UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA
AT LOS ANGELES
BROWSING ROOM
THE LIBRARY
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OF CALIFORNIA
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I^onorc tic Bal^^ac
J^onore tic Balzac
PARISIAN LIFE
VOLUME VI
LIMITED TO ONE THOUSAND COMPLETE COPIES
1 '^
NO. i ^^ t>
<>j^yUj/-Au,i iSyff^-f "^.J^ 9'- Jlin.
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M. AND MADAME JULES AND IDA
'"My name is Ida, Monsieur. And if that is
Madame Jules to ivliom I Jiave the advantage of
speaking. Eve come to tell her all I have in my
heart against her. It is very ^vrong when one is
set lip and zuhen one is in her fiirnitnre, as yon arc
here, to wish to take away from a poor girl a man
with zvJiom I am as good as married, morally, and
zvho talks of repairing his ivrongs by marrying me
before the Municipality.
THE NOVELS
OF
HONORE DE BALZAC
NOW FOR THE FIRST TIME
COMPLETELY TRANSLATED INTO ENGLISH
HISTORY OF THE THIRTEEN:
FERRAGUS CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
BY WILLIAM WALTON
WITH FIVE ETCHINGS BY CLAUDE FAIVRE AND AUGUSTIN
MONGIN, AFTER PAINTINGS BY LOUIS-
EDOUARD FOURNIER
IN ONE VOLUME
< 3 J > ^
a » >
PRINTED ONLY FOR SUBSCRIBERS BY
GEORGE BARRIE & SON, PHILADELPHIA
COPYRIGHTED, 1 896, BY G. B. * SON
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HISTORY OF THE THIRTEEN
189961
PREFACE
There were brought together under the Empire
and in Paris, thirteen men all equally possessed
by the same sentiment, all of them endowed with
sufficient force to remain constant to one idea, suffi-
ciently honorable not to betray one another, even
when their individual interests conflicted, suffi-
ciently politic to conceal the sacred ties which
united them, sufficiently strong to maintain them-
selves above all law, courageous enough to under-
take anything, and fortunate enough to have almost
always succeeded in their designs; having encoun-
tered the greatest dangers, but never speaking of
their defeats; inaccessible to fear, and having trem-
bled neither before the prince, the headsman, nor
innocence; accepting each other for such as they
were, without taking into account social prejudices;
criminals undoubtedly, but certainly remarkable for
some of those qualities which mark great men, and
recruiting their number only from men of distinc-
tion. And, finally, that nothing might be lacking
to the sombre and mysterious poetry of this history
these thirteen men have remained unknown, though
all of them have realized the strangest chimer-
ical ideas which are suggested to the imagina-
tion by that fantastic power wrongly attributed to
(3)
4 PREFACE
the Manfreds, the Fausts, the Melmoths; and all of
them are to-day crushed, or at least dispersed.
They have quietly returned to the yoke of the civil
law, as Morgan, the Achilles of pirates, transformed
himself from a destroyer to a peaceful colonist, dis-
posing without remorse by the light of his own fire-
side, of the millions gathered in blood by the red
glare of incendiarism.
Since the death of Napoleon, an accident con-
cerning which the author should still preserve
silence, has dissolved the bonds of this life, as
secret and curious, as the darkest of the romances
of Mrs. Radcliffe. The permission, sufficiently
remarkable in itself, to relate, in his own manner,
some of the adventures of these men, always with
respect for certain proprieties, has only recently
been given him by one of these anonymous heroes
to whom all branches of society were secretly sub-
ject, and in whom the author believes himself to
have discovered a vague desire for celebrity.
This man, in appearance still young, with light
hair and blue eyes, whose voice, soft and clear,
seemed to reveal a feminine soul, was pale of com-
plexion and mysterious in his manners; he con-
versed affably, pretended to be only forty years of
age, and might have been a member of the highest
class of society. The name which he had assumed
appeared to be a fictitious one; in the gay world
his person was unknown. Who is he ? no one knows.
Perhaps, in confiding to the author the extra-
ordinary things which he revealed to him, the
PREFACE 5
unknown wished to see them reproduced in some
manner and to enjoy the emotions which they
would be certain to awaken in the bosoms of the
populace; some feeling analogous to that experi-
enced by Macpherson when the name of Ossian,
his creation, was inscribed in all languages. And
it was, certainly, for the Scottish lawyer one of the
keenest sensations, or at least one of the rarest,
that man can give himself. May it not be said to
be the incognito of genius? To write the Itineraire
de Paris a Jerusalem, is to take one's part in the
human glory of a century; but to endow one's
country with a Homer, is it not to usurp the privi-
leges of God ?
The author is too well acquainted with the laws
of narration to remain in ignorance of the engage-
ments which this short preface causes him to
assume; but he also knows sufficiently well the
story of the Thirteen to be certain of never falling
below the interest which this programme would
seem to promise. Certain dramas blood-curdling,
certain comedies full of terrors, certain romances
through which roll human heads secretly struck off,
have been confided to him. If any reader has
not been satiated with the horrors coolly served
up to the public recently, he could, if but the slightest
desire to hear them were manifested, reveal to
him quiet atrocities, marvelous family tragedies.
But he has selected in preference the mildest
adventures, those in which pure scenes succeed
the storms of the passions, in which woman is
6 PREFACE
radiant with virtue and beauty. For the honor of
the Thirteen, such scenes may be met with in their
history, which perhaps some day may be judged
worthy of being published as a pendant to that of
the buccaneers, that race apart, so curiously ener-
getic, so attractive despite its crimes.
An author should disdain to convert his recital,
when that recital is truthful, into a species of jack-
in-the-box, and to lead his reader, after the manner
of some romancers, from one subterranean crypt to
another through four volumes in order to show him
a withered corpse and to say to him, by way of con-
clusion, that he has been keeping him in constant
terror of a secret door in the tapestry or of a dead
man left inadvertently under the floor. Notwith-
standing his aversion to prefaces the author has felt
obliged to place these sentences at the beginning of
this fragment. Ferragus is a preliminary episode
which is united by invisible bonds to the his-
tory of the Thirteen, whose power, naturally
acquired, alone can explain certain energies, appar-
ently supernatural. Although it be permitted to
story-tellers to have a kind of literary coquetry, on
becoming historians, they should renounce the
benefits which they might derive from strangeness
of titles, which in our day procure certain slight
successes. Therefore the author will explain here
briefly the reasons which have obliged him to ac-
cept certain titles for his books which at first sight
may not seem quite natural.
Ferragus is, according to an ancient custom, a
PREFACE 7
name taken by a chief of Devorants. The day of
their election, these chiefs adopt for themselves
those of the names of the devorantesque dynasties
which please them, just as, of the pontifical dynas-
ties, the Popes do, at their installation. Thus
the Devorants have Trempe-la-Soupe IX., Ferragus
XXII., Tutanus XIII., Masche-Fer IK, in the
same manner as the Church has its Clement
XIV., Gregory IX., Julius II., Alexander VI., etc.
Meanwhile, who are the Devorants? Devorants is the
name of one of the tribes of "companions" that issued
formerly from the great mystical organization formed
among the workmen of Christendom to rebuild the
Temple of Jerusalem. The compagnonnage still
exists in France among the people. Its traditions,
powerful for the unthinking and for those who are
not sufficiently-well educated to break these oaths,
might serve for formidable enterprises if some
rough-hewn genius were to seize the direction of
these various societies. In fact, there, there is no
lack of blind instruments; there, from one town to
another, has existed, for the compagnons, from time
immemorial an ohade, a species of halting-place
kept by a mother, an old woman, half gipsy, having
nothing to lose, knowing all that passes in the
country, and devoted — either from fear or from long
custom — to the tribe which she lodges and feeds in
detail. Finally, these people constantly chang-
ing, yet submitting to immovable customs, may
have eyes in every locality, execute everywhere a
will, without a judgment thereon, for the oldest
8 PREFACE
companion is still in an age when one believes in
something. In addition, the entire body professes
doctrines sufficiently true, sufficiently mysterious,
to electrify patriotically all the adepts, if they but
receive the slightest development Then the attach-
ment of the companions to their laws is so passionate
that the various tribes wage bloody combat among
themselves in order to decide some question of prin-
ciple. Fortunately for the existing public order,
when a Devorant becomes ambitious, he builds
houses, makes a fortune, and leaves the compag-
nonnage. There would be many curious details to
give concerning the "Companions of Duty" — com-
pagnons du Devoir — the rivals of the Devorants, and
all the different sects of workmen, their customs
and their fraternity, the relations which exist be-
tween them and the Freemasons; but these details
would be out of place here. Only, the author will
add that, under the ancient monarchy, it was not un-
known to find a Trempe-la-Soupe in the king's
service, having secured a place for a hundred and
one years in the galleys ; but from there still direct-
ing his tribe, still consulted religiously by them,
and if he quitted the chain-gang, certain of
finding aid, comfort and respect everywhere. To
see its chief at the galleys is, for a faithful tribe,
only one of those misfortunes for which Providence
is responsible, but which in no way relieves the
Devorants from the duty of obeying the power
created by them, above them. It is the temporary
exile of their legitimate king, always a king for
PREFACE 9
them. Here may be seen, then, the romantic pres-
tige attached to the name of Ferragus and to that of
Devorants completely dissipated.
As to the Thirteen, the author feels himself suffi-
ciently strongly supported by the details of this
history, almost romantic, to renounce again one of
the finest privileges of the novelist of which there
can be an example — and which, on the Ch^telet of
literature, would be awarded a high prize — and to
impose on the public as many volumes as have
been given them by LA CONTEMPORAINE. The
Thirteen were all of them men of the same quality as
was Trelawny, the friend of Lord Byron and, as it
is said, the original of the Corsair; all of them
fatalists, men of heart and poetical, but wearied of
the monotonous life they led, strongly drawn to-
wards Asiatic enjoyments by those forces which
awoke in them all the more furiously, having
been so long suppressed. One day, one of them,
after having re-read Venice Preserved, after hav-
ing admired the sublime union of Pierre and Jaffier,
fell into contemplation of the peculiar virtues of
those who find themselves thrown outside the social
order, on the probity of the bagnios, on the fidelity
of thieves to each other, on the privileges of exor-
bitant power which these men know how to con-
quer by concentrating all ideas in a single will. It
appeared to him that man was greater than men.
He thought that society in its entirety might belong
to those distinguished ones who, to their natural
abilities, to their acquired enlightenment, to their
10 PREFACE
fortune, would join a fanaticism furious enough to
cast into a single jet all these different forces.
Thus equipped, immense in action and in intens-
ity, their occult power, against which the social
order would be defenceless, might overthrow in it
all obstacles, overwhelm all wills, and give to each
one of them the diabolical power of all. This
world isolated in the midst of the world, hostile to
the world, admitting none of the ideas of the world,
recognizing none of its laws, submitting only to
the conscience of its own necessity, obedient to
devotion only, acting altogether for one of the asso-
ciates when one of them claimed the assistance of
all; this life of buccaneers in kid gloves and in car-
riages; this intimate union of superiors, cold and
mocking, smiling and cursing in the midst of a false
and mean society, the certainty of being able to
make everything bend under a caprice, of contriving
a vengeance skilfully, of living in thirteen hearts;
then the continual satisfaction of having a secret of
hatred in the face of men, of being always armed
against them, and of being able to retire into one's
self with one idea more than even the most re-
markable men could have; — this religion of pleas-
ure and of egoism fanaticized thirteen men, who
reconstituted the Society of Jesus for the profit
of the Devil. It was horrible and sublime. And
in fact the compact was made; and in fact en-
dured, precisely because it appeared impossible.
There were then, in Paris, thirteen brothers, who
belonged to each other and who did not recognize
PREFACE II
each other in the world; but who came together in
the evening, like conspirators, hiding none of their
thoughts from each other, using alternately a power
like that of the Old Man of the Mountain; having
a foothold in all the salons, their hands in all the
strong-boxes, elbow-room in all the streets, their
heads on any pillow, and, without scruple, making
everything serve their fantastic will. No chief
commanded them, no one could arrogate to himself
the supreme power; only, the most vivid passion,
the most exacting circumstances, assumed the initia-
tive. They were thirteen unknown kings, but
really kings, and more than kings, judges and
executioners who, having made for themselves
wings with which to traverse society from the top
to the bottom, disdained to be something in it
because they could be all. If the author should
learn the causes of their abdication, he will relate
them.
At present, he is permitted to commence the
recital of the three episodes which, in this history,
have most particularly attracted him by the Parisian
flavor of the details and by the extravagance of the
contrasts.
Paris, 1 83 1.
FERRAGUS, CHIEF OF THE
DEVORANTS
(13)
TO HECTOR BERLIOZ
(15)
FERRAGUS
CHIEF OF THE D^VORANTS
*
There are in Paris certain streets as dishonored
as can be any man convicted of infamy; then there
are noble streets, also streets that are simply hon-
est, also young streets concerning whose morality
the public has not yet formed any opinion; then
there are murderous streets, streets older than the
oldest possible dowagers, estimable streets, streets
that are always clean, streets that are always dirty,
workingmen's streets, students' streets and mercan-
tile ones. In short, the streets of Paris have human
qualities, and impress us by their physiognomy
with certain ideas against which we are defence-
less. There are streets of bad company in which
you would not wish to dwell, and there are others
in which you would willingly take up your resi-
dence. Some streets, like that of Montmartre, have
a fme head and end in a fish's tail. The Rue
de la Paix is a wide street, a grand street; but it
reveals none of those gracefully noble suggestions
which surprise an impressionable soul in the midst
of the Rue Royale, and it certainly lacks the majesty
which reigns in the Place Vendome. If you walk
2 (17)
l8 FERRAGUS
about in the streets of the He Saint-Louis you
will require no other cause for the nervous sad-
ness which oppresses you than the solitude, the
gloomy air of the houses and of the great deserted
houses. This island, the corpse of the Farmers-
General, is like the Venice of Paris. The Place
de la Bourse is chattering, active, prostituted; it is
only handsome by moonlight, at two o'clock in
the morning; in the daylight it is an abridged
presentation of Paris; at night, it is like a dream
of Greece. The Rue Traversiere-Saint-Honore is
it not an infamous street? There are in it wicked
little houses with two window-casements, in which,
from story to story, may be found vices, crimes and
misery. The narrow streets facing north, into
which the sunlight only comes three or four times
in the course of the year, are streets of assassina-
tion which kill with impunity; to-day, Justice
does not interfere with them ; but formerly the par-
liament would perhaps have summoned the lieuten-
ant of police to reprimand him accordingly and
would at least have issued a decree against the
street, as one was directed formerly against the per-
niqiies of the Chapter of Beauvais. Meanwhile,
Monsieur Benoiston de Chateauneuf has demon-
strated that the mortality of these streets is double
that of others. To sum up all these ideas in one
example, the Rue Fromenteau, is it not at once mur-
derous and profligate? These observations, incom-
prehensible outside of Paris, will be doubtless
appreciated by those men of study and thought^
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS TQ
of poetry and pleasure, who know how to gather,
whilst idling in Paris, all those enjoyments which
float continually within her walls; by those for
whom Paris is the most delicious of monsters; —
there, a pretty woman; farther off, old and poor;
here, brand-new, like the coinage of a new reign;
in that corner, elegant as a woman of fashion. A
monster so complete, moreover! His garrets, a
species of head, crowded with science and with
genius; his lower stories, comfortable stomachs;
his shops, veritable feet, — from them issue all the
comers and goers, all the busy people. And what
a ceaselessly active life is that of the monster!
Scarcely has the last rattling of the last carriages
from the ball ceased in his heart when already his
arms are moving at the barriers, and he shakes
himself slowly. All the doors open, turning on
their hinges, like the members of a great lobster,
invisibly set in motion by thirty thousand men or
women, of which each one lives in a space of six
feet square, possesses there a kitchen, a workshop,
a bed, children, a garden, does not see very
clearly, and should see all. Imperceptibly the limbs
begin to creak, the movement spreads, the street
speaks. By noon everything is alive, the chim-
neys smoke, the monster is eating; then he roars,
then his thousand claws are in motion. Beautiful
spectacle ! But, Oh ! Paris, he who has not admired
thy sombre passages, thy gleams of light, thy
gloomy and silent culs-de-sac; he who has not
heard thy murmurs, between midnight and two
20 FERRAGUS
o'clock in the morning, still knows nothing of thy
true poetry nor of thy great and curious contrasts.
There is a small number of amateurs, people who
never walk heedlessly, who taste their Paris, who
possess so completely her physiognomy that they
can perceive on it a wart, a mole, a pimple. For
others, Paris is always this marvellous monster, an
astonishing assemblage of movements, of machines
and thoughts, the city with a hundred thousand
romances, the head of the world. But to the first,
Paris is sorrowful or gay, ugly or handsome, living
or dead; to them, Paris is a creature; each man,
each fraction of a house, is a lobe of the cellular
tissue of this great wanton, of whom they know
perfectly the head, the heart, and the fantastic
manners. Thus these are the lovers of Paris:
they elevate their noses at such a corner of the
street sure of finding there the face of a clock;
they say to a friend whose snuff-box is empty,
^'Take such a passage, you will find in it a tobacco
shop, at the left, near to a pastry-cook who has a
pretty wife." To ramble through Paris is, for
these poets, a costly luxury. How to avoid spend-
ing precious minutes before all the dramas, the
disasters, the figures, the picturesque accidents,
which continually assail you in the midst of this
moving queen of cities, clothed with displayed posters
and who, nevertheless, has not one clean corner,
so complaisant is she to the vices of the French
nation ! To whom has it not happened to set out in
the morning from his lodging to go to the extremity
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 21
of Paris, and to find himself at dinner time still un-
able to leave the centre of the city ? These, then,
will know how to excuse this wandering introduc-
tion which, however, may be summed up in an
observation eminently useful and novel— as much
so as any observation can be new in Paris, where
there is nothing new, not even the statue set up
yesterday on which a street-boy has already
scrawled his name. Yes, then, there are streets,
or ends of streets, there are certain houses, un-
known for the greater part to people of social dis-
tinction, in which a woman belonging to society
could not enter without giving rise to the cruelest
suspicions concerning herself. If this woman be
rich, if she have a carriage, if she go on foot, or
disguised, into some of these defiles of the Parisian
country, she compromises her reputation as a vir-
tuous woman. But if by chance she should come
there at nine o'clock in the evening, the opinion
that an observer would permit himself to form
might have the most serious consequences. Finally,
if this woman be young and pretty, if she enter
some house in one of these streets; if this house
have a long and dark passage-way, damp and ill-
smelling; if at the bottom of this passage-way may
be seen trembling the pale light of a lamp, and if
under this light may be perceived a horrible visage
of an old woman with long and lean fingers, —
then in truth, let us say it, in the interests of all
young and pretty women, such woman is lost. She
is at the mercy of the first man of her acquaintance
22 FERRAGUS
whom she may encounter in these Parisian mo-
rasses. But there are many streets in Paris in
which this meeting might become the most fright-
fully terrible drama, a drama full of blood and of
love, a drama of the modern school. Unfortunately,
this conviction, this dramatic possibility, will be,
like the modern drama, comprehended but by few;
and it is a great pity to have to relate a story to a
public which does not appreciate all its local merit
But who may flatter himself that he is ever un-
derstood? We shall all die unrecognized. It is the
plaint of women and authors.
At half-past eight o'clock one evening, in Rue
Pagevin, at the period when Rue Pagevin had
not one wall that did not echo an infamous word,
and in the direction of Rue Soly, the narrowest
and the most impassable of all the streets of Paris,
not excepting the most frequented corner of the
most deserted street; in the early part of the month
of February, this adventure came to pass about
thirteen years ago. — A young man, by one of those
chances which do not present themselves twice in
a lifetime, was turning the corner of Rue Pa-
gevin on foot to enter Rue des Vieux-Augustins,
on the right, precisely where Rue Soly is.
There, this young man, who lived in Rue de
Bourbon, thought he recognized in the woman a
few feet behind whom he was walking quite care-
lessly, a vague resemblance to the prettiest woman
in Paris, a chaste and delicious being with whom
he was secretly and passionately in love, and in love
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 23
without hope, for she was married. In a moment
his heart leaped, an intolerable heat seemed to
develop in his diaphragm and to pass into all
his veins, he felt a chill in his back and in his
head a superficial trembling. He loved, he was
young, he knew Paris; and his perspicacity did not
permit him to ignore all that there was possible of
infamy for a woman, elegant, rich, young and
beautiful, walking in this locality, and with a crim-
inally furtive step. She, in this mud, at this hour !
The love which this young man bore for this lady
may well seem romantic, and all the more so that
he was an officer in the Garde Royale. If he had
been attached to the infantry, the thing might still
appear possible; but, a superior officer of cavalry,
he belonged to that arm of the service which desires
the greatest rapidity in its conquests, which finds
food for vanity in its amorous affairs as much as in
its uniform. However, the passion of this officer
was genuine, and to very many young hearts it
will seem noble. He loved this lady because she
was virtuous, in her he loved virtue, modest
grace, and imposing sanctity, as the dearest treas-
ures of his unavowed passion. She was in truth
worthy of inspiring one of those platonic loves
which may be met with, in the history of the
Middle Ages, like flowers growing in bloody ruins;
worthy of being secretly the inspiring principle of
all the actions of a young man ; a love as high, as
pure, as the sky when it is blue; a love without
hope, and to which we may attach ourselves because
24 FERRAGUS
it will never deceive; a love prodigal of unbounded
enjoyments, especially at an age when the heart is
burning, the imagination keen, and when the eyes
of a man see very clearly. There may be met with
in Paris very singular night effects, weird and
inconceivable. Those only who have amused them-
selves by observing them can know how fantastic
may become through their means a woman in the
dusk of evening. At moments the creature whom
you are following, accidentally or with design,
seems to you light and slender; again the stock-
ings, if they are very white, convince you of
the fme and elegant limbs; then the waist, though
enveloped in a shawl, as in a pelisse, reveals itself
young and voluptuous, in the shadows; then the
uncertain lights of a shop or of a street lamp give
to the unknown a fleeting illumination, nearly
always deceptive, which awakens, lights up the
imagination and carries it beyond the limita-
tions of fact. The senses are all excited, every-
thing takes color and animation; the woman
assumes an entirely novel aspect; her person be-
comes beautiful ; at certain moments she is no
longer a woman, she is a demon, a will-o'-the-wisp,
which entices you, by a magnetic attraction, to
follow all the way to some respectable house where
the poor boiirgeoise, terrified by your threatening
step or the sound of your boots, shuts the door in
your face without looking at you. A vacillating
gleam, thrown from the shop-window of a shoe-
maker, suddenly illuminated just below the waist
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 25
the figure of the woman who was before the young
man. Ah! surely, she alone had those curves!
She alone possessed the secret of that chaste gait
which so innocently reveals the beauties of the
most attractive forms. That was her shawl and
that the velvet bonnet of her morning promenades.
On her gray silk stocking not a spot; on her shoe
not a splash of mud. The shawl was drawn tightly
around the bust, it disclosed vaguely the delicious
contours; and the young man had seen the white
shoulders at balls, — he knew well what treasures
that shawl covered. By the manner in which a
Parisian woman wraps herself in her shawl, by the
way in which she lifts her feet in the street, a man
of quick intelligence can divine the secret of her
mysterious course. There is something, I know
not what, of quivering, of lightness, in the whole
person and in the gait; the woman seems to weigh
less, she goes, she goes, or, rather, she glides like
a star, and floats carried on by a thought which is
betrayed by the folds and by the motion of her
dress. The young man quickened his step, passed
the woman, and then turned to look at her — Pst ! she
had disappeared into a passage-way, the grated door
of which and its bell still rattled and sounded. The
young man turned on his steps and saw this lady
mounting, at the end of the passage-way — not with-
out receiving the obsequious salutation of an old
portress — a winding staircase, the lower steps of
which were strongly illuminated; and Madame
ascended buoyantly, quickly, like an eager woman.
26 FERRAGUS
"Eager for what? " said the young man to him-
self, drawing back to flatten himself like a grape-
vine, against the wall on the other side of the street.
And he watched, unhappy man, all the different
stories of the house with the close attention of a
police agent searching for his conspirator.
It was one of those houses of which there are
thousands in Paris, a house ignoble, vulgar, narrow,
yellowish in tone, with four stories and three win-
dows on each floor. The shop and the entresol
belonged to the shoemaker. The outer blinds on
the first floor were closed. Where was Madame
going ? The young man thought he heard the tinkle
of a bell in the apartment on the second floor. In
fact, a light began to move in a room with two
windows strongly illuminated, and suddenly lit up
the third window, the darkness of which showed
that it was that of a first room, evidently either the
salon or the dining-room of the apartment Imme-
diately the silhouette of a woman's bonnet showed
itself vaguely, the door closed, the first room became
dark again, then the other two windows resumed
their ruddy glow. At this moment the young man
heard, "Look out there," and received a blow on
his shoulder.
"You don't pay attention to anything, then,"
said a rough voice.
It was the voice of a workman carrying a long
plank on his shoulder. And he passed on. This
workman was the man sent by Providence, say-
ing to this investigator, — "What are you meddling
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 2/
with? Think of your own duty, and leave the
Parisians to their little affairs."
The young man crossed his arms; then, as no
one saw him, he suffered tears of rage to roll down
his cheeks without drying them. At last, the sight
of the shadows playing on the two lighted windows
gave him pain, he looked by chance toward the
upper part of the Rue des Vieux-Augustins, and he
saw a hackney-coach standing before a wall, at a
locality where there was neither the door of a
house nor the light of a shop.
Is it she? is it not she? Life or death for a
lover. And this lover waited. He remained there
during a century of twenty minutes. After that,
the woman came down, and he then recognized her
whom he secretly loved. Nevertheless, he wished
still to doubt. She went toward the coach and got
into it.
"The house will always be there, I can search it
at any time, " said the young man following the
carriage at a run in order to dissipate his last
doubts, and very soon he no longer had any.
The coach stopped in the Rue de Richelieu
before the shop of a florist, near the Rue de
Menars. The lady got out, entered the shop, sent
out the money to pay the coachman and came out
herself after having selected a bunch of marabouts.
Marabouts for her black hair! A brunette, she
had placed the feathers close to her head to see
the effect. The officer fancied he could hear the
conversation between her and the florists.
28 FERRAGUS
"Madame, nothing is more becoming to brunettes,
brunettes have something a little too precise in their
contours, and the marabouts lend to their toilet a
softness which they lack. Madame la Duchesse de
Langeais says that they give to a woman something
vague, Ossianic, and very comme ilfauL*'
"Very good. Send them to me promptly."
Then the lady turned quickly toward the Rue de
Menars, and entered her own house. When the
door of the hotel in which she lived closed on her,
the young lover, having lost all his hopes, and, a
double misfortune, his dearest beliefs, walked away
through the streets of Paris like a drunken man,
and presently found himself in his own room with-
out knowing how he got there. He threw himself
into an arm-chair, put his head in his hands and
his feet on the andirons, drying his dampened
boots until they burned. It was an awful moment,
one of those moments in human life when the char-
acter is modified, and when the conauct of the best
man depends on the good or evil of his first action.
Providence or fatality, choose which you will.
This young man belonged to a good family, the
nobility of which was not very ancient; but there
are so few really old families in these days, that all
younger ones pass for ancient without dispute.
His grandfather had purchased the office of Coun-
sellor to the Parliament of Paris, of which he after-
wards became President. His sons, each pro-
vided with a handsome fortune, entered the army
and through their matrimonial alliances became
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 29
attached to the Court. The Revolution swept this
family away; but there remained one old dowager,
obstinate enough to refuse to emigrate, and who,
thrown into prison, threatened with death, and
saved on the 9th Thermidor, recovered her prop-
erty. She recalled to France at the proper time,
about 1804, her grandson, Auguste de Maulincour,
the only scion of the Carbonnons de Maulincour, who
was educated by the good dowager with the triple
care of a mother, of a woman of rank, and of an
obstinate dowager. Then, when the Restoration
arrived, the young man, then eighteen years of age,
entered the Maison Rouge, followed the princes to
Ghent, was made an officer in the Gardes du Corps,
left it to serve in the line, was recalled to the
Garde Royale, where at twenty-three years of age
he found himself chef d'escadron of a regiment of
cavalry, a superb position, and one which he owed
to his grandmother, who, notwithstanding her age,
knew her own world exceedingly well. This double
biography is a compendium of the general and spe-
cial history, barring variations, of all the noble
families who have emigrated, who had debts and
property, dowagers and shrewdness. Madame la
Baronne de Maulincour had for a friend the old
Vidame de Pamiers, formerly a Commander of the
Knights of Malta. This was one of those undying
friendships founded on sexagenary ties, and which
nothing can destroy, because at the bottom of such
intimacies there are always to be found certain
secrets of the human heart, delightful to divine
30 FERRAGUS
when we have the time, but insipid to explain in
twenty lines and which might furnish the text of a
work in four volumes as amusing as le Doyen de
Killerine, one of those works about which the youth
talk, and which they judge but do not read.
Auguste de Maulincour belonged therefore to the
Faubourg Saint-Germain through his grandmother
and through the vidame, and it sufficed him to date
back two centuries to assume the airs and the opin-
ions of those who pretended to go back to Clovis.
This young man, pale, tall and slender, delicate in
appearance, a man of honor and of true courage
moreover, who would engage in a duel without
hesitating for a yes or for a no, had not yet found
himself on any battlefield, and wore at his button-
hole the cross of the Legion of Honor. He was, as
you perceive, one of the living errors of the Res-
toration, perhaps the most pardonable of them.
The youth of those days was the youth of no epoch ;
it came between the memories of the Empire and
those of the Emigration, between the old traditions
of the Court and the conscientious education of the
bourgeoisie, between religion and the masked balls,
between two political faiths; between Louis XVII!.,
who only saw the present, and Charles X., who
looked too far into the future; it was, moreover,
obliged to accept the will of the king, although
royalty deceived it. This youth, uncertain in all
things, blind and clear-seeing, was counted as noth-
ing by the old men jealously keeping the reins of
State in their palsied hands, while the monarchy
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 3 1
might have been saved by their retirement and by
the accession of this Young France of which to-day
the old doctrinaires, the emigres of the Restoration,
still speak slightingly. Auguste de Maulincour was
a victim of the ideas which at that time weighed
upon this youth, and in this manner. The vidame
was still at sixty-seven years of age a very brilliant
man, having seen much, lived much, a good talker
and man of honor, a gallant man, but who held with
regard to women the most detestable opinions; he
loved them and he despised them. Their honor,
their feelings? Ta-ra-ra-, trifles and nonsense!
When he was in their society he believed in them,
the Ci-devant monster; he never contradicted
them and he made them display their brightest
qualities. But among his male friends, when they
were brought into question, the vidame laid down
the principle that to deceive women, to carry on
several intrigues at once, should be the sole occupa-
tion of young men, who would be wasting their
time in occupying themselves with anything else
under the government. It is unfortunate to have to
sketch so hackneyed a portrait. Has it not figured
everywhere.!* And has it not become literally as
threadbare as that of a grenadier of the Empire.?
But the vidame had upon the destiny of Monsieur
de Maulincour an influence which it is necessary to
depict; he lectured the young man after his fashion
and endeavored to convert him to the doctrines of
the great age of gallantry. The dowager, a woman
tender-hearted and pious, sitting between her
32 FERRAGUS
vidame and God, a model of grace and of sweet-
ness, but gifted with that well-bred persistency
which triumphs in the long run, had wished to pre-
serve for her grandson the beautiful illusions of life,
and had educated him in the highest principles;
she gave to him all her own delicacy of feeling and
made him a timid man, a coxcomb in appearance.
The sensibilities of this young fellow, preserved
pure, were not worn by contact without, and he
remained so chaste, so scrupulous, that he was
keenly offended by actions and maxims to which
the world attached not the slightest importance.
Ashamed of his susceptibility, the young man con-
cealed it under a false assurance and suffered in
silence; but he scoffed with others at things which
when alone he reverenced. Thus it happened that he
was deceived, because, in accordance with a not
uncommon caprice of destiny, he encountered in the
object of his first passion, he, a man of gentle mel-
ancholy and a spiritualist in love, a woman who
held in horror the German sentimentalism. The
young man distrusted himself, became contempla-
tive, absorbed in his griefs, complaining of not
being understood. Then, as we desire all the more
violently the things which we find it most difficult
to obtain, he continued to adore women with that
ingenious tenderness and those feline delicacies the
secret of which belongs to them alone and of which
they perhaps prefer to keep the monopoly. In fact,
although women complain of the manner in which
men love them, they have nevertheless but little
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 33
liking for those whose souls are half feminine. All
their superiority consists in making men believe
that they are their inferiors in love; therefore they
quit willingly enough a lover when he is suffi-
ciently experienced to rob them of those fears with
which they seek to deck themselves, those delight-
ful torments of feigned jealousy, those troubles of
hope betrayed, those vain expectations, in short the
whole procession of their feminine miseries; they
hold in horror the Grandissons. What can be
more contrary to their nature than a tranquil and
perfect love? They want emotions, and happiness
without storms is no longer happiness for them.
The feminine souls that are strong enough to bring
the infinite into love constitute angelic exceptions,
and are among women what noble geniuses are
among men. The great passions are as rare as
masterpieces. Outside of this love there are only
arrangements, irritations passing and contemptible,
as are all things that are petty.
Amid the secret disasters of his heart, while he
was still searching for the woman by whom he
could be comprehended — a search which, let us say
in passing, is the great amorous folly of our epoch —
Auguste met in the society the farthest from his
own, in the secondary sphere of the world of money
where banking holds a first place, a perfect creature,
one of those women who have about them I know
not what that is saintly and sacred, who inspire so
much reverence that love has need of all the help
of a long familiarity to enable it to declare itself.
3
34 FERRAGUS
Auguste then gave himself up wholly to the delights
of the deepest and most moving of passions, to a
love that was purely adoring. It was composed of
innumerable repressed desires, shades of passion so
vague and so profound, so fugitive and so actual,
that one knows not what to compare them to; they
are like perfumes, like clouds, like rays of the sun,
like shadows, like everything which in nature can
momentarily shine and disappear, spring to life and
die, leaving in the heart long emotions. While
the soul is still young enough to nourish melan-
choly, distant hopes, and to know how to find in
woman more than a woman, is it not the greatest
happiness that can befall a man to love enough to
feel more joy in touching a white glove, or ever so
lightly the hair, to listen to a phrase, to cast a
single look, than the most rapturous possession can
ever give to happy love? Thus it is that rejected
persons, the ugly, the unhappy, the unrevealed
lovers, women or timid men, they alone know the
treasures contained in the voice of the beloved.
Taking their source and their principle from the
soul itself, the vibrations of the air, charged with
fire, bring the hearts so closely into communion,
carry so lucidly thought between them, and are so
incapable of falsehood, that a single inflection is
often a complete revelation. What enchantments
can be bestowed upon the heart of a poet by the
harmonious intonations of a soft voice! How many
ideas they awaken in it! What freshness they
shed there ! Love is in the voice before the glance
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS _ 35
avows it. Auguste, poet after the manner of lovers
— there are poets who feel, and poets who express,
the first are the happier — Auguste had tasted all
these first joys, so vast, so fecund. She possessed
the most pleasing organ that the most artificial
women in the world could have desired in order to
deceive at her ease; she had that silvery voice
which, soft to the ear, is ringing only for the heart
which it stirs and troubles, which it caresses in
overthrowing. And this woman went by night to
Rue Soly, through Rue Pagevin; and her furtive
apparition in an infamous house had just de-
stroyed the grandest of passions! The vidame's
logic triumphed.
"If she is betraying her husband, we will avenge
ourselves," said Auguste.
There was still love shown by that z/— The
philosophic doubt of Descartes is a politeness
with which we should always honor virtue. Ten
o'clock sounded. The Baron de Maulincour remem-
bered at this moment that this woman was going to
a ball that evening at a house to which he had
access. He immediately dressed himself, set out,
arrived there and searched for her with a gloomy
air through all the salons. Madame de Nucingen,
seeing him so thoughtful, said to him:
"You do not see Madame Jules, but she has not
yet come.**
"Good evening, my dear," said a voice.
Auguste and Madame de Nucingen turned round.
Madame Jules had arrived, dressed all in white,
36 FERRAGUS
simple and noble, wearing in her hair the very-
same marabouts that the young baron had seen her
selecting in the flower shop. That voice of love
pierced the heart of Auguste. If he had won the
slightest right which permitted him to be jealous
of this woman, he would have petrified her by
saying to her only: "Rue Soly!" But if he, a
stranger, had repeated a thousand times this name
in the ear of Madame Jules she would have asked
him in astonishment what he meant. He looked at
her with a stupid air.
For those malicious people who laugh at every-
thing it is perhaps a great amusement to detect the
secret of a woman, to know that her chastity is a
lie, that her calm face hides some deep thought,
that there is some frightful drama hidden under
that pure brow. But there are certain souls to
whom such a sight is truly saddening, and many of
those who laugh, when withdrawn into their inner
selves, alone with their consciences, curse the world
and despise such a woman. Such was the case
with Auguste de Maulincour in the presence of
Madame Jules. Singular situation! There was no
other relation between them than that which the
social world establishes between persons who ex-
change a few words seven or eight times in the
course of a winter, and yet he was calling her to
account for a happiness unknown to her, he was
judging her without informing her of the accusation.
Many young men have found themselves thus, re-
turning to themselves, in despair at having broken
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 37
forever with a woman adored in secret; condemned,
despised in secret. There are hidden monologues,
said to the walls of some solitary lodging, storms
roused and calmed without ever having issued from
the bottom of hearts, admirable scenes of the moral
world, for which a painter is wanted. Madame Jules
sat down, leaving her husband who was making
the tour of the salon. When she was seated she
seemed uneasy, and, while talking with her neigh-
bor, she watched furtively Monsieur Jules Desma-
rets, her husband, the broker of the Baron de
iNucingen. The following is the history of this
household:
Monsieur Desmarets was, five years before his
marriage, in a broker's office with no other means
than the meagre salary of a clerk. But he was one
of those men whom misfortune early instructs in
the things of this life, and who follow the straight
line with the tenacity of an insect making for its
nest ; one of those dogged young men who slay be-
fore obstacles and who wear out all patiences with
their own tireless patience. Thus, young as he
was, he had all the republican virtues of poor peo-
ples; he was sober, saving of his time, an enemy to
pleasure. He waited. Nature had moreover given
him the immense advantage of an agreeable exte-
rior. His calm and clear brow; the shape of his
placid but expressive face; his simple manners,
everything in him revealed a laborious and resigned
existence, that lofty personal dignity which is im-
posing, and that secret nobility of heart which can
18996J.
38 FERRAGUS
meet all situations. His modesty inspired a sort of
respect in all those who knew him. Solitary more-
over in the midst of Paris he saw the world only by
glimpses during the brief moments that he spent in
his patron's salon on holidays. There were to be
found in this young man, as in most of the men
who live in this manner, passions of amazing pro-
fundity, — passions too vast to permit him ever to
compromise himself in petty incidents. His want
of fortune compelled him to lead an austere life,
and he conquered his fancies by hard work. When
he grew pale over his figures, he found his recrea-
tion in striving obstinately to acquire that wide and
general knowledge which to-day is so necessary to
every man who wishes to make his mark in soci-
ety, in commerce, at the bar, in politics, or in
literature. The only peril which these fme souls
have to fear is their own uprightness. Should
they see some poor girl, and fall in love with her,
they marry her, and they wear out their lives in a
struggle between poverty and love. The finest am-
bition is quenched in the book of household ex-
penses. Jules Desmarets fell headlong into his
peril. One evening he met at his patron's house
a young girl of the rarest beauty. The unfortunates
deprived of affection and who consume the fine
hours of their youth in long labors, alone know the
secret of these rapid ravages which passion makes
in their lonely and misunderstood hearts. They
are so certain of loving truly, all their forces are
concentrated so quickly on the woman who attracts
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 39
them that, at her side, they receive the most
delightful sensation while inspiring frequently none
at all. This is the most flattering of all egotisms
to a woman who knows how to divine this apparently
immovable passion and these emotions so deep that
they have required a great length of time to reach
the human surface. These poor men, anchorites in
the midst of Paris, have all the enjoyments of
anchorites and may sometimes succumb to their
temptations; but more often deceived, betrayed
and misunderstood, it is rarely permitted to them
to gather the sweet fruits of this love which to
them is like a flower dropped from heaven. One
smile from his wife, a single inflection of her voice,
sufficed to make Jules Desmarets conceive a passion
without bounds. Happily, the concentrated fire of
this secret passion revealed itself ingenuously to
the one who inspired it. These two beings then
loved each other religiously. To express all in a
word, they took each other by the hand before all
the world like two children, brother and sister, who
wished to pass through a crowd where all made way
for them admiringly. The young girl was in one
of those frightful positions in which human selfish-
ness places some children. She had no civil status,
and her name of Clemence, her age, were recorded
only by a notary public. As for her fortune,
it was insignificant. Jules Desmarets was the
happiest of men on learning these misfortunes. If
Clemence had belonged to some opulent family, he
would have despaired of obtaining her; but she
II
40 FERRAGUS
was a poor child of love, the fruit of some terrible
adulterine passion; they were married. Then
began for Jules Desmarets a series of fortunate
events. Every one envied his happiness, and his
enviers accused him thenceforward of having
nothing but good fortune, without recalling either
his virtues or his courage. Some days after the
marriage of her daughter, the mother of Clemence,
who passed in society for her godmother, advised
Jules Desmarets to purchase the connection of a
broker, promising to procure for him the necessary
capital. At that time these connections could
still be bought at a moderate price. That evening,
in the salon of his broker, a wealthy capitalist, as it
happened, on the recommendation of this lady,
proposed to Jules Desmarets the most advantageous
transaction that it was possible for him to conclude,
gave him all the funds that would be required for
this purpose, and the next day the happy clerk
bought out his patron. In four years Jules Des-
marets had become one of the richest members of
his profession; many new clients had come to aug-
ment the number of those whom his predecessor
had left to him. He inspired a boundless confi-
dence, and it was impossible for him not to be con-
scious, by the manner in which his affairs prospered,
of some secret influence due to his mother-in-law, or
some hidden protection which he attributed to Prov-
idence. At the end of the third year Clemence
lost her godmother. By that time Jules, so-called
to distinguish him from his elder brother whom he
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 41
had established as a notary in Paris, possessed an
income of about 200,000 francs. There did not exist
in all Paris another example of the domestic happi-
ness enjoyed in this household. During five years
this exceptional love had only been troubled by one
calumny, for which Monsieur Jules exacted signal
vengeance. One of his former comrades attributed
the fortune of the husband to Madame Jules, ex-
plaining that it came from a high protection dearly
purchased. The calumniator was killed in a duel.
The deep passion of this couple, mutual as it was,
and which survived marriage, obtained the greatest
success in the social world, though some women
were baffled by it. The charming household was
respected, everybody feted it. Monsieur and
Madame Jules were sincerely liked, perhaps because
there is nothing pleasanter than to see happy peo-
ple; but they never remained long in any salon,
and escaped as if impatient to regain their nest in
haste, like two wandering doves. This nest was,
moreover, a large and handsome hotel in the Rue de
Menars, where a feeling for art tempered that lux-
ury which the financial world continues, tradition-
ally, to display, and where they received magnifi-
cently, although the obligations of social life suited
them but little. Nevertheless, Jules submitted to
the demands of the world, knowing that sooner or
later a family has need of it; but his wife and he
always felt themselves in its midst like greenhouse
plants in a tempest. With a delicacy that was very
natural, Jules had carefully concealed from his wife
42 FERRAGUS
the calumny and the death of the calumniator which
had well-nigh troubled their felicity. Madame Jules
was inclined, by her delicate and artistic nature,
to love luxury. Notwithstanding the terrible lesson
of the duel, some imprudent women whispered to
each other that Madame Jules must frequently be
embarrassed for money. The twenty thousand
francs which her husband gave her for her dress
and for her fancies, could not, according to their cal-
culations, suffice for her expenses. In fact, she was
often found more elegantly dressed in her own home
than when she went into society. She loved to
adorn herself only to please her husband, as though
wishing thus to prove to him that to her he was
more than all the rest of the world. A true love, a
pure love, happy above all, as much so as can be a
love which is publicly clandestine. Thus Monsieur
Jules, always a lover, and more loving each day,
happy to be near his wife, even in her caprices,
would have been uneasy if he had not found any in
her, as though it would have been the symptom of
some illness. Auguste de Maulincour had had the
unhappiness of clashing this passion, and of
madly falling in love with this woman. Never-
theless, though he carried in his heart a love so
sublime, he was not ridiculous. He complied with
all the demands of military manners and customs;
but he wore constantly, even when drinking a glass
of champagne, that dreamy look, that silent disdain
for existence, that nebulous expression, which, for
various reasons, the biases wear, those dissatisfied
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 43
with hollow life, and those who believe themselves
consumptive, or who please themselves by imagin-
ing an affection of the heart. To love without
hope, to be disgusted with life, constitute in these
days a social position. The enterprise of invading
the heart of a sovereign might give, perhaps, more
hope than a rashly conceived love for a happy
woman. Therefore Maulincour had sufficient rea-
sons for remaining grave and gloomy. A queen
retains the vanity of her power, she has against her
her lofty elevation; but a pious bourgeoise is like a
hedgehog, like an oyster, in their rough envelopes.
At this moment the young officer was beside his
nameless mistress, who certainly was not aware
that she was doubly faithless. Madame Jules was
seated in a naive attitude, like the least artful wo-
man in the world, gentle, full of a majestic serenity.
What an abyss is human nature after all ? Before
beginning the conversation, the baron looked alter-
nately at this lady and at her husband. How
many reflections did he not make? He recomposed /
Young's Night Thoughts in a moment. Mean-
while the music was sounding through the apart-
ments, the light was poured from a thousand
candles, it was a banker's ball, one of those insolent
festivities by which this world of dull gold endeav-
ored to scorn the gilded salons in which laughed the
fine company of the Faubourg Saint-Germain, not
foreseeing the day when the bank would invade the
Luxembourg and take its seat upon the throne.
The conspirators were dancing at this moment,
44 FERRAGUS
as indifferent to the future bankruptcies of power
as to future failures of banks. The gilded salons
of Monsieur le Baron de Nucingen had that
peculiar animation which fashionaole Paris, joyous
in appearance at least, gives to the festivals of
Paris. There, men of talent communicate their
wit to fools, and fools communicate that air of hap-
piness which characterizes them. By this exchange
everything becomes animated. But a festival in
Paris always a little resembles a display of fire-
works; wit, coquetry and pleasure all sparkle and
all go out like rockets. The next day, every one
has forgotten his wit, his coquetries and his pleasure.
"Well, then !" thought Auguste by way of con-
clusion, "women are, after all, just as the vidame
sees them.'' Certainly, all those dancing here are
less irreproachable than Madame Jules appears,
and Madame Jules goes to Rue Soly. "
Rue Soly was his malady, the very word con-
tracted his heart.
"Madame, you never dance then ? " he asked her.
"This is the third time that you have asked me
that question since the commencement of the win-
ter," she answered smiling.
"But you have perhaps never answered it."
"That is true."
"I knew very well that you were deceptive, as
are all other women — "
And Madame Jules continued to smile.
"Listen, Monsieur, if I told you the real reason,
it would seem to you ridiculous. I do not think
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 45
that it is deceiving not to tell secrets at which the
world is in the habit of laughing."
"Every secret demands, in order to be told, a
friendship of which I am doubtless unworthy,
Madame. But you could not have any but noble
secrets, and do you think me then capable of jest-
ing on worthy things .'' "
"Yes," she said. "You, like all the others, you
laugh at our purest feelings; you calumniate them.
Besides, I have no secrets. 1 have the right to
love my husband in the face of all the world, 1 say
it, I am proud of it; and if you laugh at me when 1
tell you that I dance only with him, 1 shall have
the worst opinion of your heart."
"You have never danced, since your marriage,
with anyone but your husband?"
"Never, Monsieur. His arm is the only one on
which I have leaned, and I have never felt the
touch of another man."
"Your physician, has he never felt your pulse?"
"Well, now, you are laughing at me."
"No, Madame, I admire you because I compre-
hend you. But you let us hear your voice, you let
us look at you, but — in fact, you permit our eyes to
admire you — "
"Ah! that is one of my griefs," she said, inter-
rupting him. "Yes, I would have had it possible
for a married woman to live with her husband as a
mistress lives with her lover; for, then — "
"Then why were you a few hours ago on foot,
disguised, on Rue Soly?"
46 FERRAGUS
"What is Rue Soly ? " she asked him.
And her voice so pure betrayed no sign of any
emotion, no feature of her face quivered, she did
not blush, and she remained calm.
"What! you did not go up to the second floor of
a house situated in Rue des Vieux-Augustins, at the
corner of Rue Soly ? You did not have a hackney-
coach waiting ten paces away, and you did not
return to Rue de Richelieu, to a flower shop, where
you selected the marabout feathers that you are now
wearing? "
"I did not leave my house this evening."
In lying thus, she was smiling and imperturbable,
she fanned herself; but if someone who enjoyed the
right had passed a hand under her girdle, in the
middle of her back he would perhaps have found it
moist. At that instant Auguste remembered the
instructions of the vidame.
"Then it was someone who strangely resembled
you," he said with a credulous air.
"Monsieur," she resumed, "if you are capable of
following a woman and detecting her secrets, you
will permit me to say to you that that is wrong,
very wrong, and I do you the honor not to believe
you."
The baron turned away, took his stand before the
fireplace, and appeared thoughtful. He bent his
head; but his look was covertly fixed on Madame
Jules, who, not thinking of the reflection in the
mirror, cast at him two or three glances that were
full of terror. Presently she made a sign to her
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 47
husband, whose arm she took as she rose to walk
about the salon. When she passed close to Mon-
sieur de Maulincour, he, who was speaking with one
of his friends, said, raising his voice, as if he were
replying to a question :
"There is a woman who certainly will not sleep
quietly this night — "
Madame Jules stopped, threw upon him an impos-
ing look full of scorn and continued her walk, with-
out knowing that one look the more, if surprised
by her husband, might put in danger her own hap-
piness and the lives of two men. Auguste, the
prey of a rage which he smothered in the depths of
his soul, presently left the house, swearing to pen-
etrate to the heart of this intrigue. Before leaving,
he sought Madame Jules in order to see her once
more, but she had disappeared. What a drama cast
into that young head so eminently romantic, like
all those which have not known love in the wide
extent which they ascribe to it ! He adored Madame
Jules under a new aspect, he loved her with the
fury of jealousy, with the frenzied anguish of hope.
Unfaithful to her husband, this woman became
common. Auguste could now give himself up to the
joys of a successful love, and his imagination
opened to him the immense career of the pleasures
of possession. In fine, if he had lost the angel, he
had found the most delicious of demons. He went
to bed building a thousand castles in the air, justify-
ing Madame Jules by some romantic fiction in
which he did not believe himself. Then he resolved
48 FERRAGUS
to devote himself wholly, from the morrow, to the
search for the causes, the motives of the intrigue
which this mystery concealed. It was a romance to
read; or, better, a drama to play, and in which he
had his part.
*
A very fine thing is the trade of a spy, when it
is followed for one's own benefit and in the interest
of a passion. Is it not to give ourselves the pleas-
ures of a thief while remaining an honest man?
But it is necessary to resign one's self to boiling
with rage, to roaring with impatience, to freezing
the feet in the mud, to be benumbed and to burn,
to devour false hopes. It is necessary to go, on the
faith of a mere indication, towards an unknown
goal, to miss our stroke, to fume, to improvise for
ourselves elegies, dithyrambics, to exclaim idiotic-
ally before an inoffensive passer-by who stops to
admire you ; then to knock over old apple-women
and their baskets of fruit, to run, to rest, to mount
guard beneath a window, to make a thousand sup-
positions. — But it is the hunt, the hunt in Paris,
the hunt with all its chances, less the dogs, the gun
and the tally-ho! It is not to be compared with
anything but the lives of gamblers. But it needs a
heart big with love and with vengeance to ambush
itself in Paris, like a tiger waiting to spring on its
prey, and to enjoy thus all the possibilities of Paris
and of a quarter, in furnishing them one interest the
more to those in which they already abound. For
this must we not have a multiple soul } Shall we
not have to live in a thousand passions, a thousand
simultaneous sentiments ?
4 (49)
50 FERRAGUS
Auguste de Maulincour plunged passionately into
this ardent existence, for he felt all its unhappinesses
and all its pleasures. He went disguised through
Paris, watching at all the corners of Rue Page-
vin or of Rue des Vieux-Augustins. He hurried
like a hunter from Rue de Menars to Rue Soly,
and from Rue Soly to Rue de Menars, without
obtaining either the vengeance or the reward
with which would be punished or recompensed
all these cares, these efforts and these ruses!
However, he had not yet reached that impatience
which wrings our entrails and makes us sweat; he
roamed about hopefully, calculating that Madame
Jules would not venture during the first few days
to return to the locality where she had been de-
tected. So he had devoted these first days to
acquiring a knowledge of all the secrets of the
street. A novice in this trade, he dared not ques-
tion either the porter or the shoemaker of the house
into which Madame Jules went; but he hoped to
be able to establish a post of observation in the
house directly opposite to the mysterious apart-
ment. He studied the ground, he endeavored to
conciliate prudence and impatience, his love and
secrecy.
During the first days of the month of March, in
the midst of the plans by which he thought to
strike a decisive blow, leaving his post after one of
those patient vigils by which he had as yet
learned nothing, he was returning about four o'clock
in the afternoon to his own house to which he was
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 5 1
recalled by a matter relating to his military service,
when he was overtaken in Rue Coquilliere by
one of those heavy showers which instantly flood
the gutters, and of which each drop splashes loudly
in the puddles of the roadway. A pedestrian in
Paris, under these circumstances, is forced to stop
short and take refuge in a shop or in a cafe, if he
is rich enough to pay for the forced hospitality or,
according to the urgency of the case, under a porte-
cochere, that asylum for the poor and the shabby.
How is it that none of our painters have ever
attempted to reproduce the appearance of a crowd
of Parisians grouped during a storm under
the dripping portico of a house? Where could
they find a richer subject? Is there not, first of
all, the musing or philosophical pedestrian, who
observes with pleasure all he sees, — whether it be
the stripes made by the rain on the gray back-
ground of the atmosphere, a species of chasing
something like the capricious threads of spun glass;
or the whirlwinds of clear water which the wind
rolls in luminous dust along the roofs; or the capri-
cious overflowings of the gutter-pipes, crackling and
foaming; in short, the thousand other admirable
nothings, studied with delight by the idlers, not-
withstanding the strokes of the broom with which
they are regaled by the occupant of the porter's
lodge? Then there is the talkative pedestrian, who
complains and converses with the porter's wife
while she leans on her broom like a grenadier on his
musket; the needy pedestrian, curiously flattened
52 FERRAGUS
against the wall, without any regard for his rags
long accustomed to the contact of the streets ; the
learned pedestrian, who studies, spells or reads the
posters without finishing them; the laughing pedes-
trian, who amuses himself with those to whom
some accident happens in the street, who laughs at
the muddy women and makes grimaces to those of
either sex who are at the windows; the silent pedes-
trian, who studies all the windows, all the stories;
the laboring pedestrian, armed with a satchel or
furnished with a package, who is estimating the
rain as so much profit or so much loss; the good-
natured pedestrian who arrives like a bomb-shell
exclaiming, "Ah! what weather. Messieurs!" and
who salutes everybody ; and, finally, the true bour-
geois of Paris, a man with an umbrella, an expert in
showers, who has foreseen this one, has come out
in spite of his wife, and who is now seated in the
porter's chair. According to his character, each
member of this fortuitous society contemplates the
sky and finally departs, skipping so as not to splash
himself, or because he is in a hurry, or because he
sees other citizens marching along in spite of wind
and tide, or because, the archway of the house being
damp and mortally catarrhal, the bed's edge, as the
proverb says, is worse than the sheets. Each one
has his own motive. No one is left but the prudent
pedestrian, the man who, before he sets out again,
waits to spy some bits of blue in the midst of the
rifting clouds.
Monsieur de Maulincour took refuge then, with a
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 53
whole family of foot passengers, under the porch of
an old house, the court-yard of which resembled an
immense chimney flue. There were along its plas-
tered, saltpetred and mouldy walls so many lead
pipes and so many conduits from all the floors of its
four main parts that you would have said it was
like the Cascatelles of Saint-Cloud. Water flowed
everywhere; it boiled, it leaped, it murmured; it
was black, white, blue, green; it cried aloud, it
multiplied itself under the broom of the portress, a
toothless old woman accustomed to storms, who
seemed to bless them as she swept into the street
a thousand bits of rubbish of which the curious
inventory would have revealed the life and the
habits of every dweller in the house. There were
scraps of printed cotton, tea-leaves, artificial flower
petals faded and worthless, parings of vegetables,
papers, fragments of metal. At every stroke of
her broom the old woman laid bare the bed of the
gutter, that black crevice, cut out in squares, over
which the porters are so exercised. The poor
lover examined this scene, one of those thousands
which agitated Paris presents daily; but he exam-
ined it mechanically, like a man absorbed in his
thoughts, when, raising his eyes, he found himself
face to face with a man who had just entered.
This man was, in appearance at least, a beggar,
but not the Parisian beggar, that creation without a
name in human language; no, this man formed
another type, outside of all the usual ideas suggested
by the word "beggar." The unknown was not
54 FERRAGUS
distinguished in any way by that character, origi-
nally Parisian, which strikes us so frequently in
the unfortunates whom Charlet has sometimes rep-
resented with a rare happiness of observation, —
coarse faces rolled in the mud, with hoarse voices,
reddened and bulbous noses, mouths deprived of
teeth, although menacing; humble and terrible
beings, in whom the profound intelligence which
shines in their eyes seems like a contradiction.
Some of these bold vagabonds have blotched,
cracked, veiny skin; the forehead covered with
wrinkles; the hair scanty and dirty, like that of a
wig thrown into a corner. All of them gay in their
degradation, and degraded in their joys, all of them
marked with the stamp of debauchery, cast their
silence like a reproach; their attitude reveals
frightful thoughts. Placed between crime and beg-
gary they no longer have any remorse, and circle
prudently around the scaffold without mounting it,
innocent in the midst of vice, vicious in the midst
of their innocence. They often cause a smile, but
they always cause reflection. One represents to
you civilization stunted and repressed, he compre-
hends everything; — the honor of the galleys, coun-
try, virtue; then it is the malice of a vulgar
crime, and the fine craftiness of elegant wickedness.
Another is resigned, a deep mimic but a stupid one.
All of them have faint indications of order and of
work, but they are pushed back into their mire by
a society which does not care to inquire as to what
there may be of poets, of great men, of intrepid souls
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 55
and magnificent organizations among these beggars,
these Bohemians of Paris; a people eminently good
and eminently wicked, like all the masses who have
suffered; accustomed to supporting unheard-of ills,
and whom a fatal power always keeps down to thei^
level of the mud. They all have a dream, a hope,
a happiness, — cards, lottery or wine. There was
nothing of all this strange life in the personage lean-
ing so carelessly against the wall before Monsieur
de Maulincour, like some fantastic idea designed by
a skilful artist on the back of a canvas turned with
its face to the wall in his atelier. This man, long
and dry, whose leaden visage betrayed a deep
but chilling thought, dried up all pity in the hearts
of the curious by his sarcastic aspect and by his
black looks which announced an intention of treat-
ing every man as his equal. His face was of a
dirty white, and his wrinkled skull, denuded of
hair, bore a vague resemblance to a block of granite,
A few straight and gray locks on each side of his head
fell to the collar of his greasy coat which was but-
toned to the chin. He resembled at once Voltaire
and Don Quixote; he was a scoffer and melancholy,
full of disdain, of philosophy, but at least half de-
ranged. He seemed to have no shirt. His beard
was long. His rusty black cravat, quite worn out
and ragged, exposed a protuberant neck, deeply fur-
rowed, with thick veins like cords. A large brown
circle like a bruise was strongly marked beneath
each eye. He seemed to be at least sixty years old.
His hands were white and clean. His boots were
56 FERRAGUS
full of holes and trodden down at the heels. His
blue pantaloons, mended in several places, were
whitened by a species of fluff which made them
offensive to the eye. Whether it was that his
damp clothes exhaled a fetid odor, or that he had in
his normal condition that smell of poverty which
belongs to the Parisian dens, just as offices, sacris-
ties and hospitals have their own, a fetid and rancid
smell, of which no words can give the least idea,
the neighbors of this man moved away from him
and left him alone. He cast upon them and then
upon the officer his calm and expressionless look,
the so celebrated regard of Monsieur de Talleyrand,
v^ a dull, cold glance, a species of impenetrable veil
beneath which a strong soul conceals profound
emotion and the most exact estimation of men,
things and events. Not a fold of his face quivered.
