Contents:

Page No 1

Page No 2

Page No 3

Page No 4

THE CRIME OF SYLVESTRE BONNARD ...................................................................................................1

ANATOLE FRANCE ..............................................................................................................................1

THAT excellent French critic, Jules Lemaitre, observes: "Let us love the books which please us and cease to

trouble ourselves about classifications and schools of literature." This generous exhortation seems especially

appropriate in the case of Anatole France. The author of "Le Crime de Sylvestre Bonnard" is not

classifiable,though it would be difficult to name any other modern French writer by whom the finer

If by Realism we mean Truth, which alone gives value to any study of human nature, we have in Anatole

France a very dainty realist:if by Romanticism we understand that unconscious tendency of the artist to

elevate truth itself beyond the range of the familiar, and into the emotional realm of aspiration, then Anatole

France is at times a romantic. And, nevertheless, as a literary figure he stands alone; neither by his distinctly

Parisian refinement of method, nor yet by any definite characteristic of style, can he be successfully attached

to any special group of writers. He is essentially of Paris, indeed;his literary training could have been

acquired in no other atmosphere: his light grace of emotional analysis, his artistic epicureanism, the vividness

and quickness of his sensations, are French as his name. But he has followed no schooltraditions; and the

charm of his art, at once so impersonal and sympathetic, is wholly his own. How marvellously well the

author has succeeded in disguising himself! It is extremely difficult to believe that the diary of Sylvestre

Bonnard could have been written by a younger man; yet the delightful octogenarian is certainly a young

M. Anatole France belongs to a period of change,a period in which a new science and a new philosophy

have transfigured the world of ideas with unprecedented suddenness. All the arts have been more or less

influenced by new modes of thought,reflecting the exaggerated materialism of an era of transition. The

reaction is now setting in;the creative work of fine minds already reveals that the Art of the Future must be

that which appeals to the higher emotions alone. Material Nature has already begun to lure less, and human

nature to gladden more;the knowledge of Spiritual Evolution follows luminously upon our recognition of

Physical Evolution;and the horizon of human fellowship expands for us with each fresh acquisition of

knowledge,as the skycircle expands to those who climb a height. The works of fiction that will live are

not the creations of men who have blasphemed the human heart, but of men who, like Anatole France, have

risen above the literary tendencies of their generation,never doubting humanity, and keeping their pages

irreproachably pure. In the art of Anatole France there is no sensuousness: his study is altogether of the

nobler emotions. What the pessimistic coarseness of selfcalled "Naturalism" has proved itself totally unable

to feel, he paints for us truthfully, simply, and touchingly,the charm of age, in all its gentleness,

lovableness, and indulgent wisdom. The dear old man who talks about his books to his cat, who has remained

for fifty years true to the memory of the girl he could not win, and who, in spite of his worldwide reputation

for scholarship, finds himself so totally helpless in all business matters, and so completely at the mercy of his

own generous impulses,may be, indeed, as the most detestable Mademoiselle Prefere observes, "a child";

but his childishness is only the delightful freshness of a pure and simple heart which could never become

aged. His artless surprise at the malevolence of evil minds; his toleration of juvenile impertinence, his

beautiful comprehension of the value of life and the sweetness of youth, his selfdisparagements and

delightful compunctions of conscience, his absolute unselfishness and incapacity to nourish a resentment, his

fine gentle irony which never wounds and always amuses: these, and many other traits, combine to make him

one of the most intensely living figures created in modern French literature. It is quite impossible to imagine

him as unreal; and, indeed, we feel to him as to some old friend unexpectedly met with after years of absence,

whose face and voice are perfectly familiar, but whose name will not be remembered until he repeats it

himself. We, might even imagine ourselves justified in doubting the statement of M. Lemaitre that Anatole

France was not an old bachelor, but a comparatively young man, and a married man, when he imagined

Sylvestre Bonnard;we might, in short, refuse to believe the book not strictly autobiographical,but for the

reflection that its other personages live with the same vividness for us as does the Member of the Institute.

Therese, the grim old housekeeper, so simple and faithful; Madame and Monsieur de Gabry, those delightful

friends; the glorious, brutal, heroic Uncle Victor; the perfectly lovable Jeanne: these figures are not less

But it is not because M. Anatole France has rare power to create original characters, or to reflect for us

something of the more recondite literary life of Paris, that his charming story will live. It is because of his far

rarer power to deal with what is older than any art, and withal more young, and incomparably more precious:

the beauty of what is beautiful in human emotion. And that writer who touches the spring of generous tears

by some simple story of gratitude, of natural kindness, of gentle selfsacrifice, is surely more entitled to our

love than the sculptor who shapes for us a dream of merely animal grace, or the painter who images for us,

however richly, the young bloom of that form which is only the husk of Being! LAFCADIO HEARN.

I HAD put on my slippers and my dressinggown. I wiped away a tear with which the north wind blowing

over the quay had obscured my vision. A bright fire was leaping in the chimney of my study. Icecrystals,

shaped like fernleaves, were sprouting over the window panes, and concealed from me the Seine with its

I drew up my easychair to the hearth, and my tablevolante, and took up so much of my place by the fire as

Hamilcar deigned to allow me. Hamilcar was lying in front of the andirons, curled up on a cushion, with his

nose between his paws. His thick fine fur rose and fell with his regular breathing. At my coming, he slowly

slipped a glance of his agate eyes at me from between his halfopened lids, which he closed again almost at

"Hamilcar," I said to him, as I stretched my legs"Hamilcar, somnolent Prince of the City of Booksthou

guardian nocturnal! Like that Divine Cat who combated the impious in Heliopolisin the night of the great

combatthou dost defend from vile nibblers those books which the old savant acquired at the cost of his

slender savings and indefatigable zeal. Sleep, Hamilcar, softly as a sultana, in this library, that shelters thy

military virtues; for verily in thy person are united the formidable aspect of a Tartar warrior and the

slumbrous grace of a woman of the Orient. Sleep, thou heroic and voluptuous Hamilcar, while awaiting that

moonlight hour in which the mice will come forth to dance before the 'Acta Sanctorum' of the learned

The beginning of this discourse pleased Hamilcar, who accompanied it with a throatsound like the song of a

kettle on the fire. But as my voice waxed louder, Hamilcar notified me by lowering his ears and by wrinkling

"This oldbook man," evidently thought Hamilcar, "talks to no purpose at all, while our housekeeper never

utters a word which is not full of good sense, full of significancecontaining either the announcement of a

meal or the promise of a whipping. One knows what she says. But this old man puts together a lot of sounds

So thought Hamilcar to himself. Leaving him to his reflections, I opened a book, which I began to read with

interest; for it was a catalogue of manuscripts. I do not know any reading more easy, more fascinating, more

delightful than that of a catalogue. The one which I was readingedited in 1824 by Mr. Thompson, librarian

to Sir Thomas Raleighsins, it is true, by excess of brevity, and does not offer that character of exactitude

which the archivists of my own generation were the first to introduce into works upon diplomatics and

paleography. It leaves a good deal to be desired and to be divined. This is perhaps why I find myself aware,

while reading it, of a state of mind which in a nature more imaginative than mine might be called reverie. I

had allowed myself to drift away thus gently upon the current of my thoughts, when my housekeeper

announced, in a tone of illhumour, that Monsieur Coccoz desired to speak with me.

In fact, some one had slipped into the library after her. He was a little mana poor little man of puny

appearance, wearing a thin jacket. He approached me with a number of little bows and smiles. But he was

very pale, and, although still young and alert, he looked ill. I thought, as I looked at him, of a wounded

squirrel. He carried under his arm a green toilete, which he put upon a chair; then unfastening the four corners

"Monsieur," he then said to me, "I have not the honour to be known to you. I am a bookagent, Monsieur. I

represent the leading houses of the capital, and in the hope that you will kindly honour me with your

Kind gods! just gods! such novelties as the homunculus Coccoz showed me! The first volume that he put in

my hand was "L'Histoire de la Tour de Nesle," with the amours of Marguerite de Bourgogne and the Captain

"In that case," I replied, "it must be very tiresome; for all the historical books which contain no lies are

extremely tedious. I write some authentic ones myself; and if you were unlucky enough to carry a copy of

any of them from door to door you would run the risk of keeping it all your life in that green baize of yours,

And, all smiling again, he offered me the "Amours d'Heloise et d'Abeilard"; but I made him understand that,

Still smiling, he proposed me the "Regle des Jeux de la Societe"piquet, bezique, ecarte, whist, dice,

"Alas!" I said to him, "if you want to make me remember the rules of bezique, give me back my old friend

Bignan, with whom I used to play cards every evening before the Five Academies solemnly escorted him to

the cemetery; or else bring down to the frivolous level of human amusements the grave intelligence of

Hamilcar, whom you see on that cushion, for he is the sole companion of my evenings."

"Here," he said, "is a new collection of society amusementsjokes and punswith a receipt for changing a

I told him that I had fallen out with roses for a long time, and that, as to jokes, I was satisfied with those

which I unconsciously permitted myself to make in the course of my scientific labours.

"Here is the 'Clef des Songes'the 'Key of Dreams'with the explanation of any dreams that anybody can

have; dreams of gold, dreams of robbers, dreams of death, dreams of falling from the top of tower.... It is

I had taken hold of the tongs, and, brandishing them energetically, I replied to my commercial visitor:

"Yes, my friend; but those dreams and a thousand others, joyous or tragic, are all summed up in onethe

"Yes, Monsieur," answered the homunculus; "the book is complete, and it is not dearone franc twentyfive

"Therese, Monsieur Coccozwhom I am going to ask you to show outhas a book here which might

"Monsieur, when one has not even time to dream awake, one has still less time to dream asleep. Thank God,

my days are just enough for my work and my work for my days, and I am able to say every night, 'Lord, bless

Thou the rest which I am going to take.' I never dream, either on my feet or in bed; and I never mistake my

eiderdown coverlet for a devil, as my cousin did; and, if you will allow me to give my opinion about it, I

think you have books enough here now. Monsieur has thousands and thousands of books, which simply turn

his head; and as for me, I have just two, which are quite enough for all my wants and purposesmy Catholic

And with these words my housekeeper helped the littleman to fasten up his stock again within the green

The homunculus Coccoz had ceased to smile. His relaxed features took such an expression of suffering that I

felt sorry to have made fun of so unhappy a man. I called him back, and told him that I had caught a glimpse

of a copy of the "Histoire d'Estelle et de Nemorin," which he had among his books; that I was very fond of

shepherds and shepherdesses, and that I would be quite willing to purchase, at a reasonable price, the story of

"I will sell you that book for one franc twenty five centimes, Monsieur," replied Coccoz, whose face at once

beamed with joy. "It is historical; and you will be pleased with it. I know now just what suits you. I see that

you are a connoisseur. Tomorrow I will bring you the "Crimes des Papes." It is a good book. I will bring

I begged him not to do anything of the sort, and sent him away happy. When the green toilette and the agent

had disappeared in the shadow of the corridor I asked my housekeeper whence this little man had dropped

"Dropped is the word," she answered; "he dropped on us from the roof, Monsieur, where he lives with his

"You say he has a wife, Therese? That is marvelous! women are very strange creatures! This one must be a

"I don't really know what she is," answered Therese; "but every morning I see her trailing a silk dress covered

with greasespots over the stairs. She makes soft eyes at people. And, in the name of common sense! does it

become a woman that has been received here out of charity to make eyes and to wear dresses like that? For

they allowed the couple to occupy the attic during the time the roof was being repaired, in consideration of

the fact that the husband is sick and the wife in an interesting condition. The concierge even says that the

pains came on her this morning, and that she is now confined. They must have been very badly off for a

"Therese," I replied, "they had no need of a child, doubtless. But Nature had decided they should bring one

into the world; Nature made them fall into her snare. One must have exceptional prudence to defeat Nature's

schemes. Let us be sorry for them, and not blame them! As for silk dresses, there is no young woman who

does not like them. The daughters of Eve adore adornment. You yourself, Theresewho are so serious and

sensiblewhat a fuss you make when you have no white apron to wait at table in! But, tell me, have they got

"How could they have it, Monsieur," my housekeeper made answer. "The husband, whom you have just seen,

used to be a jewellerypeddlerat least, so the concierge tells meand nobody knows why he stopped

selling watches. You have just seen that he is now selling almanacs. That is no way to make an honest living,

and I never will believe that God's blessing can come to an almanac peddler. Between ourselves, the wife

looks to me for all the world like a goodfornothinga Mariecouche toila. I think she would be just as

capable of bringing up a child as I should be of playing the guitar. Nobody seems to know where they came

from; but I am sure they must have come by Misery's coach from the country of Sanssouci.

"Wherever they have come from, Therese, they are unfortunate; and their attic is cold."

"Pardi!the roof is broken in several places, and the rain comes through in streams. They have neither

furniture nor clothing. I don't think cabinetmakers and weavers work much for Christians of that sect!"

"That is very sad, Therese; a Christian woman much less well provided for than this pagan, Hamilcar

"Monsieur, I never speak to those people; I don't know what she says or what she sings. But she sings all day

"Well! the heir of the Coccoz family will be able to say, like the Egg in the village riddle: 'Ma mere me fit en

chantant.'* The like happened in the case of Henry IV. When Jeanne d'Albret felt herself about to be confined

"It is certainly unreasonable to bring little unfortunates into the world. But the thing is done every day, my

dear Therese and all the philosophers on earth will never be able to reform the silly custom. Madame Coccoz

has followed it, and she sings. That is creditable at all events! But, tell me, Therese, have you not put on the

"Good! but don't forget, Therese, to take a good bowl of soup out of the pot and carry it to Madame Coccoz,

"Therese, before you do anything else, please call your friend the porter, and tell him to take a good bundle of

wood out of our stock and carry it up to the attic of those Coccoz folks. See, above all, that he puts a

firstclass log in the lota real Christmas log. As for the homunculus, if he comes back again, do not allow

Having taken all these little precautions with the refined egotism of an old bachelor, I returned to my

With what surprise, with what emotion, with what anxiety did I therein discover the following mention,

"LA LEGENDE DOREE DE JACQUES DE GENES (Jacques de Voragine),traduction francaise, petit

in4. "This MS. of the fourteenth century contains, besides the tolerably complete translation of the

celebrated work of Jacques de Voragine, 1. The Legends of Saints Ferreol, Ferrution, Germain, Vincent, and

Droctoveus; 2. A poem On the Miraculous Burial of Monsieur SaintGermain of Auxerre. This translation,

"This MS. is written upon vellum. It contains a great number of illuminated letters, and two finely executed

miniatures, in a rather imperfect state of preservation:one represents the Purification of the Virgin, and the

What a discovery! Perspiration moistened my forehead, and a veil seemed to come before my eyes. I

trembled; I flushed; and, without being able to speak, I felt a sudden impulse to cry out at the top of my

What a treasure! For more than forty years I had been making a special study of the history of Christian Gaul,

and particularly of that glorious Abbey of SaintGermaindesPres, whence issued forth those KingMonks

who founded our national dynasty. Now, despite the culpable insufficiency of the description given, it was

evident to me that the MS. of the Clerk Alexander must have come from the great Abbey. Everything proved

this fact. All the legends added by the translator related to the pious foundation of the Abbey by King

Childebert. Then the legend of SaintDroctoveus was particularly significant; being the legend of the first

abbot of my dear Abbey. The poem in French verse on the burial of SaintGermain led me actually into the

The "Golden Legend" is in itself a vast and gracious work. Jacques de Voragine, Definitor of the Order of

SaintDominic, and Archbishop of Genoa, collected in the thirteenth century the various legends of Catholic

saints, and formed so rich a compilation that from all the monasteries and castles of the time there arose the

cry: "This is the 'Golden Legend.'" The "Legende Doree" was especially opulent in Roman hagiography.

Edited by an Italian monk, it reveals its best merits in the treatment of matters relating to the terrestrial

domains of Saint Peter. Voragine can only perceive the greater saints of the Occident as through a cold mist.

For this reason the Aquitanian and Saxon translators of the good legendwriter were careful to add to his

I have read and collated a great many manuscripts of the "Golden Legend." I know all those described by my

learned colleague, M. Paulin Paris, in his handsome catalogue of the MSS. of the Bibliotheque du Roi. There

were two among them which especially drew my attention. One is of the fourteenth century and contains a

translation by Jean Belet; the other, younger by a century, presents the version of Jacques Vignay. Both come

from the Colbert collection, and were placed on the shelves of that glorious Colbertine library by the

Librarian Baluzewhose name I can never pronounce without uncovering my head; for even in the century

of the giants of erudition, Baluze astounds by his greatness. I know also a very curious codex in the Bigot

collection; I know seventyfour printed editions of the work, commencing with the venerable ancestor of

allthe Gothic of Strasburg, begun in 1471, and finished in 1475. But no one of those MSS., no one of those

editions, contains the legends of Saints Ferreol, Ferrution, Germain, Vincent, and Droctoveus; no one bears

the name of the Clerk Alexander; no one, in fine, came from the Abbey of SaintGermaindesPres.

Compared with the MS. described by Mr. Thompson, they are only as straw to gold. I have seen with my

eyes, I have touched with my fingers, an incontrovertible testimony to the existence of this document. But the

document itselfwhat has become of it? Sir Thomas Raleigh went to end his days by the shores of the Lake

of Como, whither he carried with him a part of his literary wealth. Where did the books go after the death of

that aristocratic collector? Where could the manuscript of the Clerk Alexander have gone?

"And why," I asked myself, "why should I have learned that this precious book exists, if I am never to

possess itnever even to see it? I would go to seek it in the burning heart of Africa, or in the icy regions of

the Pole if I knew it were there. But I do not know where it is. I do not know if it be guarded in a

triplelocked iron case by some jealous bibliomaniac. I do not know if it be growing mouldy in the attic of

some ignoramus. I shudder at the thought that perhaps its tornout leaves may have been used to cover the

THE heavy heat compelled me to walk slowly. I kept close to the walls of the north quays; and, in the

lukewarm shade, the shops of the dealers in old books, engravings, and antiquated furniture drew my eyes

and appealed to my fancy. Rummaging and idling among these, I hastily enjoyed some verses spiritedly

thrown off by a poet of the Pleiad. I examined an elegant Masquerade by Watteau. I felt, with my eye, the

weight of a twohanded sword, a steel gorgerin, a morion. What a thick helmet! What a ponderous

breastplateSeigneur! A giant's garb? Nothe carapace of an insect. The men of those days were cuirassed

like beetles; their weakness was within them. Today, on the contrary, our strength is interior, and our armed

...Here is a pastelportrait of a lady of the old timethe face, vague like a shadow, smiles; and a hand,

gloved with an openwork mitten, retains upon her satiny knees a lapdog, with a ribbon about its neck. That

picture fills me with a sort of charming melancholy. Let those who have no halfeffaced pastels in their own

hearts laugh at me! Like the horse that scents the stable, I hasten my pace as I near my lodgings. There it

isthat great human hive, in which I have a cell, for the purpose of therein distilling the somewhat acrid

honey of erudition. I climb the stairs with slow effort. Only a few steps more, and I shall be at my own door.

But I divine, rather than see, a robe descending with a sound of rustling silk. I stop, and press myself against

the balustrade to make room. The lady who is coming down is bareheaded; she is young; she sings; her eyes

and teeth gleam in the shadow, for she laughs with lips and eyes at the same time. She is certainly a

neighbour, and a very familiar one. She holds in her arms a pretty child, a little boyquite naked, like the

son of a goddess; he has a medal hung round his neck by a little silver chain. I see him sucking his thumbs

and looking at me with those big eyes so newly opened on this old universe. The mother simultaneously

looks at me in a sly, mysterious way; she stopsI think blushes a littleand holds out the little creature to

me. The baby has a pretty wrinkle between wrist and arm, a pretty wrinkle about his neck, and all over him,

She takes one tiny hand, lifts it to the child's own lips, and, drawing out the darling pink fingers again

Then, folding the little being in her arms, she flees away with the agility of a cat, and is lost to sight in a

"Therese, who can that young mother be whom I saw bareheaded on the stairs just now, with a pretty little

I stare up at the ceiling, as if trying to obtain some further illumination. Therese then recalls to me the little

bookpeddler who tried to sell me almanacs last year, while his wife was lying in.

I was answered that I would never see him again. The poor little man had been laid away underground,

without my knowledge, and, indeed, with the knowledge of very few people, only a short time after the happy

delivery of Madame Coccoz. I learned that his wife had been able to console herself; I did likewise.

"But, Therese," I asked, "has Madame Coccoz got everything she needs in that attic of hers?"

"You would be a great dupe, Monsieur," replied my housekeeper, "if you should bother yourself about that

creature. They gave her notice to quit the attic when the roof was repaired. But she stays there yetin spite

of the proprietor, the agent, the concierge, and the bailiffs. I think she has bewitched every one of them. She

will leave that attic when she pleases, Monsieur; but she is going to leave in her own carriage. Let me tell you

"Then I ought to thank Heaven for having spared me that curse. But here! put my hat and cane away. I am

going to amuse myself with a few pages of Moreri. If I can trust my old fox nose, we are going to have a

nicely flavoured pullet for dinner. Look after that estimable fowl, my girl, and spare your neighbours, so that

Having thus spoken, I proceeded to follow out the tufted ramifications of a princely genealogy.

I HAVE passed the winter according to the ideal of the sages, in angello cum libello; and now the swallows

of the Quai Malaquais find me on their return about as when they left me. He who lives little, changes little;

Yet I feel myself today a little more deeply impregnated than ever before with that vague melancholy which

life distils. The economy of my intelligence (I dare scarcely confess it to myself!) has remained disturbed

ever since that momentous hour in which the existence of the manuscript of the Clerk Alexander was first

It is strange that I should have lost my rest simply on account of a few old sheets of parchment; but it is

unquestionably true. The poor man who has no desires possesses the greatest of riches; he possesses himself.

The rich man who desires something is only a wretched slave. I am just such a slave. The sweetest

pleasuresthose of converse with some one of a delicate and wellbalanced mind, or dining out with a

friendare insufficient to enable me to forget the manuscript which I know that I want, and have been

wanting from the moment I knew of its existence. I feel the want of it by day and by night: I feel the want of

I recall my desires as a child. How well I can now comprehend the intense wishes of my early years!

I can see once more, with astonishing vividness, a certain doll which, when I was eight years old, used to be

displayed in the window of an ugly little shop of the Rue de Seine. I cannot tell how it happened that this doll

attracted me. I was very proud of being a boy; I despised little girls; and I longed impatiently for the day

(which, alas! has come) when a strong beard should bristle on my chin. I played at being a soldier; and, under

the pretext of obtaining forage for my rockinghorse, I used to make sad havoc among the plants my poor

mother delighted to keep on her windowsill. Manly amusements those, I should say! And, nevertheless, I

was consumed with longing for a doll. Characters like Hercules have such weaknesses occasionally. Was the

one I had fallen in love with at all beautiful? No. I can see her now. She had a splotch of vermilion on either

cheek, short soft arms, horrible wooden hands, and long sprawling legs. Her flowered petticoat was fastened

at the waist with two pins. Even now I can see the black heads of those two pins. It was a decidedly vulgar

dollsmelt of the faubourg. I remember perfectly well that, child as I was then, before I had put on my first

pair of trousers, I was quite conscious in my own way that this doll lacked grace and stylethat she was

gross, that she was coarse. But I loved her in spite of that; I loved her just for that; I loved her only; I wanted

her. My soldiers and my drums had become as nothing in my eyes, I ceased to stick sprigs of heliotrope and

veronica into the mouth of my rockinghorse. That doll was all the world to me. I invented ruses worthy of a

savage to oblige Virginie, my nurse, to take me by the little shop in the Rue de Seme. I would press my nose

against the window until my nurse had to take my arm and drag me away. "Monsieur Sylvestre, it is late, and

your mamma will scold you." Monsieur Sylvestre in those days made very little of either scoldings or

whippings. But his nurse lifted him up like a feather, and Monsieur Sylvestre yielded to force. In afteryears,

with age, he degenerated, and sometimes yielded to fear. But at that time he used to fear nothing.

I was unhappy. An unreasoning but irresistible shame prevented me from telling my mother about the object

of my love. Thence all my sufferings. For many days that doll, incessantly present in fancy, danced before

my eyes, stared at me fixedly, opened her arms to me, assuming in my imagination a sort of life which made

her appear at once mysterious and weird, and thereby all the more charming and desirable.

Finally, one daya day I shall never forgetmy nurse took me to see my uncle, Captain Victor, who had

invited me to lunch. I admired my uncle a great deal, as much because he had fired the last French cartridge

at Waterloo, as because he used to prepare with his own hands, at my mother's table, certain

chaponsal'ail,* which he afterwards put into the chicory salad. I thought that was very fine! My Uncle

Victor also inspired me with much respect by his frogged coat, and still more by his way of turning the whole

house upside down from the moment he came into it. Even now I cannot tell just how he managed it, but I

can affirm that whenever my Uncle Victor found himself in any assembly of twenty persons, it was

impossible to see or to hear anybody but him. My excellent father, I have reason to believe, never shared my

admiration for Uncle Victor, who used to sicken him with his pipe, give him great thumps in the back by way

of friendliness, and accuse him of lacking energy. My mother, though always showing a sister's indulgence to

the Captain, sometimes advised him to fondle the brandybottle a little less frequently. But I had no part

either in these repugnances or these reproaches, and Uncle Victor inspired me with the purest enthusiasm. It

was therefore with a feeling of pride that I entered into the little lodging he occupied in the Rue Guenegaud.

The entire lunch, served on a small table close to the fireplace, consisted of cold meats and confectionery.

The Captain stuffed me with cakes and undiluted wine. He told me of numberless injustices to which he had

been a victim. He complained particularly of the Bourbons; and as he neglected to tell me who the Bourbons

were, I got the ideaI can't tell howthat the Bourbons were horsedealers established at Waterloo. The

Captain, who never interrupted his talk except for the purpose of pouring out wine, furthermore made charges

against a number of dirty scoundrels, blackguards, and goodfornothings whom I did not know anything

about, but whom I hated from the bottom of my heart. At dessert I thought I heard the Captain say my father

was a man who could be led anywhere by the nose; but I am not quite sure that I understood him. I had a

My uncle put on his frogged coat, took his bellshaped hat, and we descended to the street, which seemed to

me singularly changed. It looked to me as if I had not been in it before for ever so long a time. Nevertheless,

when we came to the Rue de Seine, the idea of my doll suddenly returned to my mind and excited me in an

extraordinary way. My head was on fire. I resolved upon a desperate expedient. We were passing before the

window. She was there, behind the glasswith her red cheeks, and her flowered petticoat, and her long legs.

"Buy a doll for a boysacrebleu!" cried my uncle, in a voice of thunder. "Do you wish to dishonour

yourself? And it is that old Mag there that you want! Well, I must compliment you, my young fellow! If you

grow up with such tastes as that, you will never have any pleasure in life; and your comrades will call you a

precious ninny. If you asked me for a sword or a gun, my boy, I would buy them for you with the last silver

crown of my pension. But to buy a doll for youby all that's holy!to disgrace you! Never in the world!

Why, if I were ever to see you playing with a puppet rigged out like that, Monsieur, my sister's son, I would

On hearing these words, I felt my heart so wrung that nothing but pridea diabolic pridekept me from

My uncle, suddenly calming down, returned to his ideas about the Bourbons; but I, still smarting under the

weight of his indignation, felt an unspeakable shame. My resolve was quickly made. I promised myself never

Captain, though it be true that all your life you swore like a pagan, smoked like a beadle, and drank like a

bellringer, be your memory nevertheless honourednot merely because you were a brave soldier, but also

because you revealed to your little nephew in petticoats the sentiment of heroism! Pride and laziness had

made you almost insupportable, Uncle Victor!but a great heart used to beat under those frogs upon your

coat. You always used to wear, I now remember, a rose in your buttonhole. That rose which you offered so

readily to the shopgirlsthat large, openhearted flower, scattering its petals to all the winds, was the

symbol of your glorious youth. You despised neither wine nor tobacco; but you despised life. Neither

delicacy nor common sense could have been learned from you, Captain; but you taught me, even at an age

when my nurse had to wipe my nose, a lesson of honour and selfabnegation that I shall never forget.

You have now been sleeping for many years in the Cemetery of MontParnasse, under a plain slab bearing

But such, Captain, was not the inscription devised by yourself to be placed above those old bones of

yoursknocked about so long on fields of battle and in haunts of pleasure. Among your papers was found

this proud and bitter epitaph, which, despite your last will, none could have ventured to put upon your tomb:

CIGIT UN BRIGAND DE LA LOIRE. "Therese, we will get a wreath of immortelles tomorrow, and lay

But Therese is not here. And how, indeed, could she be near me, seeing that I am at the rondpoint of the

ChampsElysees? There, at the termination of the avenue, the Arc de Triomphe, which bears under its vaults

the names of Uncle Victor's companionsinarms, opens its giant gate against the sky. The trees of the

avenue are unfolding to the sun of spring their first leaves, still all pale and chilly. Beside me the carriages

keep rolling by to the Bois de Boulogne. Unconsciously I have wandered into this fashionable avenue on my

promenade, and halted, quite stupidly, in front of a booth stocked with gingerbread and decanters of

liquoricewater, each topped by a lemon. A miserable little boy, covered with rags, which expose his

chapped skin, stares with widely opened eyes at those sumptuous sweets which are not for such as he. With

the shamelessness of innocence he betrays his longing. His round, fixed eyes contemplate a certain

gingerbread man of lofty stature. It is a general, and it looks a little like Uncle Victor. I take it, I pay for it,

and present it to the little pauper, who dares not extend his hand to receive itfor, by reason of precocious

experience, he cannot believe in luck; he looks at me, in the same way that certain big dogs do, with the air of

"Come, little stupid," I say to him, in that rough tone I am accustomed to use, "take ittake it, and eat it; for

you, happier than I was at your age, you can satisfy your tastes without disgracing yourself."... And you,

Uncle Victoryou, whose manly figure has been recalled to me by that gingerbread general, come, glorious

Shadow, help me to forget my new doll. We remain for ever children, and are always running after new toys.

IN the oddest way that Coccoz family has become associated in my mind with the Clerk Alexander.

"Therese," I said, as I threw myself into my easychair, "tell me if the little Coccoz is well, and whether he

"He ought to have them by this time, Monsieur," replied Therese; "but I never saw them. The very first fine

day of spring the mother disappeared with the child, leaving furniture and clothes and everything behind her.

They found thirtyeight empty pomadepots in the attic. It passes all belief! She had visitors latterly; and you

may be quite sure she is not now in a convent of nuns. The niece of the concierge says she saw her driving

"Therese," I replied, "that young woman has not ended either badly or well as yet. Wait until the term of her

life is over before you judge her. And be careful not to talk too much with that concierge. It seemed to

methough I only saw her for a moment on the stairsthat Madame Coccoz was very fond of her child.

"As far as that goes, Monsieur, certainly the little one never wanted for anything. In all the Quarter one could

not have found a child better kept, or better nourished, or more petted and coddled. Every day that God

makes she puts a clean bib on him, and sings to him to make him laugh from morning till night."

"Therese, a poet has said, 'That child whose mother has never smiled upon him is worthy neither of the table

HAVING been informed that the Chapel of the Virgin at SaintGermaindesPres was being repaved, I

entered the church with the hope of discovering some old inscriptions, possibly exposed by the labours of the

workmen. I was not disappointed. The architect kindly showed me a stone which he had just had raised up

against the wall. I knelt down to look at the inscription engraved upon that stone; and then, half aloud, I read

"Cygist Alexandre, moyne de ceste e'glise, qui fist mettre en argent le menton de SaintVincent et de

SaintAmant et le pie des Innocens; qui toujours en son vivant fut preud'homme et vayllant. Priez pour l'ame

de lui." I wiped gently away with my handkerchief the dust covering that gravestone; I could have kissed it.

"It is he! it is Alexander!" I cried out; and from the height of the vaults the name fell back upon me with a

The silent severity of the beadle, whom I saw advancing towards me, made me ashamed of my enthusiasm;

and I fled between the two holywater sprinklers with which two rival "rats d'eglise" seemed desirous of

At all events it was certainly my own Alexander! there could be no more doubt possible; the translator of the

"Golden Legend," the author of the lives of Saints Germain, Vincent, Ferreol, Ferrution, and Droctoveus was,

just as I had supposed, a monk of SaintGermaindesPres. And what a monk, toopious and generous! He

had a silver chin, a silver head, and a silver foot made, that certain precious remains should be covered with

an incorruptible envelope! But shall I never be able to view his handiwork? or is this new discovery only

"I, that please some, try all; both joy and terror Of good and bad; that make and unfold error Now take

To use my wings. Impute it not a crime To me or my swift passage, that I slide O'er years."

