Lost Illusions

A strong scent of camomile and peppermint pervaded the yard and the poor little dwelling at the side, which you reached by a short ladder, with a rope on either side by way of hand-rail.  Lucien’s room was an attic just under the roof.

“Good-day, sonny,” said M. Postel, that typical, provincial tradesman.  “Are you pretty middling?  I have just been experimenting on treacle, but it would take a man like your father to find what I am looking for.  Ah! he was a famous chemist, he was!  If I had only known his gout specific, you and I should be rolling along in our carriage this day.”

The little druggist, whose head was as thick as his heart was kind, never let a week pass without some allusion to Chardon senior’s unlucky secretiveness as to that discovery, words that Lucien felt like a stab.

“It is a great pity,” Lucien answered curtly.  He was beginning to think his father’s apprentice prodigiously vulgar, though he had blessed the man for his kindness, for honest Postel had helped his master’s widow and children more than once.

“Why, what is the matter with you?” M. Postel inquired, putting down his test tube on the laboratory table.

“Is there a letter for me?”

“Yes, a letter that smells like balm! it is lying on the corner near my desk.”

Mme. de Bargeton’s letter lying among the physic bottles in a druggist’s shop!  Lucien sprang in to rescue it.

“Be quick, Lucien! your dinner has been waiting an hour for you, it will be cold!” a sweet voice called gently through a half-opened window; but Lucien did not hear.

“That brother of yours has gone crazy, mademoiselle,” said Postel, lifting his face.

The old bachelor looked rather like a miniature brandy cask, embellished by a painter’s fancy, with a fat, ruddy countenance much pitted with the smallpox; at the sight of Eve his face took a ceremonious and amiable expression, which said plainly that he had thoughts of espousing the daughter of his predecessor, but could not put an end to the strife between love and interest in his heart.  He often said to Lucien, with a smile, “Your sister is uncommonly pretty, and you are not so bad looking neither!  Your father did everything well.”

Eve was tall, dark-haired, dark of complexion, and blue-eyed; but notwithstanding these signs of virile character, she was gentle, tender-hearted, and devoted to those she loved.  Her frank innocence, her simplicity, her quiet acceptance of a hard-working life, her character—­for her life was above reproach—­could not fail to win David Sechard’s heart.  So, since the first time that these two had met, a repressed and single-hearted love had grown up between them in the German fashion, quietly, with no fervid protestations.  In their secret souls they thought of each other as if there were a bar between that kept them apart; as if the thought were an offence against some jealous husband; and hid their feelings from Lucien as though their love in some way did him a wrong.  David, moreover, had no confidence in himself, and could not believe that Eve could care for him; Eve was a penniless girl, and therefore shy.  A real work-girl would have been bolder; but Eve, gently bred, and fallen into poverty, resigned herself to her dreary lot.  Diffident as she seemed, she was in reality proud, and would not make a single advance towards the son of a father said to be rich.  People who knew the value of a growing property, said that the vineyard at Marsac was worth more than eighty thousand francs, to say nothing of the traditional bits of land which old Sechard used to buy as they came into the market, for old Sechard had savings—­he was lucky with his vintages, and a clever salesman.  Perhaps David was the only man in Angouleme who knew nothing of his father’s wealth.  In David’s eyes Marsac was a hovel bought in 1810 for fifteen or sixteen thousand francs, a place that he saw once a year at vintage time when his father walked him up and down among the vines and boasted of an output of wine which the young printer never saw, and he cared nothing about it.

David was a student leading a solitary life; and the love that gained even greater force in solitude, as he dwelt upon the difficulties in the way, was timid, and looked for encouragement; for David stood more in awe of Eve than a simple clerk of some high-born lady.  He was awkward and ill at ease in the presence of his idol, and as eager to hurry away as he had been to come.  He repressed his passion, and was silent.  Often of an evening, on some pretext of consulting Lucien, he would leave the Place du Murier and go down through the Palet Gate as far as L’Houmeau, but at the sight of the green iron railings his heart failed.  Perhaps he had come too late, Eve might think him a nuisance; she would be in bed by this time no doubt; and so he turned back.  But though his great love had only appeared in trifles, Eve read it clearly; she was proud, without a touch of vanity in her pride, of the deep reverence in David’s looks and words and manner towards her, but it was the young printer’s enthusiastic belief in Lucien that drew her to him most of all.  He had divined the way to win Eve.  The mute delights of this love of theirs differed from the transports of stormy passion, as wildflowers in the fields from the brilliant flowers in garden beds.  Interchange of glances, delicate and sweet as blue water-flowers on the surface of the stream; a look in either face, vanishing as swiftly as the scent of briar-rose; melancholy, tender as the velvet of moss—­these were the blossoms of two rare natures, springing up out of a rich and fruitful soil on foundations of rock.  Many a time Eve had seen revelations of the strength that lay below the appearance of weakness, and made such full allowance for all that David left undone, that the slightest word now might bring about a closer union of soul and soul.