His mouth and his forehead were impassible; but
his eyes lowered themselves with a noble and
almost tragic slowness. There was in fact a whole
drama in the movement of these withered eye-lids.
The aspect of this stoical figure gave rise in Mon-
sieur de Maulincour to one of those vagabond rev-
eries which begin with a common interrogation and
end by comprising a whole world of thought. The
storm was past. Monsieur de Maulincour saw no
more of the man than the skirt of his coat as it
brushed the outside wall ; but as he left his place
to depart, he saw under his feet a letter which had
fallen and which he supposed to have belonged to
the unknown, as he had seen him put back in his
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 57
pocket a handkerchief which he had used. The
officer, who picked up the letter to return it to him,
read the address involuntarily:
"A Mosieur,
Mosieur Ferragusse,
Rue des Grands-Augustains, au coing de la rue Soly,
PARIS."
The letter bore no postmark and the address
served to prevent Monsieur de Maulincour from
returning it; there are besides few passions that, in
the long run, will not come to be lacking in probity.
The baron had a presentiment of the opportunity
of this windfall, and determined, by keeping the
letter, to give himself the right of entrance into
the mysterious house to return it to this man, not
doubting that he lived in this suspected dwelling.
Already suspicions, vague as the first gleams of
daylight, caused him to establish relations between
this man and Madame Jules. Jealous lovers sup-
pose everything; and it is by supposing everything
and then selecting the most probable of these con-
jectures that judges, spies, lovers and observers,
arrive at the truth which most interests them.
"Is the letter for him ? Is it from Madame Jules ? "
His unquiet imagination tossed a thousand ques-
tions together at him at once ; but at the first words
he smiled. Here is, textually, in all the splendor
■of its artless phrases and its ignoble orthography,
this letter to which it would be impossible to add
anything, just as nothing should be taken away.
58 FERRAGUS
unless it were the letter itself, but it has been nec-
essary to punctuate it in reproducing it In the origi-
nal, there are neither commas nor stops of any kind
indicated, not even notes of exclamation, — a fact
which tends to demolish the system of points and
punctuation by which modern authors have endeav-
ored to depict the great disasters of all the passions :
"Henry,
"Among the many sacrifisis which I imposed upon myself
for your sal<e was that of no longer giving you any news of
myself; but an irresistible voice now tells me to let you know
the wrongs you done me. I know beforehand that your soul
hardened in vice will not pitty me. Your heart is def to feel-
ing. Is it not so too to the cries of nature? But what matter;
1 must tell you to what a dredful point your are gilty and the
horror of the position in which you have put me. Henry,
you knew all what I suffered from my first fault and yet you
have plunged me into the same misery and then abbandoned
me to my despair and my suffering. Yes 1 will sai it, the belif
that I had of being loved and esteamed by you gave me corage
to bare my fate. But to-day what have 1 left? Have you not
maid me lose all that 1 had that was most deer, all that held
me to life: parens, trends, 'onor, reputation, I have sacrifised
all to you and nothing is left me but oprobrum, shame, and I
say it without blushing, poverty. Nothing was wanting to
my unhappiness but the sertainty of your contempt and your
haite; and now 1 have them 1 will find the corage that my
project requires. My decision is taken and the honor of my
family commands it; I am going then to put an end to my
suffering. Do not make any reflecions on my project, Henry.
It is awful, I know it, but my condition forses me to it. With-
out help, without support, without a. friend to console me, can
I live? No. Fate hasdesidedfor me So in two days, Henry,
in two days, Ida will be no longer worthy of your esteam; but
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 59
hear the oath that 1 make you that my conscience is at peace,
since I have never seased to be worthy of your friendship.
Oh, Henry, my friend, for I can never change to you, promise
me that you will forgive me for what I am going to do. My
love has given me corage, it will sustane me in virtue. My
heart all full of your figger will be for me a preservative
against seduction. Do not forget never that my fate is your
work, and judge yourself. May Haven not punish you for
your crime, it is on my knees that I ask your pardon, for I
feel it, nothing will be wanting to my miseries but the sorow
of knowing you unhaapy. In spite of the destitution in which
I find myself I will refuse all kind of help from you. If you
had loved me I would have received it as coming from your
friendship, but a benefit given by pitty, my soul refusis it, and
I would be baser in taking it than he who offered it to me.
I have one favor to ask of you. I don't know how long I
must stay at Madame Meynardie's, be genrous enough not
to come to see me. Your last two visits did me a harm which
I shall feel a long time; I do not wish to go into partidars
about that conduct of yours. You hate me, that word is
written on my 'eart and freeses it with feer. Alas! it is at the
moment when I have need of all my corage that all my
facculties abbandon me, Henry, my friend, before 1 put a
barrier between us, give me a lastproof of your esteam; write
me, answer me, say to me that you respect me still
although you no longer love me. Although my eyes are
always worthy of meeting yours, I do not ask an intervew; I
fear all my weakness and my love. But, for pitty sake, write
me a line at once; it will give me the corage I need to meet
my troubles. Farewell, ortherof all my woes, but the only
friend that my heart has chosen and whom it will never forget.
"IDA."
This life of a young girl of which the love be-
trayed, the fatal joys, the sorrows, the poverty,
and the lamentable resignation were summed up in
60 FERRAGUS
SO few words; this poem unknown but essentially
Parisian, written in this dirty letter, agitated Mon-
sieur de Maulincour for a moment; he ended by
asking himself if this Ida might not be some rela-
tion of Madame Jules, and if the evening rendez-
vous, of which he had been a witness by chance,
had not been occasioned by some charitable effort
That the old pauper could have seduced Ida?— This
seduction would have been a miracle. Wandering in
the labyrinth of his reflections which crossed each
other and destroyed one another, the baron arrived
at the Rue Pagevin, and saw a hackney-coach
standing at the end of the Rue des Vieux-Augustins
which is near the Rue Montmartre. All waiting
hackney-coaches now had an interest for him.
' ' Can she be there ? " thought he.
And his heart beat with a hot and feverish throb-
bing. He pushed open the little door with the bell,
but he lowered his head as he did so in obedience
to a sense of shame, for he heard a secret voice
which said to him, — "Why do you put your foot
into this mystery ? "
He went up a few steps, and found himself face
to face with the old portress.
' ' Monsieur Ferragus ? "
"Don't know him."
"How.? Monsieur Ferragus does not live here?"
"We don't have that man here."
"But my good woman. — "
"1 am not a good woman, Monsieur, I am a
concierge."
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 6l
" "But Madame," insisted the baron, "I have a
letter to give to Monsieur Ferragus. "
"Ah! If Monsieur has a letter," said she, chang-
ing her tone, "the thing is very different Will
you let me see it, your letter? "
Auguste showed the folded letter. The old wo-
man shook her head with a doubtful air, hesitated,
seemed to wish to leave her lodge to go and inform
the mysterious Ferragus of this unforeseen incident;
finally she said:
"Very well go up, Monsieur, you ought to know
where it is — "
Without replying to this remark, by which the
wily old woman might have wished to have set a
trap for him, the officer went lightly up the stair-
way and rang loudly at the door of the second floor.
His lover's instinct said to him, — "She is there."
The beggar of the porch, the Ferragus or the
"orther" of Ida's woes, opened the door himself.
He appeared in a flowered dressing-gown, panta-
loons of white flannel, his feet in pretty embroid-
ered slippers, and his head washed clean. Madame
Jules, whose head appeared beyond the casing of
the door into the next room, turned pale and fell
into a chair.
' ' What is the matter, Madame ? " cried the officer,
springing toward her.
But Ferragus stretched forth an arm and threw
the officer backward with so strong a movement
that Auguste felt as though he had received in the
chest a blow from an iron bar.
62 FERRAGUS
"Back, Monsieur !" said this man. "What do
you want with us? You have been roaming about
the quarter for the last five or six days. Are you
a spy ? ' '
"Are you Monsieur Ferragus?" said the baron.
"No, Monsieur."
"Nevertheless," continued Auguste, "it is to you
that I must return this paper, which you dropped
under the doorway of the house beneath which we
both took refuge during the rain."
While speaking and in offering the letter to this
man, the baron could not refrain from casting an
eye around the room in which Ferragus received
him. He found it very well arranged, though sim-
ply. A fire burned in the chimney-place; near it
was a table with a more sumptuous service than
seemed consistent with the apparent condition of
this man and the humbleness of his lodging. And
on a small sofa in the second room, which he could
see through the doorway, he perceived a heap of
gold, and heard a sound which could be no other
than that of a woman weeping.
"This paper belongs to me, I thank you, " said
the unknown, turning away in such a manner as
to make the baron understand that he desired him
to leave immediately.
Too curious himself to take notice of the profound
examination of which he was the object, Auguste
did not see the half magnetic glances by which the
unknown seemed to wish to devour him ; but if he
had encountered that basilisk eye he would have
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 63
comprehended the danger of his position. Too pas-
sionately excited to thintc of himself, Auguste
bowed, went down the stairs and returned home,
endeavoring to find a meaning in the connection of
these three persons, — Ida, Ferragus and Madame
Jules; an occupation which was practically equiva-
lent to that of trying to arrange the outlandish bits
of wood of a Chinese puzzle without possessing the
key to the game. But Madame Jules had seen him,
Madame Jules went there, Madame Jules had lied
to him. Maulincour determined to go and pay a
visit to this woman the next day, she could not
refuse to see him, he was now her accomplice, he
had his hands and feet in this mysterious intrigue;
he already assumed to himself the power of a sul-
tan, and thought of demanding imperiously from
Madame Jules all her secrets.
In those days Paris was seized with the building
fever. If Paris is a monster, it is certainly the
most maniacal of monsters. It becomes enamored
of a thousand fancies; sometimes it falls to build-
ing like a great seigneur who loves a trowel ; then
it drops its trowel and becomes all military, it
dresses itself from head to foot as a National
Guard, drills and smokes; then all at once it aban-
dons the military manoeuvres and throws away its
cigar; then it plunges into desolation, falls into
bankruptcy, sells its furniture on the Place du
Chatelet, stops payment; but a few days later it
arranges its affairs, puts itself in festival array and
dances. One day it eats barley-sugar by handfuls,
64 FERRAGUS
by mouthfuls ; yesterday it bought papier IVeynen;
to-day, the monster has the tooth-ache and applies
an alexipharmic to all its walls; to-morrow it will
lay in its provision of pectoral paste. It has its
manias for the month, for the season, for the year,
like its manias for a day. So at this moment all
the world was building and demolishing something,
we scarcely know what as yet. There were very
few streets in which could not be seen scaffoldings
with long poles, furnished with planks set on cross-
pieces and fixed from floor to floor in holes cut in
the masonry, — a frail construction, shaken by the
Limousins, but held together by ropes all white with
plaster, scarcely secured from the wheels of carriages
by the breastwork of planks, that enclosure required
by law which is not built There is something
maritime in all these masts, these ladders, these
cordages and the shouts of the masons. So, now at
a dozen steps from the Hotel Maulincour, one of
these ephemeral constructions was erected before a
house which was being built in cut stone. The
next morning, at the moment when the Baron de
Maulincour passed in his cabriolet before this scaf-
folding, on his way to see Madame Jules, a stone,
two feet square, which had been elevated to the
topmost landing escaped from the ropes which held
it by turning on itself, and fell on the baron's ser-
vant, whom it crushed behind his carriage. A cry
of horror shook both the scaffold and the masons ;
one of the latter, in danger of death, clung with
difficulty to one of the poles and seemed to have
I
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 65
been injured by the stone. A crowd collected
promptly. All the masons came down, crying,
swearing and saying that the cabriolet of Monsieur
de Maulincour had caused the jar to their crane.
Two inches more and the officer would have had
his head crushed by the stone. The valet was
dead, the carriage shattered. It was an event for
the whole quarter, the newspapers made the most
of it. Monsieur de Maulincour, certain that he had
not touched the building, protested. Justice inter-
vened, inquest being made, it was proved that a
small boy armed with a lath had mounted guard and
called to all foot passengers to keep away. The
affair ended there. Monsieur de Maulincour ob-
tained nothing for his servant, for his fright, and
was obliged to remain in his bed for several days;
for the back of the carriage in breaking had bruised
him seriously, and the nervous shock of the
surprise gave him a fever. He did not go to see
Madame Jules. Ten days after this event, and
when he first went out, he drove to the Bois de
Boulogne in his repaired cabriolet when, as he was
de'scending the Rue de Bourgogne at the locality
where the sewer opens directly opposite the Cham-
ber of Deputies, the axle-tree broke sharply in
the middle, and the baron was driving so rapidly
that this breakage caused the two wheels to come
together with force enough to break his head ; — but
he was preserved from this danger by the resistance
of the leathern hood. Nevertheless, he was badly
wounded in the side. For the second time in ten
5
1
66 FERRAGUS
days he was carried home, half-dead, to the terri-
fied dowager. This second accident gave him a
feeling of distrust and he thought, though vaguely,
of Ferragus and of Madame Jules. To clear up his
suspicions, he kept the broken axle in his room
and sent for his carriage-maker. The carriage-
maker came, examined the axle, the fracture, and
proved two things to Monsieur de Maulincour.
First, the axle was not made in his workshop; he
furnished none on which he did not engrave the
initials of his name, and he could not explain by
what means this axle had been substituted for the
other. Secondly, the breakage of this suspicious
axle had been caused by a chamber, a species of
hollow space, by blow-holes in the metal and by
flaws, very skilfully managed.
"Eh! Monsieur le Baron, whoever did that was
mighty malicious," said he, "to fix up an axle-tree
that way, any one would swear to look at it that
the axle v/as sound — "
Monsieur de Maulincour requested his carriage-
maker to say nothing of this affair, and he consid-
ered himself duly warned. These two attempts at
assassination had been planned with an ability
which denoted the enmity of intelligent minds.
"It is war to the death," he said to himself as
he turned in his bed, "a war of savages, a war of
surprises, of ambuscades, of treachery, declared in
the name of Madame Jules. To what sort of man
does she then belong? What kind of power does
this Ferragus then wield.? "
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 67
In fact Monsieur de Maulincour, though a soldier
and a brave man, could not repress a shudder. In
the midst of the many thoughts which now assailed
him there was one against which he felt he had
neither defense nor courage: would not poison be
ere long employed by his secret enemies? Under
the influence of these fears, which his momentary
weakness, his fever, and the low diet increased
still more, he sent for an old woman long attached
to the service of his grandmother, a woman who
had for him one of those semi-maternal affections,
the sublime or the commonplace. Without confid-
ing in her wholly, he charged her to buy secretly
and daily in different localities the food he needed,
directing her to keep it under lock and key and to
bring it to him herself, not allowing anyone, no
matter who, to approach her while preparing it. In
short, he took the most minute precautions to pro-
tect himself against that form of death. He was
confined to his bed, alone and ill ; he had therefore
the leisure to think of his own security, the only
necessity sufficiently clear-sighted to enable human
egotism to forget nothing. But the unfortunate in-
valid had poisoned his own life by this dread; and,
in spite of himself, suspicion dyed all his hours
with its gloomy tints. These two lessons of assas-
sination did, however, instruct him in one of the
virtues most necessary to politic men, he under-
stood the wise dissimulation that must be practiced
in dealing with the great interests of life. To be
silent about our own secrets is nothing ; but to be
68 FERRAGUS
silent from the first, to know how to forget a fact
for thirty years, if it is necessary, as did Ali Pacha,
in order to be sure of a vengeance meditated for
thirty years, — this is a fine study in a country in
which there are but few men who know how to
keep their own counsel for thirty days. Monsieur
de Maulincour no longer lived but through Madame
Jules. He was perpetually occupied in examining
seriously the means which he could employ in this
mysterious struggle to triumph over the mysterious
adversaries. His secret passion for that woman
grew by reason of all these obstacles. Madame
Jules was ever there, erect, in the midst of his
thoughts, in the centre of his heart, more attractive
now by reason of her presumable vices than by the
certain virtues which had constituted her his idol.
The sick man, wishing to reconnoitre the posi-
tions of the enemy, thought he might without dan-
ger initiate the old vidame into the secrets of his
situation. The old commander loved Auguste as a
father loves his wife's children ; he was shrewd,
dexterous ; he had a diplomatic intelligence. He lis-
tened to the baron, shook his head, and they both
held counsel. The worthy vidame did not share
his young friend's confidence, when Auguste said
to him that in the times in which they now lived
the police and the government were able to decipher
all mysteries, and that if it were absolutely neces-
sary to have recourse to these powers he would find
in them most powerful auxiliaries.
The old man replied:
1
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 69
"The police, my dear boy, is the most incompe-
tent thing in the world, and the government is
the most feeble of all in matters concerning in-
dividuals. Neither the police nor the government
can read hearts. That which might be reasonably
asked of them is to search for the causes of an act
Now, the government and the police are eminently
unfitted for this task; they lack essentially that '*p
personal interest which reveals all to him who has {'
need of knowing all. No human power can prevent
an assassin or a poisoner from reaching either the
heart of a prince or the stomach of an honest man.
The passions make the best police."
The commander strongly advised the baron to
set out for Italy, to go from Italy to Greece, from
Greece to Syria, from Syria into Asia, and not to
return until after he had succeeded in convincing
his secret enemies of his repentance, and by so
doing make tacitly his peace with them; if not, to
remain in his house and even in his own room
where he would be safe from the attempts of this
Ferragus, and not to leave it until he could crush
him in perfect safety. "An enemy should never
be touched except to crush his head," said he
gravely.
Nevertheless, the old man promised his favorite
to employ all the astuteness with which Heaven had
provided him in order to, without compromising
anyone, reconnoitre the enemy's ground, examine
his strength, and pave the way for victory. The
commander had in his service an old retired Figaro,
70 FERRAGUS
the wildest monkey that ever assumed a human
form, formerly as clever as a devil, capable bodily
as a galley-slave, alert as a thief, sly as a woman,
but now fallen into the decadence of genius for
want of practice since the new constitution of
Parisian society which has reformed even the
valets of comedy. This Scapin-Emeritus was at-
tached to his master as to a superior being; but the
shrewd old vidame added a good round sum yearly
to the wages of his former provost of gallantry,
a little attention which strengthened the ties of
natural affection by the bonds of self-interest, and
procured for the old gentleman a care which the
most loving mistress would not have been able to
discover for her sick friend. It was this pearl of
the old-fashioned comedy valets, relic of the last
century, and auxiliary incorruptible from lack of
passions to satisfy, in whom the commander and
Monsieur de Maulincour now put their trust.
"Monsieur le Baron will spoil all," said this
great man in livery when called into counsel.
"Let Monsieur eat, drink and sleep in peace. I
take the whole matter upon myself."
hi fact, eight days after the conference, when
Monsieur de Maulincour, perfectly recovered from
his indisposition, was breakfasting with his grand-
mother and the vidame, Justin entered to make his
report. As soon as the dowager had returned to
her own apartments, he said with that mock mod-
esty which men of talent affect:
"Ferragus is not the name of the enemy who
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 7 1
is pursuing Monsieur !e Baron. This man, this
devil, is called the Sieur Gratien-Henri-Victor-
Jean- Joseph Bourignard. The Sieur Gratien Bou-
rignard is a former master-builder, once very rich
and above all one of the handsomest men of his day
in Paris, a Lovelace capable of seducing Grandison.
My information stops there. He has been a simple
workman, and the companions of the Order of the
Devorants at one time elected him for their chief
under the title of Ferragus XXIII. The police ought
to know that, if the police were instituted to know
anything. This man has moved, no longer lives in
the Rue des Vieux-Augustins, and roosts now in
the Rue Joquelet; Madame Jules Desmarets goes to
see him frequently ; often enough her husband, on
his way to the Bourse, drives her as far as the Rue
Vivienne, or she drives her husband to the Bourse.
Monsieur le Vidame knows too much about these
things to require me to tell him if it is the husband
who takes the wife, or the wife who takes her hus-
band; but Madame Jules is so pretty that I will bet
on her. All this is positively certain. My Bou-
rignard often plays at Number 129. Saving your
presence, Monsieur, he is a rogue who loves the wo-
men, and he has his little ways like a man of condi-
tion. As for the rest, he often wins, disguises him-
self like an actor, makes himself as old as he likes,
and in short leads the most original life in the
world. I don't doubt that he has a good many
lodgings, for most of the time he manages to
evade what Monsieur le Vidame calls Parliamentary
72 FERRAGUS
investigation. If Monsieur wishes, he could never-
theless be disposed of honorably, seeing what his
habits are. It is always easy to get rid of a man
who loves women. However this capitalist talks
about moving again. — Now, have Monsieur le
Vidame and Monsieur le Baron any other commands
to give me?"
"Justin, I am satisfied with you, don't go any
farther in the matter without orders; but keep a
close watch here so that Monsieur le Baron may
have nothing to fear. — My dear boy," resumed the
vidame, addressing Maulincour, "go back to your
old life and forget Madame Jules."
"No, no," said Auguste, "I will not yield to
Gratien Bourignard, 1 will have him bound hand
and foot and Madame Jules also."
That evening, the Baron Auguste de Maulincour,
recently promoted to a higher rank in a company of
the Gardes du Corps, went to a ball at the Elysee-
Bourbon, given by Madame la Duchesse de Berri.
There, certainly, no danger could lurk for him.
The Baron de Maulincour when he came out had,
nevertheless, an affair of honor on his hands, an
affair which it was impossible to arrange amicably.
His adversary, the Marquis de Ronquerolles, had
the strongest reasons for being dissatisfied with
Auguste, and Auguste had given him cause by his
former liaison with the sister of Monsieur de Ron-
querolles, the Comtesse de Serizy. This lady, who
did not love German sentimentality, was all the
more exacting in the least details of matters of
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 73
prudery. By one of those inexplicable fatalities,
Auguste uttered a harmless jest which Madame de
Serizy took amiss, and which her brother resented.
The discussion took place in a corner, with lowered
voices. In good society, the two adversaries never
make any disturbance. The very next day, the
Faubourg Saint-Honore, the Faubourg Saint-Ger-
main and the Chateau discussed this affair. Madame
de Serizy was warmly defended, and all the blame
was laid on Maulincour. August personages inter-
vened. Seconds of the highest distinction were
imposed on Messieurs de Maulincour and de Ron-
querolles, and every precaution was taken on the
ground that no one should be killed. When Auguste
found himself face to face with his adversary, a
man of pleasure, to whom no one could possibly
deny honorable sentiments, he could not bring him-
self to see in him the instrument of Ferragus, Chief
of the Devorants, but he was compelled by a secret
power to obey an inexplicable presentiment in ques-
tioning the Marquis.
"Messieurs," he said to the seconds, "I certainly
do not refuse to meet the fire of Monsieur de Ron-
querolles; but before doing so I here declare that I
was in error, I offer to him whatever excuses he
may require of me, publicly even, if he wishes it,
because when the matter concerns a woman nothing
I think can degrade a man of honor. I therefore
appeal to his generosity and his good sense; is
there not something rather silly in fighting when
the rightful cause may losei* — "
74 FERRAGUS
Monsieur de Ronquerolles would not admit that
the affair could be finished in this manner, and
then the baron, his suspicions strengthened, ap-
proached his adversary.
"Well, then. Monsieur le Marquis," he said,
"pledge me, before these gentlemen, your word as a
gentleman that you do not bring into this meeting
any other reason for vengeance than that which is
made public? "
"Monsieur, that is no question to ask me."
And Monsieur de Ronquerolles took his place.
It was agreed in advance that the two adversaries
were to be satisfied with one exchange of shots.
Monsieur de Ronquerolles, in spite of the distance
determined by the seconds, which seemed to make
the death of Monsieur de Maulincour very prob-
lematical, not to say impossible, brought down the
baron. The ball traversed the latter's body, two
fingers' breadth below the heart, but fortunately
without fatal injury.
"You aim too well. Monsieur," said the ofificer of
the Guards," to be avenging only dead quarrels."
Monsieur de Ronquerolles believed Auguste to be
a dead man, and he could not refrain from smiling
sardonically as he heard these words.
"The sister of Julius C^sar, Monsieur, should
not be suspected."
"Always Madame Jules," replied Auguste.
He fainted, without being able to utter a biting
jest which expired on his lips; but although he lost
a great deal of blood, his wound was not dangerous.
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 75
At the end of a fortnight, during which the dowager
and the vidame lavished upon him those cares of
old age the secret of which can be given only by
long experience in life, his grandmother, one morn-
ing, dealt him a heavy stroke. She revealed to
him the mortal anxieties which were oppressing her
old, her last days. She had received a letter,
signed "F, " in which the history of the secret
espionage to which her grandson had lowered him-
self, was recounted step by step. In this letter,
actions unworthy of an honorable man were
ascribed to Monsieur de Maulincour. He had, it
said, placed an old woman at the stand of hackney-
coaches in the Rue de Menars, an old spy, who pre-
tended to sell water from her cask to the coachmen,
but who was really there to watch the actions of
Madame Jules Desmarets. He had spied upon the
most inoffensive man in the world in order to detect
his secrets, when on these secrets depended the life
or the death of three persons. He had brought upon
himself a relentless struggle, in which, already
wounded three times, he would inevitably succumb
because his death had been sworn and would be
sought by all human means. Monsieur de Maulin-
cour could no longer even avoid his fate by promis-
ing to respect the mysterious life of these three
persons, because it was impossible to believe in the
word of a gentleman capable of descending to the
level of a police-spy; and for what reason.? to trou-
ble without cause the life of an innocent woman
and of a harmless old man. The letter itself was
76 FERRAGUS
as nothing for Auguste in comparison with the ten-
der reproaches with which the old Baroness de
MaulincoLir overwhelmed him. To betray a want
of respect for and confidence in a woman, to spy
upon her actions without having any right to do so !
And ought a man ever to spy upon the woman by
whom he is loved? It was a tirade of excellent rea-
sons which never prove anything, and which, for the
first time in his life, threw the young baron into one
of those great human furies in which are born, and
from which issue, the most important actions of life.
"Since this duel is one to the death," said he in
conclusion, "I shall have to kill my enemy by all
the means which I may have at my disposal."
The old commander went immediately to inter-
view in the name of Monsieur de Maulincour the
chief of the secret police of Paris and, without
bringing either the name or the person of Madame
Jules into the narrative, although she was in
reality the secret spring of it all, he made him
aware of the fears which had been inspired in the
family of de Maulincour by the unknown person
who was bold enough to swear the death of an officer
of the Guard, in defiance of the laws and the police.
The police oificial pushed up his green spectacles
in amazement, blew his nose several times, offered
snuff to the vidame, who for the sake of his dignity
pretended not to use snuff, although his own nose
was lined with it. Then the chief took notes, and
promised, Vidocq and his bloodhounds aiding, that
he would render a very good account to the family
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS ^^
de Maulincour of this enemy in a few days, saying
that there were no mysteries for the police of Paris.
A few days after this the chief came to see Mon-
sieur le Vidame at the Hotel Maulincour, and found
the young baron completely recovered from his last
wounds. Then he conveyed to them, in bureau-
cratic style, his thanks for the indications which
they had had the goodness to give him and informed
them that this Bourignard was a convict, con-
demned to twenty years' hard labor, but who had
miraculously escaped from a gang which was being
transported from Bicetre to Toulon. For thirteen
years the police had been vainly endeavoring to
recapture him, after having become aware that he
had returned with the greatest hardihood to live in
Paris, where he had been able to escape the most ac-
tive search, although he was constantly implicated in
many dark intrigues. However, this man, whose
life offered the most curious details, would certainly
be seized in one or other of his several domiciles
and delivered up to justice. The bureaucrat termi-
nated his official report by saying to Monsieur de
Maulincour that if he attached enough importance
to this affair to wish to witness the capture of Bou-
rignard he might come the next day, at eight o'clock
in the morning, to a house in the Rue Sainte-Foi of
which he gave him the number. Monsieur de Mau-
lincour dispensed with going in search of this cer-
tainty, trusting, with the sacred respect inspired by
the police of Paris, to the promptness of the author-
ities. Three days later, having read nothing in
78 FERRAGUS
the newspapers concerning this arrest, which, how-
ever, should have furnished matter for a curious
article. Monsieur de Maulincour was beginning to
feel certain anxieties, which were dissipated by the
following letter:
"to
•'MONSIEUR LE BARON,
"I have the honor to announce to you that you need have
no further fear touching the affair in question. The man
named Gratien Bourignard, otherwise called Ferragus, died
yesterday at his lodgings, Rue Joquelet, No. 7. Those sus-
picions which we naturally conceived as to his identity have
been completely set at rest by the facts. The physician of
the Prefecture of Police was detailed by us to assist the phy-
sician of the Mayor's office, and the chief of the detective
police made all the necessary verifications to obtain absolute
certainty. Moreover, the high character of the witnesses
who signed the certificate of death, and the affidavits of those
who took care of the said Bourignard in his last moments,
among others that of the worthy Vicar of the church of the
Bonne-Nouvelle, to whom he made his last confession, for he
died a Christian, do not permit us to entertain the least
doubts.
"Accept, Monsieur le Baron, etc."
Monsieur de Maulincour, the dowager and the
vidame breathed again, with an unspeakable pleas-
ure. The good old woman embraced her grandson,
shedding a tear and left him to thank God in prayer.
The dear old dowager, who was making a novena
for Auguste's safety, believed her prayers were
answered.
"Well," said the old commander, "now you can
go to the ball of which you were speaking to me, I
have no longer any objections to offer."
*
Monsieur de Maulincour was all the more eager
to go to this ball because Madame Jules would be
there. This fete was given by the Prefect of the
Seine, in whose salon the two social worlds of
Paris met as on neutral ground. Auguste traversed
the rooms without seeing the woman who exercised
so great an influence on his life. He entered a bou-
doir as yet deserted, where the card tables were
waiting for the players, and he seated himself on a
divan, giving himself up to the most contradictory
thoughts of Madame Jules. A man suddenly took
the young officer by the arm and the baron was stu-
pefied to see the pauper of the Rue Coquilli^re,
the Ferragus of Ida, the lodger in the Rue Soly,
the Bourignard of Justin, the convict of the police,
the dead man of the day before.
"Monsieur, not a cry, not a word," said Bourig-
nard, whose voice he recognized, although it cer-
tainly would have seemed unknown to any other.
He was elegantly dressed, wore the order of the
Golden Fleece and a decoration on his coat.
"Monsieur," he resumed in a voice which was
sibilant like that of a hyena, "you authorize all my
efforts against you by calling the police to your aid.
You will perish. Monsieur. It is necessary. Do
you love Madame Jules ? Are you beloved of her ?
(79)
8o FERRAGUS
By what right do you trouble her peaceful life and
blacken her virtue ? ' '
Someone entered the room. Ferragus rose to go.
"Do you know this man.?" asked Monsieur de
Maulincour, seizing Ferragus by the collar.
But Ferragus quickly disengaged himself, took
Monsieur de Maulincour by the hair and shook him
scoffmgly by the head several times.
"Must you absolutely have lead in it to render
it wise.'"' said he.
"Not personally, Monsieur, " replied de Marsay,
the witness of this scene; "but I know that he is
Monsieur de Funcal, a very rich Portuguese."
Monsieur de Funcal had disappeared. The baron
followed in pursuit without being able to overtake
him, and when he reached the peristyle he saw
Ferragus, who regarded him with a jeering laugh
from a brilliant equipage, which was driven away
at high speed.
"Monsieur, if you please," said Auguste, re-
entering the salon and addressing de Marsay, whom
he knew, "where does Monsieur de Funcal live?"
"I do not know, but someone here can no doubt
inform you."
The baron, having questioned the Prefect, ascer-
tained that the Comte de Funcal lived at the Portu-
guese Embassy. At this moment, while he still felt
the icy finger of Ferragus in his hair, he saw
Madame Jules in all her dazzling beauty, fresh,
gracious, artless, resplendent with that womanly
sanctity which had won his love. This creature,
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 8 1
infernal to him, no longer excited in his soul any
emotion but hatred, and this hatred overflowed,
bloody, terrible, in his eyes; he watched for the
moment when he could speak to her without being
overheard by anyone, and then said to her:
"Madame, here are already three times that your
bravi have missed me — "
"What can you mean. Monsieur ?" she replied
reddening. "I know that several unfortunate acci-
dents have happened to you, which I have greatly
regretted; but how could 1 have had anything to do
with them?"
"You knew then that there were bravi sent
against me by the man of the Rue Soly ? "
"Monsieur! "
"Madame, now I will not be alone in calling you
to account, not for my happiness, but for my
blood—"
At this moment Jules Desmarets approached.
"What are you saying to my wife. Monsieur? "
"Come to enquire at my house if you are curious.
Monsieur."
And Maulincour went out, leaving Madame Jules
pale and almost fainting.
There are very few women indeed who have not
found themselves, at least once in their lives,
apropos of some undeniable fact, confronted with a
direct, sharp uncompromising interrogation, one of
those questions pitilessly asked by their husbands
and of which the apprehension alone gives a chill,
of which the very first word enters the heart like
6
1
V
82 FERRAGUS
the steel of a dagger. Hence this maxim, "All
women lie." Officious falsehood, venial falsehood,
sublime falsehood, horrible falsehood, — but always
the obligation to lie. This obligation once ad-
mitted, is it not necessary to know how to lie well.?
French women do it admirably. Our customs so
readily teach them deception ! And then, woman
is so naively impertinent, so pretty, so graceful, so
truthful in her lying; she recognizes so fully the
utility of it in order to avoid, in social life, the
violent shocks which happiness might not be able
to resist that it is as necessary to her as the cotton-
wool in which she puts away her jewels. False-
hood becomes for women, thus, the foundation of
speech, and truth is only an exception ; they use it,
just as they are virtuous, through caprice or by cal-
culation. Moreover, according to their individual
character, some women laugh in lying, some
others weep, these become grave, those grow angry.
After beginning life by feigning indifference to the
homage that flatters them the most, they often end
by lying to themselves. Who has not admired their
apparent superiority to everything at the very
moment when they are trembling for the mysterious
treasures of their love? Who has never studied their
ease, their facility, their freedom of spirit in the
greatest embarrassments of life? With them, noth-
ing is borrowed; deception flows as easily as the
snow falls from the sky. Then with what art do
they discover the truth in others ! With what clev-
erness do they employ the most direct logic in
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 83
answer to some passionate question which has
revealed to them the secret of the heart of a man
who is guileless enough to proceed by questioning
them ! To question a woman, is not that to deliver
one's self up to her? Will she not learn all which
we seek to hide from her, and will she not know
how to be silent in speaking? And some men have
the pretension of being able to struggle with a Par-
isian woman! With a woman who knows how
to hold herself above all dagger-thrusts, saying, —
"You are very inquisitive! What does it matter to
you ? Why do you wish to know? Ah ! you are
jealous! And suppose I do not choose to answer
you ? " — in short, with a woman who possesses the
hundred and thirty-seven thousand manners of say-
ing "No," and incommensurable variations of the
word, "YES." The treatise on the "Yes" and the
"No," is it not one of the finest works, diplomatic,
philosophic, logographic and moral, which still
remains for us to write? But to accomplish this
diabolic work, will not an androgynous genius be
necessary? For that reason, probably, it will never
be attempted. Besides, of all unpublished works,
is not that the best known and the best practiced
among women? Have you ever studied the be-
havior, the pose, the disinvoltura of a falsehood ?
Examine it Madame Desmarets was seated in the
right hand corner of her carriage, and her husband
in the left corner. Having forced herself to recover
from her emotion in coming out of the ball-room,
Madame Jules now affected a calm demeanor. Her
84 FERRAGUS
husband had said nothing to her, and he still said
nothing. Jules looked out of the carriage window
at the black walls of the silent houses before which
he passed ; but suddenly, as if driven by a deter-
mining thought, in turning the corner of a street
he examined his wife who appeared to be cold in
spite of the fur-lined pelisse in which she was
wrapped ; he thought she seemed pensive, and per-
haps she really was pensive. Of all those things
which are communicable, reflection and gravity are
the most contagious.
"What was it, that Monsieur de Maulincour said
to you that could affect you so keenly.-"' said
Jules; "and why does he wish me to go to his
house and find out ? "
"He can tell you nothing in his house that I can-
not tell you here," she replied.
Then, with that feminine craft which always
slightly degrades virtue, Madame Jules waited for
another question. Her husband turned his face to
the houses again and continued his study of the
porte-cocheres. Another question, would it not be
a suspicion, a distrust.'' To suspect a woman is
crime in love; Jules had already killed a man with-
out having doubted his wife. Clemence did not
know all there was of true passion, of deep reflec-
tion, in her husband's silence, just as Jules was
ignorant of the wonderful drama that was wringing
the heart of his Clemence. And the carriage rolled
on through a silent Paris, bearing two lovers who
adored each other, and who, softly reclining on the
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 85
same silken cushions, were nevertheless separated
by an abyss. In these elegant coupes returning
from a ball between midnight and two o'clock in
the morning, how many curious and singular
scenes must pass, — restricting ourselves only to
those coupes whose lanterns light both the street
and the carriage, those with their windows un-
shaded, in short the coupes of legitimate love, in
which the couples can quarrel without fearing to
be seen by the passers-by, because the civil code
gives the right to provoke, to beat, or to kiss a
wife in a carriage or elsewhere, anywhere, every-
where ! How many secrets must be thus revealed
to nocturnal pedestrians, to those young men who
have gone to a ball in a carriage, but are obliged,
for whatever cause it may be, to return on foot. It
was the first time that Jules and Clemence had
found themselves thus, each in a corner. Usually
the husband pressed close to his wife.
"It is very cold," said Madame Jules.
But her husband did not hear her. He was study-
ing all the black signs above the shop windows.
"Clemence," he said at last. "Forgive me the
question I am about to ask you."
He came closer, took her by the waist and drew
her towards him.
"My God! it is coming!" thought the poor wo-
man.
"Well," she said aloud, anticipating the ques-
tion, "you wish to learn what Monsieur Maulincour
said to me. 1 will tell you Jules, but not without
86 FERRAGUS
terror. Mon Dieii, is it possible that we should
have secrets from each other ? For the last few
moments I have seen you struggling between your
conviction of our love and vague fears; but that
conviction is clear within us, is it not, and your
suspicions, do they not seem to you dark and un-
natural? Why not remain in that clear light of
confidence which pleases you? When I have told
you all, you will still desire to know more; and yet
I myself do not know what was hidden beneath the
extraordinary words of that man. And what I fear
is, that this may lead to some fatal affair between
you. I would much prefer that we both forget this
unpleasant moment. But in any case, swear to
me that you will let this singular adventure explain
itself naturally. Monsieur de Maulincour declared
to me that the three accidents of which you have
heard, —the falling of a stone on his servant, the
breaking down of his cabriolet, and his duel about
Madame de Serizy — were the result of some plot I
had laid against him. Then he threatened to reveal
to you the notion which inclined me to assassinate
him. Can you imagine what all this means? My
emotion came from the impression produced upon
me by the sight of his face expressive of insanity,
his haggard eyes and his words broken by some
violent inward emotion. I thought him mad. This
is all. Now, I should not be a woman if 1 had not
perceived that for more than a year I had become,
as they call it, the passion of Monsieur de Maulin-
cour. He has never seen me except at a ball, and
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 87
our intercourse had always been insignificant, like
that which one has at balls. Perhaps he wishes
to disunite us, so that he may find me at some future
time alone and unprotected. There, see already you
are frowning! Oh, how cordially I hate society.
We were so happy without him ! why take any
notice of him ? Jules, promise me to forget all this.
To-morrow we shall no doubt hear that Monsieur
de Maulincour has gone mad."
"What a singular affair !" thought Jules as he
descended from the carriage under the peristyle of
his stairway.
He gave his arm to his wife, and together they
went up to their apartments.
To develop this history in all its truth of detail,
and to follow its course through all its windings, it
is necessary here to divulge some of love's secrets,
to glide beneath the ceilings of a marriage chamber,
not shamelessly, but like Trilby, frightening
neither Dougal nor Jeannie, alarming no one, being
as chaste as our noble French language requires, as
bold as was the pencil of Gerard in his painting
of Daphnis and Chloe. The bedroom of Madame
Jules was a sacred spot. Herself, her husband,
and her maid alone entered it. Opulence has some
noble privileges, and the most enviable are those
which permit the development of the sentiments to
their fullest extent, fertilizing them by the accom-
plishment of their thousand caprices, surrounding
them with that brilliancy which enlarges them,
with those refinements which purify them, with
88 FERRAGUS
those delicacies which render them still more allur-
ing. If you hate dinners on the grass and meals ill-
served, if you experience a pleasure at the sight of
a damask cloth of a dazzling whiteness, a silver gilt
service, porcelains of exquisite purity, of a table
served with gold, rich with chased silverware,
lighted by transparent candles, where miracles of
the most exquisite cookery are served under covers
with armorial bearings,— you must, to be consist-
ent, leave the garrets at the tops of the houses, the
grisettes in the streets, abandon the garrets, the
grisettes, the umbrellas and pattens to those peo-
ple who pay for their dinners with tickets; then
you will be able to comprehend love as a principle
which only develops in all its grace on carpets of
the Savonnerie, beneath the opal light of an alabas-
ter lamp, between guarded and discreet walls hung
with silk, before a gilded hearth in a chamber deaf-
ened to the sounds of the neighbors, street and every-
thing by shades, by shutters, by billowy curtains.
You will require mirrors in which to show the play
of form, and in which may be repeated infinitely the
woman whom we would multiply, and whom love
often multiplies; then very low divans; then a bed
which, like a secret, is divined without being
shown; then, in this coquettish chamber are fur-
lined slippers for naked feet, wax candles under
glass with muslin draperies, by which to read at all
hours of the night, and flowers, not those oppres-
sive to the head, and linen, the fineness of which
might have satisfied Anne of Austria. Madame
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 89
Jules had realized this delightful programme, but
that was nothing. Any woman of taste could have
done as much, although, nevertheless, there was in
the arrangement of these details a stamp of person-
ality, which gives to this ornament, to that detail,
a character that cannot be imitated. To-day more
than ever reigns the fanaticism of individuality.
The more our laws tend to an impossible equality,
the more we get away from it in our manners and
customs. Thus, the rich people in France are begin-
ning to become more exclusive in their tastes and
in their belongings than they have been for the last
thirty years. Madame Jules knew well to what
this programme tended, and had arranged every-
thing about her in harmony with a luxury that
suits so well with love. The Quince Cents Francs
et Ma Sophie, or love in a cottage, are the dreams of
starvelings to whom black bread suffices in their
present state, but who, become gourmands if they
really love, end by carving all the luxuries of gas-
tronomy. Love holds toil and poverty in horror.
It would rather die than live from hand to mouth.
Most women returning from a ball, impatient for
their beds, throw off anywhere their gowns, their
faded flowers, their bouquets, the fragrance of which
has now departed. They leave their little shoes
beneath a chair, walk about in loose slippers, take
out their combs and let their hair roll down as it
will. Little they care if their husbands see the
clasps, the hair pins, the artful props which sup-
ported the elegant edifice of the hair and of its
QO FERRAGUS
dressing. No more mysteries, — everything is let
down before the husband, there is no longer any
embellishing for the husband. The corset — the
most part of the time strictly cared for — lies where
it is thrown if the too sleepy maid forgets to take
it away with her. Then the whalebone bustle, the
oiled silk protections under the sleeves, the pads,
the false hair sold by the coiffeur, all the false wo-
man, is there, scattered about in open sight Dis-
jecta membra poeice, the artificial poetry so much
admired by those for whom it has been conceived,
elaborated, the fragments of the pretty woman,
litter all the corners of the room. To the love of a
husband who yawns, the actual woman presents
herself, also yawning, in an inelegant disorder and
with a tumbled nightcap, that of last night, that of
to-morrow night also:
"For, really Monsieur, if you want a pretty night-
cap to rumple every night, give me some more pin- A
money.
There's life as it is! A woman is always old
and unpleasing to her husband, but always dainty,
elegant and adorned for the other, for that rival of
all husbands, for that world which calumniates and
tears to shreds her sex. Inspired by a true love,
for love has like other beings its instinct of self-
preservation, Madame Jules did very differently,
and found in the constant benefits of her happy state
the necessary impulse to accomplish all those min-
ute personal duties which ought never to be relaxed,
because they perpetuate love. These cares, these
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 9I
duties, do they not proceed moreover from a per-
sonal dignity which is ravishingly becoming? Are
they not subtle flatteries, is this not to respect in
one's self the beloved one ? So Madame Jules had
denied to her husband all access to her dressing-
room where she changed her ball dress, and whence
she issued dressed for the night, mysteriously
adorned for the mysterious fetes of her heart In
entering the chamber, which was always elegant
and graceful, Jules saw there a woman coquet-
tishly enveloped in an elegant peignoir, her hair
simply wound in heavy coils around her head;
for, not fearing to disarrange them, she guarded
them neither from the sight nor the touch of love;
a woman always more simple, more beautiful then,
than she was before the world ; a woman who had
found refreshment in her bath, and whose only
artifice consisted in being whiter than her muslins,
fresher than the freshest perfume, more seductive
than the most skilful courtesan, in short, always
tender and therefore always loved. This admirable
understanding of a wife's business was the great
secret of Josephine's charm for Napoleon, as it was
in former times that of Cassonia for Caius Calig-
ula, of Diane de Poitiers for Henri II. But, if it
was largely productive for women who have counted
seven or eight lustres, what a weapon it is in the
hands of young women! A husband gathers with
delight the rewards of his fidelity.
So now, on returning home after this conversa-
tion which had chilled her with fear and which still
92 FERRAGUS
gave her the keenest anxiety, Madame Jules took
particular pains with her toilet for the night She
wished to make herself, and she did make herself,
enchanting. She girdled the batiste of her peignoir
slightly opening the corsage, let her black hair fall
on her rounded shoulders; her perfumed bath had
given her an intoxicating fragrance; her bare feet
were in velvet slippers. Strong in her sense of her
advantages, she came in, stepping softly, and put
her hands over her husband's eyes whom she
found standing thoughtfully in his dressing-gown,
his elbow on the mantel and one foot on the fender.
She said in his ear, warming it with her breath and
biting the end of it gently with her teeth:
"What are you thinking about. Monsieur?"
Then, clasping him closely, she enveloped him
with her arms to tear him away from his evil
thoughts. The woman who loves has a full knowl-
edge of her power; and the more virtuous she is
the more effectual is her coquetry.
"About you," he answered.
"Only about me.?"
"Yes."
"Oh, that is a very bold 'Yes ' "
They went to bed. As she fell asleep Madame
Jules said to herself:
"Decidedly, Monsieur de Maulincour will be the
cause of some evil. Jules is preoccupied, disturbed,
and nursing thoughts he does not tell me."
It was about three o'clock in the morning when
she was awakened by a presentiment which had
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 93
struck her heart as she slept. She had a percep-
tion, at once physical and moral, of her husband's
absence. She did not longer feel the arm which
Jules passed beneath her head, that arm on which
she had slept, peaceful and happy for five years,
and which she never wearied. A voice had said to
her, "Jules suffers, Jules is weeping—" She
raised her head and then sat up, felt that her hus-
band's place was cold, and saw him sitting before
the fire, his feet on the fender, his head resting on
the back of an armchair. He had tears on his
cheeks. The poor woman threw herself hastily
from her bed and sprang at a bound to her husband's
knee.
"Jules, what is it? Are you suffering — speak!
tell me! speak to me if you love me."
And in a moment she poured out to him a hundred
words expressive of the deepest tenderness.
Jules knelt at the feet of his wife, kissed her
knees, her hands, and answered her with fresh tears :
"My dear Clemence, 1 am most unhappy! It is
not loving to distrust your mistress, and you are
my mistress. 1 adore you, and suspect you. — The
words which that man said to me this evening have
struck to my heart; they stay there in spite of my-
self, to confound me. There is underneath it all
some mystery. In short, and I blush for it, your
explanations have not satisfied me. My reason
offers me a certain light which my love causes me
to reject. It is an awful combat. Could I stay
there, holding your head and suspecting thoughts
94 FERRAGUS
within it, to me unknown? — Oil, I believe in you,
1 believe in you," cried he, quickly, seeing her
smile sadly and open her mouth as if to speak.
"Do not say anything to me — reproach me with
nothing. From you, the least word would kill me.
Besides, could you say a single thing to me which
I have not said to myself for the last three hours ?
Yes, for three hours I have been here, watching
you as you slept, so beautiful, admiring your fore-
head, so pure, so peaceful. Oh! yes, you have
always told me all your thoughts, have you not? I
alone am in your soul. While I look at you, while
my eyes can plunge into yours, I see all plainly.
Your life is always as pure as your glance is clear.
No, there is no secret behind those transparent
eyes."
And he rose and kissed them softly.
"Let me avow to you, my dearest, that for the
last five years that which has increased my happi-
ness day by day was the knowledge that you had
none of those natural affections which always take
away a little from love. You had no sister, nor
father, nor mother, nor companion, and I was there-
fore neither above nor below any one else in your
heart; I was there alone. Clemence, repeat to me
all those sweet things of the spirit you have so
often said to me; do not blame me, console me, I am
unhappy. I have certainly an odious suspicion with
which to reproach myself, and you — you have
nothing in your heart to inflame you. My beloved,
tell me, could I rest thus beside you ? Could two
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 95
heads united as ours have been, lie on the same
pillow when one was suffering and the other tran-
quil ? — What are you thinking of?'' he cried
abruptly observing that Clemence was anxious,
confused, and could not restrain her tears.
"I am thinking of my mother," she answered in
a grave voice. "You will never know, Jules, the
sorrow of your Clemence obliged to remember the
dying farewells of her mother in hearing your
voice, the sweetest of all music; and in thinking of
the solemn pressure of the icy hand of a dying one
in feeling the caresses of yours, at the moment
when you overwhelm me with the assurances of
your delightful love."
She raised her husband, took hold of him,
strained him to her with a nervous force much
greater than that of a man, kissed his hair, and cov-
ered it with her tears.
"Ah! I would be hacked to pieces for you! Tell
me that I make you happy, that I am to you the
most beautiful of women, that I am a thousand wo-
men for you. But you are loved as no other man
ever will be. I do not know the meaning of the
words duty, and virtue. Jules, I love you for your-
self, I am happy in loving you, and I will love you
more and more until my last breath. I have pride
in my love, 1 feel that I am destined to have only
one sentiment in my whole life. What I am going
to say to you is dreadful perhaps, — I am glad to
have no child, and I do not wish for any. I feel
myself more wife than mother. Well ! then, have
96 FERRAGUS
you fears? Listen to me, my love, promise me to
forget, not this hour of mingled tenderness and doubt,
but the words of that madman. Jules, I wish it
Promise me not to see him, not to go to him. I
have a conviction that if you make one step more
into this maze, we shall both roll into an abyss
in which I shall perish, but with your name upon
my lips and your heart in my heart Why do
you hold me so high in your soul and yet so low in
reality? How is it that you, who give credit to so
many as to money, cannot give up to me the beg-
garly gift of a suspicion ; and, for the first occasion
in your life in which you might prove to me a
boundless faith, you dethrone me in your heart!
Between a madman and me, it is the madman
whom you believe! — Oh Jules — "
She stopped, threw back the hair that fell about
her brow and her neck, then in a heart-rending
tone she added :
"I have said too much, one word should suffice.
If your soul and your forehead still keep this cloud,
however light it may be, know well that I shall die
of it!"
She could not repress a shudder and turned pale.
"Oh! I will kill that man," thought Jules, as he
lifted his wife in his arms and carried her to her
bed. — "Let us sleep in peace my angel," he con-
tinued. "I have forgotten all, 1 swear it to you."
Clemence fell asleep to the music of these sweet
words, more softly repeated. Jules, as he watched
her sleeping, said in his heart:
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 97
"She is right, when love is so pure, a suspicion
blights it. For that soul so fresh, for that brow so
tender, a blemish, yes, that would mean death."
When, between two beings filled with affection
for each other and whose lives are in constant com-
munion, a cloud has come, although this cloud may
be dissipated, it leaves in these souls some trace of
its passage. Either, the mutual tenderness becomes
more living, as the earth is rejuvenated after the
shower; or, the shock still echoes like distant thun-
der through a cloudless sky; but it is impossible to
recover absolutely the former life, and it will inev-
itably happen that love will either increase or
diminish. At breakfast. Monsieur and Madame
Jules showed to each other those particular atten-
tions in which there is always a little affectation.
There were glances full of a gaiety which seemed
almost forced, and which seemed to be the efforts
of persons endeavoring to deceive themselves.
Jules had involuntary doubts, and his wife had posi-
tive fears. Nevertheless, sure of each other, they
had slept. Was this strained condition the effect
of a want of faith, or of the memory of their noctur-
nal scene? They did not know themselves. But
they loved each other, they loved each other so
purely that the impression at once cruel and benefi-
cent of that scene could not fail to leave its traces
in their souls; both of them eager to make those
traces disappear, and each wishing to be the first to
return to the other, they could not yet fail to think
of the first cause, of this first discord. For loving
7
98 FERRAGUS
souls, this is not grief, pain is still far distant; but
it is a sort of mourning which is difficult to depict.
If there are indeed relations between colors and the
agitation of the soul, if, as Locke's blind man said,
scarlet produces on the sight the effects produced
on the ear by a fanfare of trumpets, it may perhaps
be permissible to compare this reaction of melan-
choly to soft gray tones. But love saddened, love
in which remains a true sentiment of its happiness
momentarily troubled, gives voluptuous pleasure
which, derived from pain and pleasure both, are all
novel. Jules studied his wife's voice, he watched
her glances with the freshness of feeling that had
inspired him in the earliest moments of his passion
for her. The memory of five perfectly happy years,
the beauty of Clemence, the candor of her love,
promptly effaced in her husband's mind the last ves-
tiges of an intolerable pain.
This next day was Sunday, a day on which there
was no Bourse and no business; the two therefore
passed the whole day together, getting farther into
each others' hearts than they had ever yet done,
like two children who in a moment of fear hold each
other tightly, pressing together, and clasp each
other united by a common instinct. There are in
this life of two in one, completely happy days,
due to chance, without any connection with yester-
day or to-morrow, ephemeral flowers! — Jules and
Clemence enjoyed this delicious day as though they
had a foreboding that it would be the last of their
loving life. What name shall we give to that
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 99
unknown power which hastens the steps of the trav-
eler before the storm is yet visible, which makes
the dying resplendent with life and with beauty a
few days before his death and inspires him with
the most joyous projects for the future, which tells
the midnight student to turn up his lamp while it
still shines brightly, which makes a mother to
fear the too thoughtful look cast upon her infant by
an observing man? We are all affected by this in-
fluence in the great catastrophes of our life and we
have not yet either named or studied it; it is some-
thing more than presentiment and it is not yet
sight. All went well until the following day. On
Monday, Jules Desmarets, obliged to go to the
Bourse at his usual hour, did not depart without
asking his wife according to his custom if she
wished to be driven anywhere in his carriage.
"No," she said, "the day is too unpleasant to go
out."
In fact, it was raining in torrents. It was about
half-past two when Monsieur Desmarets reached the
Exchange and the Treasury. At four o'clock, in
coming out of the Bourse, he found himself face to
face with Monsieur de Maulincour, who was waiting
for him there with that feverish pertinacity which
is the result of hatred and vengeance.
"Monsieur, I have important communications to
make to you," said the officer taking the broker by
the arm. "Listen to me, I am too loyal a man to
have recourse to anonymous letters which would
trouble your peace of mind, I prefer to speak to you
100 FERRAGUS
in person. Moreover, believe that if it were not a
question of my life I certainly should not interfere
in any manner with the private affairs of a house-
hold, even if I thought I had the right to do so."
"If what you have to say to me concerns Madame
Desmarets," replied Jules, "I request you, Mon-
sieur, to be silent."
"If I am silent, Monsieur, you may before long
see Madame Jules on the prisoners' bench at the
Court of Assizes, by the side of a convict. Now do
you wish me to be silent.'' "
Jules turned pale, but his noble countenance
instantly resumed a calm which was now false;
then, drawing the officer under one of the temporary
shelters of the Bourse near which they were stand-
ing, he said to him in a voice which concealed his
intense inward emotion:
"Monsieur, I will listen to you, but there will be
between us a duel to the death, if — "
"Oh! to that 1 consent," cried Monsieur de Mau-
lincour. "I have the greatest esteem for you. You
speak of death. Monsieur ? You are doubtless igno-
rant that your wife perhaps caused me to be poi-
soned last Saturday evening. Yes, Monsieur, since
day before yesterday something extraordinary has
developed in me; my hair appears to distill in me
through my head a fever and a deadly languor, and
I know perfectly well what man touched my hair
during the ball."
Monsieur de Maulincour then related, without
omitting a single fact, his platonic love for Madame
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS lOI
Jules and the details of the adventure which began
this narrative. Any one would have listened to
him with as much attention as did the broker. But
the husband of Madame Jules had good reason to be
more amazed than any other human being. Here,
his character displayed itself, he was more amazed
than overwhelmed. Made a judge, and the judge of
an adored woman, he found in his soul the equity of
a judge, as he took the inflexibility of one. A lover
still, he thought less of his own shattered life than
of that of this woman; he listened not to his own
anguish but to the far-off voice that cried to him,
"Clemence cannot lie! Why should she betray
you.-* "
"Monsieur," said the officer of the guards in con-
cluding, "being absolutely certain of having recog-
nized Saturday evening in Monsieur de Funcal that
Ferragus whom the police declared dead, I have put
immediately on his traces an intelligent man. As 1
returned home I remembered by a fortunate chance
the name of Madame Meynardie, mentioned in the
letter of that Ida, the presumed mistress of my per-
secutor. Supplied with this one clue my emissary
will soon discover for me the facts of this horrible
affair, for he is far more able to discover the truth
than the police themselves."
"Monsieur," replied the broker, "I do not know
how to thank you for this confidence. You say that
you can obtain proof, witnesses, I shall await them.
I shall seek courageously the truth of this strange
affair, but you will permit me to doubt everything
102 FERRAGUS
until the evidence of these facts is proven to me.
In any case, you shall have satisfaction, as you
must know that such is demanded by both."
Jules returned home.
"What is the matter? "said his wife to him.
You are so pale you frighten me."
"The day is cold," he answered walking with a
slow step into that chamber in which everything
spoke of happiness and of love, that chamber so calm
in which was gathering a deadly tempest.
"You have not been out to-day? "he asked as
though mechanically.
He was impelled to ask this question, doubtless, by
the last of a thousand thoughts which had secretly
gathered themselves together into a meditation,
lucid although it was actively prompted by jeal-
ousy.
"No," she answered with a false accent of
candor.
At that moment Jules saw in the dressing-room
of his wife some drops of rain on the velvet bonnet
which she wore in the morning. He was a passion-
ate man, but he was also full of delicacy, and it
was repugnant to him to bring his wife face to face
with a lie. In such a situation, everything is fin-
ished for life between certain beings. And yet
these drops of rain were like a flash which tore
open his brain.
He left the room, went down to the porter's lodge
and said to his concierge, after making sure that
they were alone :
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS IO3
**Fouquereau, a hundred crowns of pension if you
tell me the truth, dismissal if you deceive me, and
nothing at all if, having told me the truth, you
ever speak of my question and your answer."
He stopped to examine the concierge's face,
leading him to the light of the window, and re-
sumed :
"Did Madame go out this morning? "
"Madame went out at a quarter to three, and I
think I saw her come in about half an hour ago."
"That is true, upon your honor?"
"Yes, Monsieur."
"You will have the pension which I promised
you ; but if you speak of this, remember my prom-
ise, you will lose all."
Jules returned to his wife.
"Clemence, " he said to her, "I find I must put
my household accounts in order, do not be offended
at the inquiry I am going to make. Have I not
given you forty thousand francs since the beginning
of the year ? ' '
"More," she said, "forty-seven."
"Have you found use for them all ? "
"Why, yes," she replied. "In the first place,
I had to pay several of our last year's bills — "
"I shall never find out anything in this way,"
thought Jules, "I am not taking the best course. "
At this moment his valet de chambre entered and
handed him a letter, which he opened indifferently,
but which he read eagerly as soon as his eyes had
lighted on the signature.
