brilliant 
 career where they will find help and favour; and to 
 have what has thus been acquired, many a man of 
 business, lawyer or banker, would gladly pay all it has 
 cost me.' 
 
 ' I appreciate your devoted conduct, Madame,' replied 
 Popinot. ' It does you honour, and I blame you for 
 nothing. A judge belongs to all : he must know and 
 weigh every fact.'
 
 236 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 Madame d'Espard's tact and practice in estimating 
 men made her understand that M. Popinot was not to 
 be influenced by any consideration. She had counted on 
 an ambitious lawyer, she had found a man of conscience. 
 She at once thought of finding other means for securing 
 the success of her side. 
 
 The servants brought in tea. 
 
 * Have you any further explanations to give me, 
 Madame ? ' said Popinot, seeing these preparations. 
 
 * Monsieur,' she replied haughtily, ' do your business 
 your own way ; question M. d'Espard, and you will pity 
 me, I am sure.' She raised her head, looking Popinot 
 in the face with pride, mingled with impertinence j the 
 worthy man bowed himself out respectfully. 
 
 ' A nice man is your uncle,' said Rastignac to 
 Bianchon. ' Is he really so dense ? Does not he know 
 what the Marquise d'Espard is, what her influence means, 
 her unavowed power over people ? The Keeper of the 
 Seals will be with her to-morrow ' 
 
 ' My dear fellow, how can I help it ? ' said Bianchon. 
 ' Did not I warn you ? He is not a man you can get over.' 
 
 ' No,' said Rastignac ; ' he is a man you must run over.' 
 
 The doctor was obliged to make his bow to the 
 Marquise and her mute Chevalier to catch up Popinot, 
 who, not being the man to endure an embarrassing 
 position, was pacing through the rooms. 
 
 *That woman owes a hundred thousand crowns,' said 
 the judge, as he stepped into his nephew's cab. 
 
 ' And what do you think of the case ? ' 
 
 'I,' said the judge. *I never have an opinion till I 
 have gone into everything. To-morrow early I will 
 send to Madame Jeanrenaud to call on me in my private 
 office at four o'clock, to make her explain the facts which 
 concern her, for she is compromised.' 
 
 * I should very much like to know what the end 
 will be.' 
 
 * Why, bless me, do not you see that the Marquise is
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 237 
 
 the tool of that tall lean man who never uttered a word ? 
 There is a strain of Cain in him, but of the Cain who 
 goes to the Law Courts for his bludgeon, and there, 
 unluckily for him, we keep more than one Damocles' 
 sword.' 
 
 ' Oh, Rastignac ! what brought you into that boat, I 
 wonder ? ' exclaimed Bianchon. 
 
 'Ah, we are used to seeing these little family con- 
 spiracies,' said Popinot. ' Not a year passes without a 
 number of verdicts of "insufficient evidence" against 
 applications of this kind. In our state of society such 
 an attempt brings no dishonour, while we send a poor 
 devil to the galleys if he breaks a pane of glass dividing 
 him from a bowl full of gold. Our Code is not faultless.' 
 
 ' But these are the facts ? ' 
 
 'My boy, do you not know all the judicial romances 
 with which clients impose on their attorneys ? If the 
 attorneys condemned themselves to state nothing but 
 the truth, they would not earn enough to keep their 
 office open.' 
 
 Next day, at four in the afternoon, a very stout 
 dame, looking a good deal like a cask dressed up in 
 a gown and belt, mounted Judge Popinot's stairs, per- 
 spiring and panting. She had, with great difficulty, got 
 out of a green landau, which suited her to a miracle ; 
 you could not think of the woman without the landau, 
 or the landau without the woman. 
 
 ' It is I, my dear sir,' said she, appearing in the door- 
 way of the judge's room. ' Madame Jeanrenaud, whom 
 you summoned exactly as if I were a thief, neither more 
 nor less.' 
 
 The common words were spoken in a common voice, 
 broken by the wheezing of asthma, and ending in a cough. 
 
 ' When I go through a damp place, I can't tell you 
 what I suffer, sir. I shall never make old bones, saving 
 your presence. However, here I am.'
 
 238 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 The lawyer was quite amazed at the appearance of 
 this supposed Marechale d'Ancre. Madame Jeanre- 
 naud's face was pitted with an infinite number of little 
 holes, was very red, with a pug nose and a low forehead, 
 and was as round as a ball ; for everything about the 
 good woman was round. She had the bright eyes of a 
 country woman, an honest gaze, a cheerful tone, and 
 chestnut hair held in place by a bonnet cap under a green 
 bonnet decked with a shabby bunch of auriculas. Her 
 stupendous bust was a thing to laugh at, for it made one 
 fear some grotesque explosion every time she coughed. 
 Her enormous legs were of the shape which make the 
 Paris street boy describe such a woman as being built on 
 piles. The widow wore a green gown trimmed with 
 chinchilla, which looked on her as a splash of dirty oil 
 would look on a bride's veil. In short, everything about 
 her harmonised with her last words : ' Here I am.' 
 
 * Madame,' said Popinot, 'you are suspected of having 
 used some seductive arts to induce M. d'Espard to hand 
 over to you very considerable sums of money.' 
 
 * Of what! of what!' cried she. ' Of seductive arts .>' 
 But, my dear sir, you are a man to be respected, and, 
 moreover, as a lawyer you ought to have some good 
 sense. Look at me ! Tell me if I am likely to seduce 
 any one. I cannot tie my own shoes, nor even stoop. 
 For these twenty years past, the Lord be praised, I have 
 not dared to put on a pair of stays under pain of sudden 
 death. I was as thin as an asparagus stalk when I was 
 seventeen, and pretty too — I may say so now. So I 
 married Jeanrenaud, a good fellow, and head-man on the 
 salt-barges. I had my boy, who is a fine young man ; 
 he is my pride, and it is not holding myself cheap to say 
 he is my best piece of work. My little Jeanrenaud was 
 a soldier who did Napoleon credit, and who served in the 
 Imperial Guard. But, alas ! at the death of my old man, 
 who was drowned, times changed for the worse. I had 
 the smallpox. I was kept two years in my room with-
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 239 
 
 out stirring, and I came out of it the size you see me, 
 hideous for ever, and as wretched as could be. These 
 are my seductive arts.' 
 
 'But w^hat, then, can the reasons be that have induced 
 M. d'Espard to give you sums ? ' 
 
 ' Hugious sums. Monsieur, say the w^ord ; I do not 
 mind. But as to his reasons, I am not at liberty to 
 explain them.' 
 
 'You are wrong. At this moment, his family, very 
 naturally alarmed, are about to bring an action ' 
 
 ' Heavens above us ! ' said the good woman, starting 
 up. ' Is it possible that he should be worried on my 
 account ? That king of men, a man that has not his 
 match ! Rather than he should have the smallest trouble, 
 or a hair less on his head I could almost say, we would 
 return every sou. Monsieur. Write that down on your 
 papers. Heaven above us ! I will go at once and 
 tell Jeanrenaud what is going on ! A pretty thing 
 indeed ! ' 
 
 And the little old woman went out, rolled herself 
 downstairs, and disappeared. 
 
 ' That one tells no lies,' said Popinot to himself. 
 ' Well, to-morrow I shall know the whole story, for I 
 shall go to see the Marquis d'Espard.' 
 
 People who have outlived the age when a man wastes 
 his vitality at random, know how great an influence may 
 be exercised on more important events by apparently 
 trivial incidents, and will not be surprised at the weight 
 here given to the following minor fact. Next day 
 Popinot had an attack of coryza, a complaint which is 
 not dangerous, and generally known by the absurd and 
 inadequate name of a cold in the head. 
 
 The judge, who could not suppose that the delay 
 could be serious, feeling himself a little feverish, kept 
 his room, and did not go to see the Marquis d'Espard. 
 This day lost was, to this affair, what on the Day of 
 Dupes the cup of soup had been, taken by Marie de
 
 240 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 Medici, which, by delaying her meeting with Louis xiii., 
 enabled Richelieu to arrive at Saint-Germain before her, 
 and recapture his royal slave. 
 
 Before accompanying the lawyer and his registering 
 cleric to the Marquis d'Espard's house, it may be as well 
 to glance at the home and the private affairs of this 
 father of sons whom his wife's petition represented to be 
 a madman. 
 
 Here and there in the old parts of Paris a few build- 
 ings may still be seen in which the archaeologist can 
 discern an intention of decorating the city, and that love 
 of property which leads the owner to give a durable 
 character to the structure. The house in which M. 
 d'Espard was then living, in the Rue de la Montagne- 
 Sainte-Genevieve, was one of these old mansions, built 
 in stone, and not devoid of a certain richness of style ; 
 but time had blackened the stone, and revolutions in 
 the town had damaged it both outside and inside. The 
 dignitaries who formerly dwelt in the neighbourhood of 
 the University having disappeared v/ith the great 
 ecclesiastical foundations, this house had become the 
 home of industries and of inhabitants whom it was never 
 destined to shelter. During the last century a printing 
 establishment had worn down the polished floors, soiled 
 the carved wood, blackened the walls, and altered the 
 principal internal arrangements. Formerly the residence 
 of a Cardinal, this fine house was now divided among 
 plebeian tenants. The character of the architecture 
 showed that it had been built under the reigns of 
 Henry iii., Henry iv., and Louis xiii., at the time when 
 the hotels Mignon and Serpente were erected in the 
 same neighbourhood, with the palace of the Princess 
 Palatine, and the Sorbonne. An old man could 
 remember having heard it called, in the last century, 
 the hotel Duperron, so it seemed probable that the 
 illustrious Cardinal of that name had built, or perhaps 
 merely lived in it.
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 241 
 
 There still exists, indeed, in the corner of the court- 
 yard, a perron or flight of several outer steps by which 
 the house is entered ; and the way into the garden on the 
 garden front is down a similar flight of steps. In spite 
 of dilapidations, the luxury lavished by the architect 
 on the balustrade and entrance porch crowning these 
 two perrons suggests the simple-minded purpose of com- 
 memorating the owner's name, a sort of sculptured pun 
 which our ancestors often allowed themselves. Finally, 
 in support of this evidence, archaeologists can still 
 discern in the medallions which show on the principal 
 front some traces of the cords of the Roman hat. 
 
 M. le Marquis d'Espard lived on the ground floor, 
 in order, no doubt, to enjoy the garden, which might be 
 called spacious for that neighbourhood, and which lay 
 open to the south, two advantages imperatively necessary 
 for his children's health. The situation of the house, in 
 a street on a steep hill, as its name indicates, secured 
 these ground-floor rooms against ever being dam.p. M. 
 d'Espard had taken them, no doubt, for a very moderate 
 price, rents being low at the time when he settled in 
 that quarter, in order to be among the schools and to 
 superintend his boys' education. Moreover, the state in 
 which he found the place, with everything to repair, had 
 no doubt induced the owner to be accommodating. 
 Thus M. d'Espard had been able to go to some expense 
 to settle himself suitably without being accused of extra- 
 vagance. The loftiness of the rooms, the panelling, of 
 which nothing survived but the frames, the decoration 
 of the ceilings, all displayed the dignity which the 
 prelacy stamped on whatever it attempted or created, 
 and which artists discern to this day in the smallest relic 
 that remains, though it be but a book, a dress, the panel 
 of a bookcase, or an armchair. 
 
 The Marquis had the rooms painted in the rich 
 brown tones beloved of the Dutch and of the citizens 
 of Old Paris, hues which lend such good effects to the
 
 ^42 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 painter of genre. The panels were hung with plain 
 paper in harmony with the paint. The window curtains 
 were of inexpensive materials, but chosen so as to pro- 
 duce a generally happy result ; the furniture was not 
 too crowded and judiciously placed. Any one on going 
 into this home could not resist a sense of sweet peace- 
 fulness, produced by the perfect calm, the stillness which 
 prevailed, by the unpretentious unity of colour, the 
 keeping of the picture, in the words a painter might use. 
 A certain nobleness in the details, the exquisite cleanli- 
 ness of the furniture, and a perfect concord of men and 
 things, all brought the word * suavity' to the lips. 
 
 Few persons were admitted to the rooms used by the 
 Marquis and his two sons, whose life might perhaps 
 seem mysterious to their neighbours. In a wing towards 
 the street, on the third floor, there are three large rooms 
 which had been left in the state of dilapidation and 
 grotesque bareness to which they had been reduced by 
 the printing works. These three rooms, devoted to 
 the evolution of the Picturesque History of China, were 
 contrived to serve as a writing-room, a depository, and a 
 private room, where M. d'Espard sat during part of the 
 day ; for after breakfast till four in the afternoon the 
 Marquis remained in this room on the third floor to 
 work at the publication he had undertaken. Visitors 
 wanting to see him commonly found him there, and 
 often the two boys on their return from school resorted 
 thither. Thus the ground-floor rooms were a sort of 
 sanctuary where the father and sons spent their time from 
 the hour of dinner till the next day, and his domestic 
 life was carefully closed against the public eye. 
 