Shakespeare, after having terminated the third act of the "Winter's Tale," pauses in order to leave time for

little Perdita to grow up in wisdom and in beauty; and when he raises the curtain again he evokes the ancient

Scythebearer upon the stage to render account to the audience of those many long days which have weighed

Like Shakespeare in his play, I have left in this diary of mine a long interval to oblivion; and after the fashion

of the poet, I make Time himself intervene to explain the omission of ten whole years. Ten whole years,

indeed, have passed since I wrote one single line in this diary; and now that I take up the pen again, I have not

the pleasure, alas! to describe a Perdita "now grown in grace." Youth and beauty are the faithful companions

of poets; but those charming phantoms scarcely visit the rest of us, even for the space of a season. We do not

know how to retain them with us. If the fair shade of some Perdita should ever, through some inconceivable

whim, take a notion to traverse my brain, she would hurt herself horribly against heaps of dogeared

parchments. Happy the poets!their white hairs never scare away the hovering shades of Helens,

Francescas, Juliets, Julias, and Dorotheas! But the nose alone of Sylvestre Bonnard would put to flight the

Yet I, like others, have felt beauty; I have known that mysterious charm which Nature has lent to animate

form; and the clay which lives has given to me that shudder of delight which makes the lover and the poet.

But I have never known either how to love or how to sing. Now, in my memoryall encumbered as it is

with the rubbish of old textsI can discern again, like a miniature forgotten in some attic, a certain bright

young face, with violet eyes.... Why, Bonnard, my friend, what an old fool you are becoming! Read that

catalogue which a Florentine bookseller sent you this very morning. It is a catalogue of Manuscripts; and he

promises you a description of several famous ones, long preserved by the collectors of Italy and Sicily. There

is something better suited to you, something more in keeping with your present appearance.

I read; I cry out! Hamilcar, who has assumed with the approach of age an air of gravity that intimidates me,

looks at me reproachfully, and seems to ask me whether there is any rest in this world, since he cannot enjoy

In the sudden joy of my discovery, I need a confidant; and it is to the sceptic Hamilcar that I address myself

"No, Hamilcar! no," I said to him; "there is no rest in this world, and the quietude you long for is

incompatible with the duties of life. And you say that we are old, indeed! Listen to what I read in this

"'LA LEGENDE DOREE DE JACQUES DE VORAIGINE;traduction francaise du quatorzieme siecle,

par le Clerc Alexandre. "'Superb MS., ornamented with two miniatures, wonderfully executed, and in a

perfect state of preservation:one representing the Purification of the Virgin; the other the Coronation of

"'At the termination of the "Legende Doree" are the Legends of Saints Ferreol, Ferrution, Germain, and

Droctoveus (xxviij pp.) and the Miraculous Sepulture of Monsieur SaintGermain d'Auxerre (xij pp.) .

"'This rare manuscript, which formed part of the collection of Sir Thomas Raleigh, is now in the private study

"You hear that, Hamilcar? The manuscript of the Clerk Alexander is in Sicily, at the house of MichelAngelo

Polizzi. Heaven grant he may be a friend of learned men! I am going to write to him!"

Which I did forthwith. In my letter I requested Signor Polizzi to allow me to examine the manuscript of Clerk

Alexander, stating on what grounds I ventured to consider myself worthy of so great a favour. I offered at the

same time to put at his disposal several unpublished texts in my own possession, not devoid of interest. I

begged him to favour me with a prompt reply, and below my signature I wrote down all my honorary titles.

"Monsieur! Monsieur! where are you running like that?" cried Therese, quite alarmed, coming down the

"Good God! is that a way to run out in the street, bareheaded, like a crazy man?"

I had reached the bottom of the stairs, but still heard her protesting and lamenting.

I AWAITED Signor Polizzi's reply with illcontained impatience. I could not even remain quiet; I would

make sudden nervous gesturesopen books and violently close them again. One day I happened to upset a

book with my elbowa volume of Moreri. Hamilcar, who was washing himself, suddenly stopped, and

looked angrily at me, with his paw over his ear. Was this the tumultuous existence he must expect under my

roof? Had there not been a tacit understanding between us that we should live a peaceful life? I had broken

"My poor dear comrade," I made answer, "I am the victim of a violent passion, which agitates and masters

me. The passions are enemies of peace and quiet, I acknowledge; but without them there would be no arts or

industries in the world. Everybody would sleep naked on a dungheap; and you would not be able, Hamilcar,

I expatiated no further to Hamilcar on the theory of the passions, however, because my housekeeper brought

"MOST ILLUSTRIOUS SIR,I do indeed possess that incomparable manuscript of the 'Golden Legend'

which could not escape your keen observation. Allimportant reasons, however, forbid me, imperiously,

tyrannically, to let the manuscript go out of my possession for a single day, for even a single minute. It will

be a joy and pride for me to have you examine it in my humble home at Girgenti, which will be embellished

and illuminated by your presence. It is with the most anxious expectation of your visit that I presume to sign

"Winemerchant and Archaeologist at Girgenti, Sicily." Well, then! I will go to Sicily:

MY resolve had been taken and my preparations made; it only remained for me to notify my housekeeper. I

must acknowledge it was a long time before I could make up my mind to tell her I was going away. I feared

her remonstrances, her railleries, her objurgations, her tears. "She is a good, kind girl," I said to myself; "she

is attached to me; she will want to prevent me from going; and the Lord knows that when she has her mind

set upon anything, gestures and cries cost her no effort. In this instance she will be sure to call the concierge,

the scrubber, the mattressmaker, and the seven sons of the fruitseller; they will all kneel down in a circle

around me; they will begin to cry, and then they will look so ugly that I shall be obliged to yield, so as not to

Such were the awful images, the sick dreams, which fear marshalled before my imagination. Yes,

fear"fecund Fear," as the poet saysgave birth to these monstrosities in my brain. ForI may as well

make the confession in these private pagesI am afraid of my housekeeper. I am aware that she knows I am

weak; and this fact alone is sufficient to dispel all my courage in any contest with her. Contests are of

But for all that, I had to announce my departure to Therese. She came into the library with an armful of wood

to make a little fire"une flambe," she said. For the mornings are chilly. I watched her out of the corner of

my eye while she crouched down at the hearth, with her head in the opening of the fireplace. I do not know

how I then found the courage to speak, but I did so without much hesitation. I got up, and, walking up and

down the room, observed in a careless tone, with that swaggering manner characteristic of cowards,

Having thus spoken, I awaited the consequence with great anxiety. Therese did not reply. Her head and her

vast cap remained buried in the fireplace; and nothing in her person, which I closely watched, betrayed the

least emotion. She poked some paper under the wood, and blew up the fire. That was all!

Finally I saw her face again;it was calmso calm that it made me vexed. "Surely," I thought to myself,

"this old maid has no heart. She lets me go away without saying so much as 'Ah!' Can the absence of her old

"Well, then go, Monsieur," she answered at last, "only be back here by six o'clock! There is a dish for dinner

I understand, my friendfor three centimes I can eat, drink, and wash my face, all by means of one of those

slices of watermelon you display there on a little table. But Occidental prejudices would prevent me from

enjoying that simple pleasure freely and frankly. And how could I suck a watermelon? I have enough to do

merely to keep on my feet in this crowd. What a luminous, noisy night in the Strada di Portol Mountains of

fruit tower up in the shops, illuminated by multicoloured lanterns. Upon charcoal furnaces lighted in the open

air water boils and streams, and ragouts are singing in fryingpans. The smell of fried fish and hot meats

tickles my nose and makes me sneeze. At this moment I find that my handkerchief has left the pocket of my

frockcoat. I am pushed, lifted up, and turned about in every direction by the gayest, the most talkative, the

most animated and the most adroit populace possible to imagine; and suddenly a young woman of the people,

while I am admiring her magnificent hair, with a single shock of her powerful elastic shoulder, pushes me

staggering three paces back at least, without injury, into the arms of a maccaronieater, who receives me with

I am in Naples. How I ever managed to arrive here, with a few mutilated and shapeless remains of baggage, I

cannot tell, because I am no longer myself. I have been travelling in a condition of perpetual fright; and I

think that I must have looked awhile ago in this bright city like an owl bewildered by sunshine. Tonight it is

much worse! Wishing to obtain a glimpse of popular manners, I went to the Strada di Porto, where I now am.

All about me animated throngs of people crowd and press before the eatingplaces; and I float like a waif

among these living surges, which, even while they submerge you, still caress. For this Neapolitan people has,

in its very vivacity, something indescribably gentle and polite. I am not roughly jostled, I am merely swayed

about; and I think that by dint of thus rocking me to and fro, these good folks want to lull me asleep on my

feet. I admire, as I tread the lava pavements of the strada, those porters and fishermen who move by me

chatting, singing, smoking, gesticulating, quarrelling, and embracing each other the next moment with

astonishing versatility of mood. They live through all their senses at the same time; and, being philosophers

without knowing it, keep the measure of their desires in accordance with the brevity of life. I approach a

muchpatronised tavern, and see inscribed above the entrance this quatrain in Neapolitan patois:

Who knows if we shall meet again in the other world? Who knows if in the other world there be a tavern?"

Even such counsels was Horace wont to give to his friends. You received them, posthumus; you heard them

also, Leuconoe, perverse beauty who wished to know the secrets of the future. That future is now the past,

and we know it well. Of a truth you were foolish to worry yourselves about so small a matter; and your friend

showed his good sense when he told you to take life wisely and to filter your Greek wines"Sapias, vina

liques." Even thus the sight of a fair land under a spotless sky urges to the pursuit of quiet pleasures. But

there are souls for ever harassed by some sublime discontent; those are the noblest. You were of such,

Leuconoe; and I, visiting for the first time, in my declining years, that city where your beauty was famed of

old, I salute with deep respect your melancholy memory. Those souls of kin to your own who appeared in the

age of Christianity were souls of saints; and the "Golden Legend" is full of the miracles they wrought. Your

friend Horace left a less noble posterity, and I see one of his descendants in the person of that tavern poet,

who at this moment is serving out wine in cups under the epicurean motto of his sign.

And yet life decides in favour of friend Flaccus, and his philosophy is the only one which adapts itself to the

course of events. There is a fellow leaning against that trelliswork covered with vineleaves, and eating an

ice, while watching the stars. He would not stoop even to pick up the old manuscript I am going to seek with

so much trouble and fatigue. And in truth man is made rather to eat ices than to pore over old texts.

I continued to wander about among the drinkers and the singers. There were lovers biting into beautiful fruit,

each with an arm about the other's waist. Man must be naturally bad; for all this strange joy only evoked in

me a feeling of uttermost despondency. That thronging populace displayed such artless delight in the simple

act of living, that all the shynesses begotten by my old habits as an author awoke and intensified into

something like fright. Furthermore I found myself much discouraged by my inability to understand a word of

all the storm of chatter about me. It was a humiliating experience for a philologist. Thus I had begun to feel

"Dimitri, that old man is certainly a Frenchman. He looks so bewildered that I really feel sorry for him. Shall

I speak to him?... He has such a goodnatured look, with that round back of hisdo you not think so,

It was said in French by a woman's voice. For the moment it was disagreeable to hear myself spoken of as an

old man. Is a man old at sixtytwo? Only the other day, on the Pont des Arts, my colleague Perrot d'Avrignac

complimented me on my youthful appearance; and I should think him a better authority about one's age than

that young chatterbox who has taken it on herself to make remarks about my back. My back is round, she

says. Ah! ah! I had some suspicion myself to that effect, but I am not going now to believe it at all, since it is

the opinion of a giddyheaded young woman. Certainly I will not turn my head round to see who it was that

spoke; but I am sure it was a pretty woman. Why? Because she talks like a capricious person and like a

spoiled child. Ugly women may be naturally quite as capricious as pretty ones; but as they are never petted

and spoiled, and as no allowances are made for them, they soon find themselves obliged either to suppress

their whims or to hide them. On the other hand, the pretty women can be just as fantastical as they please. My

neighbour is evidently one of the latter.... But, after all, coming to think it over, she really did nothing worse

than to express, in. her own way, a kindly thought about me, for which I ought to feel grateful.

These reflectionsincluding the last and decisive onepassed through my mind in less than a second; and

if I have taken a whole minute to tell them, it is only because I am a bad writer, which failing is characteristic

of most philologists. In less than a second, therefore, after the voice had ceased, I did turn round, and saw a

"Madame," I said, with a bow, "excuse my involuntary indiscretion. I could not help overhearing what you

have just said. You would like to be of service to a poor old man. And the wish, Madame, has already been

fulfilledthe mere sound of a French voice has given me such pleasure that I must thank you."

I bowed again, and turned to go away; but my foot slipped upon a melonrind, and I should certainly have

embraced the Parthenopean soil had not the young lady put out her hand and caught me. There is a force in

circumstanceseven in the very smallest circumstancesagainst which resistance is vain. I resigned myself

"It is late," she said; "do you not wish to go back to your hotel, which must be quite close to oursunless it

"Madame," I replied, "I do not know what time it is, because somebody has stolen my watch; but I think, as

you say, that it must be time to retire; and I shall be very glad to regain my hotel in the company of such

So saying, I bowed once more to the young lady, and also saluted her companion, a silent colossus with a

After having gone a little way with them, I learned, among other matters, that my new acquaintances were the

Prince and Princess Trepof, and that they were making a trip round the world for the purpose of finding

We proceeded along a narrow, tortuous vicoletto, lighted only by a single lamp burning in the niche of a

Madonna. The purity and transparency of the air gave a celestial softness and clearness to the very darkness

itself; and one could find one's way without difficulty under such a limpid night. But in a little while we

began to pass through a "venella," or, in Neapolitan parlance, a sottoportico, which led under so many

archways and so many farprojecting balconies that no gleam of light from the sky could reach us. My young

guide had made us take this route as a short cut, she assured us; but I think she did so quite as much simply in

order to show that she felt at home in Naples, and knew the city thoroughly. Indeed, she needed to know it

very thoroughly to venture by night into that labyrinth of subterranean alleys and flights of steps. If ever any

man showed absolute docility in allowing himself to be guided, that man was myself. Dante never followed

the steps of Beatrice with more confidence than I felt in following those of Princess Trepof.

The lady appeared to find some pleasure in my conversation, for she invited me to take a carriage drive with

her on the morrow to visit the grotto of Posilippo and the tomb of Virgil. She declared she had seen me

somewhere before; but she could not remember if it had been at Stockholm or at Canton. In the former event

I was a very celebrated professor of geology; in the latter, a provisionmerchant whose courtesy and kindness

had been much appreciated. One thing certain was that she had seen my back somewhere before.

"Excuse me," she added; "we are continually travelling, my husband and I, to collect match boxes and to

change our ennui by changing country. Perhaps it would be more reasonable to content ourselves with a

single variety of ennui. But we have made all our preparations and arrangements for travelling: all our plans

have been laid out in advance, and it gives us no trouble, whereas it would be very troublesome for us to stop

anywhere in particular. I tell you all this so that you may not be surprised if my recollections have become a

little mixed up. But from the moment I first saw you at a distance this evening, I feltin fact I knewthat I

had seen you before. Now the question is, 'Where was it that I saw you?' You are not, then, either the

"No, Madame," I replied, "I am neither the one nor the other; and I am sorry for itsince you have had

reason to esteem them. There is really nothing about me worthy of your interest. I have spent all my life

poring over books, and I have never travelled: you might have known that from my bewilderment, which

"You are a member of the Institute! How nice! Will you not write something for me in my album? Do you

know Chinese? I would like so much to have you write something in Chinese or Persian in my album. I will

introduce you to my friend, Miss Fergusson, who travels everywhere to see all the famous people in the

world. She will be delighted.... Dimitri, did you hear that?this gentleman is a member of the Institute, and

"Monsieur," I said, trying to engage him in our conversation, "it is true that something can be learned from

books; but a great deal more can be learned by travelling, and I regret that I have not been able to go round

the world like you. I have lived in the same house for thirty years and I scarcely ever go out."

"Lived in the same house for thirty years!" cried Madame Trepof; "is it possible?"

"Yes, Madame," I answered. "But you must know the house is situated on the bank of the Seine, and in the

very handsomest and most famous part of the world. From my window I can see the Tuileries and the Louvre,

the PontNeuf, the towers of NotreDame, the turrets of the Palais de Justice, and the spire of the

SainteChapelle. All those atones speak to me; they tell me stories about the days of SaintLouis, of the

Valois, of Henri IV., and of Louis XIV. I understand them, and I love them all. It is only a very small corner

At this moment we found ourselves upon a public squarea largo steeped in the soft glow of the night.

Madame Trepof looked at me in an uneasy manner; her lifted eyebrows almost touched the black curls about

"On the Quai Malaquais, Madame, and my name is Bonnard. It is not a name very widely known, but I am

This revelation, unimportant as it was, produced an extraordinary effect upon Madame Trepof. She

"Come, Dimitri!" she exclaimed, "do walk a little faster. I am horribly tired, and you will not hurry yourself

in the least. We shall never get home.... As for you, monsieur, your way lies over there!"

She made a vague gesture in the direction of some dark vicolo, pushed her husband the opposite way, and

"Adieu, Monsieur! We shall not go to Posilippo tomorrow, nor the day after, either. I have a frightful

I remained for the moment stupefied, vainly trying to think what I could have done to offend Madame

Trepof. I had also lost my way, and seemed doomed to wander about all night. In order to ask my way, I

would have to see somebody; and it did not seem likely that I should find a single human being who could

understand me. In my despair I entered a street at randoma street, or rather a horrible alley that had the

look of a murderous place. It proved so in fact, for I had not been two minutes in it before I saw two men

fighting with knives. They were attacking each other even more fiercely with their tongues than with their

weapons; and I concluded from the nature of the abuse they were showering upon each other that it was a

love affair. I prudently made my way into a side alley while those two good fellows were still much too busy

with their own affairs to think about mine. I wandered hopelessly about for a while, and at last sat down,

completely discouraged, on a stone bench, inwardly cursing the strange caprices of Madame Trepof.

"How are you, Signor? Are you back from San Carlo? Did you hear the diva sing? It is only at Naples you

I looked up, and recognised my host. I had seated myself with my back to the facade of my hotel, under the

WE were all restingmyself, my guides, and their muleson the road from Sciacca to Girgenti, at a tavern

in the miserable village of MonteAllegro, whose inhabitants, consumed by the mal' aria, continually shiver

in the sun. But nevertheless they are Greeks, and their gaiety triumphs over all circumstances. A few gather

about the tavern, full of smiling curiosity. One good story would have sufficed, had I known how to tell it to

them, to make them forget all the woes of life. They had all a look of intelligence I and their women,

Before me I could see old ruins whitened by the seawindruins about which no grass ever grows. The

dismal melancholy of deserts prevails over this arid land, whose cracked surface can barely nourish a few

shrivelled mimosas, cacti, and dwarf palms. Twenty yards away, along the course of a ravine stones were

gleaming whitely like a long line of scattered bones. They told me that was the bed of a stream.

I had been about fifteen days in Sicily. On coming into the Bay of Palermowhich opens between the two

mighty naked masses of the Pellirino and the Catalfano, and extends inward along the "Golden Conch"the

view inspired me with such admiration that I resolved to travel a little in this island, so ennobled by historic

memories, and rendered so beautiful by the outlines of its hills, which reveal the principles of Greek art. Old

pilgrim though I was, grown hoary in the Gothic OccidentI dared to venture upon that classic soil; and,

securing a guide, I went from Palermo to Trapani, from Trapani to Selinonte, from Selinonte to

Sciaccawhich I left this morning to go to Girgenti, where I am to find the MS. of Clerk Alexander. The

beautiful things I have seen are still so vivid in my mind that I feel the task of writing them would be a

useless fatigue. Why spoil my pleasuretrip by collecting notes? Lovers who love truly do not write down

Wholly absorbed by the melancholy of the present and the poetry of the past, my thoughts peopled with

beautiful shapes, and my eyes ever gratified by the pure and harmonious lines of the landscape, I was resting

in the tavern at MonteAllegro, sipping a glass of heavy, fiery wine, when I saw two persons enter the

waitingroom, whom, after a moment's. hesitation, I recognised as the Prince and Princess Trepof.

This time I saw the princess in the lightand what a light! He who has known that of Sicily can better

comprehend the words of Sophocles: "Oh holy light!... Eye of the Golden Day!" Madame Trepof, dressed in

brownholland and wearing a broadbrimmed straw hat, appeared to me a very pretty woman of about

twentyeight. Her eyes were luminous as a child's; but her slightly plump chin indicated the age of plenitude.

She is, I must confess it, quite an attractive person. She is supple and changeful; her mood is like water

itselfand, thank Heaven! I am no navigator. I thought I discerned in her manner a sort of illhumour, which

I attributed presently, by reason of some observations she uttered at random, to the fact that she had met no

"Such things only happen to us!" she exclaimed, with a gesture of discouragement.

She called for a glass of iced water, which the landlord presented to her with a gesture that recalled to me

I was in no hurry to introduce myself to a lady who had so abruptly dropped my acquaintance in the public

square at Naples; but she perceived me my corner, and her frown notified me very plainly that our accidental

After she had sipped her icewater for a few momentswhether because her whim had suddenly changed,

or because my loneliness aroused her pity, I did not knowshe walked directly to me.

"Goodday, Monsieur Bonnard," she said. "How do you do? What strange chance enables us to meet again in

"This country is not frightful, Madame," I replied. "Beauty is so great and so august a quality that centuries of

barbarism cannot efface it so completely that adorable vestiges of it will not always remain. The majesty of

the antique Ceres still overshadows these arid valleys; and that Greek Muse who made Arethusa and Menalus

ring with her divine accents, still sings for my ears upon the barren mountain and in the place of the driedup

spring. Yes, Madame, when our globe, no longer inhabited, shall, like the moon, roll a wan corpse through

space, the soil which bears the ruins of Selinonte will still keep the seal of beauty in the midst of universal

death; and then, then, at least there will be no frivolous mouth to blaspheme the grandeur of these solitudes."

I knew well enough that my words were beyond the comprehension of the pretty little emptyhead which

heard them. But an old fellow like myself who has worn out his life over books does not know how to adapt

his tone to circumstances. Besides, I wished to give Madame Trepof a lesson in politeness. She received it

with so much submission, and with such an air of comprehension, that I hastened to add, as goodnaturedly

"As to whether the chance which has enabled me to meet you again be lucky or unlucky, I cannot decide the

question until I am sure that my presence be not disagreeable to you. You appeared to become weary of my

company very suddenly at Naples the other day. I can only attribute that misfortune to my naturally

unpleasant mannersince, on that occasion, I had had the honour of meeting you for the first time in my

These words seemed to cause her inexplicable joy. She smiled upon me in the most gracious, mischievous

way, and said very earnestly, holding out her hand, which I touched with my lips,

"Monsieur Bonnard, do not refuse to accept a seat in my carriage. You can chat with me on the way about

"My dear," exclaimed the prince, "you can do just as you please; but you ought to remember that one is

horribly cramped in that carriage of yours; and I fear you are only offering Monsieur Bonnard the chance of

Madame Trepof simply shook her head by way of explaining that such considerations had no weight with her

whatever; then she untied her hat. The darkness of her black curls descended over her eyes, and bathed them

in velvety shadow. She remained a little while quite motionless, and her face assumed a surprising expression

of reverie. But all of a sudden she darted at some oranges which the tavern keeper had brought in a basket,

"These will be nice on the road," she said. "We are going just where you are goingto Girgenti. I must tell

you all about it. You know that my husband is making a collection of match boxes. We bought thirteen

hundred matchboxes at Marseilles. But we heard there was a factory of them at Girgenti. According to what

we were told, it is a very small factory, and its productswhich are very uglynever go outside the city and

its suburbs. So we are going to Girgenti just to buy matchboxes. Dimitri has been a collector of all sorts of

things; but the only kind of collection which can now interest him is a collection of matchboxes. He has

already got five thousand two hundred and fourteen different kinds. Some of them gave us frightful trouble to

find. For instance, we knew that at Naples boxes were once made with the portraits of Mazzini and Garibaldi

on them; and that the police had seized the plates from which the portraits were printed, and put the

manufacturer in gaol. Well, by dint of searching and inquiring for ever so long a while, we found one of those

boxes at last for sale at one hundred francs, instead of two sous. It was not really too dear at that price; but we

were denounced for buying it. We were taken for conspirators. All our baggage was searched; they could not

find the box, because I had hidden it so well; but they found my jewels, and carried them off. They have them

still. The incident made quite a sensation, and we were going to get arrested. But the king was displeased

about it, and he ordered them to leave us alone. Up to that time, I used to think it was very stupid to collect

matchboxes; but when I found that there were risks of losing liberty, and perhaps even life, by doing it, I

began to feel a taste for it. Now I am an absolute fanatic on the subject. We are going to Sweden next summer

I feltmust I confess it?a thorough sympathy with these intrepid collectors. No doubt I would rather have

found Monsieur and Madame Trepof engaged in collecting antique marbles or painted vases in Sicily. I

should have liked to have found them interested in the ruins of Syracuse, or the poetical traditions of the

Eryx. But at all events, they were making some sort of a collectionthey belonged to the great

confraternityand I could not possibly make fun of them without making fun of myself. Besides, Madame

Trepof had spoken of her collection with such an odd mingling of irony and enthusiasm that I could not help

We were getting ready to leave the tavern, when we noticed some people coming downstairs from the upper

room, carrying carbines under their dark cloaks. To me they had the look of thorough bandits; and after they

were gone I told Monsieur Trepof my opinion of them. He answered me, very quietly, that he also thought

they were regular bandits; and the guides begged us to apply for an escort of gendarmes, but Madame Trepof

besought us not to do anything of the kind. She declared that we must not "spoil her journey."

"Do you not believe, Monsieur Bonnard, that there is nothing in life worth having except sensations?"

"Why, certainly, Madame," I answered; "but then we must take into consideration the nature of the sensations

themselves. Those which a noble memory or a grand spectacle creates within us certainly represent what is

best in human life; but those merely resulting from the menace of danger seem to me sensations which one

should be very careful to avoid as much as possible. For example, would you think it a very pleasant thing,

Madame, while travelling over the mountains at midnight, to find the muzzle of a carbine suddenly pressed

"Oh, no!" she replied; "the comicoperas have made carbines absolutely ridiculous, and it would be a great

misfortune to any young woman to find herself in danger from an absurd weapon. But it would be quite

different with a knifea very cold and very bright knife blade, which makes a cold shudder go right through

She shuddered even as she spoke; closed her eyes, and threw her head back. Then she resumed:

"People like you are so happy! You can interest yourselves in all sorts of things!"

She gave a sidelong look at her husband, who was talking with the innkeeper. Then she leaned towards me,

"You see, Dimitri and I, we are both suffering from ennui! We have still the matchboxes. But at last one

gets tired even of matchboxes. Besides, our collection will soon be complete. And then what are we going

"Oh, Madame!" I exclaimed, touched by the moral unhappiness of this pretty person, "if you only had a son,

then you would know what to do. You would then learn the purpose of your life, and your thoughts would

"But I have a son," she replied. "He is a big boy; he is eleven years old, and he suffers from ennui like the rest

of us. Yes, my George has ennui, too; he is tired of everything. It is very wretched."

She glanced again towards her husband, who was superintending the harnessing of the mules on the road

outsidetesting the condition of girths and straps. Then she asked me whether there had been many changes

on the Quai Malaquais during the past ten years. She declared she never visited that neighbourhood because it

"Why, no!" she replied. "Too far from the Avenue des Champs Elysees, where we live."

And she murmured over again, as if talking to herself, "Too far!too far!" in a tone of reverie which I could

The mules had been harnessed. The young woman hastily picked up a few oranges which had rolled off her

"Oh!" she exclaimed, "how I should like to see you grappling with the brigands! You would say such

extraordinary things to them!... Please take my hat, and hold my umbrella for me, Monsieur Bonnard."

"What a strange little mind!" I thought to myself, as I followed her. "It could only have been in a moment of

inexcusable thoughtlessness that Nature gave a child to such a giddy little woman!"

HER manners had shocked me. I left her to arrange herself in her lettica, and I made myself as comfortable as

I could in my own. These vehicles, which have no wheels, are carried by two mulesone before and one

behind. This kind of litter, or chaise, is of ancient origin. I had often seen representations of similar ones in

the French MSS. of the fourteenth century. I had no idea then that one of those vehicles would be at a future

For three hours the mules sounded their little bells, and thumped the calcined ground with their hoofs. On

either hand there slowly defiled by us the barren monstrous shapes of a nature totally African.

Madame Trepof came to me on the road, took my arm, and drew me a little away from the party. Then, very

"Do not think that I am a wicked woman. My George knows that I am a good mother."

We walked side by side for a moment in silence. She looked up, and I saw that she was crying.

"Madame," I said to her, "look at this soil which has been burned and cracked by five long months of fiery

"Your heart," I said, "however arid it be, bears also its white lily; and that is reason enough why I do not

"Yes, yes, yes!" she cried, with the obstinacy of a child"I am a wicked woman. But I am ashamed to

"I know it! I know all about you, Monsieur Bonnard!" she declared, with a smile.

I AWOKE the following morning in the House of Gellias. Gellias was a rich citizen of ancient Agrigentum.

He was equally celebrated for his generosity and for his wealth; and he endowed his native city with a great

number of free inns. Gellias has been dead for thirteen hundred years; and nowadays there is no gratuitous

hospitality among civilised peoples. But the name of Gellias has become that of a hotel in which, by reason

The modern Girgenti lifts its high, narrow, solid streets, dominated by a sombre Spanish cathedral, upon the

site of the acropolis of the antique Agrigentum. I can see from my windows, halfway on the hillside towards

the sea, the white range of temples partially destroyed. The ruins alone have some aspect of coolness. All the

rest is arid. Water and life have forsaken Agrigentum. Waterthe divine Nestis of the Agrigentine Em

pedoclesis so necessary to animated beings that nothing can live far from the rivers and the springs. But

the port of Girgenti, situated at a distance of three kilometres from the city, has a great commerce. "And it is

in this dismal city," I said to myself, "upon this precipitous rock, that the manuscript of Clerk Alexander is to

be found!" I asked my way to the house of Signor MichelAngelo Polizzi, and proceeded thither.

I found Signor Polizzi, dressed all in white from head to feet, busy cooking sausages in a fryingpan. At the

sight of me, he let go the handle of the frying pan, threw up his arms in the air, and uttered shrieks of

enthusiasm. He was a little man whose pimply features, aquiline nose, round eyes, and projecting chin

He called me "Excellence," said he was going to mark the day with a white stone, and made me sit down. The

hall in which we were represented the union of kitchen, receptionroom, bedchamber, studio, and

winecellar. There were charcoal furnaces visible, a bed, paintings, an easel, bottles, strings of onions, and a

magnificent lustre of coloured glass pendants. I glanced at the paintings on the wall.

"The arts! the arts!" cried Signor Polizzi, throwing up his arms again to heaven"the arts! What dignity!

And he showed me an unfinished SaintFrancis, which indeed could very well remain unfinished for ever

without any loss to religion or to art. Next he showed me some old paintings of a better style, but apparently

restored after a decidedly reckless manner. "I repair," he said"I repair old paintings. Oh, the Old Masters!

"Why, then," I said to him, "you must be a painter, an archaeologist, and a winemerchant all in one?"

"At your service, Excellence," he answered. "I have a zucco here at this very momenta zucco of which

"I esteem the wines of Sicily," I responded, "but it was not for the sake of your flagons that I came to see you,

He: "Then you have come to see me about paintings. You are an amateur. It is an immense delight for me to

receive amateurs. I am going to show you the chefd'oeuvre of Monrealese; yes, Excellence, his

chefd'oeuvre! An Adoration of Shepherds! It is the pearl of the whole Sicilian school!"

I: "Later on I will be glad to see the chefd'oeuvre but let us first talk about the business which brings me

His little quick bright eyes watched my face curiously; and I perceived, with anguish, that he had not the least

A cold sweat broke out over my forehead; and in the bewilderment of my anxiety I stammered out something

"I have come from Paris expressly to look at a manuscript of the 'Legende Doree,' which you in. formed me

At these words he threw up his arms, opened his mouth and eyes to the widest possible extent, and betrayed

"Oh I the manuscript of the 'Golden Legend!' A pearl, Excellence! a ruby, a diamond! Two miniatures so

perfect that they give one the feeling of glimpses of Paradise! What suavity! Those colours ravished from the

corollas of flowers make a honey for the eyes! Even a Sicilian could have done no better!"