104 FERRAGUS
"MONSIEUR,
"For the sake of your peace of mind as well as of our own
I have taken the liberty of writing to you without possessing
the advantage of being known to you; but my position, my
age, and the fear of some misfortune compel me to entreat
you to have some indulgence in the unfortunate circumstances
in which our afflicted family now finds itself. Monsieur
Auguste de Maulincour has for the last few days shown signs
of mental derangement, and we fear that he may trouble
your happiness by fancies which he has confided to us, Mon-
sieur le Commandeur de Pamiers and myself, during his first
attacks of fever. We think it right therefore to warn you of
his malady, which is without doubt still curable; but it will
have such grave and important effects on the honor of our
family and the future of my grandson that I count on your
entire discretion. If Monsieur le Commandeur or I, Mon-
sieur, had been able to go to your house we would not have
written; but 1 have no doubt that you will regard the prayer
which is here made to you by a mother, to burn this letter.
"Accept the assurance of my distinguished consideration,
BARONNE DE MAULINCOUR, nee DE RIEUX."
"How many tortures! " cried Jules.
"But what is passing in your mind.!"' asked his
wife, exhibiting the deepest anxiety.
"I have come," he answered, "to ask myself
whether it can be you who have sent me this
notice to divert my suspicions," he went on, throw-
ing the letter to her. "Judge therefore what I suffer !"
"Unhappy man," said Madame Jules, letting fall
the paper, "I pity him, although he has done me
great harm."
"You know that he has spoken to me.^*"
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 105
**Oh, you have been to see him, in spite of your
promise?" she cried, struck with terror.
"Clemence, our love is in danger of perishing,
and we are outside of all the ordinary rules of life,
let us then lay aside all petty considerations in pres-
ence of the great perils. Listen, tell me why you
went out this morning? Women think they have
the right to tell us, sometimes, little falsehoods. Do
they not like to amuse themselves often by conceal-
ing pleasures which they are preparing for us?
Just now you said to me, by mistake no doubt, one
word for another, a no for a yes."
He went into the dressing-room and brought out
the bonnet.
"See, now! without wishing to play here the
part of Bartholo, your bonnet has betrayed you.
These spots, are they not rain drops ? You must,
therefore, have gone out in a street cab, and you
must have received these drops of water either in
going out to seek one, or entering the house to
which you went, or in leaving it. But a woman
can leave her own house most innocently, even
after she has told her husband that she would not go
out. There are so many reasons for changing our
plans! To have caprices, is not that one of your
rights? You are not obliged to be consistent with
yourself. You had forgotten something, a service
to render, a visit, or some kind action to do. But
nothing hinders a woman from telling her husband
what she has done. Does one ever blush on the
breast of a friend? Well, it is not the jealous
I06 FERRAGUS
husband who speaks to you, my Clemence, it is the
lover, it is the friend, it is the brother."
He flung himself passionately at her feet.
"Speak, not to justify yourself, but to calm my
horrible suffering. I know well that you went out.
Well, what did you do.? Where did you go? "
"Yes, I went out, Jules," she answered in an
altered voice, although her face was calm. "But
ask me nothing more. Wait with confidence; with-
out which you will lay up for yourself eternal re-
morse. Jules, my Jules, confidence is the virtue of
love. I own to you that in this moment I am too
much troubled to answer you ; but I am not an artful
woman, and I love you, you know it."
"In the midst of all that can shake the faith of a
man and rouse his jealousy, for I am not then the
first in your heart, I am not then yourself i* — Well,
Clemence, I still prefer to believe you, to believe
your voice, to believe your eyes! If you deceive
me, you deserve — "
"Oh! a thousand deaths," she said, interrupting
him.
"I hide from you none of my thoughts, and you,
— you — "
"Hush!" she said, "our happiness depends upon
our mutual silence. "
"Ah! I will know all," he cried in a violent ac-
cess of rage.
At that moment the cries of a woman were heard
and the yelping of a shrill little voice came from the
ante-chamber to the ears of husband and wife.
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 107
"I will enter, I tell you! " it cried. "Yes, I shall
enter, 1 wish to see her, I will see her! "
Jules and Clemence rushed into the salon and
they saw the door violently opened. A young
woman entered suddenly, followed by two servants
who said to their master :
"Monsieur, this woman would come in in spite
of us. We told her that Madame was not at home.
She answered that she knew very well that Madame
had been out but she had seen her come in. She
threatened to stay at the door of the house till she
could speak to Madame."
"You can go," said Monsieur Desmarets to his
domestics.
"What do you want. Mademoiselle?" he added,
turning to the unknown.
This demoiselle was the type of a woman who
is to be met with nowhere but in Paris. She is
made in Paris, like the mud, like the pavement of
Paris, as the water of the Seine is manufactured in
Paris in grand reservoirs through which human
industry filters it ten times before delivering it to
the cut glass carafes in which it sparkles so clear
and pure, from the muddiness that it had. She is
therefore a creature truly original. Depicted scores
of times by the painter's brush, the pencil of the
caricaturist, the plumbago of the designer, she still
escapes all analysis because she cannot be caught
and rendered in all her moods, like nature, like this
fantastic Paris. In fact, she holds to vice by but
one spoke and breaks away from it at all the
I08 FERRAGUS
thousand other points of the social circumference.
Moreover, she only lets one trait of her character be
known, the only one which renders her blamable;
her fine virtues are hidden; in her naive shame-
lessness she glories. Incompletely rendered in
dramas and tales in which she is put upon the scene
with all her poesy, she is nowhere really true but
in her garret, because she is always calumniated or
over-praised elsewhere. Rich, she deteriorates;
poor, she is misunderstood. And this could not be
otherwise! She has too many vices and too many
good qualities; she is too near to a sublime asphyx-
iation or to a degrading laugh; she is too beautiful
and too hideous; she personifies too well Paris, to
which she furnishes the toothless portresses, the
washwomen, the char-women, beggars, occasionally
insolent countesses, admired actresses, applauded
singers; she has even given in the olden time two
quasi-Queens to the monarchy. Who can grasp
such a Proteus ? She is all woman, less than wo-
man, more than woman. From this vast portrait
the painter of manners can take but certain details,
the ensemble is the infinite. She was a grisette of
Paris, but the grisette in all her splendor ; the grisette
in a hackney-coach, happy, young, handsome, fresh,
but a grisette with claws, with scissors, impudent
as a Spanish woman, quarrelsome as a prudish Eng-
lish woman proclaiming her conjugal rights, coquet-
tish as a great lady, moreover frank and ready for
everything; a.rea.\Honne issuing from the little apart-
ment of which she had so often dreamed, with its red
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS IO9
calico curtains, its Utrecht velvet-covered furniture,
the tea-table, the cabinet of china with painted
designs, the sofa, the little moquette carpet, the ala-
baster clock and candlesticks under glass, the yellow
bed-room, the eider-down quilt, — in short all the joys
of a grisette's life ; the housekeeper, a former grisette
herself but a grisette with mustaches and chevrons;
the theatre parties, the marrons unlimited, the silk
dresses, the bonnets to spoil; in short, all the felic-
ities imagined over the counter of the modiste,
except the carriage, which only appears in the
dreams of the counter as a marshal's baton does in
those of a soldier. Yes, this grisette had all these
things in return for a true affection, or in spite of a
true affection, as some others obtain it for an hour
a day, — a sort of tax carelessly paid under the claws
of an old man. The young woman who was now
in the presence of Monsieur and Madame Jules had
a foot so uncovered in her shoe that only a slim
black line was visible between the carpet and her
white stocking. This peculiar footgear, which the
Parisian caricature has so well rendered, is a spe-
cial attribute of the Parisian grisette; but she is
still better revealed to the eyes of an observer by
the care with which her garments are made to ad-
here to her form, which they clearly define. Thus
the unknown was, not to lose the picturesque
expression invented by the French soldier, tied into
a greenish dress with a yoke which revealed the
beauty of her corsage perfectly visible; for her
shawl of Ternaux cashmere, fallen to the floor, was
no FERRAGUS
only retained by the two corners which she held
twisted around her wrists. She had a delicate face,
rosy cheeks, a clear skin, sparkling gray eyes, a
round and very prominent forehead, hair carefully
smoothed which escaped from under her little bon-
net in heavy curls upon her neck.
"My name is Ida, Monsieur. And if that is
Madame Jules to whom I have the advantage of
speaking, I've come to tell her all I have in my
heart against her. It is very wrong when one is
set up and when one is in her furniture, as you are
here, to wish to take away from a poor girl a man
with whom I am as good as married, morally, and
who talks of repairing his wrongs by marrying me
before the Municipality. There are plenty of hand-
some young men in the world, ain't there, Mon-
sieur.? to please her fancies without wishing to
take from me a man of middle-age who makes my
happiness. Quien! I haven't got a fine hotel, I —
I have my love! I hate handsome men and money,
I'm all heart, and — "
Madame Jules turned to her husband:
"You will allow me. Monsieur, not to hear any
more of this," she said, re-entering her bedroom.
"If that lady lives with you, I have made a mess
of it, I see; but so much the worser, " resumed Ida.
"Why does she come to see Monsieur Ferragus
every day? "
"You deceive yourself. Mademoiselle," said Jules
stupefied. "My wife is incapable — "
"Ha, so you are married — you two!" said the
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS ill
grisette, showing some surprise. "Then it is much
worse, Monsieur, isn't it, for a woman who has the
happiness of being married in legal marriage to
have relations with a man like Henri — "
"But what, Henri?" said Jules, taking Ida and
leading her into an adjoining room that his wife
might hear no more.
"Why, Monsieur Ferragus — "
"But he is dead," said Jules.
"Nonsense! I went to Franconi's with him yes-
terday evening and he brought me home, as he
should. Besides, your wife can give you news of
him. Didn't she go to see him at three o'clock.?
1 know she did; I waited for her in the street, all
because that good-natured man, Monsieur Justin,
whom you know perhaps, a little old man with
seals, who wears corsets, warned me that I had
Madame Jules for a rival. That name, Monsieur,
is well known among the fictitious ones. Excuse me
since it is yours, but if Madame Jules was a Duch-
ess of the Court, Henri is so rich that he could sat-
isfy all her fancies. My business is to protect my
property, and I have the right to; for love him,
Henri, 1 do. He's my first inclination, and it con-
cerns my happiness and all my future fate. I fear
nothing, Monsieur; I am honest and I have never
lied nor stolen the property of any living soul. If
it was an Empress who was my rival I'd go straight
to her; and if she carried away my future husband
I feel capable of killing her, all empress as she was,
because all pretty women are equals, Monsieur, — "
112 FERRAGUS
"Enough, enough," said Jules. "Where do you
live?"
"Rue de la Corderie-du-Temple, No. 14, Mon-
sieur. Ida Gruget, corset-maker at your service,
for we make lots of corsets for men."
"And where does he live, the man whom you
call Ferragus? "
"But, Monsieur," said she pursing up her lips,
"in the first place he's not a man. He's a mon-
sieur, much richer than you are, perhaps. But
why do you ask me his address, when your wife
knows it.'' He told me not to give it. Am I obliged
to answer youi* — I am not, thank God, neither in a
confessional nor a police court, and I'm responsible
only to myself."
"And if I were to offer you twenty, thirty, forty
thousand francs to tell me where Monsieur Ferragus
lives? "
"O ! no, O no, my little friend, and that ends the
matter! " she said, emphasizing this singular reply
with a popular gesture. "There is no sum that
would make me tell that. I have the honor to bid
you good day. How does one get out of here? "
Jules, overwhelmed, allowed Ida to depart with-
out thinking further of her. The whole world
seemed to crumble beneath his feet; and over his
head the heavens were falling in fragments.
"Monsieur is served," said his valet.
The valet and the footman waited in the dining-
room a quarter of an hour without seeing their mas-
ter or mistress.
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS II3
"Madame will not dine to-day, " said the waiting-
maid, coming in.
"What's the matter, Josephine ? " asked the valet
"I don't know," she answered. "Madame is
crying, and is going to bed. Monsieur has no doubt
some affair on hand in the city, and it has been
discovered at a very bad time, do you understand.^
I wouldn't answer for Madame's life. Men are so
clumsy! They're always making scenes without
any precaution."
"That's not so," replied the valet in a low voice,
"on the contrary it is Madame who, — you under-
stand.-' What time does Monsieur have to go after
pleasure, he who for five years hasn't slept out of
Madame's room once; who goes to his office at ten
o'clock and only leaves it at noon for dejeuner.-'
His life is all known, it is regular, while Madame
goes out nearly every day at three o'clock, no one
knows where."
"And Monsieur, too," said the maid taking her
mistress's part.
' ' But Monsieur goes straight to the Bourse. Here's
three times that I've told him that dinner was
ready," continued the valet after a pause, "and you
might as well speak to a post."
Jules entered.
"Where is Madame.?" he inquired.
"Madame is going to bed, her head aches," re-
plied the maid, assuming an air of importance.
Jules then said very composedly, addressing his
domestics :
8
114 FERRAGUS
"You can take it all away, I shall go and sit with
Madame."
And he returned to his wife's room, where he
found her weeping but endeavoring to smother her
sobs in her handkerchief.
"Why do you weep?" said Jules to her. "You
need expect from me neither violence nor reproaches.
Why should I avenge myself ? If you have not been
faithful to my love, it is that you were never
worthy of it — "
"Not worthy!"
These words repeated made themselves heard
through her sobs, and the accent in which they
were said would have moved any other man than
Jules.
"To kill you, it would be necessary to love more
than perhaps I do," he continued; "but I should
never have the courage, I would kill myself rather,
leaving you to your — happiness, and to — to whom ? ' '
He did not end his sentence.
"Kill yourself!" cried Clemence, flinging herself
at the feet of Jules and clasping them.
But he, wishing to escape this embrace, tried to
shake her off, dragging her in so doing toward the
bed.
"Let me alone," he said.
"No, no! Jules," she cried. "If you love me no
longer I shall die. Do you wish to know all ? "
"Yes."
He took her, grasped her violently, and sat down
on the edge of the bed holding her between his legs;
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 15
then looking with a dry eye at that beautiful face,
now red as fire though furrowed with tears :
"Now speak," he said.
Clemence's sobs began again.
"No, it is a secret of life and death. If I tell it,
I — No I cannot. Have mercy, Jules! "
"You are still deceiving me — "
"Yes, Jules you may think that I am deceiving
you, but soon you will know all."
"But this Ferragus, this convict, whom you go to
see, this man enriched by crime, if he does not
belong to you, if you do not belong to him — "
"Oh Jules!—"
"Well, is he your mysterious benefactor, the
man to whom we owe our fortune, as has already
been said ? ' '
"Who said that?"
"A man whom I killed in a duel."
"Oh, God! one death already."
"If he is not your protector, if he does not give
you money, if it is you who carry it to him, tell
me, is he your brother ? "
"What if he were?" she said.
Monsieur Desmarets crossed his arms.
"Why should that have been concealed from
me? " he resumed. "Then you have both deceived
me, your mother and you? Besides, does a woman
go to see her brother every day or nearly every
day, eh?"
His wife had fainted at his feet.
"Dead," he said. "And if I were mistaken? "
Il6 FERRAGUS
He sprang to the bell rope, called Josephine, and
lifted Clemence to the bed.
"I shall die of it," said Madame Jules, recover-
ing consciousness.
"Josephine," cried Monsieur Desmarets, "send
for Monsieur Desplein. Then you will go to my
brother and ask him to come here as soon as possi-
ble. ' '
"Why your brother?" asked Clemence.
Jules had already left the room.
*
For the first time in five years Madame Jules
slept alone in her bed, and was compelled to admit
a physician into that sacred chamber. These in
themselves were two keen pangs. Desplein found
Madame Jules very ill, never had a violent emotion
been more untimely. He would not say anything
definite, and postponed his opinion until the mor-
row, after leaving a few directions which were not
carried out, the emotions of the heart causing all
bodily cares to be forgotten. When morning
dawned Clemence had not yet slept. She was
absorbed in the low murmur of a conversation
which lasted several hours between the two
brothers; but the thickness of the walls allowed no
word which could betray the object of this long
conference to reach her ears. Monsieur Desmarets,
the notary, went away at last The stillness of the
night and the singular activity of the senses given
by strong emotion enabled Clemence to distinguish
the scratching of a pen and the involuntary move-
ments of a man engaged in writing. Those who
are habitually up at night and who observe the
different acoustic effects produced in absolute
silence know that often a slight echo can be readily
perceived in the same places where equable and
continued murmurs are not distinct. At four o'clock
the sound ceased. Clemence rose, anxious and
(117)
Il8 FERRAGUS
trembling. Then, with bare feet and without a
wrapper, forgetting her moistened skin and her con-
dition, the poor woman opened softly the door with-
out making any noise. She saw her husband, a
pen in his hand, sound asleep in his arm-chair.
The candles had burned to the sockets. She slowly
advanced and read on an envelope already sealed:
THIS IS MY WILL.
She kneeled down as if before a grave, and kissed
the hand of her husband, who woke instantly.
"Jules, my dear, they grant some days to crim-
inals condemned to death," she said looking at him
with eyes lit up with fever and with love. "Your
innocent wife only asks for two. Leave me free
for two days, and — wait! After that I shall die
happy, — at least you will regret me."
"Clemence, I grant them."
And then, as she kissed her husband's hand in a
touching transport of her heart, Jules, under the
spell of this cry of innocence, took her in his arms
and kissed her on the forehead, thoroughly ashamed
to feel himself still under the power of this noble
beauty.
On the morrow, after taking a few hours' rest,
Jules entered his wife's room, obeying mechanic-
ally his custom of not leaving the house without
seeing her. Clemence was asleep. A ray of light
passing through a chink in the upper blind of the
windows fell on the face of this overburdened
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS II9
woman. Already suffering had impaired her fore-
head and the fresh redness of her lips. A lover's
eye could not mistake the appearance of dark
blotches and a sickly pallor which had replaced the
uniform tone of the cheeks and the smooth white-
ness of the skin, two pure pages on which were
revealed so artlessly the sentiments of this beautiful
soul.
"She suffers," thought Jules. "Poor Clemence,
may God protect us ! "
He kissed her very softly on the forehead. She
woke, saw her husband and remembered all ; but,
unable to speak, she took his hand and her eyes
filled with tears.
"I am innocent," said she, ending her dream.
"You will not go out to-day? " asked Jules.
"No, 1 feel too weak to leave my bed."
"If you should change your mind, wait till I
return," said Jules.
Then he went down to the porter's lodge.
"Fouquereau, you will watch your door to-day
closely, I wish to know exactly who comes to the
house and who leaves it."
Then he threw himself into a hackney-coach,
caused himself to be driven to the Hotel de Maulin-
cour and there asked for the baron.
"Monsieur is ill," he was told.
Jules insisted on entering, gave his name; and,
if he could not see Monsieur de Maulincour, he
wished to see the vidame or the dowager. He
waited some time in the salon of the old baroness,
I20 FERRAGUS
who came to see him and told him that her grand-
son was much too ill to receive him.
"I know, Madame," replied Jules, "the nature of
his illness from the letter which you did me the
honor to write to me, and I beg you to believe — "
"A letter to you. Monsieur! written by me!"
cried the dowager, interrupting him; "but I have
written no letter. And what was I made to say.
Monsieur, in that letter ? "
"Madame," replied Jules, "intending to see
Monsieur de Maulincour to-day and to return you
this letter I thought it best to preserve it in spite of
the injunction with which it ends. There it is."
The dowager rang for her spectacles, and the mo-
ment she cast her eyes on the paper she exhibited
the greatest surprise.
"Monsieur," she said, "my writing is so per-
fectly imitated that if the matter were not so recent
I might be deceived myself. My grandson is ill, it
is true. Monsieur; but his reason has never been
the least bit in the world affected. We are the
puppets of some evil persons; and yet I cannot
imagine the object of this impertinence. — You shall
see my grandson, Monsieur, and you will at once
perceive that he is perfectly sound in his mind."
And she rang the bell again and sent to ask if the
baron could receive Monsieur Desmarets. The
valet returned with an affirmative answer. Jules
ascended to the apartment of Auguste de Maulin-
cour, whom he found seated in an arm-chair near
the fire, and who, too feeble to rise, saluted him
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 121
with a melancholy gesture; the Vidame de Pamiers
was sitting with him.
"Monsieur le Baron," said Jules, "I have some-
thing to say to you of such a nature as to make it
desirable that we should be alone,"
"Monsieur," replied Auguste, "Monsieur leCom-
mandeur knows all about this affair and you can
speak fearlessly before him."
"Monsieur le Baron," resumed Jules in a grave
voice, "you have troubled, well nigh destroyed
my happiness, without having any right to do so.
Until the moment when we shall be able to see
which of us should demand or should grant repara-
tion to the other you are bound to help me in fol-
lowing the dark and mysterious path into which
you have flung me. I have now come to ascertain
from you the present residence of the mysterious
being who exercises such a fearful influence on our
destinies and who seems to have at his orders a
supernatural power. On my return home yester-
day, after hearing your statements, I received this
letter."
And Jules handed him the forged letter.
"This Ferragus, this Bourignard, or this Mon-
sieur de Funcal, is a demon!" cried Maulincour
after having read it. "Into what a frightful maze
have I put my foot? Where am I going? — I did
wrong. Monsieur," he added looking at Jules; "but
death is certainly the greatest of all expiations, and
my death is approaching. You can then ask me
whatever you desire, I am at your orders."
122 FERRAGUS
"Monsieur, you should know where this unknown
lives, I wish positively to penetrate this mystery,
even if it should cost me my whole fortune; and in
presence of an enemy so cruelly intelligent every
moment is precious."
"Justin shall tell you all," replied the baron.
At these words the Commander fidgeted in his
chair.
Auguste rang the bell.
"Justin is not in the house," cried the vidame
with a hastiness that revealed much.
"Well then," said Auguste excitedly, "the other
servants must know where he is, send a man on
horseback to fmd him. Your valet is in Paris, isn't
he ? He can be found. "
The Commander was visibly distressed.
"Justin cannot come, my dear boy," said the old
man. "He is dead. I wished to conceal this acci-
dent from you, but — "
"Dead! " cried Monsieur de Maulincour, "dead.?
And when? And how?"
"Last night. He had been supping with some
old friends and was doubtless drunk; his friends,
as full of wine as he, left him lying in the street
A heavy vehicle ran over him — "
"The convict did not miss him. At the first
stroke he killed him," said Auguste. "He has not
been so lucky with me, he has been obliged to try
four times."
Jules became gloomy and thoughtful.
"I shall not know anything, then," he cried after
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 23
a long pause. "Your valet has perhaps been justly-
punished! Did he not exceed your orders in calum-
niating Madame Desmarets to a person named Ida,
whose jealousy he roused in order to turn her loose
upon us."
"Ah! Monsieur in my anger I abandoned Madame
Jules to him."
"Monsieur!" cried the husband, keenly irri-
tated.
"Oh! at present, Monsieur," replied the officer
claiming silence by a gesture of the hand, "I am
ready for all. You cannot make any better that
which is already done, and you cannot tell me any-
thing that my own conscience has not already said
to me. I am now expecting this morning the most
celebrated of professors of toxicology, in order to
learn my fate. If I am doomed to intolerable suffer-
ing, my resolution is taken, I shall blow out my
brains."
"You talk like a child," cried the Commander,
horrified by the coolness with which the baron said
these words. "Your grandmother would die of
grief."
"Then, Monsieur," said Jules, "there is no
means of discovering in what part of Paris this
extraordinary man resides?"
"I think. Monsieur," replied the old man, "from
what I have heard poor Justin say, that Monsieur
de Funcal lived at the Portuguese Embassy or at that
of Brazil. Monsieur de Funcal is a gentleman who
belongs to both those countries. As for the convict,
124 FERRAGUS
he is dead and buried. Your persecutor, whoever
he is, seems to me so powerful that it would be well
for you to accept him under his new shape until the
moment when you will have the power of confound-
ing and of crushing him ; but act with prudence,
my dear Monsieur. If Monsieur de Maulincour had
followed my advice, nothing of all this would have
happened."
Jules retired coldly but with politeness, and now
knew of no means to take to reach Ferragus. As
he passed into his own house his concierge told him
that Madame had gone out to throw a letter into the
post box at the head of the Rue de Menars. Jules
felt himself humiliated at this proof of the great
intelligence with which his concierge espoused his
cause and the cleverness with which he guessed the
way to serve him. The zealousness of servants
and their peculiar skill in compromising masters
who compromise themselves, were known to him,
the danger of having them for accomplices, no mat-
ter for what purpose, he fully appreciated; but he
could not think of his personal dignity until the
moment when he found himself thus suddenly
degraded. What a triumph for the slave incapable
of raising himself to his master, to bring down his
master to his own level ! Jules was harsh and hard.
Another fault. But he suffered so deeply! His
life, till this moment so upright, so pure, was
becoming crooked, and he was obliged now to
scheme and to lie. And Clemence also lied and
schemed. It was a moment of immense disgust
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 12$
Lost in an abyss of bitter thoughts, Jules stood
mechanically motionless at the door of his house.
At one moment, yielding to his despair, he thought
of fleeing, of leaving France, carrying with his love
all the illusions of uncertainty. Then, not doubting
that the letter thrown into the post box by Clem-
ence was addressed to Ferragus, he searched for a
means of gaining possession of the answer which
that mysterious being would send. Then, in ana-
lyzing the singular good fortune of his life since his
marriage, he asked himself whether the calumny
for which he had taken such signal vengeance was
not a truth. Finally, reverting to the coming
answer from Ferragus, he said to himself:
"But this man so profoundly capable, so logical
in his least acts, who sees, who foresees, who calcu-
lates and divines our very thoughts, this Ferragus,
is he likely to send an answer? Will he not be
more likely to employ some other means more in
keeping with his power.? Will he not send his
answer by some skilful rascal, or perhaps in a
package brought by some honest man who does not
suspect what he brings, or in some parcel of shoes
which a shop-girl may innocently deliver to my
wife ? If Clemence and he have some understand-
ing between them?"
And he distrusted everything, and his mind ran
over the immense fields, the shoreless oceans, of
conjecture; then, after having floated for a time
among a thousand contradictory ideas, he felt he
was strongest in his own house, and he resolved
126 FERRAGUS
to keep watch in it as an ant-lion does at the bottom
of his sandy labyrinth.
"Fouquereau," he said to his concierge, "I am
not at home to any one who comes to see me. If
any one wishes to see Madame or brings anything
for her, you will ring twice. And you will bring
me all letters that are addressed here, no matter for
whom they are intended. — Thus," bethought as he
mounted to his study which was in the entresol, " I
will foil the schemes of Maiter Ferragus. If he
sends some messenger clever enough to ask for me,
so as to find out if Madame is alone, at least I shall
not be tricked like a fool."
He concealed himself in the windows of his study
which looked out on the street and then by a final
scheme inspired by jealousy he resolved to send
his head clerk in his own carriage to the Bourse, in
his place, with a letter to another broker, one of
his friends, in which he explained his purchases
and sales and requested him to attend to them for
that day. He postponed his more delicate transac-
tions till the morrow, careless of the fall or rise of
stocks and of the debts of all Europe. High privi-
lege of love! it crushes all things, everything pales
before it, — the altar, the throne, and the consols.
At half-past three o'clock, just at the hour in which
the Bourse is in full blast of reports, monthly settle-
ments, premiums, leases, etc., Jules saw Fouquereau
enter his study, quite radiant.
"Monsieur, an old woman has just come, but take
carCy I think she's a sly one. She asked for
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 127
Monsieur, seemed much annoyed not to find him in,
then she gave me a letter for Madame, and here
it is."
In a feverish anxiety Jules tore open the letter ;
then he fell into his chair overcome. The letter
was mere nonsense throughout and it would have
required a key to read it. It was written in cipher.
"You can go, Fouquereau. "
The concierge went out
"It is a mystery, deeper than the sea where there
are no soundings. Ah! it must be love, love only
is so sagacious, so ingenious, as this correspondent.
My God! I shall kill Clemence. "
At this moment a happy idea flashed through his
brain with such brilliancy that he felt almost physi-
cally illuminated by it. In the days of his toil-
some poverty, before his marriage, Jules had made
for himself a true friend, a half Pemeja. The ex-
treme delicacy with which he had managed the
susceptibilities of a man both poor and modest, the
respect with which he had surrounded him, the
ingenious address with which he had nobly com-
pelled him to share his own opulence without per-
mitting him to blush at it, increased their friend-
ship. Jacquet continued faithful to Desmarets in
spite of his wealth.
Jacquet, an upright man, a toiler, austere in his
morals, had slowly made his way in that particular
ministry which develops at the same time the
greatest knavery and the greatest honesty. Hold-
ing a situation in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
X
128 FERRAGUS
he had charge of the most delicate division of its
archives. Jacquet was in this ministry a species
of glow-worm, casting his light on the secret corres-
pondence, deciphering and classifying despatches.
Placed somewhat higher than the mere bourgeois
he found in these diplomatic affairs all that there
was of the highest in subaltern ranks, and lived in
obscurity, happy in a retirement which sheltered
him from reverses, and satisfied to be able to pay in
this humble manner his debt to the country.
Hereditary associate in his mayoralty, he obtained,
as the newspapers express it, all the consideration
which was due him. Thanks to Jules, his position
had been ameliorated by a worthy marriage. An
unrecognized patriot, a ministerial one in fact, he
contented himself with groaning in his chimney-
corner over the course of the government. For the
rest, Jacquet was in his own household an easy-
going king, a man with an umbrella, who hired for
his wife a carriage which he never entered himself.
In short, to complete this sketch of this philoso-
pher without knowing it, he had not yet suspected,
and never would in all his life suspect all the
advantages he might have drawn from his position,
having for intimate friend a broker and knowing
every morning all the secrets of the State. This
man, sublime after the manner of that nameless
soldier who died in saving Napoleon by a guivive,
lived at the ministry.
In ten minutes Jules was in the office of records,
Jacquet offered him a chair, placed methodically on
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 29
the table his green taffeta eye-shade, rubbed his
hands, took up his snuff-box, stretched himself till
his shoulder blades cracked, swelled out his chest,
and said:
"What chance brings you here, Mosieur Des-
marets ? What do you want with me ? "
" Jacquet, I have need of you to decipher a secret,
a secret of life and death."
"It doesn't concern politics?"
"If it did, I shouldn't come to you for informa-
tion," said Jules. "No, it is a family matter, con-
cerning which 1 require of you the most profound
silence."
"Claude- Joseph Jacquet, dumb by profession.
You are not acquainted with me, then.?" he said
laughing. "Discretion is my lot."
Jules showed him the letter saying to him:
"You must read me this letter addressed to my
wife — "
"The devil, the devil, a bad business," said
Jacquet, examining the letter as a usurer examines
a note to be negotiated. "Ah! that's d. gridiron
letter. Wait a minute."
He left Jules alone in the office, but returned
almost immediately.
"This is silliness, my friend! it is written with
an old gridiron used by the Portuguese ambassador,
under Monsieur de Choiseul, at the time of the
dismissal of the Jesuits." Here, see.
Jacquet placed upon the writing a piece of
paper, cut out in regular squares like one of those
9
130 FERRAGUS
paper-laces which the confectioners wrap around
their sugar-plums, and Jules could then read with
perfect ease the words that were visible in the
interstices:
Have no more anxieties, my dear Cle'mence, our happiness
will not be troubled any more by any one, and your husband
will lay aside his suspicions. I cannot come to see you.
However ill you may be, you must have the courage to come;
make the effort, search for strength; you will fmd it in your
love. My affection for you has induced me to submit to the
most cruel of operations, and 1 cannot leave my bed. I
had several moxas applied yesterday evening to the back of
my neck, from one shoulder to the other, and it was necessary
to let them burn a long time. You understand me? But I
thought of you, and I did not suffer too much. To baffle all
the investigations of de Maulincour, who will notpersecute us
much longer, I have left the protecting roof of the Embassy
and am now safe from all pursuit in the Rue des Enfants-
Rouges, No. 12, with an old woman named Madame Etienne
Gruget, mother of that Ida who will pay dearly for her silly
prank. Come here to-morrow at nine in the morning. I am
in a room which is reached only by an interior staircase. Ask
for M. Camuset. Adieu till tomorrow. I kiss your forehead
my darling.
Jacquet looked at Jules with a sort of honest
terror which covered a true compassion and uttered
his favorite exclamation in two separate and dis-
tinct tones :
"The devil, the devil."
"That seems clear to you, does it not.?" said
Jules. "Well, there is in the depth of my heart a
voice which pleads for my wife, and which makes
itself heard above all the pangs of jealousy. 1 shall
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 131
endure until to-morrow the most horrible of tortures ;
but at least to-morrow between nine and ten o'clock
I shall know all, and I shall be unhappy or happy
for the rest of my life. Think of me then, Jacquet "
"I shall be at your house to-morrow at eight
o'clock. We will go there together, and I will wait
for you, if you like, in the street You may run
some danger, and you ought to have near you some
devoted person who will understand a mere sign
and whom you can safely trust. Count on me."
"Even to help me to kill someone?"
"The devil, the devil!" said Jacquet, quickly,
repeating, as it were, the same musical note, "I
have two children and a wife — "
Jules pressed the hand of Claude-Jacquet and
went away. But he returned precipitately.
"I forgot the letter," he said, "but that's not all,
it must be resealed. "
"The devil, the devil! you opened it without
saving the seal, but the impression is luckily deep
enough. There, leave it with me, and I will bring
it to you secundum scripturam."
"At what time.?"
"At half- past five—"
"If I am not yet in, just give it to the concierge
and tell him to send it up to Madame."
"Do you want me to-morrow?"
"No, adieu."
Jules arrived promptly at the Place de la Rotonde-
du-Temple, he left his cabriolet there and went on
foot to Rue des Enfants-Rouges, where he examined
132 FERRAGUS
the house of Madame dtienne Gruget There would
be cleared up the mystery on which depended the
fate of so many persons ; Ferragus was there, and
to Ferragus led all the threads of this strange
intrigue. The coming together of Madame Jules,
of her husband and of this man, would it not be the
Gordian knot of this already bloody drama, and for
which the blade would not be wanting that should
cut the most intricate ties?
This house was one of those which belonged to
the class called cahajoutis. This very significant
name is given by the populace of Paris to those
houses which are built, as it were, piecemeal. They
are nearly always buildings originally separate but
afterwards brought together according to the fancy
of the various proprietors who have successively
enlarged them ; or they are houses begun, left unfin-
ished, again built upon, and finally completed; un-
happy houses, which have passed, like certain peo-
ples, under several dynasties of capricious masters.
Neither the floors nor the windows form an ensem-
ble, to borrow from the art of painting one of its
most picturesque terms; everything is in discord,
even the external decorations. The cabajoutis is
to Parisian architecture what the capharnailm is to
the apartments, a general receptacle in which all
sorts of things are thrown higgledy-piggledy.
*'Madame Etienne?" asked Jules of the portress.
This portress had her lodge under the main en-
trance, in one of those species of chicken coops, a
little wooden house on rollers, and sufficiently like
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 33
those sentry boxes which the police have set up by
all the stands of hackney-coaches.
"Hein?" said the portress, laying down the
stocking she was knitting.
In Paris, the various component parts which
make up the physiognomy of any given portion of
this monstrous city are admirably in keeping with
its general character. Thus, porter, concierge or
Suisse, whichever name may be given to that
essential muscle of the Parisian monster, is always
in conformity with the neighborhood of which he is
a part, and of which he is often an epitome. Lazy,
and with lace on every seam of his coat, the con-
cierge dabbles in stocks on the Faubourg-Saint-
Germain; the porter takes his ease in the Chaus-
see-d'Antin; he reads his newspapers in the Bourse
quarter; he has a business of his own in the
Faubourg Montmartre. The portress is a former
prostitute in the quarter of prostitutes; in the
Marais she has morals, is ill-natured and full of
whims.
On seeing Jules this portress took a knife to stir
the almost extinguished peat in her foot-warmer;
then she said to him :
"You want Madame Etienne, is it Madame
Etienne Gruget? "
"Yes," said Jules Desmarets, assuming a vexed
air.
"Who makes passementerie.-"'
"Yes."
"Well, then. Monsieur," said she, issuing from
134 FERRAGUS
her cage, laying her hand on Jules's arm and leading
him to the end of the long dark passage-way vaulted
like a cellar, "you will go up the second staircase
at the end of the courtyard. Do you see the win-
dows where there are the pots of pinks ? That's
where Madame j^tienne lives."
"Thank you, Madame. Do you think she is
alone? "
"But why shouldn't she be alone, that woman,?
She is a widow."
Jules hastened up a very dark stairway, the steps
of which were lumpy with hardened mud left by
the feet of those who came and went On the
second floor he saw three doors, but no sign of
pinks. Fortunately, on one of the doors the oiliest
and the darkest of the three, he read these words
written in chalk:
"Ida will come at nine o'clock to-night."
"This is the place," thought Jules.
He pulled an old bell-cord, black with age, with
a handle, and heard the smothered sound of a
cracked bell and the barking of an asthmatic little
dog. The way in which the sounds manifested
themselves in the interior announced an apartment
encumbered with articles which left no space for
the least echo, — a characteristic feature of the lodg-
ings occupied by work-people, by the humble house-
holds, in which space and air are always lacking.
Jules looked about mechanically for the pinks and
finally found them on the outer sill of a sliding win-
dow, between two filthy drain-pipes. Here were
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 35
flowers; here, a garden two feet long and six inches
wide; here, a wheat-ear; here, ail life epitomized,
but here, afeo, all the miseries of that life. A ray
of light, falling from heaven as if by special favor
on these shabby flowers and this superb stalk of
wheat, brought out in full distinctness the dust, the
grease, and that nameless color peculiar to Parisian
dens, a thousand uncleanlinesses which enclosed,
spotted and made old, the damp walls, the worm-
eaten baluster of the stairway, the disjointed win-
dow casings and the doors originally painted red.
Presently an old woman's cough and the heavy
step of a woman shuffling painfully along in list
slippers announced the mother of Ida Gruget.
This old woman opened the door, came out on the
landing, raised her head and said:
"Ah! it's Monsieur Bocquillon. Why no. For
sure! how much you are like Monsieur Bocquillon.
You are his brother, perhaps. What can 1 do for
you.-* Come in. Monsieur. "
Jules followed this woman into the first room
where he saw huddled together cages, household
utensils, ovens, furniture, little earthenware dishes
full of food or of water for the dog and the cats, a
wooden clock, bed-quilts, engravings of Eisen,
heaps of old iron, all these things mixed and tum-
bled together in such a manner as to produce a
most grotesque effect, the true capharnaiJm of Paris,
to which were not lacking even a few old numbers
•of the Constitiitionnel.
Jules, instigated by a sense of prudence, paid
136 FERRAGUS
no attention to the widow Gruget, who said to
him:
"Come in here, Monsieur, and warm yourself."
Fearing to be overheard by Ferragus, Jules asked
himself whether it would not be wiser to conclude
in this first apartment the arrangement he had come
to propose to the old woman. A hen which de-
scended cackling from a loft roused him from his
inward meditation. He came to a resolution; he
therefore followed Ida's mother into the room with
the fireplace, where they were accompanied by the
wheezy little pug, a dumb personage, who jumped
upon an old stool. Madame Gruget had displayed
all the foolishness of semi-pauperism when she
invited her visitor to warm himself. Her fire-pot
concealed completely two brands sufficiently far
apart. The skimmer lay on the ground, the handle
in the ashes. The mantel-shelf, adorned with a
little wax Jesus under a square glass-case bordered
with bluish paper, was piled with wools, bobbins
and utensils used in the making of trimmings.
Jules examined all the furniture in the room with a
curiosity full of interest, and showed in spite of
himself a secret satisfaction.
"Well, Monsieur, tell me, do you want to make
an arrangement for any of my things? " said the
widow seating herself in a yellow cane arm-chair
which seemed to be her headquarters.
In it she kept altogether her handkerchief, her
snuff-box, her knitting, half-peeled vegetables,
spectacles, a calendar, a bit of livery fringe just
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 37
commenced, a greasy pack of cards, and two volumes
of novels, all stuck into the hollow of the back.
This article of furniture, in which this old creature
was floating down the river of life, resembled the
encyclopedic bag which a woman carries with
her when she travels and in which may be found a
compendium of her household belongings, from the
portrait of her husband to eau de Melisse for faint-
ness, sugar-plums for the children, and English
court-plaster in case of cuts.
Jules studied everything. He looked attentively
at the yellow visage of Madame Gruget, at her gray
eyes without eyebrows, deprived of lashes, her
toothless mouth, her wrinkles black-shaded, her cap
of rusty tulle with ruffles still more rusty, her cot-
ton petticoats full of holes, her worn-out slippers,
her broken fire-pot, her table heaped with plates
and with silks and with unfinished work in cotton
and in wool, in the midst of which appeared a
bottle of wine. Then he said to himself:
"This woman has some passion, some hidden
vice, — she is mine. — Madame," said he aloud,
making a sign of intelligence to her, "I have come
to order some trimmings of you — "
Then he lowered his voice.
"I know," he continued, "that you have with you
an unknown who takes the name of Camuset. "
The old woman looked at him suddenly, but with-
out giving the least sign of astonishment.
"Tell me, can he overhear us? Consider that
this is a question of a fortune for you."
138 FERRAGUS
"Monsieur," she replied, "speak without fear, I
have no one here. But if I had anyone up there, it
would be impossible for him to hear you."
"Ah! the sly old creature, she knows how to
answer like a Norman," thought Jules. "We shall
be able to come to an agreement. — Do not give
yourself the trouble to lie, Madame," he resumed.
"In the first place, you must know that I mean no
harm to you, nor to your lodger ill with his moxas,
nor to your daughter Ida, the corset-maker, and friend
of Ferragus. You see, I know all about it. Reas-
sure yourself, I am not of the police, nor do I desire
anything that can hurt your conscience. A young
lady will come here to-morrow between nine and
ten o'clock, to talk with the friend of your daughter,
I want to be where I can see all and hear all, with-
out being seen or heard by them. You will furnish
me the means of doing so, and I will reward this
service by a sum of two thousand francs paid down,
and a yearly annuity of six hundred. My notary
shall prepare the deed before you this evening; I
will put in his hands your money, he will pay it to
you to-morrow after the conference at which I desire
to be present and during which I shall acquire proofs
of your good faith."
"Will that injure my daughter, my dear Mon-
sieur.?" she asked, throwing a suspicious and cat-
like glance upon him.
"In no way, Madame. But, moreover, it seems
to me that your daughter treats you pretty badly.
A girl who is loved by a man as rich and as powerful
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 39
as Ferragus should find it easy to make you more
comfortable than you seem to be."
"Ah! my dear Monsieur, not so much as one poor
theatre ticket for the Ambigu or the Gaiete, where
she can go as much as she likes. It's shameful!
A girl for whom I sold my silver forks and spoons,
and I now eat, at my age, with German metal, and
all to pay her apprenticeship and give her a trade
where she could coin money if she chose. For, as
to that, she takes after me, she's as clever as a
witch, I must do her that justice. At least she
might give over to me her old silk dresses, I who
am so fond of wearing silk. No, Monsieur; she
goes to the Cadran Bleu, dinner at fifty francs a
head, rolls in her carriage like a princess, and
mocks at her mother as though she were just noth-
ing at all. Dieu de Dieii! what heedless young
ones we have brought into the world, it is the finest
thing that can be said about us. A mother, Mon-
sieur, that is a good mother ! for I have hidden her
foolishness, and I have always kept her in my
bosom, to take the bread out of my mouth and cram
everything into her own. Ah! well now, she
comes, she wheedles you, she says to you, 'how do
you do. Mother.' And there's all her duty paid
toward the author of her days. Go along, as I tell
you. But she'll have children one of these days,
and she'll find out what it is to have such bad bag-
.gages, which one can't help loving all the same."
"What! she does nothing for you.?"
"Ah, nothing.? No, Monsieur, I don't say that;
I40 FERRAGUS
if she did nothing that would be a little too much.
She pays my rent, gives me fire-wood and thirty-
six francs a month. — But Monsieur what's that at
^y age, fifty-two years old, with eyes that ache
at night, ought I to be still working? Besides, why
won't she have me with her ? I should shame her
there? Then let her say so. In truth, ought one
to be buried out of the way for such dogs of children
who have forgotten you even before they've shut
the door?"
She pulled her handkerchief out of her pocket and
with it a lottery ticket that dropped on the floor ;
but she hastily picked it up saying:
"Hi ! That's the receipt for my taxes."
Jules at once perceived the reason of the sagacious
parsimony of which the mother complained, and
he was only the more certain that the widow Gru-
get would agree to the proposed bargain.
"Well, then, Madame," he said, "accept what I
offer you."
"You said, Monsieur, two thousand francs in
ready money and six hundred annuity? "
"Madame, I've changed my mind and I will
promise you only three hundred annuity. This
way seems to me more to my interest. But I will
give you five thousand francs in ready money.
Wouldn't you like that better? "
"Bless me, yes. Monsieur."
"You will have more comfort, and you can go to
the Ambigu-Comique, to Franconi's, everywhere,
at your ease, in a hackney-coach. "
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 141
"Ah, I don't like Franconi, for they don't talk
there. But, Monsieur, if I accept, it is because it
will be very advantageous to my child. At least
I shall no longer be an expense to her. Poor little
thing, after all, I shouldn't want to take her pleas-
ures from her. Monsieur, youth must amuse itself!
and so, if you assure me that I will do no harm to
anyone — "
"To no one," repeated Jules. "But now, how
will you manage it?"
"Well, Monsieur, by giving to Monsieur Ferragus
this evening a little tea made of poppy-heads he'll
sleep sound, the dear man ! And he has good need
of it because of his sufferings, for he does suffer, so
that it is a pity. But, too, I should like to know
what kind of invention it is for a healthy man to
burn his back just to get rid of a tic-douloureux
which only torments him once in two years! To
get back to our affair, I have my neighbor's key, and
her lodging is just above mine and there is a room
adjoining the one in which Monsieur Ferragus is
lying, with only a partition between them. She is
away in the country for ten days. Well, then, in
making a hole during the night in the partition-wall
you will be able to see them and to hear them at
your ease. I am on good terms with a locksmith,
a very friendly man, who talks like an angel, and
he will do that for me, and no one will know any-
thing about it. "
"Here's a hundred francs for him; come this
evening to Monsieur Desmarets, a notary, here's
142 FERRAGUS
his address. At nine o'clock the deed will be
ready, but — motus!"
"Enough, as you say — momus! An revoir,}hon-
sieur."
Jules returned home almost calmed by the cer-
tainty of knowing everything on the morrow. As
he entered the house he found in the porter's lodge
the letter, perfectly resealed.
"How do you feel now? " he said to his wife, in
spite of the coldness which separated them.
The loving habits are so difficult to quit
"Pretty well, Jules," she replied in a coquettish
voice; "will you come and dine beside me?"
"Yes — " he replied, giving her the letter; "here
is something that Fouquereau handed me for you."
Clemence, who was pale, colored high when she
saw the letter, and this sudden redness caused the
keenest pain to her husband.
"Is that joy? " he said laughing, "or the effect of
expectation? "
"Oh! of many things," she said, examining the
seal.
"I will leave you, Madame."
And he went down to his study, where he wrote
to his brother, giving him directions about the an-
nual payment to the widow Gruget. When he
returned he found his dinner served on a little table
near the bed of Clemence, and Josephine ready to
wait on him.
"If I were up, how I should like to serve you my-
self!" she said when Josephine had left them.
«
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 143
"Oh! even on my knees," she added, passing her
white hand through her husband's hair. "Dear
noble heart, you have been very kind and gracious
to me just now. You have done me more good by
showing me such confidence than all the doctors on
earth could do me with their prescriptions. Your
womanly delicacy, for you know how to love like
a woman, — well, it has shed I know not what balm
in my soul and which has almost cured me. There
is a truce between us. Jules, move your head this
way, that I may kiss it."
Jules could not deny himself the pleasure of em-
bracing his wife. But it was not without a sort of
remorse in his heart; he felt himself small before
this woman whom he was still tempted to believe
innocent. She displayed a sort of melancholy joy.
A tender hope shone on her features through the
expression of her grief. They seemed equally un-
happy to be obliged to deceive each other; another
caress, and they would have been unable longer to
resist their suffering and they would have avowed
all to each other.
"To-morrow evening, Clemence.?"
"No, Monsieur — to-morrow at noon you will
know all, and you will kneel down before your
wife. Oh no, you shall not be humiliated, no,
everything is pardoned; no, you have not been
wrong. Listen; yesterday you did cruelly hurt
me; but my life perhaps would not have been com-
plete without that agony, it shall be a shadow that
shall make brighter our celestial days."
144 FERRAGUS
"You bewitch me," cried Jules, "and you will
fill me with remorse."
"Poor friend, destiny is stronger than we, and I
am not the accomplice of my destiny. I shall go
out to-morrow."
"At what hour?" asked Jules.
"At half-past nine."
"Clemence," he said, "take every precaution,
consult Doctor Desplein and old Haudry. "
"I will consult only my heart and my courage."
"I shall leave you free, and will not come to see
you till noon."
"Will you not keep me company a little this
evening? I am no longer in pain — "
After having finished his business, Jules returned
to his wife, recalled to her by an invincible attrac-
tion. His passion was stronger than all his suffer-
ings.
I
The next day, towards nine o'clock, Jules escaped
from his own house, hurried to Rue des Enfants-
Rouges, went up-stairs and rang the bell of the
widow Gruget
"Ah, you've kept your word, as true as the
dawn. Come in. Monsieur," said the old passe-
menterie maker as she recognized him. "1 have
made you a cup of coffee with cream in case that — "
she resumed when the door was closed. "Oh!
real cream, a little pot of it that I saw milked my-
self at the dairy we have in the market des Enfants-
Rouges. "
"Thank you, Madame, no, not anything. Show
me—"
"Well, well, my dear Monsieur. Come this
way."
The widow conducted Jules into a room above
her own where she showed him triumphantly an
opening of the size of a two-franc piece, made
during the night in a place corresponding with one
of the highest and darkest rosettes in the wall paper
of Ferragus's chamber. This opening in both rooms
was above a wardrobe, the slight traces of his work
left by the locksmith had therefore left no evidence
on either side of the wall, and it was very difficult
to perceive in the shadow this species of loop-hole.
Thus Jules was obliged, in order to look through it,
lo (145)
146 FERRAGUS
to maintain himself in a ratlier fatiguing attitude
by standing on a tall stool which the widow Cruget
had been careful to bring.
"There's a gentleman with him," said the old
woman as she retired.
Jules perceived, in fact, a man occupied in dress-
ing a string of wounds produced by a certain num-
ber of burnings on the shoulders of Ferragus, whose
head he recognized from the description given him
by Monsieur de Maulincour.
"When do you think I shall be cured ? " he asked.
"I do not know," replied the unknown; "but
according to the doctors it will require seven or
eight more dressings."
"Well then, good-bye until to-night," said Fer-
ragus, holding out his hand to the man who had just
replaced the last bandage.
"Till to-night," replied the other, pressing his
hand cordially. "I wish I could see you through
with your sufferings."
"Well, the papers of Monsieur de Funcal will be
delivered to us to-morrow, and Henri Bourignard is
certainly dead," said Ferragus. "The two fatal
letters which have cost us so dear no longer exist
I shall become then once more a social being, a man
among men, and I shall certainly be worth the sailor
whom the fishes have eaten. God knows if it is for
my own sake that I have made myself a Count! "
"Poor Gratien, you, our wisest head, our beloved
brother, you are the Benjamin of the band, as you
know."
1
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 147
"Adieu, watch well my Maulincour. "
"You can rest easy on that score."
"Ho! stay, Marquis," cried the old convict.
"What is it?"
"Ida is capable of everything after the scene of
last night. If she has thrown herself into the river,
I certainly would not fish her out. She will keep
better the secret of my name, the only one she pos-
sesses ; but still look after her ; for, after all, she is
a good girl."
"Very well."
The stranger departed. Ten minutes later Jules
heard, not without a feverish shiver, the peculiar
rustle of a silk gown and almost recognized the sound
of his wife's footsteps.
"Well, father," said Clemence, "poor father,
how do you find yourself.? What courage ! "
"Come, my child," replied Ferragus, extending
his hand to her.
And Clemence presented her forehead which he
kissed.
"Come now, what is the matter my poor little
girl .'' What new troubles ? — "
"Troubles, father! but it is the death of your
daughter, whom you love so much. As I wrote you
yesterday, it is absolutely necessary that you
should find in your head, so fertile in ideas, a way
to see my poor Jules, to-day even. If you knew
how good he has been to me, in spite of all suspi-
cions, apparently so legitimate! Father, my love
is my very life. Would you wish to see me die?
148 FERRAGUS
Ah ! I have already suffered so much ! and I feel it,
my life is in danger.'*
"Lose you, my daughter," said Ferragus. "Lose
you through the curiosity of a miserable Parisian?
1 will burn Paris! Ah! you may know what a
lover is, but you do not know what a father is."
"Father, you frighten me when you look at me
that way. Do not weigh in the balance two so
different feelings. I had a husband before I knew
that my father was living — "
"If your husband was the first to lay kisses on
your forehead," replied Ferragus, "I was the first
to drop tears upon it. — Reassure yourself, Clemence,
speak to me frankly. I love you enough to be
happy in knowing that you are happy, although
your father may have little place in your heart,
while you fill the whole of his.
Mon Dieu ! How such words do me good ! You
make yourself loved all the more, and it seems to me
that it is stealing something from Jules. But,
my good father, think, he is in despair. What
shall I say to him in two hours? "
"Child, do you think I waited for your letter to
save you from this evil which threatens you? And
what will become of those who have ventured to
touch your happiness, or to come between us?
Have you then never recognized the second provi-
dence which watches over you ? You do not know
that twelve men full of strength and of intellect
form a rank around your love and your life, ready
to do all things to protect you? Is it a father who
1
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 49
risked death in going to meet you in the public
promenades, or in coming to admire you in your
little bed in your mother's house during the night
time? Is it the father to whom the remembrance of
your childish caresses alone gave strength to live
when a man of honor ought to have killed himself
to escape infamy? is it / in short, I who only
breathe by your mouth, who only see through your
eyes, who only feel through your heart, is it I who
would not know how to defend with the claws of a
lion, with the soul of a father, my one blessing,
my life, my daughter? — But since the death of
that angel who was your mother I have dreamed of
but one thing, of the happiness of publicly avowing
you as my daughter, of clasping you in my arms
in the face of heaven and earth, of killing the
convict — There was a momentary pause — . Of
giving you a father, of being able to press without
shame your husband's hand, of living without fear
in your hearts, of being able to say to all the world
before you, 'this is my daughter,' in short to be a
father openly! "
"O my father, my father ! "
"After a great deal of trouble, after searching
the whole globe," continued Ferragus, "my friends
have found for me the skin of a man to put on. A
few days hence 1 shall be Monsieur de Funcal, a
Portuguese count. Ah ! my dear daughter there are
few men who would have had at my age the
patience to learn Portuguese and English which
that devil of a sailor spoke fluently."
150 FERRAGUS
"My dear father!"
"Everything has been foreseen, and in a few
days his Majesty, John VI., King of Portugal, will
be my accomplice. It will only be necessary for
you to have a little patience where your father has
had a great deal. But for me, it is very simple.
What would I not do to reward your devotion for
these last three years! To come so religiously to
console your old father, to risk your own happi-
ness! "
"My father ! " And Clemence took the hands of
Ferragus and kissed them.
"Come now, a little more courage, my Clemence,
keep the fatal secret till the end. He is not an
ordinary man, Jules; however, are we sure that
his lofty character and his great love would not
prevent him from entertaining a sort of disrespect
for the daughter of a — "
"Oh!" cried Clemence, "you have read the
heart of your child, I have no other fear," she added
in a heart-rending tone. "It is a thought that
turns me to ice. But, father, think that I have
promised him the truth in two hours."
"Well, then, my daughter tell him to go to the
Portuguese Embassy and see the Comte de Funcal,
your father, I will be there. ' '
"And Monsieur de Maulincour who has told him
of Ferragus.'' My God! father, to deceive, to de-
ceive, what torture!"
"To whom do you say this? But only a few
days more and there will not exist a man who can
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 151
expose me. Besides, Monsieur de Maulincour
should be beyond the faculty of remembering. —
Come, silly child, dry your eyes, and think — "
At this instant a terrible cry rang from the room
in which was Monsieur Desmarets:
"My daughter, my poor daughter ! "
This clamor came through the small opening in
the wall over the wardrobe, and struck with terror
Ferragus and Madame Jules.
"Go and see what it is, Clemence. "
Clemence ran rapidly down the little staircase,
found wide open the door into Madame Gruget's
apartment, heard the cries which echoed through
the upper floor, mounted the stairway quickly,
guided by the noise of the sobs into the fatal cham-
ber whence, before entering, these words came to
her ear :
"It is you, Monsieur, with your inventions, who
are the cause of her death."
"Will you be quiet, miserable woman," said
Jules, putting his handkerchief over the mouth of
the widow Gruget, who cried:
"Murder! Help!"
At this instant Clemence entered, saw her hus-
band, uttered a cry and fled.
"Who will save my daughter ? " asked the widow
Gruget after a long pause, "you have assassinated
her!"
"How.? " asked Jules mechanically, stupefied at
having been recognized by his wife.
"Read, Monsieur, " cried the old woman dissolving
152 FERRAGUS
into tears. "Are there any annuities tliat can
console for that!"
"Farewell, mother: I bequeeth you all that I hav. I beg
your pardon for my forlts, and the last gref which I give you
in puttin an end to my days. Henry, who I love more than
myself, has told me that I made his misfortunes and since he
has driven me away from him and I have lost all my hopes
of beings estableeched 1 am going to droun myself. 1 shall
go below Neuilly so they can't put me in the Morgue. If Henry
does not hate me any more after I have punished myself by
deth ask him to bury a poor girl whus heart beat for him alon
and to forgif me for I was wrong to medle in what didn't
concern me. Take good care of his moqca. How he has
suffered, that poor fellow. But 1 shall have the same curage
to destroy myself that he had to burn himself. Send home the
corsets 1 have finished to my customers. And pray God for
your daughter.
"IDA."
"Take this letter to Monsieur de Funcal, he who
is upstairs. If there is still time, he alone can
save your daughter."
And Jules disappeared, running like a man who
has committed a crime. His legs trembled. His
swelling heart received torrents of blood, hotter and
more copious than at any moment of his life, and
sent them out again with a most unusual violence.
The most contradictory thoughts struggled in his
mind, and yet one thought dominated all others.
He had not been loyal to the being whom he loved
the most. And it was impossible for him to argue
with his conscience, whose voice growing louder
because of his fault, came like an echo of those
THE WIDOW GRUGET AND M. DES-
MARETS
Cleincnce ran rapidly dozvn the little staircase,
found wide open the door into Madame Grnget's
apartment, heard the cries zvhich echoed through the
upper floor, mounted the stairway qjiickly, guided
by the noise of the sobs into the fatal chandler zi'hence,
before entering, these luords cavie to her ear :
""It is you. Monsieur, zvith your iiiventions, who
are the cause of her deaths
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 53
inward cries of his love during the crudest hours
of doubt which had lately agitated him. He
spent the greater part of the day wandering around
Paris, and not daring to return home. This man
of integrity trembled to meet the spotless brow
of the woman he had misjudged. The quality of
crimes varies according to the purity of our con-
sciences, and the deed which for some hearts is
scarcely a fault takes the proportion of a sin in cer-
tain purer souls. The word purity, is it not, in
fact, of a heavenly comprehensiveness .-* And the
slightest stain on the white robe of a virgin, does it
not make something ignoble, as much so as are the
rags of a beggar. Between these two, the only
difference is that between a misfortune and a fault.
God never measures repentance. He does not divide
it, and He requires as much to efface a spot as to
make Him forget a lifetime. These reflections fell
with all their weight on Jules, for passions, like
human laws, do not pardon, and they reason more
justly; are they not based on a conscience of their
own as infallible as an instinct? Jules finally came
home despairing, pale, crushed beneath a sense of
his wrong doing, and yet expressing in spite of
himself the joy which his wife's innocence gave
him. He entered her room throbbing with emotion,
he saw her in bed, she had a high fever. He
seated himself by the side of the bed, took her
hand, kissed it and covered it with his tears.
"Dear angel," he said when they were alone,
"it is repentance."
\
154 FERRAGUS
"And for what? " she answered.
As she said this she laid her head back upon the
pillow, closed her eyes and remained motionless,
keeping the secret of her sufferings that she might
not frighten her husband, — the delicacy of a mother
is the delicacy of an angel. It was the sum of all
womanliness. The silence lasted long. Jules,
thinking Clemence asleep, went to question Joseph-
ine as to her mistress's condition.
"Madame came home half-dead, Monsieur. We
sent at once for Monsieur Haudry. "
"Did he come ? what did he say ? "
"He said nothing, Monsieur. He did not seem
satisfied, gave orders that no one should go near
Madame except the nurse, and said he would come
back this evening."