Eve opened the door, and Lucien sat down without a word at the little table on an X-shaped trestle.  There was no tablecloth; the poor little household boasted but three silver spoons and forks, and Eve had laid them all for the dearly loved brother.

“What have you there?” she asked, when she had set a dish on the table, and put the extinguisher on the portable stove, where it had been kept hot for him.

Lucien did not answer.  Eve took up a little plate, daintily garnished with vine-leaves, and set it on the table with a jug full of cream.

“There, Lucien, I have had strawberries for you.”

But Lucien was so absorbed in his letter that he did not hear a word.  Eve came to sit beside him without a murmur; for in a sister’s love for a brother it is an element of great pleasure to be treated without ceremony.

“Oh! what is it?” she cried as she saw tears shining in her brother’s eyes.

“Nothing, nothing, Eve,” he said, and putting his arm about her waist, he drew her towards him and kissed her forehead, her hair, her throat, with warmth that surprised her.

“You are keeping something from me.”

“Well, then—­she loves me.”

“I knew very well that you kissed me for somebody else,” the poor sister pouted, flushing red.

“We shall all be happy,” cried Lucien, swallowing great spoonfuls of soup.

“We?” echoed Eve.  The same presentiment that had crossed David’s mind prompted her to add, “You will not care so much about us now.”

“How can you think that, if you know me?”

Eve put out her hand and grasped his tightly; then she carried off the empty plate and the brown earthen soup-tureen, and brought the dish that she had made for him.  But instead of eating his dinner, Lucien read his letter over again; and Eve, discreet maiden, did not ask another question, respecting her brother’s silence.  If he wished to tell her about it, she could wait; if he did not, how could she ask him to tell her?  She waited.  Here is the letter:—­

“MY FRIEND,—­Why should I refuse to your brother in science the help that I have lent you?  All merits have equal rights in my eyes; but you do not know the prejudices of those among whom I live.  We shall never make an aristocracy of ignorance understand that intellect ennobles.  If I have not sufficient influence to compel them to accept M. David Sechard, I am quite willing to sacrifice the worthless creatures to you.  It would be a perfect hecatomb in the antique manner.  But, dear friend, you would not, of course, ask me to leave them all in exchange for the society of a person whose character and manner might not please me.  I know from your flatteries how easily friendship can be blinded.  Will you think the worse of me if I attach a condition to my consent?  In the interests of your future I should like to see your friend, and know and decide for myself whether you are not mistaken.  What is this but the mother’s anxious care of my dear poet, which I am in duty bound to take?

“LOUISE DE NEGREPELISSE.”

Lucien had no suspicion of the art with which polite society puts forward a “Yes” on the way to a “No,” and a “No” that leads to a “Yes.”  He took this note for a victory.  David should go to Mme. de Bargeton’s house!  David would shine there in all the majesty of his genius!  He raised his head so proudly in the intoxication of a victory which increased his belief in himself and his ascendency over others, his face was so radiant with the brightness of many hopes, that his sister could not help telling him that he looked handsome.

“If that woman has any sense, she must love you!  And if so, to-night she will be vexed, for all the ladies will try all sorts of coquetries on you.  How handsome you will look when you read your Saint John in Patmos!  If only I were a mouse, and could just slip in and see it!  Come, I have put your clothes out in mother’s room.”

The mother’s room bore witness to self-respecting poverty.  There were white curtains to the walnut wood bedstead, and a strip of cheap green carpet at the foot.  A chest of drawers with a wooden top, a looking-glass, and a few walnut wood chairs completed the furniture.  The clock on the chimney-piece told of the old vanished days of prosperity.  White curtains hung in the windows, a gray flowered paper covered the walls, and the tiled floor, colored and waxed by Eve herself, shone with cleanliness.  On the little round table in the middle of the room stood a red tray with a pattern of gilt roses, and three cups and a sugar-basin of Limoges porcelain.  Eve slept in the little adjoining closet, where there was just room for a narrow bed, an old-fashioned low chair, and a work-table by the window; there was about as much space as there is in a ship’s cabin, and the door always stood open for the sake of air.  But if all these things spoke of great poverty, the atmosphere was sedate and studious; and for those who knew the mother and children, there was something touchingly appropriate in their surroundings.