"Let you see it!" cried Polizzi. "But how can I, Excellence? I have not got it any longer! I have not got it!"

And he seemed determined to tear out his hair. He might indeed have pulled every hair in his head out of his

hide before I should have tried to prevent him. But he stopped of his own accord, before he had done himself

"What!" I cried out in anger"what! you make me come all the way from Paris to Girgenti, by promising to

show me a manuscript, and now, when I come, you tell me you have not got it! It is simply infamous,

Anybody who could have seen me at that moment would have been able to form a good idea of the aspect of

"It is infamous! it is infamous!" I repeated, waving my arms which trembled from anger.

Then MichelAngelo Polizzi let himself fall into a chair in the attitude of a dying hero. I saw his eyes fill

with tears, and his hairuntil then flamboyant and erect upon his headfall down in limp disorder over his

"My son Rafaelthe son of my poor wife, for whose death I have been mourning fifteen yearsRafael,

Excellence, wanted to settle at Paris; he hired a shop in the Rue Lafitte for the sale of curiosities. I gave him

everything precious which I had I gave him my finest majolicas; my most beautiful Urbinoware; my

masterpieces of art; what paintings, Signor! Even now they dazzle me with I see them only in imagination!

And all of them signed! Finally, I gave him the manuscript of the 'Golden Legend'! I would have given him

"So," I said, "while Irelying upon your written word, Monsieurwas travelling to the very heart of Sicily

to find the manuscript of the Clerk Alexander, the same manuscript was actually exposed for sale in a

"Yes, it was there! that is positively true!" exclaimed Signor Polizzi, suddenly growing calm again; "and it is

"Here is the address of my son. Make it known to your friends, and you will oblige me. Faience and

enamelled wares; hangings; pictures. He has a complete stock of objects of artall at the fairest possible

pricesand everything authentic, I can vouch for it, upon my honour! Go and see him. He will show you the

manuscript of the 'Golden Legend.' Two miniatures miraculously fresh in colour!"

The fellow was taking further advantage of my weakness to make me circulate the name of Rafael Polizzi

My hand was already on the doorknob, when the Sicilian caught me by the arm; he had a look as of sudden

"Ah! Excellence!" he cried, "what a city is this city of ours! It gave birth to Empedocles! Empedocles! What

a great man what a great citizen! What audacity of thought! what virtue! what soul! At the port over there is a

statue of Empedocles, before which I bare my head each time that I pass by! When Rafael, my son, was going

away to found an establishment of antiquities in the Rue Lafitte, at Paris, I took him to the port, and there, at

the foot of that statue of Empedocles, bestowed upon him my paternal benediction! 'Always remember

Empedocles!' I said to him. Ah! Signor, what our unhappy country needs today is a new Empedocles!

Would you not like me to show you the way to his statue, Excellence? I will be your guide among the ruins

here. I will show you the temple of Castor and Pollux, the temple of the Olympian Jupiter, the temple of the

Lucinian Juno, the antique well, the tomb of Theron, and the Gate of Gold! All the professional guides are

asses; but wewe shall make excavations, if you are willingand we shall discover treasures! I know the

science of discovering hidden treasuresthe secret art of finding their whereaboutsa gift from Heaven!"

I succeeded in tearing myself away from his grasp. But he ran after me again, stopped me at the foot of the

stairs, and said in my ear, "Listen, Excellence. I will conduct you about the city; I will introduce you to some

Girgentines! What a race! what types! what forms! Sicilian girls, Signor!the antique beauty itself!"

"Go to the devil!" I cried at last, in anger, and rushed into the street, leaving him still writhing in the loftiness

When I had got out of his sight, I sank down upon a stone, and began to think, with my face in my hands.

"And it was for this," I said to myself"it was to hear such propositions as this that I came to Sicily! That

Polizzi is simply a scoundrel, and his son another; and they made a plan together to ruin me." But what was

their scheme? I could not unravel it. Meanwhile, it may be imagined how discouraged and humiliated I felt.

A merry burst of laughter caused me to turn my head, and I saw Madame Trepos running in advance of her

She sat down beside me, and showed melaughing more merrily all the whilean abominable little

pasteboard box, on which was printed a red and blue face, which the inscription declared to be the face of

"Yes, Madame," I said, "but that abominable Polizzi, to whom I advise you not to send Monsieur Trepof, has

made me fall out for ever with Empedocles; and this portrait is not at all of a nature to make me feel more

"Oh!" declared Madame Trepof, "it is ugly, but it is rare! These boxes are not exported at all; you can buy

them only where they are made. Dimitri has six others just like this in his pocket. We got them so as to

exchange with other collectors. You understand? At nine o'clock this morning we were at the factory. You

I then saw that she was naturally a goodhearted woman. All her merriment vanished.

I told her about them. My story was long; but she was evidently touched by it, for she asked me quite a

number of circumstantial questions, which I took for proof of friendly interest. She wanted to know the exact

title of the manuscript, its shape, its appearance, and its age; she asked me for the address of Signor Rafael

And I gave it to her; thus doing (O destiny!) precisely what the abominable Polizzi had told me to do.

It is sometimes difficult to check on self. I recommenced my plaints and my imprecations. But this time

MY unpacked trunks still encumbered the hall. I was seated at a table covered with all those good things

which the land of France produces for the delectation of gourmets. I was eating a pate le Chartres, which is

alone sufficient to make one love one's country. Therese, standing before me with her hands joined over her

white apron, was looking at me with benignity, with anxiety, and with pity. Hamilcar was rubbing himself

..."Well," I thought to myself, "I travelled to no purpose; I have come back with empty hands; but, like

And having taken my last sip of coffee, I asked Therese for my hat and cane, which she gave me not without

dire suspicions: she feared I might be going upon another journey. But I reassured her by telling her to have

It had always been a keen pleasure for me to breathe the air in those Parisian streets whose every pavingslab

and every stone I love devotedly. But I had an end in view, and I took my way straight to the Rue Lafitte. I

was not long in finding the establishment of Signor Rafael Polizzi. It was distinguishable by a great display

of old paintings which, although all bearing the signature of some illustrious artist, had a certain family air of

resemblance that might have suggested some touching idea about the fraternity of genius, had it not still more

forcibly suggested the professional tricks of Polizzi senior. Enriched by these doubtful works of art, the shop

was further rendered attractive by various petty curiosities: poniards, drinkingvessels, goblets, figulines,

Upon a Portuguese armchair, decorated with an escutcheon, lay a copy of the "Heures" of Simon Vostre,

open at the page which has an astrological figure on it; and an old Vitruvius, placed upon a quaint chest,

displayed its masterly engravings of caryatides and telamones. This apparent disorder which only masked

cunning arrangement, this factitious hazard which had placed the best objects in the most favourable light,

would have increased my distrust of the place, but that the distrust which the mere name of Polizzi had

already inspired could not have been increased by any circumstancesbeing already infinite.

Signor Rafael, who sat there as the presiding genius of all these vague and incongruous shapes, impressed me

as a phlegmatic young man, with a sort of English character. He betrayed no sign whatever of those

transcendent faculties displayed by his father in the arts of mimicry and declamation.

I told him what I had come for; he opened a cabinet and drew from it a manuscript, which he placed on a

Never in my life did I experience such an emotion except, indeed, during some few brief months of my

youth, months whose memories, though I should live a hundred years, would remain as fresh at my last hour

It was, indeed, the very manuscript described by the librarian of Sir Thomas Raleigh; it was, indeed, the

manuscript of the Clerk Alexander which I saw, which I touched! The work of Voragine himself had been

perceptibly abridged; but that made little difference to me. All the inestimable additions of the monk of

SaintGermaindesPres were there. That was the main point! I tried to read the Legend of Saint

Droctoveus; but I could notall the lines of the page quivered before my eyes, and there was a sound in my

ears like the noise of a windmill in the country at night. Nevertheless, I was able to see that the manuscript

offered every evidence of indubitable authenticity. The two drawings of the Purification of the Virgin and the

Coronation of Proserpine were meagre in design and vulgar in violence of colouring. Considerably damaged

in 1824 as attested by the catalogue of Sir Thomas, they had obtained during the interval a new aspect of

freshness. But this miracle did not surprise me at all. And, besides, what did I care about the two miniatures?

The legends and the poem of Alexanderthose alone formed the treasure I desired. My eyes devoured as

I affected indifference while asking Signor Polizzi the price of the manuscript; and, while awaiting his reply,

I offered up a secret prayer that the price might not exceed the amount of ready money at my

disposalalready much diminished by the cost of my expensive voyage. Signor Polizzi, however, informed

me that he was not at liberty to dispose of the article, inasmuch as it did not belong to him, and was to be sold

at auction shortly, at the Hotel des Ventes, with a number of other MSS. and several incunabula.

This was a severe blow to me. I tried to preserve my calmness, notwithstanding, and replied somewhat to this

"You surprise me, Monsieur! Your father, whom I talked with recently at Girgenti, told me positively the

manuscript was yours. You cannot now attempt to make me discredit your father's word."

"I did own the manuscript, indeed," answered Signor Rafael with absolute frankness; "but I do not own it any

longer. I sold that manuscriptthe remarkable interest of which you have not failed to perceiveto an

amateur whom I am forbidden to name, and who, for reasons which I am not at liberty to mention, finds

himself obliged to sell his collection. I am honoured with the confidence of my customer, and was

commissioned by him to draw up the catalogue and manage the sale, which takes place the 24th of

December. Now, if you will be kind enough to give me your address, I shall have the pleasure of sending you

the catalogue, which is already in the press. You will find the 'Legende Doree' described in it as 'No. 42.'"

The polite gravity of the son impressed me quite as disagreeably as the impudent buffoonery of the father. I

hated, from the bottom of my heart, the tricks of the vile hagglers! I was perfectly evident that the two rascals

had a secret understanding, and had only devised this auctionsale, with the aid of a professional appraiser, to

force the bidding on the manuscript I wanted so much up to an outrageous figure. I was completely at their

mercy. There is one evil in all passionate desires, even the noblestnamely, that they leave us subject to the

will of others, and in so far dependent. This reflection made me suffer cruelly; but it did not conquer my

longing to own the work of Clerk Alexander. While I was thus meditating, I heard a coachman swear. And I

discovered it was I whom he was swearing at only when I felt the pole of a carriage poke me in the ribs. I

started aside, barely in time to save myself from being run over; and whom did I perceive through the

windows of the coupe? Madame Trepof, being taken by two beautiful horses, and a coachman all wrapped up

in furs like a Russian boyard, into the very street I had just left. She did not notice me; she was laughing to

herself with that artless grace of expression which still preserved for her, at thirty years, all the charm of her

"Well, well!" I said to myself, "she is laughing! I suppose she must have just found another matchbox."

Nature, eternally indifferent, neither hastened nor hurried the twentyfourth day of December. I went to the

Hotel Bullion, and took my place in Salle No. 4, immediately below the high desk at which the auctioneer

Boulouze and the expert Polizzi were to sit. I saw the hall gradually fill with familiar faces. I shook hands

with several old booksellers of the quays; but that prudence which any large interest inspires in even the most

selfassured caused me to keep silence in regard to the reason of my unaccustomed presence in the halls of the

Hotel Bullion. On the other hand, I questioned those gentlemen closely about the purpose of their attendance

at the auction sale; and I had the satisfaction of finding them all interested about matters in no wise related to

Little by little the hall became thronged with interested or merely curious spectators; and, after half an hour's

delay, the auctioneer with his ivory hammer, the clerk with his bundle of memorandum papers, and the crier,

carrying his collectionbox fixed to the end of a pole, all took their places on the platform in the most solemn

business manner. The attendants ranged themselves at the foot of the desk. The presiding officer having

A commonplace series of Preces diae, with miniatures. were first sold off at mediocre prices. Need less to

The lowness of the bids gave courage to the gathering of secondhand booksellers present, who began to

mingle with us, and become familiar. The dealers in old brass and bricabrac pressed forward in their turn,

waiting for the doors of an adjoining room to be opened; and the voice of the auctioneer was drowned by the

A magnificent codex of the "Guerre des Juifs" revived attention. It was long disputed for. "Five thousand

francs! five thousand!" called the crier, while the bricabrac dealers remained silent with admiration. Then

seven or eight antiphonaries brought us back again to low prices. A fat old woman, in a loose gown,

bareheadeda dealer in secondhand goodsencouraged by the size of the books and the low prices

At last the expert Polizzi announced No. 42: "The 'Golden Legend'; French MS.; unpublished; two superb

There was a buzzing in my head, and, as through a cloud, I saw a host of curious faces all turning towards the

I was frightened by the sound of my own voice, and further confused by seeing, or thinking that I saw, all

Then, by a sudden bold stroke, Signor Polizzi raised the bid at once to six thousand.

Six thousand francs was all the money I could dispose of. It represented the possible. I risked the impossible.

I bowed my head and sat there stupefied, unable to answer either yes or no to the crier, who called to me:

"Six thousand five hundred, by menot by you on the right there!it is my bidno mistake! Six thousand

"Perfectly understood!" declared the auctioneer. "Six thousand five hundred. Perfectly clear; perfectly

A solemn silence prevailed. Suddenly I felt as if my head had burst open. It was the hammer of the officiant,

who, with a loud blow on the platform, adjudged No. 42 irrevocably to Signor Polizzi. Forthwith the pen of

the clerk, coursing over the papiertimbre, registered that great fact in a single line.

I was absolutely prostrated, and I felt the utmost need of rest and quiet. Nevertheless, I did not leave my seat.

My powers of reflection slowly returned. Hope is tenacious. I had one more hope. It occurred to me that the

new owner of the "Legende Doree" might be some intelligent and liberal bibliophile who would allow me to

examine the MS., and perhaps even to publish the more important parts. And, with this idea, as soon as the

"Monsieur," I asked him, "did you buy in No. 42 on your own account, or on commission?"

"Monsieur, I regret that I cannot serve you in that respect. I have been strictly forbidden to mention the

"THERESE! don't you hear the bell? Somebody has been ringing at the door for the last quarter of an hour?"

Therese does not answer. She is chattering downstairs with the concierge, for sure. So that is the way you

observe your old master's birthday? You desert me even on the eve of SaintSylvestre! Alas! if I am to hear

any kind wishes today, they must come up from the ground; for all who love me have long been buried. I

really don't know what am still living for. There is the bell again! ... I get up slowly from my seat at the fire,

with my shoulders still bent from stooping over it, and go to the door myself. Whom do I see at the

threshold? It is not a dripping love, and I am not an old Anacreon; but it is a very pretty little boy of about ten

years old. He is alone; he raises his face to look at me. His cheeks are blushing; but his little pert nose gives

one an idea of mischievous pleasantry. He has feathers in his cap, and a great laceruff on his jacket. The

pretty little fellow! He holds in both arms a bundle as big as himself, and asks me if I am Monsieur Sylvestre

Bonnard. I tell him yes; he gives me the bundle, tells me his mamma sent it to me, and then he runs

I go down a few steps; I lean over the balustrade, and see the little cap whirling down the spiral of the

stairway like a feather in the wind. "Goodbye, my little boy!" I should have liked so much to question him.

But what, after all, could I have asked? It is not polite to question children. Besides, the package itself will

It is a very big bundle, but not very heavy. I take it into my library, and there untie the ribbons and unfasten

the paper wrappings; and I seewhat? a log! a firstclass log! a real Christmas log, but so light that I know

it must be hollow. Then I find that it is indeed composed of two separate pieces, opening on hinges, and

fastened with hooks. I slip the hooks back, and find myself inundated with violets! Violets! they pour over

my table, over my knees, over the carpet. They tumble into my vest, into my sleeves. I am all perfumed with

"Therese! Therese! fill me some vases with water, and bring them here, quick! Here are violets sent to us I

know not from what country nor by what hand; but it must be from a perfumed country, and by a very

I have put all the violets on my tablenow completely covered by the odorous mass. But there is still

something in the log... a booka manuscript. It is... I cannot believe it, and yet I can. not doubt it.... It is the

"Legende Doree"!it is the manuscript of the Clerk Alexander! Here is the "Purification of the Virgin" and

the "Coronation of Proserpine";here is the legend of Saint Droctoveus. I contemplate this violetperfumed

relic. I turn the leaves of itbetween which the dark rich blossoms have slipped in here and there; and, right

Princess Trepof!you who laughed and wept by turns so sweetly under the fair sky of Agrigentum! you,

whom a cross old man believed to be only a foolish little woman!today I am convinced of your rare and

beautiful folly; and the old fellow whom you now overwhelm with happiness will go to kiss your hand, and

give you back, in another form, this precious manuscript, of which both he and science owe you an exact and

Therese entered my study just at that moment; she seemed to be very much excited.

"Monsieur!" she cried, "guess whom I saw just now in a carriage, with a coatofarms painted on it, that was

"I don't know anything about any Madame Trepof," answered my housekeeper. "The woman I saw just now

was dressed like a duchess, and had a little boy with her, with lacefrills all along the seams of his clothes.

And it was that same little Madame Coccoz you once sent a log to, when she was lyingin here about eleven

"What!" I exclaimed, "you mean to say it was Madame Coccoz, the widow of the almanac peddler?"

"Herself, Monsieur! The carriagedoor was open for a minute to let her little boy, who had just come from I

don't know where, get in. She hasn't changed scarcely at all. Well, why should those women change?they

never worry themselves about anything. Only the Coccoz woman looks a little fatter than she used to be. And

the idea of a woman that was taken in here out of pure charity coming to show off her velvets and diamonds

"Therese!" I cried, in a terrible voice, "if you ever speak to me again about that lady except in terms of the

deepest respect, you and I will fall out!... Bring me the Sevres vases to put those violets in, which now give

While Therese went off with a sigh to get the Sevres vases, I continued to contemplate those beautiful

scattered violets, whose odour spread all about me like the perfume of some sweet presence, some charming

soul; and I asked myself how it had been possible for me never to recognise Madame Coccoz in the person of

the Princess Trepof. But that vision of the young widow, showing me her little child on the stairs, had been a

very rapid one. I had much more reason to reproach myself for having passed by a gracious and lovely soul

"Bonnard," I said to myself, "thou knowest how to decipher old texts; but thou dost not know how to read in

the Book of Life. That giddy little Madame Trepof, whom thou once believed to possess no more soul than a

bird, has expended, in pure gratitude, more zeal and finer tact than thou didst ever show for anybody's sake.

"Therese! Awhile ago you were a magpie; now you are becoming a tortoise! Come and give some water to

WHEN I left the train at the Melun station, night had already spread its peace over the silent country. The

soil, heated through all the long day by a strong sunby a "gros soleil," as the harvesters of the Val de Vire

saystill exhaled a warm heavy smell. Lush dense odours of grass passed over the level of the fields. I

brushed away the dust of the railway carriage, and joyfully inhaled the pure air. My travellingbagfilled by

my housekeeper with linen and various small toilet articles, munditiis, seemed so light in my hand that I

swung it about just as a schoolboy swings his strapped package of rudimentary books when the class is let

Would to Heaven that I were again a little urchin at school! But it is fully fifty years since my good dead

mother made me some tartines of bread and preserves, and placed them in a basket of which she slipped the

handle over my arm, and, then led me, thus prepared, to the school kept by Monsieur Douloir, at a corner of

the Passage du Commerce well known to the sparrows, between a court and a garden. The enormous

Monsieur Douloir smiled upon us genially, and patted my cheek to show, no doubt, the affectionate interest

which my first appearance had inspired. But when my mother had passed out of the court, startling the

sparrows as she went, Monsieur Douloir ceased to smilehe showed no more affectionate interest; he

appeared, on the contrary, to consider me as a very troublesome little fellow. I discovered, later on, that he

entertained the same feelings towards all his pupils. He distributed whacks of his ferule with an agility no one

could have expected) on the part of so corpulent a person. But his first aspect of tender interest invariably

reappeared when he spoke to any of our mothers in our presence; and always at such times, while warmly

praising our remarkable aptitudes, he would cast down upon us a look of intense affection. Still, those were

happy days which I passed on the benches of Monsieur Douloir with my little playfellows, who, like myself,

cried and laughed by turns with all their might, from morning till evening. After a whole halfcentury these

souvenirs float up again, fresh and bright as ever, to the surface o memory, under this starry sky, whose face

has in no wise changed since then, and whose serene and immutable lights will doubtless see many other

schoolboys such as I was slowly turn into greyheaded savants, afflicted with catarrh.

Stars, who have shown down upon each wise or foolish head among all my forgotten ancestors, it is under

your soft light that I now feel stir within me a certain poignant regret! I would that I could have a son who

might be able to see you when I shall see you no more. How I should love him! Ah! such a son wouldwhat

am I saying?why, he would be now just twenty years old if you had only been willing, Clementineyou

whose cheeks used to look so ruddy under your pink hood! But you are married to that young bank clerk,

Noel Alexandre, who made so many millions afterwards! I never met you again after your marriage,

A lookingglass! a lookingglass! a lookingglass! Really, it would be curious to see what I look like now,

with my white hair, sighing Clementine's name to the stars! Still, it is not right to end with sterile irony the

thought begun in the spirit of faith and love. No, Clementine, if your name came to my lips by chance this

beautiful night, be it for ever blessed, your dear name! and may you ever, as a happy mother, a happy

grandmother, enjoy to the very end of life with your rich husband the utmost degree of that happiness which

you had the right to believe you could not win with the poor young scholar who loved you! Ifthough I

cannot even now imagine itif your beautiful hair has become white, Clementine, bear worthily the bundle

of keys confided to you by Noel Alexandre, and impart to your grandchildren the knowledge of all domestic

Ah! beautiful Night! She rules, with such noble repose, over men and animals alike, kindly loosed by her

from the yoke of daily toil; and even I feel her beneficent influence, although my habits of sixty years have so

changed me that I can feel most things only through the signs which represent them. My world is wholly

formed of wordsso much of a philologist I have become! Each one dreams the dream of life in his own

way. I have dreamed it in my library; and when the hour shall come in which I must leave this world, may it

"Well, well! it is really himself, pardieu!. How are you, Monsieur Sylvestre Bonnard? And where have you

been travelling to all this time, over the country, while I was waiting for you at the station with my cabriolet?

You missed me when the train came in, and I was driving back, quite disappointed, to Lusance. Give me your

valise, and get up here beside me in the carriage. Why, do you know it is fully seven kilometres from here to

Who addresses me thus, at the very top of his voice from the height of his cabriolet? Monsieur Paul de Gabry,

nephew and heir of Monsieur Honore de Gabry, peer of France in I 842, who recently died at Monaco. And it

was precisely to Monsieur Paul de Gabry's house that I was going with that valise of mine, so carefully

strapped by my housekeeper. This excellent young man has just inherited, conjointly with his two

brothersinlaw, the property of his uncle, who, belonging to a very ancient family of distinguished lawyers,

had accumulated in his chateau at Lusance a library rich in MSS., some dating back to the fourteenth century.

It was for the purpose of making an inventory and a catalogue of these MSS. that I had come to Lusance at

the urgent request of Monsieur Paul de Gabry, whose father, a perfect gentleman and distinguished

bibliophile, had maintained the most pleasant relations with me during his lifetime. To tell the truth,

Monsieur Paul has not inherited the fine tastes of his father. Monsieur Paul likes sporting; he is a great

authority on horses and dogs; and I much fear that of all the sciences capable of satisfying or of duping the

inexhaustible curiosity of mankind, those of the stable and the dogkennel are the only ones thoroughly

I cannot say I was surprised to meet him, since we had made a rendezvous; but I acknowledge that I had

become so preoccupied with my own thoughts that I had forgotten all about the Chateau de Lusance and its

inhabitants, and that the voice of the gentleman calling out to me as I started to follow the country road

winding away before me "un bon ruban de queue," as they sayhad given me quite a start.

I fear my face must have betrayed my incongruous distraction by a certain stupid expression which it is apt to

assume in most of my social transactions. My valise was pulled up into the carriage, and I followed my

"I don't know anything myself about your old parchments," he said; "but I think you will find some folks to

talk to at the house. Besides the cure, who writes books himself, and the doctor, who is a very good

fellowalthough a radicalyou will meet somebody able to keep your company. I mean my wife. She is

not a very learned woman, but there are few things which she can't divine pretty well. Then I count upon

being able to keep you with us long enough to make you acquainted with Mademoiselle Jeanne, who has the

"She has lost both her father and mother," answered Monsieur de Graby, keeping his eyes fixed upon the ears

of his horse, whose hoofs rang loudly over the road bluetinted by the moonshine. "Her father managed to

get us into some very serious trouble; and we did not get off with a fright either!"

Then he shook his head, and changed the subject. He gave me due warning of the ruinous condition in which

I should find the chateau and the park; they had been absolutely deserted for thirtytwo years.

I learned from him that Monsieur Honore de Gabry, his uncle, had been on very bad terms with some

poachers, whom he used to shoot at like rabbits. One of them, a vindictive peasant, who had received a whole

charge of shot in his face, lay in wait for the Seigneur one evening behind the trees of the mall, and very

"My uncle," Monsieur Paul continued, "tried to discover who had fired the shot; but he could not see any one,

and he walked back slowly to the house. The day after he called his steward, and ordered him to close up the

manor and the park, and allow no living soul to enter. He expressly forbade that anything should be touched,

or looked after, or any repairs made on the estate during his absence. He added, between his teeth, that he

would return at Easter, or Trinity Sunday, as they say in the song; and, just as the song has it, Trinity Sunday

passed without a sign of him. He died last year at Monaco; my brotherinlaw and myself were the first to

enter the chateau after it had been abandoned for thirtytwo years. We found a chestnuttree growing in the

middle of the parlour. As for the park, it was useless trying to visit it, because there were no longer any paths

My companion ceased to speak; and only the regular hoofbeat of the trotting horse, and the chirping of

insects in the grass, broke the silence. On either hand, the sheaves standing in the fields took, in the vague

moonlight, the appearance of tall white women kneeling down; and I abandoned myself awhile to those

wonderful childish fancies which the charm of night always suggests. After driving under the heavy shadows

of the mall, we turned to the right and rolled up a lordly avenue at the end of which the chateau suddenly rose

into viewa black mass, with turrets en poivriere. We followed a sort of causeway, which gave access to the

courtofhonour, and which, passing over a moat full of running water, doubtless replaced a longvanished

drawbridge. The loss of that drawbridge must have been, I think, the first of various humiliations to which the

warlike manor had been subjected ere being reduced to that pacific aspect with which it received me. The

stars reflected themselves with marvellous clearness in the dark water. Monsieur Paul, like a courteous host,

escorted me to my chamber at the very top of the building, at the end of a long corridor; and then, excusing

himself for not presenting me at once to his wife by reason of the lateness of the hour, bade me goodnight.

My apartment, painted in white and hung with chintz, seemed to keep some traces of the elegant gallantry of

the eighteenth century. A heap of stillglowing asheswhich testified to the pains taken to dispel

humidityfilled the fireplace, whose marble mantelpiece supported a bust of Marie Antoinette in biscuit.

Attached to the frame of the tarnished and discoloured mirror, two brass hooks, that had once doubtless

served the ladies of oldfashioned days to hang their chatelaines on, seemed to offer a very opportune means

of suspending my watch, which I took care to wind up beforehand; for, contrary to the opinion of the

Thelemites, I hold that man is only master of time, which is Life itself, when he has divided it into hours,

minutes and secondsthat is to say, into parts proportioned to the brevity of human existence.

And I thought to myself that life really seems short to us only because we measure it irrationally by our own

mad hopes. We have all of us, like the old man in the fable, a new wing to add to our building. I want, for

example, before I die, to finish my "History of the Abbots of SaintGermaindesPres." The time God allots

to each one of us is like a precious tissue which we embroider as we best know how. I had begun my woof

with all sorts of philological illustrations.... So my thoughts wandered on; and at last, as I bound my foulard

about my head, the oi back to the past; and for the second time within the same round of the dial I thought of

you, Clementineto bless you again in your prosperity, if you have any, before blowing out my candle and

DURING breakfast I had many opportunities to appreciate the good taste, tact, and intelligence of Madame

de Gabry, who told me that the chateau had its ghosts, and was especially haunted by the

"Ladywiththreewrinklesinherback," a poisoner during her lifetime, and thereafter a Soulinpain. I

could never describe how much wit and animation she gave to this old nurse's tale. We took our, coffee on

the terrace, whose balusters, clasped and forcibly torn away from their stone coping by a vigorous growth of

ivy, remained suspended in the grasp of the amorous plant like bewildered Athenian women in the arms of

The chateau, shaped something like a fourwheeled wagon, with a turret at each of the four angles, had lost

all original character by reason of repeated remodellings. It was merely a fine spacious building, nothing

more. It did not appear to me to have suffered much damage during its abandonment of thirtytwo years. But

when Madame de Gabry conducted me into the great salon of the groundfloor, I saw that the planking was

bulged in and out, the plinths rotten, the wainscotings split apart, the paintings of the piers turned black and

hanging more than half out of their settings. A chestnuttree, after forcing up the planks of the floor, had

grown tall under the ceiling, and was reaching out its largeleaved branches towards the glassless windows.

This spectacle was not devoid of charm; but I could not look at it without anxiety, as I remembered that the

rich library of Monsieur Honore de Gabry, in an adjoining apartment, must have been exposed for the same

length of time to the same forces of decay. Yet, as I looked at the young chestnut tree in the salon, I could not

but admire the magnificent vigour of Nature, and that resistless power which forces every germ to develop

into life. On the other hand I felt saddened to think that, what ever effort we scholars may make to preserve

dead things from passing away, we are labouring painfully in vain. Whatever has lived becomes the

necessary food of new existences. And the Arab who builds himself a hut out of the marble fragments of a

Palmyra temple is really more of a philosopher than all the guardians of museums at London, Munich, or

ALL day long I have been classifying MSS.... The sun came in through the lofty uncurtained windows; and,

during my reading, often very interesting, I could hear the languid bumble. bees bump heavily against the

windows, and the flies, intoxicated with light and heat, making their wings hum in circles around my head.

So loud became their humming about three o'clock that I looked up from the document I was readinga

document containing very precious materials for the history of Melun in the thirteenth centuryto watch the

concentric movements of those tiny creatures. "Bestions," Lafontaine calls them; he found this form of the

word in the old popular speech, whence also the term, tapisserieabestions, applied to figured tapestry. I

was compelled to confess that the effect of heat upon the wings of a fly is totally different from that it exerts

upon the brain of a paleographical archivist; for I found it very difficult to think, and a rather pleasant languor

weighing upon me, from which I could rouse myself only by a very determined effort. The dinnerbell then

startled me in the midst of my labours; and I had barely time to put on my new dresscoat, so as to make a

The repast, generously served, seemed to prolong itself for my benefit. I am more than a fair judge of wine;

and my hostess, who discovered my knowledge in this regard, was friendly enough to open a certain bottle of

ChateauMargaux in my honour. With deep respect I drank of this famous and knightly old wine, which

comes from the slopes of Bedeaux, and of which the flavour and exhilarating power are beyond all praise.

The ardour of it spread gently through my veins, and filled me with an almost juvenile animation. Seated

beside Madame de Gabry on the terrace, in the gloaming which gave a charming melancholy to the park, and

lent to every object an air of mystery, I took pleasure in communicating my impressions of the scene to my

hostess. I discoursed with a vivacity quite remarkable on the part of a man so devoid of imagination as I am. I

described to her spontaneously, without quoting from any old texts, the caressing melancholy of the evening,

and the beauty of that natal earth which feeds us, only with bread and wine, but also with ideas, sentiments,

beliefs, and which will at last take us all back to her maternal breast again, like so many tired little children at

"Monsieur," said the kind lady, "you see these old towers, those trees, that sky; is it not quite natural that the

personages of the popular tales and folksongs should have been evoked by such scenes? Why, over there is

the very path which Little Red Ridinghood followed when she went to the woods to pick nuts. Across this

changeful and always vapoury sky the fairy chariots used to roll; and the north tower might have sheltered

under its pointed roof that same old spinning woman whose distaff pricked the Sleeping Beauty in the

I continued to muse upon her pretty fancies, while Monsieur Paul related to me, as he puffed a very strong

cigar, the history of some suit he had brought against the commune about a waterright. Madame de Gabry,

feeling the chill night air, began to shiver under the shawl her husband had wrapped about her, and left us to

go to her room. I then decided, instead of going to my own, to return to the library and continue my

examination of the manuscripts. In spite of the protests of Monsieur Paul, I entered what I may call, in

oldfashioned phrase, "the bookroom," and started to work by the light of a lamp.