Jules returned softly to his wife's room, sat down
in an arm-chair and remained there by the side of
the bed, motionless, with his eyes fixed on those of
Clemence; when she raised her eyelids she saw
him at once, and a glance escaped her tear-dimmed
eyes, tender, full of passion, free from reproach and
bitterness, a glance which fell like a flame of fire
upon the heart of that husband nobly absolved and
forever loved by this being whom he had killed.
The presentiment of death struck both their minds
with equal force. Their looks were blended in one
anguish, as their hearts had long been blended in
one love, felt equally by both, shared equally. There
were no questions, but a horrible certainty. In the
wife, a complete generosity; in the husband, an
fl
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 155
awful remorse; and in both souls, the same vision
of the end, the same conviction of fatality.
There was a moment when, thinking his wife
asleep, Jules kissed her softly on the forehead and
said, after having long contemplated her :
"My God! leave me this angel still long enough
for me to absolve myself of my wrongs by a long
adoration: — A daughter she is sublime; a wife,
what word can express her ? "
Clemence raised her eyes, they were full of tears.
"You pain me," she said in a feeble voice.
It was getting late. Dr. Haudry came and re-
quested the husband to withdraw during his visit.
When he came out, Jules did not ask him one ques-
tion ; one gesture was enough.
"Call in consultation any other physician in
whom you have the greatest confidence ; I may be
wrong."
"Doctor, tell me the truth. I am a man, I shall
know how to hear it; and I have moreover the
deepest interest in knowing it, as 1 have certain
affairs to settle — "
"Madame Jules is fatally ill," replied the physi-
cian. "There is some moral malady which has
made great progress and which complicates her
physical condition, which was already so dangerous
and rendered still graver by her imprudences, — to
leave her bed, bare-footed at night; to go out when
I forbade it, yesterday on foot, to-day in a carriage.
She has wished to kill herself. However, my judg-
ment is not final, she has youth and an astonishing
156 FERRAGUS
nervous strength. — It might be well to risk all to
gain all by employing some violent reactive; but I
will not take upon myself to order it, I will not
even advise it; and in consultation I shall oppose
its use."
Jules returned to his wife. During eleven days
and eleven nights he remained beside her bed, tak-
ing no sleep except during the day when he laid
his head upon the foot of this bed. Never did any
man push to a greater extreme the jealousy of care
and the craving for devotion. He could not endure
that the slightest service should be done by others
for his wife; he continually held her hand and
seemed thus to wish to communicate his life to her.
There were days of uncertainty, of false hopes,
good days, an amelioration, then a crisis, — in short,
all the horrible vacillations of death as it hesitates,
wavers, and finally strikes. Madame Jules always
found strength to smile on her husband; she pitied
him, knowing that soon he would be alone. It was
a double agony, that of life, that of love; but life
grew feebler and love grew mightier. There was
a frightful night, that in which Clemence passed
through that delirium which always precedes the
death of the young. She talked of her happy love,
she talked of her father, she related her mother's
revelations on her death-bed and the obligations
which she had laid upon her. She struggled, not
for life but for her love which she could not leave.
"Grant, oh! God," she said, "that he may not
know that I would wish him to die with me."
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 57
Jules, unable to bear this scene, was at that
moment in the adjoining room and did not hear the
prayer, which he doubtless would have fulfilled.
When the crisis had passed Madame Jules recov-
ered some strength. The next day she was again
beautiful and tranquil ; she talked, hope came to her,
she adorned herself as the sick often do. Then she
asked to be alone all day and sent her husband
away with one of those entreaties made so earnestly
that they are granted as we grant the prayer of a
little child. Moreover, Jules had need of this day.
He went to call on Monsieur de Maulincour in order
to demand from him the duel to the death formerly
arranged between them. It was not without great
difficulty that he succeeded in reaching the pres-
ence of the author of his misfortunes; but the
vidame, when he learned that the visit related to
an affair of honor, followed the precepts which had
always governed his life and introduced Jules into
the baron's chamber. Monsieur Desmarets looked
about him for the Baron de Maulincour.
"Oh! that is really he," said the Commander,
motioning to a man who was sitting in an arm-chair
beside the fire.
"Who, Jules?" said the dying man in a broken
voice.
Auguste had lost the only faculty that makes us
live — memory. At his aspect Monsieur Desmarets
recoiled in horror. He could not recognize the
elegant young man in that thing without a name
in any language, according to Bossuet's expression.
158 FERRAGUS
It was in truth a corpse with whitened hair; bones
scarcely covered by a wrinkled, blighted, with-
ered skin; white eyes without movement; a mouth
hideously gaping like those of idiots or debauchees
killed by their excesses. No trace of intelli-
gence remained upon that brow nor in any feature;
nor was there in that flabby skin either color
or any appearance of circulating blood. In short,
here was a man shrunken, almost dissolved,
brought to the state of those monsters we see pre-
served in museums in glass bottles, floating in
alcohol. Jules fancied that he saw above this face
the terrible head of Ferragus, and this complete
vengeance terrified his own hatred. The husband
found pity in his heart for the doubtful debris of
what had been, so recently, a young man.
"The duel has taken place, " said the Commander.
"He has killed many," cried Jules sorrowfully.
"And many dear ones," added the old man.
"His grandmother is dying of grief, and I shall fol-
low her, perhaps, into the tomb."
The day after this visit Madame Jules grew
worse from hour to hour. She profited by a mo-
ment's strength to take a letter from under her pil-
low, presented it eagerly to Jules and made him a
sign which was easy to understand, — she wished to
give him in a kiss her last breath of life, he took it
and she died. Jules fell half-dead himself, and was
taken to his brother's house. There, as in his tears
and his delirium he deplored his absence of the day
before, his brother informed him that this separation
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS I59
was eagerly desired by Clemence, who wished
to spare him the sight of the religious parapher-
nalia, so terrible to tender imaginations, which the
Church displays when conferring the last sacra-
ments upon the dying.
"You could not have borne it," said his brother.
"I could not sustain the sight myself, and all the
servants wept. Clemence was like a saint. She
gathered strength to bid us all good-bye, and that
voice, heard for the last time, rent our hearts.
When she asked pardon for the pain she might have
involuntarily caused those who served her, there
was a cry mixed with sobs, a cry — "
"Enough, enough," said Jules.
He wished to be alone that he might read the last
thoughts of this woman whom all the world had
admired, and who had passed away like a flower:
" My beloved, this is my last will. Why should we not
make wills for the treasures of the heart as for other riches ?
Was not my love my whole property? I wish here to con-
sider only my love ; it was the only fortune of your Clemence,
and it is all that she can leave you in dying. Jules, I am still
loved, I die happy. The doctors explain my death in their
own manner, I alone know the true cause. I shall tell it to
you, whatever pain it may cause you. I do not want to carry
away with me in a heart all yours a secret which you do not
share, although I die the victim of an enforced silence.
"Jules, 1 was nurtured and brought up in the deepest soli-
tude, far from the vices and the falsehoods of the world, by
the loving woman whom you knew. Society did justice to
those conventional qualities by which a woman pleases in
society, but I knew secretly this celestial soul, and I could
cherish the mother who made my childhood a joy without
l6o FERRAGUS
bitterness, in knowing well why I cherished her. Was that
not to love doubly ? Yes, I loved her, I feared her, I respected
her, and yet nothing weighed on my heart, neither respect nor
fear. I was everything to her, she was everything to me.
For nineteen years, full of happiness, without a care, my soul,
solitary in the midst of the world which muttered around me,
reflected only the purest image, that of my mother, and my
heart beat only through her and for her. I was scrupulously
pious, and I found pleasure in remaining pure before God.
My mother cultivated in me all the noble and self-respecting
sentiments. Ah ! it gives me pleasure to avow it to you,
Jules ; I know now that I was indeed a young girl, and that
I came to you virgin in heart. When I left the absolute soli-
tude, when for the first time 1 braided my hair and crowned it
with almond blossoms, when I had with complacency added
a few satin bows to my white dress, thinking of the world I
was going to see and which 1 was curious to see, — ah, Jules,
that innocent and modest coquetry was all for you : for as I
entered the world it was you whom I saw first of all. Your
face, I remarked it, it stood out from the throng of others ;
your person pleased me ; your voice and your manners inspired
me with favorable presentiments ; and when you came up,
when you spoke to me, the color on your forehead, when your
voice trembled, — that moment gave me memories with which
1 still throb in writing to you to-day when I think of them for
the last time. Our love was at first the keenest of sympa-
^- thies, but it was soon mutually discovered and then as speed-
ily shared, just as in after times we have mutually experienced
its innumerable pleasures. From that moment my mother
was only second in my heart. I told her so and she smiled,
the adorable woman! Next I was yours, all yours. There is
my life, and all my life, my dear husband. And here is what
remains for me to tell you. One evening, a few days before
her death, my mother revealed to me the secret of her life, not
without shedding burning tears. I have loved you better since
I learned, before the priest who was charged to absolve my
mother, that there are passions condemned by the world and
i'
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS l6l
by the Church. But, surely, God will not be severe when
they are the sins of souls as tender as was that of my mother;
only, that angel could never bring herself to repent. She
loved much, Jules, she was all love. So I have prayed for
her daily, without ever having judged her. Then 1 learned
the cause of her deep maternal tenderness ; then I learned
that there was in Paris a man whose life and whose love
centered on me ; that your fortune was his work and that he
loved you ; that he was exiled from society ; that he bore a
tarnished name, for which he was more unhappy on my
account, on ours, than on his own. My mother was his only
consolation, and when my mother died, I promised to take her
place. With all the ardor of a soul whose feelings had never
been perverted I saw only the happiness of softening the bit-
terness which poisoned the last moments of my mother, and I
pledged myself to continue her work of secret charity, the
charity of the heart. The first time that I saw my father
was beside the bed where my mother had just expired ; when
he raised his eyes full of tears it was to find in me a revival
of all his dead hopes. I had sworn, not to lie but to keep
silent, and that silence, what woman would have broken it?
There is my fault, Jules, a fault which I expiate by death.
1 doubted you. But fear is so natural to a woman, and above
all to a woman who knows all that she may lose ! I trembled
for my love. My father's secret appeared to me to mean the
death of my happiness, and the more I loved the more I
feared. I dared not avow this feeling to my father ; it would
have wounded him, and in his situation any wound was
agony. But without letting me know it, he shared my fears.
That heart so fatherly trembled for my happiness as much as
I trembled myself, and did not dare to speak, obeying the
same delicacy which kept me mute. Yes, Jules, I believed
that you could not love some day the daughter of Gratien as
much as you loved your Clemence. Without this profound
terror could I have kept back anything from you, from you
who live in the innermost fibres of my heart ? The day when
that odious, that unfortunate, officer spoke to you I was forced
II
l62 FERRAGUS
to lie. That day, for the second time in my life, I knew what
pain was, and that pain has been growing until this moment,
when 1 speak with you for the last time. What matters now
my father's position? You know all. I might have, by the
help of my love, conquered my illness, borne all its sufferings,
but 1 could not stifle the voice of doubt. Is it not possible
that my origin would affect the purity of your love, weaken
it, diminish it? This fear nothing has been able to destroy in
me. This is, Jules, the cause of my death. I could not live
fearing a word, a look ; a word which perhaps you would
never say, a look you would never give ; but 1 cannot help it, 1
fear them. I die beloved, there is my consolation. I have
learned that in the last four years my father and his friends
have well-nigh moved the world, to deceive the world. In
order to give me a station in life, they have bought a dead
man, a reputation, a fortune, all this that a living man might
live again ; all this for you, for us. We were to have known
nothing of it. Well, my death will without doubt save my
father from that falsehood ; he will die of my death. Fare-
well, Jules, my heart is all here. To show you my love in the
innocence of its terror, is not that to bequeath to you all my
soul ? 1 could not have had the strength to speak to you ; 1
have had enough to write to you. I have confessed to God
the sins of my life ; I have indeed promised to think only of
the King of Heaven ; but I have not been able to resist the
pleasure of making my confession also to him who is for me
the whole of earth. Alas ! shall I not be pardoned for it, this
last sigh, between the life that was and the life which is to be !
Farewell, then, my beloved Jules; I go to God, before whom
love is without a cloud, before whom you will come one day.
There, under His throne, reunited forever, we can love each
other through the ages. This hope alone consoles me. If I
am worthy of being there before you, from there I will follow
you through life, my soul will accompany you ; it will envel-
ope you, for you will still remain here below. Lead then a
holy life, that you may the more surely come to me. You may
do such good upon this earth ! Is it not an angel's mission for
I
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 163
the suffering soul, to shed happiness around him, to give to
others that which he has not? I bequeath you to the unhappy.
It is only their smiles and their tears of which I shall not be
jealous. We shall find a great charm in the sweet benefi-
cences. Can we not still live together, if you would join my
name, that of your Clemence, to these good works ? After
having loved as we loved, there is naught but God, Jules.
God does not lie, God does not deceive. Adore Him only, I
wish it. Nourish the good in all those who suffer, comfort the
sorrowing members of His church. Farewell, dear soul that
I have filled, I know you ; you will never love twice. I shall
then expire happy in the thought that makes all women
happy. Yes, my grave will be your heart. After this child-
hood which I have related to you has not my life flowed on
within your heart? Dead, you will never drive me forth. I
am proud of this rare life ! You will have only known me in
the flower of my youth ; I leave you regrets without disillu-
sions. Jules, it is a very happy death.
" You who have so fully understood me, permit me to ask
one thing of you, a superfluous thing, doubtless, the fulfil-
ment of a woman's fancy, the prayer of a jealousy we all
must feel. I pray you to burn all that especially belonged to
us, to destroy our chamber, to annihilate all that might be a
souvenir of our love.
" Once more farewell, the last farewell, full of love, as
will be my last thought and my last breath."
*
When Jules had read this letter there came into
his heart one of those frenzies of which it is impos-
sible to describe the frightful crises. All sorrows
are individual, their effects are not subjected to any
fixed rule! Some men will stop their ears that they
may hear nothing; some women close their eyes
that they may see nothing; there are great and
splendid souls who fling themselves into sorrow
as into an abyss. In the matter of despair, every-
thing is true. Jules escaped from his brother's
house and returned to his own, wishing to pass the
night beside his wife and see that celestial creature
to the last moment. As he walked along, with that
indifference to life known only to those who have
reached the last degree of wretchedness, he re-
membered that in Asia the laws forbade the married
to survive each other. He wished to die. He was
not yet crushed, he was still in the fever of his
grief. He reached his home without obstacle and
went up into the sacred chamber; he saw his Cle-
mence on the bed of death, beautiful as a saint, her
hair carefully arranged, her hands joined, already
wrapped in her shroud. Tapers lighted a priest in
prayer, Josephine weeping in a corner, kneeling,
and two men standing near the bed. One of them
was Ferragus. He stood erect, motionless, gazing at
his daughter with a dry eye; his head you might
have taken for bronze. He did not see Jules. The
(165)
l66 FERRAGUS
other was Jacquet, Jacquet to whom Madame Jules
had ever been kind. He had felt for her one of those
respectful friendships which rejoice the heart with-
out troubling it, which are a gentle passion, love
without its desires and its storms; and he had come
religiously to pay his debt of tears, to bid a long
adieu to the wife of his friend, to kiss for the first
time the icy brow of the woman he had tacitly made
his sister. All was silence. Here, death was neither
terrible as it is in the church, nor pompous as it is
when it traverses the streets; it was death under
the domestic roof, touching death; here was the
mourning of the heart, tears drawn from every eye.
Jules sat down near Jacquet and pressed his hand
and without uttering a word all these persons re-
mained as they were till morning. When daylight
paled the tapers, Jacquet, foreseeing the painful
scenes which would then take place, drew Jules into
the adjoining room. At this moment the husband
looked at the father and Ferragus looked at Jules.
These two sorrows arraigned each other, measured
each other, and comprehended each other in that
look. A flash of fury shone for an instant in the
eyes of Ferragus.
"It is you who killed her," thought he.
"Why was I distrusted.^" seemed to answer the
husband.
This scene was one that might have passed
between two tigers, recognizing the futility of a
struggle, after having examined each other dur-
ing a moment of hesitation, without even a growl.
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 167
"Jacquet," said Jules, "have you attended to
everything? "
"Yes, to everything," replied the bureau chief,
"but everywhere a man had forestalled me, who
had ordered and paid for all."
"He tears his daughter from me! " cried the hus-
band in a violent accession of his despair.
He rushed back into his wife's room; but the
father was no longer there. Clemence had been
placed in a leaden coffin, and workmen were pre-
paring to solder on the lid. Jules returned, horri-
fied at this sight, and at the sound of the hammer
used by these men he involuntarily burst into
tears.
"Jacquet," he said, "there has come to me out
of this terrible night an idea, one only, but an idea
I must realize at any price. 1 do not want Cle-
mence to rest in any cemetery in Paris. I wish to
burn her body, to gather her ashes and to keep her
with me. Say nothing to me about this, but make
arrangements to have it carried out. I am going to
shut myself up in her chamber, and I shall remain
there until the moment of my departure. You
alone shall come in to give me an account of your
proceedings.— Go, and spare nothing."
During this morning, Madame Jules, after lying
in a mortuary chapel at the door of her house, was
taken to Saint-Roch. The church was entirely
draped in black. The species of luxury displayed
for this service had drawn a crowd; for in Paris all
things are sights, even the most genuine grief.
l68 FERRAGUS
There are persons who stand at their windows to
see how a son weeps when following the body of
his mother, as there are those who wish to be com-
modiously placed to see how a head falls on the scaf-
fold. No people in the world have ever had more vora-
cious eyes. But the curious were on this occasion
particularly surprised to perceive that the six lateral
chapels of Saint-Roch were also draped in black.
Two men in black attended a mortuary mass said
in each of these chapels. \n the chancel, no other
persons were seen but Monsieur Desmarets, the
notary, and Jacquet; and outside the screen, the
servants. There was, for the church loungers,
something inexplicable in so much pomp and so
few mourners. Jules had determined that no
indifferent person should be present at this cere-
mony. High mass was celebrated with all the som-
bre magnificence of funeral services. In addition
to the ordinary service of Saint-Roch, thirteen
priests from other parishes were present. Thus it
was, perhaps, that the Dies irce had never produced
upon Christians, assembled by chance, by curi-
osity, but thirsting for emotions, an effect more
profound, more nervously glacial, than the impres-
sion now produced by this hymn at the moment
when the eight voices of the choristers, accompa-
nied by those of the priests and the voices of the
choir-boys, intoned it alternately. From the six
lateral chapels, twelve other childish voices rose
shrill from grief, and mingled with it mournfully.
Dread was manifested in all parts of the church;
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 169
everywhere cries of anguish responded to cries of
terror. This terrible music spoke of sorrows un-
known to the world, and of secret friendships which
wept for the dead. Never in any human reUgion
have the terrors of the soul, violently torn from the
body and stormily shaken in presence of the fulmi-
nating majesty of God, been rendered with such
force. Before that clamor of clamors must bow,
humiliated, all artists and their most passionate
compositions. No, nothing can compare with that
hymn, which sums up all human passions and gives
to them a galvanic life beyond the coffm, in bring-
ing them, still palpitating, before the living and
avenging God. These cries of childhood, mingling
with the sounds of deep voices, and thus compre-
hending in this canticle of death the human life
in all its developments, recalling the sufferings of
the cradle, swelling to the griefs of other ages, with
the strong accents of the men, with the quavering
of the old men and the priests, — all this strident har-
mony, full of lightning and thunder, does it not
speak to the most daring imagination, to the coldest
heart, to the Philosophers themselves! In hearing
it, it seems that God thunders. The vaulted arches
of no human church are cold; they tremble, they
speak, they scatter fear by all the might of their
echoes. You think you see the unnumbered dead
rising and stretching out their hands. It is no longer
a father, nor a wife, nor a child, who is under
the black pall, it is humanity rising from its dust.
It is impossible to judge the Catholic, Apostolic
v^
170 FERRAGUS
and Roman faith unless the soul has known the
deepest grief of mourning, in weeping for the adored
one who lies under the tomb; unless it has felt all
the emotions which then fill the heart, translated
by this hymn of despair, by those cries which
crush the soul, by that sacred terror which increases
from strophe to strophe, which turns toward heaven,
and which terrifies, which shrivels, which elevates
the soul, and which leaves within our mind, as
the last verse finishes, a consciousness of eter-
nity. You have been brought very close to the
vast idea of the Infinite; and then all is silent in
the church. No word is said; the scoffers them-
selves do not know what they feel. The Spanish
genius alone was able to invent these untold
majesties for the most unheard-of sorrows. When
the supreme ceremony was over, twelve men in
black issued from the six chapels and came to hear
around the coffin, the song of hope which the church
makes known to the Christian soul before the human
form is buried. Then each of these men entered a
mourning coach; Jacquet and Monsieur Desmarets
took the thirteenth ; the servants followed on foot.
An hour later, the twelve unknown men were at
the summit of that cemetery popularly called Pere-
Lachaise, standing in a circle around an open grave
into which the coffin had been lowered, in the pres-
ence of a curious crowd gathered from all parts of
this public garden. Then, after a few short prayers,
the priest threw a handful of earth on the remains
of this woman; and the grave-diggers, having asked
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS I7I
for their fee, made haste to fill the grave in order
to go to another. —
Here this history seems to end; but perhaps it
would be incomplete if after having given a rapid
sketch of Parisian life, if after having followed its
capricious undulations, the effects of death there
were forgotten. Death in Paris is unlike death in
any other capital, and but few persons know the
trials of true grief when brought into conflict with
the civilization, with the administration, of Paris.
Perhaps, also, Jules and Ferragus XXIII, may have
proved sufficiently interesting to make the ending
of their lives not entirely tedious. Besides, many
people like to be told all, and wish, as one of the
most ingenious of our critics has said, to know by
what chemical process the oil burned in Aladdin's
lamp. Jacquet, being a Government employe,
naturally applied to the authorities for permission
to exhume the body of Madame Jules and to burn
it. He went to see the Prefect of Police, under
whose protection the dead sleep. That functionary
demanded a petition. It was necessary to buy a
sheet of stamped paper, to give to sorrow its proper
administrative form; it was necessary to employ
the bureaucratic jargon to express the wishes of a
crushed man to whom words were lacking; it was
necessary to translate coldly and repeat on the mar-
gin the nature of the request :
The petitioner
requests the incineration
of his wife.
172 FERRAGUS
When he saw this, the chief charged with the
duty of making a report to the Councilor of State,
the Prefect of Police, said in reading this marginal
note in which the object of the demand was clearly
stated, as he had recommended:
"That is a serious matter! my report cannot be
ready under a weetc. "
Jules, to whom Jacquet was obliged to speak of
this delay, comprehended the words that he had I
heard Ferragus utter, "I'll burn Paris." Nothing '
seemed to him now more natural than to annihilate
this receptacle of monstrosities.
"But," he said to Jacquet, "you must go to the
Minister of the Interior, and get your minister to
speak to him."
Jacquet went to the Minister of the Interior and
asked for an audience which was granted him, but
at the end of two weeks. Jacquet was a persistent
man. He traveled from bureau to bureau, and
finally reached the private secretary of the minister,
to whom he had made the private secretary of the
Minister of Foreign Affairs say a word in his behalf.
These high protectors aiding, he obtained for the
morrow a brief interview in which, being armed
with a line from the Autocrat of Foreign Affairs
written to the Pasha of the Interior, Jacquet hoped
to carry the matter by assault He prepared all his
reasons, answers to peremptory questions, his
replies to the hut in case of; but everything failed.
"The matter does not concern me," said the
minister. "It is an affair for the Prefect of Police.
I
I
i
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS I73
Moreover, there is no law which gives to husbands
any legal right to the bodies of their wives, nor to
fathers to those of their children. The matter is seri-
ous! Then there are questions of public utility-
involved, which require that this should be exam-
ined. The interests of the city of Paris might suffer.
In short, if the matter depended entirely upon me I
could not decide hie et nunc, I should require a
report."
A report is to the present system of administra-
tion what Limbo is in the Christian religion. Jac-
quet knew very well the mania for reports, and he
had not waited until this occasion to groan over
that bureaucratic absurdity. He knew that since
the invasion of public business by the reports, an
administrative revolution consummated in 1804,
there was never known a single minister who would
take upon himself to have an opinion, to decide
the slightest matter, unless that opinion, that mat-
ter, had been winnowed, sifted and plucked to
pieces by the paper-spoilers, the quill-drivers and
the splendid intelligences of his bureaus. Jacquet
— he was one of those men worthy of having Plu-
tarch for his biographer — saw that he had made a
mistake in his management of this affair, and that
he had rendered it impossible, by trying to proceed
legally. He should simply have taken Madame
Jules to one of Desmarets' estates in the country;
and there, under the good-natured authority of some
village mayor, to have gratified the sorrowful longing
of his friend. Constitutional and administrative
>
174 FERRAGUS
legality begets nothing; it is a barren monster,
for peoples, for kings, and for private interests; but
the people decipher only those principles which are
written in blood; the evils of legality being only
pacific it flattens a nation down, that is all. Jac-
quet, a lover of liberty, returned home reflecting on
the benefits of arbitrary power, for man judges the
laws only by the light of his own passions. When i
he found himself in the presence of Jules he was I
obliged to deceive him, for the unhappy man, a
prey to a violent fever, had been confined to his
bed for two days. The minister happened to speak
that very evening at a ministerial dinner of the
singular fancy of a Parisian wishing to burn his
wife, after the manner of the Romans. The clubs
of Paris took up the subject, and discussed for a
while the antique funeral ceremonies. Ancient
things were then becoming the fashion, and some
persons declared that it would be a fine thing to re-
establish for high personages the funeral pyre. This
opinion had its defenders and its detractors. Some
said that there were too many great men, and that
this custom would greatly increase the price of fire-
wood, that among a people as fickle in their whims
as are the French it would be ridiculous to see at
every turn a Longchamp of ancestors promenading
in their urns; and if the urns were valuable they
were likely some day to be sold at auction, or to be
seized, full of respectable ashes, by creditors, who
are accustomed to respect nothing. Others made
answer that there would be much more safety for
I
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 175
our ancestors thus enclosed than at Pere-Lachaise,
for, before very long, the city of Paris would be
compelled to order a Saint Bartholomew against its
dead, who were invading the neighboring country
and threatening to take possession one day of the
territory of Brie, it was, in short, one of those
futile and witty Parisian discussions which fre-
quently cause deep and painful wounds. Happily
for Jules, he knew nothing of the conversations,
the bon mots, the arguments, which his sorrow had
furnished to the tongues of Paris. The Prefect of
Police was indignant that Monsieur Jacquet had
appealed to the minister to avoid the delays, the
wisdom, of the Commissioners of Public Highways.
The exhumation of Madame Jules was a question
•of highways. Therefore, the Police Bureau was
doing its best to reply promptly to the petition, for
one appeal was quite sufficient to set the office in
motion, and once in motion the subject would be
thoroughly investigated. The administration might
carry all cases up to the Council of State, another
machine very difficult to set in motion. The second
day, Jacquet was obliged to tell his friend that he
must renounce his desire; that in a city in which
the number of tears embroidered on black draperies
is tariffed, where the laws recognize seven classes
of funerals, where the ground for the dead is sold
for its weight in silver, where grief is exploited,
kept by double entry, where the prayers of the
Church are paid for dearly, where the vestry inter-
venes to claim payment for two or three slender
176 FERRAGUS
voices added to the Dies ircB, — all attempt to get out
of the administrative rut prescribed for grief is
impossible.
"It would have been," said Jules, "a. comfort in
my misery, I had meant to die far away from
here, and I hoped to hold Clemence in my arms in
the tomb! I did not know that the bureaucracy
could extend its claws into our very coffins."
He now wished to see if room had been left for
him beside his wife. The two friends went to the
cemetery. When they reached it, they found, as at
the doors of the theatres or the entrance to museums,
as in the court yards of the diligences, ciceroni who
offered to guide them through the labyrinth of Pere-
Lachaise. It would have been impossible for either
of them to find the spot where Clemence lay. Ah!
frightful anguish! They went to consult the porter
of the cemetery. The dead have a concierge, and
there are hours when the dead are not to be seen.
It would be necessary to upset all the regulations of
the upper and lower police to obtain permission to
come and weep in the night in silence and solitude,
over the tomb where a loved one lies. There is a
regulation for winter, a regulation for summer.
Certainly, of all the porters in Paris he of P^re-
Lachaise is the luckiest. In the first place, he has
no gate-cord to pull ; then, instead of a lodge he has
a house, an establishment, which is not quite min-
isterial although there are a very great number of
administrators and several employes, and this gov-
ernor of the dead has an income and is endowed
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 77
with immense powers, of which none can complain;
he plays the despot at his ease. His lodge is not a
commercial establishment, although it has offices, a
system of accounts, receipts, expenses and profits.
This man is not a Suisse, nor a concierge, nor a
porter; the gate which admits the dead stands
always wide open, and although there are monu-
ments to be cared for he is not a care-taker; in
short, he is an indefinable anomaly, an authority
which participates in all and yet is nothing, an
authority placed — like death by which it lives —
outside of all. Nevertheless, this exceptional man
grows out of the city of Paris, a chimerical creation
like the ship which serves as its emblem, a crea-
ture of reason, moved by a thousand paws which
are seldom unanimous in their motion, so that its
employes are almost irremovable. This guardian
of the cemetery is, then, the concierge arrived at
the condition of a functionary, not soluble by disso-
lution. His place is by no means a sinecure; he
does not allow anyone to be buried without a per-
mit, he must count his dead, he points out to you
in this vast field the six square feet where you will
one day put all you love or all you hate, a mistress
or a cousin. Yes, know this well, all the feelings
and emotions of Paris come to end at this porter's
lodge, and there are administrationized. This man
has registers for his dead, they are in their tombs
and in his books. He has under him keepers,
gardeners, grave-diggers, assistants. He is a per-
sonage. The mourners in tears do not speak to
12
178 FERRAGUS
him at first He only appears in serious cases, —
one corpse mistaken for another, a murdered body,
an exhumation, a dead man who comes to life.
The bust of the reigning king is in his hall, and he
perhaps preserves the ancient royal, imperial, and
quasi-royal busts in some cupboard, a sort of little
Pere-Lachaise all ready for revolutions. In short,
he is a public man, an excellent man, good father
and good husband, — epitaph apart. But so many
diverse sentiments have passed before him on biers,
he has seen so many tears, true and false; he has
seen sorrow under so many countenances and on so
many countenances, he has seen six millions of
eternal woes! For him, a grief is no longer any-
thing but a stone, eleven lines in thickness and four
feet in height, twenty-two inches wide. As for
regrets, they are the annoyances of his office, —
he neither breakfasts nor dines without first wiping
off the rain of an inconsolable affliction. He is
kind and tender to all other feelings; he will weep
over some hero of the drama, over Monsieur Ger-
meuil in the Aiiherge des Adrets, the man with
the butter-colored breeches assassinated by Robert
Macaire; but his heart is ossified in the matter of
real dead men. The dead are only numbers to him ;
it is his business to organize death. Then, finally,
he does meet, three times in a century, a situation
in which his role becomes sublime, and then he is
sublime every hour, — in times of pestilence.
When Jacquet accosted him, this absolute mon-
arch was in a sufficiently-bad humor.
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 179
**I told you," he cried, "to water the flowers
from Rue Massena to the Place Regnaud-de-Saint-
Jean-d'Angely ! You paid no attention to me — you
there. Sac ct papier! if the relations should take it
into their heads to come to-day because the weather
is fine they would all get at me, — they would shriek
as if they were burned, they would say horrid
things of us and calumniate us — "
"Monsieur," said Jacquet to him, "we wish to
know where Madame Jules is buried."
"Madame Jules who?" he asked. "Within the
last week we have had three Madame Jules. —Ah,"
he said, interrupting himself, "here comes the
funeral of Colonel de Maulincour, go and get the
permit. — A fine procession that!" he resumed.
"He has soon followed his grandmother. Some
families, when they begin to go, rattle down as if
for a wager. There is plenty of bad blood in these
Parisians."
"Monsieur, " said Jacquet, touching him on the
arm, "the person of whom I speak is Madame Jules
Desmarets, the wife of the broker of that name."
"Ah! I know," he replied, looking at Jacquet.
"Was not that the funeral in which there were
thirteen mourning coaches and only one mourner in
each of the first twelve } That was so droll that it
struck us all — "
"Monsieur, take care. Monsieur Jules is with
me, he might hear you, and what you say is not
seemly."
"I beg pardon, Monsieur — you are right. Excuse
l80 FERRAGUS
me, I took you for the heirs. — Monsieur," he con-
tinued, consulting a plan of the cemetery, "Madame
Jules is in the Rue Marechal-Lefebvre, Alley No.
4, between Mademoiselle Raucourt of the Comedie-
Fran^aise and Monsieur Moreau-Malvin, a distin-
guished butcher, for whom a handsome tomb in
white marble has been ordered, which will certainly
be one of the finest in our cemetery."
"Monsieur," said Jacquet, interrupting him,
"that does not help us."
"That's true," he replied looking around him.
"Jean," he cried to a man whom he saw at a
little distance, "conduct these gentlemen to the
grave of Madame Jules, the wife of the broker.
You know it, near to Mademoiselle Raucourt, the
tomb where there is a bust."
And the two friends followed one of the keepers ;
but they did not reach the steep path which leads to
the upper alley of the cemetery without having to
pass through more than a score of propositions offered
to them with a honeyed softness by the agents of
marble-workers, iron-founders and monumental
sculptors.
"If Monsieur would like to order something, we
could arrange it for him on the most reasonable
terms. — "
Jacquet was fortunate enough to be able to spare
his friend the hearing of these proposals, so fearful
for still bleeding hearts, and they finally reached
the resting-place. When he saw this earth so
recently turned, and in which the masons had stuck
I
I
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS l8l
stakes to mark the places for the stone posts re-
quired to support the iron railing, Jules leaned on
the shoulder of Jacquet, raising himelf at intervals
to cast long glances at the clay mould where he was
forced to leave the remains of the being by whom
he still lived.
"How miserably she lies there," he said.
"But she is not there," replied Jacquet, "she is in
your memory. Come, let us go, let us leave this
odious cemetery, where the dead are adorned like
women for a ball."
"Suppose we take her away from there? "
"Can it be done? "
"All things can be done," cried Jules. — "So I
shall lie there," he added after a pause. "There
is room enough. "
Jacquet finally succeeded in getting him to leave
this great enclosure, divided like a chess-board by
bronze railings, by elegant compartments, in which
were enclosed the tombs decorated with palms,
with inscriptions, with tears as cold as the stones on
which sorrowing hearts had caused to be carved
their regrets and their coats of arms. Many clever
phrases are there engraved in black letters, epi-
grams reproving the curious, concetti, wittily turned
farewells, rendezvous given at which only one side
ever appears, pretentious biographies, glitter, rub-
bish and tinsel. Here, may be seen the thyrsus;
there, lance heads ; farther on, Egyptian urns, now
and then a few cannons, on all sides the emblems of
a thousand professions ; in short all styles, — Moorish,
l82 FERRAGUS
Greek, Gothic, friezes, ovules, paintings, urns,
Genii, temples, a great many faded immortelles
and dead rosebushes. It is a forlorn comedy ! it is
another Paris, with its streets, its signs, its indus-
tries, its lodgings; but seen through the diminish-
ing end of an opera-glass, a microscopic Paris,
reduced to the littleness of shadows, of the larvae
of the dead, a human race which has no longer any-
thing great about it except its vanity. Then Jules
saw at his feet, in the long valley of the Seine,
between the slopes of Vaugirard and Meudon, be-
tween those of Belleville and Montmartre, the real
Paris, enveloped in a bluish veil produced by its
smoke and which the sunlight rendered at this
moment diaphanous. He embraced in his furtive
glance these forty thousand houses, and said, point-
ing to the space comprised between the column of
the Place Vendome and the gilded cupola of the
Invalides:
"She was carried away from me there by the
fatal curiosity of that world which excites itself
and interferes for the purpose of interfering and
exciting itself."
At a distance of four leagues, on the banks of the
Seine, in a modest village lying on the slope of one
of the hills of that long hilly enclosure in the mid-
dle of which great Paris stirs like a child in its
cradle, a scene of death and of sorrow was taking
place, far indeed removed from all the Parisian
pomps, with no accompaniment of torches, or of
tapers, or mourning coaches, without the prayers of
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 183
the Church, death in all its simplicity. Here are
the facts: The body of a young girl was found
early in the morning, stranded on the river bank,
in the slime and reeds of the Seine. Some men
employed in dredging sand saw it as they were get-
ting into their frail boat, on their way to their work.
"Look there! Fifty francs earned," said one of
them.
"That is true," said the other.
And they approached the body.
"It is a very pretty girl."
"Let us go and make our statement."
And the two sand-dredgers, after covering the
body with their jackets, went to the village mayor,
who was much embarrassed at having to make out
the legal papers necessitated by this discovery.
The news of this event spread with that tele-
graphic rapidity peculiar to regions where social
communications have no interruption, where the
scandal, the gossip, the calumnies, the social tale
on which the world regales itself, have no break of
continuity from one boundary to another. Before
long, some persons arriving at the mayor's office
relieved him from all embarrassment. They were
able to convert the proces-verbal into a simple cer-
tificate of death. Through them the body of the
young girl was recognized as that of the demoiselle
Ida Gruget, corset maker, living at Rue de la Corde-
rie-du-Temple, No. 14. The judiciary police inter-
vened, the widow Gruget, mother of the defunct,
arrived, bringing with her the last letter of her
1
1 84 FERRAGUS
daughter. Amidst the mother's lamentations a
doctor certified to death by asphyxia, through the
injection of black blood into the pulmonary system,
and everything was said. The inquest over, the
certificate signed, by six o'clock the same evening
authority was given to bury the grisette. The cure
of the place refused to receive her into the church
and to pray for her. Ida Gruget was therefore
wrapped in a shroud by an old peasant woman, put
into a common coffin made of pine planks, and car-
ried to the village cemetery by four men, followed
by a few curious peasant women who discussed this
death, commenting upon it with wonder mingled _
with some commiseration. The widow Gruget (
was charitably taken in by an old lady who pre-
vented her from following in the sad procession of
her daughter's funeral. A man of triple functions,
the bell-ringer, beadle and grave-digger of the par-
ish, had dug a grave in the village cemetery, a
cemetery half an acre in extent behind the
church,— a church well known, a classic church,
furnished with a square tower with a pointed roof
covered with slate, supported on the outside by
angular buttresses. Behind the circular back of the
chancel lay the cemetery, enclosed with a dilapi-
dated wall,— a little field full of hillocks; no mar-
bles, no visitors, but surely in every furrow tears
and true regrets which were lacking for Ida Gruget.
She was cast into a corner among the brambles and
the tall grass. When the coffin had been laid in
this field, so poetic in its simplicity, the grave
I
I
i
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 185
digger found himself alone, with the night falling.
While filling the grave he stopped now and then to
gaze over the wall along the road ; at one moment
with his hand on his spade he was looking at the
Seine which had brought him this body.
"Poor girl!" cried a man who suddenly appeared.
"How you frightened me, Monsieur," said the
grave-digger.
"Was there any service held over the body you
are burying? "
"No, Monsieur. Monsieur le cure was not will-
ing. This is the first person buried here who
didn't belong to the parish. Here, everybody
knows everybody else. Does Monsieur— why, he's
gone! "
Some days had elapsed when a man dressed in
black called at the house of Jules, and without ask-
ing to see him deposited in his wife's chamber a
great porphyry vase on which he read these words:
INVITA LEGE,
CONJUGI MOERENTI
FILIOL^ CINERES
RESTITUIT.
AMICIS XII. JUVANTIBUS,
MORIBUNDUS PATER.
"What a man!" cried Jules, bursting into
tears.
Eight days sufficed the husband to carry out all
the wishes of his wife and to arrange his own
l86 FERRAGUS
affairs; he sold his practice to a brother of Martin
Faleix, and left Paris while the authorities were
still discussing whether it was lawful for a citizen
to dispose of the body of his wife.
Who has not encountered on the Boulevards of
Paris, at the turn of the street, or beneath the
arcades of the Palais-Royal, or in fact in any part
of the world where chance may offer him the sight,
a being, man or woman, at whose aspect a thousand
confused thoughts spring into his mind ? At the
appearance of this being we are suddenly inter-
ested, either by features whose fantastic conforma-
tion reveals an agitated life, or by the curious
general effect produced by the gestures, the air, the
gait, and the garments, or by some profound look,
or by other inexpressible signs which impress us
forcibly and suddenly, without our being able to
exactly explain to ourselves the cause of our emo-
tion. The next day, other thoughts, other Parisian
images, carry away this passing dream. But if we
meet the same personage again, either passing at
some fixed hour like an employe of the mayor's
office who belongs to the marriage-bureau during
eight hours, or wandering about the public prome-
nades, like those individuals who seem to be a sort
of furniture belonging to the Parisian streets and
who are always to be found in the public places, at
first representations, or in the noted restaurants of
which they are the finest ornament, — then this
being enfeoffs himself in your memory and remains
there, like the first volume of a novel, the end of
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 87
which is lost. We are tempted to question this
unknown and say to him, "Who are you? Why
are you lounging here? By what right do you wear
that plaited rulifle, why do you carry a cane with
an ivory top, why that faded waistcoat? Why
those blue spectacles with double glasses?" Or,
"Why do you still wear the cravat of the Musca-
dins? " Among these wandering creatures there
are some that belong to the species of the ancient
terminal statues; they say nothing to the soul;
they are there, and that is all: Why? No one
knows; they are figures, like those which serve as
a type to the sculptors for the four Seasons, for
Commerce, for Plenty. Some others, former law-
yers, old merchants, antique generals, go about,
walk, and yet seem always stationary. Like those
trees which hang, half-uprooted, over the banks of
a stream, they seem never to take part in the tor-
rent of Paris nor in its youthful, active crowd. It
is impossible to know if it has been forgotten to
bury them, or if they have escaped from their
coffins ; they have reached a quasi-fossil condition.
One of these Parisian Melmoths had come within a
few days to mingle with the sober and quiet popula-
tion which, when the weather is fine, invariably
furnishes the space which lies between the south
entrance of the Luxembourg and the north entrance
of the Observatoire, a space without a class, the
neutral space of Paris. In fact, Paris is no longer
there; and there Paris still lingers. This spot par-
takes at once of the street, the place, the boulevard,
1 88 FERRAGUS
the fortification, the garden, the avenue, the high-
road, of the province and of the capital ; certainly
all that is to be found there, and yet the place is
nothing of all that, — it is a desert Around this
spot without a name stand the hospital of the En-
fants Trouves, the Bourbe, the Cochin Hospital, the
Capucins, the hospital La Rochefoucauld, the Deaf
and Dumb Asylum, the hospital of the Val-de-
Grace; in short, all the vices and all the misfor-
tunes of Paris find there their asylum; and that
nothing may be lacking to this philanthropic enclo-
sure, science there studies the tides and the longi-
tudes; Monsieur de Chateaubriand has erected
there the Marie-Therese Infirmary, and the Carmel-
ites have founded a convent there. The great events
of life are represented by bells which ring inces-
santly through this desert, for the mother giving
birth, and for the babe that is born, and for the
vice that succumbs, and for the workman who dies,
for the virgin who prays, for the old man who is
cold, for genius which deludes itself. Then, at a
distance of two steps, is the cemetery of Mont-
Parnasse, which draws hour after hour to itself the
sorry funerals of the Faubourg Saint-Marceau. This
esplanade, which commands a view of Paris, has
been taken possession of by the players of bowls,
old gray figures, full of kindliness, worthy men who
continue our ancestors, and whose physiognomies
can only be compared with those of their public,
the moving gallery which follows them. The man
who had become during the last few days an
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 1 89
inhabitant of this desert region assisted assiduously
at these games of bowls, and would certainly be
considered the most striking creature of these vari-
ous groups who — if it be permissible to liken the
Parisians to the different orders of zoology — belong
to the genus mollusk. This new-comer kept sym-
pathetic step with the cochonnei, the little bowl
which serves as the point aimed at and on which
the interest of the game centres; he leaned against
a tree when the cochonnet stopped ; then, with the
same attention that a dog gives to his master's ges-
tures, he watched the bowls flying through the air
or rolling along the ground. You would have taken
him for the fantastic genius of the cochonnet. He
said nothing, and the bowl-players, the most fanatic
men that can be encountered among the sectarians
of any religion whatever, had never asked him the
reason of this obstinate silence; only some very
great minds thought him deaf and dumb. On
those occasions on which it became necessary to
determine the different distances between the bowls
and the cochonnet, the cane of the unknown served
as the infallible measure, the players coming up
and taking it from the icy hands of this old man,
without asking him for the loan of it, without even
making him a sign of friendliness. The loan of his
cane was like a servitude to which he had nega-
tively consented. When a shower came up, he
remained near the cochonnet, the slave of the
bowls, the guardian of the unfinished game. Rain
affected him no more than the fine weather did, and
igO FERRAGUS
he was like the players themselves, an interme-
diary species between the Parisian who has the
least intelligence of his kind and the animal which
has the highest. In other respects, pallid and
shrunken, indifferent to his own person, vacant in
mind, he often came bare-headed, showing his
white hair and his square, yellow, bald skull, not
unlike the knee which pierces the pantaloon of a
beggar. He was open-mouthed, without intelli-
gence in his glance, without any steadiness in his
walk; he never smiled, never lifted his eyes to
heaven, and kept them habitually on the ground,
where he seemed to be always looking for some-
thing. At four o'clock an old woman arrived to
take him away, no one knows where, towing him
along by the arm as a young girl drags a wilful
goat which still wants to browse by the wayside
when it should go to the stable. This old man was
a horrible thing to see.
In the afternoon, Jules Desmarets, alone in his
traveling carriage, passed rapidly through Rue
de I'Est, and came upon the esplanade of the Ob-
servatoire at the moment when this old man, lean-
ing against a tree had allowed his cane to be
taken from his hand amid the noisy vocifera-
tions of the players pacifically irritated. Jules,
thinking he recognized that face, wished to stop,
and in fact his carriage came to a standstill. The
postilion, hemmed in by some carts, did not ask for
a passage-way through the insurgent bowl-players;
he had too much respect for uprisings, the postilion.
I
CHIEF OF THE DEVORANTS 191
"It is he! " said Jules, beholding in that human
wreck Ferragus XXlil., Chief of the Devorants. —
"How he loved her!" he added after a pause. —
"Go on postilion ! " he cried.
Paris, February, 1833.
HISTORY OF THE THIRTEEN
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
13 (193)
1
i
TO
FRA-NTZ LISTZ
(195]
'Cr^t.^^,&K/. ^fS'i^^ 'f/ :^.
m
THE INTERVIEW IN THE CONVENT
"J/)' Mother',' cried Sister TJieri^se in Spanish, "/
]iave lied to you, this man is my lover /"
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
*
In a Spanish town on an island of the Mediterra-
nean there is a convent of the Bare-footed Carmel-
ites in which the rule of the Order instituted by
Saint Theresa is still maintained with the primi-
tive rigor of the reformation brought about by that
illustrious woman. This fact is true, extraordinary
as it may seem. Although the religious establish-
ments of the Peninsula and those of the Continent
were nearly all destroyed or subverted by the explo-
sions of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic
wars, this island having been constantly protected
by the British navy, the wealthy convent and its
peaceful inmates were sheltered from the general
disasters and spoliation. The storms of every kind
which disturbed the first fifteen years of the nine-
teenth century broke idly on this rock, not far from
the coast of Andalusia. If the name of the Emperor
was carried even to this shore, it may be doubted
whether the fantastic train of his glory and the
flaming majesty of his meteoric life were ever
realized by the saintly women kneeling in this
cloister. A conventual rigor which nothing relaxed
(197)
198 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
recommended this haven to the Catholic world.
Moreover, the purity of its rule drew to it from the
most distant parts of Europe sorrowful women, whose
souls, deprived of all human ties, sighed for this slow
suicide accomplished in the bosom of God. NoH
other convent moreover was better adapted to that ;
complete separation from the things of this world
which the religious life demands. Nevertheless, i
there may be found on the Continent a great num-
ber of these houses, magnificently built in view of
their purpose. Some are ensconced in the depths
of the most solitary valleys; others overhang the
steepest mountains, or crown the brinks of preci-
pices ; every where man has sought the poetry of
the infinite, the solemn horror of silence; every-
where he has desired to draw closest to God ; he
has sought him on the summits, in the depths of
abysses, on the edges of cliffs, and has found him
everywhere. Yet nowhere as on this rock, half
European, half African, could be found so many
differing harmonies all blending to so elevate the
soul, to remove the most dolorous impressions, to
assuage the keenest, to give from the sorrows of
life a profound rest. This monastery was built at
the extremity of the island, on the highest point of
the rock which, by some great convulsion of nature,
has been broken off sharply on the side of the sea,
where at all points it presents the sharp angles of
its surfaces, slightly worn away at the water line,
but inaccessible. This rock is protected from all
attack by dangerous reefs which extend far out into
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS I99
the sea, and among which play the sparkling waves
of the Mediterranean. It is only from the sea that
one can perceive the four principal parts of this
square structure, whose form, height, and doorways,
have all been minutely prescribed by monastic laws.
On the side towards the town, the church com-
pletely hides the massive building of the cloister,
with its roof covered with large tiles which render
it invulnerable to squalls, storms, and the fierce
heat of the sun. The church, the generous gift of
a Spanish family, crowns the town. The fagade,
bold and elegant, gives a noble aspect to this little
maritime town. Is not the view of a city with its
crowded roofs, nearly all of them disposed like an
amphitheatre before a beautiful harbor, and rising
above all a magnificent portal with Gothic triglyph,
with campaniles, slender towers and pierced spires, a
spectacle full of terrestrial grandeur ? Religion dom-
inating life, in offering to men unceasingly both
the end and the way of life, an image moreover
altogether Spanish! Transplant this scene to the
middle of the Mediterranean beneath an ardent sky;
add to it palms, and dwarfed perennial trees, which
mingle their waving green fronds with the sculptured
leafage of the immobile architecture; look at the
white fringes of the sea breaking over the reefs and
contrasting with the sapphire blue of the water;
admire the galleries, the terraces built upon the roof
of each house where the inhabitants come to
breathe the evening air among the flowers, between
the tops of the trees of their little gardens. Then,
200 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
in the harbor some white sails. And lastly, in
the serenity of the early evening, listen to the
music of the organ, the chant of the vespers, the
sweet chimes of the bells on the open sea. Every-
where, sound and calm ; but oftenest, the calm every-
where. Within, the church was divided into three
naves, dark and mysterious. Doubtless the fury of
the winds forbade the architect to construct those
lateral arched buttresses which adorn almost all
other cathedrals, and between which are constructed
the chapels, hence the walls which flanked the two
small naves and sustained this structure, admitted
no light into it Exteriorly, these strong walls pre-
sented the aspect of their gray masses supported at
intervals by enormous buttresses. The great nave
and its two small lateral galleries were therefore
lighted only by a rose-window of stained glass,
placed with miraculous art over the portal, whose
favorable exposure had permitted a wealth of stone
lacework and the beauty peculiar to the order mis-
called Gothic. The greater part of these three
naves was given up to the townsfolk, who came to
hear Mass and the services. In front of the choir
was a railing, behind which hung a brown curtain
with ample folds, slightly parted in the middle so as
to allow only the officiating priest and the altar to be
seen. This railing was divided at equal intervals
by pillars which supported an interior gallery and
the organs. This work in carved wood, in harmony
with the decoration of the church, formed exter-
nally the small columns of the galleries supported
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 201
by the pillars of the great nave. It was thus
impossible for any curious person who might be
bold enough to mount upon the narrow balustrade
of these galleries to see within the choir anything
but the long octagonal stained-glass windows which
pierced the wall at equal distances around the high-
altar.
At the time of the French expedition into Spain
for the purpose of reestablishing the authority of
King Ferdinand VII., and after the fall of Cadiz, a
French general, sent to this island to obtain its
recognition of the Royal Government, prolonged his
stay that he might reconnoitre this convent, if pos-
sible, and gain admittance. The enterprise was,
certainly, a delicate one. But a man of passion, a
man whose life had been — so to speak — a series of \0^
poems in action, and who had always lived romances
Instead of writing them, above all, a man of deeds,
might well be tempted by a project apparently im-
possible. To open the gates of a convent for him-
self, legally! the Pope or the metropolitan Arch-
bishop himself would scarcely have sanctioned it.
To employ artifice or force, in case of failure, was
he not certain to lose his station, all his military
future, and miss his aim in addition.? The Due
d'Angouleme was still in Spain, and of all the indis-
cretions which a man in favor with the commander-
in-chief could commit, this alone would be punished
without pity. This general had solicited his
present mission for the purpose of satisfying his
secret curiosity, although never was curiosity more
§y
^'
202 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
desperate. But this last effort was a matter of con-
science. The house of these Carmelites was the
only Spanish convent which had escaped his search.
While crossing from the mainland, a voyage which
took less than an hour, a presentiment favorable to
his hopes had arisen in his heart. Since then
although he had seen nothing of the convent but its
walls, and of the nuns not so much as their robes,
and though he had heard nothing but the chants of
their liturgies, yet he had gathered under these
walls and from these chants faint indications that
seemed to justify his slender hope. And, slight as
were the auguries thus capriciously awakened,
never was human passion more violently aroused
than was the curiosity of the general. But the
heart knows no insignificant events; it magnifies
all things; it puts in the same balance the fall of
an empire of fourteen years' duration and the fall
of a woman's glove, and nearly always the glove
outweighs the empire. Here, then, are the facts
in all their actual simplicity. After^the facts will
come the emotions.
An hour after the general had landed on this
island the royal authority was reestablished. A
few constitutional Spaniards, who had taken refuge
there by night after the fall of Cadiz, embarked on
a vessel which the general permitted them to char-
ter for a voyage to London. There was thus neither
resistance nor reaction. This little insular restora-
tion could not, however, be accomplished without
a Mass, at which must necessarily be present the two
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 203
companies of troops of the expedition. Not being
aware of the rigor of the cloister among the Bare-
footed Carmelites, the general had hoped to be able
to obtain in the church some information concerning
the nuns immured in the convent, one of whom
might be a being dearer to him than life, and more
precious than honor. His hopes were at first cruelly
disappointed. Mass was indeed celebrated with
pomp, hi honor of this solemn occasion, the cur-
tains which habitually hid the choir were drawn
aside and gave to view the rich ornaments, the
priceless paintings and the shrines encrusted with
precious stones whose brilliancy effaced that of the
numerous votive offerings in gold and in silver
hung by the mariners of the port on the pillars of
the great nave. The nuns had all retired to the
seclusion of the organ-gallery. Yet in spite of this
first check, and during the Mass of thanksgiving,
there suddenly developed a drama endowed with
more secret interests than had ever moved the heart
of man. The sister who played the organ aroused
an enthusiasm so vivid that not one of the military
contingent present regretted the order which had
brought him to the ceremony. The common sol-
diers even listened with pleasure, and all the
officers were ravished by it. As to the general, he
remained calm and cold in appearance. The sensa-J
tions which were aroused in him by the different
selections played by the nun rank with the small
number of things whose expression words can not
convey, rendering it impotent, but which, like
\
204 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
death, like God, like eternity, can be perceived only
y at their slender point of contact with man. By a
' strange chance, the music of the organ seemed to
belong to the school of Rossini, the composer who
./has carried more liuman passion than any other
> into the art of music, and whose works will some
■ day, by their number and their extent, inspire
Homeric respect. Of the scores of this fine genius
the nun seemed to have more particularly studied
that of Moses in Egypt, doubtless because the senti-
ments of sacred music are there carried to the
highest degree. Perhaps these two spirits, the one
so gloriously European, the other unknown, had
met together in some intuitive perception of the
same poetry. This opinion was that of two officers,
true dilettanti, who no doubt regretted in Spain the
theatre Favart. At last, in the Te Deiim it was
impossible not to recognize a French soul in the
character which the music suddenly took on. The
triumph of His Most Christian Majesty evidently
roused the keenest joy in the bottom of the heart of
^ this nun. Surely, she was a French woman. Pres-
ently the patriotic spirit burst forth, sparkling like
a jet of light to the repeats of the organ, in which
the sister introduced motifs which breathed all the
delicacy of Parisian taste, and with which were
vaguely blended sentiments of our finest national
anthems.
Spanish hands could never have put into this
graceful homage to victorious arms the fire that thus
betrayed the origin of the musician.
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 205
"There is, then, France everywhere?" said a
soldier.
The general left the church during the Te Deum,
it was impossible for him to listen to it. The notes
of the musician revealed to him at last the woman
madly loved, and who had buried herself so deeply
in the heart of religion and had so carefully hidden
herself away from the sight of the world that she
had escaped up to this time the most persistent
search skilfully set on foot by men armed not only
with great power but with superior intelligence.
The suspicion awakened in the general's heart was
almost justified by the vague echo of an air of
sweet melancholy, Fleuve du Tage, a French bal-
lad, of which he had often heard the prelude in the
Parisian boudoir of the woman he loved, and which
this nun now used to express amid the joy of the con-
querors the regrets of an exile. A terrible sensa-
tion ! To hope for the resurrection of a lost love,
to find it again still lost, to have a mysterious
glimpse of it after five years during which passion
had been exasperated by the void and intensified
by the inutility of the efforts made to satisfy it!
Who has not, once at least, in his life, overturned
everything about him, his papers, his house, ran-
sacked his memory impatiently, in searching for
some precious object and then felt the ineffable
pleasure of finding it after a day or two consumed
in the vain search ; after having hoped and despaired
of its recovery; after having expended the liveliest
irritations of the soul for this important nothing
206 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
which has caused almost a passion? Well, extend
this kind of fury through five years; put a woman,
a heart, a love, in the place of this nothing; lift the
passion into the highest realms of feelings; and
then picture to yourself an ardent man, a man with
the heart and the face of a lion, one of those men
with a mane, who are imposing and who communi-
cate to all those about them a respectful terror.
Perhaps you will then understand the abrupt de-
parture of the general during the Te Deimi, at the
moment when the prelude of an air once heard with
delight under gilded ceilings, vibrated through the
nave of this church by the sea.
He descended the steep street which led up to the
church, and did not stop until the deep tones of the
organ no longer reached his ear. Unable to think
of anything but the love whose volcanic eruption
fired his heart, he only perceived that the Te Deum
was ended when the Spanish congregation poured
from the church. He felt that his conduct and
appearance might appear ridiculous, and he returned
to take his place at the head of the procession,
explaining to the alcade and to the governor of the
town that a sudden indisposition had obliged him to
come out into the air. Then it suddenly occurred
to him to use this pretext at first carelessly given
as a means of prolonging his stay on the island.
Excusing himself because of the aggravation of his
discomfort, he declined to preside at the banquet
offered by the authorities of the island to the French
officers; he took to his bed after writing to the
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 207
major-general that a passing illness compelled him
to turn over his command to the colonel. This
artifice, so commonplace but so natural, left him
free from all duties during the time necessary for
the accomplishment of his projects. In his char-
acter of a man essentially catholic and monarchical he
acquainted himself with the hours of the various
services and affected the utmost interest in the
duties of religion, — a piety which in Spain would
excite no surprise.
The very next day, while his soldiers were
embarking, the general went up to the convent to
be present at vespers. He found the church deserted
by the townspeople who, in spite of their devotion,
had all gone to the port to see the embarkation of
the troops. The Frenchman, glad to fmd himself
alone in the church, took care to make the clink of
his spurs resound under the vaulted roof. He
walked noisily, he coughed, he spoke aloud to him-
self, in order to inform the nuns, and above all the
organist, that if the French were departing, one, at
least, remained behind. Was this singular method
of communication heard, understood ? — the general
believed it was. In the Magnificat, the organ
seemed to send him a response which was
brought him by the vibrations of the air. The
soul of the nun floated towards him on the
wings of her notes, quivering in the movements
of the sounds. The music burst forth in all its
power; it inspired the church. This hymn of joy,
consecrated by the sublime liturgy of Roman
208 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
Christianity to the uplifting of the soul in presence
of the splendors of the ever-living God, became the
expression of a heart almost terrified at its own hap-
piness in the presence of the splendors of a perish-
able love which still lived and came to move it once
more beyond the religious tomb in which women are
buried to rise again, brides of Christ.