Lucien was tying his cravat when David’s step sounded outside in the little yard, and in another moment the young printer appeared.  From his manner and looks he seemed to have come down in a hurry.

“Well, David!” cried the ambitious poet, “we have gained the day!  She loves me!  You shall come too.”

“No,” David said with some confusion, “I came down to thank you for this proof of friendship, but I have been thinking things over seriously.  My own life is cut out for me, Lucien.  I am David Sechard, printer to His Majesty in Angouleme, with my name at the bottom of the bills posted on every wall.  For people of that class, I am an artisan, or I am in business, if you like it better, but I am a craftsman who lives over a shop in the Rue de Beaulieu at the corner of the Place du Murier.  I have not the wealth of a Keller just yet, nor the name of a Desplein, two sorts of power that the nobles still try to ignore, and —­I am so far agreed with them—­this power is nothing without a knowledge of the world and the manners of a gentleman.  How am I to prove my claim to this sudden elevation?  I should only make myself a laughing-stock for nobles and bourgeoisie to boot.  As for you, your position is different.  A foreman is not committed to anything.  You are busy gaining knowledge that will be indispensable by and by; you can explain your present work by your future.  And, in any case, you can leave your place to-morrow and begin something else; you might study law or diplomacy, or go into civil service.  Nobody had docketed and pigeon-holed you, in fact.  Take advantage of your social maiden fame to walk alone and grasp honors.  Enjoy all pleasures gladly, even frivolous pleasures.  I wish you luck, Lucien; I shall enjoy your success; you will be like a second self for me.  Yes, in my own thoughts I shall live your life.  You shall have the holiday life, in the glare of the world and among the swift working springs of intrigue.  I will lead the work-a-day life, the tradesman’s life of sober toil, and the patient labor of scientific research.

“You shall be our aristocracy,” he went on, looking at Eve as he spoke.  “If you totter, you shall have my arm to steady you.  If you have reason to complain of the treachery of others, you will find a refuge in our hearts, the love there will never change.  And influence and favor and the goodwill of others might fail us if we were two; we should stand in each other’s way; go forward, you can tow me after you if it comes to that.  So far from envying you, I will dedicate my life to yours.  The thing that you have just done for me, when you risked the loss of your benefactress, your love it may be, rather than forsake or disown me, that little thing, so great as it was—­ah, well, Lucien, that in itself would bind me to you forever if we were not brothers already.  Have no remorse, no concern over seeming to take the larger share.  This one-sided bargain is exactly to my taste.  And, after all, suppose that you should give me a pang now and again, who knows that I shall not still be your debtor all my life long?”

He looked timidly towards Eve as he spoke; her eyes were full of tears, she saw all that lay below the surface.

“In fact,” he went on, turning to Lucien, who stood amazed at this, “you are well made, you have a graceful figure, you wear your clothes with an air, you look like a gentleman in that blue coat of yours with the yellow buttons and the plain nankeen trousers; now I should look like a workingman among those people, I should be awkward and out of my element, I should say foolish things, or say nothing at all; but as for you, you can overcome any prejudice as to names by taking your mother’s; you can call yourself Lucien de Rubempre; I am and always shall be David Sechard.  In this society that you frequent, everything tells for you, everything would tell against me.  You were born to shine in it.  Women will worship that angel face of yours; won’t they, Eve?”

Lucien sprang up and flung his arms about David.  David’s humility had made short work of many doubts and plenty of difficulties.  Was it possible not to feel twice tenderly towards this friend, who by the way of friendship had come to think the very thoughts that he, Lucien, had reached through ambition?  The aspirant for love and honors felt that the way had been made smooth for him; the young man and the comrade felt all his heart go out towards his friend.

It was one of those moments that come very seldom in our lives, when all the forces in us are sweetly strung, and every chord vibrating gives out full resonance.

And yet, this goodness of a noble nature increased Lucien’s human tendency to take himself as the centre of things.  Do not all of us say more or less, “L’Etat, c’est moi!” with Louis Quatorze?  Lucien’s mother and sister had concentrated all their tenderness on him, David was his devoted friend; he was accustomed to see the three making every effort for him in secret, and consequently he had all the faults of a spoiled eldest son.  The noble is eaten up with the egoism which their unselfishness was fostering in Lucien; and Mme. de Bargeton was doing her best to develop the same fault by inciting him to forget all that he owed to his sister, and mother, and David.  He was far from doing so as yet; but was there not ground for the fear that as his sphere of ambition widened, his whole thought perforce would be how he might maintain himself in it?