 His only servants were a cook — an old woman who 
 had long been attached to his family, and a man-servant 
 forty years old, who was with him when he married 
 Mademoiselle de Blamont. His children's nurse had also 
 remained with them, and the minute care to which the 
 apartment bore witness revealed the sense of order and
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 243 
 
 the maternal affection expended by this woman in her 
 master's interest, in the management of his house, and 
 the charge of his children. These three good souls, 
 grave and uncommunicative folks, seemed to have entered 
 into the idea which ruled the Marquis's domestic life. 
 And the contrast between their habits and those of most 
 servants was a peculiarity which cast an air of mystery 
 over the house, and fomented the calumny to which M. 
 d'Espard himself lent occasion. Very laudable motives 
 had made him determine never to be on visiting terms 
 with any of the other tenants in the house. In under- 
 taking to educate his boys he wished to keep them from 
 all contact with strangers. Perhaps, too, he wished to 
 avoid the intrusion of neighbours. 
 
 In a man of his rank, at a time when the ^uartier 
 Latin was distracted by Liberalism, such conduct was 
 sure to rouse in opposition a host of petty passions, of 
 feelings whose folly is only to be measured by their 
 meanness, the outcome of porters' gossip and malevolent 
 tattle from door to door, all unknown to M. d'Espard 
 and his retainers. His man-servant was stigmatised as a 
 Jesuit, his cook as a sly fox ; the nurse was in collusion 
 with Madame Jeanrenaud to rob the madman. The 
 madman was the Marquis. By degrees the other tenants 
 came to regard as proofs of madness a number of things 
 they had noticed in M. d'Espard, and passed through the 
 sieve of their judgment without discerning any reasonable 
 motive for them. 
 
 Having no belief in the success of the History of China^ 
 they had managed to convince the landlord of the house 
 that M. d'Espard had no money just at a time when, 
 with the forgetfulness which often befalls busy men, he 
 had allowed the tax-collector to send him a summons for 
 non-payment of arrears. The landlord had forthwith 
 claimed his quarter's rent from January ist by sending 
 in a receipt, which the porter's wife had amused herself 
 'by detaining. On the 15th a summons to pay was
 
 244 '^^^ Commission in Lunacy 
 
 served on M. d'Espard, the portress had delivered it at 
 her leisure, and he supposed it to be some misunder- 
 standino-, not conceiving of any incivility from a man 
 in whose house he had been living for twelve years. 
 The Marquis was actually seized by a bailiff at the time 
 when his man-servant had gone to carry the money for 
 the rent to the landlord. 
 
 This arrest, insidiously reported to the persons with 
 whom he was in treaty for his undertaking, had alarmed 
 some of them who were already doubtful of M. d'Espard's 
 solvency in consequence of the enormous sums which 
 Baron Jeanrenaud and his mother were said to be receiv- 
 ing from him. And, indeed, these suspicions on the 
 part of the tenants, the creditors, and the landlord had 
 some excuse in the Marquis's extreme economy in 
 housekeeping. He conducted it as a ruined man might. 
 His servants always paid in ready money for the most 
 trifling necessaries of life, and acted as not choosing 
 to take credit ; if now they had asked for anything on 
 credit, it would probably have been refused, calum- 
 nious gossip had been so widely believed in the neigh- 
 bourhood. There are tradesmen who like those of their 
 customers who pay badly when they see them often, 
 while they hate others, and very good ones, who hold 
 themselves on too high a level to allow of any familiarity 
 as churns^ a vulgar but expressive word. Men are made 
 so ; in almost every class they will allow to a gossip, or a 
 vulgar soul that flatters them, facilities and favours they 
 refuse to the superiority they resent, in whatever form it 
 may show itself. The shopkeeper who rails at the Court 
 has his courtiers. 
 
 In short, the manners of the Marquis and his children 
 were certain to arouse ill-feeling in their neighbours, and 
 to work them up by degrees to the pitch of malevolence 
 when men do not hesitate at an act of meanness if only it 
 may damage the adversary they have themselves created. 
 
 M. d'Espard was a gentleman, as his wife was a lady,
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 245 
 
 by birth and breeding ; noble types, already so rare in 
 France that the observer can easily count the persons 
 who perfectly realise them. These two characters are 
 based on primitive ideas, on beliefs that may be called 
 innate, on habits formed in infancy, and which have 
 ceased to exist. To believe in pure blood, in a privileged 
 race, to stand in thought above other men, must we not 
 from birth have measured the distance which divides 
 patricians from the mob ? To command, must we not 
 have never met our equal ? And finally, must not edu- 
 cation inculcate the ideas with which Nature inspires 
 those great men on whose brow she has placed a crown 
 before their mother has ever set a kiss there ? These 
 ideas, this education, are no longer possible in France, 
 where for forty years past chance has arrogated the right 
 of making noblemen by dipping them in the blood of 
 battles, by gilding them with glory, by crowning them 
 with the halo of genius ; where the abolition of entail 
 and of eldest sonship, by frittering away estates, compels 
 the nobleman to attend to his own business instead of 
 attending to affairs of state, and where personal greatness 
 can only be such greatness as is acquired by long and 
 patient toil : quite a new era. 
 
 Regarded as a relic of that great institution known 
 as feudalism, M. d'Espard deserved respectful admiration. 
 If he believed himself to be by blood the superior of 
 other men, he also believed in all the obligations of 
 nobility j he had the virtues and the strength it de- 
 mands. He had brought up his children in his own 
 principles, and taught them from the cradle the religion 
 of their caste. A deep sense of their own dignity, pride 
 of name, the conviction that they were by birth great, 
 gave rise in them to a kingly pride, the courage of 
 knights, and the protecting kindness of a baronial lord ; 
 their manners, harmonising with their notions, would 
 have become princes, and offended all the world of the 
 Rue de la Montagne-Sainte-Genevieve — a world, above
 
 246 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 all others, of equality, where every one believed that M. 
 d'Espard was ruined, and where all, from the lowest to 
 the highest, refused the privileges of nobility to a noble- 
 man without money, because they all were ready to 
 allow an enriched bourgeois to usurp them. Thus the 
 lack of communion between this family and other persons 
 was as much moral as it was physical. 
 
 In the father and the children alike, their personality 
 harmonised with the spirit within. M. d'Espard, at this 
 time about fifty, might have sat as a model to represent 
 the aristocracy of birth in the nineteenth century. He 
 was slight and fair ; there was in the outline and general 
 expression of his face a native distinction which spoke of 
 lofty sentiments, but it bore the impress of a deliberate 
 coldness which commanded respect a little too decidedly. 
 His aquiline nose bent at the tip from left to right, a 
 slight crookedness which was not devoid of grace ; his 
 blue eyes, his high forehead, prominent enough at the 
 brows to form a thick ridge that checked the light and 
 shaded his eyes, all indicated a spirit of rectitude, capable 
 of perseverance and perfect loyalty, while it gave a 
 singular look to his countenance. This pent-house 
 forehead might, in fact, hint at a touch of madness, and 
 his thick-knitted eyebrows added to the apparent eccen- 
 tricity. He had the white well-kept hands of a gentle- 
 man ; his foot was high and narrow. His hesitating 
 speech — not merely as to his pronunciation, which was 
 that of a stammerer, but also in the expression of his 
 ideas, his thought, and language — produced on the mind 
 of the hearer the impression of a man who, in familiar 
 phraseology, comes and goes, feels his way, tries every- 
 thing, breaks off his gestures, and finishes nothing. This 
 defect was purely superficial, and in contrast with the 
 decisiveness of a firmly-set mouth, and the strongly- 
 marked character of his physiognomy. His rather jerky 
 gait matched his mode of speech. These peculiarities 
 helped to affirm his supposed insanity. In spite of his
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 247 
 
 elegant appearance, he was systematically parsimonious 
 in his personal expenses, and wore the same black frock- 
 coat for three or four years, brushed with extreme care 
 by his old man-servant. 
 
 As to the children, they both were handsome, and 
 endowed with a grace which did not exclude an expres- 
 sion of aristocratic disdain. They had the bright colour- 
 ing, the clear eye, the transparent flesh which reveal 
 habits of purity, regularity of life, and a due proportion 
 of work and play. They both had black hair and blue 
 eyes, and a twist in their nose, like their father ; but 
 their mother, perhaps, had transmitted to them the 
 dignity of speech, of look and mien, which are hereditary 
 in the Blamont-Chauvrys. Their voices, as clear as 
 crystal, had an emotional quality, the softness which 
 proves so seductive ; they had, in short, the voice a 
 woman would willingly listen to after feeling the flame 
 of their looks. But, above all, they had the modesty of 
 pride, a chaste reserve, a touch-me-not which at a maturer 
 age might have seemed intentional coyness, so much 
 did their demeanour inspire a wish to know them. The 
 elder, Comte Clement de Negrepelisse, was close upon 
 his sixteenth year. For the last two years he had 
 ceased to wear the pretty English round jacket which his 
 brother, Vicomte Camille d'Espard, still wore. The 
 Count, who for the last six months went no more to the 
 College Henri iv., was dressed in the style of a young 
 man enjoying the first pleasures of fashion. His father 
 had not wished to condemn him to a year's useless study 
 of philosophy ; he was trying to give his knowledge 
 some consistency by the study of transcendental mathe- 
 matics. At the same time, the Marquis was having him 
 taught Eastern languages, the international law of Europe, 
 heraldry, and history from the original sources — charters, 
 early documents, and collections of edicts. Camille had 
 lately begun to study rhetoric. 
 
 The day when Popinot arranged to go to question M,
 
 248 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 d'Espard was a Thursday, a holiday. At about nine in 
 the morning, before their father was awake, the brothers 
 were playing in the garden. Clement was finding it 
 hard to refuse his brother, who was anxious to go to the 
 shooting gallery for the first time, and who begged him 
 to second his request to the Marquis. The Viscount 
 always rather took advantage of his weakness, and was 
 very fond of wrestling with his brother. So the couple 
 were quarrelling and fighting in play like schoolboys. 
 As they ran in the garden, chasing each other, they made 
 so much noise as to wake their father, who came to the 
 window without their perceiving him in the heat of the 
 frav. The Marquis amused himself with watching his 
 two children twisted together like snakes, their faces 
 flushed by the exertion of their strength ; their com- 
 plexion was rose and white, their eyes flashed sparks, 
 their limbs writhed like cords in the fire ; they fell, 
 sprang up again, and caught each other like athletes in 
 a circus, affording their father one of those moments of 
 happiness which would make amends for the keenest 
 anxieties of a busy life. Two other persons, one on the 
 second and one on the first floor, were also looking into 
 the garden, and saying that the old madman was amusing 
 himself by making his children fight. Immediately a 
 number of heads appeared at the windows ; the Mar- 
 quis, noticing them, called a word to his sons, who at 
 once climbed up to the window and jumped into his 
 room, and Clement obtained the permission asked by 
 Camille. 
 
 All through the house every one was talking of the 
 Marquis's new form of insanity. When Popinot arrived 
 at about twelve o'clock, accompanied by his clerk, the 
 portress, when he asked for M. d'Espard, conducted 
 him to the third floor, telling him 'as how M. d'Espard, 
 no longer ago than that very morning, had set on his 
 two children to fight, and laughed like the monster he 
 was on seeing the younger biting the elder till he bled,
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 249 
 
 and as how no doubt he longed to see them kill each 
 other. — Don't ask me the reason why,' she added ; ' he 
 doesn't know himself! ' 
 
 Just as the woman spoke these decisive words, she had 
 brought the judge to the landing on the third floor, face 
 to face with a door covered with notices announcing the 
 successive numbers of the Picturesque History of China. 
 The muddy floor, the dirty banisters, the door where 
 the printers had left their marks, the dilapidated window, 
 and the ceiling on which the apprentices had amused 
 themselves with drawing monstrosities with the smoky 
 flare of their tallow dips, the piles of paper and Htter 
 heaped up in the corners, intentionally or from sheer 
 neglect — in short, every detail of the picture lying before 
 his eyes, agreed so well with the facts alleged by the 
 Marquise that the judge, in spite of his impartiality, 
 could not help believing them. 
 
 ' There you are, gentlemen,' said the porter's wife j 
 'there is the manifactor, where the Chinese swallow up 
 enough to feed the whole neighbourhood.' 
 
 The clerk looked at the judge with a smile, and 
 Popinot found it hard to keep his countenance. They 
 went together into the outer room, where sat an old man, 
 who, no doubt, performed the functions of office clerk, 
 shopman, and cashier. This old man was the Maitre 
 Jacques of China. Along the walls ran long shelves, on 
 which the published numbers lay in piles. A partition 
 in wood, with a grating lined with green curtains, cut 
 off the end of the room, forming a private office. A till 
 with a slit to admit or disgorge crown pieces indicated 
 the cash-desk. 
 