*
The organ is beyond all question the grandest, the
most daring, the most magnificent of all the instru-
ments created by human genius. It is an orchestra
in itself, from which a skilful hand may demand all
things, it can express all things. Is it not in some
sort an elevation on which the soul may poise itself
ere it launches itself into space, endeavoring to per-
ceive in its flight a thousand scenes, to depict life,
to traverse the infinite which separates heaven from
earth? The longer a poet listens to its gigantic
harmonies the more will he be inclined to believe
that between kneeling humanity and the God hid-
den by the dazzling rays of the sanctuary, the hun-
dred voices of this terrestrial choir can alone fill the
vast distance and serve as the only interpreter
strong enough to transmit to heaven human prayers
in the omnipotence of their desires, in the diversity
of their melancholy, with the tints of their medita-
tive ecstasies, with the impetuous spring of their
repentance and the thousand imaginations of their
beliefs. Yes, beneath these long vaults, the har-
monies born of the genius of sacred things find
grandeurs yet unheard of with which they adorn,
with which they strengthen themselves. There, the
dim light, the profound silence, the chants alternat-
ing with the thunder of the organ, seem to make
for God a veil through which His luminous attributes
14 (209)
2IO LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
radiate. All these sacred riches now seemed flung
like a grain of incense on the frail altar of an
V earthly love, before the eternal throne of a jealous
and avenging God. In fact, the joy of the nun had
not that character of grandeur and of gravity which
is in harmony with the solemnity of the Magnificat;
she gave to the music richness, graceful develop-
ments, the different rhythms of which seemed to
breathe of human gayety. Her motifs had the bril-
liancy of the roulades of a cantatrice striving to
express love, and the notes rose buoyantly like
those of a bird by the side of its mate. Then, at
moments, she darted back into the past, to sport
there or to weep there alternately. Her changing
moods had something disordered about them, like
the agitation of a woman happy at the return of her
lover. Then, after the flexible fugues of delirium
and the marvelous effects of this fantastic recogni-
tion, the soul that spoke thus returned upon itself.
The musician, passing from the major to the minor
key, revealed to her auditor the story of her present
situation. Suddenly, unexpectedly, she recounted
to him her long melancholy and depicted for him
her lingering moral malady. She had abolished
every day a feeling, cut off every night some
thought, reduced gradually her heart to ashes.
After soft modulations the music took on slowly,
tint by tint, the hue of profound sadness. Soon the
echoes poured forth in torrents the well-springs of
grief. Then, all at once, the higher notes struck a
■! concert of angelic voices, as if to announce to her
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 211
lost lover, lost but not forgotten, that the reunion of \
two souls could only take place in heaven : hope \
most precious ! Then came the Amen. There, no \
longer any joy nor any tears, neither melancholy
nor regrets. The Amen was a return to God; this
last chord was grave, solemn, terrible. The musi- /
cian revealed the veil which covered the nun, and
after the last thunder of the basses which made the
hearers tremble even to their hair she seemed to
sink again into that tomb from which she had for a
moment issued. When the echoes had by degrees
ceased their long vibration it seemed that the
church, until then luminous, had again been plunged
into profound obscurity.
The general had been completely carried away by
the course of this powerful genius, and had followed
her through all the regions which she had traversed.
He comprehended in their full meaning all the
images that crowded that burning symphony, and
for him these chords echoed far. For him, as for the
sister, this poem was the future, the present, and
the past. Music, even that of the theatre, is it not
for tender and poetic souls, for wounded and suffer-
ing hearts, a text which they interpret at the will
of their memories? If it requires the heart of a
poet to make a musician, are not poetry and love
required to hear, to comprehend, the great works
of music? Religion, love, and music, are they not \
the triple expression of the same fact, the need of
expansion which agitates every noble soul ? these
three forms of poetry all lead to God, who alone can
f
212 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
unravel all terrestrial emotions. Thus this holy
human trinity participates in the infinite grandeurs
of God, whom we never figure to ourselves without
surrounding Him by the fires of love, the golden
timbrels of music, of light and of harmony. Is it
not the principle and the end of all our works ?
The French general divined that in this desert,
on this rock surrounded by the sea, the nun had
taken possession of music to pour into it the excess
of passion that consumed her. Was it a homage
made to God of her love? was it the triumph of
love over God? questions difficult to answer. But,
certainly, the general could not doubt that he had
found in this heart dead to the world, a passion as
burning as his own. When vespers were ended,
he returned to the alcade's house, where he lodged.
Giving himself over at first to the thousand delights
lavished by a satisfaction long waited for, painfully
sought, he could see nothing beyond. He was still
loved. Solitude had nourished love in that heart,
as much as love had grown in his own by the bar-
riers, successively surmounted, which this woman
had placed between herself and him. This expan-
sion of the soul had its natural duration. Then
came the desire to see this woman again, to reclaim
her from God, to ravish her from Him, — a bold
project, welcome to this bold man. After the repast
he retired to his bed to escape questions, to be
alone, to be able to think without interruption, and
he remained plunged in the deepest meditation
until the morning broke. He only rose to go to
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 21 3
Mass. He went to the church, placed himself close
to the screen; his brow touched the curtain; he
longed to tear it away, but he was not alone, — his
host had accompanied him through politeness and
the least imprudence might compromise the future
of his passion and ruin his new hopes. The sound
of the organ again filled the church but not under
the touch of the same hand; the musician of the
last two days was absent from the keyboard. All
was chill and pale to the general. Was his mis-
tress overcome by the same emotions under which
had well nigh succumbed his own vigorous man's
heart.? Had she so truly shared, comprehended,
a faithful and eager love that she now lay dying on
her bed in her cell ? At the moment when a thous-
and thoughts like these were rising in the French-
man's mind he heard beside him the voice of the
beloved, he recognized the clearness of its tones.
This voice, slightly modified by a tremor which
gave it all the grace lent to young girls by their
chaste timidity, detached itself from the volume of
song of the chant like that of a prima donna over
the harmonies of a finale. It gave to the soul an
impression like that produced on the eyes by a
fillet of silver or of gold threading a dark frieze. It
was indeed she! Still Parisian, she had not lost
her gracious charm though she had quitted the
adornments of the world for the headband and the
coarse serge of a Carmelite. After having revealed
her love the night before in the midst of the praises
addressed to the Lord she now seemed to say to her
214 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
/
V
lover: "Yes it is I, I am here, I love forever; yet I
am sheltered from love. Thou wilt hear me, my
soul shall enfold thee, and I shall remain beneath
the brown shroud of this choir from which no power
can tear me. Thou canst not see me."
"It is indeed she!" said the general to himself,
lifting his head from his hands on which he had
been leaning; for he had not been able at first to
sustain the crushing emotion which rose like a
whirlwind in his heart when that well-known voice
vibrated under the arches, to the accompaniment of
the murmur of the waves.
The storm raged without and calm was within
the sanctuary. This voice, so rich, continued to
display all its charming cajoleries, it fell like balm
upon the parched heart of this lover, it flowered in
the air about him, which he well might desire to
breathe so as to receive the emanations of a soul
exhaled with love in the words of the prayer. The
alcade came to rejoin his guest, he found him in
tears at the elevation of the Host, which was chanted
by the nun, and carried him away to his house.
Surprised to find such devotion in a French soldier,
the alcade invited the confessor of the convent to
join them at supper, and informed the general, to
whom no news had ever given such pleasure. Dur-
ing the supper, the confessor was the object of such
respectful attention on the part of the Frenchman
that the Spaniards were confirmed in the high opin-
ion they had formed of his piety. He inquired with
great interest the number of the nuns, asked for
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 215
details about the revenues of the convent and its
wealth, with the air of a man who wished politely
to entertain the good old priest with the matters
in which he was most interested. Then he in-
quired about the life led by these holy sisters.
Could they go out? Could they be seen ?
"Senor, " said the venerable priest, "the rule is
severe. If the permission of our Holy Father must
be obtained before a woman can enter a house of
Saint-Bruno, here is the same rigor. It is impossi-
ble for any man to enter a convent of the Bare-footed
Carmelites unless he is a priest and delegated by
the Archbishop for duty in the house. No nun can
go out It is true, however, that THE GREAT SAINT
— Mother Therese — did frequently leave her cell.
The Visitor, or the Mothers Superior, can alone,
with the authorization of the Archbishop, permit a
nun to see strangers, especially in case of ill-
ness. Now, ours is one of the chief Houses of
the Order and we have consequently a Mother
Superior residing in the convent. We have among
other foreigners a French woman, Sister Therese,
the one who directs the music of the chapel."
"Ah!" said the general, feigning surprise. "She
must have been gratified by the triumph of the
Arms of the House of Bourbon?"
"I told them the object of the Mass, they are
always a little curious."
"Perhaps Sister Therese has some interest in
France; she might perhaps be glad to receive some
news from there, or to ask some questions?"
\
2l6 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"I think not or she would have spoken to me
about it"
"As a compatriot," said the general, " I should
be curious to see her. — If that were possible, if the
Mother Superior would consent, if — "
"At the grating, even in presence of the reverend
mother, an interview would be impossible for any-
one, no matter whom; but in favor of a liberator of
the Catholic throne and of our holy religion, in
spite of the strictness of our Mother, the rule might
perhaps be relaxed a moment," said the confessor,
slightly winking his eyes. "I will speak about it"
"How old is Sister Ther^se?" asked the lover,
who dared not question the priest about the beauty
of the nun.
"She is no longer of any age," replied the good
old man with a simplicity which made the general
shudder.
1
*
The next morning, before the siesta, the confessor
came to announce to the Frenchman that Sister
Therese and the Mother Superior consented to
receive him at the grating of the convent parlor
before the hour of Vespers. After the siesta, during
which the general had whiled away the time by
walking around the port in the noonday heat, the
priest came to seek him and introduced him into
the convent; he guided him under a gallery which
ran the length of the cemetery and in which foun-
tains, several green trees and numerous arcades main-
tained a cooling freshness in harmony with the
silence of the place. When they reached the end
of this long gallery the priest caused his companion
to enter a parlor divided in the middle by a grating
covered with a brown curtain. On the side, to a
degree public, in which the confessor left the gen-
eral, there was a wooden bench along one side of
the wall ; some chairs, also of wood, were near the
grating. The ceiling was crossed by projecting
beams of evergreen oak without ornament The
daylight only entered this apartment through two
windows in the division set apart for the nuns, so
that this feeble light, mostly absorbed by the brown
tones of the woodwork, scarcely sufficed to reveal
the great black Christ, the portrait of Saint Therese
and a picture of the Virgin which hung on the gray
(217)
2l8 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
panels of the wall. The feelings of the general
were subdued, in spite of their violence, to a tone of
melancholy. He became calm in this domestic
calm. Something mighty as the grave seized him
beneath these chilling rafters. Was this not its
eternal silence, its profound peace, its suggestions
\ of the infinite.? Then the stillness and the fixed
thought of the cloister, this thought which fills the
air, in the half-light, in all things, and which,
nowhere traced, is yet magnified by the imagina-
tion, this great word, Peace in the Lord, enters
there with living power into the least religious soul.
Convents of men are not easily conceivable;
man seems feeble and unworthy in them,— he is
■ born to act, to fulfil a life of toil, which he evades
in his cell. But in a monastery of women, what
virile strength and yet what touching weakness!
A man may be pushed by a thousand sentiments
into the depths of an abbey, he flings himself into
them as from a precipice; but a woman enters there
drawn only by one sentiment, — she does not unsex
herself, she becomes the bride of God. You may
say to the man, "Why did you not struggle.?"
-,,,Butthe seclusion of the woman, is it not always
a sublime struggle.? The general found this silent
parlor and this convent lost in the midst of the sea
full of memories of Him. Love seldom reaches up-
ward to solemnity; but love still faithful in the
bosom of God, is there not something solemn in it,
and more than a man has the right to hope for in
this nineteenth century, and with our manners and
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 219
customs? The general's soul was one that might
readily be impressed by the infinite grandeurs of
this situation, he was one of those sufficiently
elevated to forget political interests, worldly honors,
Spain, the world of Paris, and rise to the heights of
this sublime termination. Moreover, what could
be more truly tragic? How many emotions might
be found in the situation of these two lovers,
reunited alone in the middle of the sea, on a granite
ledge, yet separated by an idea, by an impassable
barrier ! Look at this man saying to himself, "Can
I triumph over God in that heart?" A slight
sound made this man quiver, the brown curtain
was drawn back; then he saw in the half-light a
woman standing whose face was hidden from him
by a prolongation of the veil folded on her head;
according to the rule of the order she was clothed
in that garb, the color of which has become pro-
verbial. The general could not see the naked feet of
the nun, which would have revealed to him a
frightful emaciation; yet through the numerous
Tolds of the coarse robe which covered and did not
adorn this woman he divined that tears, prayer,
passion, solitude, had already wasted her away.
The cold hand of a woman, doubtless that of the
Mother Superior, held back the curtain; and the
genera], examining the necessary witness of this
interview, encountered the black and thoughtful
eyes of an old nun, almost a centenarian, a clear
and youthful look, which belied the numberless
wrinkles which furrowed her pale face.
220 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
<«]
'Madame la Duchesse, " he said in a voice
shaken by emotion to the nun who bowed her head,
"Does your companion understand French?"
"There is no duchesse here," replied the nun.
"You are in presence of Sister Therese. The
woman whom you call my companion is my mother
in God, my superior here below."
These words, so humbly uttered by the voice
that once harmonized with the luxury and elegance
in which this woman had lived, queen of the world
of Paris, by lips whose language had formerly been
so gay, so mocking, struck the general as if with
lightning.
"My holy Mother speaks only Latin and Spanish,"
she added.
"I understand neither. Dear Antoinette, make
my excuses to her. "
As she heard her name softly uttered by a man
once so hard to her, the nun was shaken by an
inward emotion which betrayed itself by the
slight trembling of her veil on which the light fell
directly.
"My brother," she said passing her sleeve
beneath her veil, perhaps to wipe her eyes, "my
name is Sister Therese."
Then she turned to the mother and said to her in
Spanish these words which the general plainly
heard ; he knew enough of the language to under-
stand them, perhaps also to speak them :
"My dear Mother, this cavalier presents his
respects to you and begs you to excuse him for not
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 221
laying them himself at your feet; but he knows
neither of the two languages which you speak — "
The old woman bowed her head slowly, her coun-
tenance took an expression of angelic softness,
heightened nevertheless by the consciousness of
her power and her dignity.
"You know this cavalier?" she asked with a
penetrating glance at the sister.
"Yes, my Mother."
"Retire to your cell, my daughter!" said the
Mother Superior in a tone of authority.
The general hastily withdrew behind the curtain,
so that his face might not reveal the terrible emo-
tion which agitated him ; and in the shadow he
seemed to see still the piercing eyes of the Mother
Superior. This woman, arbiter of the frail and
fleeting joy he had won at such a cost, made him
afraid and he trembled, he whom a triple range of
cannon had never terrified. The duchess walked
towards the door, but she turned :
"My Mother," she said in a voice of horrible
calmness, "this Frenchman is one of my brothers."
"Remain then, my daughter," replied the old
woman after a pause.
This admirable Jesuitism revealed so much love
and such regret that a man of a weaker organiza-
tion than the general would have given way in
experiencing so lively a pleasure in the midst of an
immense peril, for him so novel. Of what value
were words, looks, gestures, in a scene in which
love must be hidden from the eyes of the lynx,
222 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
the claws of a tiger ! The Sister Therese came
back.
"You see, my brother, what I dared to do that I
might speak to you, for one moment, of your salva-
tion, and of the prayers which my soul addresses
to heaven every day for you. 1 have committed a
mortal sin. I have lied. How many days of peni-
tence to efface that lie! but it will be to suffer for
you. You do not know, my brother, what happiness
it is to love in heaven, to be able to avow our feel-
ings now that religion has purified them, has trans-
ported them into the highest regions, and that it is
permitted us to no longer consider anything but the
soul. If the doctrines, if the spirt of the saint to
whom we owe this refuge had not lifted me far
above terrestrial miseries to a sphere, far indeed
from that where she is, but certainly above the
world, I could not have seen you. But I can see
you, hear you, and remain calm — "
"Antoinette," cried the general, interrupting her
at these words, "let me see you, you whom 1 love
now passionately, to distraction, as you once wished
me to love you."
"Do not call me Antoinette, I implore you. The
memories of the past do me harm. See in me only
Sister Therese, a creature trusting to the divine
pity. And — " she added after a pause, "calm your-
self, my brother. Our Mother would separate us
pitilessly if your face betrayed earthly passions, or
if your eyes shed tears."
The general bowed his head as if to collect
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 223
himself. When he again lifted his eyes to the grat-
ing he saw between two bars the pale, emaciated, yet
still ardent face of the nun. Her complexion, where
once had bloomed all the loveliness of youth, where
once there shone the happy contrast of a creamy
whiteness with the color of the rose of Bengal, had
now taken the warm translucent tone of a porcelain
cup through which a feeble light shines faintly. The
beautiful hair of which this woman was once so
proud had been shorn. A band bound her forehead
and enveloped her face. Her eyes surrounded with
dark circles, due to the austerities of her life,
launched, at moments, feverish rays and their
habitual calm was but a veil. In a word, of this
woman only the soul remained.
"Ah! you will leave this tomb, you who have
become my life! You belonged to me, and you
were not free to give yourself, even to God. Did
you not promise me to sacrifice all to the least of
my commands? Now, perhaps, you will think me
worthy of this promise when you know what I have
done for you. I have sought you through the whole
world. For five years you have been the thought
of every instant, the occupation of my life. My
friends, very powerful friends as you know, have
helped me with all their ability to search the con-
vents of France, of Italy, of Spain, of Sicily, of
America. My love was rekindled with every fruit-
less search; I have made many a long journey on a
false hope, 1 have expended my life and the strong-
est beatings of my heart around the black walls of
f
224 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
cloisters. I do not speak to you of a fidelity unlim-
ited, what is it? nothing in comparison with the
infinite desires of my love. If in other days your
remorse was real you cannot now hesitate to follow
me."
"You forget that I am not free."
"The duke is dead," he said hastily.
Sister Therese reddened.
"May Heaven receive him ! " she said with quick
emotion; "he was generous to me. But I was not
speaking of those ties, one of my faults was my will-
ingness to break them all without scruple for you."
"You speak of your vows," cried the general,
frowning. "1 did not believe that anything would
weigh in your heart against your love. But do not
doubt, Antoinette, 1 will obtain from the Holy
Father a brief which will cancel your vows. I
will surely go to Rome, I will petition every earthly
power; and if God could descend, I — "
"Do not blaspheme."
"Do not fear how God would see it! Ah! 1 would
much more gladly know that you would escape from
these walls for me; that this very night you would
throw yourself into some bark, at the foot of these
rocks. We would depart to be happy anywhere, to
the end of the world! And with me, you would
come back to life, to health in the shelter of love."
"Do not say such things," returned Sister Therese,
"you do not know what you have become to me.
I love you much better than 1 have ever loved you.
I pray to God for you daily, and I see you no longer
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 225
with the eyes of my body. If you but knew,
Armand, the joy of being able without shame to
deliver yourself to a pure affection which God pro-
tects ! You do not know how happy I am to call
down the blessings of Heaven upon your head. I
never pray for myself: God will do with me accord-
ing to His will. But you, I would wish at the price
of my eternity to have some assurance that you are
happy in this world, and that you will be happy in
the other, throughout the ages. My life eternal is
all that misfortune has left me to offer you. Now,
I have grown old in tears, I am no longer either
young or beautiful ; moreover, you would despise a
nun who again became a woman, whom no senti-
ment, not even maternal love, could absolve. —
What could you say to me that would outweigh the
unnumbered reflections which have accumulated in
my heart during five years, and which have
changed it, hollowed it, withered it.'' I should have
given it less sorrowfully to God! "
"What I would say to you, dear Antoinette! I
would say to you that I love you, that affection,
love, true love, the happiness of living in a heart
wholly one's own, and without one reservation, is so
rare and so difficult to find that I have doubted you,
that I have put you to cruel tests ; but to-day I love
you with all the powers of my soul, — if you will
follow me into some retreat I will no longer listen
to any other voice than yours, I will no longer look
on any other face than yours — "
"Silence, Armand ! You are shortening the single
15
226 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
moment in which we are permitted to see each
other here below."
"Antoinette, will you follow me?"
"But I never leave you. I live in your heart,
but otherwise than by the interest of worldly pleas-
ure, of vanity, of selfish joy; I live here for you,
pale and faded, in the bosom of God! If He is just
you will be happy — "
"Phrases all! But if I wish to have you pale
and faded ? But if 1 cannot be happy without pos-
sessing you? You will still be thinking of duties
in the presence of your lover ? He is never, then,
above all things else in your heart? In other days
you preferred to him society, yourself, I know not
what; now it is God, it is my salvation. In Sister
Therese I recognize still the duchess, ignorant of
the joys of love, and still unfeeling beneath a pre-
tence of tenderness. You do not love me, you have
never loved — "
. "Ah! my brother — "
"You will not leave this tomb; you love my soul,
you say? Well then, you shall lose forever this
soul, I will kill myself — "
"My Mother," cried Sister Therese in Spanish,
"1 have lied to you, this man is my lover! "
Immediately the curtain fell. The general, stand-
ing stupefied, scarcely heard the interior doors clos-
ing violently.
"Ah! she loves me still!" he cried, comprehend-
ing all that there was of sublimity in the cry of the
nun. "She shall be carried away from here — "
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 227
He left the island immediately, returned to head-
quarters, reported himself still ill, asked for a
leave of absence and returned immediately to France.
The following adventure will explain the situa-
tion in which we found the two persons of this his-
tory.
*
What is called in France the Faubourg Saint-Ger-
main is not a quarter of Paris, nor a sect, nor an
institution, nor indeed anything that can be defi-
nitely expressed. The Place Royale, the Faubourg
Saint-Honore, the Chaussee-d'Antin, all contain
mansions in which may be found the atmosphere
of the Faubourg Saint-Germain. Thus to begin
with, all the Faubourg is not in the Faubourg.
Persons born far from its influence may feel it and
affiliate with this world, whilst others born in its
midst may be forever banished from it. The man-
ners, the forms of speech, in a word the traditions,
of the Faubourg Saint-Germain have been to Paris
for the last forty years what the Court was to it in
former days, what the Hotel Saint-Paul was in the
fourteenth century, the Louvre in the fifteenth, the
Palais, the Hotel Rambouillet, the Place Royale, in
the sixteenth, and, finally, Versailles in the seven-
teenth and eighteenth centuries. Through all
phases of history the Paris of the upper class and
of the nobility has had its centre, just as the Paris
of the people will always have its own. This
recurring singularity offers ample matter for reflec-
tion to those who wish to observe or to paint the
different social strata ; and perhaps its causes should
be investigated, not only to explain the character of
this story but also to serve important interests, —
(229)
230 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
more important to the future than to the present, if
the teachings of experience were not always as
profitless for political parties as for youth. The
great seigneurs and the men of wealth, who always
imitate the great seigneurs, have at all epochs with-
drawn their houses from much frequented places.
If the Due d'Uzes built for himself, during the reign
of Louis XIV., the handsome hotel at the gate of
which he placed the fountain of Rue Montmartre, a
beneficent act which rendered him, in addition to his
virtues, an object of such popular veneration that all
the people of the quarter followed him to his grave,
it was because this quarter of Paris was then de-
serted. But no sooner were the fortifications
leveled, the marshes beyond the boulevards cov-
ered with houses, than the d'Uzes family aban-
doned their fine hotel which is occupied in our days
by a banker. Then the nobility, compromised by
the surrounding shops, abandoned the Place Royale,
the neighborhood of the Parisian centre, and crossed
the river in order to be able to breathe at its ease
in the Faubourg Saint-Germain, where palaces had
already arisen around the hotel built by Louis
XIV. for the Due du Maine, the Benjamin of his
legitimatized sons. For those accustomed to the
splendors of life is there, in fact, anything more
ignoble than the tumult, the mud, the cries, the
offensive smells, the narrowness of populous streets ?
Are not the habits of a shop-keeping or manu-
facturing quarter in constant discord with the
habits of the great world? Commerce and labor
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 23 1
are going to bed just when aristocracy is going to
dine; the one is in noisy activity while the other
is in need of repose; their computations are never
on the same basis, one is the receipt and the other
the expenditure. Thus arise manners and customs
diametrically opposed. This observation has in it
nothing of disdain. An aristocracy is in some sort
the thought of a society, as the bourgeoisie and the
proletariat are its organism and its action. From
this comes the need of different seats and localities
for these differing forces; and from their antago-
nism grows an apparent antipathy which produces
the diversity of movements all operating, however,
towards a common end. These social discords
result so logically from every constitutional code
that the liberal, the most disposed to complain of it
— as of an attack upon the sublime ideas under
which the ambitious of the lower classes hide their
designs — would find it prodigiously absurd if Mon-
sieur le Prince Montmorency lived in Rue Saint-
Martin, on the corner of the street which bears his
name, or if Monsieur le Due de Fitz- James, descend-
ant of the royal Scottish race, had his hotel in Rue
Marie-Stuart at the corner of Rue Montorgueil.
Sint tit sunt, aut non sint, —this fine pontifical
saying might serve as a motto for the great world
of every nation. This fact, obvious to every epoch
and accepted always by the people, bears within it
reasons of State; it is at once an effect and a cause,
a principle and a law. The masses have a sound
common sense which only deserts them at the
232 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
moment when the evil-disposed excite their passions.
This common sense rests on the essential truths of
a common order, as true at Moscow as in London, as
true in Geneva as in Calcutta. Everywhere,
whenever you assemble families of unequal for-
tunes within a given space you will see them divid-
ing into superior circles, those of patricians, of the
first, second, and third classes of society. Equality
may perhaps be a right, but no human power can
convert it into difact. It would be well for the hap-
piness of France if this truth could be popularized.
The least intelligent classes may still feel the ben-
efits of political harmony. This harmony is the
poetry of order, and the people are conscious of a
lively need of order. The co-operation of things
among themselves, — unity, to express all in one
word, — is it not the simplest expression of the prin-
ciple of order? Architecture, music, poetry, all
rest in France, more than in any other country,
upon this principle which moreover is written in
the depths of its clear and pure language, — and
language will always be the most infallible formula
of a nation. Thus you may see the people here
adopting the most poetical airs, the best modulated;
attaching themselves to the most simple ideas;
choosing incisive formula which are most closely
packed with thought France is the only country
in which a little phrase may bring about a great
revolution. The masses here have never revolted
except to endeavor to bring into unison men, things,
and principles. Thus no other nation has ever so
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 233
well understood the idea of unity which should
exist in the aristocratic life, perhaps because no
other has so well comprehended political necessi-
ties; history has never found it lagging behind.
France is often deceived, but as a woman is
deceived, — by generous ideas, by ardent sentiments
whose extent at first escapes calculation.
Thus to begin with, for its first characteristic
trait the Faubourg Saint-Germain has the splendor
of its mansions, its large gardens, their stillness
formerly in keeping with the magnificence of its
territorial fortunes. Is not this space intervening
between a class and the whole capital a material
expression of the moral distance which should sep-
arate them ? In all created things the head has its
indicated place. If, by chance, a nation causes its
head to fall at its feet it perceives, sooner or later,
that it has committed suicide. As the nations do
not wish to die, they, therefore, apply themselves to
the reconstruction of a head. When a nation has no
longer the strength to do this, it perishes, as per-
ished Rome, Venice and so many others. The dis-
tinction introduced by the difference in habits and
manners between the other spheres of social activity
and the superior sphere implies, necessarily, an
actual and commanding worth at the aristocratic
summits. Whenever in any state, under any form
which the government may assume, the patricians
fail in their conditions of complete superiority,
they become powerless, and the people soon over-
throw them. The people desire always to see in
234 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
■ their hands, in their hearts, and in their heads for-
tune, power and the initiative, — speech, intelli-
gence and glory. Without this triple strength all
their privileges vanish. The people, like women,
love strength in those who govern them and their
love is not given where they do not respect; they
will not yield obedience to those who do not com-
mand their homage. A despised aristocracy is
like a sluggard king, a husband in petticoats; it is
naught before it becomes nothing. Thus the separa-
tion of the great, their distinct habits, in a word
the general customs of the patrician castes, is both
the symbol of a real power and the cause of their
destruction when they have lost power. The Fau-
bourg Saint-Germain has allowed itself to be tem-
porarily cast aside because it has not chosen to
recognize the conditions of its existence, which
existence could easily have been perpetuated. It
should have had the good faith to see in time, as
the English aristocracy saw, that institutions have
their climacteric years in which the same words
have no longer the same signification, in which
ideas clothe themselves in new garments, and in
which the conditions of political life change entirely
their form without any essential change in their
being. These thoughts have natural developments
which are essentially relevant to this tale, into
which they enter both in definition of its causes
and in explanation of its facts.
The grandeur of chateaux and of aristocratic
palaces, the luxury of their details, the constant
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 235
sumptuousness of their appointments, the orbit in
which the fortunate proprietor, rich before he was
born, moves without constraint and without dis-
agreeable contacts; the habit of never descending
to the petty daily calculations of life, the leisure at
his disposal, the superior instruction which he early
acquires, — in short, all those patrician traditions
which give him social powers which his adversaries
can scarcely acquire by study, by a force of will,
by tenacious clinging to some vocation, — all these
things should elevate the soul of a man who from
his youth possesses such privileges, should fill him
with that high respect for himself the least conse-
quence of which is a nobility of the heart in keep-
ing with the nobility of tlie name. This is true of
certain families. Here and there in the Faubourg
Saint-Germain may be met noble characters, excep-
tions which weigh against the widespread egotism
which has been the ruin of that exclusive world.
These advantages pertain to the French aristocracy,
as they do to all the patrician flowering which
nations produce on their surface as long as their
existence rests on domain, — domain of the soil like
the domain of wealth, the only solid basis of regular
society; but these advantages remain with patri-
cians of all kinds only so long as they fulfill the con-
dition upon which the people leave them in posses-
sion. They hold them as a kind of moral fief, the
tenure of which has its obligations to the sovereign,
and here the sovereign is certainly to-day the peo-
ple. Times have changed, and so have arms.
236 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
The knight to whom formerly it sufficed to wear the
coat of mail, the hauberk, to know how to wield his
lance and to display his pennon, must to-day give
proof of the qualities of his mind; and where there
was formerly required only a brave heart, there must
be to-day a strong brain. Art, science and wealth
are the social triangle on which the arms of power
are now blazoned and from which modern aristocracy
proceeds. A noble theorem is the equal of a great
name. The Rothschilds, those modern Fuggers,
are princes de facto. A great artist is really an
oligarchy, he represents an entire century and
becomes almost always a law. Thus, the gift of
language, the motor power at high pressure of the
writer, the genius of the poet, the perseverance of
the merchant, the will of a statesman who concen-
trates in himself a thousand dazzling qualities, the
sword of the general, these personal conquests made
by an individual which give him authority over
society, — the aristocratic class should seek to
acquire to-day the monopoly of all these, as for-
merly it had that of material strength. To remain
at the head of a nation, is it not always necessary
to remain worthy of conducting it; of being for it
the soul and the mind, in order to guide the hands.?
How can a people be led without the qualities of
command? What would be the marshal's baton
without the intrinsic strength of the captain who
holds it in his hand? The Faubourg Saint-Germain
has played with batons, thinking them the power
itself. It has reversed the terms of the proposition
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 237
which justify its existence. Instead of throwing
aside the symbols which offended the people and
holding fast secretly the essentials of power, it has
let the bourgeoisie seize the power whilst it clung
with fatal persistency to its symbols, and has con-
stantly forgotten the laws imposed upon it by its
numerical weakness. An aristocracy which per-
sonally constitutes scarcely the thousandth part of
society must, to-day as heretofore, multiply its
means of action in a society in order to oppose in
the great crisis a weight equal to that of the
masses. In our day, means of action should be real
forces, and not historicar traditions. Unhappily, in
France, the nobility, still swelling with a sense of
its ancient and banished power, excites a sort of
prejudice against which it is difficult for it to
defend itself. Perhaps this is a national defect.
The Frenchman, more than any other man, never
finishes on a lower level ; he mounts from the step
on which he finds himself to that next higher ; he
seldom pities the unfortunates over whose heads he
lifts himself, he sighs only to see so many happy
ones above him. Although he has a good deal of
heart, he only too often prefers to listen to his intel-
ligence. This national instinct which always sends
the French in advance, this vanity which eats into
their fortunes and rules them as rigidly as the prin-
ciple of economy rules the Hollanders, has for three
centuries absolutely dominated our nobility, which
in this respect has been eminently French. The
man of the Faubourg Saint-Germain has always
238 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
convinced himself of his intellectual superiority
because of his material superiority. Everything in
France has convinced him of this because since the
establishment of the Faubourg Saint-Germain — an
aristocratic revolution which began on the day the
monarchy left Versailles — the Faubourg Saint-Ger-
main has, allowing for a few lapses, always leaned
upon power, which will always be in France more
or less Faubourg Saint-Germain. Hence its defeat
in 1830. At that epoch it was like an army operat-
ing without a base. It had not profited by the
peace to plant itself in the heart of the nation. It
sinned from a defect of instruction, and from a total
inability to survey the whole field of its interests.
It killed a certain future in favor of a doubtful pres-
ent. This, perhaps, was the reason of this false
policy: the physical and moral distance which this
superior class endeavored to maintain between
itself and the rest of the nation has fatally had for
its only result, in the last forty years, the develop-
\ ment in the upper class of a personal sentiment at
1 the expense of the patriotism of caste. Formerly,
when the French nobility were great, rich and pow-
erful, the gentlemen knew how in moments of dan-
ger to choose their leaders and to obey them. As
they became less eminent they showed themselves
less capable of discipline; and, as in the Later Em-
pire, each one wished to be Emperor; perceiving
their equality in weakness each fancied himself
individually superior. Every family ruined by the
Revolution and by the equal division of property
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 239
thought only of itself instead of considering the
whole great family of the aristocracy, and fancied
that if each were enriched the whole body would
be strong. An error. Wealth is but a sign of
power. These families, composed of persons who
preserved the lofty traditions of courtesy, of true
elegance, of pure language, of reserve and of a noble
pride, as became their state — qualities which
become petty when made the chief occupation of
an existence to which they should only be acces-
sory,— all these families had a certain intrinsic
worth which, judged superficially, left them in ap-
pearance only a nominal value. Not one of these
families has had the courage to ask itself, "Are
we strong enough to hold supreme power ? " They
flung themselves down as the lawyers did in 1830.
Instead of showing itself as a protector like a gran-
dee, the Faubourg Saint-Germain was grasping like
a parvenu. The day on which it was demonstrated
to the most intelligent nation in the world that the
restored nobility had organized power and the
budget for its own profit, that day the nobility
received a mortal wound. It wished to be an aris-
tocracy when it was no longer capable of being any-
thing but an oligarchy, — two widely different
systems, as will be comprehended by any man
clever enough to read intelligently the patronymic
names of the lords of the Upper Chamber. Un-
doubtedly the royal government was well inten-
tioned ; but it constantly forgot that it was necessary
to make everything for the best for the people, even
240 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
their own happiness, and that France, that capri-
cious female, will be made happy or beaten in her
own way. Had there been many dukes like the
Due de Laval, whose modesty made him worthy of
his name, the throne of the eldest branch would
have become as firm as that of the House of Han-
over. In 1814, and above all in 1820, the French
nobility had to rule the best informed epoch, the
most aristocratic middle-class, and the most femi-
nine nation in the world. The Faubourg Saint-
Germain could have easily led and amused a mid-
dle-class intoxicated with worldly distinctions,
enamored of art and science. But the petty leaders
of this great epoch of intelligence hated all the art
and the sciences. They did not even know how
to present religion, of which they stood greatly in
need, under the poetic colors which would have
made it beloved. While Lamartine, Lamennais,
Montalembert and other writers whose talents were
lit with poetry renewed or uplifted religious ideas,
all those who were bungling the government made
the bitterness of religion to be felt. Never was a
nation more amenable, it was at that time like a
woman who weary of resisting becomes complacent;
never was power more awkward and blundering; —
France and womankind love real faults better. To
reinstate itself, to found a great oligarchy, the
nobility of the Faubourg should have searched in
good faith to find in its own pockets the coins of
Napoleon, should have eviscerated itself if neces-
sary to give birth to a constitutional Richelieu; if
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 241
this genius was not to be found within itself, it
should have gone to seek it even in the cold garret
where it might be dying, and have assimilated it,
as the English House of Lords constantly assimi-
lates to itself the new creations of the aristoc-
racy, — then to have required of this man implac-
able firmness, the pruning off all the dead branches,
the trimming down to the ground of the tree of the
aristocracy. But in the first place, the great system
of English Toryism is too immense for little heads;
and its importation would have taken too much time
for the French, for whom a gradual success is no
more than a. fiasco. Moreover, far from having that
redeeming policy which seeks strength wherever
God himself has put it, these little-great personages
hated all strength outside of their own; in short,
far from renewing its youth, the Faubourg Saint-
Germain grew aged. Etiquette, an institution of
secondary importance, could have been maintained
if kept for great occasions ; but etiquette became a
daily warfare, and instead of being merely a matter
of art or of magnificence, it became a question of
the maintenance of power. If at first the throne
was in need of one of those counselors equal to the
importance of the circumstances, the Aristocracy
lacked above all that due knowldege of its own
general interests which might have supplied all
other deficiencies. It came to a halt before the
marriage of Monsieur de Talleyrand, the only man
with one of those metallic heads in which are forged
anew the political systems capable of gloriously
16
242 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
reviving the nations. The Faubourg mocked at
ministers who were not nobles, and furnished no
nobles capable of being ministers; it might have
rendered veritable service to the country by raising
the status of the justices of the peace, by fertil-
izing the soil, by constructing roads and canals, by
making itself an active territorial power; but it
sold its estates to gamble on the Bourse. It might
have drawn from the bourgeoisie men of action and
of talent, whose ambition undermined its power, by
opening to them its ranks; it preferred to combat
them, and without arms; for it now possessed only
as a tradition, that which it had formerly held in
reality. For the misfortune of this nobility, it
retained precisely enough of its various fortunes to
sustain its haughty pride. Content with these
souvenirs, not one of these families thought seri-
ously of selecting arms for their eldest sons among
the fasces which the nineteenth century threw down
in the public place. Their youth, excluded from
public affairs, danced at the balls of Madame,
instead of continuing at Paris under the influence
of the fresh, young, conscientious talents of the
Empire and of the Republic, the work which the
chiefs of each of these families should have begun
in all departments by there conquering acknowledg-
ment of their titles by continual demands in favor
of local interests, by conforming to the spirit of the
age, by remodeling their caste according to the
demands of the century. Concentrated in its Fau-
bourg Saint-Germain, where still dwelt the spirit
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 243
of old feudal opposition mingled with that of the old
Court, the aristocracy, only slightly connected with
the Tuileries, was more easily vanquished, exist-
ing as it did only on one ground, and, above all, as
badly constituted as it was in the Chamber of
Peers. Had it become an integral part of the
country, it would have been indestructible; but
cornered in its Faubourg, backed against the chateau,
spread on the budget, one blow of the axe was
sufficient to cut the thread of its expiring life,
and the flat figure of a petty lawyer came forward
to deal this stroke of the axe. Notwithstanding the
fine speech of Monsieur Royer-Collard, the heredi-
tary rights of the peerage and its entailed estates
fell before the pasquinades of a man who boasted
that he had saved many heads from the executioner,
but who now killed, awkwardly enough, great insti-
tutions. There may be found in this warnings and
instruction for the future. If the French oligarchy
is to have no future life there would be an inexpres-
sibly sad cruelty in thus torturing it after its death,
and there should be thought only to bury it with
honors; but if the scalpel of the surgeons is sharp
to feel, it often gives life to the dying. The Fau-
bourg Saint-Germain may find itself more powerful
under persecution than it ever was in its triumph,
— if it find for itself a head and a system.
At present, it is easy to sum up this semi-politi-
cal sketch. This lack of broad views and this vast
assemblage of small errors; the desire of reestab-
lishing large fortunes with which everyone was
244 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
preoccupied; a real need of a creed to sustain politi-
cal action ; a thirst for pleasure which lowered the
religious tone, and necessitated hypocrisies; the
partial opposition of certain nobler spirits who saw
clearly and who were displeased by the rivalries of
the Court; the nobility of the provinces, often
purer of race than the Court nobles, but who, too
often slighted, became disaffected, — all these causes
combined to give the Faubourg Saint-Germain the
most discordant elements. It was neither compact
in system nor consistent in its acts, neither truly
moral nor openly licentious, neither corrupted nor
corrupting; it did not wholly abandon the questions
which worked to its injury and it did not adopt
ideas which might have saved it. In short, how-
ever weak its personality may have been, the
party was nevertheless armed with all those grand
principles which are the life of nations. There-
fore, how was it that it perished in its vigor.? It
was exacting in its selection of those whom it
received; it had good taste, much elegant supercili-
ousness; yet its fall had certainly nothing of the
brilliant or chivalric about it. The emigration of
'89 was brought about by strong sentiments ; the
domestic emigration of 1830 only by self-interest.
The names of some men illustrious in literature, the
triumphs of oratory. Monsieur de Talleyrand in the
congresses, the conquest of Algiers, and certain
names which became again historic on battle-
fields, — all these revealed to the aristocracy of France
the means which remained to it to nationalize itself
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 245
and to win back the recognition of its rights, if only
it would deign to take them. In all organized
beings there is manifested the workings of an
inward harmony. If a man is lazy, indolence
betrays itself in every one of his movements. In
like manner the physiognomy of a class conforms to
its general spirit, to the soul which animates its
body. Under the Restoration the woman of the
Faubourg Saint-Germain displayed neither the
proud hardihood which the ladies of the Court for-
merly carried into their transgressions, nor the
modest dignity of the tardy virtues with which
they expiated their faults, and which diffused
around them such a vivid lustre. She had nothing
that was very frivolous, nothing that was very
grave. Her passions, with a few exceptions, were
hypocritical ; she made terms, as it were, with
their enjoyment. A few of these families lived the
bourgeoise life of the Duchesse d'Orleans, whose '^^
conjugal bed was so absurdly shown to visitors of
the Palais-Royale ; two or three kept up with diffi-
culty the habits of the Regency and inspired a sort
of disgust in women more adroit than they. This
new great lady had no influence whatever on the
manners of the times; she could have nevertheless
done much, she could, in despair of cause, have
offered the imposing spectacle of the women of the
English aristocracy; but she hesitated stupidly
among her old traditions, was devout from compul-
sion, and concealed everything, even her good qual-
ities. Not one of these French women could create
A-vi'^
246 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
a salon to which the leaders of society might come
to acquire lessons in taste and elegance. Their
voices, once so potent in literature — that living
expression of all societies — were now absolutely
without sound. When a literature has no general
system it has no body, and disappears with its day.
Whenever, in any age, there is found in the midst
of a nation a body of people apart, thus constituted,
the historian nearly always finds among them some
principal personage who illustrates in himself the
virtues and the defects of the society to which he
belongs, — Coligny among the Huguenots, the Coad-
jutor in the bosom of the Fronde, the Marechal de
Richelieu under Louis XV., Danton in the Terror.
This identity of physiognomy between a man and
his historical train is in the nature of things. To
lead parties, must we not be in harmony with their
ideas? to shine in an epoch, must we not represent
it? From this constant obligation laid upon the
sagacious and prudent leaders of the people to con-
sider the prejudices and follies of the masses which
follow them, come the acts for which certain his-
torians blame these leaders, when — at a safe dis-
tance from terrible popular convulsions — they judge
in cold blood the passions which are most necessary
to conduct great secular struggles. That which is
true of the historical comedy of the ages is equally
true in the narrower sphere of those partial scenes
in the national drama which are called its manners
and customs.
At the beginning of the ephemeral life which
the Faubourg Saint-Germain led under the Restora-
tion, and to which — if the preceding considerations
are true — it did not know how to give stability, a
young woman was for a time the most com-
plete type of the nature, at once superior and fee-
ble, grand and petty, of her caste. She was a
woman artificially educated, really ignorant; full of
elevated sentiments, yet lacking one thought to
bring them into co-ordination; expending the
richest treasures of her soul on conventionalities;
ready to defy society, but hesitating and falling
into artifice as the natural consequence of her scru- < Iv^*'-''
pies; having more positiveness than character,
more infatuation than enthusiasm, more head than
heart; eminently a woman and eminently a co-
quette, above all Parisian; loving brilliancy, fes^
tivities; reflecting not at all, or reflecting too late;
of an imprudence which came near being poetical ;
charmingly insolent, but humble in the depths of her
heart; asserting strength like a reed erect, but like
this reed ready to bend beneath a strong hand; talk-
ing much of religion, yet not loving it, and yet
ready to accept it as an issue. How shall we
explain a creature so veritably many-sided, capable
of heroism, and forgetting to be heroic for the sake
of uttering some malicious saying; young and
(247)
248 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
agreeable, less old in heart than aged by the max-
ims of the world about her, and comprehending
their egotistical philosophy without ever having
applied it; having all the vices of the courtier
and all the nobility of adolescent womanhood; dis-
trusting all things, and yet yielding herself up at
moments to the fulness of faith ? Must not forever
remain this unfinished portrait of this woman, in
which the most changeable tints clashed while yet
producing a poetic confusion, for there was in it a
divine light, a gleam of youth, which blended these
confused tints into a sort of harmonious whole?
Her grace served her for unity. Nothing in her
was feigned. These passions, these half-passions,
these slight indications of grandeur, this reality of
pettiness, these cold feelings and these warm im-
pulses, were natural to her and sprang as much from
her personal position as from that of the aristocracy
to which she belonged. She alone fully compre-
^ hended herself, and she held herself proudly above
the world, in the shelter of her great name. There
was something of the / of Medea in her life, as in
that of the aristocracy, which was dying without
being willing to rouse itself, or extend its hand to
any political physician, or to touch, or to be
touched, so profoundly did it feel itself fainting or
already dust. The Duchesse de Langeais, as she
was named, had been married about four years at
the consummation of the Restoration, that is to
say in 1816, that epoch in which Louis XVllI., en-
lightened by the revolution of the Hundred-Days,
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 249
comprehended his situation and his century, in spite
of his advisers, who nevertheless triumphed later
over this Louis XI. without an axe — as soon as he
was struck down by disease. The Duchesse de Lan-
geais was a Navarreins, a ducal family which from
the time of Louis XIV. had maintained the principle
of never abdicating its own title in its marriages.
The daughters of this house were all to have,
sooner or later, like their mother, the right to be
seated in the royal presence. At the age of eighteen
Antoinette de Navarreins issued from the deep
seclusion in which she had been brought up to
marry the eldest son of the Due de Langeais. The
two families were then living isolated from the
world; but the invasion of France promised to the
Royalists the return of the Bourbons as the only
possible conclusion to the misfortunes of war. The
Dues de Navarreins and de Langeais, remaining
faithful to the Bourbons, had nobly resisted all the
seductions of the imperial glory, and in the circum-
stances in which they found themselves at the
period of this marriage they were naturally obliged
to follow the ancient policy of their families.
Mademoiselle Antoinette de Navarreins, beautiful
and poor, was therefore married to the Marquis de
Langeais, whose father died a few months after this
marriage. On the return of the Bourbons the two
families resumed their rank, their functions, and
their court dignities, and again entered the social
world from which they had long held themselves
aloof. They now stood at the summit of this new
2 50 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
political world. In that period of cowardice and of
false conversions the public conscience was gratified
to recognize in these two families spotless fidelity,
the harmony between private life and political
character to which all parties render involuntary
homage. But, by a misfortune not uncommon in
times of transformation, the most upright person-
ages, those who by the elevation of their views,
the wisdom of their principles, would have brought
about in France a belief in the generosity of a new
and bold policy, were pushed aside from the conduct
of affairs, which fell into the hands of those who
were interested in carrying principles to an extreme
as a pledge of their devotion. The de Langeais'
andde Navarreins' families remained in the highest
sphere of court life, condemned to the duties of its
etiquette as well as exposed to the reproaches and
the ridicule of liberalism, accused of gorging them-
selves with honors and wealth while in point of
fact their patrimony had in no wise increased and
their receipts from the civil list were consumed by
the mere cost of appearance, — a necessity in all
European monarchies, even in those which are
republican. In 1818, Monsieur le Due de Langeais
held the command of a military division, and the
duchess had a position with a princess which en-
abled her to live in Paris, far from her husband,
without scandal. The due had in addition to his
command, a function at Court, to which he some-
times came, leaving on such occasions his command
to a field marshal. The due and the duchesse thus
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 25 1
lived entirely separated from each other, both in
fact and in heart, though unknown to the world.
This marriage of convention had resulted as such
family compacts usually do. Two characters, the
most uncongenial in the world, were brought
together, they secretly irritated each other, were
both secretly wounded, and separated forever.
Then each had followed his own nature and the
habits of the world. The Due de Langeais, as
methodical in mind as the Chevalier de Folard,
gave himself up systematically to his tastes and his
pleasures, and left his wife free to follow her own,
after having recognized in her an eminently proud
spirit, a cold heart, a deep submission to the usages
of the world, a youthful loyalty which was likely to
remain unsullied under the eyes of her great rela-
.ives and in the atmosphere of a Court at once
pious and prudish. He adopted then, deliberately
and coolly, the part of a grand seigneur of the pre-
ceding century, abandoning to herself a young
woman of twenty-two, deeply offended, and who
had in her character an alarming quality, that of
never pardoning an offense when all her feminine
vanities, when her self-love, her virtues, perhaps,
had been misunderstood, secretly wounded. When
an outrage is public, a woman likes to forget it, it
gives her an opportunity to exalt herself, she is a
woman in her forgiveness ; but they never forgive
secret wrongs, because they love neither concealed
cowardice, nor virtue, nor love.
Such was the position, unknown to the world.
252 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
in which Madame la Duchesse de Langeais found
herself, and on which she wasted no reflections
when the fetes in honor of the marriage of the Due
de Berri took place. On this occasion the Court
and the Faubourg Saint-Germain came out of their
apathy and their reserve. This event was the real
commencement of that unheard-of splendor so use-
lessly displayed by the government of the Restora-
tion. At this period, the Duchesse de Langeais,
from policy or from vanity, never appeared in the
world without being surrounded or accompanied by
three or four women as distinguished by their names
as by their position. Queen of society, she had
her ladies-in-waiting who reproduced elsewhere her
manners and her wit. She had skilfully chosen
them from among those who were closely allied
neither with the Court nor with the Faubourg
Saint-Germain, but who aspired to both positions;
simple dominions which wished to elevate them-
selves to the edge of the throne and to mingle with
the seraphic powers of that high sphere called le
Petit Chateau. In such a position, the Duchesse de
Langeais was stronger, ruled better and, moreover,
was more secure. Her ladies defended her against
calumny and aided her to play the contemptible role
of a woman of fashion. She could at her ease laugh
at men, at their passions, excite them, gather in
the homage which nourishes all female natures,
and remain mistress of herself. At Paris and in the
highest circles woman is always woman; she lives
by incense, flatteries and honors. The truest
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 253
beauty, the most admirable face, is nothing if it is
not admired ; a lover, the sycophancy of adulation,
are the attestations of her power. What is power
if unknown ? Nothing. The very prettiest woman
alone in a corner of the salon is unhappy. When
one of these creatures is at the centre of social
magnificence she desires then to reign in all hearts,
often from lack of power to be the happy sovereign
in one alone. These toilets, these charms, these
coquetries, were all provided for the most paltry
beings that were ever found in any society, fops
without mind, men whose sole merit was a hand-
some face, and for whom all women compromised
themselves without profit; veritable idols of wood
gilded, which, with a few exceptions, had neither
the antecedents of the coxcombs in the days of the
^-'ronde, nor the good solid value of the heroes of
the Empire, nor the wit and manners of their grand-
fathers, but who assumed nevertheless to possess
these advantages gratis; who were brave, as is
the French youth; they had ability, doubtless, if
put to the proof, but they could accomplish nothing
under the reign of the worn-out old men who held
them in leash. It was a cold, petty and unpoetical
epoch. Perhaps it requires a good deal of time for
a restoration to become a monarchy.
For eighteen months the Duchesse de Langeais
had been leading this empty life, filled exclusively
with balls, and visits concerning balls, with tri- /
umphs without an object, with ephemeral passions
born and dead in a night. When she entered a
2 54 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
room all eyes turned upon her, she gathered a har-
vest of flattering words, sometimes passionate
expressions which she encouraged with a gesture,
a glance, and which could never penetrate her fair
exterior. Her tone, her manner, everything about
her marked authority. She lived in a sort of fever
of vanity, of perpetual amusement which made her
giddy. In her conversation she would go to great
lengths, she listened to everything, and depraved —
so to speak — the surface of her heart. When alone
she often blushed over the recollection of things at
which she had laughed, of some scandalous story
the details of which had aided her in discussing
theories of love of which she knew nothing, and
the subtle distinctions of modern passion which
obliging hypocrites of her own sex explained to her ;
for women, able to say everything to each other,
lose more among themselves than they do by men's
corruption. There came a time when she compre-
hended that the woman beloved was the only one
whose beauty, whose spirit, could be universally
recognized. What did a husband prove? Merely
that a young girl, a woman either with a rich por-
tion or well brought up, had had a clever mother, or
that she satisfied a man's ambition; but a lover is
a constant announcement of her personal perfec-
tions. Madame de Langeais learned, young as she
was, that a woman could allow herself to be loved
ostensibly without sharing in love, without sanc-
tioning it, without gratifying it except by the most
meagre service of love, and more than one demure
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 255
hypocrite revealed to her the method of playing
these dangerous comedies. The duchess therefore
had her court, and the number of those who adored
her or courted her was a guarantee of her virtue.
She was coquettish, gracious, seductive to the end
of the fete, of the ball, of the soiree; then when the
curtain fell she became again solitary, cold, care-
less, and yet, nevertheless, revived the next morn-
ing for other emotions equally superficial. There
were two or three young men, completely deceived,
who really loved her, and whom she derided with a
perfect lack of feeling. She would say to herself "I
am loved — he loves me!" This certainty sufficed
her. Like the miser, content in the knowledge
that his whims can be satisfied, she did not go, per-
haps, so far as to desire.
One evening she was at the house of one of her
intimate friends, Madame la Vicomtesse de Fon-
taine, one of her humble rivals, who hated her cor-
dially and accompanied her everywhere;— a species
of armed friendship in which each is suspicious,
and in which the confidences are skilfully discreet,
sometimes perfidious. After distributing a few
patronizing recognitions, affectionate or disdainful,
with the natural air of a woman who knows all the
value of her smiles, her eyes chanced to fall upon
a man wholly unknown to her, but whose large and
grave figure surprised her. She felt in looking at
him, an emotion sufficiently like that of fear.
"My dear," she asked of Madame de Maufrig-
neuse, "who is that newcomer?"
256 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"A man of whom you have no doubt heard, the
Marquis de Montriveau. "
"Ah! it is he."
She took her eyeglass and examined him some-
what insolently, as she would have looked at a por-
trait which receives all glances and can return none.
"Present him to me, he must be amusing."
"No one could be more tiresome nor more gloomy,
my dear. But he is all the fashion."
Monsieur Armandde Montriveau was at this time,
though unaware of it, the object of a general curios-
ity, and he was worthy of it much more than any of
those passing idols of which Paris has need and with
which it is enamored for a few days in order to sat-
isfy that passion of infatuation and of factious en-
thusiasm with which it is periodically afflicted.
Armand de Montriveau was the only son of General
de Mon+riveau, one of those ci-devant who nobly
served the Republic, and who fell, killed by the side
of Joubert, at Novi. The orphan was placed
through the care of Bonaparte in the military school
at Chalons, and taken, with several other sons of
generals killed in battle, under the protection of the
French Republic. On leaving this school, without
fortune, he entered the artillery, and was only in
command of a battalion at the time of the disaster
of Fontainebleau. The arm to which he belonged
offered few chances of promotion. In the first place,
the number of officers is more limited than in any
other branch of the service; in the second the lib-
eral, and almost republican, opinions prevalent
among the artillery, the fears inspired in the Em-
peror's mind by a body of skilled men, accustomed
to reflection, hindered the military fortunes of the
most of them. Therefore, contrary to the usual
rule, officers advanced to the grade of general were
17 (257)
258 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
not always the most distinguished members of this
arm, for, being mediocrities, they gave rise to
fewer fears. The artillery was a corps apart in the
army, and belonged to Napoleon only on the field
of battle. To these general causes which may
explain the checks encountered in his career by
Armand de Montriveau, were joined others inherent
in his person and his character. Alone in the
world, thrown at the age of twenty years into that
tempest of men in the midst of which Napoleon
lived, and having no interest outside of himself,
prepared to meet death day by day, he accustomed
himself to live only by an inward esteem and by
the consciousness of duty fulfilled. He was habit-
ually silent, as are all timid men; but his timidity
did not come from lack of courage, it was a sort of
modesty which forbade in him all vain demonstra-
tion. His intrepidity on the battle-field was never
ostentatious; he saw everything, could tranquilly
give good advice to his comrades, and advance in
face of the bullets, stooping at the right moment to
avoid them. He was kind, but his countenance
made him seem haughty and severe. Of mathe-
matical strictness in everything, he admitted no
hypocritical compromise, neither with the duties of
a position nor with the consequences of a deed. He
lent himself to nothing shameful, never asked any-
thing for himself; in short, he was one of those
great unknown men, philosophical enough to despise
glory, and who live without attachment to life be-
cause they find no way to develop their powers or
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 259
their opinions to their full extent. He was feared,
held in esteem, but little loved. Men will permit
us indeed to rise above them, but they will never
forgive us for not descending to their level. Thus
their sentiments towards great characters are never
without a little of hatred and of fear. To be too
honorable is for them a tacit censure, which they
forgive neither to the living nor the dead. After
the parting at Fontainebleau, Montriveau, though
noble and titled, was placed on half pay. His
antique integrity alarmed the ministry of war,
where his faithfulness to his oath taken to the
imperial eagle was well known. During the Hun-
dred-Days he was appointed colonel of the Guard,
and was left behind on the field of Waterloo. His
wounds having detained him in Belgium, he was
not with the army of the Loire; but the royal gov-
ernment refused to recognize the ranks bestowed
during the Hundred-Days, and Armand de Montri-
veau left France. Led by his spirit of enterprise,
by that nobility of mind which up to this time the
chances of war had satisfied, and possessed by his
instinctive rectitude to undertake projects of great
utility. General de Montriveau embarked in the
design of exploring Upper Egypt and the unknown
parts of Africa, the central countries particularly,
which to-day excite so much interest among men of
science. His scientific expedition was long and
unfortunate. He had gathered many valuable notes
which would have aided in the solution, so ardently
sought for, of many geographical or industrial
260 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
problems, and he had penetrated, not without having
surmounted innumerable obstacles, to the heart of
Africa, when he fell by treason into the power of a
savage tribe. He was stripped of everything, held
in slavery, and driven for two years across the
deserts, threatened with death at every moment
and treated worse than an animal made the sport of
pitiless children. His bodily strength and his con-
stancy of soul enabled him to endure all the horrors
of his captivity ; but he almost completely exhausted
his energy in effecting his escape, which was noth-
ing less than miraculous. He reached the French
settlement of the Senegal half-dead, in rags, having
no longer anything but confused recollections. The
immense sacrifices of his journey, the study of
African dialects, his discoveries and observations,
were all lost. A single fact will serve to illustrate
his sufferings: During several days the children of
the Sheik of the tribe in which he was a slave
amused themselves by taking his head for the tar-
get in a game which consisted of throwing from a
sufficient distance the small bones of horses and
making them stick in this target. Montriveau re-
turned to Paris about the middle of the year 1818,
ruined in prospects, without patrons and seeking
none. He would have died twenty times rather
than solicit a favor, no matter what it might be, not
even the recognition of his own rights. Adversity
and suffering had developed his energy even in
\ small things, and the habit of maintaining his dig-
nity as a man in presence of that moral being
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 261
which we call conscience, gave importance in his
mind to acts apparently the most insignificant.