When emotion had subsided, David had a suggestion to make.  He thought that Lucien’s poem, Saint John in Patmos, was possibly too biblical to be read before an audience but little familiar with apocalyptic poetry.  Lucien, making his first appearance before the most exacting public in the Charente, seemed to be nervous.  David advised him to take Andre de Chenier and substitute certain pleasure for a dubious delight.  Lucien was a perfect reader, the listeners would enjoy listening to him, and his modesty would doubtless serve him well.  Like most young people, the pair were endowing the rest of the world with their own intelligence and virtues; for if youth that has not yet gone astray is pitiless for the sins of others, it is ready, on the other hand, to put a magnificent faith in them.  It is only, in fact, after a good deal of experience of life that we recognize the truth of Raphael’s great saying—­“To comprehend is to equal.”

The power of appreciating poetry is rare, generally speaking, in France; esprit soon dries up the source of the sacred tears of ecstasy; nobody cares to be at the trouble of deciphering the sublime, of plumbing the depths to discover the infinite.  Lucien was about to have his first experience of the ignorance and indifference of worldlings.  He went round by way of the printing office for David’s volume of poetry.

The two lovers were left alone, and David had never felt more embarrassed in his life.  Countless terrors seized upon him; he half wished, half feared that Eve would praise him; he longed to run away, for even modesty is not exempt from coquetry.  David was afraid to utter a word that might seem to beg for thanks; everything that he could think of put him in some false position, so he held his tongue and looked guilty.  Eve, guessing the agony of modesty, was enjoying the pause; but when David twisted his hat as if he meant to go, she looked at him and smiled.

“Monsieur David,” she said, “if you are not going to pass the evening at Mme. de Bargeton’s, we can spend the time together.  It is fine; shall we take a walk along the Charente?  We will have a talk about Lucien.”

David longed to fling himself at the feet of this delicious girl.  Eve had rewarded him beyond his hopes by that tone in her voice; the kindness of her accent had solved the difficulties of the position, her suggestion was something better than praise; it was the first grace given by love.

“But give me time to dress!” she said, as David made as if to go at once.

David went out; he who all his life long had not known one tune from another, was humming to himself; honest Postel hearing him with surprise, conceived a vehement suspicion of Eve’s feelings towards the printer.

The most trifling things that happened that evening made a great impression on Lucien, and his character was peculiarly susceptible to first impressions.  Like all inexperienced lovers he arrived so early that Louise was not in the drawing-room; but M. de Bargeton was there, alone.  Lucien had already begun to serve his apprenticeship in the practice of the small deceits with which the lover of a married woman pays for his happiness—­deceits through which, moreover, she learns the extent of her power; but so far Lucien had not met the lady’s husband face to face.

M. de Bargeton’s intellect was of the limited kind, exactly poised on the border line between harmless vacancy, with some glimmerings of sense, and the excessive stupidity that can neither take in nor give out any idea.  He was thoroughly impressed with the idea of doing his duty in society; and, doing his utmost to be agreeable, had adopted the smile of an opera dancer as his sole method of expression.  Satisfied, he smiled; dissatisfied, he smiled again.  He smiled at good news and evil tidings; with slight modifications the smile did duty on all occasions.  If he was positively obliged to express his personal approval, a complacent laugh reinforced the smile; but he never vouchsafed a word until driven to the last extremity.  A tete-a-tete put him in the one embarrassment of his vegetative existence, for then he was obliged to look for something to say in the vast blank of his vacant interior.  He usually got out of the difficulty by a return to the artless ways of childhood; he thought aloud, took you into his confidence concerning the smallest details of his existence, his physical wants, the small sensations which did duty for ideas with him.  He never talked about the weather, nor did he indulge in the ordinary commonplaces of conversation—­the way of escape provided for weak intellects; he plunged you into the most intimate and personal topics.

“I took veal this morning to please Mme. de Bargeton, who is very fond of veal, and my stomach has been very uneasy since,” he would tell you.  “I knew how it would be; it never suits me.  How do you explain it?” Or, very likely—­

“I am just about to ring for a glass of eau sucree; will you have some at the same time?”

Or, “I am going to take a ride to-morrow; I am going over to see my father-in-law.”