After having read fifteen pages, evidently written by some ignorant and careless scribe, for I could scarcely

discern their meaning, I plunged my hand into the pocket of my coat to get my snuffbox; but this

movement, usually so natural and almost instinctive, this time cost me some effort and even fatigue.

Nevertheless, I got out the silver box, and took from it a pinch of the odorous powder, which, somehow or

other, I managed to spill all over my shirtbosom under my baffled nose. I am sure my nose must have

expressed its disappointment, for it is a very expressive nose. More than once it has betrayed my secret

thoughts, and especially upon a certain occasion at the public library of Coutances, where I discovered, right

What a delight! My little eyes remained as dull and expressionless as ever behind my spectacles. But at the

mere sight of my thick pugnose, which quivered with joy and pride, Brioux knew that I had found

something. He noted the volume I was looking at, observed the place where I put it back, pounced upon it as

soon as I turned my heel, copied it secretly, and published it in haste, for the sake of playing me a trick. But

his edition swarms with errors, and I had the satisfaction of afterwards criticising some of the gross blunders

But to come back to the point at which I left off: I began to suspect that I was getting very sleepy indeed. I

was looking at a chart of which the interest may be divined from the fact that it contained mention of a hutch

sold to Jehan d'Estonville, priest, in 1312. But although, even then, I could recognise the importance of the

document, I did not give it that attention it so strongly invited. My eyes would keep turning, against my will,

towards a certain corner of the table where there was nothing whatever interesting to a learned mind. There

was only a big German book there, bound in pigskin, with brass studs on the sides, and very thick cording

upon the back. It was a fine copy of a compilation which has little to recommend it except the wood

engravings it contains, and which is well known as the "Cosmography of Munster." This volume, with its

I could not say for how long I had been staring causelessly at the sixteenthcentury folio, when my eyes were

captivated by a sight so extraordinary that even a person as devoid of imagination as I could not but have

I perceived, all of a sudden, without having noticed her coming into the room, a little creature seated on the

back of the book, with one knee bent and one leg hanging downsomewhat in the attitude of the amazons of

Hyde Park or the Bois de Boulogne on horseback. She was so small that her swinging foot did not reach the

table, over which the trail of her dress extended in a serpentine line. But her face and figure were those of an

adult. The fulness of her corsage and the roundness of her waist could leave no doubt of that, even for an old

savant like myself. I will venture to add that she was very handsome, with a proud mien; for my iconographic

studies have long accustomed me to recognise at once the perfection of a type and the character of a

physiognomy. The countenance of this lady who had seated herself inopportunely on the back of a

"Cosmography of Munster" expressed a mingling of haughtiness and mischievousness. She had the air of a

queen, but a capricious queen; and I judged, from the mere expression of her eyes, that she was accustomed

to wield great authority somewhere, in a very whimsical manner. Her mouth was imperious and mocking, and

those blue eyes of hers seemed to laugh in a disquieting way under her finely arched black eyebrows. I have

always heard that black eyebrows are very becoming to blondes; and this lady was very blonde. On the

It may seem odd to say that a person who was no taller than a winebottle, and who might have been hidden

in my coat pocketbut that it would have been very disrespectful to put her in itgave me precisely an idea

of greatness. But in the fine proportions of the lady seated upon the "Cosmography of Munster" there was

such a proud elegance, such a harmonious majesty, and she maintained an attitude at once so easy and so

noble, that she really seemed to me a very great person. Although my inkbottle, which she examined with

an expression of such mockery as appeared to indicate that she knew in advance every word that could ever

come out of it at the end of my pen, was for her a deep basin in which she would have blackened her

goldclocked pink stockings up to the garter, I can assure you that she was great, and imposing even in her

Her costume, worthy of her face, was extremely magnificent; it consisted of a robe of gold and silver

brocade, and a mantle of nacarat velvet, lined with vair. Her headdress was a sort of hennin, with two high

points; and pearls of splendid lustre made it bright and luminous as a crescent moon. Her little white hand

held a wand. That wand drew my attention very strongly, because my archeological studies had taught me to

recognise with certainty every sign by which the notable personages of legend and of history are

distinguished. This knowledge came to my aid during various very queer conjectures with which I was

labouring. I examined the wand, and saw that it appeared to have been cut from a branch of hazel.

"Then it is a fairy's wand," I said to myself; "consequently the lady who carries it is a fairy."

Happy at thus discovering what sort of a person was before me, I tried to collect my mind sufficiently to

make her a graceful compliment. It would have given me much satisfaction, I confess, if I could have talked

to her about the part taken by her people, not less in the life of the Saxon and Germanic races, than in that of

the Latin Occident. Such a dissertation, it appeared to me, would have been an ingenious method of thanking

the lady for having thus appeared to an old scholar, contrary to the invariable custom of her kindred, who

Because one happens to be a fairy, one is none the less a woman, I said to myself; and since Madame

Recamier, according to what I heard J. J. Ampere say, used to blush with pleasure when the little

chimneysweeps opened their eyes as wide as they could to look at her, surely the supernatural lady seated

upon the "Cosmography of Munster" might feel flattered to hear an erudite man discourse learnedly about

her, as about a medal, a seal, a fibula, or a token. But such an undertaking, which would have cost my

timidity a great deal, became totally out of the question when I observed the Lady of the Cosmography

suddenly take from an almspurse hanging at her girdle the very smallest nuts I had ever seen, crack the

shells between her teeth, and throw them at my nose, while she nibbled the kernels with the gravity of a

At this conjuncture, I did what the dignity of science demanded of meI remained silent. But the nutshells

caused such a painful tickling that I put up my hand to my nose, and found, to my great surprise, that my

spectacles were straddling the very end of itso that I was actually looking at the lady, not through my

spectacles, but over them. This was incomprehensible, because my eyes, worn out over old texts, cannot

ordinarily distinguish anything without glassescould not tell a melon from a decanter, though the two were

That nose of mine, remarkable for its size, its shape, and its coloration, legitimately attracted the attention of

the fairy; for she seized my goosequill pen, which was sticking up from the ink bottle like a plume, and she

began to pass the featherend of that pen over my nose. I had had more than once, in company, occasion to

suffer cheerfully from the innocent mischief of young ladies, who made me join their games, and would offer

me their cheeks to kiss through the back of a chair, or invite me to blow out a candle which they would lift

suddenly above the range of my breath. But until that moment no person of the fair sex had ever subjected me

to such a whimsical piece of familiarity as that of tickling my nose with my own feather pen. Happily I

remembered the maxim of my late grandfather, who was accustomed to say that everything was permissible

on the part of ladies, and that whatever they do to us is to be regarded as a grace and a favour. Therefore, as a

grace and a favour I received the nutshells and the titillations with my own pen, and I tried to smile. Much

"Madame," I said, with dignified politeness, "you accord the honour of a visit not to a silly child, nor to a

boor, but to a bibliophile who is very happy to make your acquaintance, and who knows that long ago you

used to make elfknots in the manes of mares at the crib, drink the milk from the skimmingpails, slip

grainesagratter down the backs of our greatgrandmothers, make the hearth sputter in the faces of the old

folks, and, in short, fill the house with disorder and gaiety. You can also boast of giving the nicest frights in

the world to lovers who stayed out in the woods too late of evenings. But I thought you had vanished out of

existence at least three centuries ago. Can it really be, Madame, that you are still to be seen in this age of

railways and telegraphs? My concierge, who used to be a nurse in her young days, does not know your story;

and my little boy neighbour, whose nose is still wiped for him by his bonne, declares that you do not exist."

"What do you yourself think about it?" she cried, in a silvery voice, straightening up her royal little figure in a

very haughty fashion, and whipping the back of the "Cosmography of Munster" as though it were a

This reply, indicating a deeply scientific scepticism, had the most deplorable effect upon my questioner.

"Monsieur Sylvestre Bonnard," she said to me, "you are nothing but an old pedant. I always suspected as

much. The smallest little ragamuffin who goes along the road with his shirttail sticking out through a hole in

his pantaloons knows more about me than all the old spectacled folks in your Institutes and your Academies.

To know is nothing at all; to imagine is everything. Nothing exists except that which is imagined. I am

imaginary. That is what it is to exist, I should think! I am dreamed of, and I appear. Everything is only dream;

and as nobody ever dreams about you, Sylvestre Bonnard, it is you who do not exist. I charm the world; I am

everywhereon a moon beam, in the trembling of a hidden spring, in the moving of leaves that murmur, in

the white vapours that rise each morning from the hollow meadow, in the thickets of pink

briereverywhere... I am seen; I am loved. There are sighs uttered, weird thrills of pleasure felt by those

who follow the light print of my feet, as I make the dead leaves whisper. I make the little children smile; I

give wit to the dullestminded nurses. Leaning above the cradles, I play, I comfort, I lull to sleepand you

doubt whether I exist! Sylvestre Bonnard, your warm coat covers the hide of an ass!"

She ceased speaking; her delicate nostrils swelled with indignation; and while I admired, despite my

vexation, the heroic anger of this little person, she pushed my pen about in the inkbottle, backward and

I rubbed my face, and felt it all covered with ink. She had disappeared. My lamp was extinguished. A ray of

moonlight streamed down through a window and descended upon the "Cosmography of Munster." A strong

cool wind, which had arisen very suddenly without my knowledge, was blowing my papers, pens, and wafers

about. My table was all stained with ink. I had left my window open during the storm. What an imprudence!

I WROTE to my housekeeper, as I promised, that I was safe and sound. But I took good care not to tell her

that I had caught cold from going to sleep in the library at night with the window open; for the good woman

would have been as unsparing in her remonstrances to me as parliaments to kings. "At your age, Monsieur,"

she would have been sure to say, "one ought to have more sense." She is simple enough to believe that sense

Not having any similar motive for concealing my experiences from Madame de Gabry, I told her all about my

"Why, that was a charming dream of yours," she said; "and one must have real genius to dream such a

I know that Madame de Gabry, in making this remark, only wished to please me; but that intention alone

deserves my utmost gratitude; and it is therefore in a spirit of thankfulness and kindliest remembrance that I

write down her words, which I will read over and over again until my dying day, and which will never be

I passed the next few days in completing the inventory of the manuscripts in the Lusance library. Certain

confidential observations dropped by Monsieur Paul de Gabry, however, caused me some painful surprise,

and made me decide to pursue the work after a different manner from that in which I had begun it. From

those few words I learned that the fortune of Monsieur Honore de Gabry, which had been badly managed for

many years, and subsequently swept away to a large extent through the failure of a banker whose name I do

not know, had been transmitted to the heirs of the old French nobleman only under the form of mortgaged

Monsieur Paul, by agreement with his joint heirs, had decided to sell the library, and I was intrusted with the

task of making arrangements to have the sale effected upon advantageous terms. But, totally ignorant as I was

of all business methods and tradecustoms, I thought it best to get the advice of a publisher who was one of

my private friends. I wrote him at once to come and join me at Lusance; and while waiting for his arrival I

took my hat and cane and made visits to the different churches of the diocese, in several of which I knew

there were certain mortuary inscriptions to be found which had never been correctly copied.

So I left my hosts and departed on my pilgrimage. Exploring the churches and the cemeteries every day,

visiting the parish priests and the village notaries, supping at the public inns with peddlers and cattledealers,

sleeping at night between sheets scented with lavender, I passed one whole week in the quiet but profound

enjoyment of observing the living engaged in their various daily occupations even while I was thinking of the

dead. As for the purpose of my researches, I made only a few mediocre discoveries, which caused me only a

mediocre joy, and one therefore salubrious and not at all fatiguing. I copied a few interesting epitaphs; and I

added to this little collection a few recipes for cooking country dishes, which a certain good priest kindly

With these riches, I returned to Lusance; and I crossed the courtofhonour with such secret satisfaction as a

bourgeois feels on entering his own home. This was the effect of the kindness of my hosts; and the

impression I received on crossing their threshold proves, better than any reasoning could do, the excellence of

I entered the great parlour without meeting anybody; and the young chestnuttree there spreading out its

broad leaves seemed to me like an old friend. But the next thing which I sawon the piertablecaused me

such a shock of surprise that I readjusted my glasses upon my nose with both hands at once, and then felt

myself over so as to get at least some superficial proof of my own existence. In less than one second there

thronged into my mind twenty different conjecturesthe most rational of which was that I had suddenly

become crazy. It seemed to me absolutely impossible that what I was looking at could exist; yet it was

equally impossible for me not to see it as a thing actually existing. What caused my surprise was resting on

I saw myself in that mirror; and I can say that I saw for once in my life the perfect image of stupefaction. But

I made proper allowance for myself; I approved myself for being so stupefied by a really stupefying thing.

The object I was thus examining with a degree of astonishment that all my reasoning power failed to lessen,

obtruded itself on my attention though quite motionless. The persistence and fixity of the phenomenon

excluded any idea of hallucination. I am totally exempt from all nervous disorders capable of influencing the

sense of sight. The cause of such visual disturbance is, I think, generally due to stomach trouble; and, thank

God! I have an excellent stomach. Moreover, visual illusions are accompanied with special abnormal

conditions which impress the victims of hallucination themselves, and inspire them with a sort of terror.

Now, I felt nothing of this kind; the object which I saw, although seemingly impossible in itself, appeared to

me under all the natural conditions of reality. I observed that it had three dimensions, and colours, and that it

cast a shadow. Ah! how I stared at it I The water came into my eyes so that I had to wipe the glasses of my

Finally I found myself obliged to yield to the evidence, and to affirm that I had really before my eyes the

Fairy, the very same Fairy I had been dreaming of in the library a few evenings before. It was she, it was her

very self, I assure you! She had the same air of childqueen, the same proud supple poise; she held the same

hazel and in her hand; she still wore her doublepeaked headdress, and the train of her long brocade robe

undulated about her little feet. Same face, same figure. It was she indeed; and to prevent any possible doubt

of it, she was seated on the back of a huge oldfashioned book strongly resembling the "Cosmography of

Munster." Her immobility but half reassured me; I was really afraid that she was going to take some more

I was standing there, waving my hands and gaping, when the musical and laughing voice of Madame de

"So you are examining your fairy, Monsieur Bonnard!" said my hostess. "Well, do you think the resemblance

It was very quickly said; but even while hearing it I had time to perceive that my fairy was a statuette in

coloured wax, modelled with much taste and spirit by some novice hand. But the phenomenon, even thus

reduced by a rational explanation, did not cease to excite my surprise. How, and by whom, had the Lady of

the Cosmography been enabled to assume plastic existence? That was what remained for me to learn.

Turning towards Madame de Gabry, I perceived that she was not alone. A young girl dressed in black was

standing beside her. She had large intelligent eyes, of a grey as sweet as that of the sky of the Isle of France,

and at once artless and characteristic in their expression. At the extremities of her rather thin arms were

fidgeting uneasily two slender hands, supple but slightly red, as it becomes the hands of young girls to be.

Sheathed in her closely fitting merino robe, she had the slim grace of a young tree; and her large mouth

bespoke frankness. I could not describe how much the child pleased me at first sight! She was not beautiful;

but the three dimples of her cheeks and chin seemed to laugh, and her whole person, which revealed the

My gaze alternated from the statuette to the young girl; and I saw her blushso frankly and fully!the

"Well," said my hostess, who had become sufficiently accustomed to my distracted moods to put the same

question to me twice, "is that the very same lady who came in to see you through the window that you left

open? She was very saucy, but then you were quite imprudent! Anyhow, do you recognise her?"

"It is her very self," I replied; "I see her now on that piertable precisely as I saw her on the table in the

"Then, if that be so," replied Madame de Gabry, "you have to blame for it, in the first place, yourself, as a

man who, although devoid of all imagination, to use your own words, knew how to depict your dream in such

vivid colours; in the second place, me, who was able to remember and repeat faithfully all your dream; and,

lastly, Mademoiselle Jeanne, whom I now introduce to you, for she her self modelled that wax figure

Madame de Gabry had taken the young girl's hand as she spoke; but the latter had suddenly broken away

"Little crazy creature!" Madame de Gabry cried after her. "How can one be so shy? Come back here to be

But it was all of no avail; the frightened child disappeared among the shrubbery. Madame de Gabry seated

"I should be much surprised," she said, "if my husband had not already spoken to you of Jeanne. She is a

sweet child, and we both love her very much. Tell me the plain truth; what do you think of her statuette?"

I replied that the work was full of good taste and spirit, but that it showed some want of study and practice on

the author's part; otherwise I had been extremely touched to think that those young fingers should have thus

embroidered an old man's rough sketch of fancy, and given form so brilliantly to the dreams of a dotard like

"The reason I ask your opinion," replied Madame de Gabry, seriously, "is that Jeanne is a poor orphan. Do

"As for that, no!" I replied; "and I think there is no reason to regret the fact. You say the girl is affectionate

and sensitive; I can well believe you; I could believe it from her face alone. There are excitements in

artistlife which impel generous hearts to act out of all rule and measure. This young creature is made to

"You are our friend; I can tell you everything. The father of this child was a banker, and one of our friends.

He went into a colossal speculation, and it ruined him. He survived only a few months after his failure, in

which, as Paul must have told you, threefourths of my uncle's fortune were lost, and more than half of our

"We had made his acquaintance at Manaco, during the winter we passed there at my uncle's house. He had an

adventurous disposition, but such an engaging manner! He deceived himself before ever he deceived others.

After all, it is in the ability to deceive oneself that the greatest talent is shown, is it not? Well, we were

capturedmy husband, my uncle, and I; and we risked much more than a reasonable amount in a very

hazardous undertaking. But, bah! as Paul says, since we have no children we need not worry about it.

Besides, we have the satisfaction of knowing that the friend in whom we trusted was an honest man.... You

must know his name, it was so often in the papers and on public placardsNoel Alexandre. His wife was a

very sweet person. I knew her only when she was already past her prime, with traces of having once been

very pretty, and a taste for fashionable style and display which seemed quite becoming to her. She was

naturally fond of social excitement; but she showed a great deal of courage and dignity after the death of her

And on thus learning what I had never even imaginedthe mere idea of which would have set all the forces

of my soul in revoltupon hearing that Clementine was no longer in this world something like a great

silence came upon me; and the feeling which flooded my whole being was not a keen, strong pain, but a quiet

and solemn sorrow. Yet I was conscious of some incomprehensible sense of alleviation, and my thought rose

"From wheresoever thou art at this moment, Clementine," I said to myself, "look down upon this heart now

indeed cooled by age, yet whose blood once boiled for thy sake, and say whether it is not reanimated by the

mere thought of being able to love all that remains of thee on earth. Everything passes away since thou

thyself hast passed away; but Life is immortal; it is that Life we must love in its forms eternally renewed. All

the rest is child's play; and I myself, with all my books, am only like a child playing with marbles. The

"The daughter of Clementine is poor!" I exclaimed aloud; "how fortunate that it is so! I would not wish that

any one but myself should provide for her and dower her! No! the daughter of Clementine must not have her

And, approaching Madame de Gabry as she rose from her chair, I took her right hand; I kissed that hand, and

SAINT DROCTOVEUS and the early abbots of SaintGermaindesPres have been occupying me for the

past forty years; but I do not know if I shall be able to write their history before I go to join them. It is already

quite a long time since I became an old man. One day last year, on the Pont des Arts, one of my fellow

members at the Institute was lamenting before me over the ennui of becoming old.

"Still," SaintBeuve replied to him, "it is the only way that has yet been found of living a long time."

I have tried this way, and I know just what it is worth. The trouble of it is not that one lasts too long, but that

one sees all about him pass awaymother, wife, friends, children. Nature makes and unmakes all these

divine treasures with gloomy indifference, and at last we find that we have not loved, we have only been

embracing shadows. But how sweet some shadows are! If ever creature glided like a shadow through the life

of a man, it was certainly that young girl whom I fell in love with whenincredible though it now seemsI

A Christian sarcophagus from the catacombs of Rome bears a formula of imprecation, the whole terrible

meaning of which I only learned with time. It says: "Whatsoever impious man violates this sepulchre, may he

die the last of his own people!" In my capacity of archaeologist, I have opened tombs and disturbed ashes in

order to collect the shreds of apparel, metal ornaments, or gems that were mingled with those ashes. But I did

it only through that scientific curiosity which does not exclude the feelings of reverence and of piety. May

that malediction graven by some one of the first followers of the apostles upon a martyr's tomb never fall

upon me! I ought not to fear to survive my own people so long as there are men in the world; for there are

But the power of love itself weakens and gradually becomes lost with age, like all the other energies of man.

Example proves it; and it is this which terrifies me. Am I sure that I have not myself already suffered this

great loss? I should surely have felt it, but for the happy meeting which has rejuvenated me. Poets speak of

the Fountain of Youth; it does exist; it gushes up from the earth at every step we take. And one passes by

The young girl I loved, married of her own choice to a rival, passed, all greyhaired, into the eternal rest. I

have found her daughterso that my life, which before seemed to me without utility, now once more finds a

Today I "take the sun," as they say in Provence; I take it on the terrace of the Luxembourg, at the foot of the

statue of Marguerite de Navarre. It is a spring sun, intoxicating as young wine. I sit and dream. My thoughts

escape from my head like the foam from a bottle of beer. They are light, and their fizzing amuses me. I

dream; such a pastime is certainly permissible to an old fellow who has published thirty volumes of texts, and

contributed to the Journal des Savants for twentysix years. I have the satisfaction of feeling that I performed

my task as well as it was possible for me to do, and that I utilised to their fullest extent those mediocre

faculties with which Nature endowed me. My efforts were not all in vain, and I have contributed, in my own

modest way, to that renaissance of historical labours which will remain the honour of this restless century. I

shall certainly be counted among those ten or twelve who revealed to France her own literary antiquities. My

publication of the poetical works of Gautier de Coincy inaugurated a judicious system and fixed a date. It is

in the austere calm of old age that I decree to myself this deserved credit, and God, who sees my heart, knows

But I am tired; my eyes are dim; my hand trembles, and I see an image of myself in those old men of Homer,

whose weakness excluded them from the battle, and who, seated upon the ramparts, lifted up their voices like

So my thoughts were wandering when three young men seated themselves near me. I do not know whether

each one of them had come in three boats, like the monkey of Lafontaine, but the three certainly displayed

themselves over the space of twelve chairs. I took pleasure in watching them, not because they had anything

very extraordinary about them, but because I discerned in them that brave joyous manner which is natural to

youth. They were from the schools. I was less assured of it by the books they were carrying than by the

character of their physiognomy. For all who busy themselves with the things of the mind can be at once

recognised by an indescribable something which is common to all of them. I am very fond of young people;

and these pleased me, in spite of a certain provoking wild manner which recalled to me my own college days

with marvellous vividness. But they did not wear velvet doublets and long hair, as we used to do; they did not

walk about, as we used to do, with a death'shead; they did not cry out, as we used to do, "Hell and

malediction!" They were quite properly dressed, and neither their costume nor their language had anything

suggestive of the Middle Ages. I must also add that they paid considerable attention to the women passing on

the terrace, and expressed their admiration of some of them in very animated language. But their reflections,

even on this subject, were not of a character to oblige me to flee from my seat. Besides, so long as youth is

One or them, having made some gallant pleasantry which I forget, the smallest and darkest of the three

"What a thing to say! Only physiologists like us have any right to occupy ourselves about living matter. As

for you, Gelis, who only live in the pastlike all your fellow archivists and paleographersyou will do

better to confine yourself to those stone women over there, who are your contemporaries."

And he pointed to the statues of the Ladies of Ancient France which towered up, all white, in a halfcircle

under the trees of the terrace. This joke, though in itself trifling, enabled me to know that the young man

called Gelis was a student at the Ecole des Chartes. From the conversation which followed I was able to learn

that his neighbour, blond and wan almost to diaphaneity, taciturn and sarcastic, was Boulmier, a fellow

student. Gelis and the future doctor (I hope he will become one some day) discoursed together with much

fantasy and spirit. In the midst of the loftiest speculations they would play upon words, and make jokes after

the peculiar fashion of really witty personsthat is to say, in a style of enormous absurdity. I need hardly

say, I suppose, that they only deigned to maintain the most monstrous kind of paradoxes. They employed all

their powers of imagination to make themselves as ludicrous as possible, and all their powers of reasoning to

assert the contrary of common sense. All the better for them! I do not like to see young folks too rational.

The student of medicine, after glancing at the title of the book that Boulmier held in his hand, exclaimed,

Gelis, who dominated both by his fine stature, imperious gestures, and ready wit, took the book, turned over a

"Michelet always had a great propensity to emotional tenderness. He wept sweet tears over Maillard, that nice

little man who introduced la paperasserie into the September massacres. But as emotional tenderness leads to

fury, he becomes all at once furious against the victims. There was no help for it. It is the sentimentality of

the age. The assassin is pitied, but the victim is considered quite unpardonable. In his later manner Michelet

is more Michelet than ever before. There is no common sense in it; it is simply wonderful! Neither art nor

science, neither criticism nor narrative; only furies and faintingspells and epileptic fits over matters which

he never deigns to explain. Childish outcriesenvies de femme grosse!and a style, my friends!not a

And he handed the book back to his comrade. "This is amusing madness," I thought to myself, "and not quite

so devoid of common sense as it appears. This young man, though only playing, has sharply touched the

But the Provencal student declared that history was a thoroughly despicable exercise of rhetoric. According

to him, the only true history was the natural history of man. Michelet was in the right path when he came in

contact with the fistula of Louis XIV., but he fell back into the old rut almost immediately afterwards.

After this judicious expression of opinion, the young physiologist went to join a party of passing friends. The

two archivists, less well acquainted in the neighbourhood of a garden so far from the Rue ParadisauMarais,

remained together, and began to chat about their studies. Gelis, who had completed his third classyear, was

preparing a thesis on the subject of which he expatiated with youthful enthusiasm. Indeed, I thought the

subject a very good one, particularly because I had recently thought myself called upon to treat a notable part

of it. It was the Monzasticon Gallicattum. The young erudite (I give him the name as a presage) wanted to

describe all the engravings made about 1690 for the work which Dom Michel Germain would have had

printed but for the one irremediable hindrance which is rarely foreseen and never avoided. Dom Michel

Germain left his manuscript complete, however, and in good order when he died. Shall I be able to do as

much with mine?but that is not the present question. So far as I am able to understand, Monsieur Gelis

intends to devote a brief archeological notice to each of the abbeys pictured by the humble engravers of Dom

His friend asked him whether he was acquainted with all the manuscripts and printed documents relating to

the subject. It was then that I pricked up my ears. They spoke at first of original sources; and I must confess

they did so in a satisfactory manner, despite their innumerable and detestable puns. Then they began to speak

"Have you read," said Boulmier, "the article by Tamisey de Larroque in the 'Revue des Questions

"Have you read," said Boulmier, "the 'Tableau des Abbayes Benedictines en 1600,' by Sylvestre Bonnard?"

"Mai foi! no!" replied Gelis. "Bonnard is an idiot!" Turning my head, I perceived that the shadow had

reached the place where I was sitting. It was growing chilly, and I thought to myself what a fool I was to have

remained sitting there, at the risk of getting the rheumatism, just to listen to the impertinence of those two

"Well! well!" I said to myself as I got up. "Let this prattling fledgling write his thesis, and sustain it! He will

find my colleague, Quicherat, or some other professor at the school, to show him what an ignoramus he is. I

consider him neither more nor less than a rascal; and really, now that I come to think of it, what he said about

Michelet awhile ago was quite insufferable, outrageous! To talk in that way about an old master replete with

But Therese is deaf as a sack of charcoal and slow as Justice. Years have made her so. The worst is that she

thinks she can hear well and move about well; and, proud of her sixty years of upright domesticity, she serves

"What did I tell you?"... And now she will not give me my silverheaded cane, for fear that I might lose it! It

is true that I often forget umbrellas and walkingsticks in the omnibuses and booksellers' shops. But I have a

special reason for wanting to take out with me today my old cane with the en graved silver head

representing Don Quixote charging a windmill, lance in rest, while Sancho Panza, with uplifted arms, vainly

conjures him to stop. That cane is all that came to me from the heritage of my uncle, Captain Victor, who in

his lifetime resembled Don Quixote much more than Sancho Panza, and who loved blows quite as much as

For thirty years I have been in the habit of carrying this cane upon all memorable or solemn visits which I

make; and those two figures of knight and squire give me inspiration and counsel. I imagine I can hear them

"Think well about great things; and know that thought is the only reality in this world. Lift up Nature to thine

own stature; and let the whole universe be for thee no more than the reflection of thine own heroic soul.

Combat for honour's sake: that alone is worthy of a man! and if it should fall to thee to receive wounds, shed

"Remain just what heaven made thee, comrade! Prefer the breadcrust which has become dry in thy wallet to

all the partridges that roast in the kitchens of lords. Obey thy master, whether he be a wise man or a fool, and

do not cumber thy brain with too many useless things. Fear blows; 'tis verily tempting God to seek after

But if the incomparable knight and his matchless squire are imaged only upon this cane of mine, they are

realities to my inner conscience. Within every one of us there lives both a Don Quixote and a Sancho Panza

to whom we hearken by turns; and though Sancho most persuades us, it is Don Quixote that we find

ourselves obliged to admire.... But a truce to this dotage!and let us go to see Madame de Gabry about some

After some compliments about the good health of her husband, who was taking a walk at the time, we

I do not know what secret influence I feared to dissipate by breaking silence, but we followed the great

deserted drives without speaking, looking at the crosses, the monumental columns, and the mortuary wreaths

The vehicle at last halted at the extreme verge of the land of the living, before the gate upon which words of

"Follow me," said Madame de Gabry, whose tall stature I noticed then for the first time. She first walked

down an alley of cypresses, and then took a very narrow path contrived between the tombs. Finally, halting

And she knelt down. I could not help noticing the beautiful easy manner in which this Christian woman fell

upon her knees, leaving the folds of her robe to spread themselves at random about her. I had never before

seen any lady kneel down with such frankness and such forgetfulness of self, except two fair Polish exiles,

This image passed like a flash; and I saw only the sloping stone on which was graven the name of

Clementine. What I then felt was something so deep and vague that only the sound of some rich music could

convey any idea of it. I seemed to hear instruments of celestial sweetness make harmony in my old heart.

With the solemn accords of a funeral chant there seemed to mingle the subdued melody of a song of love; for

my soul blended into one feeling the grave sadness of the present with the familiar graces of the past.

I cannot tell whether we had remained a long time at the tomb of Clementine before Madame de Gabry arose.

We passed through the cemetery again without speaking to each other. Only when we found ourselves among

"While following you there," I said to Madame de Gabry, "I could not help thinking of those angels with

whom we are said to meet on the mysterious confines of life and death. That tomb you led me to, of which I

knew nothingas I know nothing, or scarcely anything, concerning her whom it coversbrought back to

me emotions which were unique in my life, and which seem in the dulness of that life like some light

gleaming upon a dark road. The light recedes farther and farther away as the journey lengthens; I have now

almost reached the bottom of the last slope; and, nevertheless, each time I turn to look back I see the glow as

"You, Madame, who knew Clementine as a wife and mother after her hair had become grey, you cannot

imagine her as I see her still; a young fair girl, all pink and white. Since you have been so kind as to be my

guide, dear Madame, I ought to tell you what feelings were awakened in me by the sight of that grave to

which you led me. Memories throng back upon me. I feel myself like some old gnarled and mossy oak which

awakens a nestling world of birds by the shaking of its branches. Unfortunately the song my birds sing is old

"Tell me your souvenirs," said Madame de Gabry. "I cannot read your books, because they are written only

for scholars; but I like very much to have you talk to me, because you know how to give interest to the most

ordinary things in life. And talk to me just as you would talk to an old woman. This morning I found three

"Let them come without regret, Madame," I replied. "Time deals gently only with those who take it gently.

And when in some years more you will have a silvery fringe under your black fillet, you will be reclothed

with a new beauty, less vivid but more touching than the first; and you will find your husband admiring your

grey tresses as much as he did that black curl which you gave him when about to be married, and which he

preserves in a locket as a thing sacred.... These boulevards are broad and very quiet. We can talk at our ease

as we walk along. I will tell you, to begin with, how I first made the acquaintance of Clementine's father. But

you must not expect anything extraordinary, or anything even remarkable; you would be greatly deceived.

"Monsieur de Lessay used to live in the second storey of an old house in the Avenue de l'Observatoire,

having a stuccoed front, ornamented with antique busts, and a large unkept garden attached to it. That facade

and that garden were the first images my childeyes perceived; and they will be the last, no doubt, which I

shall still see through my closed eyelids when the Inevitable Day comes. For it was in that house that I was

born; it was in that garden I first learned, while playing, to feel and know some particles of this old universe.