Nevertheless, his connection with the principal
scientific men of Paris and with a few military men
of attainments made known his merits and his
adventures. The particulars of his captivity and
his escape, those of all his travels in fact, revealed
so much intelligence, courage and self-possession
that he acquired, without being aware of it, that
fleeting celebrity of which the salons of Paris are
so prodigal, but which demands unheard-of efforts
from those artists who may wish to perpetuate it
Toward the end of this year his position suddenly
changed. From poor he became rich, or at least he
had all the external advantages of wealth. The
royal government, which sought to attach to itself
the men of merit in order to give real strength to
the army, began to make some concessions to those
old officers whose loyalty and known character
offered guarantees of fidelity. Monsieur de Montr i-
veau was reestablished in his rank on the army
lists, received all his back pay, and was admitted
to the Royal Guard. These favors were succes-
sively shown to him without any request on his
part. His friends spared him all personal efforts,
which he certainly would never have made for him-
self. Then, contrary to his habits, which suddenly
changed, he began to go into society, where he was
favorably received and where he met on all sides
evidences of high esteem. He seemed to have
reached some end in his life; but in him all took
262 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
place within his own breast and he made no exter-
na! demonstration. He bore in society a grave
and reserved manner, he was silent and cold. He
had therein much success, just because he presented
a sharp contrast to the mass of conventional
physiognomies which furnished the salons of Paris,
—where, in fact, he was entirely strange. His
speech had the conciseness of the language of soli-
tary men and savages. His shyness was taken for
pride and pleased greatly. He was something
strange and grand, and women were so much the
more generally taken with this original character
because he escaped from their adroit flatteries,
from those manoeuvres by which they circumvent
the most powerful men and soften the most inflexi-
ble minds. Monsieur de Montriveau did not in the
least understand these little Parisian tricks, and his
soul could only respond to the sonorous vibrations
of lofty sentiments. He would promptly have been
dropped were it not for the romance of his adven-
tures and his life, for the praises which were
sounded behind his back without his knowledge,
and for that triumph of vanity which was waiting
for the woman who was destined to occupy his
thoughts. Thus the curiosity of the Duchesse de
Langeais was as lively as it was natural. As it
happened, she had become interested in this man
the night before, for she had heard the narration of
one of the scenes in the travels of Monsieur de
Montriveau which was most calculated to impress
the lively imagination of a woman. In an excursion
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAFS 263
toward the sources of the Nile, he had with one
of his guides the most extraordinary struggle known
in the annals of travel. There was a desert
which could only be crossed on foot in order to
reach a region he was anxious to explore. There
was but one guide capable of leading him there.
Up to that time no traveler had been able to pene-
trate to this region, in which the intrepid officer
believed he should find the solution of several
scientific problems. In spite of the representations
made to him by the old men of the country and by
his guide, he undertook this terrible journey. Arm-
ing himself with all his courage, sharpened more-
over by the assurance of the terrible difficulties to
overcome, he started early one morning. After
marching for the entire day he slept that night upon
the sand, a prey to an extraordinary fatigue caused
by the shiftiness of the sand, which gave way under
his foot at every step. However, he knew that on
the morrow he must resume his route, and his guide
had assured him that by the middle of the day he
should reach his goal. This assurance gave him
courage and renewed his strength, and in spite of
his sufferings he continued his march, cursing
science a little, but, ashamed to complain openly
before his guide, he kept his sufferings secret. He
had traveled for a third of the day when, conscious
of his exhausted strength and with his feet bleed-
ing from the journey, he asked if they would soon
arrive. "In an hour," said the guide. Armand
roused his strength for one hour more, and went on.
264 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
The hour passed by and he was not able to see,
even on the horizon, a horizon of sand as broad as
that of the open sea, the palm trees and the mount-
ains whose tops should announce the end of his
journey. He stopped, refused to go farther, threat-
ened his guide, reproached him as his murderer, for
having deceived him; tears of rage and of fatigue
ran down his scorched cheeks; he was overwhelmed
with the increasing suffering of the march and his
throat seemed closing with the thirst of the desert.
The guide, unmoved, listened to his reproaches
with an ironical air while seeming to study, with
the apparent indifference of an Oriental, the imper-
ceptible irregularities of the sand, almost blackish
like burnished gold.
"I was mistaken," he said coldly. "It is too
long since I have followed this road for me to be
able to recognize the landmarks; we are in the
right way, but we shall have to march two hours
more."
"The man is doubtless right," thought Monsieur
de Montr iveau.
Then he resumed his route, following painfully
the pitiless African, to whom he seemed tied by a
rope, as a condemned man is invisibly to his execu-
tioner. But the two hours passed, the Frenchman
had expended the last drops of his energy and the
horizon was still clear, he saw on it neither palms
nor mountains. He had no strength left for cries
or murmurs, he stretched himself on the sand to
die; but his look might have terrified the most
M. DE MOXTRIVEAU AND HIS GUIDE
The tiuo hours passed, the Frenchman had ex-
pended the last drops of /us energy and the horizon
was still clear, he sazv on it neither palms nor moun-
tains. He had no strength left for cries or murmnrs,
he stretched himself on the sand to die ; Init his look
might have terrified the most intrepid man, it seemed
to annotince that he ivoiild not die alone. His guide,
like a veritable demon, replied luith a calm glance,
full of pozuer.
'^6y<^^^'A./i^ /*S6jy '.OilS.
=te
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 265
intrepid man, it seemed to announce that he would
not die alone. His guide, like a veritable demon,
replied with a calm glance, full of power, and left
him where he lay, — taking care to place himself at
a distance which would permit him to escape his
victim's despair. Finally, Monsieur de Montriveau
gathered his strength for a last imprecation. The
guide drew nearer, looked at him fixedly, motioned
him to silence, and said:
"Did you not insist, in spite of us, on going to
the place to which I am now guiding you.? You
reproach me with deceiving you; if I had not done
so, you would not have come as far as this. Do
you wish for the truth, here it is. We have still
five hours of march before us, and we cannot turn
back on our steps. Sound your heart, if you have
not enough courage, here is my poniard."
Surprised by this frightful comprehension of
suffering and of human strength. Monsieur de Montri-
veau would not fall below the standard of a barba-
rian; and, drawing from his European pride a fresh
draught of courage, he rose to follow his guide. The
five hours passed by. Monsieur de Montriveau still
perceived nothing, he turned a dying eye upon his
guide; but at the same moment the Nubian took
him on his shoulders, lifted him up a few feet and
showed him at the distance of a hundred steps a
lake surrounded by verdure and a noble forest lit
up by the rays of the setting sun. They had
arrived within a short distance of an immense
granite ledge beneath which this sublime landscape
266 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
lay, as it were, buried. Armand felt himself born
again, and his guide, this giant of intelligence and
courage, ended his labor of devotion by carrying
him across the burning and polished paths scarcely
traced on the granite. He saw on one side the hell
of sand and on the other the terrestrial paradise of
the most beautiful oasis in these deserts.
The duchess, already struck by the aspect of this
romantic personage, was still more interested when
she learned that she saw in him the Marquis de
Montriveau of whom she had dreamed during the
night. To have found herself in the burning
sands of the desert with him, to have had him
for the companion of her nightmare, was not this
for a woman of her nature a delightful presage of
amusement? No man ever better expressed his
character in his person than Armand de Montri-
veau, or challenged more inevitably the thoughts of
others. His head, which was large and square,
had for its principal characteristic trait an enor-
mous and abundant mass of black hair which sur-
rounded his face in a way that perfectly recalled
General Kleber, whom he also resembled by the
vigor expressed in his forehead, by the shape of
his face, by the tranquil courage of his eyes, and
by the ardor expressed in his strong features. He
was small of stature, broad in the chest, muscular
as a lion. When he walked, his carriage, his step,
his least gesture, indicated an inexpressible con-
sciousness of power which was imposing and had
something despotic in it. He seemed to know that
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 267
nothing could oppose his will, perhaps because he
willed only that which was right. Nevertheless, \
like all men really strong, he was gentle in his *
speech, simple in manner and naturally kind.
Only it seemed that all these fine qualities might
disappear under certain grave circumstances in '
which the man would become implacable in his con-
victions, fixed in his resolves, terrible in his action.
A close observer would have been able to see at the
closing line of his lips a slight upward curve which
was habitual and which betrayed his disposition to
irony.
*
The Duchesse de Langeais, knowing the passing
value of the conquest of such a man, resolved, during
the few moments that the Duchesse de Maufrigneuse
took to bring him up for presentation, to make him
one of her lovers, to give him precedence over all
the others, to attach him to her suite and to display
for him all her coquetry. It was a whim, the pure
caprice of a duchess with which Lope de Vega or_
Calderon would have made The Gardener's Dog. She
resolved that this man should belong to no other
woman, but she did not imagine that she might
belong to him. The Duchesse de Langeais had
received from nature all the qualities necessary to
play the role of a coquette and her education had
perfected them. Women had good reason to envy
her, and men to love her. Nothing was lacking in
her which could inspire love, which could justify it,
and which could perpetuate it. Her style of beauty,
her address, her attitudes, all combined to give her
the grace of natural coquetry which in a woman
seems to be the consciousness of her power. She
was well formed and her movements perhaps had
in them a little too much ease, the only affectation
with which she could be reproached. Everything
about her was in harmony, from the least little
gesture to the particular turn of her phrases, to the
hypocritical manner in which she launched her
(269)
270 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
glances. The predominating character of her coun-
tenance was a refined nobleness, which did not
destroy her entirely French mobility of person.
These ever changing attitudes had an infinite charm
for men. It seemed as though she would be the
most delicious of mistresses when she laid aside
her corset and all the paraphernalia of her outward
show. In fact, the germs of all the joys of love
were in the freedom of her expressive glance, in
the caressing tones of her voice, in the grace of her
words. She let it be seen that there was in her a
noble courtesan, vainly denied by the religion of
the duchess. Whoever passed an evening beside
her found her alternately gay and melancholy,
without her ever having the air of pretended gaiety
or gravity. She seemed able to be at will cour-
teous, contemptuous, sarcastic or confiding. She
seemed kind, and really was so. In her position,
nothing obliged her to descend to maliciousness.
At times she showed herself alternately trustful and
distrustful, easily moved to tenderness, then hard
and chilling enough to break a heart. But to prop-
erly paint her would it not be necessary to gather
together every feminine antithesis; in a word, she
was everything she wished to be or seem. Her
face, which was perhaps a trifle too long, had in it
a grace, something spiritual, slender, which recalled
the faces of the Middle Ages. Her skin was pale
with delicate rose tints. Everything in her erred,
so to speak, through excessive delicacy.
Monsieur de Montriveau allowed himself very
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 27 1
willingly to be presented to the Duchesse de Lan-
geais who, with the exquisite tact that avoids com-
monplaces, received him without overv/helming
him with questions or compliments, but with a cer-
tain respectful grace which should flatter a superior
man, for superiority in a man implies a little of
that tact which enables women to divine so surely
in all matters of sentiment. If she showed some
curiosity it was only in her glance; if she flattered,
it was only by her manner; and she displayed that
prettiness of speech, that delicate desire to please,
which she knew how to show better than anyone
else. But all her conversation was, in some sort,
only the body of the letter; there was to be a post-
script in which the real thought would be uttered.
When after half an hour of light conversation in
which the accent, the smiles alone, gave any value
to the word. Monsieur de Montriveau seemed to wish
to retire discreetly, the duchess retained him by an
expressive gesture.
"Monsieur," she said to him, "I do not know if
the few moments during which I have had the
pleasure of conversing with you have offered you
sufficient attraction to justify me in inviting you to
come and see me ; 1 am afraid that there would be a
great deal of egotism in wishing to claim you. If
1 have been so happy as to make the prospect agree-
able to you, you will always find me in the evening
until ten o'clock."
These words were said so softly that Monsieur
de Montriveau could do no less than accept the
272 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
invitation. When he fell back among the group of
men who stood at some distance from the women sev-
eral of his friends congratulated him, half in jest and
half in earnest, on the unusual welcome that had
been accorded him by the Duchesse de Langeais.
This difficult, this illustrious conquest they declared
was undoubtedly made, and the glory thereof had
been reserved for the artillery of the Guard. It is
easy to imagine the good and evil pleasantries
which this topic, once launched, suggested in one
of these Parisian salons where amusement is so
eagerly sought and where the jests are of such brief
duration that each one hastens to gather the flower
while it blooms.
These foolishnesses flattered the general uncon-
sciously. From the place where he stationed him-
self his eyes were drawn to the duchess by many
confused impulses; and he could not help admitting
to himself that, of all the women whose beauty had
charmed his eyes, not one had ever offered him a
more delightful expression of the virtues, the de-
fects, the harmonies which the most juvenile imag-
ination in France could desire in a mistress. What
man, in whatever rank fate has placed him, has not
felt in his soul an indefinable joy in finding in a
woman whom he chooses, even in his dreams, for his
own, the triple perfections, moral, physical and
social, which permit him always to see in her all
his wishes accomplished? If it is not a cause of
love, this flattering union of qualities is assuredly
one of the greatest incentives to feeling. Without
LA DUCHESSE AND M. DE MONTRIVEAU
TJic DucJicssc de Langcais, kiioicing the passing
value of the conquest of such a man, resolved * * *
to make him one of her lovers, to give him prece-
dence over all the others, to attach him to her suite
and to display for him all her coquetry. It was a
xvhini, the pure caprice of a duchess ivith zvhich
Lope de Vega or Calderon luould Jiave made The
Gardener's Dog. She resolved that this man should
belong to no other luoman, hut she did not imagine
that she might belong to him.
,fM^ 6/. 3.
Oui(- Fti ju j,, j
U'.i rr^er.
!fac-t
acv^e^ »y ^
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 273
vanity, said a great moralist of the last century,
love is a convalescent. There is undoubtedly, for
man as for woman, a treasure-house of delight in
the superiority of the being beloved. Is it not a
great deal, not to say everything, to know that our
self-love can never be wounded through her ; that
she is sufficiently noble never to be wounded by a
contemptuous glance, sufficiently wealthy to be sur-
rounded by a splendor equal to that in which the
ephemeral sovereigns of finance wrap themselves,
sufficiently witty never to be humiliated by a fine
jest, and beautiful enough to be the rival of all her
sex? Such reflections as these a man makes in a
twinkling of an eye. But if the woman who in-
spires them offers him at the same time, for the
future of his sudden passion, the changing charms
of grace, the ingenuousness of a virgin soul, the
thousand changes of the toilets of coquettes, the
perils of love, will not the heart of the coldest man
be stirred? Here is the situation which Monsieur
de Montriveau occupied at this period with relation
to women, and his past life was in a measure
responsible for the oddness of the circumstance.
Thrown while young into the tempest of the French
wars, living always on fields of battle, he knew
woman only as a hurried traveler passing fiom inn
to inn knows the country through which he travels.
Perhaps he could have said of his life, as Voltaire
at the age of eighty said of his, and had he not
thirty-seven follies with which to reproach himself?
He was, at his age, as new to love as the young
18
274 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
man who has just read Faublas in secret. Of woman,
he knew all ; but of love, he knew nothing; and the
virginity of his sentiment thus furnished him new
desires. Some men, engrossed by labors to which
they have been condemned by poverty or ambition,
art or science, as Monsieur de Montriveau had been
carried away by the fortunes of war and the events
of his life, know this singular situation, though they
seldom avow it In Paris, every man is supposed
to have loved. No woman desires him for whom
no other woman has sighed. From the fear of being
thought an imbecile spring the falsehoods of self-
conceit so common in France, where to be taken for
an imbecile is not to be of the fatherland. At this
moment Monsieur de Montriveau was a prey to a
passionate desire, a desire aggrandized by the burn-
ing sun of the deserts and by a swelling of the heart
of which he had never before known the fiery em-
brace. As strong as he was passionate, this man
knew how to suppress his emotions; but even while
conversing about trifling subjects he withdrew into
his own mind and swore to himself that he would
win that woman, the only thought through which
he could enter into love. His desire became an
oath, sworn after the manner of the Arabs with
whom he had lived, for whom an oath is a con-
tract made between them and their whole destiny,
which they stake on the success of the enterprise
consecrated by the oath, and in which they count
even their death as one chance the more of success.
A young man would have said to himself, "1 would
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 275
very much like to have the Duchesse de Langeais
for my mistress! " another, "The man whom the
Duchesse de Langeais loves will be a very happy
fellow!" But the general said to himself, "I will
have for mistress Madame de Langeais." When a v
man, virgin in heart and for whom love becomes a /
religion, admits such a thought, he does not know /'
into what a hell he sets his foot.
Monsieur de Montriveau left the salon abruptly
and went home, devoured by the first access of his
first fever of love. If, towards middle age, a man
still retains the beliefs, the illusions, the freedom
and the impetuosity of childhood, his first move-
ment is, so to speak, to put forth his hand to seize
the object of his desire; then when he has measured
the distance, almost impossible to cross, which sep-
arates him from it, he is seized, like children, with
a sort of astonishment or of impatience which gives
new value to the object desired; he trembles or he
weeps. Thus it happened that on the morrow,
after the most stormy reflections which had ever
shaken his soul, Armand de Montriveau found him-
self under the dominion of his emotions, concen-
trated by the pressure of a true love. This woman,
so cavalierly treated the night before, had now be-
come for him the most sacred, the most feared of
powers. She was thenceforward for him life and \y
the world. The mere recollection of the slightest
emotion she had caused him paled the greatest
joys, the keenest pains, of his past life. The
most rapid revolutions trouble only the interests of
276 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
man, but one passion can overthrow all his senti-
ments. Thus, for those who live rather by feelings
than by interests, for those who have more of soul
and blood than of mind and lymph, true love changes
the whole course of existence. With one stroke,
with one thought, Armand de Montriveau effaced
his whole past life. After having asked himself
twenty times, like a child, "shall I go.? shall I not
go.?" he dressed and went to the Hotel de Langeais,
about eight in the evening, and was admitted to
the presence of the woman, no, not the woman, but
the idol, he had seen the night before under the
blaze of lights, like a fresh and pure young girl,
clothed in white, in gauze and in veils. He arrived
impetuously to declare his love, as if it were an
affair of the first cannon shot on a field of battle.
Poor neophyte! he found his vaporous sylphid en-
veloped in a peignoir of brown cashmere, skilfully
flounced, languidly lying upon a divan in a dusky
boudoir. Madame de Langeais did not even rise,
she showed only her head, with the hair somewhat
in disorder though covered by a veil. With a hand
which in the faint light produced by the trembling
flame of a single wax candle placed at a distance
from her, seemed to the eyes of Montriveau as
white as a hand of marble, she made him a sign
to be seated, and said in a voice as soft as the
light:
"If it were anyone but you. Monsieur le Marquis,
if it had been a friend with whom I could take a
liberty or some indifferent acquaintance who would
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 277
only slightly interest me, I should have sent you
away. You find me suffering fearfully."
Armand said to himself:
"I must go."
"But," she added with a glance at him the fire
of which the ingenuous soldier attributed to fever,
"I do not know whether it is from a presentiment
of your kind visit, of the promptness of which
I cannot be more sensible, but for the last few
minutes I have seemed to feel my head clear
itself."
"I may then remain?" said Montriveau to
her.
"Ah! I should be sorry indeed to have you go. I
said to myself this morning that I could not have
made any impression upon you; that you had
doubtless taken my invitation for one of those
meaningless phrases of which Parisian women are
so prodigal, and I pardoned your ingratitude in ad-
vance. A man who comes from the desert is not
expected to know how exclusive in its friendships
our Faubourg is."
These gracious words, half murmured, fell one by
one and were as if freighted with the pleased feel-
ing that seemed to dictate them. The duchess
wished to have all the benefits of her headache,
and her speculation was a complete success. The
poor soldier suffered really from the pretended
suffering of this woman. Like Crillon, hearing the
story of the passion of the Saviour, he was ready
to draw his sword against the headache. Ah! how
278 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
could he now dare to speak to this invalid of the
love which she inspired? Armand comprehended
already that he would be ridiculous to fire his love
point-blank at so superior a being. He compre-
hended by one thought all the niceties of feeling
and the exigencies of the soul. To love, is it not
to know how to plead, to crave, to wait? If he felt
this love, must he not prove it? He found himself
silenced, chilled, by the proprieties of the noble
Faubourg, by the majesty of the headache, and by
the timidities of genuine love. But no power on
earth could have veiled the look in his eyes in
which flamed the glow, the infinitude of the desert,
eyes calm like those of panthers, and over which
the lids rarely fell. She liked much this fixed look
which bathed her in light and in love.
"Madame la Duchesse," he replied, "I should
fear to express to you badly my gratitude for your
goodness. At this moment I wish for but one thing,
the power to dissipate your suffering."
"Permit me to get rid of this, I am now too
warm," she said, throwing off by a movement full
of grace the cushion that had lain upon her feet,
which she now showed in all their splendor.
"Madame, in Asia your feet would be valued at
nearly ten thousand sequins."
"Travelers' flattery," she said smiling.
This bright creature took delight in drawing the
stern Montriveau into a conversation full of trifling,
of commonplaces and of nonsense, in which he
manoeuvred, to use a military phrase, like Prince
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 279
Charles when pitted against Napoleon. She
amused herself maliciously in recognizing the
extent of this new passion by the number of foolish
things wrested from this novice whom she led, step
by step, into an inextricable labyrinth in which she
proposed to leave him, very much ashamed of him-
self. She began therefore by laughing at him,
pleasing herself nevertheless by making him forget
the time. The length of a first visit is often a
llattery, but in this Armand was not her accom-
plice. The celebrated traveler had been in her
boudoir an hour, talking of everything, having said
nothing, conscious that he was only an instrument
in the hands of this woman who was playing upon
him, when she moved, sat up, threw around her
neck the veil which she had on her head, leaned
on her elbows, did him the honors of a complete
recovery, and rang for lights. To the absolute inac-
tion in which she had been lying succeeded move-
■nents full of grace. She turned towards Monsieur
Je Montriveau and said in reply to a confidence
which she had just wrung from him and which
seemed to give her a lively interest:
"You are laughing at me when you try to make
me believe that you have never loved. That is a
favorite pretence of men before us. We believe
them. Pure politeness! Do we not know how
much of this to believe? Where is the man who
has never encountered in his life one single occa-
sion to be in love? But you delight to deceive us,
and we let you do it, silly fools that we are,
28o LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
because your deceptions are still a homage paid to
the superiority of our sentiments, which are always
pure."
This last phrase was pronounced with an accent
full of haughtiness and of pride which made of this
novice of a lover a ball flung down to the bottom of
an abyss and of the duchess an angel floating
upward towards her own particular heaven.
"The deuce," cried Armand de Montriveau
within his soul, "how shall I ever tell this far-of/
being that I love her?"
He had already told her so twenty times, or
rather the duchess had twenty times read it in his
eyes and perceived in the passion of this truly great
man an amusement for herself, an interest in a life
hitherto devoid of interest. She was therefore
prepared already to throw up, with the greatest
skill, a certain number of redoubts around her
which she would give him to carry, one by one,
before he would be permitted to enter the citadel of
her heart. Plaything of her caprices, Montriveau
was to be kept stationary while all the time sur-
mounting obstacle after obstacle, as an insect tor-
mented by a child jumps from one fmger to another,
thinking it is getting away, while its malicious
executioner keeps it at the same place. Neverthe-
less, the duchess recognized with an inexpressible
pleasure that this man of character had not lied in
his assertion. Armand had, in fact, never loved.
He was about to take his leave, discontented with
himself, still more discontented with her; but she
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 28 1
saw with delight an ill-humor which she knew
how to dissipate with a word, a look, a gesture.
"Will you come to-morrow evening?" she said
to him. "I am going to a ball, I shall expect you
up to ten o'clock."
*
The greater part of the next day was spent by
Montriveau seated in the window of his study and
smoking an indefinite number of cigars. He could
only thus wait for the hour in which to dress and to
go to the Hotel de Langeais. It would have been
pitiful for those who knew the noble worth of this
man to see him thus so belittled, so agitated, to
know that this mind whose faculties might embrace
worlds was now contracted to the limits of the bou-
doir of an exquisitely elegant woman. But he felt
himself already so fallen, in his happiness, that to
save his life he would not have confided his love to
his most intimate friend. In the modesty which
takes possession of a man when he loves, is there
not always some sense of shame, and is it not his
littleness which swells the pride of a woman.-* In
short, is there not a crowd of motives of this
species, but which women never explain to them-
selves, which lead almost all of them to be the first
to betray the secret of their love, a secret of which
they weary, perhaps .-'
"Monsieur, " said the valet de chambre, "Madame
la Duchesse is not yet visible, she is dressing, and
begs you to wait for her."
Armand walked about the salon, studying the
taste displayed in the least details. He admired
Madame de Langeais in admiring the things which
(283)
284 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
were hers and which betrayed her habits, even
before he was fully conscious of her individuality
or of her thoughts. After waiting about an hour
the duchess came from her chamber, softly, with-
out noise. Montriveau turned, saw her walking
with the lightness of a shadow and quivered. She
came to him without saying as a bourgeoise might
have done, "What do you think of me? " She was
sure of herself, and her steadfast look said, "I have
adorned myself thus to please you." Some old
fairy godmother of some hidden princess, alone
could have wound about the throat of this charming
creature the cloud of gauze whose folds held bril-
liant tones which lit up still more the clearness of
her satin skin. The duchess was dazzling. The
delicate blue of her gown, whose ornaments were
repeated in the flowers in her hair, seemed, by the
richness of its color, to give substance to its frail
texture, at times quite aerial; for in advancing
rapidly towards Armand she caused to float behind
her the two ends of the scarf which hung at her
side, and the gallant soldier could not but compare
her with those pretty blue insects which hover
above the waters, among the flowers, with which
they seem to blend.
"I have made you wait," she said in the voice
which women know how to assume for the man they
wish to please.
"I would wait patiently an eternity if I could fmd
a divinity beautiful as you; but it is not a compli-
ment to speak to you of your beauty, you can
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 285
accept nothing less than adoration. Let me then
only kiss your scarf."
"Ah, fie!" she said with a proud gesture, "I
esteem you- enough to offer you my hand."
And she held out to him her still moist hand.
The hand of a woman, at the moment when she
issues from her perfumed bath, retains an inexpres-
sibly tender freshness, a velvety softness, of which
the tingling impression goes from the lips to the
soul. Thus, in a man already charmed, who has
in his senses as much voluptuousness as he has
love in his heart, this kiss, chaste in appearance,
may excite redoubtable storms.
"Will you always offer it to me thus? " said the
general, humbly kissing with respect this dangerous
hand.
"Yes; but we will go no farther," she said smil-
ing.
She sat down and seeemd to be curiously awkward
in putting on her gloves and in slipping the kid
which was at first too tight, around her slender fin-
gers, looking at the same time at Monsieur de Mon-
triveau, who admired alternately the duchess and
the grace of her repeated gestures.
"Ah, this is well," she said, "you have been
punctual, I love punctuality. His Majesty says
that it is the politeness of kings; but, in my opin-
ion, between us, I think it the most respectful of
flattery. Eh! is it not so."* Don't you think so? "
Then she looked at him sideways again to ex-
press to him a deceiving friendship, finding him
286 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
mute with pleasure, and positively happy with
these nothings. Ah! the duchess understood mar-
velously well her business as a woman, she knew
admirably how to lift a man up in proportion as he
humbled himself, and to reward him with hollow
flatteries at each step that he took in descending to
the sillinesses of sentimentality.
"You will not forget to come always at nine
o'clock."
"No, but do you go to a ball every night? "
"How can I tell?" she replied, shrugging her
shoulders with a little childish gesture, as if to
avow that she was all caprice and that a lover must
take her as he found her. "Besides," she added,
"what does it matter to you? you shall take me
there."
"For this evening," he said, "it would be diffi-
cult, I am not suitably dressed."
"It seems to me," she replied looking at him
haughtily, "that if anyone would suffer for your
dress it would be I. But know. Monsieur, the trav-
eler, that the man whose arm I accept is always
above fashion, no one will dare to criticise him.
1 see that you do not know the world; I like you the
better for it."
And she was already dragging him into the petti-
nesses of the world, in endeavoring to initiate him
into the vanities of a woman of fashion.
"If she chooses to commit a folly for me," Ar-
mand said to himself, "I should be a great fool
to prevent her. She undoubtedly likes me, and
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 287
certainly she cannot despise the world more than
I despise it myself; so here goes for the ball ! "
The duchess doubtless was thinking that when
the general was seen following her to the ball in
boots and a black cravat no one would hesitate to
believe him passionately in love with her. The
general, on the other hand, delighted to see the
queen of the elegant world willing to compromise
herself for him, found his wit rising with his hopes.
Conscious that he pleased, he displayed his ideas
and his feelings without experiencing the constraint
that had troubled his heart the night before. This
genuine conversation, animated, filled with those
first confidences as pleasant to utter as to hear, did
it really charm Madame de Langeais, or had she
planned this delightful coquetry; nevertheless,
when midnight sounded, she glanced mischievously
at the clock.
"Ah! you are making me lose the ball!" she
said with an expression of surprise and of vexation
at having forgotten herself.
Then she justified to herself the exchange of her
pleasures by a smile which made Armand's heart
leap.
"I certainly did promise Madame de Beauseant,"
she added. "They are all expecting me."
"Well then, let us go."
"No, go on," she said. "I shall stay here. Your
adventures in the East charm me. Tell me all
your life. I love to share the sufferings of a brave
man, for I do feel them, truly! "
288 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
She played with her scarf, twisting it, tearing it
by impatient movements which seemed to express
some inward discontentment and serious thought
"We are worth nothing, we women," she re-
sumed. "Ah! we are unworthy beings, selfish,
frivolous. All we know is how to weary ourselves
with amusement. Not one of us comprehends the
role of her life. Formerly, in France, women were
beneficent lights, they lived to comfort those who
weep, to encourage the great virtues, to reward
artists and animate their life by noble thoughts. If
the world has become so little, the fault is ours.
You make me hate this world and the ball. No, I
have not sacrificed much to you."
She ended by destroying her scarf, like a child
who, playing with a flower, finishes by tearing off
all the petals; then rolling it up she threw it from
her, thus disclosing her swan-like neck. She rang
the bell.
"I shall not go out," she said to her valet de
chambre.
Then she turned her long blue eyes on Armand
timidly so as to make him accept by the fear
which they expressed, this order as an avowal, as
a first, as a great favor.
"You have had many sufferings," she said after
a pause full of thought and with that tenderness
which is often in the voice of a woman when it is
not in her heart.
"No," answered Armand. "Until to-day I did
not know what happiness was."
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 289
"You know it then ? " said she, looking up at him
with a hypocritical and subtle air.
"But happiness for me henceforth, will it not be
to see you, to listen to you? — Up to the present
time, I have only suffered, and now I comprehend
that I may be unhappy — "
"Enough, enough," she cried, "now go, it is
midnight, let us respect the proprieties. I did not
go to the ball, but you were there. Let us not give
occasion for gossip. Adieu. I do not know what I
shall say, but the headache is a good person and
never contradicts us."
"Is there a ball to-morrow? " he asked.
"You will get accustomed to them, I think.
Well, yes, to-morrow we will go to another ball."
Armand went away the happiest man on earth;
and he returned every evening to Madame de Lan-
geais at the hour which, by a sort of tacit under-
standing, was reserved for him. It would be tedious,
and for those numerous young people who have so
many of these beautiful souvenirs superfluous, to
make this recital advance step by step as did the
poem of these hidden conversations, the course of
which checked or widened at a woman's pleasure
by a dispute over words when the sentiment went
too far, by a complaint of the sentiment when words
would not answer to her thought. To mark the
progress of this Penelope's web, perhaps it would
be better to restrict ourselves to the material gains
which the sentiment was allovved to make. Thus,
a few days after the first meeting of the duchess
19
290 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
and Armand de Montriveau, the assiduous general
had conquered in all propriety the right to kiss the
insatiable hands of his mistress. Wherever Madame
de Langeais appeared Monsieur de Montriveau was
certain to be seen also, so that certain people called
him in jest "the orderly of the Duchess." Already
his position had brought him envy, jealousy and
enemies. Madame de Langeais had attained her
object. The marquis was confounded with her nu-
merous other admirers, and he served her to humili-
ate those who boasted of being in her good graces
by publicly giving him the precedence.
"Decidedly," said Madame de Serizy, "Monsieur
de Montriveau is the man whom the duchess most
distinguishes,"
Who does not know what this expression means
in Paris, to be distinguished by a woman? The
circumstances were thus perfectly well regulated.
The stories told of the general rendered him so
redoubtable that the clever young men tacitly aban-
doned all pretensions to the duchess, and only con-
tinued to revolve in her sphere that they might
make the most of the importance it lent them, use
her name, her reputation, to better ingratiate them-
selves with certain powers of the second rank,
delighted to carry off one of the lovers of Madame
de Langeais. The duchess had quite enough per-
spicacity to perceive all these desertions and these
treaties, of which her pride would not permit her to
be the dupe. And she knew very well, as Monsieur
le Prince de Talleyrand who was much in love with
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 29I
her said, how to gather an aftermath of vengeance
with a two-edged scoff at such morganatic espousals.
Her disdainful satire contributed not a little to the
fear she inspired and to her reputation for keen wit.
She thus strengthened her reputation for virtue, all
the while entertaining herself with the secrets of
others without ever permitting her own to be pene-
trated. Nevertheless, after two months of this
assiduity she began to feel in the depths of her heart
a vague fear as she saw that Monsieur de Montri-
veau comprehended nothing of the refinements of
the coquetry of the Faubourg Saint-Germain and
took quite seriously the pretty little Parisian ways.
"My dear duchess," the old Vidame de Pamiers
said to her one day, "your friend is first cousin to
the eagles, you will never tame him, and he will
carry you off to his eyrie some day if you do not
take care."
*
The day after the evening in which the worldly-
wise old man had made her this speech, which
Madame de Langeais feared was only too prophetic,
she began a serious effort to make herself hated,
and showed herself hard, exacting, fidgety, detest-
able, to Armand, who disarmed her by an angelic
mildness. This woman knew so little of the great
kindness of noble natures that she was touched and
surprised by the courteous pleasantries with which
her ill-humor was at first met. She was seeking a
quarrel, and found only fresh proofs of affection.
Nevertheless she persisted.
"In what respect," said Armand to her, "has a
man who idolizes you been so unfortunate as to dis-
please you? "
"You don't displease me," she replied, becoming
suddenly sweet and submissive; "but why do you
wish to compromise me? You can only be d, friend
for me. Do you not know it? I would wish to find
in you the instinct, the delicacy of true friendship,
so that I need not be forced to lose either your
regard or the pleasure I experience when near you."
"To be only your friend!" cried Monsieur de
Montriveau, to whom this terrible word was like an
electric shock. "On the faith of all those sweet
hours which you have granted me I have rested,
and 1 thought to have awakened in your heart; and
(293)
294 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
to-day, without motive, you take gratuitous pleas-
ure in killing the secret hopes by which I live.
After having made me promise such constancy and
after showing such horror of women who have only
caprices, do you wish me to understand that, like
all the other women of Paris, you have only pas-
sions and no love ? Why, then, have you asked of
me my life, and why have you accepted it? "
"I was wrong, my friend. Yes, a woman is
wrong when she yields to such intoxication which
she has neither the power nor the right to reward."
"I understand, you have only been a little co-
quettish and — "
"Coquettish ? I hate coquetry. To be a coquette,
Armand, is to promise one's self to many men and
to give one's self to none. To give one's self to all
is to be a libertine. That is how I understand our
ethics. But to be sad with the melancholy, gay
with the careless, politic with the ambitious, to
listen with feigned admiration to the chatterers, to
be military with the soldiers, to grow passionate for
the good of the country with the philanthropists, to
give to each his little dose of flattery, all this seems
to me as necessary as to put flowers in our hair, as
diamonds, gloves or clothes. Conversation is the
moral part of our toilet; we put it on and take it off
with the feathers in our hair. Do you call that
coquetry ? But I have never treated you as 1 have
the rest of the world. With you, my friend, I am
true. I have not always agreed with your ideas,
and when you have convinced me after a discussion,
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 295
have you not seen me perfectly happy ? In fact I
love you, but only as a pure and religious woman
should love. I have been thinking over it I am
married, Armand. If the terms on which I live
with Monsieur de Langeais leave me free to dispose
of my heart as I please, the laws, the conventions
of society have taken from me the right to dispose
of my person. In whatever rank a woman is placed,
a dishonored woman is driven from society, and I
have never yet seen the man who could understand
the full meaning of our sacrifices. Even more, the
rupture which everyone foresees between Madame
de Beauseant and Monsieur d'Ajuda who, they say,
is going to marry Mademoiselle de Rochefide, proves
to me that these same sacrifices are almost always
the reasons of men abandoning us. If you love me
sincerely you will cease to see me, at least for some
time! For you I lay aside all vanity; is not that
something? What does the world not say of a wo-
man to whom no man is attached ? That she has
no heart, no mind, no soul, and above all no charm.
Oh ! the coquettes will not spare me, they will take
away from me all the qualities which they have
been offended at finding in me. So long as I pre-
serve my reputation, what does it matter to me to
see the contest of my rivals for my advantages? —
They certainly will not inherit it. Come, my
friend, give something to one who sacrifices so much
for you! Call on me less often, I will not love you
the less for it."
"Ah!" replied Armand with the profound irony
296 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
of a wounded heart, "love, according to the scrib-
blers, is fed only on illusions! Nothing is more
true, 1 see it, I am to imagine myself loved. But
truly, there are thoughts like wounds from which
there is no recovery: You were one of my last
beliefs, and I now see that all things here below
are false."
She smiled.
"Yes," continued Montriveau in an altered voice,
"your Catholic faith to which you have tried to
convert me is a lie that men make to themselves,
hope is a lie based upon the future, pride is a lie
between us; pity, wisdom, fear are all lying calcu-
lations. My happiness is then also to be a lie, I
am to cheat myself and consent to give forever gold
for silver. If you can so easily dispense with my
presence, if you will acknowledge me neither for
your friend nor your lover, you do not love me!
And I, poor fool, I say this to myself, I know it,
and I love you! "
"But, Mon Dieu! my poor Armand, how you go
to extremes."
"To extremes ? "
"Yes, you think that everything is at an end
because I speak to you of prudence."
In her heart she was enchanted with the anger
that overflowed in her lover's eyes. At this mo-
ment she was tormenting him; but at the same
time she judged him, and noticed every alteration
in his countenance. Had the general been so un-
fortunate as to show himself generous without
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 297
discussion, as sometimes happens to these candid
souls, he would have been banished forever, im-
peached and convicted of not knowing how to love.
The greater number of women like to feel their
moral convictions violated. Is it not one of their
flatteries to yield only to superior force? But
Armand was not wise enough to perceive the net
skilfully spread for him by the duchess. Strong
men who love have so much of the child in their
souls!
"If you only wish to keep up appearances," he
said artlessly, "I am ready to — "
"Keep up appearances !" she cried, interrupting
him ; "what sort of ideas do you have of me ? Have
I given you the smallest reason to think I could ever
be yours?"
"Ah, then, what are we talking about?" de-
manded Montriveau.
"But, Monsieur, you frighten me — No, pardon,
thank you," she continued in a freezing tone,
"thank you Armand,— you call my attention in
time to an imprudence quite involuntary, believe
it, my friend. You know how to suffer, you say!
I also, I will learn how to suffer. We will cease to
see each other; and then, when we have both
recovered some calmness, well, then we will try to
arrange for ourselves some sort of happiness ap-
proved by the world. I am young, Armand, a man
without delicacy might do many things to compro-
mise a woman of twenty-four. But, you! you will
always be my friend — promise me."
298 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"The woman of twenty-four," he replied, "is
old enough to calculate."
He sat down on the divan of the boudoir and held
his head between his hands.
"Do you love me, Madame?" he demanded lifting
his head and showing a face full of resolution.
"Answer fearlessly, yes or no! "
The duchess was more frightened by this inter-
rogation than she would have been by a threat of
death,— a common trick which easily frightens
women of the nineteenth century who no longer see
men wearing their swords by their sides; but are
there not effects of the eye-lashes, the eyebrows,
contractions in the look, tremblings of the lips,
which communicate the fear which they express so
keenly, so magnetically?
"Ah ! " she said, "if I were free, if—"
"Eh! is it only your husband that is in the
way?" cried the general joyfully, walking with
great strides up and down the boudoir. "My dear
Antoinette, I possess a more absolute power than
that of the autocrat of all the Russias. I am on
good terms with fate: I can, socially speaking, ad-
vance it or put it back at my will like the hands of
a watch. To guide fate in our political machine,
is it not simply to know the mechanism ? In a little
while you will be free, remember then your prom-
ise. ' '
"Armand, " she cried, "what do you mean?
Good God! Do you think that I could be the
reward of a crime? do you wish my death? Have
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 299
you no religion at all? For myself, I fear God.
Although Monsieur de Langeais has given me the
right to hate him, I wish him no ill."
Monsieur de Montriveau, who was beating a tattoo
mechanically with his fingers on the marble of the
chimney-piece, contented himself by looking at the
duchess with a calm air.
" My friend, " she said, continuing, "respect him.
He does not love me, he has not been good to me,
but I have duties to fulfil towards him. To spare
him the misfortunes with which you threaten him,
what would I not do? — Listen," she resumed after
a pause, "I will not talk to you any more of separa-
tion, you shall come here as in the past, I will
always offer you my forehead to kiss; if I refused
it sometimes it was pure coquetry, in truth. But
let us understand each other," she said, seeing him
approach. "You will permit me to increase the
number of my followers, to receive them in the
morning even more than I have been doing, — I will
increase my frivolities, I will treat you very badly
in appearance, and feign a rupture; you will come
a little less often; and then, afterwards — "
As she said these words she permitted him to
pass his arm around her and seemed to feel, thus
pressed in his embrace, the excessive pleasure
which most women find in this pressure, in which
all the enjoyments of love seem to be promised;
then she doubtless wished to inspire some confi-
dence, for she stood on tiptoe to bring her forehead
under the burning lips of Armand.
3CXD LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"Afterwards," resumed Montriveau, "you will
talk to me no more of your husband; you ought not
even to think of him."
Madame de Langeais kept silence.
"At least," she said after an expressive pause,
"you will do all that I ask of you, without grum-
bling, without being wicked, will you not, my
friend? You only wished to frighten me? Come,
confess it! — you are too good to ever entertain
criminal thoughts. But have you then secrets that
1 know nothing of? What do you mean by controll-
ing fate? "
"The moment, when you confirm the gift that
you have already made me of your heart, I am too
happy to know well how I should answer you. I
have confidence in you, Antoinette, I shall have no
doubts, no false jealousies. But if chance should
^ set you at liberty, we are united — "
"Chance, Armand," she said, making one of
those pretty gestures of the head which seem to
mean so many things and which this species of
women dispense so lightly, as a cantatrice plays
with her voice. "Pure chance," she resumed.
"Understand it well; if through you any misfor-
tune happens to Monsieur de Langeais, I will never
be yours."
They parted mutually satisfied. The duchess
had made a compact which would permit her to
prove to all the world by her words and her actions
that Monsieur de Montriveau was not her lover.
As for him, the wily creature purposed to tire him
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 3OI
out by granting no other favors than those snatched
in those little quarrels which she could arrest as she
pleased. She knew so prettily how to revoke on
the morrow a concession granted the night before,
she was so seriously determined to remain physic-
ally virtuous, that she saw no risk to herself in
these preliminaries, dangerous only to women
really in love. In fact, a duchess separated from
her husband offered but little to love, in sacrificing
to it a marriage that had long been annulled. On
his side, Montriveau, quite happy in having ob-
tained the vaguest of promises, and of having put
aside forever the objections that a wife could find
in conjugal faith for refusing love, congratulated
himself on having conquered a little more ground.
Thus for some time he abused those rights of enjoy-
ment which had been so reluctantly granted him.
More childlike than he had ever yet been, this man
gave himself up to all those childish delights which
make a first love the flower of our life. He became
a child again in pouring out his soul and all the
cheated energies which his passion communicated,
upon the hands of this woman, upon her blonde
hair whose wavy curls he kissed, upon that dazzling
forehead which seemed to him so pure. Inundated
with love, vanquished by the magnetic outflowings
of so warm a sentiment, the duchess hesitated to
begin the quarrel which should separate them for-
ever. She was more of a woman than she thought
herself, this fragile creature, striving to reconcile
the claims of religion with the lively emotions of
302 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
vanity, with those semblances of pleasure upon
which the Parisians dote. Every Sunday she heard
Mass, not missing one of the Offices of the Church;
every evening she plunged into the intoxicating
voluptuousness which flows from desires ceaselessly
repressed. Armand and Madame de Langeais re-
sembled those fakirs of India who are rewarded for
their chastity by the temptations it offers them.
Perhaps also the duchess had come to persuade
herself that all love might be resolved into these
fraternal caresses, which would doubtless have
appeared innocent in the eyes of the world but to
which the fearlessness of her thoughts lent an
excessive depravation. How else explain the in-
comprehensible mystery of her perpetual fluctua-
tions? Every morning she resolved to close her
doors to the Marquis de Montriveau; every evening
at the appointed hour she allowed herself to be
charmed by him. After a feeble defence she would
become less forbidding; her conversation became
sweet and gracious; two lovers only could be thus.
The duchess displayed her most sparkling wit, her
most charming coquetries; then, when she had irri-
tated the soul and the senses of her lover, if he
seized her, she would have been quite willing to
have allowed herself to be broken and tormented by
him, but she had her ne plus ultra of passion ; and
when he had reached this limit she always became
offended if, mastered by his passion, he threatened
to pass the barriers. But no woman will dare to
deny herself to love without a reason, nothing is
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 303
more natural than to yield; so Madame de Langeais
soon surrounded herself by a second line of fortifi-
cations, more difficult to carry than the first. She
invoked the terrors of religion. Never did the most
eloquent father of the church plead better the com-
mands of God ; never was the vengeance of the
Most High better proclaimed than by the voice of
the duchess. She employed neither the phraseology
of sermons nor the amplifications of rhetoric. No,
she had her own pathos. To Armand's most ardent
supplications she replied by a tearful glance, by a
gesture that revealed a frightful fulness of senti-
ment; she silenced him by imploring mercy; a word
more, she would not hear it, she would succumb,
and death seemed to her preferable to a criminal
happiness.
"Is it then nothing to disobey God! " she would
say to him, recovering her voice made feeble by
the inward conflicts over which this pretty come-
dienne seemed to secure with difficulty a temporary
mastery. "Men, the whole world, I would gladly
sacrifice for you ; but you are very selfish to ask of
me my whole future in return for a moment of
pleasure. Come, see, now are you not happy?"
she added offering him her hand and revealing her-
self to him in a neglige which certainly offered
to her lover some consolations of which he always
availed himself.
If to retain a man whose ardent passion gave her
some unaccustomed emotions or if through weak-
ness, she permitted him to snatch a rapid kiss,
304 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
immediately she feigned terror, she blushed and
banished Armand from the sofa at the moment when
the sofa became dangerous for her.
"Your pleasures are sins that I must expiate,
Armand; they cost me penitences, remorse," she
cried.
When Montriveau found himself two chairs away
from these aristocratic petticoats, he took to blas-
phemy, he cursed God. Then the duchess grew
angry.
"But, my friend," she said severely, "I cannot
understand why you refuse to believe in God, for
it certainly is impossible to believe in men. Be
silent, do not speak in that manner ; your soul is
too noble to espouse the follies of liberalism which
pretend to do away with God."
Discussions, theological and political, served her
as douches to calm Montriveau, who knew no longer
how to be reconciled to love when she excited his
anger by casting him a thousand leagues away from
this boudoir into theories of absolutism which she
defended admirably. Few women dare to be dem-
ocratic, they are then too much in contradiction
to their own despotism in matters of sentiment.
But sometimes also the general shook his mane,
ignored politics, growled like a lion, lashed his
flanks, threw himself on his prey, became again
terrible from love of his mistress, incapable of curb-
ing longer his evident thought and love. If this
woman then felt within her the movings of some
fancy strong enough to compromise her, she was
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 305
discreet enough to quit her boudoir, — she left the
atmosphere so charged with desire which she there
breathed, went into her salon, seated herself at the
piano and began to sing the sweetest airs of modern
music, and thus deceived the love of the senses
which sometimes did not spare her, but which she
had strength to overcome. At such moments, she
was sublime in Armand's eyes; she did not feign,
she was true, and the poor lover thought himself
beloved. This egotistic resistance caused him to
take her for a saintly and virtuous creature, and he
resigned himself, and he talked of platonic love, —
he, General of Artillery! When she had played
religion long enough in her own interest Madame de
Langeais played it over again in his; she endeav-
ored to bring him back to Christian sentiments,
she remodeled the Genius of Christianity for mili-
tary purposes. Montriveau grew impatient, found
his yoke heavy. Oh ! then in a spirit of contradic-
tion, she flung at him the terrors of God, to see if
God would relieve her of a man who held to his
purpose with a constancy which began to frighten
her. Moreover, she wished to prolong every quar-
rel which might promise to lengthen out indefinitely
the moral struggle, after which would come the ma-
terial struggle, much more dangerous.
20
If the opposition made in the name of the mar-
riage laws represented the civil epoch of this senti-
mental war, the present struggle constituted the
religions epoch, and it had, like its predecessor, a
crisis after which its fury must abate. One even-
ing Armand arriving accidentally at a very early
hour found Monsieur I'Abbe Gondrand, the director
of the conscience of Madame de Langeais, estab-
lished in an arm-chair in the chimney-corner with
the air of a man who was comfortably digesting his
dinner and the pretty sins of his penitent. The
sight of this man, with his fresh and placid counte-
nance, whose forehead was calm, his mouth ascetic,
his glance somewhat maliciously inquisitorial, who
had in his bearing a true ecclesiastical dignity and
already in his vestments the Episcopal purple,
caused the face of Montriveau to darken singularly;
he bowed to no one and kept silence. Outside of
his love the general was not wanting in judgment,
he guessed therefore, in exchanging some glances
with the future bishop, that this man promoted the
difficulties with which the duchess fenced about her
love for him. That an ambitious abbe should play
fast and loose and restrain the love of a man tem-
pered as he had been, this thought brought the blood
to Montriveau's face, clenched his hands, made him
rise, walk about the room, stamp about; but when
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308 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
he returned to his seat resolved to give open vent
to his feelings, a single look from the duchess sufficed
to calm him. Madame de Langeais, in no wise dis-
turbed by the black silence of her lover, which
would have embarrassed any other woman, con-
tinued to converse very intelligently with Monsieur
Gondrand on the necessity of reestablishing
religion in all its ancient splendor. She demon-
strated much more cleverly than the abbe could
have done, the reasons why the Church should be
a power at once temporal and spiritual and regretted
that the Chamber of Peers had not yet its Bench
of Bishops, as the English House of Lords had.
However, the abbe, knowing that Lent would soon
give him his revenge, yielded his place to the gen-
eral and went away. The duchess scarcely rose to
acknowledge the humble bow of her director, so
occupied was she in watching Montriveau's
behavior.
"What is the matter, my friend?"
"Your abbe turns my stomach."
"Why did you not take a book.!*" she said with-
out caring whether the abbe who was just closing
the door, heard her or not.
Montriveau remained silent a moment, for the
duchess accompanied her speech with a gesture
which added to its excessive impertinence.
"My dear Antoinette, I thank you for giving pre-
cedence to love over the Church ; but I beg you will
permit me to ask you one question."
"Ah! you ask me questions. Very well," she
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 309
replied. "Are you not my friend? I can certainly
show you the depths of my heart. You will find
but one image there."
"Have you spoken to that man of our love.?"
"He is my confessor."
"Does he know that I love you ? "
"Monsieur de Montriveau, you surely do not pre-
sume to wish to penetrate the secrets of my confes-
sion? "
"Then that man knows all our quarrels and my
love for you? — "
"A man, Monsieur! — say God!"
"God! God! I should be alone in your heart.
But leave God alone, there wherever He is, for the
love of Him and of me. Madame, you shall not go
any more to confession, or — "
"Or?" she said smiling.
"Or I will never come here again."
"Go, Armand. Adieu, adieu forever. "
She rose and went into her boudoir, without cast-
ing a single glance at Montriveau, who remained
standing, his hand resting on the back of a chair.
How long he stood there he never knew himself.
The soul has the mysterious power of extending as
of contracting space.
He opened the door of the boudoir, all was dark
within. A feeble voice gathered strength to say
sharply:
"I did not ring. Besides, why do you enter with-
out orders? Suzette, leave me. "
"You are suffering?" cried Montriveau.
3IO LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"Remove yourself, Monsieur," she cried, ringing,
"and go away from here, at least for a moment."
"Madame la Duchesse rang for lights," he said
to the valet de chambre, who came into the boudoir
and lighted the candles.
When the two lovers were alone Madame de Lan-
geais remained reclining on her divan, silent,
motionless, precisely as if Montriveau were not
there.
"Dear," he said with an accent of pain and ten-
der kindness, "I was wrong. I certainly would not
have you without religion — "
"It is fortunate," she replied in a hard voice,
without looking at him, "that you recognize the
necessity of conscience. I thank you, for God."
At this the general, withered by the inclemency
of this woman, who knew so well how to become at
will a perfect stranger or a sister for him, made a
step toward the door in despair, and was about to
abandon her forever without speaking a single
word. He suffered, and the duchess in her heart
was laughing at sufferings caused by a moral torture
much more cruel than was in old times the judicial
torture. But this man was not to be allowed to go.
In every kind of crisis a woman is, if we may say
so, pregnant with a certain quantity of words; and
when she has not uttered them she experiences the
sensation suggested by the sight of an unfinished
thing. Madame de Langeais, who had not spoken
all her mind, resumed:
"We have not the same convictions, general, I
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 31I
am pained to know it. It would be terrible for a
woman not to believe in a religion which allows her
to love beyond the grave. I put aside Christian
sentiments, you cannot understand them. Let me
speak to you only of the proprieties. Would you
wish to deny to a woman of the Court the Holy
Communion when it is customary to receive it at
Easter? but it is necessary nevertheless to know
what stand to take. The Liberals will not kill the
religious sentiment, for all their desire to do so.
Religion will always be a political necessity.
Would you undertake to govern a nation of pure
Rationalists? Napoleon did not dare, he persecuted
the Ideologists. To keep the people from reasoning,
you must give them sentiments. Let us accept
therefore the Catholic religion with all its conse-
quences. If we wish that France should go to
Mass, should we not commence by going there our-
selves? Religion, Armand, is as you see the bond
of the conservative principles which enable the rich
to live in safety. Religion is intimately connected
with the rights of property. It is certainly a finer
thing to lead the people by moral ideas than by
scaffolds, as in the days of the Terror, the only
means that your detestable Revolution could invent
for enforcing submission. The priest and the king,
why, they are you, they are me, they are the
princess, my neighbor; they are, in a word, all the
interests of honest people personified. Come, my
friend, be then really on your own side, you who
might be its Sylla, if you had the least ambition.
312 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
As for me I am quite ignorant of politics, I only
reason from feeling; but I know enough, neverthe-
less, to be sure that society will be upset if its base
is to be called in question at every moment — "
"If your court, your government, has these opin-
ions, I am sorry for you," said Montriveau. "The
Restoration, Madame, should say like Catherine
de Medicis when she thought the battle of Dreux
was lost, — 'Well, then, we will go to the Protestant
church.' Now, 1815 is your battle of Dreux. Like
the throne of those days, you have gained it in
fact but lost it in law. Political protestantism is
victorious in all minds. If you do not wish to
make an Edict of Nantes; or if, making it, you
revoke it; if you are some day tried and convicted
of desiring to do away with the Charter, which is
only a pledge given to maintain the interests of the
Revolution, — ^the Revolution will rise again terri-
ble, and will give you but one blow. It is not it
that will leave France; it is its very soil. Men
allow themselves to be killed, but not interests. —
Eh ! my God ! what to us are France, the throne,
legitimacy, the world itself? They are but idle
tales compared with my happiness. Reign, or be
overthrown, it is but little I care. Where am I
then?"
"My friend, you are in the boudoir of Madame la
Duchesse de Langeais. "
"No, no, no more duchess, no more de Langeais, I
am beside my dear Antoinette! "
"Will you do me the pleasure to stay where you
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 313
are," said she, laughing and repelling him, but
without violence.
"You have never then loved me?" he said in a
rage which flashed from his eyes like lightning.
"No, my friend."
This 'no' had the sound of a 'yes.'
"I am a great fool," he said, kissing the hand of
this terrible queen once more become woman. —
"Antoinette," he resumed, resting his head upon
her feet, "you are too chastely tender to tell our
happiness to anyone in the world."
"Ah! you are indeed a great fool," she said, ris-
ing with a quick and graceful movement. And
without adding a word she fled into the salon.
"What is the matter with her ? " asked the general,
who could not guess the power of the disturbance
that his burning head had electrically communi-
cated from the feet to the head of his mistress.
As he arrived furious in the salon he heard celes-
tial strains. The duchess was at her piano. Men
of science or of poetic natures, who can at the same
time comprehend and enjoy without reflection injur-
ing their pleasure, feel that the notes and the
phrases of music are the intimate instruments of
the musician, just as the wood or the brass are
those of the performer. For them there exists a
music apart in the depths of the double expression
of this sensual language of souls. Andiamo mio
ben can bring tears of joy or piteous laughter,
according to the singer. Often, here and there in
the world, a young girl dying under the weight of
314 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
/'
/ a hidden grief, a man whose soul vibrates under the
strokes of a passion, tai<e a musical theme and
become reconciled with Heaven, or speak with
themselves in some sublime melody, like a lost
poem. So, now the general at this moment listened
to one of these poems, as unknown as could be the
solitary complaint of a bird dying without compan-
ions in a virgin forest.
''Mon Dieu! what are you playing,?" he asked
in a voice of emotion.
"The prelude to a ballad called, I think, Fleuve
dii Tage."
"I did not know that there could be such music
in a piano," he said.
"Ah! my friend," she said, giving him for the
first time the glance of a loving woman, "neither
do you know that I love you, that you make me
suffer horribly, and that I must indeed find a way
to complain without being too well understood;
otherwise 1 should be yours. — But you see nothing. "
"And you will not make me happy! "
"Armand, I should die of sorrow the next day."
The general left her brusquely, but when he
reached the street he wiped away two tears which
he had had the strength to retain till then.
*
Religion lasted three months. At the end of that
time, the duchess, weary of her repetitions, deliv-
ered, so to speak, her God bound hand and foot to
her lover. Perhaps she was afraid that by dint of
preaching eternity she might perpetuate the gen-
eral's love in this world and in the next. For the
honor of this woman we must believe that she was
virgin even in heart; otherwise her conduct would
be too cruel. As yet far from the age at which men
and women both find themselves too near the limits
of the future to lose time and to quibble with their
enjoyments she was doubtless not at her first love,
but among her first pleasures. Without experience
whereby to compare the good with the evil, without
the knowledge of suffering that might have taught
her the value of the treasures poured at her feet,
she was amusing herself with them. Ignorant of
the delightful splendors of light, she was content to
remain in the shadows. Armand, who began to
comprehend this singular condition, trusted in the
primary instincts of nature. He reflected every
night, as he left Madame de Langeais, that no
woman could accept for seven months the devotion
of a man and the most tender, the most delicate,
proofs of his love, or yield herself to the superficial
exigencies of a passion to deceive it finally, and he
patiently awaited the summer season, confident that
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3l6 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
he would gather the fruit in its prime. He perfectly
understood the scruples of a married woman and
religious scruples. He even rejoiced in these strug-
gles. He thought the duchess chaste where she
was only frightfully coquettish ; and he would not
have had her otherwise. He liked to see her raise
obstacles; would he not gradually triumph over
them all? And each triumph, would it not augment
the slight total of amorous intimacies long with-
held, then conceded by her with all the semblance
of love? But he had so well tasted and appreciated
all those slight and progressive conquests which
satisfy timid lovers that they had become habitual
to him. In the matter of obstacles he had only his
own fears to overcome; for he no longer saw any
hindrance to his happiness other than the caprices
of the one who allowed him to call her Antoinette.
He resolved therefore to demand more, to demand
everything. Timid as a lover still young who does
not dare to believe in the lowering of his idol, he
hesitated long and passed through those terrible
reactions of the heart, those clearly formed desires
which a word annihilates, those fixed resolutions
which expire at the threshold of the door. He
despised himself for not having strength to say a
word, and yet he did not say it. Nevertheless, at
last one evening he proceeded in a sombre melan-
choly to put forth the rude claims to his illegally
legitimate rights. The duchess did not wait the
request of her slave to know his desire. Is a man's
desire ever secret? Have not all women that
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 317
intuitive knowledge of certain expressions of the
physiognomy ?
"What, would you cease to be my friend?" she
asked, interrupting him at the first word and cast-
ing on him a glance made lovelier by a divine flush
which flowed like a new blood under her diaphanous
skin. "As a reward for my generosity, you would
dishonor me. Reflect a little. I have myself
reflected much; 1 think always of us. There is an
integrity for women in which we should no more
make default than you should fail in honor. For
myself, I could not deceive. If I became yours, I
could no longer be in any respect the wife of Mon-
sieur de Langeais. You exact therefore the sacri-
fice of my position, of my rank, of my life, for a
doubtful love which has not had seven months of
patience. What ! already you would wish to deprive
me of the free disposition of myself? No, no, do
not speak to me thus. No, say nothing to me. I
will not, I can not listen to you."