 ' M. d'Espard ? ' said Popinot, addressing the man, who 
 wore a grey blouse. 
 
 The shopman opened the door into the next room, 
 where the lawyer and his companion saw a venerable 
 old man, white-headed and simply dressed, wearing the 
 Cross of Saint-Louis, seated at a desk. He ceased com-
 
 250 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 paring some sheets of coloured prints to look up at the 
 two visitors. This room was an unpretentious office, 
 full of books and proof-sheets. There was a black wood 
 table at which some one, at the moment absent, no doubt 
 was accustomed to work. 
 
 ' The Marquis d'Espard ? ' said Popinot. 
 
 ' No, Monsieur,' said the old man, rising ; ' what do 
 you want with him ? ' he added, coming forward, and 
 showing by his demeanour the dignified manners and 
 habits due to a gentlemanly education. 
 
 *We wish to speak to him on business exclusively 
 personal to himself,' replied Popinot. 
 
 ' D'Espard, here are some gentlemen who want to see 
 you,' then said the old man, going into the furthest room, 
 where the Marquis was sitting by the fire reading the 
 newspaper. 
 
 This innermost room had a shabby carpet, the windows 
 were hung with grey holland curtains; the furniture con- 
 sisted of a few mahogany chairs, two armchairs, a desk 
 with a revolving front, an ordinary office table, and, on 
 the chimney-shelf, a dingy clock and two old candle- 
 sticks. The old man led the way for Popinot and his 
 registrar, and pulled forward two chairs, as though he 
 were master of the place ; M. d'Espard left it to him. 
 After the preliminary civilities, during which the judge 
 watched the supposed lunatic, the Marquis naturally 
 asked what was the object of this visit. On this Popinot 
 glanced significantly at the old gentleman and the 
 Marquis. 
 
 ' I believe. Monsieur le Marquis,' said he, ' that the 
 character of my functions, and the inquiry that has 
 brought me here, make it desirable that we should be 
 alone, thous^h it is understood bv law that in such cases 
 the inquiries have a sort of family publicity. I am 
 judge on the Inferior Court of Appeal for the Department 
 of the Seine, and charged by the President with the 
 duty of examining you as to certain facts set forth in a
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 251 
 
 petition for a Commission in Lunacy on the part of the 
 Marquise d'Espard.' 
 
 The old man withdrew. When the lawyer and the 
 Marquis were alone, the clerk shut the door, and seated 
 himself unceremoniously at the office table, where he 
 laid out his papers and prepared to take down his notes. 
 Popinot had still kept his eye on M. d'Espard ; he was 
 watching the effect on him of this crude statement, so 
 painful for a man in full possession of his reason. The 
 Marquis d'Espard, whose face was usually pale, as are 
 those of fair men, suddenly turned scarlet with anger ; he 
 trembled for an instant, sat down, laid his paper on the 
 chimney-piece, and looked down. In a moment he had 
 recovered his gentlemanly dignity, and looked steadily at 
 the judge, as if to read in his countenance the indications 
 of his character. 
 
 'How is it. Monsieur,' he asked, 'that I have had no 
 notice of such a petition ? ' 
 
 ' Monsieur le Marquis, persons on whom such a com- 
 mission is held, not being supposed to have the use of 
 their reason, any notice of the petition is unnecessary. 
 The duty of the Court chiefly consists in verifying the 
 allegations of the petitioner.' 
 
 ' Nothing can be fairer,' replied the Marquis. ' Well, 
 then. Monsieur, be so good as to tell me what I ought 
 to do ' 
 
 'You have only to answer my questions, omitting 
 nothing. However delicate the reasons may be which 
 may have led you to act in such a manner as to give 
 Madame d'Espard a pretext for her petition, speak with- 
 out fear. It is unnecessary to assure you that lawyers 
 know their duties, and that in such cases the profoundest 
 
 secrecy ' 
 
 - 'Monsieur,' said the Marquis, whose face expressed 
 the sincerest pain, ' if my explanations should lead to any 
 blame being attached to Madame d'Espard's conduct, 
 what will be the result ? '
 
 252 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 ' The Court may add its censure to its reasons for its 
 decision.' 
 
 ' Is such censure optional ? If I were to stipulate with 
 you, before replying, that nothing should be said that 
 could annoy Madame d'Espard in the event of your 
 report being in my favour, would the Court take my 
 request into consideration ? ' 
 
 The judge looked at the Marquis, and the two men 
 exchanged sentiments of equal magnanimity. 
 
 ' Noel,' said Popinot to his registrar, 'go into the other 
 room. If you can be of use, I will call you in. — If, as I 
 am inclined to think,' he went on, speaking to the 
 Marquis when the clerk had gone out, ' I find that there 
 is some misunderstanding in this case, I can promise 
 you. Monsieur, that on your application the Court will 
 act with due courtesy. 
 
 'There is a leading fact put forward by Madame 
 d'Espard, the most serious of all, of which I must beg 
 for an explanation,' said the judge after a pause. ' It 
 refers to the dissipation of your fortune to the advantage 
 of a certain Madame Jeanrenaud, the widow of a barge- 
 master — or rather, to that of her son. Colonel Jeanrenaud, 
 for whom you are said to have procured an appointment, 
 to have exhausted your influence with the King, and at 
 last to have extended such protection as secures him a 
 good marriage. The petition suggests that such a friend- 
 ship is more devoted than any feelings, even those which 
 morality must disapprove ' 
 
 A sudden flush crimsoned the Marquis's face and fore- 
 head, tears even started to his eyes, for his eyelashes were 
 wet, then wholesome pride crushed the emotions, which 
 in a man are accounted a weakness. 
 
 'To tell you the truth. Monsieur,' said the Marquis, 
 in a broken voice, 'you place me in a strange dilemma. 
 The motives of my conduct were to have died with me. 
 To reveal them I must disclose to you some secret 
 wounds, must place the honour of my family in your
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 2^2 
 
 keeping, and must speak of myself, a delicate matter, as 
 you will fully understand. I hope, Monsieur, that it 
 will all remain a secret between us. You will, no doubt, 
 be able to find in the formulas of the law one which will 
 allow of judgment being pronounced without any be- 
 trayal of my confidences.' 
 
 'So far as that goes, it is perfectly possible, Monsieur 
 le Marquis.' 
 
 'Some time after my marriage,' said M. d'Espard, 'my 
 wife having run into considerable expenses, I was obliged 
 to have recourse to borrowing. You know what was 
 the position of noble families during the Revolution ; I 
 had not been able to keep a steward or a man of business. 
 Nowadays gentlemen are for the most part obliged to 
 manage their affairs themselves. Most of my title-deeds 
 had been brought to Paris, from Languedoc, Provence, 
 or le Comtat, by my father, who dreaded, and not with- 
 out reason, the inquisition which family title-deeds, and 
 what were then styled the "parchments" of the privileged 
 class, brought down on the owners. 
 
 ' Our name is Negrepelisse ; d'Espard is a title acquired 
 in the time of Henry iv. by a marriage which brought 
 us the estates and titles of the house of d'Espard, on con- 
 dition of our bearing an escutcheon of pretence on our 
 coat-of-arms, those of the house of d'Espard, an old 
 family of Beam, connected in the female line with that 
 of Albret : quarterly, paly of or and sable ; and azure two 
 griffins' claws armed, gules in saltire, with the famous 
 motto Des partem leonis. At the time of this alliance 
 we lost Negrepelisse, a little town which was as famous 
 during the religious struggles as was my ancestor who 
 then bore the name. Captain de Negrepelisse was ruined 
 by the burning of all his property, for the Protestants 
 did not spare a friend of Montluc's. 
 
 'The Crown was unjust to M. de Negrepelisse; he 
 received neither a marshal's baton, nor a post as governor, 
 nor any indemnity ; King Charles ix., who was fond of
 
 2 54 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 him, died without being able to reward him ; Henri iv. 
 arranged his marriage with Mademoiselle d'Espard, and 
 secured him the estates of that house, but all those of the 
 Negrepelisses had already passed into the hands of his 
 creditors. 
 
 'My great-grandfather, the Marquis d'Espard, was, 
 like me, placed early in life at the head of his family by 
 the death of his father, who, after dissipating his wife's 
 fortune, left his son nothing but the entailed estates of 
 the d'Espards, burdened with a jointure. The young 
 Marquis was all the more straitened for money because 
 he held a post at Court. Being in great favour with 
 Louis XIV., the King's goodwill brought him a fortune. 
 But here. Monsieur, a blot stained our escutcheon, an 
 unconfessed and horrible stain of blood and disgrace 
 which I am making it my business to wipe out. I dis- 
 covered the secret among the deeds relating to the estate 
 of Negrepelisse and the packets of letters.' 
 
 At this solemn moment the Marquis spoke without 
 hesitation or any of the repetition habitual with him ; 
 but it is a matter of common observation that persons 
 who, in ordinary life, are afflicted with these two defects, 
 are freed from them as soon as any passionate emotion 
 underlies their speech. 
 
 ' The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes was decreed,' 
 he went on. ' You are no doubt aware. Monsieur, that 
 this was an opportunity for many favourites to make 
 their fortunes. Louis xiv. bestowed on the magnates 
 about his Court the confiscated lands of those Protestant 
 families who did not take the prescribed steps for the sale 
 of their property. Some persons in high favour went 
 " Protestant-hunting," as the phrase was. I have ascer- 
 tained beyond a doubt that the fortune enjoyed to this 
 day by two ducal families is derived from lands seized 
 from hapless merchants. 
 
 ' I will not attempt to explain to you, a man of law, 
 all the manoeuvres employed to entrap the refugees who
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 255 
 
 had large fortunes to carry away. It is enough to say 
 that the lands of Negrepelisse, comprising twenty-two 
 churches and rights over the town, and those of 
 Gravenges which had formerly belonged to us, were at 
 that time in the hands of a Protestant family. My 
 grandfather recovered them by gift from Louis xiv. 
 This gift was effected by documents hall-marked by 
 atrocious iniquity. The owner of these two estates, 
 thinking he would be able to return, had gone through 
 the form of a sale, and was going to Switzerland to join 
 his family, whom he had sent in advance. He wished, 
 no doubt, to take advantage of every delay granted by 
 the law, so as to settle the concerns of his business. 
 
 ' This man was arrested by order of the governor, the 
 trustee confessed the truth, the poor merchant was hanged, 
 and my ancestor had the two estates. I would gladly 
 have been able to ignore the share he took in the plot ; 
 but the governor was his uncle on the mother's side, 
 and I have unfortunately read the letter in which he 
 begged him to apply to Deodatus, the name agreed upon 
 by the Court to designate the King. In this letter there 
 is a tone of jocosity with reference to the victim, which 
 filled me with horror. In the end, the sums of money 
 sent by the refugee family to ransom the poor man's life 
 were kept by the governor, who dispatched the merchant 
 all the same.' 
 
 The Marquis paused, as though the memory of it 
 were still too heavy for him to bear. 
 
 * This unfortunate family were named Jeanrenaud,' he 
 went on. ' That name is enough to account for my 
 conduct. I could never think without keen pain of the 
 secret disgrace that weighed on my family. That fortune 
 enabled my grandfather to marry a demoiselle de Na- 
 varreins-Lansac, heiress to the younger branch of that 
 house, who were at that time much richer than the 
 elder branch of the Navarreins. My father thus became 
 one of the largest landowners in the kingdom. He was
 
 256 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 able to marry my mother, a Grandlicu of the younger 
 branch. Though ill-gotten, this property has been 
 singularly profitable. 
 
 ' For my part, being determined to remedy the mis- 
 chief, I wrote to Switzerland, and knew no peace till I was 
 on the traces of the Protestant victim's heirs. At last I 
 discovered that the Jeanrenauds, reduced to abject want, 
 had left Fribourg and returned to live in France. Finally, 
 I found in M. Jeanrenaud, lieutenant in a cavalry 
 regiment under Napoleon, the sole heir of this unhappy 
 family. In my eyes. Monsieur, the rights of the Jean- 
 renauds were clear. To establish a prescriptive right is 
 it not necessary that there should have been some possi- 
 bility of proceeding against those who are in the enjoy- 
 ment of it ? To whom could these refugees have 
 appealed ? Their Court of Justice was on high, or 
 rather. Monsieur, it was here,' and the Marquis struck 
 his hand on his heart. ' I did not choose that my chil- 
 dren should be able to think of me as I have thought of 
 my father and of my ancestors. I aim at leaving them 
 an unblemished inheritance and escutcheon. I did not 
 choose that nobility should be a lie in my person. And, 
 after all, politically speaking, ought those emigres who are 
 now appealing against revolutionary confiscations, to 
 keep the property derived from antecedent confiscations 
 by positive crimes ? 
 