Magical hours!sacred hours!when the soul, all fresh from the making, first discovers the world, which

for its sake seems to assume such caressing brightness, such mysterious charm! And that, Madame, is indeed

"My mother was a being very happily constituted. She rose with the sun, like the birds; and she herself

resembled the birds by her domestic industry, by her maternal instinct, by her perpetual desire to sing, and by

a sort of brusque grace, which I could feel the charm of very well even as a child. She was the soul of the

house, which she filled with her systematic and joyous activity. My father was just as slow as she was brisk. I

can recall very well that placid face of his, over which at times an ironical smile used to flit. He was fatigued

with active life; and he loved his fatigue. Seated beside the fire in his big armchair, he used to read from

morning till night; and it is from him that I inherit my love of books. I have in my library a Mably and a

Raynal, which he annotated with his own hand from beginning to end. But it was utterly useless attempting to

interest him in anything practical whatever. When my mother would try, by all kinds of gracious little ruses,

to lure him out of his retirement, he would simply shake his head with that inexorable gentleness which is the

force of weak characters. He used in this way greatly to worry the poor woman, who could not enter at all

into his own sphere of meditative wisdom, and could understand nothing of life except its daily duties and the

merry labour of each hour. She thought him sick, and feared he was going to become still more so. But his

"My father, entering the Naval office under Monsieur Decres, in 1801, gave early proof of high

administrative talent. There was a great deal of activity in the marine department in those times; and in 1805

my father was appointed chief of the Second Administrative Division. That same year, the Emperor, whose

attention had been called to him by the Minister, ordered him to make a report upon the organisation of the.

English navy. This work, which reflected a profoundly liberal and philosophic spirit, of which the editor

himself was unconscious, was only finished in 1807about eighteen months after the defeat of Admiral

Villeneuve at Trafalgar. Napoleon, who, from that disastrous day, never wanted to hear the word ship

mentioned in his presence, angrily glanced over a few pages of the memoir, and then threw it into the fire,

vociferating, 'Words!words! I said once before that I hated ideologists.' My father was told afterwards that

the Emperor's anger was so intense at the moment that he stamped the manuscript down into the fire with his

bootheels. At all events, it was his habit, when very much irritated, to poke down the fire with his feet until

he had scorched his bootsoles. My father never fully recovered from this disgrace; and the fruitlessness of

all his efforts towards reform was certainly the cause of the apathy which came upon him at a later day.

Nevertheless, Napoleon, after his return from Elba, sent for him, and ordered him to prepare some liberal and

patriotic bulletins and proclamations for the fleet. After Waterloo, my father, whom the event had rather

saddened than surprised, retired into private life, and was not interfered withexcept that it was generally

averred of him that he was a Jacobin, a buveurdesangone of those men with whom no one could afford to

be on intimate terms. My mother's eldest brother, Victor Maldent, an infantry captainretired on halfpay in

1814 and disbanded in 1815aggravated by his bad attitude the situation in which the fall of the Empire had

placed my father. Captain Victor used to shout in the cafe's and the public balls that the Bourbons had sold

France to the Cossacks. He used to show everybody a tricoloured cockade hidden in the lining of his hat; and

carried with much ostentation a walkingstick, the handle of which had been so carved that the shadow

"Unless you have seen certain lithographs by Charlet, Madame, you could form no idea of the physiognomy

of my Uncle Victor, when he used to stride about the garden of the Tuileries with a fiercely elegant manner of

his ownbuttoned up in his frogged coat, with his crossofhonour upon his breast, and a bouquet of violets

"Idleness and intemperance greatly intensified the vulgar recklessness of his political passions. He used to

insult people whom he happened to see reading the Quotidienne, or the Drapeau Blanc, and compel them to

fight with him. In this way he had the pain and the shame of wounding a boy of sixteen in a duel. In short, my

Uncle Victor was the very reverse of a wellbehaved person; and as he came to lunch and dine at our house

every blessed day in the year, his bad reputation became attached to our family. My poor father suffered

cruelly from some of his guest's pranks; but being very goodnatured, he never made any remarks, and

continued to give the freedom of his house to the captain, who only despised him for it. "All this which I have

told you, Madame, was explained to me afterwards. But at the time in question, my uncle the captain filled

me with the very enthusiasm of admiration, and I promised myself to try to become some day as like him as

possible. So one fine morning, in order to begin the likeness, I put my arms akimbo, and swore like a trooper.

My excellent mother at once gave me such a box on the ear that I remained half stupefied for some little

while before I could even burst out crying. I can still see the old armchair, covered with yellow Utrecht

"I was a very little fellow then. One morning my father, lifting me upon his knees, as he was in the habit of

doing, smiled at me with that slightly ironical smile which gave a certain piquancy to his perpetual gentleness

of manner. As I sat on his knee, playing with his long white hair, he told me something which I did not

understand very well, but which interested me very much, for the simple reason that it was mysterious to me.

I think, but am not quite sure, that he related to me that morning the story of the little King of Yvetot,

according to the song. All of a sudden we heard a great report; and the windows rattled. My father slipped me

down gently on the floor at his feet; he threw up his trembling arms, with a strange gesture; his face became

all inert and white. and his eyes seemed enormous. He tried to speak, but his teeth were chattering. At last he

murmured, 'They have shot him!' I did not know what he meant, and felt only a vague terror. I knew

afterwards, however, that he was speaking of Marshal Ney, who fell on the 7th of December, 1815, under the

"About that time I used often to meet on the stairway an old man (or, perhaps, not exactly an old man) with

little black eyes which flashed with extraordinary vivacity, and an impassive, swarthy face. He did not seem

to me aliveor at least he did not seem to me alive in the same way that other men were alive. I had once

seen, at the residence of Monsieur Denon, where my father had taken me with him on a visit, a mummy

brought from Egypt; and I believed in good faith that Monsieur Denon's mummy used to get up when no one

was looking, leave its gilded case, put on a brown coat and powdered wig, and become transformed into

Monsieur de Lessay. And even today, dear Madame, while I reject that opinion as being without foundation,

I must confess that Monsieur de Lessay bore a very strong resemblance to Monsieur Denon's mummy. The

"In reality, Monsieur de Lessay was a small gentleman and a great philosopher. As a disciple of Mably and

Rousseau, he flattered himself on being a man without any prejudices; and this pretension itself is a very

"He professed to hate fanaticism, yet was himself a fanatic on the topic of toleration. I am telling you,

Madame, about a character belonging to an age that is past. I fear I may not be able to make you understand,

and I am sure I shall not be able to interest you. It was so long ago! But I will abridge as much as possible:

besides, I did not promise you anything interesting; and you could not have expected to hear of remarkable

"Monsieur de Lessay was brusque with men and courteous to ladies. He used to kiss the hand of my mother,

whom the customs of the Republic and the Empire had not habituated to such gallantry. In him, I touched the

age of Louis XVI. Monsieur de Lessay was a geographer; and nobody, I believe, ever showed more pride

than he in occupying himself with the face of the earth. Under the Old Regime he had attempted

philosophical agriculture, and thus squandered his estates to the very last acre. When he had ceased to own

one square foot of ground, he took possession of the whole globe, and prepared an extraordinary number of

maps, based upon the narratives of travellers. But as he had been mentally nourished with the very marrow of

the "Encyclopedie," he was not satisfied with merely parking off human beings within so many degrees,

minutes, and seconds of latitude and longitude. He also occupied himself, alas! with the question of their

happiness. It is worthy of remark, Madame, that those who have given themselves the most concern about the

happiness of peoples have made their neighbours very miserable. Monsieur de Lessay, who was more of a

geometrician than D'Alembert, and more of a philosopher than Jean Jacques, was also more of a royalist than

Louis XVIII. But his love for the King was as nothing to his hate for the Emperor. He had joined the

conspiracy of Georges against the First Consul; but in the framing of the indictment he was not included

among the inculpated parties, having been either ignored or despised, and this injury he never could forgive

Bonaparte, whom he called the Ogre of Corsica, and to whom he used to say he would never have confided

"In 1820, Monsieur de Lessay, who had then been a widower for many years, married again, at the age of

sixty, a very young woman, whom he pitilessly kept at work preparing maps for him, and who gave him a

daughter some years after their marriage, and died in childbed. My mother had nursed her during her brief

illness, and had taken care of the child. The name of that child was Clementine.

"It was from the time of that birth and that death that the relations between our family and Monsieur de

Lessay began. In the meanwhile I had been growing dull as I began to leave my true childhood behind me. I

had lost the charming power of being able to see and feel; and things no longer caused me those delicious

surprises which form the enchantment of the more tender age. For the same reason, perhaps, I have no

distinct remembrance of the period following the birth of Clementine; I only know that a few months

afterwards I had a misfortune, the mere thought of which still wrings my heart. I lost my mother. A great

silence, a great coldness, and a great darkness seemed all at once to fill the house.

"I fell into a sort of torpor. My father sent me to the lycee, but I could only arouse myself from my lethargy

"Still, I was not altogether a dullard, and my professors were able to teach me almost everything they wanted,

namely, a little Greek and a great deal of Latin. My acquaintances were confined to the ancients. I learned to

esteem Miltiades, and to admire Themistocles. I became familiar with Quintus Fabius, as far, at least, as it

was possible to become familiar with so great a Consul. Proud of these lofty acquaintances, I scarcely ever

condescended to notice little Clementine and her old father, who, in any event, went away to Normandy one

fine morning without my having deigned to give a moment's thought to their possible return.

"They came back, however, Madame, they came back! Influences of Heaven, forces of nature, all ye

mysterious powers which vouchsafe to man the ability to love, you know how I again beheld Clementine!

They reentered our melancholy home. Monsieur de Lessay no longer wore a wig. Bald, with a few grey

locks about his ruddy temples, he had all the aspect of robust old age. But that divine being whom I saw all

resplendent, as she leaned upon his armshe whose presence illuminated the old faded parlourshe was

not an apparition! It was Clementine herself! I am speaking the simple truth: her violet eyes seemed to me in

that moment supernatural, and even today I cannot imagine how those two living jewels could have endured

"She betrayed a little shyness in greeting my father, whom she did not remember. Her complexion was

slightly pink, and her halfopen lips smiled with that smile which makes one think of the Infiniteperhaps

because it betrays no particular thought, and expresses only the joy of living and the bliss of being beautiful.

Under a pink hood her face shone like a gem in an open casket; she wore a cashmere scarf over a robe of

white muslin plaited at the waist, from beneath which protruded the tip of a little Morocco shoe. ...Oh! you

must not make fun of me, dear Madame, that was the fashion of the time; and I do not know whether our new

"Monsieur de Lessay informed us that, in consequence of having undertaken the publication of a historical

atlas, he had come back to live in Paris, and that he would be pleased to occupy his former apartment, if it

was still vacant. My father asked Mademoiselle de Lessay whether she was pleased to visit the capital. She

appeared to be, for her smile blossomed out in reply. She smiled at the windows that looked out upon the

green and luminous garden; she smiled at the bronze Marius seated among the ruins of Carthage above the

dial of the clock; she smiled at the old yellowvelveted armchairs, and at the poor student who was afraid to

"But here we are already at the Rue de Sevres, and in a little while we shall be in sight of your windows. I am

a very bad storyteller; and if I wereby some impossible chanceto take it into my head to compose a

novel, I know I should never succeed. I have been drawing out to tiresome length a narrative which I must

finish briefly; for there is a certain delicacy, a certain grace of soul, which an old man could not help

offending by any complacent expatiation upon the sentiments of even the purest love. Let us take a short turn

on this boulevard, lined with convents; and my recital will be easily finished within the distance separating us

"Monsieur de Lessay, on finding that I had graduated at the Ecole des Chartes, judged me worthy to assist

him in preparing his historical atlas. The plan was to illustrate, by a series of maps, what the old philosopher

termed the Vicissitudes of Empires from the time of Noah down to that of Charlemagne. Monsieur de Lessay

had stored up in his head all the errors of the eighteenth century in regard to antiquity. I belonged, so far as

my historical studies were concerned, to the new school; and I was just at that age when one does not know

how to dissemble. The manner in which the old man understood, or, rather, misunderstood, the epoch of the

Barbarianshis obstinate determination to find in remote antiquity only ambitious princes, hypocritical and

avaricious prelates, virtuous citizens, poetphilosophers, and other personages who never existed outside of

the novels of Marmontel,made me dreadfully unhappy, and at first used to excite me into attempts at

argument,rational enough, but perfectly useless and sometimes dangerous, for Monsieur de Lessay was

very irascible, and Clementine was very beautiful. Between her and him I passed many hours of torment and

of delight. I was in love; I was a coward, and I granted to him all that he demanded of me in regard to the

political and historical aspect which the Earththat was at a later day to bear Clementinepresented in the

"As fast as we drew our maps Mademoiselle de Lessay tinted them in watercolours. Bending over the table,

she held the brush lightly between two fingers; the shadow of her eyelashes descended upon her cheeks, and

bathed her halfclosed eyes in a delicious penumbra. Sometimes she would lift her head, and I would see her

lips pout. There was so much expression in her beauty that she could not breathe without seemming to sigh;

and her most ordinary poses used to throw me into the deepest ecstasies of admiration. Whenever I gazed at

her I fully agreed with Monsieur de Lessay that Jupiter had once reigned as a despotking over the

mountainous regions of Thessaly, and that Orpheus had committed the imprudence of leaving the teaching of

philosophy to the clergy. I am not now quite sure whether I was a coward or a hero when I accorded all this

"Mademoiselle de Lessay, I must acknowledge, paid very little attention to me. But this indifference seemed

to me so just and so natural that I never even dreamed of thinking I had a right to complain about it; it make

me unhappy, but without my knowing that I was unhappy at the time. I was hopeful;we had then only got

"Monsieur de Lessay came every evening to take coffee with my father. I do not know how they became such

friends; for it would have been difficult to find two characters more oppositely constituted. My father was a

man who admired very few things, but was capable of excusing a great many. Still, as he grew older, he

evinced more and more dislike of everything in the shape of exaggeration. He clothed his ideas with a

thousand delicate shades of expression, and never pronounced an opinion without all sorts of reservations.

These conversational habits, natural to a finely trained mind, used greatly to irritate the dry, terse old

aristocrat, who was never in the least disarmed by the moderation of an adversaryquite the contrary! I

always foresaw one danger. That danger was Bonaparte. My father had not himself retained any particular

affection for his memory; but, having worked under his direction, he did not like to hear him abused,

especially in favour of the Bourbons, against whom he had serious reason to feel resentment. Monsieur de

Lessay, more of a Voltairean and a Legitimist than ever, now traced back to Bonaparte the origin of every

social, political, and religious evil. Such being the situation, the idea of Uncle Victor made me feel

particularly uneasy. This terrible uncle had become absolutely insufferable now that his sister was no longer

there to calm him down. The harp of David was broken, and Saul was wholly delivered over to the spirit of

madness. The fall of Charles X. had increased the audacity of the old Napoleonic veteran, who uttered all

imaginable bravadoes. He no longer frequented our house, which had become too silent for him. But

sometimes, at the dinnerhour, we would see him suddenly make his appearance, all covered with flowers,

like a mausoleum. Ordinarily he would sit down to table with an oath, growled out from the very bottom of

his chest, and brag, between every two mouthfuls, of his good fortune with the ladies as a vieux brave. Then,

when the dinner was over, he would fold up his napkin in the shape of a bishop's mitre, gulp down half a

decanter of brandy, and rush away with the hurried air of a man terrified at the mere idea of remaining for

any length of time, without drinking, in conversation with an old philosopher and a young scholar. I felt

perfectly sure that, if ever he and Monsieur de Lessay should come together, all would be lost. But that day

"The captain was almost hidden by flowers that day, and seemed so much like a monument commemorating

the glories of the Empire that one would have liked to pass a garland of immortelles over each of his arms.

He was in an extraordinarily good humour; and the first person to profit by that good humour was our

cookfor he put his arm round her waist while she was placing the roast on the table.

"After dinner he pushed away the decanter presented to him, observing that he was going to burn some

brandy in his coffee later on. I asked him tremblingly whether he would not prefer to have his coffee at once.

He was very suspicious, and not at all dull of comprehensionmy Uncle Victor. My precipitation seemed to

"'Patience! my nephew. It isn't the business of the baby of the regiment to sound the retreat! Devil take it!

You must be in a great hurry, Master Pedant, to see if I've got spurs on my boots!'

"It was evident the captain had divined that I wanted him to go. And I knew him well enough to be sure that

he was going to stay. He stayed. The least circumstances of that evening remain impressed on my memory.

My uncle was extremely jovial. The mere idea of being in somebody's way was enough to keep him in good

humour. He told us in regular barrack style, ma foi! a certain story about a monk, a trumpet, and five bottles

of Chambertin, which must have been much enjoyed in garrison society, but which I would not venture to

repeat to you, Madame, even if I could remember it. When we passed into the parlour, the captain called

attention to the bad condition of our andirons, and learnedly discoursed on the merits of rottenstone as a

brasspolisher. Not a word on the subject of politics. He was husbanding his forces. Eight o'clock sounded

from the ruins of Carthage on the mantelpiece. It was Monsieur de Lessay's hour. A few moments later he

entered the parlour with his daughter. The ordinary evening chat began. Clementine sat down and began to

work on some embroidery beside the lamp, whose shade left her pretty head in a soft shadow, and threw

down upon her fingers a radiance that made them seem almost selfluminous. Monsieur de Lessay spoke of a

comet announced by the astronomers, and developed some theories in relation to the subject, which, however

audacious, betrayed at least a certain degree of intellectual culture. My father, who knew a good deal about

astronomy, advanced some sound ideas of his own, which he ended up with his eternal, 'But what do we

know about it, after all?' In my turn I cited the opinion of our neighbour of the Observatorythe great

Arago. My Uncle Victor declared that comets had a peculiar influence on the quality of wines, and related in

support of this view a jolly tavern story. I was so delighted with the turn the conversation had taken that I did

all in my power to maintain it in the same groove, with the help of my most recent studies, by a long

exposition of the chemical composition of those nebulous bodies which, although extending over a length of

billions of leagues, could be contained in a small bottle. My father, a little surprised at my unusual eloquence,

watched me with his peculiar, placid, ironical smile. But one cannot always remain in heaven. I spoke, as I

looked at Clementine, of a certain 'comete' of diamonds, which I had been admiring in a jeweller's window

"'Ah! my nephew,' cried Uncle Victor, 'that comete of yours was nothing to the one which the Empress

Josephine wore in her hair when she came to Strasburg to distribute crosses to the army.'

"'That little Josephine was very fond of finery and display,' observed Monsieur de Lessay, between two sips

of coffee. 'I do not blame her for it; she had good qualities, though rather frivolous in character. She was a

Tascher, and she conferred a great honour on Bonaparte by marrying him. To say a Tascher does not, of

"'I am not a marquis,' dryly responded Monsieur de Lessay; 'and I mean simply that Bonaparte would have

been very well suited had he married one of those cannibal women described by Captain Cook in his

voyagesnaked, tattooed, with a ring in her nosedevouring with delight putrefied human flesh.'

"I had foreseen it, and in my anguish (O pitiful human heart!) my first idea was about the remarkable

exactness of my anticipations. I must say that the captain's reply belonged to the sublime order. He put his

arms akimbo, eyed Monsieur de Lessay contemptuously from head to foot, and said,

"'Napoleon, Monsieur the Vidame, had another spouse besides Josephine, another spouse besides

MarieLouise. That companion you know nothing of; but I have seen her, close to me. She wears a mantle of

azure gemmed with stars; she is crowned with laurels; the CrossofHonour flames upon her breast. Her

"My father rose up calmly, extended his arm, and said very softly to Monsieur de Lessay,

"Whatever the man was who died at St. Helena, I worked for ten years in his government, and my

brotherinlaw was three times wounded under his eagles. I beg of you, dear sir and friend, never to forget

"What the sublime and burlesque insolence of the captain could not do, the courteous remonstrance of my

father effected immediately, throwing Monsieur de Lessay into a furious passion.

"'I did forget,' he exclaimed, between his set teeth, livid in his rage, and fairly foaming at the mouth; 'the

herringcask always smells of herring, and when one has been in the service of rascals'

"As he uttered the word, the Captain sprang at his throat; I am sure he would have strangled him upon the

"My father, a little paler than his wont, stood there with his arms folded, and watched the scene with a look of

inexpressible pity. What followed was still more lamentablebut why dwell further upon the folly of two

old men. Finally I succeeded in separating them. Monsieur de Lessay made a sign to his daughter and left the

"'Mademoiselle,' I said to her, wildly, taking her hand as I spoke, 'I love you! I love you!'

"For a moment she pressed my hand; her lips opened. What was it that she was going to say to me? But

suddenly, lifting her eyes towards her father ascending the stairs, she drew her hand away, and made me a

"I never saw her again. Her father went to live in the neighbourhood of the Pantheon, in an apartment which

he had rented for the sale of his historical atlas. He died in it a few months afterward of an apoplectic stroke.

His daughter, I was told, retired to Caen to live with some aged relative. It was there that, later on, she

married a bankclerk, the same Noel Alexandre who became so rich and died so poor.

"As for me, Madame, I have lived alone, at peace with myself; my existence, equally exempt from great pains

and great joys, has been tolerably happy. But for many years I could never see an empty chair beside my own

of a winter's evening without feeling a sudden painful sinking at my heart. Last year I learned from you, who

had known her, the story of her old age and death. I saw her daughter at your house. I have seen her; but I

cannot yet say like the aged man of Scripture, 'And now, O Lord, let thy servant depart in peace!' For if an

old fellow like me can be of any use to anybody, I would wish, with your help, to devote my last energies and

I had uttered these last words in Madame de Gabry's own vestibule; and I was about to take leave of my kind

"My dear Monsieur, I cannot help you in this matter as much as I would like to do. Jeanne is an orphan and a

minor. You cannot do anything for her without the authorisation of her guardian."

"Ah!" I exclaimed, "I had not the least idea in the world that Jeanne had a guardian!"

Madame de Gabry looked at me with visible surprise. She had not expected to find the old man quite so

"The guardian of Jeanne Alexandre is Maltre Mouche, notary at LevalloisPerret. I am afraid you will not be

"Why! good God!" I cried, "with what kind of people can you expect me to have any sort of understanding at

She smiled with a sweet mischievousnessjust as my father used to smileand answered:

"With those who are like youthe innocent folks who wear their hearts on their sleeves. Monsieur Mouche

is not exactly a man of that kind. He is cunning and lightfingered. But although I have very little liking for

him, we will go together and see him, if you wish, and ask his permission to visit Jeanne, whom he has sent

We agreed at once upon a day; I kissed Madame de Gabry's hands, and we bade each other goodbye.

I HAVE seen him in his office, Maltre Mouche, the guardian of Jeane. Small, thin, and dry; his complexion

looks as if it was made out of the dust of his pigeonholes. He is a spectacled animal; for to imagine him

without his spectacles would! be impossible. I have heard him speak, this Maltre Mouche; he has a voice like

a tin rattle, and he uses choice phrases; but I should have been better pleased if he had not chosen his phrases

so carefully. I have observed him, this Maltre Mouche; he is very ceremonious, and watches his visitors slyly

Maltre Mouche is quite pleased, he informs us; he is delighted to find we have taken such an interest in his

ward. But he does not think we are placed in this world just to amuse ourselves. No: he does not believe it;

and I am free to acknowledge that anybody in his company is likely to reach the same conclusion, so little is

he capable of inspiring joyfulness. He fears that it would be giving his dear ward a false and pernicious idea

of life to allow her too much enjoyment. It is for that reason that he requests Madame de Gabry not to invite

We left the dusty notary and his dusty study with a permit in due form (everything which issues from the

office of Maltre Mouche is in due form) to visit Mademoiselle Jeanne Alexandre on the first Thursday of

The first Thursday in May I set out to pay a visit to Mademoiselle Prefere, whose establishment I discerned

from afar off by a big sign, painted with blue letters. That blue tint was the first indication I received of

Mademoiselle Prefere's character, which I was able to see more of later on. A scaredlooking servant took

my card, and abandoned me without one word of hope at the door of a chilly parlour, full of that stale odour

peculiar to the diningrooms of educational establishments. The floor of this parlour had been waxed with

such pitiless energy, that I remained for awhile in distress upon the threshold. But happily observing that little

strips of woollen carpet had been scattered over the floor in front of each horsehair chair, I succeeded, by

cautiously stepping from one carpetisland to another, in reaching the angle of the mantelpiece, where I sat

Over the mantelpiece, in a large gilded frame, was a written document, entitled in flamboyant Gothic

lettering, Tableau d'Honneur, with a long array of names underneath, among which I did not have the

pleasure of finding that of Jeanne Alexandre. After having read over several times the names of those

girlpupils who had thus made themselves honoured in the eyes of Mademoiselle Prefere, I began to feel

uneasy at not hearing any one coming. Mademoiselle Prefere would certainly have succeeded in establishing

the absolute silence of the interstellar spaces throughout her pedagogical domains, had it not been that the

sparrows had chosen her yard to assemble in by legions, and chirp at the top of their voices. It was a pleasure

to hear them. But there was no way of seeing themthrough the groundglass windows. I had to content

myself with the sights of the parlour, decorated from floor to ceiling, on all of its four walls, with drawings

executed by the pupils of the institution. There were Vestals, flowers, thatched cottages, columncapitals,

and an enormous head of Tatius, King of the Sabines, bearing the signature Estelle Mouton.

I had already passed some time in admiring the energy with which Mademoiselle Mouton had delineated the

bushy eyebrows and the fierce gaze of the antique warrior, when a sound, faint like the rustling of a dead leaf

moved by the wind, caused me to turn my head. It was not a dead leaf at allit was Mademoiselle Prefere.

With hands joined before her, she came gliding over the mirrorpolish of that wonderful floor as the Saints of

the Golden Legend were wont to glide over the crystal surface of the waters. But upon any other occasion, I

am sure, Mademoiselle Prefere would not have made me think in the least about those virgins dear to

mystical fancy. Her face rather gave me the idea of a russetapple preserved for a whole winter in an attic by

some economical housekeeper. Her shoulders were covered with a fringed pelerine, which had nothing at all

remarkable about it, but which she wore as if it were a sacerdotal vestment, or the symbol of some high civic

I explained to her the purpose of my visit, and gave her my letter of introduction.

"Ah!so you saw Monsieur Mouche!" she exclaimed. "Is his health very good? He is the most upright of

She did not finish the phrase, but raised her eyes to the ceiling. My own followed the direction of their gaze,

and observed a little spiral of paper lace, suspended from the place of the chandelier, which was apparently

destined, so far as I could discover, to attract the flies away from the gilded mirror frames and the Tableau

"I have met Mademoiselle Jeanne Alexandre," I observed, "at the residence of Madame de Gabry, and had

reason to appreciate the excellent character and quick intelligence of the young girl. As I used to know her

parents very well, the friendship which I felt for them naturally inclines me to take an interest in her."

Mademoiselle Prefere, in lieu of making any reply, sighed profoundly, pressed her mysterious pelerine to her

"Since you were once the friend of Monsieur and Madame Alexandre, I hope and trust that, like Monsieur

Mouche and myself, you deplore those crazy speculations which led them to ruin, and reduced their daughter

I thought to myself, on hearing these words, how very wrong it is to be unlucky, and how unpardonable such

an error on the part of those previously in a position worthy of envy. Their fall at once avenges and flatters

After having answered, very frankly, that I knew nothing whatever about the history of the bank, I asked the

And she assumed an attitude of lofty resignation, to symbolise the difficult situation she was placed in by a

"The young person is not unintelligent. But she cannot resign herself to learn things by rule."

What a strange old maid was this Mademoiselle Prefere! She walked without lifting her legs, and spoke

without moving her lips! Without, however, considering her peculiarities for more than a reasonable instant, I

replied that principles were, no doubt, very excellent things, and that I could trust myself to her judgment in

regard to their value; but that, after all, when one had learned something, it made very little difference what

"Ah, Monsieur! those who do not understand educational methods are apt to have very false ideas on these

subjects. I am certain they express their opinions with the best intentions in the world; but they would do

I did not attempt to argue further; and simply asked her whether I could see Mademoiselle Alexandre at once.

She looked at her pelerine, as if trying to read in the entanglement of its fringes, as in a conjuring book, what

"Mademoiselle Alexandre has a penance to perform, and a classlesson to give; but I should be very sorry to

let you put yourself to the trouble of coming here all to no purpose. I am going to send for her. Only first

She sat down at the table, opened a large copybook, and, taking out Maltre Mouche's letter again from under

"'Bonnard'with a d, is it not?" she asked. "Excuse me for being so particular; but my opinion is that proper

names have an orthography. We have dictationlessons in proper names, Monsieur, at this schoolhistorical

After I had written down my name in a running hand, she inquired whether she should not put down after it

my profession, title, qualitysuch as "retired merchant," "employe," "independent gentleman," or something

"My goodness, Madame!" I said, "if you must absolutely fill that column of yours, put down 'Member of the

It was still Mademoiselle Prefere's pelerine I saw before me; but it was not Mademoiselle Prefere now who

wore it; it was a totally different person, obliging, gracious, caressing, radiant, happy. Her eyes, smiled; the

little wrinkles of her face (there were a vast number of them!) also smiled; her mouth smiled likewise, but

only on one side. I discovered afterwards that was her best side. She spoke: her voice had also changed with

"You said, Monsieur, that our dear Jeanne was very intelligent. I discovered the same thing myself, and I am

proud of being able to agree with you. This young girl has really made me feel a great deal of interest in her.

She has what I call a happy disposition.... But excuse me for thus drawing upon your valuable time."

She summoned the servantgirl, who looked much more hurried and scared than before, and who vanished

with the order to go and tell Mademoiselle Alexandre that Monsieur Sylvestre Bonnard, Member of the

Mademoiselle Prefere had barely time to confide to me that she had the most profound respect for all

decisions of the Institutewhatever they might be when Jeanne appeared, out of breath, red as a poppy,

with her eyes very wide open, and her arms dangling helplessly at her sidescharming in her artless

"What a state you are in, my dear child!" murmured Mademoiselle Prefere, with maternal sweetness, as she

Jeanne certainly did present an odd aspect. Her hair combed back, and imperfectly held by a net from which

loose curls were escaping; her slender arms, sheathed down to the elbows in lustring sleeves; her hands,

which she did not seem to know what to do with, all red with chilblains; her dress, much too short, revealing

that she had on stockings much too large for her, and shoes worn down at the heel; and a skippingrope tied

round her waist in lieu of a belt,all combined to lend Mademoiselle Jeanne an appearance the reverse of

"Oh, you crazy girl!" sighed Mademoiselle Prefere, who now seemed no longer like a mother, but rather like

"Sit down, Jeanne, and talk to me as you would to a friend. Are you not better satisfied here now than you

I asked her to tell me about her school life. She began at once to enumerate all her different studies piano,

style, chronology of the Kings of France, sewing, drawing, catechism, deportment.... I could never remember

them all! She still held in her hands, all unconsciously, the two ends of her skippingrope, and she raised and

lowered them regularly while making her enumeration. Then all at once she became conscious of what she

was doing, blushed, stammered, and became so confused that I had to renounce my desire to know the full

After having questioned Jeanne on various matters, and obtained only the vaguest answers, I perceived that

her young mind was totally absorbed by the skippingrope, and I entered bravely into that grave subject.

"So you have been skipping?" I said. "It is a very nice amusement, but one that you must not exert yourself

too much at; for any excessive exercise of that kind might seriously injure your health, and I should be very

"You are very kind, Monsieur," the young girl said, "to have come to see me and talk to me like this. I did not

think about thanking you when I came in, because I was too much surprised. Have you seen Madame de

"Madame de Gabry," I answered, "is very well. I can only tell you about her, Jeanne, what an old gardener

once said of the lady of the castle, his mistress, when somebody anxiously inquired about her: 'Madame is in

her road.' Yes, Madame de Gabry is in her own road; and you know, Jeanne, what a good road it is, and how

steadily she can walk upon it. I went out with her the other day, very, very far away from the house; and we

I felt too much reverence for those generous tears to attempt in any way to check the emotion that had evoked

"Will you not tell me, Jeanne, why you were thinking so much about that skippingrope a little while ago?"