Here Madame de Langeais with both hands put
back her clusters of curls that heated her brow and
became very animated.
"You come to a feeble creature with well defined
calculations, saying to yourself: 'She will talk to
me of her husband for a certain length of time, then
of God, then of the inevitable consequences of love;
but I will use, I will abuse the influence which I
shall have acquired; I will render myself necessary;
I shall have on my side the ties of habit, the ar-
rangements recognized by the public; finally, when
3l8 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
the world shall have finished by accepting our liai-
son, 1 shall be the master of this woman.' Be
frank, these are your thoughts — Ah! you cal-
culate, and you call that love! Fie! you are in
love, ah! I really believe it! You desire me, and
you wish to have me for your mistress, that is all.
Well, then, no. La Duchesse de Langeais will
not descend so low as that. Let the artless bour-
geoises be the dupes of your falsehood; for
myself, I never shall. Nothing assures me of your
love. You speak of my beauty, I may become ugly
in six months, like the dear princess, my neighbor.
You are charmed with my wit, with my grace;
Mon Dieu! you will get accustomed to them just as
you get accustomed to pleasure. Have you not
already made a habit for the last few months of the
favors which I have had the weakness to accord you }
When I am lost, some day, you will give me no
other reason for your change than the decisive
word: 'I no longer love you.' Rank, fortune, honor,
all of the Duchesse de Langeais will be swallowed
up in a hope deceived. I shall have children who
will bear witness to my shame, and — . But," she
resumed with an involuntary gesture of impatience,
"I am too kind to explain to you that which you
know better than I. Come now, let us remain as
we are. I am too happy as I am to be able yet to
break the bonds which you think so strong. Is
there then anything so very heroic in coming to the
Hotel de Langeais to pass some time every evening
with a woman whose chatter pleased you, with
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 319
whom you amused yourself as with a plaything?
But there are several young fops who come to see
me daily, from three to five o'clock, as regularly as
you come in the evening. They are then very gen-
erous! I laugh at them, they receive very tran-
quilly my caprices, my impertinences, and make
me laugh; whilst you, you to whom I accord the
most precious treasures of my soul, you wish to
ruin me and cause me a thousand griefs. Keep
silence, enough, enough," she said seeing him
about to speak, "you have neither heart, nor soul,
nor delicacy. I know what you wish to say to me.
Well then, yes. 1 had rather appear in your eyes
as a woman cold, without feeling, without devotion,
without a heart even, than to appear in the eyes of
the world as a common woman, than to be con-
demned to eternal suffering after having been con-
demned to your pretended pleasures, which would
certainly end by wearying you. Your egotistical
love is not worth so many sacrifices — "
These words represent very imperfectly those
which the duchess trilled forth with the lively
prolixity of a hand-organ. Certainly she might
have talked on a long while, the poor Armand
offered for sole reply to this torrent of soft phrases
a silence teeming with painful thoughts. He per-
ceived for the first time the coquetry of this woman,
and instinctively divined that a devoted love, love
shared with another, did not calculate, did not
reason thus in the heart of a true woman. Then
he experienced a sort of shame as he remembered
320 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
that he had involuntarily made the calculations
with the odious thoughts of which he had been
reproached. Then, examining his conscience with
a quite angelic good faith, he found nothing but
selfishness in his words, in his ideas, in the answers
conceived and not expressed. He blamed himself,
and in his despair he thought of throwing himself
out of the window. The / paralyzed him. What to
say, in fact, to a woman who did not believe in
love.-* 'Let me prove to you how much I love you.'
Always /. Montriveau did not know, as in similar
circumstance the ordinary heroes of the boudoir
know, how to imitate the rough logician who
marched before the Pyrrhonians while denying his
own movement. This audacious man failed pre-
cisely in that audacity which is common to those
lovers who know the formula of feminine algebra.
If so many women, and even the most virtuous, fall a
prey to those men skilful in love to whom the vul-
gar give a bad name, perhaps it is because they
are grand demonstrators, and that love, in spite of
its delightful poetry of sentiment, demands more
geometry than we think for. Now, the duchess
and Montriveau were alike in this respect, that they
were equally inexpert in love. She knew very
little of its theory, was ignorant of its practice, felt
nothing and reflected on all. Montriveau knew
very little of its practice, was ignorant of its
theory, and felt too much to reflect. Both of
them were suffering under the misfortune of this
curious situation. In this supreme moment, its
I
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 321
myriads of thoughts might be reduced to this one
only: "Surrender yourself." A phrase, horribly
egotistical to a woman for whom these words bore
no memories and revealed no image. Nevertheless,
it was necessary to reply. Although his blood was
lashed by these little phrases, shot like arrows, one
by one, very sharp, very cold, very steely, Montri-
veau was compelled to dissemble his anger that he
might not lose all by some extravagance.
"Madame la Duchesse, I am in despair that God
has not invented for woman any other manner of
confirming the gift of her heart than by adding to it
that of her person. The high price which you
attach to yourself shows me that I should not attach
a lesser one. If you give me your soul and all your
feelings, as you say you do, what matters the rest.?
However, if my happiness is to you so painful a
sacrifice, let us say no more about it. Only, you
will pardon a man of heart for feeling humiliated in
seeing himself taken for a spaniel."
The tone of this last phrase might well have
frightened any other woman ; but when one of these
petticoat-wearers is lifted above everything else in
permitting herself to be turned into a divinity,
there is no power here below that is as proud
as she.
"Monsieur le Marquis, I am in despair that God
has not invented for man any more noble manner
of confirming the gift of his heart than by the man-
ifestation of desires prodigiously vulgar. If, in giv-
ing our persons we become slaves, a man commits
21
322 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
himself to nothing in accepting us. Who can
assure me that 1 shall be always loved? The love
that I should be forced to show at all times to attach
you closer to me might be the very reason of your
desertion. I do not choose to be a second edition
of Madame de Beauseant. Does any one ever know
what it is that keeps you faithful to us ? Our con-
stant coldness is the secret of the constant passion
of some of you ; for others, a perpetual devotion is
required, an adoration every minute; for these,
kindness; for those, despotism. No woman has
ever yet fully deciphered your heart"
There was a pause, after which she changed her
tone.
"In short, my friend, you cannot prevent a
woman from trembling at this question, 'shall I be
always loved ? ' Hard as they may be, my words
are dictated to me by the fear of losing you. Mon
Dieii! it is not I, dear, who speak to you, but rea-
son; and how is it that reason is to be found in
such a light creature as I am.? Indeed, I cannot
tell."
To hear this answer, begun in a tone of most
trenchant irony and ended with the sweetest accents
which a woman can use to picture love in all its
candor, was not this to pass in a moment from mar-
tyrdom to the skies? Montriveau turned pale, and
for the first time in his life fell on his knees at the
foot of a woman. He kissed the hem of the robe of
the duchess, her feet, her knees ; but for the honor
of the Faubourg Saint-Germain let us not reveal the
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 323
mysteries of her boudoirs in which everything is
required of love excepting that which could prove
love.
"Dear Antoinette," cried Montr iveau in the
delirium in which he was plunged by the entire
surrender of the duchess who thought herself gen-
erous in permitting herself to be adored; "yes, you
are right, I do not wish that you should retain any
doubts. At this moment I tremble myself lest I
should lose the angel of my life, and I would wish
to invent for us indissoluble bonds."
"Ah!" she said in a low voice, "you see, I was
right"
"Let me finish," resumed Armand, "I will with
one word dispel all your doubts. Listen, if I for-
sake you 1 will merit a thousand deaths. Be
entirely mine, and I will give you the right to kill
me if 1 betray you. I will write, myself, a letter
in which I will declare certain reasons that have
compelled me to destroy myself; in short, I will
make in it my last will. You shall hold this testa-
ment which will justify my death, and you can
thus avenge yourself without having anything to
fear from either God or man."
"Have I any need of such a letter? If I had lost
your love, what would life be to me.'' If I wished
to kill you, would I not follow you? No, I thank
you for the idea, but I do not want the letter.
Would I not think that you were faithful to me
through fear, or, the danger of an infidelity, would
not that be an attraction for one who thus exposed
324 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
his life? Armand, that which I ask of you is the
one thing difficult to do."
"And what do you wish, then ? "
"Your obedience and my freedom."
"My God," he cried, "I am like a child."
"A wilful child and one well spoiled," she said,
caressing the thick hair of his head which she still
retained on her knees. "Oh! yes, much more
loved than he thinks, and yet very disobedient.
Why not stay as we are ? why not sacrifice to me
the desires which offend me? why not accept what
I give if it is all that I can honestly grant? Are
you not then happy?"
"Oh! yes," he answered, "I am happy when I
have no doubts. Antoinette, to doubt in love, is it
not to die?"
And he showed at a stroke what he was, and
what all men are when burning with desires, elo-
quent, insinuating. After having tasted those
pleasures sanctioned no doubt by some secret and
Jesuitical ukase, the duchess experienced all those
cerebral emotions the habit of which had rendered
the love of Armand as necessary for her as society,
the ball, the opera. To see herself adored by a
man whose superiority, whose character, inspired
fear; to make him a child; to play with him as
Poppoea played with Nero, — very many women,
like the wives of Henry VIII., have paid for this
perilous delight with their life's blood. Well, curi-
ous presentiment! in yielding to him the pretty
blond waves of her hair through which he loved to
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 325
thrust his fingers, in feeling the pressure of the
loving hand of this truly great man, in playing her-
self with the black locks of his hair, in this boudoir
where she reigned, the duchess said to herself:
"This man is capable of killing me if he once
perceives that I am trifling with him."
I
Monsieur de Montriveau remained till two in the
morning beside his mistress, who, from that mo-
ment, seemed to him no longer either a duchess or
a Navarreins; — Antoinette had pushed her deception
so far as to seem a woman. During this delightful
evening, the sweetest prelude that ever a Parisian
woman gave to that which the world calls a
fault the general was permitted to see in her,
despite the affectations of a coquettish modesty, all
the beauty of a young girl. He might think with
reason that so many capricious quarrels were only
veils with which a celestial soul clothed itself, to
be lifted one by one like those with which she
enveloped her adorable body. The duchess was
to him the most artless, the most ingenuous of mis-
tresses, and he made of her the one woman of his
choice ; he went away from her, at last, happy in
having brought her finally to grant him so many
pledges of love that it seemed to him impossible not
to be henceforth for her a husband in secret, the
choice of whom had been approved by God. With
this thought, with the candor of those who feel all
the obligations of love in tasting its pleasures,
Armand returned slowly home. He followed the
quays so that he might see the greatest possible
space of heaven. He wished to enlarge the firma-
ment and all nature as he felt his heart expand.
(327)
328 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
His lungs seemed to him to inspire more air than
they had taken in the night before. As he walked
he questioned himself, and he promised himself to
love this woman so religiously that she should find
each day an absolution for her social faults in a
continued happiness. Gentle agitations of an over-
flowing life ! Men who have sufficient strength to
dye their souls with only one sentiment experience
an infinite joy in contemplating by snatches a
whole life-time incessantly passionate, as some
recluses can contemplate the divine light in their
ecstasies. Without this belief in its perpetuity,
^ love would be nothing; constancy enlarges it. It
was thus that Montriveau comprehended his passion
as he walked along in the grasp of his happiness.
"We are joined one to the other forever! "
This thought was for this man a talisman which
realized the desires of his life-time. He did not ask
himself if the duchess would change, if this love
would endure; no, he had faith, that virtue without
which there is no Christian future, but which, per-
haps, is still more necessary to society. For the
first time, he regarded life through his feeling, he
who had hitherto lived only by the excessive action
of human strength, the devotion, half corporeal, of
the soldier.
The next day Monsieur de Montriveau set out at
an early hour towards the Faubourg Saint-Germain.
He had an appointment in a house near the Hotel
de Langeais, to which, as soon as he had transacted
his business, he turned his steps, as if to his own
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 329
home. The general was walking with a man for
whom he seemed to have a species of aversion
when he encountered him in society. This man
was the Marquis de Ronquerolles, whose reputation
became so high in the boudoirs of Paris; a man of
wit, of talent, above all of courage, and who gave
the tone to all the young men of Paris; a gallant
man, whose success and whose experience were
equally envied, and to whom was lacking neither
fortune nor birth, which add in Paris so much lustre
to the qualities of a man of the world.
"Where are you going?" said Monsieur de Ron-
querolles to Montriveau.
"To Madame de Langeais. "
"Ah! true, I forgot that you had allowed yourself
to be taken in her toils. You will lose with her a
love which you had much better employ elsewhere.
I could give you ten women who are worth a thous-
and of that titled courtesan, who does with her head
what other women, more frank, do— "
"What are you saying, my dear fellow?" said
Armand, interrupting him, "the duchess is an
angel of purity."
Ronquerolles laughed.
"If you have got as far as that, my dear fellow, "
he said, "I must enlighten you. One word only!
between us, it cannot matter. Is the duchess
yours? In that case, I have nothing to say. Come
now, confide in me. It is a question of not losing
your time in attaching your fme soul to an ungrate-
ful nature that will betray every hope you form."
330 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
When Armand had naively sketched the situation,
in which he mentioned minutely the rights which
he had obtained with so much difficulty, Ronque-
rolles burst into a fit of laughter so cruel that in
another man it would have cost his life. But
in seeing the peculiar manner in which these two
men looked and spoke to each other, standing alone
in the angle of a wall as far from the world of men
^ as they would have been in the middle of a desert,
it was easy to imagine that they were united by
some friendship without bounds and that no human
interest could embroil them.
"My dear Armand, why did you not tell me that
you were involved with the duchess.? I could have
given you some advice that would have enabled
you to bring this intrigue to a good end. You
ought to know, first, that the women of our Fau-
bourg, like all others, delight in being immersed in
love ; but they wish to possess without themselves
being possessed. They have arranged matters with
nature. The jurisprudence of the parish allows
them almost everything, short of the positive sin.
The favors with which your lovely duchess regales
you are venial sins which she washes off with the
waters of penitence. But, if you had the imperti-
nence to demand seriously the great mortal sin to
which, naturally, you attach the highest import-
ance, you would see with what profound disdain the
door of the boudoir and that of the hotel would be
incontinently shut in your face. The tender
Antoinette would have forgotten everything, you
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 33 1
would be less than nothing for her. Your kisses,
my dear friend, are wiped off with the indifference
that a woman brings to the details of her toilet.
The duchess would sponge love away from her
cheeks just as she does her rouge. We are well
acquainted with that sort of woman, the pure
Parisian. Have you never noticed in the streets a
little grisette trotting quickly along? her head is a
picture, — pretty bonnet, fresh cheeks, coquettish
hair, arch smile, all the rest of her very little cared
for. Is not that a good portrait? There is your
Parisian woman, she knows that her head alone
will be seen, — therefore for her head are all her
cares, all her adornments, all her vanities. Well,
your duchess is all head, she only feels by her
head, she has a heart in her head, a voice in her
head, she is dainty in her head. We call this poor
thing an intellectual Lais. You are played with
like a child. If you doubt it, you can have the
proof this evening, this morning, this instant. Go
to her, try to demand, to wish imperiously that
which is refused you ; even though you set about it
like the late Marechal de Richelieu, not to be
denied."
Armand was dumfounded.
"Do you want her enough to make a fool of your-
self?"
"I want her at any price!" cried Montriveau,
desperately.
"Well then, listen. Be as implacable as she will
be; try to humiliate her, to pique her vanity, to
332 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
interest, not her heart, not her soul, but the nerves
and the lymph of this woman who is at once nerv-
ous and lymphatic. If you can rouse a desire in
her, you are saved. But quit all your beautiful
childish ideas. If, having caught her in your
eagles' claws, you hesitate, if you yield, if one of
your eyelashes quivers, if she thinks she can still
control you, she will slip from your talons like a
fish and escape, never to be caught again. Be as
inflexible as the law. Have no more mercy than
the executioner. Strike. When you have struck,
strike again. Strike always, as if with a knout.
Duchesses are hard, my dear Armand, and these
feminine natures soften only under blows; suffering
gives them a heart, and it is a work of charity to
strike them. Striketherefore without ceasing. Ah!
when pain has well wrung their nerves, enervated
those fibres that you think so soft and tender ; made
that dry heart to beat, which, under this play, will
resume its elasticity; when the brain has yielded,
passion will enter perhaps in the metallic springs
of this machine of tears, of manners, of swoonings,
of melting phrases; and you will see the most mag-
nificent of conflagrations if only the chimney takes
fire. This kind of female steel will have the red
heat of metal in the forge! a heat more durable
than any other, and this incandescence will perhaps
become love. Nevertheless, I doubt it. And then,
is the duchess worth so much trouble.? Between
ourselves, she would have done better to have been
primarily formed by a man like myself, I would
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 333
have made of her a charming woman, she has race;
but as for you two, you will stay always at the A,
B, C of love. But you are in love, and you do
not share at this moment my ideas on the subject. —
All happiness to you, my children," added Ronque-
rolles laughing and after a pause. "For my part, I
declare in favor of easy women ; at least they are
tender, they love naturally, and not with all these
social condiments. My poor boy, a woman who
quibbles, who only wishes to inspire love? well, it
is well to have one as a matter of luxury, as you
have a riding horse; to see only in her the little
game of the confessional against the sofa, or of
white against black, of the queen against the
bishop, of scruples against pleasure, a very divert-
ing game of chess. A man ever so little of a roue,
who knows the game, would give mate in three
moves, at will. If I undertook a woman of that kind,
I would make it my object to — "
He whispered a word in Armand's ear and left
him abruptly that he might not hear his answer.
As for Montriveau, he made one bound across the
courtyard of the Hotel de Langeais, went up to the
duchess's apartments and, without having himself
announced, entered and went into her bedroom.
"But this is not the thing," she said, gathering
her dressing-robe about her hastily; "Armand, you
are an abominable man. Go away, leave me, I beg
of you. Go, go. Wait for me in the salon. Go."
"Dear angel," he said to her, "has a husband no
privileges? "
334 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"But it is detestable taste, Monsieur, either in a
bridegroom or in a husband, to surprise his wife in
this way."
He came up to her, took hold of her and clasped
her in his arms:
"Forgive me, my dear Antoinette, but a thousand
evil suspicions fill my heart."
"Suspicions, fie — ah! fie, fie, then!"
"Suspicions which seem almost justified. If you
loved me, would you now quarrel with me ? Would
you not be happy to see me ? Would you not have
felt some, I know not what, movement of the heart.?
Why I, who am not a woman, I feel an inward
trembling at the very sound of your voice. The
desire to fall upon your neck has often assailed me
in the midst of a ball."
"Oh! if you have as many suspicions as the
times I have not fallen on your neck before all the
world, 1 fear that I shall be under suspicion all my
life; but in comparison with you Othello was a
baby!" ^
"Ah," he said in despair, "I am not loved — "
"At least, at this moment, admit that you are
not lovable."
"I have, then, still to seek to please you?"
"Ah! I believe it. Come," she said with a little
imperative air, "go, leave me. I am not like you;
I do seek to please you — "
Never did any woman know better than Madame
de Langeais how to put so much grace into her inso-
lence; and is this not to double its effect.? is this
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 335
not to make the coldest man furious? At this mo-
ment her eyes, the tone of her voice, her attitude,
all expressed a species of perfect liberty which is
never found in a loving woman when she is in the
presence of the one the sight of whom alone should
make her palpitate. Armand, his mind somewhat
disabused by the counsels of the Marquis de Ron-
querolles and still farther enlightened by that rapid
perception with which passion momentarily endows
the least sagacious of men, but which is found so
complete in strong minds, defined at once the terri-
ble truth which the self-possession of the duchess
betrayed, and his heart swelled with a storm like
a lake ready to burst its bounds.
"If you spoke the truth yesterday, be mine, my
dear Antoinette," he cried, "I will — "
"In the first place," she said, repelling him
calmly and with strength when she saw him
advance, "do not compromise me. My waiting-
woman might hear you. Respect me, I beg of you.
Your familiarity is very well in the evening in my
boudoir; but here, — no. And pray what signifies
your 'I will ' ? I will ! No one has ever said that
word to me. It seems to me very ridiculous, per-
fectly ridiculous."
"You will not yield to me on this point? " said he.
"Ah! you call it a point, the free disposition of
ourselves; a point of great importance, in fact;
and you will permit me to be on this point entirely
my own mistress."
"And if, trusting to your promises, I exact it?"
336 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"Then you will prove to me that I have been
very wrong in making you the slightest promise, I
shall not be foolish enough to keep it, and 1 shall
entreat you to let me alone."
The general turned pale, was about to spring for-
ward; Madame de Langeais rang, her maid entered,
and smiling at him with a mocking grace, the
duchess said to Armand:
"Have the kindness to come back when I am
ready to be seen."
Montriveau felt at this moment all the hardness
of this woman; cold and cutting as steel, she was
crushing in her scorn. In one moment she had
broken the bonds that were strong only for her
lover. The duchess had read on Armand's brow
tlie secret exigencies of this visit and had judged
that the moment had come to make this imperial
soldier know that duchesses might well lend them-
selves to love, but not give themselves, and that
their conquest was more difficult to make than had
been that of Europe.
"Madame," said Armand, "I have not the time to
wait. I am, as you said yourself, a spoiled child.
When 1 seriously wish for that of which we were
speaking just now, I will have it."
"You will have it?" she said with a haughty
manner in which was mingled some surprise.
"I will have it."
"Ah! how good of you to will it. As a matter of
curiosity, 1 should like to know how you intend to
get it—"
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 337
"I am enchanted," replied Montriveau, laughing
in such a manner that it frightened the duchess, "to
be able to give an interest to your life. Will you
permit me to come to take you to the ball to-night ? "
"A thousand thanks, Monsieur de Marsay has
preceded you, I have made an engagement."
Montriveau bowed gravely and withdrew.
"Ronquerolles was right," he thought, "we are
going to play henceforth a game of chess."
From that moment he hid his emotions under an
appearance of perfect calmness. No man is strong
enough to be able to support these changes which
transport the soul rapidly from the highest happi-
ness to supreme despair. Had he not caught a
glimpse of a life of happiness only to feel more
deeply the void of his previous existence ? It was a
terrible storm ; but he knew how to suffer, and he
received the rush of his tumultuous thoughts as a
granite rock receives the waves of an angry ocean.
"I could say nothing to her; in her presence I
have no longer any wits. She does not know how
vile and despicable she is. No one has ever dared
to put this creature face to face with herself. She
has doubtless trifled with many men, I will avenge
them all."
For the first time, perhaps, in the heart of a man
love and revenge were so equally mingled that it
was impossible for Montriveau himself to know
whether it was love or vengeance which had the
ascendancy. He went that same evening to the
ball where he knew she would be, and he almost
22
338 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
despaired of being able to touch this woman to whom
he was tempted to ascribe something demoniacal:
She showed herself very gracious to him, and
smiled on him pleasantly, she doubtless did not
wish the world to believe that she had compromised
herself with Monsieur de Montriveau. A mutual
coolness would have betrayed love. But that the
duchess should change nothing in her manner
while the marquis appeared sombre and vexed,
would not that make it apparent that Armand had
obtained nothing from her? The world is quick to
recognize the unhappiness of a rejected man, and
never confounds this with the discontent which
some women order their lovers to affect in the
hope of concealing a mutual love. And every one
smiled at Montriveau, who, not having consulted his
new elephant-driver, remained dreamy, suffering;
while Monsieur de Ronquerolles would perhaps
have advised him to compromise the duchess by
replying to her false courtesies with passionate
demonstrations. Armand de Montriveau left the
ball, holding all human nature in horror, and yet
hardly able to believe in such utter perversity.
"Since there are no public executioners for such
crimes," he said, looking at the lighted windows of
the salons in which were dancing, talking and smil-
ing the loveliest women in Paris, "1 will take you
by the nape of your neck, Madame la Duchesse, and
I will make you feel a sharper blade than the knife
of the Place de la Gr^ve. Steel against steel, we
shall see which heart can bear most."
*
For about a week, Madame de Langeais hoped to
see the Marquis de Montriveau again; but Armand
contented himself by sending his card every morn-
ing to the Hotel de Langeais. Each time that this
card was brought to the duchess she was unable to
repress a shudder, she was filled with sinister
thoughts, but indistinctly, like a presentiment of
misfortune. When she read that name at times
she seemed to feel in her hair the powerful hand of
this implacable man, at times this name threatened
vengeances which her active fancy imagined as
atrocious. She had studied him too closely not to
fear him. Would she be assassinated.? This man
with the neck of a bull, would he tear her open in
tossing her over his head.? would he trample her
under foot.? When, where, how would he seize
her.? would he make her suffer much, and what
species of suffering was he now preparing for her.?
She repented. There were moments when, if he
had come, she would have flung herself into his
arms in complete surrender. Every night as she
fell asleep she saw his image under some new
aspect. Sometimes his bitter smile, sometimes
his brows knitted like Jupiter's, his lion-look, or
some proud motion of his shoulders, made him terri-
ble to her. The next morning the card would
seem to her covered with blood. She lived agitated
(339)
340 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
by that name more than she had ever been by the
fiery, obstinate, exacting lover. Then, as the
silence was prolonged, her apprehensions deepened;
she was forced to prepare herself, without outside
help, for a horrible struggle, of which she was not
permitted to speak. This soul, proud and hard,
was more sensible to the sting of hate than it had
recently been to the caresses of love. Ah ! if the
general could have seen his mistress as she knit
her brows in bitter thoughts in the recesses of that
boudoir in which he had tasted so many joys, per-
haps he would have been filled with great hopes.
Is not pride, after all, one of those human emotions
which can give birth to none but noble actions?
Although Madame de Langeais kept the secret of
her thoughts, we may suppose that Monsieur de
Montriveau was no longer indifferent to her. Is it
not an immense conquest for a man to absorb a
woman's mind? Once there, he must necessarily
make progress one way or the other. Put the
feminine creature under the heels of a furious horse,
before some terrible animal, and she will certainly
fall on her knees, she will expect death; but if the
beast be merciful and does not kill her at once, she
will love the horse, the lion, the bull, she will
speak to it with composure. The duchess felt
herself under the feet of a lion ; she trembled, she
did not hate. These two persons thus so strangely
pitted against each other met in society three
times during that week. Each time, in reply to
her coquettish interrogations, the duchess received
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 341
from Armand respectful salutations and smiles
tinged with so cruel an irony that they confirmed
all the apprehensions inspired in the morning by
the visiting-card. Life is only what our feelings
make of it for us, feelings had now hollowed an
abyss between these two persons.
At the commencement of the following week the
Comtesse de Serizy, sister of the Marquis de Ron-
querolles, gave a grand ball, at which Madame de
Langeais was present. The first person the duchess
saw on entering was Armand. He was waiting for
her this time, at least she thought so. They ex-
changed looks. A cold sweat suddenly issued from
every pore of her skin. She had believed Montriveau
capable of some unheard-of vengeance, propor-
tioned to their condition ; this vengeance was found,
it was waiting, it was hot, it seethed. The eyes
of this betrayed lover darted lightnings at her, and
his visage radiated a satisfied hatred. With the
utmost desire to display her coldness and her super-
ciliousness the duchess remained silent and op-
pressed. She moved to the side of the Comtesse
de Serizy, who could not forbear saying to her :
"What is the matter, my dear Antoinette? You
look terrifying."
"A contra-dance will restore me," she answered,
taking the hand of a young man who came forward.
Madame de Langeais began to waltz with a sort
of nervous frenzy that increased the lowering look
on Montriveau's face. He remained standing,
somewhat in advance of those who were amusing
342 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
themselves by watching the waltzers. Each time
\that his mistress passed before him his eyes seized
ppon this revolving head like those of a tiger sure
of its prey. The waltz over, the duchess came and
seated herself near the countess, and the marquis
did not cease to watch her as he conversed with a
stranger.
"Monsieur," he said, "one of the things which
most struck me in this journey — "
The duchess was all ears.
" — Was the phrase used by the guard at West-
minster in showing the axe with which a masked
man, as it is said, had struck off the head of
Charles I., in memory of the king who had said it
himself to an inquirer."
"What did he say," asked Madame de Serizy.
"Do not touch the axe!" answered Montr iveau
in a tone in which there seemed to be menace.
"Really, Monsieur le Marquis," said the
Duchesse de Langeais, "you look at my neck with
such a melodramatic air in repeating this old story,
familiar to everyone who has been to London, that I
can almost imagine I can see the axe in your hand. "
These last words were said laughingly, though
a cold sweat had taken possession of her.
"But this story is, on the contrary, very new,"
he replied.
"In what way, pray tell me? if you please, in
what?"
"In this, Madame, you have touched the axe,"
said Montriveau to her in a low tone.
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 343
"What a delightful prophecy! " she cried with a
forced smile. "And when will my head fall ? "
"I do not wish your pretty head to fall, Madame.
1 only fear some great misfortune for you. If you
were shorn, would you not regret your charming
blond hair which you make so much of? — "
"But there are tiiose for whom women are glad
to make such sacrifices, and often even for men
who do not know how to overlook their momentary
ill humor."
"Agreed. Well, if, all at once, by some chemical
process, a jester were to take away your beauty,
make you seem a hundred years old when you are
for us but eighteen ? "
"Ah! Monsieur," she said, interrupting him,
"the small-pox is our Battle of Waterloo. The day
after, we know those who truly love us."
"Would you not regret that delightful counte-
nance which? — "
"Oh! very much; but less for myself than for
him who might care for it. Still, if I were sincerely
loved always, faithfully, what would my beauty
matter ? — What do you think, Clara ? "
"It is a dangerous subject," replied Madame de
Serizy.
"Might one ask of His Majesty, the King of the
Sorcerers," continued Madame de Langeais, "when
1 committed the sin of touching the axe, — I who
have never been to London — "
No so, he answered with a mocking laugh.
"And when will the execution commence?"
344 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
Upon which Montriveau coolly drew out his
watch and looked at the hour with an air of convic-
tion that was really frightful.
"The day will not end until a horrible misfortune
has overtaken you — "
"I am not a child to be easily frightened, or,
rather, I am a child that knows no danger," said
the duchess, "and I am going to dance without
fear on the verge of the abyss."
"I am delighted, Madame, to know that you have
so much strength of mind," he replied as he saw
her go to take her place in the quadrille.
Notwithstanding her apparent disdain for Ar-
mand's sinister predictions, the duchess was a
prey to mortal terror. The moral and almost phys-
ical oppression under which her lover held her
scarcely ceased when he left the ball. Nevertheless,
after the momentary relief of breathing at her ease,
she was surprised to find herself regretting this
absence of fear, so eager is the female nature for
extremes of emotion. This regret was not love, but
it belonged undoubtedly to the feelings that lead up
to it. Then, as if she were again under the effects
of the influence which Monsieur de Montriveau
had upon her, she recalled the air of conviction
with which he had looked at his watch, and,
unable to control her terror, she left the ball. It
was then about midnight. Those of her servants
who were waiting for her put on her pelisse and
went before her to call her carriage; once seated in
it, she fell very naturally into a reverie induced by
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 345
Monsieur de Montriveau's prediction. When she
arrived in her court-yard she entered into a vesti-
bule that closely resembled that of her own hotel ;
but suddenly she perceived that the stairway was
not hers ; then, at the moment when she turned to
call her servants, several men seized her suddenly,
bound a handkerchief over her mouth, tied her hand
and foot, and carried her away. She cried out
loudly.
"Madame, we have orders to kill you if you make
a noise," said a voice in her ear.
The terror of the duchess was so great that after-
wards she could not in the least remember when
or how she was transported. When she recov-
ered her senses, she found herself lying, bound
hand and foot with silken cords, on the sofa in a
bachelor's chamber. She could not retain a cry as
she encountered the eyes of Armand de Montriveau,
who, seated quietly in an arm-chair and wrapped
in his dressing-gown, was smoking a cigar.
"Make no noise, Madame la Duchesse, " he said
coolly, taking his cigar from his lips, "I have a
headache. Besides, I am about to unbind you.
But listen carefully to what I am now to have the
honor to say to you."
He gently loosened the cords that bound the feet
of the duchess.
"What good will your cries do you? no one can
hear them. You are too well bred to make useless
grimaces. If you are not quiet, if you insist upon
struggling with me, I will bind you again hand and
346 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
foot I believe, however, all things considered,
that you will respect yourself enough to remain
upon that sofa as if you were lying upon your own,
— cold and indifferent still, if you will, — You have
caused me to shed on that couch very many tears
which I have hidden from the eyes of others."
As Montriveau spoke the duchess cast about her
that furtive female glance which sees all even when
it appears most abstracted. She greatly liked the
appearance of this room, which bore a strong
resemblance to the cell of a monk. The character
and the habits of the master pervaded it. No orna-
ment relieved the gray tone of the empty walls.
On the floor was a green carpet. A black sofa, a
table covered with papers, two large arm-chairs, a
chest of drawers on which stood an alarm-clock, a
very low bed over which was thrown a red cloth
with a Grecian border in black, all proclaimed the
habits of a life reduced to its simplest needs. A
three-branched candlestick on the chimney-piece
recalled by its Egyptian shape the immensity of
the deserts in which this man had so long wandered.
Beside the bed, whose feet, like the enormous paws
of a Sphinx, appeared under the folds of the drapery,
and the angle of one of the lateral walls of the
chamber, was a door hidden by a green curtain with
red and black fringes held by large rings to a pole.
The door through which unknown hands had brought
the duchess had a similar portiere, held back by
a loop. At the last glance which the duchess
cast upon the two curtains to compare them she
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 347
perceived that the door nearest to the bed was open,
and that a ruddy light from the adjoining room
shone in a narrow line at the foot of the curtain.
Her curiosity was naturally roused by this mysteri-
ous light which hardly enabled her to distinguish in
the obscurity some strange forms; but for the mo-
ment she did not think that her danger could come
from that direction, and she wished to satisfy a
more pressing interest
"Monsieur, is it an indiscretion to ask of you
what you propose to do with me? " she said offen-
sively and with a tone of cutting mockery.
The duchess believed she heard the voice of
exceeding love in Montriveau's words. Besides,
to carry off a woman, does not that necessarily
mean to adore her ?
"Nothing at all, Madame," he answered, blowing
away easily the last smoke of his tobacco. "You
are here for a short time only. I wish first to
explain to you what you are, and what I am.
When you are attitudinizing on your divan in your
boudoir, 1 find no words to express my ideas. More-
over, in your house, at the least word which dis-
pleases you, you pull your bell-rope, you cry out
and put your lover out of the door, as if he were
the worst of outcasts. Here, my mind is free. Here,
no one can throw me out of doors. Here, you will
be my victim for a few moments, and you will
have the extreme goodness to listen to me. Fear
nothing. 1 have not carried you off to utter insults
to you, or to obtain from you by violence that
348 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
which I have not been able to deserve, that which
you have not been willing to freely grant me.
That would be baseness. You may perhaps con-
ceive of rape; I can not conceive of it."
He threw, with a sharp movement, his cigar into
the fire.
"Madame, the smoke doubtless annoys you?"
He immediately rose, took from the fire-place a
warming-pan, burnt some perfumes in it and puri-
fied the air. The astonishment of the duchess
could not be compared with her humiliation. She
was in the power of this man, and this man did
not intend to abuse his power. Those eyes, once
flaming with love, she now saw calm and fixed as
the stars. She trembled. Then, the terror with
which Armand inspired her was augmented by one of
those petrifying sensations, analogous to those help-
less and motionless agitations peculiar to nightmares.
She lay gripped by fear, fancying she saw the lurid
light behind the curtain grow more vivid, as if
blown by bellows. Suddenly, the glow, becoming
stronger, illuminated three masked men. This ter-
rible appearance disappeared so suddenly that she
took it for an optical illusion.
"Madame," resumed Armand, looking at her with
contemptuous coldness, "a moment, one only, will
suffice me to strike you through every moment of
your life, the only eternity of which I myself can
dispose. 1 am not God. Listen to me attentively,"
he said, making a pause to give solemnity to his
words. "Love will always come at your will; you
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 349
have over men a power that is unUmited; but recol-
lect that one day you called love to you, — it came
to you, pure and honest, as much so as it can be on
this earth; as respectful as it was violent; tender
as the love of a devoted woman, or of that of a
mother for her child; and, finally, so grand that it
was a madness. You trifled with that love, you
committed a crime. Every woman has a right to
refuse a love she feels she cannot share. The
man who loves without making himself beloved
should not be pitied, and has no cause for com-
plaint. But, Madame la Duchesse,to draw to herself,
in feigning feeling, an unfortunate deprived of all
natural affection, to make him comprehend happi-
ness in all its plenitude only to tear it from him ; to
rob ail his future of joy; to kill him, not only for
to-day but for the eternity of his life, by poisoning
all his hours and all his thoughts, that is what I
call a frightful crime! "
"Monsieur — "
"I cannot yet permit you to answer me. Listen
to me still. Moreover, I have certain rights over
you; though 1 only wish those of the judge over the
criminal, in order to awaken your conscience. If
you had no longer any conscience I should not
blame you; but you are still so young! you must
still feel life in your heart, I like to think so. if I
believe you sufficiently depraved to commit a crime
unpunishable by law I do not take you to be so
degraded as not to comprehend the meaning of my
words. I resume."
350 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
At this moment the duchess heard the dull
sound of a bellows with which the unknown, of
whom she had had a glimpse, were doubtless stir-
ring the fire, the light of which was thrown on
the curtain; but the flaming glance of Montriveau
compelled her to remain quiet and palpitating, with
her eyes fixed before him. However great might be
her curiosity, the fire of his words interested her
still more than the crackling voice of that mysteri-
ous flame.
"Madame," he continued after a pause, "when
in Paris the executioner puts his hand upon a poor
assassin and stretches him upon the plank where
the law wills that an assassin shall lie to lose his
head, — you know, the newspapers inform of it both
the rich and the poor, the first, that they may sleep
in peace, and the second, that they may take warn-
ing. Well, then, you who are religious and even
somewhat devout, you go to offer masses for the
soul of that man, — and yet you are of his family,
you are the elder branch of it You can remain
seated in peace, you can exist happy and without
care. Driven by poverty or by rage, your brother
of the bagnio has only killed a man; and you! you
have killed the happiness of a man, his best life,
his dearest beliefs. The other has but simply
waited for his victim; he killed him despite him-
self, notwithstanding his fear of the guillotine; but
you! — you have heaped up all the crimes of your
weakness upon an innocent strength ; you have
tamed your sufferer in order the better to devour
his heart; you have baited him with caresses; you
have not omitted one of those which could make
him think of, dream of, desire the delights of love.
You have demanded a thousand sacrifices of him to
refuse him everything. You have made him see
the light strongly before putting out his eyes. A
(351)
352 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
noble courage ! Such infamies are luxuries which
are not understood by those bourgeoises at whom
you sneer. They know how to give themselves
and to forgive ; they know how to love and to suffer.
They make us all little by the grandeur of their
devotion. As we go higher in society we find just
as much mud as there is at the bottom ; only it is
hardened and gilded. Yes, to find perfection in the
ignoble we must look for a fine education, a great
name, a pretty woman, a duchess. To fall to the
bottom of all it is necessary to be at the top of all.
1 express myself badly to you, I still suffer too
much from the wounds which you have caused me ;
but do not fear that I shall complain ! No. My
words are the expression of no personal hope, and
contain no bitterness. Rest assured, Madame, I
pardon you, and this pardon is so complete that you
cannot complain of coming to seek it against your
will. — Only, you may make suffer other hearts as
confiding as mine, and I should spare them their
sufferings. You have therefore inspired me with a
thought of justice. Expiate your fault here below.
God will pardon you perhaps, I hope so, but He is
implacable, and He will strike you."
At these words the eyes of this humbled, tortured
woman filled with tears.
"Why do you weep? Be faithful to your own
nature. You have watched without feeling the tor-
tures of the heart you have broken. Enough,
Madame, console yourself. I can no longer suffer.
Others may tell you that you have given them life;
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 353
for myself 1 say to you with delight that you have
given me annihilation. Perhaps you have guessed
that I do not belong to myself, that I should live for
my friends, and that I could then support with them
the coldness of death and the griefs of life. Would
you have so much kindness? would you be like the
tigers of the desert who make the wound and then
lick it?"
The duchess melted into tears.
"Spare yourself those tears, Madame. If I be-
lieved in them, it would be to be suspicious of
them. Are they, or are they not, one of your arti-
fices? After all those which you have employed,
how could I believe that there can be anything
truthful in you? Nothing in you has henceforth
the power to move me. 1 have said all. "
Madame de Langeais rose with a movement that
was at once full of nobility and of humility.
"You have the right to treat me harshly," she
said, holding out to him a hand which he did not
take, "your words are not yet harsh enough, and I
deserve this punishment."
"To punish you, Madame, I! but to punish, is
not that to love? Expect nothing from me that
resembles feeling. I might, indeed, on my own
behalf be accuser and judge, decree and executioner ;
but no. I shall accomplish presently a duty, but
nowise a desire for vengeance. The cruelest ven-
geance is, to my thinking, the disdain of a possi-
ble vengeance. Who knows? perhaps I shall be
the minister of your pleasures. Henceforward, in
23
354 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
wearing so elegantly the sad livery in which society
clothes its criminals, perhaps you may be compelled
to have their integrity. And then, you will love! "
The duchess listened with a submission that was
neither feigned nor artfully calculated; she spoke
only after an interval of silence.
"Armand," she said, "it seemed to me that in
resisting love I obeyed the chaste instincts of a
woman, and it was not from you that I expected
such reproaches. You take all my weaknesses
and impute them to me as crimes. How is it that
you could not see that I might be drawn beyond my
duties by all the curiosities of love, and that, on
the morrow, I would be grieved, distressed at hav-
ing gone so far? Alas! it was sinning through
ignorance. There was, I swear to you, as much of
good faith in my faults as in my remorse. My cruel-
ties betrayed much more love than my yieldings
bore witness to. And, moreover, of what is it you
complain ? The gift of my heart did not suffice you,
you demanded brutally that of my person — "
"Brutally!" exclaimed Monsieur de Montriveau.
Then he said within himself:
"If I let myself be dragged into a war of words, I
am lost."
"Yes, you came to me as though I were one of
those bad women, without respect, with none of the
courtesies of love. Had I not the right to pause, to
reflect.!* Well, I have reflected. The unseemliness
of your conduct is excusable, — love is its motive;
let me think so and justify you to my own heart
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 355
Ah! well, Armand, at the very moment when, this
evening, you were predicting to me misfortune, I —
I was believing in our happiness. Yes, 1 had confi-
dence in that noble and proud character of which
you had given me so many proofs. — And I was all
thine," she added, bending towards his ear. "Yes,
I had I know not what desire to give happiness to a
man so sorely tried by adversity. Master for mas-
ter, I wished for a noble man. The higher I felt
myself, the less did I wish to descend. Trusting
in thee I thought I saw a lifetime of love at the mo-
ment when thou didst show me death.— Strength is
never without mercy. My friend, thou art too
strong to be cruel to a poor woman who loves thee.
If I had faults, can I not obtain forgiveness.? can 1
not repair them ? Repentance is the grace of love,
1 would be gracious to thee. Could I alone of all
women be without their uncertainties, their fears,
their timidity which it is so natural to feel when
one binds one's self for life, and when you break so
easily bonds of this sort? Those bourgeoises, to
whom you compare me, give themselves, but they
struggle. Well, I have struggled, but I am here — .
Oh! God! he will not hear me!" she cried, inter-
rupting herself.
.She wrung her hands crying:
/ "But I love thee! but I am thine! "
^ She fell at Armand's feet.
""■"Thine! Thine! My only, my sole master ! "
"Madame," said Armand, offering to raise her,
^'Antoinette can no longer save the Duchesse de
356 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
Langeais. I trust neither the one nor the other.
You give yourself to-day, you will refuse yourself
perhaps to-morrow. No power, neither in heaven
nor on the earth, can assure me of the gentle fidelity
of your love. The pledges of it were for the past;
our past has gone forever."
At this moment a light blazed up so vividly that
the duchess involuntarily turned her head towards
the portiere, and saw again distinctly the three
masked men.
"Armand," she said, "I would not think ill of
you. Why are those men here? What are you
preparing to do to me ? "
"Those men are as discreet as I shall be myself
on all that passes here," he said. "See in them
only my arms and my heart. One of them is a
surgeon — "
"A surgeon," she said. "Armand, my friend,
uncertainty is the cruelest of sufferings. Speak,
then, tell me if you wish my life.' I will give it to
you, you need not take it — "
"You have not then understood me?" said Mon-
triveau. "Did I not speak to you of justice? To
quiet your fears," he added, coldly, taking up a
piece of steel which lay on the table, "1 will ex-
plain to you what I have decided to do to you."
He showed her a cross of two bars fastened to
the end of a steel handle.
"Two of my friends are heating at this moment
a cross like this one. We shall apply it to your
forehead, there, between the two eyes, so that you
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 357
cannot hide it with diamonds and thus escape the
inquiries of the world. You will then bear upon j
your brow the infamous mark branded on the ;
shoulder of your brothers the convicts. The pain '
will be slight, but I feared some nervous crisis, or
resistance — . "
"Resistance?" she said, striking her hands joy-
fully together. "No, no, I would that all the world
were here to see it. Ah ! my Armand, mark, mark
quickly thy creature as a poor little thing of thine!
Thou didst demand pledges of my love, they are all
here in one. Ah! 1 see only mercy and pardon,
only an everlasting happiness in thy vengeance — .
When thou hast thus marked a woman for thine
own, when thou wilt have a servile soul which will
bear thy red cipher, ah! then thou canst never
abandon it, thou wilt be forever mine. In isolating
me from the world thou wilt be charged with my
happiness, under penalty of being a coward, and I
know thee noble, great ! But the woman who loves
will always mark herself — . Come, messieurs,
enter and mark, mark the Duchesse de Langeais.
She belongs to Monsieur de Montriveau forever.
Enter quickly, and all of you, my forehead burns
hotter than your iron."
Armand turned quickly that he might not see the
duchess palpitating, kneeling before him. He
uttered a word which caused his three friends to
disappear. Women accustomed to the life of salons
understand the possibilities of mirrors. Thus the
duchess, eager to read clearly Armand's heart, was
358 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
all eyes. Armand who did not think of his mirror
thus let her see two tears quickly wiped away.
All the future of the duchess was in those two tears.
When he turned to lift her, he found her standing,
she thought herself loved. Consequently the shock
was terrible when she heard Montriveau say, with
all that firmness which she herself had so often
used when she was trifling with him :
"I grant you grace, Madame. You may believe
me, this scene will be as if it had never taken
place. But here, let us say farewell. I like to
believe that you were sincere in your boudoir in
your seductions, sincere here in the outpouring of
your heart. Farewell. I no longer have any faith.
You would torment me still, you would be always
the duchess, and — . But farewell, we shall never
understand each other — . What do you desire, at
present.''" he said, changing his tone to that of a
master of ceremonies. "Will you return home or
go back to Madame de Serizy's ball ? I have em-
ployed all my power to protect your reputation.
Neither your servants nor the world can ever know
of what has passed between us in the last quarter
of an hour. Your servants think you still at the
ball ; your carriage has not yet left Madame de
Serizy's court-yard; your coupe is in your own.
Where would you like to go?"
"What would you advise, Armand?"
"There is no Armand here, Madame la Duchesse.
We are strangers to each other."
"Take me to the ball, then," she said, curious
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 359
still to put his power to the proof. "Throw back
into the hell of the world a creature who has suffered
there, and who will continue to suffer there, if for
her there is no longer any happiness. Oh ! my
friend, 1 do love you as much as your bourgeoises
can love ! I love you enough to throw myself on
your neck at the ball, before all the world, if you
asked it. That horrible world has not corrupted me.
See, 1 am young and I am going to renew my youth
still more. Yes, i am a child, thy child, thou hast
created me. Oh, do not banish me from my Eden 1 "
Armand made a gesture.
"Ah! if I must go, let me then take something
with me from here, a trifle, — this, to put upon my
heart at night," she said, picking up one of his
gloves and folding it in her handkerchief — . "No,"
she continued, "I am not of that world of depraved
women; thou dost not know it, and so thou canst
not appreciate me ; know it well ! some of them f^ive
themselves for money; others yield to presents; all
that is vile ! Ah ! I would wish to be a simple bour-
geoise, a work-woman, if thou wouldst love better
a woman who is below thee than one whose devo-
tion is allied with human grandeur. Ah! my
Armand, there are among us women who are noble,
grand, chaste and pure, and then they are deli-
cious. I would wish to possess all noble qualities to
sacrifice them all to thee ; misfortune made me duch-
ess; I would I had been born near the throne that I
might sacrifice everything for thee. I would be
grisette for thee and queen for all others."
360 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
He listened, moistening a cigar.
"When you are ready to go," he said, "you will
let me know — "
"But I desire to remain."
"That is another thing," said he.
"Look, this one is ill-made," she cried, taking a
cigar and putting it eagerly to her mouth, where the
lips of Armand had touched it.
"Thou wouldst smoke ? " he said to her
"Oh ! what would I not do to please thee ? "
"Well then, go, Madame — "
"I obey," she answered, weeping.
"It will be necessary to cover your face that you
may not see the way by which you have to pass."
"I am ready, Armand," she said, blindfolding
herself.
"Can you see? "
"No."
He knelt softly at her feet.
"Ah! I hear thee," she said with a charming
gesture, thinking that his feigned harshness was
about to cease.
He offered to kiss her lips, she bent towards him.
"You can see, Madame."
"But I am a little curious."
"You deceive me then, still ? "
"Ah ! " she said, with the anger of an honor mis-
understood, "take off this handkerchief and lead
me. Monsieur, I shall not open my eyes."
Armand, convinced of her integrity by this cry,
conducted the duchess, who, faithful to her word.
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 361
made herself nobly blind; but as he held her
hand with paternal care to show her where now to
ascend and now to descend, he studied the quivering
pulsations which agitated the heart of this woman,
so surely conquered by a true love. Madame de
Langeais, happy in being able to speak to him thus,
pleased herself by telling him all, but he remained
inflexible; and when her hand questioned his, his
gave no answering pressure. Finally, after having
thus proceeded some time together, Armand told
her to step forward, she did so and perceived that
he held back her dress that it might not brush
against the walls of some opening, doubtless nar-
row. Madame de Langeais was touched by this
care, it betrayed a little lingering love; but it was
in some sort Montriveau's farewell, for he left her
without a word. When she felt herself in a warm
atmosphere, she opened her eyes. She found her-
self alone, before the chimney-piece of the boudoir
of the Comtesse de Serizy. Her first care was to
arrange the disorder of her toilet; she promptly
readjusted her dress and reestablished the arrange-
ment of her coiffure.
"Well, my dear Antoinette, we have been look-
ing for you everywhere," said the countess, opening
the door of the boudoir.
"I came here for a little fresh air," she said, "it
is so intolerably warm in the salon."
"It was thought you had left; but my brother
Ronquerolles told me that he had seen your servants
still waiting for you."
362 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"I am very tired, my dear, let me rest here a
moment."
And the duchess seated herself on the divan.
"What is the matter,? You are trembling all
over! "
The Marquis de Ronquerolles entered.
"I fear, Madame la Duchesse, that some accident
may happen to you. I have just seen your coach-
man as drunk as the ' Twenty-two Cantons.' "
The duchess did not answer, she was looking at
the chimney, the mirrors, striving to detect the
opening through which she had passed; then she
experienced an extraordinary sensation in finding
herself again in the midst of the gaieties of a ball
after the terrible scene which had just changed for-
ever the course of her life. She began to tremble
violently.
"My nerves are shaken by that prediction which
Monsieur de Montriveau made me here. Although
it was a jest, I am going home to see if his London
axe will pursue me in my dreams — . Adieu then,
dear. — Adieu, Monsieur le Marquis."
She traversed the ball-room, where she was
detained by flatterers whom she looked at with
pity. She felt how small her world was when she,
its queen, was thus humbled and abased. And oh !
what were all these men compared with him whom
she truly loved and whose character had resumed
the gigantic proportions momentarily lessened by
her, but which she now perhaps unduly exagger-
ated. She could not forbear looking at that one of
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 363
her servants who had accompanied her, and found
him very sleepy.
"You have not gone away from here this even-
ing?" she asked him.
"No, Madame."
As she got into her carriage she saw, in fact,
that her coachman was in a state of intoxication at
which she would have been frightened under any
other circumstances; but the great shocks of life
destroy all vulgar fears. However, she reached
home without accident; but she felt herself changed,
and in the grasp of entirely new emotions. For
her there was henceforth but one man in the world,
that is to say, for him only did she desire hence-
forth to have some value. If physiologists can
promptly define love by its connection with the
laws of nature, moralists fmd much more difficulty
in explaining it when they wish to consider it in
all the developments given to it by society. Never-
theless there exists, in spite of the heresies of the
thousand sects that divide the church of love, a
straight and clear-cut line passing sharply through
their doctrines, a line which discussions can never
bend and the inflexible application of which ex-
plains the crisis into which, like almost all other
women, the Duchesse de Langeais was now plunged.
She did not love as yet, she had a passion. — ~^
I
Love and passion are two different states of the
soul wiiich poets and men of tiie world, philosophers
and fools, continually confound. Love carries with
it a mutuality of feeling, a certainty of joys that
nothing can alter, and a too constant exchange of /
pleasures, a too complete adherence between hearts,
not to exclude all jealousy. Possession is then a
means and not an end; an infidelity may cause
suffering but not detachment; the soul is not more,
nor is it less, ardent or agitated, it is ceaselessly
happy; in short, desire, extended by a divine
breath from one end to the other of the immensity
of time, takes on for us but one tint, — life is as
blue as the pure sky. Passion is the presenti-
ment of love and of its infinitudes, to which all
suffering souls aspire. Passion is a hope which
may be deceived. Passion signifies at once suffer-
ing and transition ; passion ceases when hope is
dead. Men and women can without dishonoring
themselves feel more than one passion; it is so
natural to reach out towards happiness! but there
is in life only one love. All discussions, written or
spoken, upon the sentiments, may then be resumed
by these two questions: "Is it a passion? Is it
love? " As love can not exist without the intimate '
knowledge of the pleasures which perpetuate it,
the duchess was now under the yoke of a passion;
(365)
366 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
thus she was experiencing the consuming agita-
tions, the involuntary calculations, the parching
desires, in short, all that is expressed by the word
passion: she suffered. Amid these troubles of her
soul, rose the tumult stirred up by her vanity, by
her self-love, by her pride or by her haughtiness, —
all these varieties of egotism are allied to each
other. She had said to a man: "I love thee, I am
thine!" The Duchesse de Langeais, could she
really have uttered these words in vain.? Either
she must be loved or abdicate her role in society.
Conscious now of the solitude of her voluptuous
bed, in which voluptuousness had not yet set his
burning feet, she writhed and twisted in it, repeat-
ing to herself:
"I wish to be loved! "
And the faith she still kept in herself gave her
hopes of success. The duchess was piqued, the
vain Parisian woman was humiliated, the true
woman had glimpses of happiness, and her imagina-
tion, avenging all the time which nature had caused
her to lose, amused itself by making flame before
her the inextinguishable fires of pleasure. She well
nigh attained to the sensations of love; for, in the
doubt of being loved which stung her, she found
happiness in saying to herself: "I love him!"
God and the world, she had a strong desire to tram-
ple them under her feet. Montriveau was now her
religion. She passed the following day in a species
of moral numbness mixed with bodily agitations
that nothing can express. She tore up as many
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 367
letters as she wrote, and made a thousand impossi-
ble conjectures. At the hour in which Montriveau
formerly came she tried to believe that he would
arrive, and she took pleasure in waiting for him.
Her whole being was concentrated in the single
sense of hearing. She closed her eyes at times
and endeavored to listen through space. Then she
wished for the power of annihilating all obstacles
between herself and her lover, so that she might
obtain that absolute silence which allows sound to
reach us from enormous distances. In this concen-
tration of her mind the ticking of her clock was dis-
tracting to her, it was so like a sinister chatter that
she stopped it. Midnight sounded from the salon.
"My God," she said to herself, "to see him here,
that would be happiness. And yet he came for-
merly drawn by desire. His voice filled this
boudoir. And now, nothing!"
Remembering those scenes of coquetry that she
had played, and which had driven him from her,
tears of despair flowed down her cheeks for a long
time.
"Madame la Duchesse is perhaps not aware that
it is two o'clock in the morning," said her maid, "I
thought that Madame was indisposed."
"Yes, I am going to bed; but remember, Suzette,"
said Madame de Langeais, wiping away her tears,
"never to enter my room unless I ring; I shall not
tell you again."
For a week Madame de Langeais went to all
the houses where she hoped to meet Monsieur de
368 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
Montriveau. Contrary to her custom, she went
early and came away late; she gave up dancing
and played cards. Useless attempts ! she could not
succeed in seeing Armand, whose name she no
longer dared to pronounce. However, one evening
in a moment of desperation she said to Madame de
Serizy with as much indifference as she could as-
sume:
"Have you quarreled with Monsieur de Mon-
triveau? I no longer see him in your house."
"Why, he no longer comes here," replied the
countess, laughing. "Moreover, he is not seen any-
where, he is doubtless occupied with some woman."
"I thought," said the duchess, gently, "that the
Marquis de Ronquerolles was one of his friends — "
"I never heard my brother say that he even
knew him."
Madame de Langeais made no reply. Madame
de Serizy thought that she could now with impunity
lash a discreet friendship which had so long been
bitter to her, and she resumed :
"You regret, then, that gloomy individual? I
have heard shocking things said about him, — wound
him, and he never returns, never forgives; love
him, and he will put you in chains. And to every-
thing which I have said about him one of those who
laud him to the skies replies to me only with this
one word: 'He knows how to love!' They never
grow tired of repeating tome: 'Montriveau would
quit everything for his friend, his is an immense
soul. ' Ah, bah ! society does not require such grand^
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 369
souls. Men of that character are all very well
among each other, let them stay there, and leave
us to our own pretty pettinesses. What is your
opinion, Antoinette?"
In spite of her worldly self-possession the duchess
seemed agitated; but she replied, nevertheless,
with an ease of manner that deceived her friend:
"I am really sorry not to see him any more, I
took a great interest in him and would have given
him a sincere friendship. Even if you should think
me absurd, dear friend, I love the nobler natures.
To give yourself to a fool, is not that to admit dis-
tinctly that one has only senses?"
Madame de Serizy had never distinguished any
but commonplace men, and was at this moment
beloved by a handsome fop, the Marquis d'Aigle-
mont.
The countess made her visit very brief, it may
be believed. Madame de Langeais, seeing some
hope in the complete retreat of Armand from the
world, wrote him immediately, a tender and hum-
ble letter which should bring him back to her if he
still loved her. She sent it the next day by her
valet de chambre, and when the man returned she
asked him if he had given it to Montriveau himself;
at his affirmative reply she could not repress an
'Involuntary movement of joy. Armand was in
Paris, he was there alone, at home, not going out
in the world! She was then loved. During all
that day she waited for an answer, and no answer
came. In the midst of the reawakened agitations
24
370 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
renewed by her impatience Antoinette found con-
stant reasons for this delay, — Armand was hesitat-
ing, his reply would come by post; but in the even-
ing she could no longer deceive herself. A frightful
day, a tumult of sufferings which brought pleasure,
of palpitations which crushed life, heart excesses
which shortened life. The next day, she sent to
Armand for a reply.
"Monsieur le Marquis sends word that he will
come to see Madame la Duchesse, " answered Julien.
She turned away so that her happiness might not
be seen, she threw herself on her sofa to give way
to her first emotions.
"He is coming! "
This thought rent her soul. Unhappy, indeed,
are they for whom such waiting is not the most
horrible of tempests and the fecundation of the
sweetest pleasures, they are devoid of that clear
flame which reveals the images of all things and
doubles nature for us by presenting us with the
pure essence of desired objects as well as their
actual reality. In love, to wait, is it not to con-
stantly exhaust a certain hope, to deliver one's self
to the terrible flail of passion, happy without the
disillusions of the truth? The constant emanation
of strength and of desire, expectation, is it not to
the human soul what their perfumed exhalations
are to certain flowers? We leave the gorgeous and
sterile colors of the coreopsis or the tulip to breathe
the perfumed thoughts of the orange flower and the
volkameria, — two flowers which their native lands
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 37I
have likened involuntarily to youthful fiancees, full
of love, lovely in their past, lovely in their future.