 * I found in M. Jeanrenaud and his mother the most 
 perverse honesty ; to hear them you would suppose that 
 they were robbing me. In spite of all I could say, they 
 will accept no more than the value of the lands at the 
 time when the King bestowed them on my family. The 
 price was settled between us at the sum of eleven hun- 
 dred thousand francs, which I was to pay at my con- 
 venience and without interest. To achieve this I had 
 to forgo my income for a long time. And then. 
 Monsieur, began the destruction of some illusions I had 
 allowed myself as to Madame d'Espard's character.
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 257 
 
 When I proposed to her that we should leave Paris and 
 go into the country, where we could Hve respected on 
 half of her income, and so more rapidly complete a 
 restitution of which I spoke to her without going into 
 the more serious details, Madame d'Espard treated me as 
 a madman. I then understood my wife's real character. 
 She would have approved of my grandfather's conduct 
 without a scruple, and have laughed at the Huguenots. 
 Terrified by her coldness, and her little affection for her 
 children, whom she abandoned to me without a regret, 
 I determined to leave her the command of her fortune, 
 after paying our common debts. It was no business 
 of hers, as she told me, to pay for my follies. As I then 
 had not enough to live on and pay for my sons' educa- 
 tion, I determined to educate them myself, to make 
 them gentlemen and men of feeling. By investing my 
 money in the funds I have been enabled to pay off my 
 obligation sooner than I had dared to hope, for I took 
 advantage of the opportunities afforded by the improve- 
 ment in prices. If I had kept four thousand francs a year 
 for my boys and myself, I could only have paid off twenty 
 thousand crowns a year, and it would have taken almost 
 eighteen years to achieve my freedom. As it is, I have 
 lately repaid the whole of the eleven hundred thousand 
 francs that were due. Thus I enjoy the happiness of 
 having made this restitution without doing my children 
 the smallest wrong. 
 
 ' These, Monsieur, are the reasons for the payments 
 made to Madame Jeanrenaud and her son.' 
 
 ' So Madame d'Espard knew the motives of your 
 retirement ? ' said the judge, controlling the emotion he 
 felt at this narrative. 
 
 ' Yes, Monsieur.' 
 
 Popinot gave an expressive shrug ; he rose and opened 
 the door into the next room. 
 
 ' Noel, you can go,' said he to his clerk. 
 
 ' Monsieur,' he went on, ' though what you have told 
 
 R
 
 258 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 me is enough to enlighten me thoroughly, I should like 
 to hear what you have to say to the other facts put 
 forward in the petition. For instance, you are here 
 carrying on a business such as is not habitually under- 
 taken by a man of rank.' 
 
 *We cannot discuss that matter here,' said the 
 Marquis, signing to the judge to quit the room. 
 ' Nouvion,' said he to the old man, ' I am going down to 
 my rooms ; the children will soon be in ; dine with 
 us.' 
 
 'Then, Monsieur le Marquis,' said Popinot on the 
 stairs, ' that is not your apartment ? ' 
 
 ' No, Monsieur ; I took those rooms for the office of 
 this undertaking. You see,' and he pointed to an 
 advertisement sheet, ' the History is being brought out 
 by one of the most respectable firms in Paris, and not by 
 me.' 
 
 The Marquis showed the lawyer into the ground- 
 floor rooms, saying, ' This is my apartment.' 
 
 Popinot was quite touched by the poetry, not aimed at 
 but pervading this dwelling. The weather was lovely, 
 the windows were open, the air from the garden brought 
 in a wholesome earthy smell, the sunshine brightened 
 and gilded the woodwork, of a rather gloomy brown. 
 At the sight Popinot made up his mind that a madman 
 would hardly be capable of inventing the tender harmony 
 of which he was at that moment conscious. 
 
 *I should like just such an apartment,' thought he. 
 *You think of leaving this part of the town?' he in- 
 quired. 
 
 * I hope so,' replied the Marquis. * But I shall remain 
 till my younger son has finished his studies, and till the 
 children's character is thoroughly formed, before intro- 
 ducing them to the world and to their mother's circle. 
 Indeed, after giving them the solid information they 
 possess, I intend to complete it by taking them to travel 
 to the capitals of Europe, that they may see men and
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 259 
 
 things, and become accustomed to speak the languages 
 they have learned. And Monsieur,' he went on, giving the 
 judge a chair in the drawing-room, ' I could not discuss 
 the book on China with you, in the presence of an old 
 friend of my family, the Comte de Nouvion, who, having 
 emigrated, has returned to France without any fortune 
 whatever, and who is my partner in this concern, less 
 for my profit than his. Without telling him what my 
 motives were, I explained to him that I was as poor as he, 
 but that I had enough money to start a speculation in 
 which he might be usefully employed. My tutor was 
 the Abbe Grozier, whom Charles x. on my recommenda- 
 tion appointed Keeper of the Books at the Arsenal, which 
 were returned to that Prince when he was still Monsieur. 
 The Abbe Grozier was deeply learned with regard to 
 China, its manners and customs ; he made me heir to this 
 knowledge at an age when it is difficult not to become a 
 fanatic for the things we learn. At five-and-twenty 1 
 knew Chinese, and I confess I have never been able 
 to check myself in an exclusive admiration for that 
 nation, who conquered their conquerors, whose annals 
 extend back indisputably to a period more remote than 
 mythological or Biblical times, who by their immutable 
 institutions have preserved the integrity of their empire, 
 whose monuments are gigantic, whose administration is 
 perfect, among whom revolutions are impossible, who 
 have regarded ideal beauty as a barren element in art, 
 who have carried luxury and industry to such a pitch 
 that we cannot outdo them in anything, while they are 
 our equals in things where we believe ourselves superior. 
 ' Still, Monsieur, though I often make a jest of com- 
 paring China with the present condition of European 
 states, I am not a Chinaman, I am a French gentleman. 
 If you entertain any doubts as to the financial side of 
 this undertaking, I can prove to you that at this moment 
 we have two thousand five hundred subscribers to this 
 work, which is literary, iconographical, statistical, and
 
 i6o The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 religious; its importance has been generally appreciated ; 
 our subscribers belong to every nation in Europe, we 
 have but twelve hundred in France. Our book will 
 cost about three hundred francs, and the Comte de 
 Nouvion will derive from it from six to seven thousand 
 francs a year, for his comfort was the real motive of the 
 undertaking. For my part, I aimed only at the possi- 
 bility of affording my children some pleasures. The 
 hundred thousand francs I have made, quite in spite of 
 myself, will pay for their fencing lessons, horses, dress, 
 and theatres, pay the masters who teach them accom- 
 plishments, procure them canvases to spoil, the books 
 they may wish to buy, in short, all the little fancies which 
 a father finds so much pleasure in gratifying. If I had 
 been compelled to refuse these indulgences to my poor 
 boys, who are so good and work so hard, the sacrifice I 
 made to the honour of my name would have been 
 doubly painful. 
 
 ' In point of fact, the twelve years I have spent in 
 retirement from the world to educate my children have 
 led to my being completely forgotten at Court. I have 
 given up the career of politics ; I have lost my histori- 
 cal fortune, and all the distinctions which I might have 
 acquired and bequeathed to my children ; but our house 
 will have lost nothing ; my boys will be men of mark. 
 Though I have missed the senatorship, they will win 
 it nobly by devoting themselves to the affairs of the 
 country, and doing such service as is not soon forgotten. 
 While purifying the past record of my family, I have 
 insured it a glorious future j and is not that to have 
 achieved a noble task, though in secret and without 
 glory ? — And now. Monsieur, have you any other 
 explanations to ask of me ? ' 
 
 At this instant the tramp of horses was heard in the 
 courtyard. 
 
 ' Here they are ! ' said the Marquis. In a moment the 
 two lads, fashionably but plainly dressed, came into the
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 261 
 
 room, booted, spurred, and gloved, and flourishing their 
 riding-whips. Their beaming faces brought in the 
 freshness of the outer air; they were brilHant with 
 health. They both grasped their father's hand, giving 
 him a look, as friends do, a glance of unspoken affection, 
 and then they bowed coldly to the lawyer. Popinot felt 
 that it was quite unnecessary to question the Marquis as 
 to his relations towards his sons. 
 
 ' Have you enjoyed yourselves ? ' asked the Marquis.i t 
 
 * Yes, father ; I knocked down six dolls in twelve 
 shots at the first trial ! ' cried Camille. 
 
 ' And where did you ride ? ' 
 ' In the Bois ; we saw my mother.' 
 ' Did she stop ? ' 
 
 'We were riding so fast just then that I daresay she 
 did not see us,' replied the young Count. 
 
 ' But, then, why did you not go to speak to her ? ' 
 
 * I fancy I have noticed, father, that she does not care 
 that we should speak to her in public,' said Clement, in 
 an undertone. ' We are a little too big.' 
 
 The judge's hearing was keen enough to catch these 
 words, which brought a cloud to the Marquis's brow. 
 Popinot took pleasure in contemplating the picture of the 
 father and his boys. His eyes went back with a sense 
 of pathos to M. d'Espard's face ; his features, his expres- 
 sion, and his manner all expressed honesty in its noblest 
 aspect, intellectual and chivalrous honesty, nobility in all 
 its beauty. 
 
 ' You — you see. Monsieur,' said the Marquis, and his 
 hesitation had returned, ' you see that Justice may look 
 in — in here at any time — yes, at any time — here. If 
 there is anybody crazy, it can only be the children — the 
 children — who are a little crazy about their father, and 
 the father who is very crazy about his children — but that 
 sort of madness rings true.' 
 
 At this juncture Madame Jeanrenaud's voice was 
 heard in the anteroom, and the good woman came
 
 262 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 bustling in, in spite of the man-servant's remon- 
 strances. 
 
 ' I take no roundabout ways, I can tell you ! ' she 
 exclaimed. ' Yes, Monsieur le Marquis, I want to speak 
 to you, this very minute,' she went on, with a compre- 
 hensive bow to the company. ' By George, and I am too 
 late as it is, since Monsieur the criminal Judge is before 
 me.' 
 
 ' Criminal ! ' cried the two boys. 
 
 * Good reason why I did not find you at your own 
 house, since you are here. Well, well ! the Law is always 
 to the fore when there is mischief brewing. — I came, 
 Monsieur le Marquis, to tell you that my son and I are 
 of one mind to give you everything back, since our 
 honour is threatened. My son and I, we had rather give 
 you back everything than cause you the smallest trouble. 
 My word, they must be as stupid as pans without handles 
 to call you a lunatic ' 
 
 'A lunatic ! My father?' exclaimed the boys, clinging 
 to the Marquis. ' What is this ? ' 
 'Silence, Madame,' said Popinot. 
 
 * Children, leave us,' said the Marquis. 
 
 The two boys went into the garden without a word, 
 but very much alarmed. 
 
 'Madame,' said the judge, 'the moneys paid to you 
 by Monsieur le Marquis were legally due, though given 
 to you in virtue of a very far-reaching theory of honesty. 
 If all the people possessed of confiscated goods, by what- 
 ever cause, even if acquired by treachery, were com- 
 pelled to make restitution every hundred and fifty years, 
 there would be few legitimate owners in France. The 
 possessions of Jacques Coeur enriched twenty noble 
 families ; the confiscations pronounced by the English 
 to the advantage of their adherents at the time when they 
 held a part of France made the fortune of several 
 princely houses. 
 
 ' Our law allows M. d'Espard to dispose of his income
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 16$ 
 
 without accounting for it, or suffering him to be accused 
 of its misapplication. A Commission in Lunacy can 
 only be granted when a man's actions are devoid of 
 reason ; but in this case, the remittances made to you 
 have a reason based on the most sacred and most 
 honourable motives. Hence you may keep it all with- 
 out remorse, and leave the world to misinterpret a noble 
 action. In Paris, the highest virtue is the object of the 
 foulest calumny. It is, unfortunately, the present con- 
 dition of society that makes the Marquis's actions sublime. 
 For the honour of my country, I would that such deeds 
 were regarded as a matter of course ; but, as things are, 
 I am forced by comparison to look upon M. d'Espard 
 as a man to whom a crown should be awarded, rather 
 than that he should be threatened with a Commission in 
 Lunacy. 
 
 ' In the course of a long professional career, I have 
 seen and heard nothing which has touched me more 
 deeply than that I have just seen and heard. But it is 
 not extraordinary that virtue should wear its noblest 
 aspect when it is practised by men of the highest class. 
 
 ' Having heard me express myself in this way, I hope. 
 Monsieur le Marquis, that you feel certain of my silence, 
 and that you will not for a moment be uneasy as to the 
 decision pronounced in the case — if it comes before the 
 Court.' 
 