"Why, indeed I will, Monsieur. It was only be. cause I had no right to come into the parlour with a

skippingrope. You know, of course, that I am past the age for playing at skipping. But when the servant said

there was an old gentleman... oh! ... I mean... that a gentleman was waiting for me in the parlour, I was

making the little girls jump. Then I tied the rope round my waist in a hurry, so that it might not get lost. It

was wrong. But I have not been in the habit of having many people come to see me. And Mademoiselle

Prefere never lets us off if we commit any breach of deportment: so I know she is going to punish me, and I

"Yes, Monsieur, it is too bad; because when I am punished myself, I have no more authority over the little

I did not at once fully understand the nature of this unpleasantness; but Jeanne explained to me that, as she

was charged by Mademoiselle Prefere with the duties of taking care of the youngest class, of washing and

dressing the children, of teaching them how to behave, how to sew, how to say the alphabet, of showing them

how to play, and, finally, of putting them to bed at the close of the day, she could not make herself obeyed b

those turbulent little folks on the days she was condemned to wear a nightcap in the classroom, or to eat

Having secretly admired the punishments devised by the Lady of the Enchanted Pelerine, I responded:

"Then, if I understand you rightly, Jeanne, you are at once a pupil here and a mistress? It is a condition of

"Then, I suspect," said I, "that your indulgence gets you many scoldings from Mademoiselle Prefere?"

Then I said to her that the troubles in which we often involve ourselves, by trying to act according to our

conscience and to do the best we can, are never of the sort that totally dishearten and weary us, but are, on the

contrary, wholesome trials. This sort of philosophy touched her very little. She even appeared totally

unmoved by my moral exhortations. But was not this quite natural on her part?and ought I not to have

remembered that it is only those no longer innocent who can find pleasure in the systems of moralists?... I

"Jeanne," I said, "you were asking a moment ago about Madame de Gabry. Let us talk about that Fairy of

"And, then, you see, Monsieur, my figurines, as you call them, are not in Mademoiselle Prefere's programme.

But I had begun to make a very small SaintGeorge for Madame de Gabrya tiny little SaintGeorge, with

a golden cuirass. Is not that right, Monsieur Bonnardto give SaintGeorge a gold cuirass?"

"I am going to tell you. I kept it in my pocket because I had no other place to put it, andand I sat down on

She drew out of her pocket a little wax figure, which had been squeezed out of all resemblance to human

form, and of which the dislocated limbs were only attached to the body by their wire framework. At the sight

of her hero thus marred, she was seized at once with compassion and gaiety. The latter feeling obtained the

mastery, and she burst into a clear laugh, which, however, stopped as suddenly as it had begun.

"That dear child!" sighed the schoolmistress in her tenderest tone. "I am afraid she will tire you. And, then,

I begged Mademoiselle Prefere to dismiss that illusion, and, rising to take my leave, I took from my pocket

"That is so nice!" said Jeanne; "there will be enough to go round the whole school."

Jeanne looked at her for an instant in a sullen way; then, turning to me, said with remarkable firmness,

"Jeanne," I said, pressing both her hands, "remain always a good, truthful, brave girl. Good. bye."

As she left the room with her packages of chocolate and confectionery, she happened to strike the handles of

her skippingrope against the back of a chair. Mademoiselle Prefere, full of indignation, pressed both hands

over her heart, under her pelerine; and I almost expected to see her give up her scholastic ghost.

When we found ourselves alone, she recovered her composure; and I must say, without considering myself

"Mademoiselle," I said, taking advantage of her good humour, "I noticed that Jeanne Alexandre looks a little

pale. You know better than I how much consideration and care a young girl requires at her age. It would only

be doing you an injustice by implication to recommend her still more earnestly to your vigilance."

These words seemed to ravish her with delight. She lifted her eyes, as in ecstasy, to the paper spirals of the

"How well these eminent men know the art of considering the most trifling details!"

I called her attention to the fact that the health of a young girl was not a trifling detail, and made my farewell

"You must excuse me, Monsieur. I am a woman, and I love glory. I cannot conceal from you the fact that I

feel myself greatly honoured by the presence of a Member of the Institute in my humble institution."

I duly excused the weakness of Mademoiselle Prefere; and, thinking only of Jeanne, with the blindness of

egotism, kept asking myself all along the road, "What are we going to do with this child?"

I HAD escorted to the Cimetiere de Marnes that day a very aged colleague of mine who, to use the words of

Goethe, had consented to die. The great Goethe, whose own vital force was something extraordinary, actually

believed that one never dies until one really wants to diethat is to say, when all those energies which resist

dissolution, and the sum of which make up life itself, have been totally destroyed. In other words, he believed

that people only die when it is no longer possible for them to live. Good! it is merely a question of properly

understanding one another; and when fully comprehended, the magnificent idea of Goethe only brings us

Well, my excellent colleague had consented to die thanks to several successive attacks of extremely

persuasive apoplexythe last of which proved unanswerable. I had been very little acquainted with him

during his lifetime; but it seems that I became his friend the moment he was dead, for our colleagues assured

me in the most serious manner, with deeply sympathetic countenances, that I should act as one of the

After having read very badly a short address I had written as well as I couldwhich is not saying much for

itI started out for a walk in the woods of Villed'Avray, and followed, without leaning too much on the

Captain's cane, a shaded path on which the sunlight fell, through foliage, in little discs of gold. Never had the

scent of grass and fresh leaves,never had the beauty of the sky over the trees, and the serene might of noble

tree contours, so deeply affected my senses and all my being; and the pleasure I felt in that silence, broken

I sat down in the shade of the roadside under a clump of young oaks. And there I made a promise to myself

not to die. or at least not to consent to die, before I should be again able to sit down under an oak, wherein

the great peace of the open country I could meditate on the nature of the soul and the ultimate destiny of

man. A bee, whose brown breastplate gleamed in the sun like armour of old gold, came to light upon a

mallowflower close by medarkly rich in colour, and fully opened upon its tufted stalk. It was certainly

not the first time I had witnessed so common an incident; but it was the first time that I had watched it with

such comprehensive and friendly curiosity. I could discern that there were all sorts of sympathies between the

insect and the flowera thousand singular little relationships which I had never before even suspected.

Satiated with nectar, the insect rose and buzzed away in a straight line, while I lifted myself up as best I

"Adieu!" I said to the flower and to the bee. "Adieu! Heaven grant I may live long enough to discover the

secret of your harmonies. I am very tired. But man is so made that he can only find relaxation from one kind

of labour by taking up another. The flowers and insects will give me that relaxation, with God's will, after my

long researches in philology and diplomatics. How full of meaning is that old myth of Antaeus! I have

touched the Earth and I am a new man; and now, at seventy years of age, new feelings of curiosity take birth

in my mind, even as young shoots sometimes spring up from the hollow trunk of an aged oak!"

I LIKE to look out of my window at the Seine and its quays on those soft grey mornings which give such an

infinite tenderness of tint to everything. I have seen that azure sky which flings so luminous a calm over the

Bay of Naples. But our Parisian sky is more animated, more kindly, more spiritual. It smiles, threatens,

caressestakes an aspect of melancholy or a look of merriment like a human gaze. At this moment it is

pouring down a very gentle light on the men and beasts of the city as they accomplish their daily tasks. Over

there, on the opposite bank, the stevedores of the Port Saint Nicholas are unloading a cargo of cow's horns;

while two men standing on a gangway are tossing sugarloaves from one to the other, and thence to

somebody in the hold of a steamer. On the north quay, the cabhorses, standing in a line under the shade of

the planetrees each with its head in a nosebag, are quietly munching their oats, while the rubicund drivers

are drinking at the counter of the wineseller opposite, but all the while keeping a sharp lookout for early

customers. The dealers in secondhand books put their boxes on the parapet. These good retailers of Mind,

who are always in the open air, with blouses loose to the breeze, have become so weatherbeaten by the wind,

the rain, the frost, the snow, the fog, and the great sun, that they end by looking very much like the old statues

of cathedrals. They are all friends of mine, and I scarcely ever pass by their boxes without picking out of one

of them some old book which I had always been in need of up to that very moment, without any suspicion of

Then on my return home I have to endure the outcries of my housekeeper, who accuses me of bursting all my

pockets and filling the house with waste paper to attract the rats. Therese is wise about that, and it is because

she is wise that I do not listen to her; for in spite of my tranquil mien, I have always preferred the folly of the

passions to the wisdom of indifference. But just because my own passions are not of that sort which burst out

with violence to devastate and kill, the common mind is not aware of their existence. Nevertheless, I am

greatly moved by them at times, and it has more than once been my fate to lose my sleep for the sake of a few

pages written by some forgotten monk or printed by some humble apprentice of Peter Schaeffer. And if these

fierce enthusiasms are slowly being quenched in me, it is only because I am being slowly quenched myself.

Our passions are our selves. My old books are Me. I am just as old and thumbworn as they are.

A light breeze sweeps away, along with the dust of the pavements, the winged seeds of the planetrees, and the

fragments of hay dropped from the mouths of the horses. The dust is nothing remarkable in itself; but as I

watch it flying, I remember a moment in my childhood when I watched just such a whirl of dust; and my old

Parisian soul is much affected by that sudden recollection. All that I see from my windowthat horizon

which extends to the left as far as the hills of Chaillot, and enables me to distinguish the Arc de Triomphe

like a die of stone, the Seine, river of glory, and its bridges, the ashtrees of the terrace of the Tuileries, the

Louvre of the Renaissance, cut and graven like goldsmithwork; and on my right, towards the PontNeuf

(pons Lutetiae Novus dictus, as it is named on old engravings), all the old and venerable part of Paris, with its

towers and spires:all that is my life, it is myself; and I should be nothing but for all those things which are

thus reflected in me through my thousand varying shades of thought, inspiring me and animating me. That is

And nevertheless I am weary, and I know that there can be no rest for me in the heart of this great city which

thinks so much, which has taught me to think, and which for ever urges me to think more. And how avoid

being excited among all these books which incessantly tempt my curiosity without ever satisfying it? At one

moment it is a date I have to look for; at another it is the name of a place I have to make sure of, or some

quaint term of which it is important to determine the exact meaning. Words?why, yes! words. As a

philologist, I am their sovereign; they are my subjects, and, like a good king, I devote my whole life to them.

But shall I not be able to abdicate some day? I have an idea that there is somewhere or other, quite far from

here, a certain little cottage where I could enjoy the quiet I so much need, while awaiting that day in which a

greater quietthat which can be never brokenshall come to wrap me all about. I dream of a bench before

the threshold, and of fields spreading away out of sight. But I must have a fresh smiling young face beside

me, to reflect and concentrate all that freshness of nature. I could then imagine myself a grandfather, and all

I am not a violent man, and yet I become easily vexed, and all my works have caused me quite as much pain

as pleasure. And I do not know how it is that I still keep thinking about that very conceited and very

liberty to utter about me some three months ago. I do not call him "friend" in irony, for I love studious youth

with all its temerities and imaginative eccentricities. Still, my young friend certainly went beyond all bounds.

Master Ambroise Pare who was the first to attempt the ligature of arteries, and who, having commenced his

profession at a time when surgery was only performed by quack barbers, nevertheless succeeded in lifting the

science to the high place it now occupies, was assailed in his old age by all the young sawbones' apprentices.

Being grossly abused during a discussion by some young addlehead who might have been the best son in the

world, but who certainly lacked all sense of respect, the old master answered him in his treatise De la Mumie,

de la Licorne, des Venins et de la Peste. "I pray him," said the great man"I pray him, that if he desire to

make any contradictions to my reply, he abandon all animosities, and treat the good old man with

gentleness." This answer seems admirable from the pen of Ambroise Pare; but even had it been written by a

village bonesetter, grown grey in his calling, and mocked by some young stripling, it would still be worthy of

It might perhaps seem that my memory of the incident had been kept alive only by a base feeling of

resentment. I thought so myself at first, and reproached myself for thus dwelling on the saying of a boy who

could not yet know the meaning of his own words. But my reflections on this subject subsequently took a

better course: that is why I now note them down in my diary. I remembered that one day when I was twenty

years old (that was more than half a century ago) I was walking about in that very same garden of the

Luxembourg with some comrades. We were talking about our old professors; and one of us happened to

name Monsieur PetitRadel, an estimable and learned man, who was the first to throw some light upon the

origin of early Etruscan civilisation, but who had been unfortunate enough to prepare a chonological table of

the lovers of Helen. We all laughed a great deal about that chronological table; and I cried out, "PetitRadel

This foolish speech of my adolescence was uttered too lightly to be a weight on my conscience as an old man.

May God kindly prove to me some day that I never used any less innocent shaft of speech in the battle of life!

But I now ask myself whether I really never wrote, at any time in my life, something quite as unconsciously

absurd as the chronological table of the lovers of Helen. The progress of science renders useless the very

books which have been the greatest aids to that progress. As those works are no longer useful, modern youth

is naturally inclined to believe they never had any value; it despises them, and ridicules them if they happen

to contain any superannuated opinion whatever. That was why, in my twentieth year, I amused myself at the

expense of Monsieur PetitRadel and his chronological table; and that was why, the other day, at the

"Rentre en toimeme, Octave, et cesse de te plaindre. Quoi! tu veux qu'on t'epargne et n'as rien epargne!"*

*"Look into thyself, Octavius, and cease complaining. What! thou wouldst be spared, and thou thyself hast

IT was the first Thursday in June. I shut up my books and took my leave of the holy Abbot Droctoveus, who,

being now in the enjoyment of celestial bliss, cannot feel very impatient to behold his name and works

glorified on earth through the humble compilation being prepared by my hands. Must I confess it? That

mallowplant I saw visited by a bee the other day has been occupying my thoughts much more than all the

ancient abbots who ever bore croisers or wore mitres. There is in one of Sprengel's books which I read in my

youth, at that time when I used to read anything and everything, some ideas about "the loves of flowers"

which now return to memory after having been forgotten for half a century, and which today interest me so

much that I regret not to have devoted the humble capacities of my mind to the study of insects and of plants.

And only awhile ago my housekeeper surprised me at the kitchen window, in the act of examining some

It was while looking for my cravat that I made these reflections. But after searching to no purpose in a great

number of drawers, I found myself obliged, after all, to have recourse to my house keeper. Therese came

"Monsieur," she said, "you ought to have told me you were going out, and I would have given you your

"But Therese," I replied, "would it not be a great deal better to put it in some place where I could find it

Therese no longer allows me to arrange anything, I cannot even have a handkerchief without asking her for it;

and as she is deaf, crippled, and, what is worse, beginning to lose her memory, I languish in perpetual

destitution. But she exercises her domestic authority with such quiet pride that I do not feel the courage to

attempt a coup d'etat against her government. "My cravat! Therese!do you hear?my cravat! if you drive

me wild like this with your slow ways, it will not be a cravat I shall need, but a rope to hang myself!"

"You must be in a very great hurry, Monsieur," replied Therese. "Your cravat is not lost. Nothing is ever lost

in this house, because I have charge of everything. But please allow me the time at least to find it."

"Yet here," I thought to myself"here is the result of half a century of devotedness and selfsacrifice!... Ah!

if by any happy chance this inexorable Therese had once in her whole life, only once, failed in her duty as a

servantif she had ever been at fault for one single instant, she could never have assumed this inflexible

authority over me, and I should at least have the courage to resist her. But how can one resist virtue? The

people who have no weaknesses are terrible; there is no way of taking advantage of them. Just look at

Therese, for example; she has not a single fault for which you can blame her! She has no doubt of herself; nor

of God, nor of the world. She is the valiant woman, the wise virgin of Scripture; others may know nothing

about her, but I know her worth. In my fancy I always see her carrying a lamp, a humble kitchen lamp,

illuminating the beams of some rustic roofa lamp which will never go out while suspended from that

"Therese, my cravat! Don't you know, wretched woman, that today is the first Thursday in June, and that

Mademoiselle Jeanne will be waiting for me? The schoolmistress has certainly had the parlour floor

vigorously waxed: I am sure one can look at oneself in it now; and it will be quite a consolation for me when

I slip and break my old bones upon itwhich is sure to happen sooner or laterto see my rueful

countenance reflected in it as in a lookingglass. Then taking for my model that amiable and admirable hero

whose image is carved upon the handle of Uncle Victor's walkingstick, I will control myself so g not to

make too ugly a grimace.... See what a splendid sun! The quays are all gilded by it, and the Seine smiles in

countless little flashing wrinkles. The city is gold: a dusthaze, blonde and goldtoned as a woman's hair,

floats above its beautiful contours.... Therese, my cravat!... Ah! I can now comprehend the wisdom of that old

Chrysal who used to keep his neckbands in a big Plutarch. Hereafter I shall follow his example by laying all

Therese lets me talk on, and keeps looking for the necktie in silence. I hear a gentle ringing at our doorbell.

"Therese," I exclaim; "there is somebody ringing the bell! Give me my cravat, and go to the door; or, rather,

go to the door first, and then, with the help of Heaven, you will give me my cravat. But please do not stand

there between the clothespress and the door like an old hackhorse between two saddles.

Therese marched to the door as if advancing upon an enemy. My excellent housekeeper becomes more

inhospitable the older she grows. Every stranger is an object of suspicion to her. According to her own

assertion, this disposition is the result of a long experience with human nature. I had not the time to consider

whether the same experience on the part of another experimenter would produce the same results. Maltre

Maltre Mouche is still more yellow than I had believed him to be. He wears blue glasses, and his eyes keep

Maltre Mouche excuses himself for having intruded upon me at a moment when... He does not characterise

the moment; but I think he means to say a moment in which I happen to be without my cravat. It is not my

fault, as you very well know. Maltre Mouche, who does not know, does not appear to be at all shocked,

however. He is only afraid that he might have dropped in at the wrong moment. I succeeded in partially

reassuring him at once upon that point. He then tells me it is as the guardian of Mademoiselle Alexandre that

he has come to talk with me. First of all, he desires that I shall not hereafter pay any heed to those restrictions

he had at first deemed it necessary to put upon the permit given to visit Mademoiselle Jeanne at the

boardingschool. Henceforth the establishment of Mademoiselle Prefere will be open to me any day that I

may choose to callbetween the hours of midday and four o'clock. Knowing the interest I have taken in the

young girl, he considers it his duty to give me some information about the person to whom he has confided

his ward. Mademoiselle Prefere, whom he has known for many years, is in possession of his utmost

confidence. Mademoiselle Prefere is, in his estimation, an enlightened person, of excellent morals, and

"Mademoiselle Prefer," he said to me, "has principles; and principles are rare in these days, Monsieur.

Everything has been totally changed; and this epoch of ours cannot compare with the preceding ones."

"My stairway is a good example, Monsieur," I replied; "twentyfive years ago it used to allow me to climb it

without any trouble, and now it takes my breath away, and wears my legs out before I have climbed half a

dozen steps. It has had its character spoiled. Then there are those journals and books I used once to devour

without difficulty by moonlight: today, even in the brightest sunlight, they mock my curiosity, and exhibit

nothing but a blur of white and black when I have not got my spectacles on. Then the gout has got into my

"Not only that, Monsieur," gravely replied Maltre Mouche, "but what is really unfortunate in our epoch is that

no one is satisfied with his position. From the top of society to the bottom, in every class, there prevails a

"Mon Dieu, Monsieur!" I exclaimed. "You think this love of comfort is a sign of the times? Men have never

had at any epoch a love of discomfort. They have always tried to better their condition. This constant effort

produces constant changes, and the effort is always going onthat is all there is about it!"

"Ah! Monsieur," replied Maltre Mouche, "it is easy to see that you live in your booksout of the business

world altogether. You do not see, as I see them, the conflicts of interest, the struggle for money. It is the same

effervescence in all minds, great or small. The wildest speculations are being everywhere indulged in. What I

I wondered within myself whether Maitre Mouche had called upon me only for the purpose of expressing his

virtuous misanthropy; but all at once I heard words of a more consoling character issue from his lips. Maitre

Mouche began to speak to me of Virginie Prefere as a person worthy of respect, of esteem, and of

sympathy,highly honourable, capable of great devotedness, cultivated, discreet,able to read aloud

remarkably well, extremely modest, and skilful in the art of applying blisters. Then I began to understand that

he had only been painting that dismal picture of universal corruption in order the better to bring out, by

contrast, the virtues of the schoolmistress. I was further informed that the institution in the Rue Demours was

well patronised, prosperous, and enjoyed a high reputation with the public. Maltre Mouche lifted up his

handwith a black woollen glove on itas if making oath to the truth of these statements. Then he added:

"I am enabled, by the very character of my profession, to know a great deal about people. A notary is, to a

I deemed it my duty, Monsieur, to give you this agreeable information at the moment when a lucky chance

enabled you to meet Mademoiselle Prefere. There is only one thing more which I would like to say. This

ladywho is, of course, quite unaware of my action in the matterspoke to me of you the other day in

terms of the deepest sympathy. I could only weaken their expression by repeating them to you; and,

furthermore, I could not repeat them without betraying, to a certain extent, the confidence of Mademoiselle

"Do not betray it, Monsieur; do not betray it!" I responded. "To tell you the truth, I had no idea that

Mademoiselle Prefere knew anything whatever about me. But since you have the influence of an old friend

with her, I will take advantage of your good will, Monsieur, to ask you to exercise that influence in behalf of

Mademoiselle Jeanne Alexandre. The childfor she is still a childis overloaded with work. She is at once

a pupil and a mistressshe is overtasked. Besides, she is punished in petty disgusting ways; and hers is one

of those generous natures which will be forced into revolt by such continual humiliation."

"Alas!" replied Maltre Mouche, "she must be trained to take her part in the struggle of life. One does not

"One comes into this world," I responded, rather warmly, "to enjoy what is beautiful and what is good, and to

do as one pleases, when the things one wants to do are noble, intelligent, and generous. An education which

does not cultivate the will, is an education that depraves the mind. It is a teacher's duty to teach the pupil how

I perceived that Maltre Mouche began to think me a rather silly man. With a great deal of quiet

"You must remember, Monsieur, that the education of the poor has to be conducted with a great deal of

circumspection, and with a view to that future state of dependence they must occupy in society. Perhaps you

are not aware that the late Noel Alexandre died a bankrupt, and that his daughter is being educated almost by

"Oh! Monsieur!" I exclaimed, "do not say it! To say it is to pay oneself back, and then the statement ceases to

"The liabilities of the estate," continued the notary, "exceeded the assets. But I was able to effect a settlement

He undertook to explain matters in detail. I declined to listen to these explanations, being incapable of

understanding business methods in general, and those of Maltre Mouche in particular. The notary then took it

upon himself to justify Mademoiselle Prefere's educational system, and observed by way of conclusion,

"It is only by amusing oneself that one can learn," I replied. "The whole art of teaching is only the art of

awakening the natural curiosity of young minds for the purpose of satisfying it afterwards; and curiosity itself

can be vivid and wholesome only in proportion as the mind is contented and happy. Those acquirements

crammed by force into the minds of children simply clog and stifle intelligence. In order that knowledge be

properly digested, it must have been swallowed with a good appetite. I know Jeanne! If that child were

intrusted to my care, I should make of hernot a learned woman. for I would look to her future happiness

onlybut a child full of bright intelligence and full of life, in whom everything beautiful in art or nature

would awaken some gentle responsive thrill. I would teach her to live in sympathy with all that is

beautifulcomely landscapes, the ideal scenes of poetry and history, the emotional charm of noble music. I

would make lovable to her everything I would wish her to love. Even her needlework I would make

pleasurable to her, by a proper choice cf the fabrics, the style of embroideries, the designs of lace. I would

give her a beautiful dog, and a pony to teach her how to manage animals; I would give her birds to take care

of, so that she could learn the value of even a drop of water and a crumb of bread. And in order that she

should have a still higher pleasure, I would train her to find delight in exercising charity. And inasmuch as

none of us may escape pain, I should teach her that Christian wisdom which elevates us above all suffering,

and gives a beauty even to grief itself. That is my idea of the right way to educate a young girl."

"I yield, Monsieur," replied Maltre Mouche, joining his blackgloved hands together.

"Of course you understand," I remarked, as I went to the door with him, "that I do not pretend for a moment

to impose my educational system upon Mademoiselle Prefere; it is necessarily a private one, and quite

incompatible with the organisation of even the bestmanaged boarding schools. I only ask you to persuade

her to give Jeanne less work and more play, and not to punish her except in case of absolute necessity, and to

let her have as much freedom of mind and body as the regulations of the institution permit."

It was with a pale and mysterious smile that Maltre Mouche informed me that my observations would be

Therewith he made me a little bow, and took his departure, leaving me with a peculiar feeling of discomfort

and uneasiness. I have met a great many strange characters in my time, but never any at all resembling either

MAITRE MOUCHE had so much delayed me by his visit that I gave up going to see Jeanne that day.

Professional duties kept me very busy for the rest of the week. Although at the age when most men retire

altogether from active life, I am still attached by a thousand ties to the society in which I have lived. I have to

preside at meetings of academies, scientific congresses, assemblies of various learned bodies. I am

overburdened with honorary functions; I have seven of these in one government department alone. The

bureaux would be very glad to get rid of me, and I should be very glad to get rid of them. But habit is

stronger than both of us together, and I continue to hobble up the stairs of various government buildings. Old

clerks point me out to each other as I go by like a ghost wandering through the corridors. When one has

become very old one finds it extremely difficult to disappear. Nevertheless, it is time, as the old song says, de

prendre ma retraite et de songer a faire un fin"to retire on my pension and prepare myself to die a good

An old marchioness, who used to be a friend of Helvetius in her youth, and whom I once met at my father's

house when a very old woman, was visited during her last sickness by the priest of her parish, who wanted to

"Is that really necessary?" she asked. "I see everybody else manage it perfectly well the first time."

"Goodevening, my friend!" she said, pressing his hand. "I am going to see whether God improves upon

So were wont to die the belles amies of the philosophers. Such an end is certainly not vulgar nor impertinent,

and such levities are not of the sort that emanate from dull minds. Nevertheless, they shock me. Neither my

fears nor my hopes could accommodate themselves to such a mode of departure. I would like to make mine

with a perfectly collected mind; and that is why I must begin to think, in a year or two, about some way of

belonging to myself; otherwise, I should certainly risk ... But, hush! let Him not hear His name and turn to

...I found Jeanne very happy indeed. She told me that, on the Thursday previous, after the visit of her

guardian, Mademoiselle Prefere had set her free from the ordinary regulations and lightened her tasks in

several ways. Since that lucky Thursday she could walk in the gardenwhich only lacked leaves and

flowersas much as she liked; and she had even been given facilities to work at her unfortunate little figure

I tried to talk with her about other matters, but I remarked that she could not attend to what I was saying, in

"I see you are thinking about something else," I said. "Well, tell me what it is; for, if you do not, we shall not

be able to talk to each other at all, which would be very unworthy of both of us."

"Oh! I was really listening to you, Monsieur; but it is true that I was thinking about something else. You will

excuse me, won't you? I could not help thinking that Mademoiselle Prefere must like you very, very much

"Because I can see no reason, no reason at all ... but there!... no reason at all why you should please

She bit her lips, as if to punish them for having made a mistake; and then, in a coaxing way, looking at me

"I know I said a foolish thing; but, still, I do not see any reason why you should be so pleasing to

Mademoiselle Prefere. And, nevertheless, you seem to please her a great deala very great deal. She called

"Yes; she wanted to find out all about your house. Just think I she even asked me how old your servant was!"

She remained a long while with her eyes fixed on the wornout cloth of her shoes, and seemed to be thinking

"I am distrustful. Isn't it very natural to feel uneasy about what one cannot understand; I know I am foolish;

I must acknowledge that I was beginning to share her surprise; and I began to turn over in my old head the

singular thought of this young girl"One is uneasy about what one cannot understand."

"She asked me... guess! I will give you a hundred guessesa thousand guesses. You give it up?... She asked

"I replied, 'I don't know, Mademoiselle.' And Mademoiselle then said to me, 'You are a little fool. The least

details of the life of an eminent man ought to be observed. Please to know, Mademoiselle, that Monsieur

But I don't care at all... (I know it is naughty what I am going to say)... I don't care a bit, not a bit, whether

"Yes, yes, she was quite right that time; but I wanted to love everybody who loved youeverybody without

exceptionand I cannot do it, because it would never be possible for me to love Mademoiselle Prefere."

"Listen, Jeanne," I answered, very seriously, "Mademoiselle Prefere has become good to you; try now to be

"It is very easy for Mademoiselle Prefere to be good to me, and it would be very difficult indeed for me to be

"My child, the authority of a teacher is sacred. You must consider your schoolmistress as occupying the place

I had scarcely uttered this solemn stupidity when I bitterly regretted it. The child turned pale, and the tears

"Oh, Monsieur!" she cried, "how could you say such a thingyou? You never knew mamma!"

Ay, just Heaven! I did know her mamma. And how indeed could I have been foolish enough to have said

A lucky chance prevented me from playing the fool any further. I do not know how it happened that at that

moment I looked as if I was going to cry. At my age one does not cry. It must have been a bad cough which

brought the tears into my eyes. But, anyhow, appearances were in my favour. Jeanne was deceived by them.

Oh! what a pure and radiant smile suddenly shone out under her beautiful wet eyelasheslike sunshine

among branches after a summer shower! We took each other by the hand and sat a long while without saying

a wordabsolutely happy. Those celestial harmonies which I once thought I heard thrilling through my soul

while I knelt before that tomb to which a saintly woman had guided me, suddenly awoke again in my heart,

slowswelling through the blissful moments with infinite softness. Doubtless the child whose hand pressed

my own also heard them; and then, elevated by their enchantment above the material world, the poor old man

and the artless young girl both knew that a tender ghostly Presence was making sweetness all about

"My child," I said at last, "I am very old, and many secrets of life, which you will only learn little by little,

have been revealed to me. Believe me, the future is shaped out of the past. Whatever you can do to live

contentedly here, without impatience and without fretting, will help you to live some future day in peace and

joy in your own home. Be gentle, and learn how to suffer. When one suffers patiently one suffers less. If you

should ever happen to have a serious cause of complaint I shall be there to take your part. If you should be

badly treated, Madame de Gabry and I would both consider ourselves badly treated in your person."...

It was Mademoiselle Prefere, approaching stealthily behind us, who had asked the question with her peculiar

smile. My first idea was to tell her to go to the devil; my second, that her mouth was as little suited for

smiling as a fryingpan for musical purposes; my third was to answer her politely and assure her that I hoped

She sent the young girl out to take a walk in the garden; then, pressing one hand upon her pelerine and

extending the other towards the Tableau d'Honneur, she showed me the name of Jeanne Alexandre written at

"I am very much pleased," I said to her, "to find that you are satisfied with the behaviour of that child.

Nothing could delight me more; and I am inclined to attribute this happy result to your affectionate vigilance.

I have taken the liberty to send you a few books which I think may serve both to instruct and to amuse young

girls. You will be able to judge by glancing over them whether they are adapted to the perusal of

The gratitude of the schoolmistress not only overflowed in words, but seemed about to take the form of

"Yes," she replied; "and if this weather continues, those dear children will have a nice time for their

"I suppose you are referring to the holidays. But Mademoiselle Alexandre, who has no relatives, cannot go

"Oh, we will do everything we can to amuse her.... I will take her to the museums and"

We separated very good friends with one another. I with her, because I had been able to obtain what I

desired; she with me, for no appreciable motive which fact, according to Plato, elevated her into the

... And nevertheless it is not without a presentiment of evil that I find myself on the point of introducing this

person into my house. And I would be very glad indeed to see Jeanne in charge of any body else rather than

of her. Maltre Mouche and Mademoiselle Prefere are characters whom I cannot at all understand. I never can

imagine why they say what they do say, nor why they do what they do; they have a mysterious something in

common which makes me feel uneasy. As Jeanne said to me a little while ago: "One is uneasy about what

Alas! at my age one has learned only too well how little sincerity there is in life; one has learned only too

well how much one loses by living a long time in this world; and one feels that one can no longer trust any

I WAITED for them. In fact, I waited for them very impatiently. I exerted all my powers of insinuation and of

coaxing to induce Therese to receive them kindly; but my powers in this direction are very limited. They

came. Jeanne was neater and prettier than I had ever expected to see her. She has not, it is true, anything

approaching the charm of her mother. But today, for the first time, I observed that she has a pleasing face;

and a pleasing face is of great advantage to a woman in this world. I think that her hat was a little on one side;

I watched Therese to see whether the rigid manners of the old housekeeper would soften a little at the sight of

the young girl. I saw her turning her lustreless eyes upon Jeanne; I saw her long wrinkled face, her toothless

mouth, and that pointed chin of herslike the chin of some puissant old fairy. And that was all I could see.