The duchess learned the joys of her new life as
she felt, with a species of intoxication, the scourg-
ings of love; then, with the change of her feelings,
she found new vistas and nobler meanings in the
things of life. As she hastened to her dressing-
room she understood for the first time the true value
of the refinements of the toilet, the delicate minute
cares of the person, when dictated by love and not
by vanity; already these adornments were aiding
her to bear the burden of suspense. Her toilet fin-
ished, she fell back into excessive agitation, into
the nervous horrors of that dread power which
throws all our ideas into a state of fermentation and
which is perhaps only a malady the sufferings of
which are dear to us. The duchess was dressed
and waiting by two o'clock in the afternoon; Mon-
sieur de Montriveau had not yet arrived at half-past
eleven at night. To explain the anguish of this
woman who might be called the spoiled child of
civilization we should need to tell how much poetry
the heart can concentrate into one thought, to weigh
the force exhaled by the soul at the sound of a bell,
or to measure the vital force lost by the prostration
caused by a carriage which rolls away and does not
stop.
"Can he be trifling with me? " she asked herself
as she heard the clock strike midnight.
She turned pale, her teeth chattered, and she
struck her hands together as she sprang up quivering
372 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
in that boudoir where formerly she remembered
he had come unasked. Then she resigned herself.
Had she not forced him to turn pale and quiver
under the cutting darts of her irony.!" Madame de
Langeais now learned the miseries of a woman's
destiny, who, deprived of all those means of action
which men possess, can only wait when she loves.
To seek her lover is a fault which few men will
pardon. The greater number of them see degrada-
tion in that celestial flattery ; but Armand had a
great soul, and he should be among the lesser num-
ber of those men who know how to reward such
excess of love by an eternal love.
"Ah! well, 1 will go," she said to herself, tossing
sleepless on her bed, "I will go to him, I will offer
him my hand and never weary of offering it to him.
A superior man will see in every step which a
woman takes toward him a promise of love and of
constancy. Yes, the angels should descend from
heaven to come to men, and I will be to him an
angel."
On the morrow, she wrote one of those letters in
which excels the spirit of the ten thousand Sevignes
which Paris now includes. And yet, to know how
to ask for pity without humiliation, to fly to him
swift-winged and never stoop to self-abasement, to
complain but not offend, to rebel with tenderness,
to forgive without compromising your personal
dignity, to tell all and yet to avow nothing, — surely,
it needed to be the Duchesse de Langeais and to
have been trained by Madame la Princesse de
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 373
Blamont-Chauvry to write this enchanting note.
Julien was dispatclied with it. Julien was, like
all valets de chambre, the victim of the marches
and counter-marches of love.
"What answer did Monsieur de Montriveau
send?" she asked Julien as carelessly as she could
when he returned to give an account of his mission.
"Monsieur le Marquis desired me to say to
Madame la Duchesse that it was well."
Frightful reaction of the hoping heart! to receive
before inquisitive witnesses this torture of the
heart and not to murmur, to be constrained to
silence. This is one of the thousand misfortunes
of the wealthy.
For twenty-two days Madame de Langeais wrote
to Monsieur de Montriveau without obtaining any
reply. At last she made the excuse of illness to
escape her duties to the princess, of whom she was
one of the attendants, and to society. She received
only her father, the Due de Navarreins; her aunt,
the Princesse de Blamont-Chauvry; the old Vidame
de Pamiers, her maternal great-uncle; and the
uncle of her husband, the Due de Grandlieu. These
persons readily believed in Madame de Langeais's
illness when they found her day by day paler,
thinner, more depressed. The vague ardor of a real
love, the irritations of wounded pride, the constant
sting of the only disdain that could have reached
her, her springing impulses towards those pleasures
perpetually desired, perpetually cheated, — all these
forces, uselessly excited, undermined her double
374 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
nature. She was paying the arrears of her wasted
life. She went out at last to be present at a review
in which Monsieur de Montriveau was to take part.
Stationed with the royal family in the balcony of
the Tuileries, the duchess witnessed one of those
festivals the memory of which lingers long in the
soul. She was adorable in her languor, and all eyes
saluted her with admiration. She exchanged a few
glances with Montriveau, whose presence it was
that rendered her so beautiful. The general rode
past almost at her feet, in all the splendor of that
military costume the effect of which on feminine
imaginations is confessed even by the most prudish
persons. To a woman deeply in love, who had not
seen her lover for two months, this fleeting moment
must have seemed like that glimpse in our dreams
in which is revealed to our sight the fugitive vision
of a land without horizon. Women and very young
persons alone can imagine the stupid and yet deliri-
ous avidity expressed by the eyes of the duchess.
As to men, if, during their youth, they have experi-
enced, in the paroxysms of their first passions, these
phenomena of nervous force, they forget them so
completely in later years that they come to deny
the very existence of these luxurious ecstasies, — the
only possible term for these glorious intuitions.
Religious ecstasy is the madness of thought released
from its corporeal bonds; whereas, in the ecstasy
of love, the forces of our dual natures mingle,
unite, and embrace each other. When a woman
falls a prey to the furious tyrannies under which
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 375
Madame de Langeais was now subjugated, her defi-
nite resolutions succeed each other so rapidly that
it is impossible to render an account of them.
Thoughts are born one of another, and rush through
the soul like those clouds carried away by the wind
across the gray depths which veil the sun. Thence-
forward, acts alone will speak. Here then are the
facts. The morning after the review, Madame de
Langeais sent her carriage and liveries to wait at
the door of the Marquis de Montriveau from eight
o'clock in the morning till three in the afternoon.
Armand lived in Rue de Tournon, not far from
the Chamber of Peers, where there was to be a sit-
ting that day. But long before the peers arrived
at their palace some persons had noticed the car-
riage and the liveries of the duchess. A young
officer, scorned by Madame de Langeais and wel-
comed by Madame de Serizy, the Baron de Maulin-
cour, was the first who recognized it. He went at
once to his mistress to- relate to her, under promise
of secrecy, this extraordinary folly. Immediately
the report spread telegraphically through all the
coteries of the Faubourg Saint-Germain, reached
the Chateau, the Elysee-Bourbon, became the
news of the day, the topic of all conversation from
mid-day until evening. Nearly all the women
denied the fact, but in a manner which confirmed
the truth of it; and the men believed it in testify-
ing the most indulgent sympathy for Madame de
Langeais.
**That savage of a Montriveau has a character of
376 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
bronze, he has doubtless exacted this exposure,"
said some of them, throwing the blame on Armand.
"Well," said others, "Madame de Langeais has
committed a most generous imprudence! Before all
Paris, to renounce for her lover her world, her rank,
her fortune, her good name, is a feminine coup
d'Etat as fine as that cut of the peruke-maker's
knife which so electrified Canning at the Court of
Assizes. Not one of the women who blame the
duchess would have made this declaration, worthy
the olden time. Madame de Langeais is an heroic
woman to proclaim herself thus frankly. After this,
she can love no one but Montriveau. Is there not
some grandeur in a woman's saying: 'I will have
but one passion.? ' "
"What will become of society. Monsieur, if you
thus do honor to open vice, without respect for vir-
tue?" said the wife of the Procureur-General, the
Comtesse de Granville.
While the Chateau, the Faubourg and the Chaus-
see-d'Antin were discussing the shipwreck of this
aristocratic virtue; while eager young men were
hastening on horseback to assure themselves by the
sight of the carriage in Rue de Tournon that the
duchess was really in Monsieur de Montriveau's
house, she was lying palpitating in the depths of
her boudoir. Armand, who had not slept at home,
was walking in the Tuileries with Monsieur de
Marsay. The relatives of Madame de Langeais
were visiting each other and appointing a rendezvous
at her house to reprimand her and take measures
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 377
to stop the scandal caused by her conduct. At
three o'clock the Due de Navarreins, the Vidame
de Pamiers, the old Princesse de Blamont-Chauvry
and the Due de Grandlieu were assembled in the
salon of Madame de Langeais and waiting for her.
To them, as to some other inquirers, the servants
had stated that their mistress was out The
duchess had made no exception in favor of anyone.
These four personages — illustrious in the aristo-
cratic sphere of which the Almanach de Gotha
records annually the revolutions and the hereditary
pretensions — demand a rapid sketch, without which
this social picture would be incomplete.
The Princesse de Blamont-Chauvry was in the
feminine world the most poetic relic of the reign of
Louis XV,, to whose surname she had, it was said,
in her gay youth contributed her quota. Of her
former charms there now remained only a remark-
ably prominent nose, thin, curved like a Turkish
blade, the principal ornament of a face which
resembled an old white glove; some crimped and
powdered curls; slippers with high heels, a lace
cap with ribbon bows, black mittens and the par-
faits contentements. But, to do her complete jus-
tice, it is necessary to add that she had so high an
opinion of her ruins that she went decollete in the
evening, wore long gloves, and still painted her
cheeks with the classic rouge of Martin. A formid-
able amiability in her wrinkles, a prodigious fire in
her eyes, a portentous dignity in her whole person, a
triple dart of malice in her tongue, an infallible
memory in her head, made this old woman a veri-
table power. She held in the parchment of her
brain quite as much information as there was in
the Cabinet des Chartes, and she knew the alli-
ances of all the princely and ducal houses and even
those of the counts of Europe down to the very last
descendants of Charlemagne. No usurpation of
titles could escape her. Young men anxious to be
well thought of, the ambitious, the young women,
(379)
380 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
paid her perpetual homage. Her salon gave the
law to the Faubourg Saint-Germain. The words
of this female Talleyrand were accepted as final.
Certain persons came to her for advice on etiquette
and the usages of society, and to receive from her
lessons in good taste. Certainly, no other old lady
knew so well how to pocket her snuff-box ; and she
had, when seating herself or when crossing her
legs, arrangements of the petticoat of such a pre-
cision, such a grace, that the young women, even
the most elegant, were reduced to despair. Her
voice had remained in her head during the third of
her lifetime, but she had not been able to prevent
it from descending into the membranes of her nose,
which rendered it strangely significant. Of her
great fortune there remained to her a hundred and
fifty thousand francs in woodland, generously
returned to her by Napoleon. Thus, worldly goods
and person, everything about her was of impor-
tance. This curious antique was seated on a sofa
at the corner of the fire-place in conversation with
the Vidame de Pamiers, another contemporaneous
ruin. This old noble, formerly a commander of the
Order of Malta, was a tall, slim and lean man, whose
neck was always buckled so tightly that his cheeks
fell a little over his cravat and compelled him to
carry his head high, — an attitude which would seem
consequential in certain persons, but in him was
justified by a spirit altogether Voltairian. His prom-
inent eyes seemed to see everything and had, in
fact, seen everything He always put cotton in his
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 381
ears. In short, his person in its entirety offered a
perfect model of aristocratic lines, lines slender and
fragile, supple and pleasing, which, like those of
a serpent, seem to be able to bend or erect them-
~s"elves at pleasure, to glide or to stiffen.
The Due de Navarreins was walking up and down
the salon with the Due de Grandlieu. Both were
men of fifty-five years of age, still fresh, fat and
short, well nourished, rather florid, with weary
eyes, the under lips already slightly pendulous.
Except for the elegance of their language and the
affable courtesy of their manner, their perfect ease,
which could in a moment change into insolence,
a superficial observer might have taken them for
bankers. But any error would have been impossi-
ble in listening to their conversation, which was
hedged with precautions against those whom they
held in awe, dry or empty for their equals, and per-
fidious for their inferiors, — whom courtiers and
statesmen know how to tame with verbal flattery
and wound with an unexpected word. Such were
the representatives of this great nobility, which
chooses to die or to remain quite unchanged, which
deserves as much praise as blame, and which will
be always misunderstood until some poet shall have
portrayed it happy in obeying its king and in per-
ishing by the axe of Richelieu, and despising the
guillotine of '89 as a low and contemptible ven-
geance.
These four personages were remarkable for thin,
shrill voices, curiously in harmony with their ideas
382 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
and their deportment Moreover, the most perfect
equality existed among them. The habit, learned
at Court, of concealing their emotions, doubtless
restrained them from openly expressing the dis-
pleasure caused them by the prank of tlieir young
relative.
To prevent the critics from accusing of puerility
the commencement of the following scene, perhaps
it is necessary to observe here that Locke, when in
company with certain English lords renowned for
their wit, distinguished as much by their manners
as by their political consistency, amused himself
maliciously by taking down their conversation by
an ingenious method of shorthand, and caused
them to shout with laughter in reading it to them
afterwards, asking them what they could make of
it. The truth is, the upper classes in all nations
have a certain jargon of glitter which, when
washed in the embers of literary or philosophical
thought, leaves a very small residuum of gold in the
crucible. In all planes of social life, with the excep-
tion of a few Parisian salons, the observer will fmd
the same absurdities, which differ from each other
only according to the thickness or transparency of
the varnish. Thus, solid conversation is excep-
tional in society and Boetian dulness supports
habitually the various zones of the gay world. So,
consequently, there is a great deal of talk in the
upper circles, and very little thought. To think
is fatiguing, and the wealthy wish to see their
life flow on without much effort. Thus it is, in
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 383
comparing the great bulk of wit by stages, from the
gamin of Paris to the peer of France, that the
observer will comprehend the saying of Monsieur
de Talleyrand: Manners are everything, — an ele-
gant translation of this judicial axiom : "La forme
emporte lefond." In the eyes of a poet, the language
of the lower classes will always retain a certain
advantage from their habit of giving a rough stamp
of poetry to their thoughts. This observation will
also perhaps explain the barren emptiness of the
salons, their want, their little depth, and the
repugnance which superior persons feel for the
unprofitable interchange of their thoughts which
characterizes them.
The duke stopped suddenly, as if struck by a
brilliant idea, and said to his companion:
"You have then sold Tornthon ? "
"No, he is sick. I am afraid I shall lose him,
and I shall be exceedingly sorry: he is a capital
hunter. Do you know how the Duchesse de Mar-
igny is? "
"No, I did not call this morning. I was going to
see her when you came to tell me about Antoinette.
But she was very ill yesterday, they despaired of
her life, she received the last sacraments."
"Will her death alter your cousin's prospects?"
"Not at all, she divided her property in her life-
time and kept for herself only a pension which is
paid to her by her niece, Madame de Soulanges, to
whom she made over her estate of Guebriant for an
annuity."
384 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"She will be a great loss to society. She was a
good woman. Her family will have one less person
whose advice and experience always had weight.
Between ourselves, she was the real head of the
house. Her son, Marigny, is an amiable man; he
is witty, he can talk. He is agreeable, very agree-
able, — oh! as for agreeable, that's not to be denied;
but — no idea whatever of conducting himself.
Still, it is extraordinary, he is very clever. The
other day, he was dining at the club with all those
rich fellows of the Chaussee d'Antin, and your
uncle — who is always there for his game of whist —
saw him. Surprised to meet him there, he asked
him if he were a member of the club. 'Yes, I don't
go into society any longer, I live with the bankers.'
You know why? " said the marquis, looking at the
duke with a sly smile.
"No."
"He is infatuated with a young bride, that little
Madame Keller, the daughter of Gondreville, a
woman whom they say is all the fashion among
that set."
"Antoinette is not boring herself, it would seem,"
said the old vidame.
"The affection I feel for that little woman is
obliging me to spend my time at present in a sin-
gular manner," the princess answered him, pocket-
ing her snuff-box.
"My dear aunt," said the duke, stopping before
her, "I am in despair. Only one of those Bona-
parte men would be capable of exacting from a
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 385
respectable woman such impropriety. Between
ourselves, Antoinette might have made a better
choice."
"My dear," answered the princess, "the Mon-
triveaus are an ancient family and very well con-
nected, they are related to all the high nobility of
Burgundy. If the Rivaudoults of Arschoot, of the
Dulmen branch, should come to an end in Gallicia,
the Montriveaus will succeed to the estates and to
the titles of Arschoot; they inherit them through
their great-grandfather."
"You are sure of it? — "
"I know it better than the father of this man,
whom I often saw, and to whom I told it Though a
knight of several orders, he ridiculed them all ; he
was an 'Encyclopedist' But his brother profited
greatly during the emigration. I have heard that
his relatives at the north behaved admirably to
him.—"
"Yes, that is true. The Comte de Montriveau
died at St Petersburg, where 1 met him," said the
vidame. "He was a large man, with an incredible
passion for oysters."
"How many could he eat?" said the Due de
Grandlieu.
"Ten dozen every day."
"Without indigestion?"
"Not the least"
"Oh! but that is most extraordinary ! Did they
not give him the stone or gout, or some other incon-
venience? "
25
386 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"No, he had perfect health, he died from an acci-
dent."
"An accident! Nature prompted him to eat
oysters, they were probably necessary to him ; for
up to a certain point our predominant tastes are the
conditions of our existence."
"I am of your opinion," said the princess, smil-
ing.
"Madame, you always take things a little mali-
ciously," said the marquis.
"I only wished to make you see that these things
might be very much misunderstood by a young
woman," she replied.
Then she interrupted herself to say:
"But my niece ! my niece ! "
"Dear aunt," said Monsieur de Navarreins, "I
cannot yet believe that she has gone to Monsieur
de Montriveau. "
"Bah!" said the princess.
"What is your opinion, vidame.?" asked the
marquis.
"If the duchess were naive, 1 should think — "
"But a woman in love becomes naive, my poor
vidame. You are getting old, it seems .J* "
"What is to be done? " said the duke.
"If my dear niece is wise," replied the princess,
"she will go to Court this evening, happily this is
Monday, the day of reception; you will take care
to have her well surrounded and to give the lie to
this ridiculous rumor. There are a thousand ways
of explaining things; and if the Marquis de
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 387
Montriveau is a gallant man, he will lend him-
self to any of them. We will make these children
listen to reason — "
"But it would be difficult to break a lance with
Monsieur de Montriveau, dear aunt, he is a pupil
of Bonaparte, and he has a position. Bless me! he
is a seigneur of these days, he has an important
command in the Guard, where he is very useful.
He has not the slightest ambition. At the first
word which displeased him, he is just the man to
say to the king: 'There is my resignation, leave
me in peace.' "
"What are his opinions? "
"Very bad ones."
"In fact," said the princess, "the king is what
he always was, — a Jacobin, fleur-de-lysed. "
"Oh! somewhat modified," said the vidame.
"No, I know him of old. The man who said to
his wife, the day on which she was first present at
the first grand repast : ' There are our servants, ' indi-
cating to her the Court, can be nothing but a black
scoundrel. I recognize perfectly MONSIEUR in the
king. The wicked brother who voted so badly in
his bureau of the Constituent Assembly probably
conspires now with the Liberals, consults them,
discusses with them. This philosophical bigot will
be quite as dangerous for his younger brother as he
was for the elder ; for I do not see how his successor
will be able to get out of the troubles which this
big man with little wit has been pleased to create
for him; besides, he hates him, and would be happy
388 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
to be able to say to himself on his deathbed: 'He
will not reign long.' "
"My dear aunt, he is the king, I have the honor
to serve him, and — "
"But, my dear nephew, does your office deprive
you of the right of free speech ? You are of as good
a house as that of the Bourbons. If the Guises
had had a shade more resolution. His Majesty
would only be a poor gentleman to-day. I am
going to leave the world at a good time, nobility
is dead. Yes, everything is at an end for you,
my children," she added, looking at the vidame.
"Is the conduct of my niece to be made the talk of
the town? She has done wrong, I don't approve of
her, a useless scandal is a fault; so that I still have
my doubts of this lack of the proprieties, I brought
her up and I know that — "
At this moment the duchess emerged from her
boudoir. She had recognized her aunt's voice and
had heard the name of Montriveau. She was in
morning dishabille; and, as she came into the
room. Monsieur de Grandlieu, who was looking
carelessly out of the window, saw her carriage
return without her.
"My dear daughter," said the duke, taking her
head and kissing her on the forehead, "do you
know what is going on ? "
"Is anything extraordinary going on, dear
father?"
"But all Paris thinks you are with Monsieur de
Montriveau."
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 389
"My dear Antoinette, you have not been out,
have you?" said the princess, offering her hand,
which the duchess kissed with respectful affection.
"No, dear mother, I have not been out And,"
she added, turning to salute the vidame and the
marquis, "I intended that all Paris should think
me with Monsieur de Montriveau. "
The duke raised his hands to heaven, struck
them together despairingly and folded his arms.
"But do you not know what will be the result of
this rash action.? " he said at last.
The old princess rose suddenly on her heels and
looked at the duchess, who blushed and lowered
her eyes ; Madame de Chauvry drew her gently to
her and said:
"Let me kiss you, my little angel."
Then she kissed her forehead very affectionately,
pressed her hand and added smiling:
" We are no longer under the Valois, my dear
daughter. You have compromised your husband,
your position in the world; however, we will take
measures to undo all that."
"But, my dear aunt, I want nothing undone. I
wish all Paris to think or to say that I was this
morning with Monsieur de Montriveau. Destroy
that belief, false as it is, and you will do me the
greatest harm."
"My daughter, do you wish, then, to be lost, and
to grieve your family ? "
"My dear father, my family, in sacrificing me to
its own interest, gave me over, without intending
390 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
it, to irreparable misery. You may blame me for
seeking to soften my fate, but certainly you must
pity me."
"To give yourself a thousand troubles in order to
establish your daughters suitably!" murmured
Monsieur de Navarreins to the vidame.
"Dear child," said the princess, shaking off the
grains of snuff that had fallen on her dress, "be
happy if you can; it is not a question of hindering
your happiness, but of making it accord with ordi-
nary customs. We all know, here, that marriage
is a defective institution modified by love. But is
it necessary in taking a lover to make your bed on
the Carrousel ? Come now, be reasonable, listen
to us."
"I am listening."
"Madame la Duchesse, " said the Due de Grandlieu,
"if uncles were obliged to take care of their nieces,
there would be but one business in life; and society
would owe them honors, rewards and incomes, such
as it gives to the king's employes. Therefore, I
have not come to talk to you of my nephew, but of
your interests. Let us consider. If you are resolved
to make an open break, I know the Sieur Langeais,
I don't like him. He is miserly, he has the devil
of a character ; he will separate from you, he will
keep your fortune, he will leave you poor and con-
sequently without position in the world. The hun-
dred thousand francs of income which you have
lately inherited from your maternal great-aunt will
go to pay for the pleasures of his mistresses, and
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 39I
you will be bound, garroted by the laws, and
compelled to say Amen to all these arrangements.
Suppose Monsieur de Montriveau should leave you !
— Mon Dieu, dear niece, do not let us get angry, a
man will never abandon you while you are young
and pretty; but have we not seen enough charming
women forsaken, even among princesses, for you to
admit of my making this supposition — almost im-
possible, I readily believe; then, where will you be
without a husband? Manage, then, the one you
have, just as you take care of your beauty, which
is, after all, like the husband himself, the para-
chute of a woman. I wish you to be always happy
and beloved; I will not take into consideration any
unfortunate event. This being so, happily or un-
happily, you may have children? What will you
call them ? Montriveau ? — Well, they can never
inherit their father's fortune. You will wish to
give them all yours, and he, all his. Mon Dieu,
nothing is more natural. You will find the laws
forbidding it. How often have we seen suits
brought by heirs-at-law to dispossess love children?
I have heard of them in all the tribunals of the
world. Will you have recourse to some person to
whom you will leave your property in trust; if the
person in whom you put your confidence deceives
you,— in truth, human justice will not interfere,
and your children will be ruined. Choose, then,
carefully! "
"You see the difficulties in which you are. In
every way your children will necessarily be
392 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
sacrificed to the fancies of your heart, and deprived
of their position in the world. Mon Dieu! so long
as they are little, they will be charming; but they
will reproach you one day with having thought
more of yourself than of them. We know all about
that, we old gentlemen. Children become men,
and men are ungrateful. Did I not hear the young
de Horn in Germany say, one night after supper :
'If my mother had been an honest woman, I should
have been the reigning prince? ' But this IF, we
have passed our lives in hearing it uttered by the
lower classes, and it made the Revolution. When
men cannot accuse their father or their mother,
they complain to God of their evil fate. To sum
up, dear child, we are here to open your eyes to all
this. Well, I can resume it all in one word, which
you should think over, — a wife should never give
her husband reason to condemn her."
"Uncle, I have calculated so much that I did not
love. Then I saw, as you do yourself, interest
there where now there is no longer for me anything
but feeling," said the duchess.
"But, my dearest child, life is altogether a com-
plication of interests and feelings," replied the
vidame; "and to be happy, especially in the posi-
tion in which you are placed, we should try to com-
bine feelings with interest. Let a grisette make
love as she likes, that's all very well ; but you have
a pretty fortune, a family, a title, a place at Court,
and you should not throw them all out of the win-
dow. To arrange all this, what is it we ask of
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 393
you? Only, to cleverly conciliate the proprieties,
instead of flying in their face. Ah, Mon Dieu! I
am nearly eighty years old, and I do not remember
to have ever met, under any regime, a love which
was worth the price which you are ready to pay
for that of this fortunate young man."
The duchess silenced the vidame with a look;
and if Montriveau could have seen her then he
would have pardoned everything.
"This would be a fine theatrical scene," said the
Due de Grandlieu, "and yet signifies nothing when
it concerns your property, your position and your
independence. You are not grateful, my dear
niece. You will not find many families in which
the relations are courageous enough to give the
lessons of their experience and make the giddy
young heads hear the language of common sense.
Renounce your salvation in two minutes, if it
pleases you to get yourself damned, I am willing!
But reflect well when it comes to renouncing your
income. 1 don't know any confessor who can ab-
solve you from the pains of poverty. 1 think 1
have the right to speak to you thus; because, if
you go to perdition, I alone shall be able to offer
you a refuge. I am almost the uncle of Langeais,
and I alone can put him in the wrong by so doing."
"My daughter," said the Due de Navarreins,
rousing himself from painful meditation, "as you
speak of feelings let me observe to you that a
woman who bears your name should have other feel-
ings than those which belong to the common people.
394 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
Do you wish to help the cause of the Liberals, of
those Jesuits of Robespierre who seek to dishonor
the nobility? There are certain things that a
Navarreins cannot do without injuring her house.
You will not be the only one dishonored."
"Come," said the princess, "do not let us talk
of dishonor! My children, do not make so much
noise over the promenade of an empty carriage,
and leave me alone with Antoinette. You will
come and dine with me, all three. I take upon my-
self to arrange this thing in a proper manner. You
don't understand things, you men, you put already
too much sharpness in your words, and I do not
want you to quarrel with my dear daughter. Do
me then the pleasure to go away."
The three gentlemen doubtless divined the inten-
tions of the princess, they bowed to the ladies; and
Monsieur de Navarreins kissed his daughter on the
forehead, saying to her:
"Come, my dear child, be wise. If you will,
there is still time."
"Could we not find in the family some vigorous
young fellow who would pick a quarrel with this
Montriveau?" said the vidame as they descended
the stairs.
*
"My treasure," said the princess, making a sign
to her pupil to take a small, low chair near her
when they were alone, "I know nothing here below
so calumniated as God and the Eighteenth Century,
for, as I look back to the days of my youth, I can-
not recall a single duchess who trod the proprieties
under foot as you are doing. The romance-makers
and the scribblers have vilified the reign of Louis
XV. ; do not believe them. The Du Barry, my dear,
was well worth the Widow Scarron, she was a
better person. In my day, a woman knew how, in
the midst of her gallantries, to keep her dignity.
Indiscretions have ruined us. From them comes
all the trouble. The philosophers, those nobodies
whom we admitted into our salons, have had the
impropriety and the ingratitude, in return for our
bounty, to make an inventory of our hearts, to
decry us as a whole and in detail, to rail against
the century. The lower orders, who are very
badly situated to judge anything, no matter what,
saw the character of things only and not their
forms. But, in those times, my dear heart, men
and women were quite as remarkable as in any
other epoch of the monarchy. Not one of your
Werthers, not one of your notables, as they call
themselves, not one of your men in yellow gloves
and whose pantaloons conceal the leanness of their
(395)
396 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
legs, would have crossed Europe, disguised as a
peddler, to shut himself up at the risk of his life and
in braving the poniards of the Due de Mod^ne in
the dressing-room of the regent's daughter. Not
one of your little consumptives with tortoise-shell
eye-glasses would have hid, like Lauzun, in a
wardrobe for six weeks to give courage to his mis-
tress in the pains of childbirth. There was more
passion in the little finger of Monsieur de Jaucourt
than in your whole race of wranglers who leave a
woman's side to vote for an amendment. Find me
to-day a page who would let himself be hacked to
pieces and buried under the floor merely to kiss the
gloved fingers of a Koenismark! To-day, really it
would seem that the roles had been changed, and
that women were expected to devote themselves to
men. These messieurs are worthless, and estimate
themselves as worth more. Believe me, my dear, all
those adventures which have become public and
which are used to-day to assassinate our good Louis
XV, were all at first secret. If it had not been for a
crowd of poetasters, sorry rhymsters, moralists, who
gossiped with our waiting-women and wrote down
their calumnies,our epoch would have held its own in
literature as to manners and morals. I am defending
the century and not its skirts. There may have
been a hundred women of quality who lost them-
selves, but the fools made a thousand of them, just
as the gazettes do when they estimate the enemy's
dead on the battle field. Besides, I don't know why
the Revolution or the Empire should reproach us, —
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 397
those times were licentious enough, without wit,
coarse, fie ! all that revolts me. These are the bad
spots on our history. This preamble, my dear
child," she resumed after a pause, "is simply to
lead up to telling you that, if you care for Mon-
triveau, you are quite free to love him at your con-
venience and as much as you can. For myself, I
know by experience that — short of locking you up,
and we no longer lock up people in these days —
you will do what you please; that is what I should
have done at your age. Only, my jewel, I should
not have abdicated my right to make Dues de Lan-
geais. So, behave with propriety. The vidame is
quite right, no man is worth a single one of the
sacrifices with which we are foolish enough to pay
for their love. Keep yourself then in the position,
if you should be unhappy enough to have to repent,
to be able to still remain the wife of Monsieur de
Langeais. When you are old, you will be glad
enough to hear mass at Court and not in some
country conv^ent, there's the whole of it in a nut-
shell. Imprudence, that means an annuity, a wan-
dering life, being at the mercy of your lover; it
means the mortification caused by the imperti-
nences of women who are not worthy of you, simply
because they have been very vulgarly clever. It
would be a hundred times better to go to Mon-
triveau after dark, in a hackney coach, disguised,
than to send your carriage in broad daylight You
are a little goose, my dear child. Your carriage
flattered his vanity, your person would have won
398 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
his heart. I have told you the exact truth, but 1
^m not in the least angry with you. You are two
centuries behind the times with your misplaced
grandeur. Come, let us arrange the matter, we
will say that Montriveau made your servants drunk
to gratify his vanity and to compromise you — "
"For heaven's sake, dear aunt," cried the duchess,
starting up, "do not calumniate him ! "
"Ah! dear child," said the princess, whose eyes
lighted up, "I should wish to see you have illusions
which were not dangerous for you, but all illusions
fade. You would melt my heart, if it were not so
old. Come now, do not vex anyone, neither him
nor us. I take upon myself to satisfy all parties ;
but promise me that you will not take after this a
single step without consulting me. Tell me every-
thing, I will guide you, perhaps safely."
"Dear aunt, 1 promise you — "
"To tell me all?"
"Yes, all, that is all that can be told."
"But, dear heart, it is precisely that which can-
not be told that I wish to know. Let us understand
each other thoroughly. Come, permit me to press
my dry lips on your beautiful brow. No, let me do
it, I forbid you to kiss my bones. Old people have
a politeness of their own. — Come, take me down to
my carriage," she said after having embraced her
niece.
"Dear aunt, I can then go to him disguised?"
"Why yes, that can always be denied," said
the old woman.
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 399
The duchess had definitely caught this idea alone
from the sermon which the princess had preached
to her. When Madame de Chauvry was safely
seated in the corner of her carriage, Madame de
Langeais bade her a gracious adieu, and remounted,
radiant, to her own apartments.
"My presence would have won his heart; my
aunt is right, a man could not refuse a pretty wo-
man when she knows well how to offer herself."
That evening, at the reception of Madame la
Duchesse de Berri, the Due de Navarreins, Monsieur
de Pamiers, Monsieur de Marsay, Monsieur de
Grandlieu and the Due de Maufrigneuse triumph-
antly denied the offensive rumors which were cur-
rent about the Duchesse de Langeais. So many
officers and others bore witness to having seen Mon-
triveau walking in the Tuileries during the fore-
noon that this foolish story was laid to the door of
chance, which takes all that is given to it. There-
fore, the next day the reputation of the duchess
became, in spite of the stationing of her carriage,
as spotless and bright as Mambrino's helmet after
Sancho had polished it. Only at two o'clock in the
afternoon, in the Bois de Boulogne, Monsieur de
Ronquerolles passing by Montriveau in a secluded
alley said to him smiling:
"She is well, your duchess."
"Just as usual," he added, applying a signifi-
cant stroke of the whip to his mare, which dashed
away like a bullet.
Two days after this futile explosion Madame de
^
400 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
Langeais wrote to Monsieur de Montriveau a letter,
which remained unanswered like all its predeces-
sors. This time, however, she had taken her
measures and bribed Auguste, Armand's valet de
chambre. At eight o'clock that evening, therefore,
she was introduced into Montriveau's apartment,
into a room altogether different from the one in
which the former secret scene had been enacted.
There the duchess learned that the general would
not return that evening. Had he two domiciles?
The valet would not reply. Madame de Langeais
had bought the key of the room, and not all the
integrity of this man. Left alone she saw her
fourteen letters lying on an old round table; they
were still sealed, unopened ; not one had been read.
At this sight she fell into an arm-chair, and for
a moment lost consciousness. When she came to
herself she found Auguste holding vinegar to her
face.
"A carriage, quick," she said.
When it came, she ran down stairs with convul-
sive rapidity, returned home, went to bed and
denied herself to everyone. She remained twenty-
four hours in her bed, letting no one approach her
but her waiting-maid, who brought her from time to
time a cup of orange-flower water. Suzette heard
her mistress uttering some complaints and saw tears
in her eyes, brilliant, though surrounded by dark
circles. The third day, after having meditated
in tears of despair on the course which she wished
to take, Madame de Langeais had a conference
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 4OI
with her man of business and doubtless gave
him instructions to make certain preparations.
Then she sent for the old Vidame de Pamiers.
While waiting for him, she wrote to Monsieur de
Montriveau. The vidame was punctual. He found
his young cousin pale, dejected, but resigned. It
was about two in the afternoon. Never had this
divine creature been more poetic than she was now
in the languor of her anguish.
"My dear cousin," she said to the vidame, "your
eighty years have obtained for you this rendezvous.
Oh! do not smile, I pray you, before a poor woman
who is in the deepest grief. You are a gallant man,
and the adventures of your youth, I like to believe,
have inspired you with some indulgence for women. "
"Not the least," he said.
"Really!"
"They are happy with everything, " he answered.
"Ah! well, you are in the heart of my family;
you will be perhaps the last relative, the last friend,
whose hand I shall ever press; I may then ask of
you a favor. Do me, my dear vidame, a service
which I cannot ask from my father, nor from my
uncle Grandiieu, nor from any woman. You will
understand me. I entreat you to obey me, and to
forget that you have obeyed me, whatever may be
the issue of your action. It is to go with this letter
to Monsieur de Montriveau, to see him, to show it
to him, to ask him as one man can ask of another,
— for you have between yourselves an integrity,
certain feelings, which you forget with us, — to ask
26
402 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
him if he will read it, not in your presence, men
wish to hide certain emotions. I authorize you, to
enable him to decide and if you judge it necessary,
to say to him that it is a matter of life or death to
me. If he deigns — "
"Deigns! " exclaimed the commander.
"If he deigns to read it," continued the duchess,
with dignity, "say to him one last word. You will
see him at five o'clock, he dines at that hour at
home to-day, I know this; well, he should, for sole
answer, come and see me. If, three hours later, if
at eight o'clock, he has not left home, all will be
over. The Duchesse de Langeais will have disap-
peared from this world. 1 shall not be dead, my
dear, no; but no human power will ever find me
again on this earth. Come and dine with me, I
shall have at least one friend beside me in my last
agonies. Yes, to-night, my dear cousin, my life
will be decided; and which ever way it is it can
only be cruelly fervid. Go now. Silence, I can
listen to nothing which resembles either comments
or advice. — Come, let us talk, let us laugh," she
said, holding out to him a hand which he kissed.
"Let us be like two old philosophers who know
how to enjoy life up to the moment of their death.
1 will adorn myself, will be very coquettish for you.
You will be, perhaps, the last man that sees the
Duchesse de Langeais."
The vidame made no reply, he bowed, took the
letter and did his errand. He returned at five o'clock,
found his cousin dressed with care, exquisite in
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 403
fact The salon was decorated with flowers as
if for a f^te. The repast was delicious. For this
old man the duchess displayed all the brilliancy
of her wit and showed herself more attractive than
she had ever been. The commander at first tried
to see in all these seductions only a young woman's
pretty whim ; but from time to time the false magic
of her charms displayed for him suddenly paled. At
times he surprised her shivering with sudden terror;
at times she seemed to listen in the silence. Then,
if he said to her :
"What is it?"
"Hush," she replied.
At seven o'clock the duchess left the old man,
but soon returned dressed as her maid might have
been dressed for a journey ; she requested the arm
of her guest, and asking him to accompany her, they
entered a hired coach. At a quarter before eight
o'clock they were both before the door of Monsieur
de Montriveau.
Armand all this while was meditating over the
following letter :
" My friend,
" I have passed a few moments in your room without your
knowledge ; 1 have brought back my letters. Oh, Armand !
from you to me this cannot be indifference, and hatred would
act otherwise. If you love me, cease this cruel play. You
would kill me. Later, you would despair on learning how
much you were loved. If I have unfortunately understood
you, if you have for me only aversion, aversion means con-
tempt and disgust ; then, all hope abandons me : from those
404 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
two feelings men never return. However terrible it might be,
this thought would bring some consolation into my long
sorrow. You will have no regrets some day. Regrets ! Ah,
my Armand ! would that I were unacquainted with them !
If I have caused you a single one— no, I will not tell you
what ravages it would cause in me. I should live, and
should no longer be your wife. After giving myself utterly
to you, in my thought, to whom must I now give myself? —
to God. Yes, the eyes which you loved for a moment shall
see no man's face again ; and may the glory of God close
them ! 1 shall hear no other human voice after having heard
yours, so tender at first, so terrible yesterday, for I am still
in the morrow of your vengeance ; may then the word of God
consume me ! Between His anger and yours, my friend,
there will be for me only tears and prayers. You ask, per-
haps, why I write to you. Alas ! may I not cling to a last
ray of hope, breathe a last sigh toward the happy life before
1 leave it forever? My situation is a terrible one. 1 feel in me
._4< all the serenity which a supreme resolution communicates to
''-' { the soul, and yet feel the last upheavals of the storm. In that
/ terrible adventure which first drew me to you, Armand, you
/ went from the desert to the oasis led by a faithful guide.
Well, 1— I drag myself from the oasis to the desert, and you
are for me a pitiless guide. Nevertheless, you alone, my
friend, can comprehend the melancholy in the last looks
which I give to happiness, and you are the only one to whom
I can complain without a blush. If you hear my prayers, I
shall be happy; if you are inexorable, 1 will expiate my
wrong doing. After all, is it not natural that a woman
should wish to live in the memory of him she loves, clothed
with all noble feelings ? Oh, my only dear one ! Suffer your
creature to bury herself in the belief that you will think her
noble. Your harshness has compelled me to reflect; and
since I have loved you so well, I have come to think myself
less guilty than you deem me. Listen to my justification, I
owe it to you ; and you who are all the world to me, you owe
me at least a moment's justice.
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 405
" I have learned through my own sorrows how much my
coquetries must have made you suffer ; but I was then in
complete ignorance of love. You, yourself, you know the
secret of these tortures, and yet you impose them on me.
During the first eight months that you gave to me you did
not make yourself loved. Why, my friend ? I can no more
tell you than I can now explain to you why I love you. Ah !
certainly I was flattered to find myself the object of your pas-
sionate discourses, to receive your burning glances ; yet you
left me cold and without desires. No, 1 was not a woman, 1
conceived nothing, either of the devotion or of the happiness
of our sex. Whose was the fault? Would you not have
despised me if I had given myself up without impulse ? Per-
haps it is one of the sublime qualities of our sex to give our-
selves without receiving any pleasure ; perhaps there is no
merit in abandoning one's self to delights known and ardently
desired. Alas, my friend, I may say it to you, these thoughts
came to me when 1 was so coquettish with you ; but you
seemed to me so noble that 1 could not wish that you should
win me through mere pity. — What have I written ? Ah ! I
have taken away from you all my letters, I have thrown
them into the fire ! They are burning. You will never know
what they revealed of love, of passion, of madness — . I will
be silent, Armand, I stop, I will say no more to you of my
feelings. If my prayers have not communicated from my
soul to yours, neither can I, a woman, owe your love only to
your pity. 1 would be loved irresistibly or cast off ruthlessly.
If you refuse to read this letter, it will be burned. If, after
having read it, you are not within three hours my only hus-
band forever, I shall have no shame in knowing that it is in
your hands ; the pride of my despair will protect my memory
from all insult, and my end shall be worthy of my love. You
yourself, meeting me no more in this world, though I shall still
be living, you will not think without a shudder of the woman
who within three hours will breathe only to cover you with
her tenderness, of a woman consumed by love without hope,
and faithful, not to shared pleasures, but to misunderstood
\>
406 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
feeling. The Duchesse de la Valliere wept a lost happi-
ness, her vanished power ; while the Duchesse de Langeais
will be happy because of her tears, and will still remain a
power for you. Yes, you will regret me. I am conscious that
y I was not made for this world, and I thank you for having
,,,>/ proved it to me. Adieu, you cannot touch my axe ; yours
\3' was that of the executioner, mine is that of God ; yours kills,
. y " and mine saves. Your love was mortal, it could not support
(f . either disdain or ridicule ; mine can endure everything without
\ y y weakening, it lives immortally. Ah ! I feel_a dreary joy in
overcoming you, you who feel yourself so^reatTTn humbling
you with the calm and protecting smile of the feeble angels
who obtain, in sitting at the feet of God, the right and the
power to watch over men in His name. You have had only
passing desires ; while the poor nun will ceaselessly lighten
your path with her ardent prayers and cover you forever with
the wings of divine love. I foresee your answer, Armand,
and I give you a rendezvous— in heaven. Friend, strength
and weakness are both admitted there ; both are sufferings.
This thought soothes the agitations of my last trial. Now I
am so calm that I should fear 1 no longer loved thee, were it
not for thee that I quit the world.
" ANTOINETTE."
"Dear vidame," said the duchess when they
reached Montriveau's house, "do me the kindness
to ask at the door if he is at home."
The commander, obeying after the manner of the
men of the Eighteenth Century, got out of the car-
riage and presently returned to his cousin with a
yes which made her shiver. At this word she took
his hand, pressed it, permitted him to kiss her on
both cheeks and begged him to go away without
watching her or seeking to protect her.
"But the passers-by.? " he said.
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 407
"No one could show me disrespect," she an-
swered.
This was the last word of the woman of the world
and the duchess. The commander went away.
Madame de Langeais remained on the threshold of
this door wrapt in her mantle, waiting till the hour
of eight. The clock struck. This unhappy woman
gave herself ten minutes more, a quarter of an
hour; finally she saw a new humiliation in this
delay and hope abandoned her. She could not re-
press one cry : "Oh my God!" then she left the
fatal threshold. It was the first word of the Car-
melite.
*
Montriveau had a conference that evening with
several of his friends, he urged them to bring it to
a close, but his clock was slow and he only left his
house to go to the Hotel de Langeais at the moment
when the duchess, carried away by a cold rage, was
flying on foot through the streets of Paris. She
was weeping when she reached the Boulevard
d'Enfer. There, for the last time, she looked at
Paris, smoking, noisy, covered by the reddish
atmosphere produced by its lights; then she entered
a hired carriage and quitted this city, never to
enter it again. When the Marquis de Montriveau
reached the Hotel de Langeais he did not find his
mistress there, and thought himself tricked. Then
he rushed to the vidame, and was received at the
moment when that worthy man was putting on his
dressing-gown and thinking of the happiness of his
pretty cousin. Montriveau threw at him that ter-
rible look whose electric shock affected equally men
and women.
"Monsieur, have you lent yourself to a cruel
jest.? " he cried. "I have just come from the Hotel
de Langeais, and the servants say the duchess is
out."
"There has doubtless happened, through your
fault, a great misfortune! " replied the vidame. "I
left the duchess at your door — "
(409)
410 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
"At what hour?"
"At a quarter to eight."
"Good evening," said Montriveau and returned
home precipitately to ask his porter if he had seen
in the evening, a lady at the door.
"Yes, Monsieur, a beautiful lady, who seemed in
much trouble. She was crying like a Madeleine,
without making any noise, and standing up straight
like a picket. At last she said, 'Oh my God! ' and
went away, so that, begging your pardon, my wife
and I, who were close by without her seeing us, it
made our hearts ache."
These few words made this strong man turn pale.
He wrote a line to Monsieur de Ronquerolles and
sent it to him immediately, then he went up to his
own apartment. Towards midnight Ronquerolles
arrived.
"What is the matter, my good friend?" he said
on seeing the general.
Armand gave him the duchess's letter to read.
"Well? " asked Ronquerolles.
"She was at my door at eight o'clock, and at a
quarter past eight she disappeared. I have lost
her and I love her! Ah! if my life belonged to
me, I would have already blown out my brains! "
"Bah! bah!" said Ronquerolles, "calm yourself,
duchesses do not fly away like milkmaids. She
cannot do more than three leagues an hour; to-
morrow we will do six, all of us. Ah! plague on
it!" he added, "Madame de Langeais is not an
ordinary woman. We will all be on horseback
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAiS 41 1
to-morrow morning. In the course of the day we
will know through the police where she has gone.
She must have a carriage, these angels have no
wings. Whether she is on the road, or hidden in
Paris, we will find her. Have we not the telegraph
to stop her, without following her? You will yet
be happy. But, my dear brother, you have com-
mitted the error of which all men with your
strength are more or less guilty. You judge of
others by yourself, and never know when human
nature will break under the strain which you are
putting on it. Why did not you consult me a little
earlier? I should have said to you: 'Be punctual.'
— Till to-morrow then," he added, grasping the
hand of Montriveau, who stood silent. "Sleep now,
if you can."
But the greatest resources with which statesmen,
sovereigns, ministers, bankers, in short, all human
powers, were ever invested were employed in vain.
Neither Montriveau nor his friends could find any
trace of the duchess. She was evidently cloistered.
Montriveau resolved to search, or to have searched,
every convent in the world. He would have the
duchess even though it cost the lives of a whole
city. To do justice to this extraordinary man, we
must state that his passionate ardor rose day after
day with the same fire, and that it lasted for five
years. It was not until 1829 that the Due de Navar-
reins learned by chance that his daughter had gone
to Spain, as waiting-maid to Lady Julia Hopwood,
and that she had left the latter at Cadiz without
412 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
Lady Julia's having any suspicion that Mademoi-
selle Caroline was the illustrious duchess whose
disappearance had excited so much interest in the
upper circles of Parisian society.
The feelings with which these two lovers met at
last at the iron grating of the Carmelites and in the
presence of a Mother Superior, can now be under-
stood in all their intensity; and their violence,
reawakened on both sides, will doubtless explain
the final scenes of this history.
The Due de Langeais having died in 1823, his
'wife was free. Antoinette de Navarreins was liv-
ing, consumed by love, on a rock of the Mediterra-
nean; but the Pope might annul the vows of Sister
^ Therese. Happiness bought by so much love might
yet blossom for these two lovers. These thoughts
carried Montriveau from Cadiz to Marseilles, from
Marseilles to Paris. Some months after his arrival
in France a merchant brig, armed, left the port of
Marseilles for Spain. This vessel carried a number
of distinguished men, nearly all French, who, filled
with a desire to see the Orient, wished to visit
those countries. The intimate knowledge which
Montriveau possessed of the manners and customs
of these lands made him a most desirable traveling
companion for these gentlemen, who entreated him
to join them, and he consented. The Minister of
War appointed him Lieutenant-General, and placed
him on the Committee of Artillery, that he might
be free to join this party of pleasure.
The brig dropped anchor twenty-four hours after
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 413
her departure, to the north-west of an island in
sight of the coasts of Spain. The vessel which had
been selected was sufficiently slender of keel and
light of mast to permit her to anchor without danger
within half a league of the reefs which on this side
effectively defend the approach to the island. If the
fishing vessels or the inhabitants perceived the brig
at her anchorage, they would scarcely have their
suspicions aroused; and, in addition, her presence
could be readily explained. Before arriving in
sight of the island Montriveau had run up the flag
of the United States. The seamen engaged for the
voyage were all Americans and could speak nothing
but English. One of Montriveau's companions
took them all ashore in a long-boat and conducted
them to the inn of the little town, where he kept
them at a degree of drunkenness which deprived
them of the free use of their tongues. He himself
gave out that the brig was chartered by treasure-
seekers, a class well enough known in the United
States for their superstitions, and of whom one of
the writers of that country has compiled a history.
Thus the presence of the vessel outside the reefs
was sufficiently explained. The owners and the
passengers were searching, said the pretended boat-
swain, for the wreck of a galleon lost in 1778, with
treasures brought from Mexico. The innkeepers
and the authorities inquired no further.
Armand and the devoted friends who were second-
ing him in his difficult enterprise concluded at once
that neither fraud nor force would enable them to
414 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
assure the deliverance or the carrying away of
Sister Therese by the town approach to the convent.
Therefore, with a common accord, these audacious
men resolved to take the bull by the horns. They
determined to construct a path to the convent on
the very side where all access seemed impossible,
and to vanquish nature as General Lamarque had
vanquished it at the assault of Capri. In the pres-
ent instance, the perpendicular granite cliffs at the
edge of the island offered less foothold than the
cliffs of Capri had offered to Montriveau, who was
in that incredible expedition, and the nuns seemed
to him more redoubtable than had been Sir Hudson
Lowe. To carry off the duchess with noise and
disturbance would have covered these men with
confusion. They might as well have laid siege to
the town and the convent, and not left alive a sin-
gle witness of their victory, after the manner of
pirates. For them, this enterprise had but two
aspects. Either, some conflagration, some feat of
arms, which might terrify Europe without revealing
the cause of the crime; or some aerial, mysterious
carrying-off which would persuade the nuns that
the devil had paid them a visit This last plan
had carried the day in the secret council held at
Paris, before the departure. Moreover, everything
had been foreseen for the success of an enterprise
which offered to these men, wearied with the pleas-
ures of Paris, a genuine amusement.
A species of pirogue, of an excessive lightness,
constructed at Marseilles after a Malay model,
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 415
permitted them to navigate among the reefs to a point
beyond which navigation became quite impossible.
Two cables of iron wire, stretched parallel for a dis-
tance of some feet on an inward incline, and along
which traveled baskets also made of iron wire,
served for a bridge, as in China, on which to pass
from one rock to another. The reefs were thus
connected together by a series of cables and .
baskets which resembled the threads on which cer- \
tain spiders travel and in which they envelop the
branches of a tree, — a work of instinct which the
Chinese, that people of born imitators, were the
first, historically speaking, to copy. Neither the
waves nor any of the caprices of the sea could
affect these frail constructions. The cables had
elasticity and play enough to offer to the fury of
the waves that curve — studied by an engineer, the
late Cachin, the immortal creator of the port of
Cherbourg — the scientific line of which limits the
power of the angry waves; a curve established by
a law won from the secrets of nature by the genius
of observation, which is almost the whole of human
genius.
The companions of Monsieur de Montriveau were
alone upon the vessel. No eye of man could reach
them. The best glasses, leveled from the upper
decks of the passing merchant vessels, could not
have discovered these cables lost among the reefs,
nor the men hidden among the rocks. After eleven
days of preparatory toil, these thirteen human
demons reached the foot of the promontory, which
4l6 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
rose to a height of thirty fathoms above the sea, a
cliff as difficult for men to climb as would be the
polished sides of a porcelain vase for a mouse.
This table of granite was fortunately cracked. Its
fissure, whose edges were two straight lines, allowed
them to drive in, at the distance of a foot apart,
stout wooden wedges .n which these bold workmen
fastened cramping-irons. These irons, prepared in
advance, terminated at one end with perforated iron
plates into which they fixed steps made of very
thin fir plank, which also fitted into notches made
in a mast the exact height of the promontory, and
which was firmly set into the rock at the foot of the
cliff. With an art worthy of these men of action, one
of them, a profound mathematician, had calculated
the angle at which to space the steps gradually
from the top to the bottom of the mast, so as to
bring at its exact middle the point from which the
steps of the upper half should widen like a fan till
they reached the top of the rock; while the steps of
the lower half widened in like manner, only in a
reversed direction, to the bottom. This staircase
of incredible lightness, and perfectly firm, cost
twenty-two days of work. A steel and phosphorus,
a night, and the breakers of the sea, would suffice
to obliterate all traces of it. Thus no revelation
was possible, and no search for the violators of the
convent could be successful.
On the summit of the rock was a platform,
surrounded on every side by the perpendicular
precipice. The thirteen strangers, examining the
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 417
ground with their telescopes from the top of their
mast, were satisfied that, in spite of some difficul-
ties, they could easily reach the gardens of the con-
vent, the trees of which were sufficiently thick to
offer secure cover. There, they could doubtless
come to an ultimate decision as to the best means
of seizing the nun. After such great efforts they
were unwilling to compromise the success of their
enterprise by running any risk of discovery, and
they were obliged to wait till after the last quarter
of the moon.
Montriveau remained for two nights wrapped in
his cloak, lying on the bare rock. The chants of the
evening and those of the morning filled him with
inexpressible delights. He went to the foot of the
wall to hear the notes of the organ, and endeavored
to distinguish one voice in this volume of voices.
But, in spite of the silence, the distance was too
great for any but the confused sounds of the music
to reach his ear. They were mellow harmonies, in
which all defects of execution disappeared, and from
which the pure thought of art disengaged itself and
filled the listener's soul, requiring of him no efforts
of attention, nor the weariness of listening. Terri-
ble memories for Armand, whose love blossomed
afresh in its entirety in this breeze of music in
which he wished to find aerial promises of happi-
ness. On the morning of the last night he descended
before sunrise, after having remained several hours
with his eyes fixed on the unbarred window of a
cell. Bars were not necessary to the windows
27
4l8 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
looking out over these abysses. He had seen there
a light throughout the night. And that instinct of
the heart, which deceives as often as it speaks true,
had cried to him: "She is there."
"She is certainly there, and to-morrow she will
be mine," he said to himself, mingling his joyous
thoughts with the sounds of a bell ringing slowly.
Strange capriciousness of heart! He loved with
more passion the nui, wasted away in the raptures
of love, consumed by tears, fastings, vigils, and
prayer, the woman of twenty-nine so sorely tried,
than he had loved the light young girl, the sylph,
the woman of twenty-four ! But the men of vigor-
ous soul, are they not naturally moved by an
impulse which draws them towards the sublime
expressions which noble griefs, or the impetuous
flow of thought, have imprinted upon the face of a
woman ? The beauty of a sorrowful woman, is it
not the most attaching of all to a man who feels in
his heart an inexhaustible treasure of consolations
and of tenderness to expend on a creature, tender
in weakness and strong through feeling. The fresh
beauty, florid, smooth, the pretty in a word, is a
commonplace charm which attracts the common
run of men. Montriveau was one of those to love a
face in which love reveals itself amid the lines of
grief and the blight of melancholy. Should not a
lover suffice to bring forth, at the voice of his puis-
sant desire, a new being, young, palpitating, break-
ing forth for him alone from the worn shell so
beautiful to his eyes yet defaced for all others.?
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 419
Does he not possess two women, — one who shows
herself to the world pale, discolored, sad; and that
other one of his heart, whom no one sees, gj}_angeL.
who comprehends life through her feelings and who
only appears in all her glory for the solemnities of
love? Before quitting his post, the general heard
faint harmonies which issued from that cell, soft
voices full of tenderness. When he descended to
his friends stationed at the bottom of the rock he
told them in a few words, imprinted with that pas-
sion, communicative yet discreet, whose imposing
expression men always respect, that never in his
life had he experienced such captivating felicity.
In the evening of the next day, eleven devoted
comrades mounted in the darkness up the precipice,
having each one a poniard, a provision of chocolate,
and all the instruments necessary for the trade of a
burglar. When they reached the enclosing wall of
the convent, they scaled it by means of ladders
which they had made, and found themselves in the
cemetery of the convent. Montriveau recognized
both the long vaulted gallery through which he had
recently passed on his way to the parlor and the
windows of that apartment. His plan was at once
formed and adopted. To enter by the window of
that parlor which opened into the part occupied by
the nuns, to penetrate into the corridors, to see if
the names were inscribed on each cell, to go to that
of Sister Therese, to surprise her there and gag her
during her sleep, bind her and carry her away, all
this part of the work would be easy for men who,
420 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
to the audacity, to the expertness of galley-slaves,
joined the special knowledge of men of the world,
and to whom it was indifferent whether the stroke
of a poniard should be necessary to purchase
silence.
The bars of the window were sawed in two in
two hours. Three men remained as sentries
without, two others watched in the parlor. The
rest, bare-footed, stationed themselves at certain dis-
tances along the cloister which Montriveau entered,
hidden behind a young man, the most dexterous of
them all, Henri de Marsay, who, as a matter of pre-
caution, was dressed in the habit of the Carmelites,
precisely like that worn in the convent. The clock
struck three as Montriveau and the false nun reached
the dormitories. They soon made out the position
of the cells. Then, hearing no noise, they began
to read by the light of a dark lantern the names for-
tunately inscribed on each door together with those
mystical devices, portraits of saints, male or female,
which each nun wrote like an epigraph over the
new dispensation of her life, and in which she
revealed the last thought of her past. When they
reached the cell of Sister Therese, Montriveau read
this inscription: Sub invocatione sanctce mairis
TherescB, The motto was: Adoremus in (Sternum.
Suddenly his companion laid a hand upon his shoul-
der and showed him a bright light shining on the
flagstones of the corridor through the chink of the
door. At this moment Monsieur de Ronquerolles
joined them.
LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS 42 1
**A11 the nuns are in the church, and are com-
mencing the Office of the Dead," he said.
"I remain here," replied Montriveau; "fall back,
all of you, to the parlor and close the door of this
corridor."
He entered quickly, preceded by the pretended
nun who put down his veil. They saw then, in the
antechamber of the cell, the dead body of the
duchess lying on the floor upon a plank of her bed
and lighted by two wax tapers. Neither Montriveau
nor de Marsay said a word, nor uttered a cry; but
they looked at each other. Then the general made
a sign which meant: "We will carry her away!"
"Save yourselves," cried Ronquerolles, "the pro-
cession of nuns is returning, you will be seen."
With that magical rapidity which a passionate
desire infuses into movements, the body of the
duchess was carried into the parlor, passed through
the window and conveyed to the foot of the wall
just as the abbess, followed by the nuns, reached
the cell to take the body of Sister Therese. The
nun, whose duty it was to watch with the dead,
had had the imprudence to leave her charge, to
search the inner cell for the secrets of its occupant,
and was so intent upon this purpose that she heard
nothing, and was thunderstruck when slie came out
and found the body gone. Before these stupefied
women thought of making any search, the duchess
had been lowered by ropes to the foot of the rocks
and the companions of Montriveau had destroyed
their work. At nine o'clock in the morning no
422 LA DUCHESSE DE LANGEAIS
trace remained of the stairway, nor of the cable
bridges; the body of Sister Therese was on board;
the brig came into port to embark her men, and
disappeared in the course of the day. Montriveau
remained alone in his cabin with Antoinette de
Navarreins, whose countenance, during several
hours, shone mercifully for him, resplendent with
the sublime beauty which the peculiar calm of
death lends to our mortal remains.
"Come," said Ronquerolles to Montriveau when
the latter reappeared on deck, "she was a woman,
now she is nothing. Let us fasten a cannon ball to
each of her feet, throw her into the sea, and think
no more of her than we do a book read in our child-
hood."
"Yes," said Montriveau, "for it is no longer any-
thing but a poem."
"Now you are wise. Henceforth, have passions;
but, as for love, it is well to know where to place
it, and it is only the last love of a woman that
should satisfy the first love of a man."
Geneva, Pre-L6veque, January 26, 1834.
LIST OF ETCHINGS
VOLUME VI
PAGE
M. AND Mme. JULES AND IDA Fronts.
THE WIDOW GRUGET AND M. DESMARETS 152
THE INTERVIEW IN THE CONVENT 197
M. DE MONTRIVEAU AND HIS GUIDE 264
LA DUCHESSE AND M. DE MONTRIVEAU 272
6 N. R., H. T. 423
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY
Los Angeles
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