These short observations did not permit of discussion; a “Yes” or “No,” extracted from his interlocutor, the conversation dropped dead.  Then M. de Bargeton mutely implored his visitor to come to his assistance.  Turning westward his old asthmatic pug-dog countenance, he gazed at you with big, lustreless eyes, in a way that said, “You were saying?”

The people whom he loved best were bores anxious to talk about themselves; he listened to them with an unfeigned and delicate interest which so endeared him to the species that all the twaddlers of Angouleme credited M. de Bargeton with more understanding than he chose to show, and were of the opinion that he was underrated.  So it happened that when these persons could find nobody else to listen to them, they went off to give M. de Bargeton the benefit of the rest of the story, argument, or what not, sure beforehand of his eulogistic smile.  Madame de Bargeton’s rooms were always crowded, and generally her husband felt quite at ease.  He interested himself in the smallest details; he watched those who came in and bowed and smiled, and brought the new arrivals to his wife; he lay in wait for departing visitors, and went with them to the door, taking leave of them with that eternal smile.  When conversation grew lively, and he saw that every one was interested in one thing or another, he stood, happy and mute, planted like a swan on both feet, listening, to all appearance, to a political discussion; or he looked over the card-players’ hands without a notion of what it was all about, for he could not play at any game; or he walked about and took snuff to promote digestion.  Anais was the bright side of his life; she made it unspeakably pleasant for him.  Stretched out at full length in his armchair, he watched admiringly while she did her part as hostess, for she talked for him.  It was a pleasure, too, to him to try to see the point in her remarks; and as it was often a good while before he succeeded, his smiles appeared after a delay, like the explosion of a shell which has entered the earth and worked up again.  His respect for his wife, moreover, almost amounted to adoration.  And so long as we can adore, is there not happiness enough in life?  Anais’ husband was as docile as a child who asks nothing better than to be told what to do; and, generous and clever woman as she was, she had taken no undue advantage of his weaknesses.  She had taken care of him as you take care of a cloak; she kept him brushed, neat, and tidy, looked closely after him, and humored him; and humored, looked after, brushed, kept tidy, and cared for, M. de Bargeton had come to feel an almost dog-like affection for his wife.  It is so easy to give happiness that costs nothing!  Mme. de Bargeton, knowing that her husband had no pleasure but in good cheer, saw that he had good dinners; she had pity upon him, she had never uttered a word of complaint; indeed, there were people who could not understand that a woman might keep silence through pride, and argued that M. de Bargeton must possess good qualities hidden from public view.  Mme. de Bargeton had drilled him into military subordination; he yielded a passive obedience to his wife.  “Go and call on Monsieur So-and-So or Madame Such-an-One,” she would say, and he went forthwith, like a soldier at the word of command.  He stood at attention in her presence, and waited motionless for his orders.

There was some talk about this time of nominating the mute gentleman for a deputy.  Lucien as yet had not lifted the veil which hid such an unimaginable character; indeed, he had scarcely frequented the house long enough.  M. de Bargeton, spread at full length in his great chair, appeared to see and understand all that was going on; his silence added to his dignity, and his figure inspired Lucien with a prodigious awe.  It is the wont of imaginative natures to magnify everything, or to find a soul to inhabit every shape; and Lucien took this gentleman, not for a granite guard-post, but for a formidable sphinx, and thought it necessary to conciliate him.

“I am the first comer,” he said, bowing with more respect than people usually showed the worthy man.

“That is natural enough,” said M. de Bargeton.

Lucien took the remark for an epigram; the lady’s husband was jealous, he thought; he reddened under it, looked in the glass and tried to give himself a countenance.

“You live in L’Houmeau,” said M. de Bargeton, “and people who live a long way off always come earlier than those who live near by.”

“What is the reason of that?” asked Lucien politely.

“I don’t know,” answered M. de Bargeton, relapsing into immobility.

“You have not cared to find out,” Lucien began again; “any one who could make an observation could discover the cause.”

“Ah!” said M. de Bargeton, “final causes!  Eh! eh! . . .”

The conversation came to a dead stop; Lucien racked his brains to resuscitate it.

“Mme. de Bargeton is dressing, no doubt,” he began, shuddering at the silliness of the question.

“Yes, she is dressing,” her husband naturally answered.

Lucien looked up at the ceiling and vainly tried to think of something else to say.  As his eyes wandered over the gray painted joists and the spaces of plaster between, he saw, not without qualms, that the little chandelier with the old-fashioned cut-glass pendants had been stripped of its gauze covering and filled with wax candles.  All the covers had been removed from the furniture, and the faded flowered silk damask had come to light.  These preparations meant something extraordinary.  The poet looked at his boots, and misgivings about his costume arose in his mind.  Grown stupid with dismay, he turned and fixed his eyes on a Japanese jar standing on a begarlanded console table of the time of Louis Quinze; then, recollecting that he must conciliate Mme. de Bargeton’s husband, he tried to find out if the good gentleman had a hobby of any sort in which he might be humored.