 'There, now ! Well said,' cried Madame Jeanrenaud. 
 'That is something hke a judge ! Look here, my dear 
 sir, I would hug you if I were not so ugly ; you speak 
 like a book.' 
 
 The Marquis held out his hand to Popinot, who gently 
 pressed it with a look full of sympathetic comprehension 
 at this great man in private life, and the Marquis 
 responded with a pleasant smile. These two natures, 
 both so large and full — one commonplace but divinely 
 kind, the other lofty and subhme — had fallen into unison 
 gently, without a jar, without a flash of passion, as
 
 264 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 though two pure Hghts had been merged into one. The 
 father of a whole district felt himself worthy to grasp the 
 hand of this man who was doubly noble, and the Marquis 
 felt in the depths of his soul an instinct that told him 
 that the judge's hand was one of those from which the 
 treasures of inexhaustible beneficence perennially flow. 
 
 * Monsieur le Marquis,' added Popinot, with a bow, ' I 
 am happy to be able to tell you that, from the first words 
 of this inquiry, I regarded my clerk as quite unnecessary.' 
 
 He went close to M. d'Espard, led him into the 
 window-bay, and said : * It is time that you should 
 return home, Monsieur. I beheve that Madame la 
 Marquise has acted in this matter under an influence 
 which you ought at once to counteract.' 
 
 Popinot withdrew ; he looked back several times as he 
 crossed the courtyard, touched by the recollection of 
 the scene. It was one of those which take root in the 
 memory to blossom again in certain hours when the 
 soul seeks consolation. 
 
 * Those rooms would just suit me,' said he to himself 
 as he reached home. ' If M, d'Espard leaves them, I will 
 take up his lease.' 
 
 The next day, at about ten in the morning, Popinot, 
 who had written out his report the previous evening, 
 made his way to the Palais de Justice, intending to have 
 prompt and righteous justice done. As he went into the 
 robing-room to put on his gown and bands, the usher 
 told him that the President of his Court begged him to 
 attend in his private room, where he was waiting for him. 
 Popinot forthwith obeyed. 
 
 'Good-morning, my dear Popinot,' said the President, 
 ' I have been waiting for you.' 
 
 ' Why, Monsieur le President, is anything wrong ? ' 
 
 *A mere silly trifle,' said the President. 'The Keeper 
 of the Seals, with whom I had the honour of dining 
 yesterday, led me apart into a corner. He had heard
 
 The Commission in Lunacy 265 
 
 that you had been to tea with Madame d'Espard, in 
 whose case you were employed to make inquiries. He 
 gave me to understand that it would be as well that you 
 should not sit on this case ' 
 
 'But, Monsieur le President, I can prove that I left 
 Madame d'Espard's house at the moment when tea was 
 brought in. And my conscience ' 
 
 ' Yes, yes ; the whole Bench, the two Courts, all the 
 profession know you. I need not repeat what I said 
 about you to his Eminence ; but, you know, " Caesar's 
 wife must not be suspected." So we shall not make this 
 foolish trifle a matter of discipline, but only of the pro- 
 prieties. Between ourselves, it is not on your account, 
 but on that of the Bench.' 
 
 ' But, Monsieur, if you only knew the kind of 
 
 woman ' said the judge, trying to pull his report out 
 
 of his pocket. 
 
 ' I am perfectly certain that you have proceeded in 
 this matter with the strictest independence of judgment. 
 I myself, in the provinces, have often taken more than a 
 cup of tea with the people I had to try ; but the fact 
 that the Keeper of the Seals should have mentioned it and 
 that you might be talked about, is enough to make the 
 Court avoid any discussion of the matter. Any conflict 
 with public opinion must always be dangerous for a con- 
 stitutional body, even when the right is on its side 
 against the public, because their weapons are not equal. 
 Journalism may say or suppose anything, and our dignity 
 forbids us even to reply. In fact, I have spoken of the 
 matter to your President, and M. Camusot has been 
 appointed in your place on your retirement, which you 
 will signify. It is a family matter, so to speak. And I 
 now beg you to signify your retirement from the case as 
 a personal favour. To make up, you will get the Cross 
 of the Legion of Honour, which has so long been due to 
 you. I make that my business.' 
 
 When he saw M. Camusot, a judge recently called to
 
 266 The Commission in Lunacy 
 
 Paris from a provincial Court of the same class, as he 
 went forward bowing to the Judge and the President, 
 Popinot could not suppress an ironical smile. This pale, 
 fair young man, full of covert ambition, looked ready to 
 hang and unhang, at the pleasure of any earthly king, the 
 innocent and the guilty alike, and to follow the example 
 of a Laubardemont rather than that of a Mole. 
 
 Popinot withdrew with a bow ; he scorned to deny 
 the lying accusation that had been brought against him.' 
 
 Paris, February 1836.
 
 PIERRE GRASSOU 
 
 To Lieutenant-Colonel Periollas {of the Artillery) as a proof 
 of the author'*s affection and esteem. 
 
 De Balzac. 
 
 On every occasion when you have gone seriously to study 
 the Exhibition of v^^orks in sculpture and painting, such 
 as it has been since the Revolution of 1830, have you not 
 been seized by a feeling of discomfort, boredom, and 
 melancholy at the sight of the long, over-filled galleries ? 
 Since 1830 the Salon has ceased to exist. Once more 
 the Louvre has been taken by storm by the mob of 
 artists, and they have kept possession. Formerly, when 
 the Salon gave us a choice collection of works of art, it 
 secured the greatest honours for the examples exhibited 
 there. Among the two hundred selected pictures the 
 public chose again ; a crown was awarded to the master- 
 pieces by unknown hands. Impassioned discussions 
 arose as to the merits of a painting. The abuse 
 heaped on Delacroix and on Ingres were not of less 
 service to them than the praises and fanaticism of their 
 adherents. 
 
 In our day neither the crowd nor the critic can be 
 vehement over the objects in this bazaar. Being com- 
 pelled to make the selection which was formerly under- 
 taken by the examining jury, their attention is exhausted 
 by the effort ; and by the time it is finished the Exhibi- 
 tion closes. 
 
 267
 
 268 Pierre Grassou 
 
 Until 1 817 the pictures accepted never extended 
 beyond the two first columns of the long gallery con- 
 taining the works of the old masters, and this year they 
 filled the whole of this space, to the great surprise of the 
 public. Historical painting, genre, easel pictures, land- 
 scape, flowers, animals, and water-colour painting, — 
 each of these eight classes could never yield more than 
 twenty pictures worthy of the eye of the public, who 
 cannot give attention to a larger collection of pictures. 
 
 The more the number of artists increases, the more 
 exacting should the jury of selection become. All was 
 lost as soon as the Salon encroached further on the 
 gallery. The Salon should have been kept within fixed 
 and restricted limits, inflexibly defined, where each class 
 might exhibit its best works. The experience of ten 
 years has proved the excellence of the old rules. Instead 
 of a tourney, you now have a riot; instead of a glorious 
 exhibition, you have a medley bazaar ; instead of a selec- 
 tion, you have everything at once. What is the result ? 
 A great artist is swamped. The Turkish Cafe, the 
 Children at the Well, the Torture by Hooks, and the Joseph 
 by Decamps would have done more for his glory if exhi- 
 bited, all four, in the great room with the hundred other 
 good pictures of the year, than his twenty canvases 
 buried among three thousand paintings, and dispersed 
 among six galleries. 
 
 With strange perversity, since the doors have been 
 thrown open to all, there has been much talk of unap- 
 preciated genius. When, twelve years before, the 
 Courtesan, by Ingres, and Sigalon's pictures, Gericault's 
 Raft of the Medusa, Delacroix's Massacre of Scio, and 
 Eugene Deveria's Baptism of Henri IV. — accepted, as 
 they were, by yet more famous men, who were taxed with 
 jealousy — revealed to the world, notwithstanding the 
 carping of critics, the existence of youthful and ardent 
 painters, not a complaint was ever heard. But now, 
 when the veriest dauber of canvas can display his works.
 
 Pierre Grassou 269 
 
 we hear of nothing but misunderstood talent. Where 
 there is no longer any judgment, nothing is judged. 
 Our artists, do what they may, will come back to the 
 ordeal of selection which recommends their work to the 
 admiration of the public for whom they toil. Without 
 the choice exercised by the Academy, there will be no 
 Salon ; and without the Salon, art may perish. 
 
 Since the catalogue has grown to be a fat volume, 
 many names are found there which remain obscure, not- 
 withstanding the list of ten or twelve pictures that 
 follows them. Among these names, the least known of 
 all perhaps is that of an artist named Pierre Grassou, a 
 native of Fougeres, and called, for shortness, Fougeres in 
 the artist world — a name which nowadays fills so much 
 space on the page, and which has suggested the bitter 
 reflections introducing this sketch of his life, and applic- 
 able to some other members of the artist tribe. 
 
 In 1832 Fougeres was living in the Rue de Navarin, 
 on the fourth floor of one of those tall, narrow houses 
 that are like the obelisk of Luxor, which have a passage 
 and a dark, narrow staircase with dangerous turnings, 
 which are not wide enough for more than three windows 
 on each floor, and have a courtyard, or, to be exact, a 
 square well at the back. Above the three or four rooms 
 inhabited by Fougeres was his studio, looking out over 
 Montmartre. The studio, painted brick red ; the floor, 
 carefully stained brown and polished ; each chair provided 
 with a square, bordered mat ; the sofa, plain enough, but 
 as clean as that in a tradeswoman's bedroom, everything 
 betrayed the petty existence of a narrow mind and the 
 carefulness of a poor man. There was a closet for keep- 
 ing the studio properties in, a breakfast table, a sideboard, 
 a desk, and the various objects necessary for painting, all 
 clean and in order. The stove, too, had the benefit of 
 this Dutch neatness, which was all the more conspicuous 
 because the pure and steady northern sky flooded the 
 back room with clear, cold light. Fougeres, a mere
 
 lyo Pierre Grassou 
 
 painter of genre, had no need for the huge machinery 
 which ruins historical painters ; he had never discerned 
 in himself faculties competent to venture on the higher 
 walks of art, and was still content with small easels. 
 
 In the beginning of the month of December of that 
 vear, the season when Paris Philistines are periodically 
 attacked by the burlesque idea of perpetuating their faces 
 — in themselves a sufficient burden — Pierre Grassou, 
 having risen early, was setting his palette, lighting his 
 stove, eating a roll soaked in milk, and waiting to work 
 till his window panes should have thawed enough to let 
 daylight in. The weather was dry and fine. At this 
 instant, the painter, eating with the patient, resigned 
 look that tells so much, recognised the footfall of a man 
 who had had the influence over his life which people of 
 his class have in the career of most artists — Elias Magus, 
 a picture dealer, an usurer in canvas. And, in fact, Elias 
 Magus came in, at the moment when the painter was 
 about to begin work in his elaborately clean studio. 
 
 ' How is yourself, old rascal ? ' said the painter. 
 
 Fougeres had won the Cross ; Elias bought his pictures 
 for two or three hundred francs, and gave himself the 
 most artistic airs. 
 
 'Business is bad,' replied Elias. 'You all are such 
 lords ; you talk of two hundred francs as soon as you have 
 six sous worth of paint on the canvas. — But you are a 
 very good fellow, you are. You are a man of method, 
 and I have come to bring you a good job.' 
 
 ' Timeo Danaos et dona fcrentes^ said Fougeres. ' Do 
 you know Latin ? ' 
 
 'No.' 
 
 'Well, that means that the Greeks did not offer a bit 
 of good business to the Trojans without making some- 
 thing out of it. In those days they used to say, "Take 
 my horse." Nowadays we say, " Take my trash ! " — 
 Well, what do you want, Ulysses- Lagingeole-Elias- 
 Magus ? '
 
 Pierre Grassou 271 
 
 This speech shows the degree of sweetness and wit 
 which Fougeres could put into what painters call studio- 
 chafF. 
 
 'I don't say that you will not have to paint me two 
 pictures for nothing.' 
 
 ' Oh ! oh ! ' 
 
 ' I leave it to you ; I do not ask for them. You are an 
 honest artist.' 
 
 ' Indeed ? ' 
 
 ' Well. I am bringing you a father, a mother, and 
 an only daughter.' 
 
 * All unique specimens ? ' 
 
 * My word, yes, indeed ! — to have their portraits 
 painted. The worthy folks, crazy about art, have never 
 dared venture into a studio. The daughter will have 
 a hundred thousand francs on her marriage. You may 
 do well to paint such people. Family portraits for your- 
 self, who knows ? ' 
 
 The old German image, who passes muster as a man, 
 and is called Elias Magus, broke off to laugh a dry cackle 
 that horrified the painter. He felt as if he had heard 
 Mephistopheles talking of marriage. 
 
 'The portraits are to be five hundred francs apiece; 
 you may give me three pictures.' 
 