Mademoiselle Prefere made her appearance all in blueadvanced, retreated, skipped, tripped, cried out,

sighed, cast her eyes down, rolled her eyes up, bewildered herself with excusessaid she dared not, and

nevertheless daredsaid she would never dare again, and nevertheless dared againmade courtesies

"What a lot of books!" she screamed. "And have you really read them all, Monsieur Bonnard?"

"Alas! I have," I replied, "and that is just the reason that I do not know anything; for there is not a single one

of those books which does not contradict some other book; so that by the time one has read them all one does

Thereupon she called Jeanne for the purpose of communicating her impressions. But Jeanne was looking out

"How beautiful it is!" she said to us. "How I love to see the river flowing! It makes you think about all kinds

Mademoiselle Prefere having removed her hat and exhibited a forehead tricked out with blonde curls, my

housekeeper sturdily snatched up the hat at once, with the observation that she did not like to see people's

clothes scattered over the furniture. Then she approached Jeanne and asked her for her "things," calling her

"my little lady!" Whereupon the little lady, giving up her cloak and hat, exposed to view a very graceful neck

and a lithe figure, whose outlines were beautifully relieved against the great glow of the open window; and I

could have wished that some one else might have seen her at that momentsome one very different from an

aged housekeeper, a schoolmistress frizzled like a sheep, and this old humbug of an archivist and

"So you are looking at the Seine," I said to her. "See how it sparkles in the sun!"

"Yes," she replied, leaning over the windowbar, "it looks like a flowing of fire. But see how nice and cool it

looks on the other side over there, under the shadow of the willows! That little spot there pleases me better

"Good!" I answered. "I see that the river has a charm for you. How would you like, with Mademoiselle

Prefere's permission, to make a trip to SaintCloud? We should certainly be in time to catch the steamboat

Jeanne was delighted with my suggestion, and Mademoiselle Prefere willing to make any sacrifice. But my

housekeeper was not at all willing to let us go off so unconcernedly. She summoned me into the

"Monsieur," she said to me as soon as we found ourselves alone, "you never think about anything, and it is

always I who have to think about every thing. Luckily for you I have a good memory."

I did not think that it was a favourable moment for any attempt to dispel this wild illusion. She continued:

"So you were going off without saying a word to me about what this little lady likes to eat? At her age one

does not know anything, one does not care about anything in particular, one eats like a bird. You yourself,

Monsieur, are very difficult to please; but at least you know what is good: it is very different with these

young peoplethey do not know anything about cooking. It is often the very best thing which they think the

worst, and what is bad seems to them good, because their stomachs are not quite formed yetso that one

never knows just what to do for them. Tell me if the little lady would like a pigeon cooked with green peas,

"My good Theresa," I answered, "just do what ever you think best, and whatever that may be I am sure it will

be very nice. Those ladies will be quite contented with our humble ordinary fare."

"Monsieur, I am asking you about the little lady: she must not leave this house without having enjoyed

herself a little. As for that old frizzle headed thing, if she doesn't like my dinner she can suck her thumbs. I

My mind being thus set at rest, I returned into the City of Books, where Mademoiselle Prefere was crocheting

as calmly as if she were at home. I almost felt inclined myself to think she was. She did not take up much

room, it is true, in the angle of the window. But she had chosen her chair and her footstool so well that those

Jeanne, on the other hand, devoted her attention to the books and picturesgazing at them in a kindly,

"Here," I said to her, "amuse yourself with this book, which I am sure you cannot help liking, because it is

full of beautiful engravings." And I threw open before her Vecellio's collection of costumedesignsnot the

commonplace edition, by your leave, so meagrely reproduced by modern artists, but in truth a magnificent

and venerable copy of that editio princeps which is noble as those noble dames who figure upon its yellowed

"We were talking about taking a walk; but this is a great journey you are making me take. And I would like to

"In that case, Mademoiselle," I said to her, "you must arrange yourself as comfortably as possible for

travelling. But you are now sitting on one corner of your chair, so that the chair is standing upon only one leg,

and that Vecellio must tire your knees. Sit down comfortably; put your chair on its four feet, and put your

"Oh, come look at this beautiful costume!" (It was that of the wife of a Doge of Venice.) "How noble it is!

What magnificent ideas it gives one of that life! Oh, I must tell youI adore luxury!"

"You must not express such thoughts as those, Mademoiselle," said the schoolmistress, lifting up her little

"Nevertheless, it was a very innocent utterance," I replied. "There are splendid souls in whom the love of

"Mademoiselle Prefere likes luxury too," said Jeanne; "she cuts out paper trimmings and shades for the

Having returned to the subject of Venice, we were just about to make the acquaintance of a certain patrician

lady attired in an embroidered dalmatic, when I heard the bell ring. I thought it was some peddler with his

basket; but the gate of the City of Books opened, and... Well, Master Sylvestre Bonnard, you were wishing

awhile ago that the grace of your protegee might be observed by some other eyes than old withered ones

behind spectacles. Your wishes have been fulfilled in a most unexpected manner, and a voice cries out to you,

"Craignez, Seigneur, craignez que le Ciel rigoureux Ne vous haisse assez pour exaucer vos voeux! Souvent

dans sa colere il recoit nos victimes, Ses presents sont souvent la peine de nos crimes."*

*"Beware, my lord! Beware lest stern Heaven hate you enough to hear your prayers!

Often 'tis in wrath that Heaven receives our sacrifices: its gifts are often the punishment of our crimes."

The gate of the City of Books had opened, and a handsome young man made his appearance, ushered in by

Therese. That good old soul only knows how to open the door for people and to shut it behind them; she has

no idea whatever of the tact requisite for the waitingroom and for the pallour. It is not in her nature either to

make any announcements or to make anybody wait. She either throws people out on the lobby, or simply

And here is this handsome young man already inside; and I cannot really take the girl at once and hide her

like a secret treasure in the next room. I wait for him to explain himself; he does it without the least

embarrassment; but it seems to me that he has already observed the young girl who is still bending over the

table looking at Vecellio. As I observe the young man it occurs to me that I have seen him somewhere before,

or else I must be very much mistaken. His name is Gelis. That is a name which I have heard somewhere,I

can't remember where. At all events, Monsieur Gelis (since there is a Gelis) is a finelooking young fellow.

He tells me that this is his third classyear at the Ecole des Chartes, and that he has beer working for the past

fifteen or eighteen months upon his graduation thesis, the subject of which is the Condition of the

Benedictine Abbeys in 1700 He has just read my works upon the "Monasticon"; and he is convinced that he

cannot terminate this thesis successfully without my advice to begin with, and in the second place without a

certain manuscript which I possess, and which is nothing less than the "Register of the Accounts of the

Having thus explained himself, he hands me a letter of introduction bearing the signature of one of the most

Good! Now I know who he is! Monsieur Gelis is the very same young man who last year under the

chestnuttrees called me an idiot! And while unfolding his letter of introduction I think to myself:

"Aha! my unlucky youth, you are very far from suspecting that I overheard what you said, and that I know

what you think of meor, at least, what you did think of me that day, for these young minds are so fickle? I

have got you now, my friend! You have fallen into the lion's den, and so unexpectedly, in good sooth, that the

astonished old lion does not know what to do with his prey. But come now, old lion! do not act like an idiot!

Is it not possible that you were an idiot? If you are not one now, you certainly were one! You were a fool to

have been listening to Monsieur Gelis at the foot of the statue of Marguerite de Valois; you were doubly a

fool to have heard what he said; and you were trebly a fool not to have forgotten what it would have been

Having thus scolded the old lion, I exhorted him to show clemency. He did not appear to require much

coaxing, and gradually became so goodnatured that he had some difficulty in restraining himself from

bursting out into joyous roarings. From the way in which I had read my colleague's letter one might have

supposed me a man who did not know his alphabet. I took a long while to read it; and Monsieur Gelis might

have become very tired under different circumstances; but he was watching Jeanne, and endured the trial with

exemplary patience. Jeanne occasionally turned her face in our direction. Well, you could not expect a person

to remain perfectly motionless, could you? Mademoiselle Prefere was arranging her curls, and her bosom

occasionally swelled with little sighs. It may be observed that I have myself often been honoured with these

"Monsieur," I said, as I folded up the letter, "I shall be very happy to be of any service to you. You are

occupied with researches in which I myself have always felt a very lively interest. I have done all that lay in

my power. I know, as you doand still better than you can knowhow much there remains to do. The

manuscript you asked for is at your disposal; you may take it home with you, but it is not a manuscript of the

"Oh, Monsieur," said Gelis, "big books have never been able to make me afraid of them."

I begged the young man to wait for me, and I went into the next room to get the Register, which I could not

find at first, and which I almost despaired of finding, as I discerned, from certain familiar signs, that Therese

had been setting the room in order. But the Register was so big and so heavy that, luckily for me, Therese had

not been able to put it in order as she had doubtless wished to do. I could scarcely lift it up myself; and I had

"Wait, my boy," I said, with a smile which must have been very sarcastic"wait! I am going to give you

something to do which will break your arms first, and afterwards your head. That will be the first vengeance

When I returned to the City of Books I heard Monsieur Gelis and Mademoiselle Jeanne chattingchatting

together, if you please! as if they were the best friends in the world. Mademoiselle Prefere, being full of

decorum, did not say anything; but the other two were chattering like birds. And what about? About the blond

tint used by Venetian painters! Yes, about the "Venetian blond." That little serpent of a Gelis was telling

Jeanne the secret of the dye with which, according to the best authorities, the women of Titian and of

Veronese tinted their hair. And Mademoiselle Jeanne was expressing her opinion very prettily about the

honey tint and the golden tint. I understood that that scamp of a Vecellio was responsible that they had

been bending over the book together, and that they had been admiring either that Doge's wife we had been

Never mind! I appeared with my enormous old book, thinking that Gelis was going to make a grimace. It was

as much as one could have asked a porter to carry, and my arms were stiff merely with lifting it. But the

young man caught it up like a feather, and slipped it under his arm with a smile. Then he thanked me with

that sort of brevity which I like, reminded me that he had need of my advice, and, having made an

appointment to meet me another day, took his departure after bowing to us with the most perfect

THE regularity with which visit succeeded visit to the old man's house thereafter made me feel very grateful

to Mademoiselle Prefere, who succeeded at last in winning her right to occupy a special corner in the City of

Books. She now says "my chair," "my footstool," my pigeonhole." Her pigeon hole is really a small shelf

properly belonging to the poets of La Champagne, whom she expelled therefrom in order to obtain a lodging

for her workbag. She is very amiable, and I must really be a monster not to like her. I can only endure

herin the severest signification of the word. But what would one not endure for Jeanne's sake? Her

presence lends to the City of Books a charm which seems to hover about it even after she has gone. She is

very ignorant; but she is so finely gifted that whenever I show her anything beautiful I am astounded to find

that I had never really seen it before, and that it is she who makes me see it. I have found it impossible so far

to make her follow some of my ideas, but I have often found pleasure in following the whimsical and delicate

A more practical man than I would attempt to teach her to make herself useful; but is not the capacity of

being amiable a useful thing in life? Without being pretty, she charms; and the power to charm is perhaps,

after all, worth quite as much as the ability to darn stockings. Furthermore, I am not immortal; and I doubt

whether she will have become very old when my notary (who is not Maltre Mouche) shall read to her a

I do not wish that any one except myself should provide for her, and give her her dowry. I am not, however,

very rich, and the paternal inheritance did not gain bulk in my hands. One does not accumulate money by

poring over old texts. But my booksat the price which such noble merchandise fetches todayare worth

something. Why, on that shelf there are some poets of the sixteenth century for which bankers would bid

against princes! And I think that those "Heures" of Simon Vostre would not be readily overlooked at the

Hotel Sylvestre any more than would those Preces Piae compiled for the use of Queen Claude. I have taken

great pains to collect and to preserve all those rare and curious editions which people the City of Books; and

for a long time I used to believe that they were as necessary to my life as air and light. I have loved them

well, and even now I cannot prevent myself from smiling at them and caressing them. Those morocco

bindings are so delightful to the eye! Those old vellums are so soft to the touch! There is not a single one

among those books which is no worthy, by reason of some special merit, to command the respect of an

honourable man. What other owner would ever know how to dip into them in the proper way? Can I be even

sure that another owner would not leave them to decay in neglect, or mutilate them at the prompting of some

ignorant whim? Into whose hands will fall that incomparable copy of the "Histoire de l'Abbaye de

SaintGermaindesPres," on the margins of which the author himself, in the person of Jacques Bouillard,

made such substantial notes in his own handwriting?... Master Bonnard, you are an old fool! Your

housekeeperpoor soul!is nailed down upon her bed with a merciless attack of rheumatism. Jeanne is to

come with her chaperon, and, instead of thinking how you are going to receive them, you are thinking about a

thousand stupidities. Sylvestre Bonnard, you will never succeed at anything in this world, and it is I myself

And at this very moment I catch sight of them from my window, as they get out of the omnibus. Jeanne leaps

down like a kitten; but Mademoiselle Prefere intrusts herself to the strong arm of the conductor, with the shy

grace of a Virginia recovering after the shipwreck, and this time quite resigned to being saved. Jeanne looks

up, sees me, laughs, and Mademoiselle Prefere has to prevent her from waving her umbrella at me as a

friendly signal. There is a certain stage of civilisation to which Mademoiselle Jeanne never can be brought.

You can teach her all the arts if you like (it is not exactly to Mademoiselle Prefere that I am now speaking);

but you will never be able to teach her perfect manners. As a charming girl she makes the mistake of being

charming only in her own way. Only an old fool like myself could forgive her pranks. As for young

foolsand there are several of them still to be foundI do not know what they would think about it; and

what they might think is none of my business. Just look at her running along the pavement, wrapped up in her

cloak, with her hat tilted back on her head, and her feather fluttering in the wind, like a schooner in full rig!

And really she has a grace of poise and motion which suggests a fine sailingvesselso much so, indeed,

that she makes me remember seeing one day, when I was at Havre... But, Bonnard, my friend, how many

times is it necessary to tell you that your housekeeper is in bed, and that you must go and open the door

It is Jeanne herselfJeanne all flushed like a rose. Mademoiselle Prefere, indignant and out of breath, has

I explained the condition of my housekeeper, and proposed that we should dine at a restaurant. But

Thereseallpowerful still, even upon her sickbed decided that we should dine at home, whether we

wanted to or no. Respectable people, in her opinion, never dined at restaurants. Moreover, she had made all

The audacious Jeanne insisted upon going to see whether the old woman wanted anything. As you might

suppose, she was sent back to the parlour with short shrift, but not so harshly as I had feared.

"If I want anybody to do anything for me, which, thank God, I do not," Therese had replied, "I would get

somebody less delicate and dainty than you are. What I want is rest. That is a merchandise which is not sold

at fairs under the sign of Motus with finger on lip. Go and have your fun, and don't stay herefor old age

Jeanne, after telling us what she had said, added that she liked very much to hear old Therese talk.

Whereupon Mademoiselle Prefere reproached her for expressing such unladylike tastes.

I tried to excuse her by citing the example of Moliere. Just at that moment it came to pass that, while

climbing the ladder to get a book, she upset a whole shelfrow. There was a heavy crash; and Mademoiselle

Prefere, being, of course, a very delicate person, almost fainted. Jeanne quickly followed the books to the foot

of the ladder. She made one think of a kitten suddenly transformed into a woman, catching mice which had

been transformed into old books. While picking them up, she found one which happened to interest her, and

she began to read it, squatting down upon her heels. It was the "Prince Grenouille," she told us. Mademoiselle

Prefere took occasion to complain that Jeanne had so little taste for poetry. It was impossible to get her to

recite Casimir Delavigne's poem on the death of Joan of Arc without mistakes. It was the very most she could

do to learn "Le Petit Savoyard." The schoolmistress did not think that any one should read the "Prince

Grenouille" before learning by heart the stanzas to Duperrier; and, carried away by her enthusiasm, she began

"How beautiful that is! What harmony! How is it possible for any one not to admire such exquisite, such

touching verses! But why did Malherbe call that poor Monsieur Duperrier his 'injurieux ami' at a time when

he had been so severely tried by the death of his daughter? Injurieux amiyou must acknowledge that the

I explained to this poetical person that the phrase "Injurieux ami," which shocked her so much, was in

apposition, etc. etc. What I said, however, had so little effect towards clearing her head that she was seized

with a severe and prolonged fit of sneezing. Meanwhile it was evident that the history of "Prince Grenouille"

had proved extremely funny; for it was all that Jeanne could do, as she crouched down there on the carpet, to

keep herself from bursting into a wild fit of laughter. But when she had finished with the prince and princess

of the story, and the multitude of their children, she assumed a very suppliant expression, and begged me as a

great favour to allow her to put on a white apron and go to the kitchen to help in getting the dinner ready.

"Jeanne," I replied, with the gravity of a master, "I think that if it is a question of breaking plates, knocking

off the edges of dishes, denting all the pans, and smashing all the skimmers, the person whom Therese has set

to work in the kitchen already will be able to perform her task without assistance; for it seems to me at this

very moment I can hear disastrous noises in that kitchen. But anyhow, Jeanne, I will charge you with the duty

of preparing the dessert. So go and get your white apron; I will tie it on for you."

Accordingly, I solemnly knotted the linen apron about her waist; and she rushed into the kitchen, where she

proceeded at onceas we discovered later onto prepare various dishes unknown to Vatel, unknown even

to that great Careme who began his treatise upon pieces montees with these words: "The Fine arts are five in

number: Painting, Music, Poetry, Sculpture, and Architecturewhereof the principal branch is

Confectionery." But I had no reason to be pleased with this little arrangementfor Mademoiselle Prefere, on

finding herself alone with me, began to act after a fashion which filled me with frightful anxiety. She gazed

"Oh, how I pity you!" she said. "A man like youa man so superior as you arehaving to live alone with a

coarse servant (for she is certainly coarse, that is incontestable)! How cruel such a life must be! You have

need of reposeyou have need of comfort, of care, of every kind of attention; you might fall sick. And yet

there is no woman who would not deem it an honour to bear your name, and to share your existence. No,

I was driven almost to distraction. I tried to make Mademoiselle Prefere comprehend that I had no intention

whatever of changing my habits at so advanced an age, and that I found just as much happiness in life as my

"No, you are not happy!" she cried. "You need to have always beside you a mind capable of comprehending

your own. Shake off your lethargy, and cast your eyes about you. Your professional connections are of the

most extended character, and you must have charming acquaintances. One cannot be a Member of the

Institute without going into society. See, judge, compare. No sensible woman would refuse you her hand. I

am a woman, Monsieur; my instinct never deceives methere is something within me which assures me that

you would find happiness in marriage. Women are so devoted, so loving (not all, of course, but some)! And,

then, they are so sensitive to glory. Remember that at your age one has need, like OEdipus, of an Egeria!

Your cook is no longer ableshe is deaf, she is infirm. If anything should happen to you at night! Oh! it

And she really shudderedshe closed her eyes, clenched her hands, stamped on the floor. Great was my

"Your healthyour dear health! The health of a Member of the Institute! How joyfully I would shed the very

last drop of my blood to preserve the life of a scholar, of a litterateur, of a man of worth. And any woman

who would not do as much, I should despise her! Let me tell you, MonsieurI used to know the wife of a

great mathematician, a man who used to fill whole notebooks with calculationsso many notebooks that

they filled all the cupboards in the house. He had heartdisease, and he was visibly pining away. And I saw

that wife of his, sitting there beside him, perfectly calm! I could not endure it. I said to her one day, 'My dear,

you have no heart! If I were in your place I should... I should... I do not know what I should do!'"

She paused for want of breath. My situation was terrible. As for telling Mademoiselle Prefere what I really

thought about her advicethat was something which I could not even dream of daring to do. For to fall out

with her was to lose the chance of seeing Jeanne. So I resolved to take the matter quietly. In any case, she was

in my house: that consideration helped me to treat her with something of courtesy.

"I am very old, Mademoiselle," I answered her, "and I am very much afraid that your advice comes to me

rather too late in life. Still, I will think about it. In the meanwhile let me beg of you to be calm. I think a glass

To my great surprise, these words calmed her at once; and I saw her sit down very quietly in her corner, close

The dinner was a complete failure. Mademoiselle Prefere, who seemed lost in a brown study, never noticed

the fact. As a rule I am very sensitive about such misfortunes; but this one caused Jeanne so much delight that

at last I could not help enjoying it myself. Even at my age I had not been able to learn before that a chicken,

raw on one side and burned on the other, was a funny thing; but Jeanne's bursts of laughter taught me that it

was. That chicken caused us to say a thousand very witty things, which I have forgotten; and I was enchanted

that it had not been properly cooked Jeanne put it back to roast again; then she broiled it; then she stewed it

with butter. And every time it came back to the table it was much less appetising and much more

mirthprovoking than before. When we did eat it, at last, it had become a thing for which there is no name in

The almond cake was much more extraordinary. It was brought to the table in the pan, because it never could

have been got out of it. I invited Jeanne to help us all to a piece, thinking that I was going to embarrass her;

but she broke the pan and gave each of us a fragment. To think that anybody at my age could eat such things

was an idea possible only to a very artless mind. Mademoiselle Prefere, suddenly awakened from her dream,

indignantly pushed away the sugary splinter of earthenware, and deemed it opportune to inform me that she

Then she wrapped all the fragments of the pan in a piece of paper, for the purpose of giving them to her little

playmatesespecially to the three little Mouton girls, who are naturally inclined to gluttony.

Secretly, however, I was beginning to feel very uneasy. It did not now seem in any way possible to keep

much longer upon good terms with Mademoiselle Prefere since her matrimonial fury had thus burst forth.

And that lady affronted, goodbye to Jeanne! I took advantage of a moment while the sweet soul was busy

putting on her cloak, in order to ask Jeanne to tell me exactly what her own age was. She was eighteen years

and one month old. I counted on my fingers, and found she would not come of age for another two years and

At the door Mademoiselle Prefere squeezed my hand with so much meaning that I fairly shook from head to

"Goodbye," I said very gravely to the young girl. "But listen to me a moment: your friend is very old, and

might perhaps fail you when you need him most. Promise me never to fail in your duty to yourself, and then I

After closing the door behind them, I opened the window to get a last look at her as she was going away. But

the night was dark, and I could see only two vague shadows flitting across the quay. I heard the vast deep

hum of the city rising up about me; and I suddenly felt a great sinking at my heart.

THE King of Thule kept a goblet of gold which his dying mistress had bequeathed him as a souvenir. When

about to die himself, after having drunk from it for the last time, he threw the goblet into the sea. And I keep

this diary of memories even as that old prince of the misthaunted seas kept his carven goblet; and even as he

flung away at last his lovepledge, so will I burn this my book of souvenirs. Assuredly it is not through any

arrogant avarice nor through any egotistical pride, that I shall destroy this record of a humble lifeit is only

because I fear lest those things which are dear and sacred to me might appear to others, because of my

I do not say this in view of what is going to follow. Absurd I certainly must have been when, having been

invited to dinner by Mademoiselle Prefere, I took my seat in a bergere (it was really a bergere) at the right

hand of that alarming person. The table had been set in a little parlour; and I could observe from the poor way

in which it was set out that the schoolmistress was one of those ethereal souls who soar above terrestrial

things. Chipped plates, unmatched glasses, knives with loose handles, forks with yellow prongsthere was

I was assured that the dinner had been cooked for mefor me alonealthough Maitre Mouche had also

been invited. Mademoiselle Prefere must have imagined that I had Sarmatian tastes on the subject of butter;

for that which she offered me, served up in little thin pats, was excessively rancid.

The roast very nearly poisoned me. But I had the pleasure of hearing Maltre Mouche and Mademoiselle

Prefere discourse upon virtue. I said the pleasureI ought to have said the shame; for the sentiments to

What they said proved to me as clear as day that devotedness was their daily bread, and that selfsacrifice

was not less necessary to their existence than air and water. Observing that I was not eating, Mademoiselle

Prefere made a thousand efforts to overcome that which she was good enough to term my "discretion."

Jeanne was not of the party, because, I was told, her presence at it would have been contrary to the rules, and

would have wounded the feelings of the other schoolchildren, among whom it was necessary to maintain a

certain equality. I secretly congratulated her upon having escaped from the Merovingian butter; from the

huge radishes, empty as funeralurns; from the leathery roast, and from various other curiosities of diet to

The extremely disconsolatelooking servant served up some liquid to which they gave the name of creamI

Then Mademoiselle Prefere related to Maltre Mouche, with extraordinary transports of emotion, all that she

had said to me in the City of Books, during the time that my housekeeper was sick in bed. Her admiration for

a Member of the Institute, her terror lest I should be taken ill while unattended, and the certainty she felt that

any intelligent woman would be proud and happy to share my existenceshe concealed nothing, but, on the

contrary, added many fresh follies to the recital. Maitre Monche kept nodding his head in approval while

cracking nuts. Then, after all this verbiage, he demanded, with an agreeable smile, what my answer had been.

Mademoiselle Prefere, pressing her hand upon her heart and extending the other towards me, cried out,

"He is so affectionate, so superior, so good, and so great! He answered.... But I could never, because I am

only a humble womanI could never repeat the words of a Member of the Institute. I can only utter the

And with these words she reached out and seized one of my hands. Then Maitre Mouche, also overwhelmed

Several times in my life I have known fear; but never before had I experienced any fright of so nauseating a

I disengaged my two hands, and, rising to my feet, so as to give all possible seriousness to my words, I said,

"Madame, either I explained myself very badly when you were at my house, or I have totally misunderstood

you here in your own. In either case, a positive declaration is absolutely necessary. Permit me, Madame, to

make it now, very plainly. NoI never did understand you; I am totally ignorant of the nature of this

marriage project that you have been planning for meif you really have been planning one. In any event, I

should not think of marrying. It would be an unpardonable folly at my age, and even now, at this moment, I

cannot conceive how a sensible person like you could ever have advised me to marry. Indeed, I am strongly

inclined to believe that I must have been mistaken, and that you never said anything of the kind before. In the

latter case, please to excuse an old man totally unfamiliar with the usages of society, unaccustomed to the

Maltre Mouche went back very softly to his place, where, not finding any more nuts to crack, he began to

Mademoiselle Prefere, after staring at me for a few moments with an expression in her little round dry eyes

which I had never seen there before, suddenly resumed her customary sweetness and graciousness. Then she

"Oh! these learned men!these studious men! They are all like children. Yes, Monsieur Bonnard, you are a

Then, turning to the notary, who still sat very quietly in his corner, with his nose over his cork, she

"Oh, do not accuse him! Do not accuse him! Do not think any evil of him, I beg of you! Do not think it at all!

Maltre Mouche continued to examine all the various aspects and surfaces of his cork without making any

I was very indignant; and I know that my cheeks must have been extremely red, if I could judge by the flush

of heat which I felt rise to my face. This would enable me to explain the words I heard through all the

"I am frightened about him! our poor friend! ...Monsieur Mouche, be kind enough to open a window! It

I PASSED eight days without hearing anything further in regard to the Prefere establishment. Then, feeling

myself unable to remain any longer without some news of Clementine's daughter, and feeling furthermore

that I owed it as a duty to myself not to cease my visits to the school without more serious cause, I took my

The parlour seemed to me more cold, more damp, more inhospitable, and more insidious than ever before;

and the servant much more silent and much more scared. I asked to see Mademoiselle Jeanne; but, after a

very considerable time, it was Mademoiselle Prefere who made her appearance insteadsevere and pale,

"Monsieur," she said, folding her arms over her pelerine, "I regret very much that I cannot allow you to see

"Monsieur," she replied, "the reasons which compel me to request that your visits shall be less frequent

hereafter are of an excessively delicate nature; and I must beg you to spare me the unpleasantness of

"Madame," I replied, "I have been authorized by Jeanne's guardian to see his ward every day. Will you please

"The guardian of Mademoiselle Alexandre," she replied (and she dwelt upon that word "guardian" as upon a

solid support), "desires, quite as strongly as I myself do, that your assiduities may come to an end as soon as

"Then, if that be the case," I said, "be kind enough to let me know his reasons and your own."

She looked up at the little spiral of paper on the ceiling, and then replied, with stern composure,

"You insist upon it? Well, although such explanations are very painful for a woman to make, I will wield to

your exaction. This house, Monsieur is an honourable house. I have my responsibility. I have to watch like a

mother over each one of my pupils. Your assiduities in regard to Mademoiselle Alexandre could not possibly

be continued without serious injury to the young girl herself; and it is my duty to insist that they shall cease."

"I do not really understand you," I repliedand I was telling the plain truth. Then she deliberately resumed:

"Your assiduities in this house are being interpreted, by the most respectable and the least suspicious persons,

in such a manner that I find myself obliged, both in the interest of my establishment and in the interest of

"Madame," I cried, "I have heard a great many silly things in my life, but never anything so silly as what you

"Your words of abuse will not affect me in the slightest. When one has a duty to accomplish, one is strong

And she pressed her pelerine over her heart once morenot perhaps on this occasion to restrain, but

"Madame," I said, shaking my finger at her, "you have wantonly aroused the indignation of an aged man. Be

good enough to act in such a fashion that the old man may be able at least to forget your existence, and do not

add fresh insults to those which I have already sustained from your lips. I give you fair warning that I shall

never cease to look after Mademoiselle Alexandre; and that should you attempt to do her any harm, in any

The more I became excited, the more she became cool; and she answered in a tone of superb indifference:

"Monsieur, I am much too well informed in regard to the nature of the interest which you take in this young

girl, not to withdraw her immediately from that very surveillance with which you threaten me. After

observing the more than equivocal intimacy in which you are living with your housekeeper, I ought to have

taken measures at once to render it impossible for you ever to come into contact with an innocent child. In the

future I shall certainly do it. If up to this time I have been too trustful, it is for Mademoiselle Alexandre, and

not for you, to reproach me with it. But she is too artless and too purethanks to me!ever to have

suspected the nature of that danger into which you were trying to lead her. I scarcely suppose that you will

"Come, my poor old Bonnard," I said to myself, as I shrugged my shoulders"so you had to live as long as

this in order to learn for the first time exactly what a wicked woman is. And now your knowledge of the

I went out without replying; and I had the pleasure of observing, from the sudden flush which overspread the

face of the schoolmistress, that my silence had wounded her far more than my words.

As I passed through the court I looked about me in every direction for Jeanne. She was watching for me, and

"If anybody touches one little hair of your head, Jeanne, write to me! Goodbye!"

She had indeed written to me in regard to her leaving home; but my head must have become very much

confused, so that I had forgotten all about it. The servant seemed to be of the same opinion for he looked at

me in a way that seemed to signify, "Monsieur Bonnard is doting"and he leaned down over the balustrade

of the stairway to see if I was not going to do something extraordinary before I got to the bottom. But I

descended the stairs rationally enough and then he drew back his head in disappointment.

On returning home I was informed that Monsieur Gelis was waiting for me in the parlour. (This young man

has become a constant visitor. His judgment is at fault at times; but his mind is not at all commonplace.) On

this occasion, however, his usually welcome visit only embarrassed me. "Alas" I thought to myself, "I shall

be sure to say something very stupid to my young friend today, and he also will think that my faculties are

becoming impaired. But still I cannot really explain to him that I had first been demanded in wedlock, and

subsequently traduced as a man wholly devoid of moralsthat even Therese had become an object of

suspicionand that Jeanne remains in the power of the most rascally woman on the face of the earth. I am

certainly in an admirable state of mind for conversing about Cistercian abbeys with a young and

That is a fact! this is December. Ah! what is the matter with my head? what a fine help I am going to be to

"Therese, take my cane; and put it, if you possibly can, in some place where I shall be able to find it again.