“You seldom leave the city, monsieur?” he began, returning to M. de Bargeton.

“Very seldom.”

Silence again.  M. de Bargeton watched Lucien’s slightest movements like a suspicious cat; the young man’s presence disturbed him.  Each was afraid of the other.

“Can he feel suspicious of my attentions?” thought Lucien; “he seems to be anything but friendly.”

Lucien was not a little embarrassed by the uneasy glances that the other gave him as he went to and fro, when luckily for him, the old man-servant (who wore livery for the occasion) announced “M. du Chatelet.”  The Baron came in, very much at ease, greeted his friend Bargeton, and favored Lucien with the little nod then in vogue, which the poet in his mind called purse-proud impertinence.

Sixte du Chatelet appeared in a pair of dazzling white trousers with invisible straps that kept them in shape.  He wore pumps and thread stockings; the black ribbon of his eyeglass meandered over a white waistcoat, and the fashion and elegance of Paris was strikingly apparent in his black coat.  He was indeed just the faded beau who might be expected from his antecedents, though advancing years had already endowed him with a certain waist-girth which somewhat exceeded the limits of elegance.  He had dyed the hair and whiskers grizzled by his sufferings during his travels, and this gave a hard look to his face.  The skin which had once been so delicate had been tanned to the copper-red color of Europeans from India; but in spite of his absurd pretensions to youth, you could still discern traces of the Imperial Highness’ charming private secretary in du Chatelet’s general appearance.  He put up his eyeglass and stared at his rival’s nankeen trousers, at his boots, at his waistcoat, at the blue coat made by the Angouleme tailor, he looked him over from head to foot, in short, then he coolly returned his eyeglass to his waistcoat pocket with a gesture that said, “I am satisfied.”  And Lucien, eclipsed at this moment by the elegance of the inland revenue department, thought that it would be his turn by and by, when he should turn a face lighted up with poetry upon the assembly; but this prospect did not prevent him from feeling the sharp pang that succeeded to the uncomfortable sense of M. de Bargeton’s imagined hostility.  The Baron seemed to bring all the weight of his fortune to bear upon him, the better to humiliate him in his poverty.  M. de Bargeton had counted on having no more to say, and his soul was dismayed by the pause spent by the rivals in mutual survey; he had a question which he kept for desperate emergencies, laid up in his mind, as it were, against a rainy day.  Now was the proper time to bring it out.

“Well, monsieur,” he said, looking at Chatelet with an important air, “is there anything fresh? anything that people are talking about?”

“Why, the latest thing is M. Chardon,” Chatelet said maliciously.  “Ask him.  Have you brought some charming poet for us?” inquired the vivacious Baron, adjusting the side curl that had gone astray on his temple.

“I should have asked you whether I had succeeded,” Lucien answered; “you have been before me in the field of verse.”

“Pshaw!” said the other, “a few vaudevilles, well enough in their way, written to oblige, a song now and again to suit some occasion, lines for music, no good without the music, and my long Epistle to a Sister of Bonaparte (ungrateful that he was), will not hand down my name to posterity.”

At this moment Mme. de Bargeton appeared in all the glory of an elaborate toilette.  She wore a Jewess’ turban, enriched with an Eastern clasp.  The cameos on her neck gleamed through the gauze scarf gracefully wound about her shoulders; the sleeves of her printed muslin dress were short so as to display a series of bracelets on her shapely white arms.  Lucien was charmed with this theatrical style of dress.  M. du Chatelet gallantly plied the queen with fulsome compliments, that made her smile with pleasure; she was so glad to be praised in Lucien’s hearing.  But she scarcely gave her dear poet a glance, and met Chatelet with a mortifying civility that kept him at a distance.

By this time the guests began to arrive.  First and foremost appeared the Bishop and his Vicar-General, dignified and reverend figures both, though no two men could well be more unlike, his lordship being tall and attenuated, and his acolyte short and fat.  Both churchmen’s eyes were bright; but while the Bishop was pallid, his Vicar-General’s countenance glowed with high health.  Both were impassive, and gesticulated but little; both appeared to be prudent men, and their silence and reserve were supposed to hide great intellectual powers.