 * Right you are ! ' said Fougeres cheerfully. 
 
 * And if you marry the daughter, you will not forget 
 me ' 
 
 ' Marry ? I ! ' cried Pierre Grassou ; ' I, who am used to 
 have a bed to myself, to get up early, whose life is all laid 
 out ' 
 
 'A hundred thousand francs,' said Magus, 'and a sweet 
 girl, full of golden lights like a Titian ! ' 
 
 ' And what position do these people hold ? ' 
 
 ' Retired merchants : in love with the arts at the 
 present moment ; they have a country house at Ville- 
 d'Avray, and ten or twelve thousand francs a year.' 
 
 'What was their business ? '
 
 272 Pierre Grassou 
 
 ' Bottles.' 
 
 ' Don't speak that word ; I fancy 1 hear corks being 
 cut, and it sets my teeth on edge.' 
 
 ' Well ; am I to bring them ? ' 
 
 ' Three portraits ; I will send them to the Salon ; I 
 might go in for portrait-painting. — All right, yes.' 
 
 And old Elias went downstairs to fetch the Vervelle 
 family. 
 
 To understand exactly what the outcome of such a 
 proposal would be on the painter, and the effect produced 
 on him by Monsieur and Madame Vervelle, graced by 
 the addition of their only daughter, it is necessary to 
 glance for a moment at the past life of Pierre Grassou of 
 Fougeres. As a pupil, he had learned to draw of Servin, 
 who was regarded in the academical world as a great 
 draughtsman. He afterwards worked under Schinner, to 
 discover the secrets of the powerful and splendid colour- 
 ing that characterises that master. The master and his 
 disciples had kept the secrets ; Pierre had discovered 
 nothing. From thence Fougeres had gone to Sommer- 
 vieux's studio to familiarise himself with that part of art 
 which is called composition ; but composition was shy, and 
 held aloof from him. Then he had tried to steal from 
 Granet and Drolling the mystery of their luminous 
 interiors ; the two masters had not allowed him to rob 
 them. Finally, Fougeres had finished his training under 
 Duval-Lecamus. 
 
 Through all these studies and various transformations, 
 Fougeres' quiet, steady habits had furnished materials 
 for mockery in every studio where he had worked ; 
 but he everywhere disarmed his comrades by his diffi- 
 dence and his lamb-like patience and meekness. The 
 masters had no sympathy with this worthy lad ; masters 
 like brilliant fellows, eccentric spirits, farcical and fiery, 
 or gloomy and deeply meditative, promising future 
 talent. Everything in Fougeres proclaimed his medi- 
 ocrity. His nickname of Fougeres — the name of the
 
 Pierre Grassou ly;^ 
 
 painter in the play by Fabre dt Eglantine — was the pre- 
 text for endless affronts, but by force of circumstances 
 he was saddled with the name of the town ' where he 
 first saw the light.' 
 
 Grassou de Fougeres matched his name. Plump and 
 rather short, he had a dull complexion, brown eyes, 
 black hair, a thick prominent nose, a rather wide mouth, 
 and long ears. His placid, gentle, resigned expression 
 did little to improve these features of a face that was full 
 of health but not of movement. He could never suffer 
 from the flow of blood, the vehemence of thought, or 
 the spirit of comedy by which a great artist is to be 
 known. This youth, born to be a virtuous citizen, had 
 come from his provincial home to serve as shop-clerk to a 
 colour-man, a native of Mayenne, distantly related to 
 the d'Orgemonts, and he had made himself a painter by 
 the sheer obstinacy which is the backbone of the Breton 
 character. What he had endured, and the way in which 
 he lived during his period of study, God alone knows. 
 He suffered as much as great men suffer when they are 
 haunted by want, and hunted down like wild beasts by 
 the pack of inferior souls, and the whole army of vanity 
 thirsting for revenge. 
 
 As soon as he thought himself strong enough for 
 flight on his own wings, he took a studio at the top of 
 the Rue des Martyrs, and there he began to work. 
 He first sent in a picture in 1819. The picture he 
 offered the jury for their exhibition at the Louvre 
 represented a Village Wedding, a laborious imitation of 
 Greuze's picture. It was refused. When Fougeres 
 heard the fatal sentence, he did not fly into those furies 
 or fits of epileptic vanity to which proud spirits are 
 liable, and which sometimes end in a challenge sent to 
 the President or the Secretary, or in threats of assassina- 
 tion. Fougeres calmly received his picture back, wrapped 
 it in a handkerchief, and brought it home to his studio, 
 swearing that he would yet become a great painter. 
 
 s
 
 274 Pierre Grassou 
 
 He placed the canvas on the easel and went to call on 
 his old master, a man of immense talent — Schinner — a 
 o-entle and patient artist, whose success had been brilliant 
 at the last Salon. He begged him to come and criticise 
 the rejected work. The great painter left everything 
 and went. When poor Fougeres had placed him in front 
 of the painting, Schinner at the first glance took Fougeres 
 by the hand — 
 
 * You are a capital good fellow ; you have a heart of 
 gold, it will not be fair to deceive you. Listen ; you 
 have kept all the promise you showed at the studio. 
 When a man has such stuff as that at the end of his 
 brush, my good fellow, he had better leave his paints in 
 Brullon's shop, and not deprive others of the canvas. 
 Get home early, pull on your cotton night-cap, be in 
 bed by nine ; and to-morrow morning at ten o'clock go 
 to some office and ask for work, and have done with 
 art.' 
 
 ' My good friend,' said Fougeres, ' my picture is con- 
 demned already. It is not a verdict that 1 want, but the 
 reasons for it.' 
 
 ' Well, then, your tone is grey and cold ; you see 
 nature through a crape veil ; your drawing is heavy and 
 clumsy ; your composition is borrowed from Greuze, 
 who only redeemed his faults by qualities which you 
 have not.' 
 
 As he pointed out the faults of the picture, Schinner 
 saw in Fougeres' face so deep an expression of grief 
 that he took him away to dine, and tried to comfort 
 him. 
 
 Next day, by seven in the morning, Fougeres, before 
 his easel, was working over the condemned canvas ; he 
 warmed up the colour, made the corrections suggested 
 by Schinner, and touched up the figures. Then, sick 
 of such patching, he took it to Elias Magus. Elias 
 Magus, being a sort of Dutch-Belgian-Fleming, had 
 three reasons for being what he was — miserly and rich.
 
 Pierre Grassou 275 
 
 He had lately come from Bordeaux, and was starting in 
 business in Paris as a picture-dealer ; he lived on the 
 Boulevard Bonne-Nouvelle. Fougeres, w^ho trusted to 
 his palette to take him to the baker's, bravely ate bread 
 and w^alnuts, or bread and milk, or bread and cherries, 
 or bread and cheese, according to the season. Elias 
 Magus, to whom Pierre offered his first picture, eyed it 
 for a long time, and then gave him fifteen francs. 
 
 ' Taking fifteen francs a year and spending a thousand, 
 I shall go fast and far,' said Fougeres, smiling. 
 
 Elias Magus gave a shrug and bit his thumb at the 
 thought that he might have had the picture for five 
 francs. Every morning, for some days, Fougeres went 
 down the Rue des Martyrs, lost himself in the crowd on 
 the Boulevard opposite Magus' shop, and fixed his eyes 
 on his picture — which did not attract the gaze of the 
 passers-by. Towards the end of the week the picture 
 disappeared. Fougeres wandered up the boulevard towards 
 the picture-dealer's shop with an affectation of amusing 
 himself. The Jew was standing in the doorway. 
 
 ' Well, you have sold my picture ? ' 
 
 ' There it is,' said Magus. ' I am having it framed 
 to show to some man who fancies himself knowing in 
 paintings.' 
 
 Fougeres did not dare come along the boulevard any 
 more. He began a new picture ; for two months he 
 laboured at it, feeding like a mouse and working like a 
 galley-slave. One evening he walked out on the 
 boulevard ; his feet carried him involuntarily to Magus' 
 shop ; he could nowhere see his picture. 
 
 * I have sold your picture,' said the dealer to the 
 artist. 
 
 ' For how much ? ' 
 
 ' I got my money back with a little interest. Paint 
 me some Flemish interiors, an Anatomy lecture, a land- 
 scape ; I will take them of you,' said Elias. 
 
 Fougeres could have hugged Magus in his arms j he
 
 276 Pierre Grassou 
 
 looked upon him as a father. He went home with joy 
 in his heart. Then Schinner, the great Schinner, was 
 mistaken ! In that vast city of Paris there were some 
 hearts that beat in unison with that of Grassou ; his 
 talent was discerned and appreciated ! 
 
 The poor fellow, at seven-and-twenty, had the artless- 
 ness of a boy of sixteen. Any one else, one of your 
 distrustful, suspicious artists, would have noticed Elias' 
 diabohcal expression, have seen the quiver of his beard, 
 the ironical curl of his moustache, the action of his 
 shoulders, all betraying the satisfaction of Walter Scott's 
 Jew cheating a Christian. Fougeres paraded the boule- 
 vards with a joy that gave his face an expression of 
 pride. He looked like a schoolboy protecting a woman. 
 He met Joseph Bridau, one of his fellow-students, one 
 of those eccentric men of genius who are predestined to 
 glory and disaster. Joseph Bridau, having a few sous 
 in his pocket, as he expressed it, took Fougeres to the 
 opera. Fougeres did not see the ballet, did not hear the 
 music ; he was imagining pictures, he was painting. 
 
 He left Joseph half-way through the evening, and ran 
 home to make sketches by lamp-light ; he invented 
 thirty pictures, full of reminiscences, and believed him- 
 self a genius. Next day he bought some colours and 
 canvases of various sizes ; he spread out some bread and 
 some cheese on his table ; he got some water in a jug, and 
 a store of wood for his stove ; then, to use the studio 
 phrase, he pegged away at his painting ; he employed a 
 few models, and Magus lent him draperies. After two 
 months of seclusion, the Breton had finished four 
 pictures. He again asked Schinner's advice, with the 
 addition of Joseph Bridau's. The two painters found 
 these works to be a servile imitation of Dutch land- 
 scapes, of Metzu's interiors, and the fourth was a version 
 of Rembrandt's Anatomy lecture. 
 
 ' Always imitations ! ' said Schinner. ' Ah, Fougeres 
 would find it hard to be original.'
 
 Pierre Grassou 277 
 
 * You ought to turn your attention to something else 
 than painting,' said Bridau. 
 
 ' To what ? ' said Fougeres. 
 
 ' Go in for literature.' 
 
 Fougeres bent his head as sheep do before rain. 
 Then he asked and got some practical advice, touched 
 up his paintings, and carried them to Elias. Elias gave 
 him twenty-five francs for each. At this price Fougeres 
 made nothing, but, thanks to his abstemiousness, he lost 
 nothing. He took some walks to see what became of 
 his pictures, and had a singular hallucination. His 
 works, so firmly painted, so neat, as hard as tin-plate 
 iron, and as shining as painting on porcelain, seemed 
 to be covered with a fog ; they looked quite like old 
 masters. 
 
 Elias had just gone out; Fougeres could obtain no 
 information as to this phenomenon. He thought his eyes 
 deceived him. 
 
 The painter went home to his studio to make new old 
 masters. After seven years of constant work, Fougeres 
 was able to compose and paint fairly good pictures. He 
 did as well as all the other artists of the second class. 
 Elias bought and sold all the poor Breton's pictures, 
 while he laboriously earned a hundred louis a year, and 
 did not spend more than twelve hundred francs. 
 
 At the Exhibition of 1829, Leon de Lora, Schinner 
 and Bridau, who all three filled a large space, and were 
 at the head of the new movement in art, took pity 
 on their old comrade's perseverance and poverty ; they 
 managed to get a picture by Fougeres accepted and hung 
 in the great room. This work, of thrilling interest, 
 recalling Vigneron in its sentiment, and Dubufe's early 
 manner in its execution, represented a young man in 
 prison having the back of his head shaved. On one side 
 stood a priest, on the other a young woman in tears. 
 A lawyer's clerk was reading an official document. On 
 a wretched table stood a meal which no one had eaten.
 
 278 Pierre Grassou 
 
 The light came in through the bars of a high window. 
 It was enough to make the good folks shudder, and they 
 shuddered. 
 
 Fougeres had borrowed directly from Gerard Dow's 
 masterpiece : he had turned the group of the Dropsical 
 Woman towards the window instead of facing the 
 spectator. He had put the condemned prisoner in the 
 place of the dying woman — the same pallor, the same 
 look, the same appeal to heaven. Instead of the Dutch 
 physician, there was the rigid official figure of the clerk 
 dressed in black ; but he had added an old woman by 
 the side of Gerard Dow's young girl. The cruelly good- 
 humoured face of the executioner crowned the group. 
 This plagiarism, skilfully concealed, was not recognised. 
 