Close upon the two ecclesiastics followed Mme. de Chandour and her husband, a couple so extraordinary that those who are unfamiliar with provincial life might be tempted to think that such persons are purely imaginary.  Amelie de Chandour posed as the rival queen of Angouleme; her husband, M. de Chandour, known in the circle as Stanislas, was a ci-devant young man, slim still at five-and-forty, with a countenance like a sieve.  His cravat was always tied so as to present two menacing points—­one spike reached the height of his right ear, the other pointed downwards to the red ribbon of his cross.  His coat-tails were violently at strife.  A cut-away waistcoat displayed the ample, swelling curves of a stiffly-starched shirt fastened by massive gold studs.  His dress, in fact, was exaggerated, till he looked almost like a living caricature, which no one could behold for the first time with gravity.

Stanislas looked himself over from top to toe with a kind of satisfaction; he verified the number of his waistcoat buttons, and followed the curving outlines of his tight-fitting trousers with fond glances that came to a standstill at last on the pointed tips of his shoes.  When he ceased to contemplate himself in this way, he looked towards the nearest mirror to see if his hair still kept in curl; then, sticking a finger in his waistcoat pocket, he looked about him at the women with happy eyes, flinging his head back in three-quarters profile with all the airs of a king of the poultry-yard, airs which were prodigiously admired by the aristocratic circle of which he was the beau.  There was a strain of eighteenth century grossness, as a rule, in his talk; a detestable kind of conversation which procured him some success with women—­he made them laugh.  M. du Chatelet was beginning to give this gentleman some uneasiness; and, as a matter of fact, since Mme. de Bargeton had taken him up, the lively interest taken by the women in the Byron of Angouleme was distinctly on the increase.  His coxcomb superciliousness tickled their curiosity; he posed as the man whom nothing can arouse from his apathy, and his jaded Sultan airs were like a challenge.

Amelie de Chandour, short, plump, fair-complexioned, and dark-haired, was a poor actress; her voice was loud, like everything else about her; her head, with its load of feathers in winter and flowers in summer, was never still for a moment.  She had a fine flow of conversation, though she could never bring a sentence to an end without a wheezing accompaniment from an asthma, to which she would not confess.

M. de Saintot, otherwise Astolphe, President of the Agricultural Society, a tall, stout, high-colored personage, usually appeared in the wake of his wife, Elisa, a lady with a countenance like a withered fern, called Lili by her friends—­a baby name singularly at variance with its owner’s character and demeanor.  Mme. de Saintot was a solemn and extremely pious woman, and a very trying partner at a game of cards.  Astolphe was supposed to be a scientific man of the first rank.  He was as ignorant as a carp, but he had compiled the articles on Sugar and Brandy for a Dictionary of Agriculture by wholesale plunder of newspaper articles and pillage of previous writers.  It was believed all over the department that M. Saintot was engaged upon a treatise on modern husbandry; but though he locked himself into his study every morning, he had not written a couple of pages in a dozen years.  If anybody called to see him, he always contrived to be discovered rummaging among his papers, hunting for a stray note or mending a pen; but he spent the whole time in his study on puerilities, reading the newspaper through from end to end, cutting figures out of corks with his penknife, and drawing patterns on his blotting-paper.  He would turn over the leaves of his Cicero to see if anything applicable to the events of the day might catch his eye, and drag his quotation by the heels into the conversation that evening saying, “There is a passage in Cicero which might have been written to suit modern times,” and out came his phrase, to the astonishment of his audience.  “Really,” they said among themselves, “Astolphe is a well of learning.”  The interesting fact circulated all over the town, and sustained the general belief in M. de Saintot’s abilities.

After this pair came M. de Bartas, known as Adrien among the circle.  It was M. de Bartas who boomed out his song in a bass voice, and made prodigious claims to musical knowledge.  His self-conceit had taken a stand upon solfeggi; he began by admiring his appearance while he sang, passed thence to talking about music, and finally to talking of nothing else.  His musical tastes had become a monomania; he grew animated only on the one subject of music; he was miserable all evening until somebody begged him to sing.  When he had bellowed one of his airs, he revived again; strutted about, raised himself on his heels, and received compliments with a deprecating air; but modesty did not prevent him from going from group to group for his meed of praise; and when there was no more to be said about the singer, he returned to the subject of the song, discussing its difficulties or extolling the composer.

M. Alexandre de Brebian performed heroic exploits in sepia; he disfigured the walls of his friends’ rooms with a swarm of crude productions, and spoiled all the albums in the department.  M. Alexandre de Brebian and M. de Bartas came together, each with his friend’s wife on his arm, a cross-cornered arrangement which gossip declared to be carried out to the fullest extent.  As for the two women, Mesdames Charlotte de Brebian and Josephine de Bartas, or Lolotte and Fifine, as they were called, both took an equal interest in a scarf, or the trimming of a dress, or the reconciliation of several irreconcilable colors; both were eaten up with a desire to look like Parisiennes, and neglected their homes, where everything went wrong.  But if they dressed like dolls in tightly-fitting gowns of home manufacture, and exhibited outrageous combinations of crude colors upon their persons, their husbands availed themselves of the artist’s privilege and dressed as they pleased, and curious it was to see the provincial dowdiness of the pair.  In their threadbare clothes they looked like the supernumeraries that represent rank and fashion at stage weddings in third-rate theatres.

One of the queerest figures in the rooms was M. le Comte de Senonches, known by the aristocratic name of Jacques, a mighty hunter, lean and sunburned, a haughty gentleman, about as amiable as a wild boar, as suspicious as a Venetian, and jealous as a Moor, who lived on terms of the friendliest and most perfect intimacy with M. du Hautoy, otherwise Francis, the friend of the house.

Madame de Senonches (Zephirine) was a tall, fine-looking woman, though her complexion was spoiled already by pimples due to liver complaint, on which grounds she was said to be exacting.  With a slender figure and delicate proportions, she could afford to indulge in languid manners, savoring somewhat of affectation, but revealing passion and the consciousness that every least caprice will be gratified by love.

Francis, the house friend, was rather distinguished-looking.  He had given up his consulship in Valence, and sacrificed his diplomatic prospects to live near Zephirine (also known as Zizine) in Angouleme.  He had taken the household in charge, he superintended the children’s education, taught them foreign languages, and looked after the fortunes of M. and Mme. de Senonches with the most complete devotion.  Noble Angouleme, administrative Angouleme, and bourgeois Angouleme alike had looked askance for a long while at this phenomenon of the perfect union of three persons; but finally the mysterious conjugal trinity appeared to them so rare and pleasing a spectacle, that if M. du Hautoy had shown any intention of marrying, he would have been thought monstrously immoral.  Mme. de Senonches, however, had a lady companion, a goddaughter, and her excessive attachment to this Mlle. de la Haye was beginning to raise surmises of disquieting mysteries; it was thought, in spite of some impossible discrepancies in dates, that Francoise de la Haye bore a striking likeness to Francis du Hautoy.

When “Jacques” was shooting in the neighborhood, people used to inquire after Francis, and Jacques would discourse on his steward’s little ailments, and talk of his wife in the second place.  So curious did this blindness seem in a man of jealous temper, that his greatest friends used to draw him out on the topic for the amusement of others who did not know of the mystery.  M. du Hautoy was a finical dandy whose minute care of himself had degenerated into mincing affectation and childishness.  He took an interest in his cough, his appetite, his digestion, his night’s rest.  Zephirine had succeeded in making a valetudinarian of her factotum; she coddled him and doctored him; she crammed him with delicate fare, as if he had been a fine lady’s lap-dog; she embroidered waistcoats for him, and pocket-handkerchiefs and cravats until he became so used to wearing finery that she transformed him into a kind of Japanese idol.  Their understanding was perfect.  In season and out of season Zizine consulted Francis with a look, and Francis seemed to take his ideas from Zizine’s eyes.  They frowned and smiled together, and seemingly took counsel of each other before making the simplest commonplace remark.

The largest landowner in the neighborhood, a man whom every one envied, was the Marquis de Pimentel; he and his wife, between them, had an income of forty thousand livres, and spent their winters in Paris.  This evening they had driven into Angouleme in their caleche, and had brought their neighbors, the Baron and Baroness de Rastignac and their party, the Baroness’ aunt and daughters, two charming young ladies, penniless girls who had been carefully brought up, and were dressed in the simple way that sets off natural loveliness.

These personages, beyond question the first in the company, met with a reception of chilling silence; the respect paid to them was full of jealousy, especially as everybody saw that Mme. de Bargeton paid marked attention to the guests.  The two families belonged to the very small minority who hold themselves aloof from provincial gossip, belong to no clique, live quietly in retirement, and maintain a dignified reserve.  M. de Pimentel and M. de Rastignac, for instance, were addressed by their names in full, and no length of acquaintance had brought their wives and daughters into the select coterie of Angouleme; both families were too nearly connected with the Court to compromise themselves through provincial follies.