 The catalogue contained these words : — 
 
 510, Grassou de Fougeres (Pierre), Rue de Navarin, 2. 
 The Chouan's Toilet ; condemned to Death, 1809. 
 
 Though quite mediocre, the picture had a prodigious 
 success, for it reminded the spectators of the affair of the 
 robbers — known as the Chauffeurs — of Mortagne. A 
 crowd collected every day in front of the picture, which 
 became the fashion, and Charles x. stopped to look at it. 
 Madame, having heard of the poor Breton's patient life, 
 grew enthusiastic about him. The Due d'Orleans asked 
 the price of the painting. The priests told Madame 
 the Dauphiness that the work was full of pious feeling ; 
 it had no doubt a very satisfactory suggestion of religion. 
 Monseigneur the Dauphin admired the dust on the 
 window panes, a stupid, dull mistake, for what Fougeres 
 had intended was a greenish tone, which spoke of 
 damp at the bottom of the walls. Madame bought the 
 picture for a thousand francs, and the Dauphin gave a 
 commission for another. Charles x. bestowed the Cross 
 on this son of a peasant who had fought for the Royal 
 Cause in 1799 ; Joseph Bridau, a great painter, was not 
 decorated. The Minister of the Interior ordered two
 
 Pierre Grassou 279 
 
 sacred pictures for the church at Fougeres. This Salon 
 was to Pierre Grassou fortune, glory, a future, and life. 
 
 To invent in any kind is to die by inches ; to copy is 
 to live. Having at last discovered a vein full of gold, 
 Grassou of Fougeres practised that part of this barbarous 
 maxim to which the world owes the atrocious medio- 
 crity whose duty it is to elect its superiors in every class 
 of society, but which naturally elects itself, and wages 
 pitiless war against all real talent. The principle of 
 election universally applied is a bad one ; France will 
 get ove- it. At the same time, Fougeres was so gentle 
 and kind that his modesty, his simplicity, and his astonish- 
 ment silenced recriminations and envy. Then, again, 
 he had on his side all the successful Grassous, represent- 
 ing all the Grassous to come. Some people, touched by 
 the energy of a man whom nothing had discouraged, 
 spoke of Domenichino, and said, ' Hard work in the arts 
 must be rewarded. Grassou has earned his success. He 
 has been pegging at it for ten years, poor old fellow ! ' 
 
 This oxlamation, 'poor old fellow!' counted for a 
 great deal in the support and congratulations the painter 
 received. Pity elevates as many second-rate talents as 
 envy runs down great artists. The newspapers had 
 not been sparing of criticism, but the Chevalier Fougeres 
 took it all as he took his friend's advice, with angelic 
 patience. Rich now, with fifteen thousand francs very 
 hardly earned, he furnished his rooms and his studio in 
 the Rue de Navarin, he painted the picture ordered by 
 Monseigneur the Dauphin, and the two sacred works 
 commanded by the Minister, finishing them to the day, 
 with a punctuality perfectly distracting to the cashier of 
 the Ministry, accustomed to quite other ways. But 
 note the good luck of methodical people ! If he had 
 delayed, Grassou, overtaken by the revolution of July, 
 would never have been paid. 
 
 By the time he was seven-and-thirty Fougeres had 
 manufactured for Elias Magus about two hundred pictures.
 
 2 8o Pierre Grassou 
 
 all perfectly unknown, but by which he had gained 
 with practice that satisfactory handling, that pitch of 
 dexterity at which an artist shrugs his shoulders, and 
 which is dear to the Philistine. Fougeres was lo\ed by 
 his friends for his rectitude of mind and steadfastness of 
 feeling, for his perfectly obliging temper and loyal spirit; 
 though they had no respect for his palette, they were 
 attached to the man who held it. 
 
 'What a pity that Fougeres should indulge in the vice 
 of painting ! ' his friends would say. 
 
 Grassou, however, could give sound advice, like the 
 newspaper writers, who are incapable of producing a 
 book, but who know full well where a book is faulty. 
 But there was a difference between Fougeres and these 
 literary critics ; he was keenly alive to every beauty, he 
 acknowledged it, and his advice was stamped with a sense 
 of justice which made his strictures acceptable. 
 
 After the revolution of July Fougeres sent in ten or 
 more paintings to every exhibition, of which the jury 
 would accept four or five. He lived with the strictest 
 economy, and his whole household consisted of a woman 
 to manage the housework. His amusements lay solely 
 in visits to his friends, and in going to see works of art ; 
 he treated himself to some little tours in France, and 
 dreamed of seeking inspiration in Switzerland. This 
 wretched artist was a good citizen ; he served in the 
 Guard, turned out for inspection, and paid his rent and 
 bills with the vulgarest punctuality. Having lived in 
 hard work and penury, he had never had time to be in 
 love. A bachelor and poor, up to the present day he had 
 had no wish to complicate his simple existence. 
 
 Having no idea of any way of increasing his wealth, 
 he took his savings and his earnings every quarter to his 
 notary, Cardot. When the notary had a thousand crowns 
 in hand, he invested them in a first mortgage, with 
 substitution in favour of the wife's rights if the borrower 
 should marry, or in favour of the seller if the borrower
 
 Pierre Grassou 281 
 
 should wish to pay it off. The notary drew the interest 
 and added it to the sums deposited by Grassou de 
 Fougeres. The painter looked forward to the happy 
 day when his investments should reach the imposing 
 figure of two thousand francs a year, when he would 
 indulge in the otium cum dignitate of an artist and paint 
 pictures — oh ! but such pictures ! Real pictures, finished 
 pictures — something like, clipping, stunning ! His 
 fondest hope, his dream of joy, the climax of all his 
 hopes — would you like to know it ? It was to be elected 
 to the Institute and wear the rosette of the officers of 
 the Legion of Honour ! To sit by Schinner and Leon 
 de Lora ! To get into the Academy before Bridau ! 
 To have a rosette in his button-hole. — What a vision ! 
 Only your commonplace mind can think of everything. 
 
 On hearing several footsteps on the stairs, Fougeres 
 pushed his fingers through his top-knot of hair, buttoned 
 his bottle-green waistcoat, and was not a little surprised 
 at the entrance of a face of the kind known in the studio 
 as a melon. This fruit was perched on a pumpkin dressed 
 in blue cloth, and graced with a dangling bunch of jing- 
 ling seals. The melon snorted like a porpoise, the 
 pumpkin walked on turnips incorrectly called legs. A 
 real artist would at once have sketched such a caricature 
 of the bottle merchant and then have shown him out, 
 saying that he did not paint vegetables. Fougeres looked 
 at his customer without laughing, for M. Vervelle wore 
 in his shirt-front a diamond worth a thousand crowns. 
 Fougeres glanced at Magus, and said in the studio slang 
 of the day, * A fat job,' meaning that the worthy was 
 rich. 
 
 M. Vervelle heard it and frowned. He brought in 
 his train some other vegetable combinations in the 
 persons of his wife and daughter. The wife had in her 
 face a fine mahogany tone ; she looked like a cocoa-nut 
 surmounted by a head and tightened in with a belt ; she
 
 282 Pierre Grassou 
 
 twirled round on her feet ; her dress was yellow, with 
 black stripes. She proudly displayed absurd mittens on a 
 pair of hands as swollen as a glover's sign. The feathers 
 of a first-class funeral waved over a coal-scuttle bonnet ; 
 lace frills covered a figure as round behind as before, 
 thus the spherical form of the cocoa-nut was perfect. 
 Her feet, which a painter would have termed hoofs, had 
 a garnish of half-an-inch of fat projecting beyond her 
 patent-leather shoes. How had her feet been got into 
 the shoes ? Who can tell ? 
 
 Behind her came a young asparagus shoot, green and 
 yellow as to her dress, with a small head covered with 
 hair in flat braids of a carroty yellow which a Roman 
 would have adored, thread-paper arms, a fairly white but 
 freckled skin, large innocent eyes, with colourless lashes 
 and faintly marked eyebrows, a Leghorn straw hat, 
 trimmed with a couple of honest white satin bows, and 
 bound with white satin, virtuously red hands, and feet 
 like her mother's. 
 
 These three persons, as they looked round the studio, 
 had a look of beatitude which showed a highly respect- 
 able enthusiasm for art. 
 
 *And it is you, sir, who are going to take our like- 
 nesses ? ' said the father, assuming a little dashing air. 
 ^1^' Yes, sir,' replied Grassou. 
 
 ' - * Vervelle, he has the Cross,' said the wife to her 
 husband in a whisper while the painter's back was 
 turned. 
 
 ' Should I have our portraits painted by an artist who 
 was not " decorated " ? ' retorted the bottle-merchant. 
 
 Elias Magus bowed to the Vervelle family and went 
 away. Grassou followed him on to the landing. 
 
 'Who but you would have discovered such a set of 
 phizzes ? ' 
 
 ' A hundred thousand francs in settlement ! ' 
 
 ' Yes, but what a family ! ' 
 
 'And three hundred thousand francs in expectations,
 
 Pierre Grassou 283 
 
 a house in the Rue Boucherat, and a country place at 
 Ville d'Avray.' 
 
 * Boucherat, bottles, bumpkins, and bounce ! ' said the 
 painter. 
 
 ' You will be out of want for the rest of your days,' 
 said Elias. 
 
 This idea flashed into Pierre Grassou's brain as the 
 morning light had broken on his attic. As he placed 
 the young lady's father in position, he thought him 
 really good-looking, and admired his face with its strong 
 purple tones. The mother and daughter hovered round 
 the painter, wondering at all his preparations ; to them 
 he seemed a god. This visible adoration was pleasing to 
 Fougeres. The golden calf cast its fantastic reflection 
 on this family. 
 
 ' You must earn enormous sums ; but you spend it as 
 fast as you get it ? ' said the mother. 
 
 ' No, Madame,' replied the painter, * I do not spend. 
 I have not means to amuse myself. My notary invests 
 my money ; he knows what I have, and when once the 
 money is in his hands I think no more about it.' 
 
 ' And I have always been told that painters were a 
 thriftless set ! ' said father Vervelle. 
 
 ' Who is your notary, if it is not too great a liberty ? ' 
 said Madame Vervelle. 
 
 ' A capital fellow all round — Cardot.' 
 
 ' Lord ! lord ! Isn't that funny now ! ' said Vervelle. 
 ' Why, Cardot is ours too.' 
 
 ' Do not move,' said the painter. 
 
 ' Sit still, do, Antenor,' said his wife ; ' you will put 
 the gentleman out ; if you could see him working you 
 would understand.' 
 
 'Gracious me, why did you never have me taught 
 art ? ' said Mademoiselle Vervelle to her parents. 
 
 ' Virginie ! ' exclaimed her mother, ' there are certain 
 things a young lady cannot learn. When you are 
 married — well and good. Till then be content.'
 
 284 Pierre Grassou 
 
 In the course of this first sitting the Vervelle family 
 became almost intimate with the worthy artist. They 
 were to come again two days after. As they left, the 
 father and mother desired Virginie to go first ; but in 
 spite of the distance between them, she heard these 
 words, of which the meaning must have roused her 
 curiosity : — 
 
 ^ Decore — thirty-seven — an artist who gets commis- 
 sions, and places his money in our notary's hands. We 
 will consult Cardot. Madame de Fougeres, heh ! not a 
 bad name ! He does not look like a bad fellow ! A man 
 of business, you would say ? But so long as a merchant 
 has not retired from business, you can never tell what 
 your daughter may come to ; while an artist who saves. 
 — And then we are fond of art. — Well, well ! ' 
 
 While the Vervelles were discussing him, Pierre 
 Grassou was thinking of the Vervelles. He found it 
 impossible to remain quietly in his studio ; he walked up 
 and down the boulevard, looking at every red-haired 
 woman who went by ! He argued with himself in the 
 strangest way : Gold was the most splendid of the metals, 
 yellow stood for gold ; the ancient Romans liked red- 
 haired women, and he became a Roman, and so forth. 
 After being married two years, what does a man care for 
 his wife's complexion ? Beauty fades — but ugliness 
 remains ! Money is half of happiness. That evening, 
 when he went to bed, the painter had already persuaded 
 himself that Virginie Vervelle was charming. 
 
 When the trio walked in on the day fixed for the 
 second sitting, the artist received them with an amiable 
 smile. The rogue had shaved, had put on a clean white 
 shirt ; he had chosen a becoming pair of trousers, and 
 red slippers with Turkish toes. The family responded 
 with a smile as flattering as the artist's ; Virginie turned 
 as red as her hair, dropped her eyes, and turned away her 
 head, looking at the studies. Pierre Grassou thought 
 these little affectations quite bewitching. Virginie was
 
 Pierre Grassou 285 
 
 graceful ; happily, she was like neither father nor mother. 
 But whom was she like ? 
 
 * Ah, I see,' said he to himself j *the mother has had 
 an eye to business.' 
 
 During the sitting there was a war of wits between 
 the family and the painter, who was so audacious as to 
 say that father Vervelle was witty. After this piece of 
 flattery the family took possession of the painter's heart 
 in double quick time ; he gave one of his drawings to 
 Virginie, and a sketch to her mother. 
 
 ' For nothing ? ' they asked. 
 
 Pierre Grassou could not help smiling. 
 
 ' You must not give your works away like this ; they 
 are money,' said Vervelle. 
 
 At the third sitting old Vervelle spoke of a fine collec- 
 tion of pictures he had in his country house at Ville 
 d'Avray — Rubens, Gerard Dow, Mieris, Terburg, Rem- 
 brandt, a Titian, Paul Potter, etc. 
 
 *M. Vervelle has been frightfully extravagant,' said 
 Madame Vervelle pompously. ' He has a hundred 
 thousand francs' worth of pictures.' 
 
 ' I am fond of the arts,' said the bottle-merchant. 
 
 When Madame Vervelle's portrait was begun, that of 
 her husband was nearly finished. The enthusiasm of 
 the family now knew no bounds. The notary had 
 praised the artist in the highest terms. Pierre Grassou 
 was in his opinion the best fellow on earth, one of the 
 steadiest of artists, who had indeed saved thirty-six 
 thousand francs ; his days of poverty were past, he was 
 making ten thousand francs a year, he was reinvesting 
 his interest, and he was incapable of making a woman 
 unhappy. This last sentence was of great weight in 
 the scale. The friends of the family heard nothing 
 talked of but the celebrated Fougeres. 
 
 By the time Fougeres began the portrait of Virginie 
 he was already the son-in-law elect of the Vervelle 
 couple. The trio expanded in this studio, which they
 
 2 86 Pierre Grassou 
 
 had begun to regard as a home ; there was an inexpli- 
 cable attraction to them in this cleaned, cared-for, neat, 
 artistic spot. Abyssus abyssum^ like to like. 
 
 Towards the end of the sitting the stairs were shaken, 
 the door was flung open, and in came Joseph Bridau ; be 
 rode the whirlwind, his hair was flying ; in he came 
 with his broad, deeply-seamed face, shot lightning glances 
 all round the room, and came suddenly up to Grassou, 
 pulling his coat across the gastric region, and trying to 
 button it, but in vain, for the button mould had escaped 
 from its cloth cover. 
 
 ' Times are bad,' he said to Grassou. 
 
 ' Hah ? ' 
 
 ' The duns are at my heels. — Hallo ! are you painting 
 that sort of thing ? ' 
 
 ' Hold your tongue ! ' 
 
 * To be sure ' 
 
 The Vervelle family, excessively taken aback by this 
 apparition, turned from the usual red to the cherry scarlet 
 of a fierce fire. 
 
 ' It pays,' said Joseph. ' Have you any shot in your 
 locker ? ' 
 
 * Do you want much ? ' 
 
 ' A five hundred franc note. . . . There is a party 
 after me of the bloodhound kind, who, when once they 
 have set their teeth, do not let go without having the 
 piece out. What a set I ' 
 
 ' I will give you a line to my notary ' 
 
 ' What ! you have a notary ? ' 
 
 ' Yes.' 
 
 'Then that accounts for your still painting cheeks 
 rose-pink, only fit for a hairdresser's doll ! ' 
 
 Grassou could not help reddening, for Virginie was 
 sitting to him. 
 
 ' Paint nature as it is,' the great painter went on. 
 ' Mademoiselle is red-haired. Well, is that a deadly sin ? 
 Everything is fine in painting. Squeeze me out some
 
 Pierre Grassou 287 
 
 cinnabar, warm up those cheeks, give me those little 
 brown freckles, butter your canvas boldly ! Do you 
 want to do better than Nature ? "" 
 
 ' Here,' said Fougeres, * take my place while I write.' 
 
 Vervelle waddled to the writing-table and spoke in 
 Grassou's ear. 
 
 ' That interfering muddler will spoil it,' said the bottle- 
 merchant. 
 
 ' If he would paint your Virginie's portrait, it would be 
 worth a thousand of mine,' replied Fougeres indignantly. 
 
 On hearing this, the goodman quietly beat a retreat to 
 join his wife, who sat bewildered at the invasion of this 
 wild beast, and not at all happy at seeing him co-operating 
 in her daughter's portrait. 
 
 ' There, carry out those hints,' said Bridau, returning 
 the palette, and taking the note. ' I will not thank you. — 
 I can get back to D'Arthez' chateau ; I am painting a 
 dining-room for him, and Leon de Lora is doing panels 
 over the doors — masterpieces. Come and see us ! ' 
 
 He went off without bowing even, so sick was he of 
 looking at Virginie. 
 
 ' Who is that man ? ' asked Madame Vervelle. 
 
 ' A great artist,' replied Grassou. 
 
 There was a moment's silence. 
 
 ' Are you quite sure,' said Virginie, * that he has 
 brought no ill-luck to my portrait ? ... He frightened 
 me.' 
 
 ' He has only improved it,' said Grassou. 
 
 ' If he is a great artist, I prefer a great artist like you,' 
 said Madame de Vervelle. 
 
 ' Oh, mamma. Monsieur Fougeres is a much greater 
 artist. He will take me full length,' remarked Virginie. 
 
 The eccentricities of genius had scared these steady- 
 going Philistines. 
 
 The year had now reached that pleasant autumn 
 season prettily called Saint-Martin's summer. It was 
 with the shyness of a neophyte in the presence of a man
 
 288 Pierre Grassou 
 
 of genius that Vervelle ventured to invite Grassou to 
 spend the following Sunday at his country-house. He 
 knew how little attraction a bourgeois family could offer 
 to an artist. 
 
 * You artists,' said he, ' must have excitement, fine 
 scenes, and clever company. But I can give you some 
 good wine, and I rely on my pictures to make up for 
 the dulness an artist like you must feel among trades- 
 folks.' 
 
 This worship, which greatly soothed his vanity, de- 
 lighted poor Pierre Grassou, who was little used to such 
 compliments. This worthy artist, this ignominious 
 mediocrity, this heart of gold, this loyal soul, this 
 blundering draughtsman, this best of good fellows, dis- 
 playing the Cross of the Royal Order of the Legion of 
 Honour, got himself up with care to go and enjoy the 
 last fine days of the year at Ville-d'Avray. The painter 
 arrived unpretentiously by the public conveyance, and 
 could not help admiring the bottle-merchant's handsome 
 residence placed in the midst of a park of about five 
 acres, at the top of the hill, and the best point of view. 
 To marry Virginie meant owning this fine house some 
 day ! 
 
 He was received by the Vervelles with an enthusiasm, 
 a delight, a genuine heartiness, a simple, commonplace 
 stupidity that overpowered him. It was a day of triumph. 
 The future son-in-law was taken to walk along the 
 nankeen-coloured paths, which had been raked, as was 
 due, for a great man. The very trees looked as if they 
 had been brushed and combed, the lawns were mown. 
 The pure country air diluted kitchen odours of the most 
 comforting character. Everything in the house pro- 
 claimed, ' We have a great artist here ! ' Little father 
 Vervelle rolled about his paddock like an apple, the 
 daughter wriggled after him like an eel, and the mother 
 followed with great dignity. For seven hours these 
 three beings never released Grassou.
 
 Pierre Grassou 289 
 
 After a dinner, of which the length matched the 
 splendour, Monsieur and Madame Vervelle came to 
 their grand surprise — the opening of the picture gallery, 
 lighted up by lamps carefully arranged for effect. Three 
 neighbours, all retired business men, an uncle from 
 whom they had expectations, invited in honour of the 
 great artist, an old Aunt Vervelle, and the other guests 
 followed Grassou into the gallery, all curious to hear his 
 opinion of little Daddy Vervelle's famous collection, for 
 he overpowered them by the fabulous value of his pictures. 
 The bottle-merchant seemed to wish to vie with King 
 Louis-Philippe and the galleries of Versailles. 
 
 The pictures, splendidly framed, bore tickets, on which 
 might be read in black letters on a gold label: — 
 
 RUBENS 
 A Dance of Fauns and Nymphs 
 
 REMBRANDT 
 
 Interior of a Dissecting-room 
 Doctor Tromp giving a Lesson to his Pupils 
 
 There were a hundred and fifty pictures, all varnished 
 and dusted; a few had green curtains over them, not to 
 be raised in the presence of the young person. 
 
 The artist stood with limp arms and a gaping mouth, 
 without a word on his lips, as he recognised in this 
 gallery half his own works ; he. He was Rubens, Paul 
 Potter, Mieris, Metzu, Gerard Dow ! He alone was 
 twenty great masters ! 
 
 ' What is the matter ? you look pale.' 
 
 ' Daughter, a glass of water ! ' cried Madame 
 Vervelle. 
 
 The painter took the old man by the button of his 
 coat and led him into a corner, under pretence of 
 examining a Murillo. — Spanish pictures were then the 
 fashion. 
 
 T
 
 290 Pierre Grassou 
 
 ' You bought your pictures of Elias Magus ? ' said he. 
 
 ' Yes. All original works.' 
 
 ' Between ourselves, what did he make you pay for 
 those I will point out to you ? ' 
 
 The couple went round the gallery. The guests were 
 amazed at the solemnity with which the artist, following 
 his host, examined all these masterpieces. 
 
 'Three thousand francs!' exclaimed Vervelle in an 
 undertone, as he came to the last. ' But I tell you 
 forty thousand francs ! ' 
 
 ' Forty thousand francs for a Titian ! ' said the artist 
 aloud ; 'why, it is dirt-cheap ! ' 
 
 ' When I told you I had a hundred thousand crowns* 
 worth of pictures ' exclaimed Vervelle. 
 
 ' I painted every one of those pictures,' said Pierre 
 Grassou in his ear ; * and I did not get more than ten 
 thousand francs for the whole lot.' 
 
 ' Prove it,' replied the bottle-merchant, ' and I will 
 double my daughter's settlements ; for in that case you 
 are Rubens, Rembrandt, Terburg, Titian ! ' 
 
 ' And Magus is something like a picture-dealer ! ' 
 added the painter, who could account for the antique 
 look of the pictures, and the practical end of the subjects 
 ordered by the dealer. 
 
 Far from falling in his admirer's estimation, M. de 
 Fougeres — for so the family insisted on calling Pierre 
 Grassou — rose so high that he painted his family for 
 nothing, and of course presented the portraits to his 
 father-in-law, his mother-in-law, and his wife. 
 
 Pierre Grassou, who never misses a single exhibition, 
 is now regarded in the Philistine world as a very good 
 portrait-painter. He earns about twelve thousand francs 
 a year, and spoils about five hundred francs' worth of 
 canvas. His wife had six thousand francs a year on her 
 marriage, and they live with her parents. The Vervelles 
 and the Grassous, who get on perfectly well together.
 
 Pierre Grassou 291 
 
 keep a carriage, and are the happiest people on earth. 
 Pierre Grassou moves in a commonplace circle, where 
 he is considered one of the greatest artists of the period. 
 Not a family portrait is ordered between the Barriere du 
 Trone and the Rue du Temple that is not the work of 
 this great painter, or that costs less than five hundred 
 francs. The great reason why the townsfolk employ this 
 artist is this : ' Say what you like, he invests twenty 
 thousand francs a year through his notary.' 
 
 As Grassou behaved very well in the riots of the 12th 
 of May, he has been promoted to be an officer of the 
 Legion of Honour. He is major in the National Guard. 
 The Versailles gallery was bound to order a battle-scene 
 of so worthy a citizen, who forthwith walked all about 
 Paris to meet his old comrades, and to say with an air 
 of indifference, 'The King has ordered me to paint a 
 battle!' 
 
 Madame de Fougeres adores her husband, whom she 
 has presented with two children. The painter, however, 
 a good father and a good husband, cannot altogether get 
 rid of a haunting thought : other painters make fun of 
 him ; his name is a term of contempt in every studio ; 
 the newspapers never notice his works. Still, he works 
 on, and is making his way to the Academy ; he will be 
 admitted. And then — a revenge that swells his heart 
 with pride — he buys pictures by famous artists when 
 they are in difficulties, and he is replacing the daubs 
 at the Ville d'Avray by real masterpieces — not of his 
 own painting. 
 
 There are mediocrities more vexatious and more spiteful 
 than that of Pierre Grassou, who is in fact anonymously 
 benevolent and perfectly obliging. 
 
 Paris, 'December 1839.
 
 ^ 
 
 Printed by T. and A. Constaele, Printers to Her Majesty 
 at the Edinburgh University Press
 
 -JLLli-'S
 
 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY 
 
 AA 000 320 010
 
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