NEXT morning the old boy wanted to get up; but the old boy could not get up. A merciless invisible hand

kept him down upon his bed. Finding himself immovably riveted there, the old boy resigned himself to

He must have had a very violent fever; for Mademoiselle Prefere, the Abbots of SaintGermaindesPres,

and the servant of Madame de Gabry appeared to him in diverse fantastic shapes. The figure of the servant in

particular lengthened weirdly over his head, grimacing like some gargoyle of a cathedral. Then it seemed to

This bedroom of mine is furnished after the antiquated fashion. The portrait of my father in full uniform, and

the portrait of my mother in her cashmere dress, are suspended on the wall. The wallpaper is covered with

green foliage designs. I am aware of all this, and I am even conscious that everything is faded, very much

faded. But an old man's room does not require to be pretty; it is enough that it should be clean, and Therese

sees to that. At all events my room is sufficiently decorated to please a mind like mine, which has always

remained somewhat childish and dreamy. There are things hanging on the wall or scattered over the tables

and shelves which usually please my fancy and amuse me. But today it would seem as if all those objects

had suddenly conceived some kind of illwill against me. They have all become garish, grimacing,

menacing. That statuette, modelled after one of the Theological Virtues of NotreDame de Brou, always so

ingenuously graceful in its natural condition, is now making contortions and putting out its tongue at me. And

that beautiful miniaturein which one of the most skilful pupils of Jehan Fouquet depicted himself, girdled

with the cordgirdle of the Sons of St. Francis, offering his book, on bended knee, to the good Duc

d'Angoulemewho has taken it out of its frame and put in its place a great ugly cat's head, which stares at

me with phosphorescent eyes. And the designs on the wallpaper have also turned into headshideous green

heads.... But noI am sure that wallpaper must have foliagedesigns upon it at this moment just as it had

twenty years ago, and nothing else.... But no, againI was right beforethey are heads, with eyes, noses,

mouthsthey are heads!... Ah! now I understand! they are both heads and foliagedesigns at the same time. I

And there, on my right, the pretty miniature of the Franciscan has come back again; but it seems to me as if I

can only keep it in its frame by a tremendous effort of will, and that the moment I get tired the ugly cathead

will appear in its place. Certainly I am not delirious; I can see Therese very plainly, standing at the foot of my

bed; I can hear her speaking to me perfectly well, and I should be able to answer her quite satisfactorily if I

were not kept so busy in trying to compel the various objects about me to maintain their natural aspect.

Here is the doctor coming. I never sent for him, but it gives me pleasure to see him. He is an old neighbour of

mine; I have never been of much service to him, but I like him very much. Even if I do not say much to him, I

have at least full possession of all my faculties, and I even find myself extraordinarily crafty and observant

today, for I note all his gestures, his ever look, the least wrinkling of his face. But the doctor is very

cunning, too, and I cannot really tell what he thinks about me. The deep thought of Goethe suddenly comes to

"Doctor, the old man has consented to allow himself to become sick; but he does not intend, this time at least,

Neither the doctor nor Therese laughs at my little joke. I suppose they cannot have understood it.

The doctor goes away; evening comes; and all sorts of strange shadows begin to shape themselves about my

bedcurtains, forming and dissolving by turns. And other shadowsghoststhrong by before me; and

through them I can see distinctly the impassive face of my faithful servant. And suddenly a cry, a shrill cry, a

The day is over; and the shadows take their places at my bedside to remain with me all through the long

THE doctor is quite jovial. It seems that I am doing him a great deal of credit by being able to get out of bed.

If I must believe him, innumerable disorders must have pounced down upon my poor old body all at the same

These disorders, which are the terror of ordinary mankind, have names which are the terror of philologists.

They are hybrid names, half Greek, half Latin, with terminations in "itis," indicating the inflammatory

condition, and in "algia," indicating pain. The doctor gives me all their names, together with a corresponding

number of adjectives ending in "ic," which serve to characterise their detestable qualities. In short, they

represent a good half of that most perfect copy of the Dictionary of Medicine contained in the tooauthentic

"Doctor, what an excellent commonsense story the story of Pandora is!if I were a poet I would put it into

French verse. Shake hands, doctor I You have brought me back to life; I forgive you for it. You have given

me back to my friends; I thank you for it. You say I am quite strong. That may be, that may be; but I have

lasted a very long time. I am a very old article of furniture; I might be very satisfactorily compared to my

father's armchair. It was an armchair which the good man had inherited, and in which he used to lounge

from morning until evening. Twenty times a day, when I was quite a baby, I used to climb up and seat myself

on one of the arms of that oldfashioned chair. So long as the chair remained intact, nobody paid any

particular attention to it. But it began to limp on one foot; and then folks began to say that it was a very good

chair. Afterwards it became lame in three legs, squeaked with the fourth leg, and lost nearly half of both

arms. Then everybody would exclaim, 'What a strong chair!' They wondered how it was that after its arms

had been worn off and all its legs knocked out of perpendicular, it could yet preserve the recognisable shape

of a chair, remain nearly erect, and still be of some service. The horsehair came out of its body at last, and it

gave up the ghost. And when Cyprien, our servant, sawed up its mutilated members for firewood,

everybody redoubled their cries of admiration. Oh! what an excellentwhat a marvellous chair! It was the

chair of Pierre Sylvestre Bonnard, the cloth merchantof Epimenide Bonnard, his sonof JeanBaptiste

Bonnard, the Pyrrhonian philosopher and Chief of the Third Maritime Division. Oh! what a robust and

venerable chair!' In reality it was a dead chair. Well, doctor, I am that chair. You think I am solid because I

have been able to resist an attack which would have killed many people, and which only threefourths killed

me. Much obliged! I feel none the less that I am something which has been irremediably damaged."

The doctor tries to prove to me, with the help of enormous Greek and Latin words, that I am really in a very

good condition. It would, of course, be useless to attempt any demonstration of this kind in so lucid a

language as French. However, I allow him to persuade me at last; and I see him to the door.

"Good! good!" exclaimed Therese; "that is the way to put the doctor out of the house! Just do the same thing

once or twice again, and he will not come to see you any moreand so much the better?"

"Well, Therese, now that I have become such a hearty man again, do not refuse to give me my letters. I am

sure there must be quite a big bundle of letters, and it would be very wicked to keep me any longer from

Therese, after some little grumbling, gave me my letters. But what did it matter?I looked at all the

envelopes, and saw that no one of them had been addressed by the little hand which I so much wish I could

see here now, turning over the pages of the Vecellio. I pushed the whole bundle of letters away: they had no

"Wait, Monsieur, until I have put on my clean things," exclaimed Therese, "and I will go out with you this

time also; I will carry your foldingstool as I have been doing these last few days, and we will go and sit

Therese actually thinks me infirm. I have been sick, it is true, but there is an end to all things! Madame

Malady has taken her departure quite awhile ago, and it is now more than three months since her pale and

graciousvisaged handmaid, Dame Convalescence, politely bade me farewell. If I were to listen to my

housekeeper, I should become a veritable Monsieur Argant, and I should wear a nightcap with ribbons for the

rest of my life.... No more of this!I propose to go out by myself! Therese will not hear of it. She takes my

"Therese, tomorrow, if you like, we will take our seats on the sunny side of the wall of La Petite Provence

and stay there just as long as you please. But today I have some very important affairs to attend to."

It is quite a pleasant day. With the aid of a cab, and the help of God, I trust to be able to fulfil my purpose.

There is the wall on which is painted in great blue letters the words "Pensionnat de Demoiselles tenu par

Mademoiselle Virginie Prefere." There is the iron gate which would give free entrance into the courtyard if

it were ever opened. But the lock is rusty, and sheets of zinc put up behind the bars protect from indiscreet

observation those dear little souls to whom Mademoiselle Prefere doubtless teaches modesty, sincerity,

justice, and disinterestedness. There is a window, with iron bars before it, and panes daubed over with white

paintthe window of the domestic offices, like a glazed eyethe only aperture of the building opening

upon the exterior world. As for the housedoor, through which I entered so often, but which is now closed

against me for ever, it is just as I saw it the last time, with its little irongrated wicket. The single stone step

in front of it is deeply worn, and, without having very good eyes behind my spectacles, I can see the little

white scratches on the stone which have been made by the nails in the shoes of the girls going in and out. And

why cannot I also go in? I have a feeling that Jeanne must be suffering a great deal in this dismal house, and

that she calls my name in secret. I cannot go away from the gate! A strange anxiety takes hold of me. I pull

the bell. The scaredlooking servant comes to the door, even much more scaredlooking than when I saw her

the last time. Strict orders have been given; I am not to be allowed to see Mademoiselle Jeanne. I beg the

servant to be so kind as to tell me how the child is. The servant, after looking to her right and then to her left,

tells me that Mademoiselle Jeanne is well, and then shuts the door in my face. And I am all alone in the street

How many times since then have I wandered in the same way under that wall, and passed before the little

door,full of shame and despair to find myself even weaker than that poor child, who has no other help of

Finally I overcame my repugnance sufficiently to call upon Maitre Mouche. The first thing I remarked was

that his office is much more dusty and much more mouldy this year than it was last year. The notary made his

appearance after a moment, with his familiar stiff gestures, and his restless eyes quivering behind his

eyeglasses. I made my complaints to him. He answered me.... But why should I write down, even in a

notebook which I am going to burn, my recollections of a downright scoundrel? He takes sides with

Mademoiselle Prefere, whose intelligent mind and irreproachable character he has long appreciated. He does

not feel himself in a position to decide the nature of the question at issue; but he must assure me that

appearances have been greatly against me. That of course makes no difference to me. He adds(and this

does make some difference to me) that the small sum which had been placed in his hands to defray the

expenses of the education of his ward has been expended, and that, in view of the circumstances, he cannot

but gently admire the disinterestedness of Mademoiselle Prefere inconsenting to allow Mademoiselle Jeanne

A magnificent light, the light of a perfect day, floods the sordid place with its incorruptible torrent, and

And outside it pours down its splendour upon all the wretchedness of a populous quarter.

How sweet it is,this light with which my eyes have so long been filled, and which ere long I must for ever

cease to enjoy! I wander out with my hands behind me, dreaming as I go, following the line of the

fortifications; and I find myself after awhile, I know not how, in an outoftheway suburb full of miserable

little gardens. By the dusty roadside I observe a plant whose flower, at once dark and splendid, seems worthy

of association with the noblest and purest mourning for the dead. It is a columbine. Our fathers called it "Our

Lady's Glove"le gant de NotreDame. Only such a "NotreDame" as might make herself very, very small,

for the sake of appearing to little children, could ever slip her dainty fingers into the narrow capsule of that

And! there is a big bumblebee who tries to force himself into the flower, brutally; but his mouth cannot

reach the nectar, and the poor glutton strives and strives in vain. He has to give up the attempt, and comes out

of the flower all smeared over with pollen. He flies off in his own heavy lumbering way; but there are not

many flowers in this portion of the suburbs, which has been defiled by the soot and smoke of factories. So he

comes back to the columbine again, and this time he pierces the corolla and sucks the honey through the little

hole which he has made; I should never have thought that a bumblebee had so much sense! Why, that is

admirable! The more I observe them, the more do insects and flowers fill me with astonishment. I am like

that good Rollin who went wild with delight over the flowers of his peachtrees. I wish I could have a fine

IT occurred to me one Sunday morning to watch for the moment when Mademoiselle Prefere's pupils were

leaving the school in procession to attend Mass at the parish church. I watched them passing two by

two,the little ones first with very serious faces. There were three of them all dressed exactly

alikedumpy, plump, importantlooking little creatures, whom I recognised at once as the Mouton girls.

Their elder sister is the artist who drew that terrible head of Tatius, King of the Sabines. Beside the column,

the assistant schoolteacher, with her prayerbook in her hand, was gesturing and frowning. Then came the

next oldest class, and finally the big girls, all whispering to each other, as they went by. But I did not see

I went to policeheadquarters and inquired whether they chanced to have, filed away somewhere or other,

any information regarding the establishment in the Rue Demours. I succeeded in inducing them to send some

female inspectors there. These returned bringing with them the most favourable reports about the

establishment. In their opinion the Prefere School was a model school. It is evident that if I were to force an

THIS Thursday being a schoolholiday I had the chance of meeting the three little Mouton girls in the

vicinity of the Rue Demours. After bowing to their mother, I asked the eldest who appears to be about ten

"Jeanne Alexandre is not my playmate. She is only kept in the school for charityso they make her sweep

the classrooms. It was Mademoiselle who said so. And Jeanne Alexandre is a bad girl; so they lock her up in

the dark roomand it serves her rightand I am a good girland I am never locked up in the dark room."

The three little girls resumed their walk, and Madame Mouton followed close behind them, looking back over

Alas! I find myself reduced to expedients of a questionable character. Madame de Gabry will not come back

to Paris for at least three months more, at the very soonest. Without her, I have no tact, I have no common

Nevertheless, I cannot possibly permit them to make Jeanne a boardingschool servant!

THE idea that Jeanne was obliged to sweep the rooms had become absolutely unbearable.

The weather was dark and cold. Night had already begun. I rang the schooldoor bell with the tranquillity of

a resolute man. The moment that the timid servant opened the door, I slipped a gold piece into her hand, and

promised her another if she would arrange matters so that I could see Mademoiselle Alexandre. Her answer

And she slammed the door in my face so rudely that she knocked my hat into the gutter. I waited for one very

long hour in a violent snowstorm; then I approached the window. Nothing! The wind raged, and the snow

fell heavily. Workmen passing by with their implements on their shoulders, and their heads bent down to

keep the snow from coming in their faces, rudely jostled me. Still nothing. I began to fear I had been

observed. I knew that I had done wrong in bribing a servant, but I was not a bit sorry for it. Woe to the man

who does not know how to break through social regulations in case of necessity! Another quarter of an hour

"Oh! don't ask me to tell you that!but I would rather die than find myself alone with him again."

At that instant I formed a resolve which nothing in this world could have induced me to change. I did, indeed,

have some idea that I might be acting contrary to law; but I did not give myself the least concern about that

idea. And, being firmly resolved, I was able to be prudent. I acted with remarkable coolness.

"Jeanne," I asked, "tell me! does that room you are in open into the courtyard?"

"Go and see if there is any one there, and be careful that nobody observes you."

I took an old newspaper out of my pocket, andin a wind which blew almost hard enough to put the

streetlamps out, in a downpour of snow which almost blinded meI managed to wrap up and address that

"When the postman passes he puts the papers and letters in the box, doesn't he? He rings the bell and goes

away? Then the servant opens the letterbox and takes whatever she finds there to Mademoiselle Prefere

immediately; is not that about the way the thing is managed whenever anything comes by post?"

"Then we shall soon see. Jeanne, go and watch again; and, as soon as the servant leaves the lodge, open the

Having said this, I put my newspaper in the box, gave the bell a tremendous pull, and then hid myself in the

I might have been there several minutes, when the little door quivered, then opened, and a young girl's head

made its appearance through the opening. I took hold of it; I pulled it towards me.

She stared at me uneasily. Certainly she must have been afraid that I had gone mad; but, on the contrary, I

Then she took my arm. For some time we ran like a couple or thieves. But running is an exercise illsuited to

one as corpulent as I am, and, finding myself out of breath at last, I stopped and leaned upon something

which turned Out to be the stove of a dealer in roasted chestnuts, who was doing business at the corner of a

wineseller's shop, where a number of cabmen were drinking. One of them asked us if we did not want a cab.

Most assuredly we wanted a cab! The driver, after setting down his glass on the zinc counter, climbed upon

"Phew!" I panted, wiping my forehead. For, in spite of the cold, I was perspiring profusely.

What seemed very odd was that Jeanne appeared to be much more conscious than I was of the enormity

She shook her head, as if to say, "Well, there or anywhere else, what does it matter to me?" And by the light

of the streetlamps, I observed with pain that her face was very thin and her features all pinched. I did not

find in her any of that vivacity, any of those bright impulses, any of that quickness of expression, which used

to please me so much. Her gaze had become timid, her gestures constrained, her whole attitude melancholy. I

took her handa little cold hand, which had become all hardened and bruised. The poor child must have

suffered very much. I questioned her. She told me very quietly that Mademoiselle Prefere had summoned her

one day, and called her a little monster and a little viper, for some reason which she had never been able to

Bonnard any more; for he has been giving you bad advice, and he has conducted himself in a most shameful

manner towards me." "I then said to her, 'That, Mademoiselle, you will never be able to make me believe.'

Then Mademoiselle slapped my face and sent me back to the schoolroom. The announcement that I should

never be allowed to see you again made me feel as if night had come down upon me. Don't you know those

evenings when one feels so sad to see the darkness come?well, just imagine such a moment stretched out

into weeksinto whole months! Don't you remember my little SaintGeorge? Up to that time I had worked

at it as well as I couldjust simply to work at itjust to amuse myself. But when I lost all hope of ever

seeing you again I took my little wax figure, and I began to work at it in quite another way. I did not try to

model it with wooden matches any more, as I had been doing, but with hair pins. I even made use of epingles

a la neige. But perhaps you do not know what epingles a la neige are? Well, I became more particular about it

than you can possibly imagine. I put a dragon on SaintGeorge's helmet; and I passed hours and hours in

making a head and eyes and a tail for the dragon. Oh, the eyes! the eyes, above all! I never stopped working

at them till I got them so that they had red pupils and white eyelids and eyebrows and every thing! I know

I am very silly; I had an idea that I was going to die as soon as my little SaintGeorge would be finished. I

worked at it during recreationhours, and Mademoiselle Prefere used to let me alone. One day I learned that

you were in the parlour with the schoolmistress; I watched for you; we said Au revoir that day to each other. I

was a little consoled by seeing you. But, some time after that, my guardian came and wanted to make me go

out with him one Thursday. I refused to go to his house,but please don't ask me why, Monsieur. He

answered me, quite gently, that I was a very whimsical little girl. And then he left me alone. But the next day

Mademoiselle Prefere came to me with such a wicked look on her face that I was really afraid. She had a

letter in her hand. 'Mademoiselle,' she said to me, 'I am informed by your guardian that he has spent all the

money which belonged to you. Don't be afraid! I do not intend to abandon you; but, you must acknowledge

yourself, it is only right that you should earn your own livelihood.' Then she put me to work housecleaning;

and whenever I made a mistake she would lock me up in the garret for days together. And that is what has

happened to me since I saw you last. Even if I had been able to write to you I do not know whether I should

have done it, because I did not think you could possibly take me away from the school; and, as Maltre

Mouche did not come back to see me, there was no hurry. I thought I could wait for awhile in the garret and

"Jeanne," I cried, "even if we should have to flee to Oceania, the abominable Prefere shall never get hold of

you again. I will take a great oath on that I And why should we not go to Oceania? The climate is very

healthy; and I read in a newspaper the other day that they have pianos there. But, in the meantime, let us go to

the house of Madame de Gabry, who returned to Paris, as luck would have it, some three or four days ago; for

you and I are two innocent fools, and we have great need of some one to help us."

Even as I was speaking Jeanne's features suddenly became pale, and seemed to shrink into lifelessness; her

eyes became all dim; her lips, half open, contracted with an expression of pain. Then her head sank sideways

I lifted her in my arms, and carried her up Madame de Gabry's staircase like a little baby asleep. But I was

myself on the point of fainting, from emotional excitement and fatigue together, when she came to herself

IT was eight o'clock. Madame de Gabry, as might be supposed, was very much surprised by our unexpected

appearance. But she welcomed the old man and the child with that glad kindness which always expresses

itself in her beautiful gestures. It seems to me,if I might use that language of devotion so familiar to

her,it seems to me as though some heavenly grace streams from her hands when, ever she opens them; and

even the perfume which impregnates her robes seems to inspire the sweet calm zeal of charity and good

works. Surprised she certainly was; but she asked us no questions,and that silence seemed to me

"Madame," I said to her, "we have both come to place ourselves under your protection. And, first of all, we

are going to ask you to give us some supperor to give Jeanne some, at least; for a moment ago, in the

carriage, she fainted from weakness. As for myself, I could not eat a bite at this late hour without passing a

He came. It was a pleasure for me to see his frank broad face, and to press his strong square hand. Then we

went, all four of us, into the diningroom; and while some cold meat was being cut for Jeannewhich she

never touched notwithstandingI related our adventure. Paul de Gabry asked me permission to smoke his

pipe, after which he listened to me in silence. When I had finished my recital he scratched the short, stiff

beard upon his chin, and uttered a tremendous "Sacrebleu!" But, seeing Jeanne stare at each of us in turn,

"We will talk about this matter tomorrow morning. Come into my study for a moment; I have an old book to

I followed him into his study, where the steel of guns and hunting knives, suspended against the dark

hangings, glimmered in the lamplight. There, pulling me down beside him upon a leathercovered, sofa, he

"What have you done? Great God! Do you know what you have done? Corruption of a minor, abduction,

kidnapping! You have got yourself into a nice mess! You have simply rendered yourself liable to a sentence

"Mercy on us!" I cried; "ten years imprisonment for having saved an innocent child."

"That is the law!" answered Monsieur be Gabry. "You see, my dear Monsieur Bonnard, I happen to know the

Code pretty wellnot because I ever studied law as a profession, but because, as mayor of Lusance, I was

obliged to teach myself something about it in order to be able to give information to my subordinates.

Mouche is a rascal; that woman Prefere is a vile hussy; and you are a... Well! I really cannot find any word

After opening his bookcase, where dogcollars, ridingwhips, stirrups, spurs, cigarboxes, and a few books

of reference were indiscriminately stowed away, he took out of it a copy of the Code, and began to turn over

"'CRIMES AND MISDEMEANOURS' ... 'SEQUESTRATION OF PERSONS'that is not your case....

'ABDUCTION OF MINORS'here we are.... 'ARTICLE 354:Whosoever shall, either by fraud or

violence, have abducted or have caused to be abducted any minor or minors, or shall have enticed them, or

turned them away from, or forcibly removed them, or shall have caused them to be enticed, or turned away

from or forcibly removed from the places in which they have been placed by those to whose authority or

direction they have been submitted or confided, shall be liable to the penalty of imprisonment. See PENAL

CODE, 21 and 28.' Here is 21:'The term of imprisonment shall not be less than five years.' 28. 'The

sentence of imprisonment shall be considered as involving a loss of civil rights.' Now all that is very plain, is

Now let us go on: 'ARTICLE 356:In case the abductor be under the age of 21 years at the time of the

offense, he shall only be punished with'... But we certainly cannot invoke this article in your favour.

'ARTICLE 357:In case the abductor shall have married the girl by him abducted, he can only be

prosecuted at the instance of such persons as, according to the Civil Code, may have the right to demand that

the marriage shall be declared null; nor can he be condemned until after the nullity of the marriage shall have

been pronounced.' I do not know whether it is a part of your plans to marry Mademoiselle Alexandre! You

can see that the Code is goodnatured about it; it leaves you one door of escape. But noI ought not to joke

with you, because really you have put yourself in a very unfortunate position! And how could a man like you

imagine that here in Paris, in the middle of the nineteenth century, a young girl can be abducted with absolute

impunity? We are not living in the Middle Ages now; and such things are no longer permitted by law."

"You need not imagine," I replied, "that abduction was lawful under the ancient Code. You will find in

Baluze a decree issued by King Childebert at Cologne, either in 593 or 594, on the subject: moreover,

everybody knows that the famous Ordonnance de Blois, of May 1579, formally enacted that any persons

convicted of having suborned any son or daughter under the age of twentyfive years, whether under promise

of marriage or otherwise; without the full knowledge, will, or consent of the father, mother, and guardians,

should be punished with death; and the ordinance adds: 'Et pareillement seront punis extraordinairement tous

ceux qui auront participe audit rapt, et qui auront prete conseil, confort, et aide en aucune maniere que ce

soit.' (And in like manner shall be extraordinarily punished all persons whomsoever, who shall have

participated in the said abduction, and who shall have given thereunto counsel, succor, or aid in any manner

whatsoever.) Those are the exact, or very nearly the exact, terms of the ordinance. As for that article of the

CodeNapoleon which you have just told me of, and which excepts from liability to prosecution the abductor

who marries the young girl abducted by him, it reminds me that according to the laws of Bretagne, forcible

abduction, followed by marriage, was not punished. But this usage, which involved various abuses, was

suppressed in 1720at least I give you the date within ten years. My memory is not very good now, and the

time is long passed when I could repeat by heart without even stopping to take breath, fifteen hundred verses

"As far as regards the Capitulary of Charlemagne, which fixes the compensation for abduction, I have not

mentioned it because I am sure that you must remember it. So, my dear Monsieur de Gabry, you see

abduction was considered as a decidedly punishable offense under the three dynasties of Old France. It is a

very great mistake to suppose that the Middle Ages represent a period of social chaos. You must remember,

"So," he exclaimed, "you know the Ordonnance de Blois, you know Baluze, you know Childebert, you know

I replied that, as a matter of fact, I never had read the Code; and he looked very much surprised.

"And now do you understand," he asked, "the extreme gravity of the action you have committed?"

I had not indeed been yet able to understand it fully. But little by little, with the aid of Monsteur Paul's very

sensible explanations, I reached the conviction at last that I should not be judged in regard to my motives,

which were innocent, but only according to my action, which was punishable. Thereupon I began to feel very

"What am I to do?" I cried out, "what am I to do? Am I then irretrievably ruined?and have I also ruined the

Monsieur de Gabry silently filled his pipe, and lighted it so slowly that his kind broad face remained for at

least three or four minutes glowing red behind the light, like a blacksmith's in the gleam of his forgefire.

"You want to know what to do? Why, don't do anything, my dear Monsieur Bonnard! For God's sake, and for

your own sake, don't do anything at all! Your situation is bad enough as it is; don't try to meddle with it now,

unless you want to create new difficulties for yourself. But you must promise me to sustain me in any action

that I may take. I shall go to see Monsieur Mouche the very first thing tomorrow morning; and if he turns

out to be what we think he isthat is to say, a consummate rascalI shall very soon find means of making

him harmless, even if the devil himself should take sides with him. For everything depends on him. As it is

too late this evening to take Mademoiselle Jeanne back to her boardingschool, my wife will keep the young

lady here tonight. This of course plainly constitutes the misdemeanour of complicity; but it saves the girl

from anything like an equivocal position. As for you, my dear Monsieur, you just go back to the Quai

Malaquais as quickly as you can; and if they come to look for Jeanne there, it will be very easy for you to

While we were thus talking, Madame de Gabry was preparing to make her young lodger comfortable for the

night. When she bade me goodbye at the door, she was carrying a pair of clean sheets, scented with lavender,

"Well, of course," answered Madame de Gabry, "you must remember we are peasants."

"Ah!" I answered her, "Heaven grant that I also may be able one of these days to become a peasant! Heaven

grant that one of these days I may be able, as you are at Lusance, to inhale the sweet fresh odour of the

country, and live in some little house all hidden among trees; and if this wish of mine be too ambitious on the

part of an old man whose life is nearly closed, then I will only wish that my windingsheet may be as sweetly

It was agreed that I should come to lunch the following morning. But I was positively forbidden to show

myself at the house before midday. Jeanne, as she kissed me goodbye, begged me not to take her back to the

I found Therese waiting for me on the landing, in such a condition of worry about me that it had made her

furious. She talked of nothing less than keeping me under lock and key in the future.

What a night I passed! I never closed my eyes for one single instant. From time to time I could not help

laughing like a boy at the success of my prank; and then again, an inexpressible feeling of horror would come

upon me at the thought of being dragged before some magistrate, and having to take my place upon the

prisoner's bench, to answer for the crime which I had so naturally committed. I was very much afraid; and

nevertheless I felt no remorse or regret whatever. The sun, coming into my room at last, merrily lighted upon

"My God, Thou who didst make the sky and the dew, as it is said in Tristan, judge me in Thine equity, not

indeed according unto my acts, but according only to my motives, which Thou knowest have been upright

and pure; and I will say: Glory to Thee in heaven, and peace on earth to men of goodwill. I give into Thy

hands the child I stole away. Do that for her which I have not known how to do; guard her from all her

Had she also, like myself, at the first light of dawn, called upon Him who made the sky and the dew? She

Madame de Gabry called her away to arrange her hair; for the amiable lady had insisted upon combing and

plaiting, with her own hands, the hair of the child confided to her care. As I had come a little before the hour

agreed upon, I had interrupted this charming toilet. By way of punishment I was told to go and wait in the

parlour all by myself. Monsieur de Gabry joined me there in a little while. He had evidently just come in, for

I could see on his forehead the mark left by the lining of his hat. His frank face wore an expression of joyful

excitement. I thought I had better not ask him any questions; and we all went to lunch. When the servants had

finished waiting at table, Monsieur Paul, who had been keeping his good story for the dessert, said to us,

"No," he replied, curiously watching the expression of disappointment upon our faces.

After having amused himself with our anxiety for a reasonable time, the good fellow added:

"Maitre Mouche is no longer at Levallois. Maitre Mouche has gone away from France. The day after

tomorrow will make just eight days since he decamped, taking with him all the money of his clientsa

tolerably large sum. I found the office closed. A woman who lived close by told me all about it with an

abundance of curses and imprecations. The notary did not take the 7.55 train all by himself; he took with him

the daughter of the hairdresser of Levallois, a young person quite famous in that part of the country for her

beauty and her accomplishments;they say she could shave better than her father. Well, anyhow Mouche

has run away with her; the Commissaire de Police confirmed the fact for me. Now, really, could it have been

possible for Maitre Mouche to have left the country at a more opportune moment? If he had only deferred his

escapade one week longer, he would have been still the representative of society, and would have had you

dragged off to gaol, Monsieur Bonnard, like a criminal. At present we have nothing whatever to fear from

him. Here is to the health of Maitre Mouche!" he cried, pouring out a glass of white wine.

I would like to live a long time if it were only to remember that delightful morning. We four were all

assembled in the big white diningroom around the waxed oak table. Monsieur Paul's mirth was of the hearty

kind,even perhaps a little riotous; and the good man quaffed deeply. Madame de Gabry smiled at me, with

a smile so sweet, so perfect, and so noble, that I thought such a woman ought to keep smiles like that simply

as a reward for good actions, and thus make everybody who knew her do all the good of which they were

capable. Then, to reward us for our pains, Jeanne, who had regained something of her former vivacity, asked

us in less than a quarter of an hour one dozen questions, to answer which would have required an exhaustive

exposition of the nature of man, the nature of the universe, the science of physics and of metaphysics, the

Macrocosm and the Microcosmnot to speak of the Ineffable and the Unknowable. Then she drew out of

her pocket her little SaintGeorge, who had suffered most cruelly during our flight. His legs and arms were

gone; but he still had his gold helmet with the green dragon on it. Jeanne solemnly pledged herself to make a

On reentering my lodgings I had to endure the very sharpest remonstrances from Therese, who said she had

given up trying to understand my new way of living. In her opinion Monsieur had really lost his mind.

"Yes, Therese, I am a mad old man and you are a mad old woman. That is certain! May the good God bless

us both, Therese, and give us new strength; for we now have new duties to perform. But let me lie down upon

"GOODMORNING, Monsieur," said Jeanne, letting herself in; while Therese remained grumbling in the

"Mademoiselle, I beg you will be kind enough to address me very solemnly by my title, and to say to me,

"Then it has all been settled? Oh, how nice!" cried the child, clapping her hands.

"It has all been arranged, Mademoiselle, in the Sallecommune and before the Justice of the Peace; and from

today you are under my authority.... What are you laughing about, my ward? I see it in your eyes. You have

"Oh, no! Monsieur.... I mean, my guardian. I was looking at your white hair. It curls out from under the edge

of your hat like honeysuckle on a balcony. It is very handsome, and I like it very much!"

"Be good enough to sit down, my ward, and, if you can possibly help it, stop saying ridiculous things,

because I have some very serious things to say to you. Listen. I suppose you are not going to insist upon

being sent back to the establishment of Mademoiselle Prefere?... No. Well, then, what would you say if I

should take you here to live with me, and to finish your education, and keep you here until... what shall I

"Behind there we have a nice little room, which my housekeeper has cleaned up and furnished for you. You

are going to take the place of the books which used to be in it; you will succeed them as the day succeeds

night. Go with Therese and look at it, and see if you think you will be able to live in it. Madame de Gabry

"Jeanne, listen to me a moment longer! You have always until now made yourself a favourite with my

housekeeper, who, like all very old people, is apt to be cross at times. Be gentle and forbearing. Make every

allowance for her. I have thought it my duty to make every allowance for her myself, and to put up with all

her fits of impatience. Now, let me tell you, Jeanne:Respect her! And when I say that, I do not forget that

she is my servant and yours; neither will she ever allow herself to forget it for a moment. But what I want you

to respect in her is her great age and her great heart. She is a humble woman who has lived a very, very long

time in the habit of doing good; and she has become hardened and stiffened in that habit. Bear patiently with

the harsh ways of that upright soul. If you know how to command, she will know how to obey. Go now, my

child; arrange your room in whatever way may seem to you best suited for your studies and for your repose."

Having started Jeanne, with this viaticum, upon her domestic career, I began to read a Review, which,

although conducted by very young men, is excellent. The tone of it is somewhat unpolished, but the spirit

zealous. The article I read was certainly far superior, in point of precision and positiveness, to anything of the

sort ever written when I was a young man. The author of the article, Monsieur Paul Meyer, points out every

We used not in my time to criticise with such strict justice. Our indulgence was vast. It went even so far as to

confuse the scholar and the ignoramus in the same burst of praise. And nevertheless one must learn how to

find fault; and it is even an imperative duty to blame when the blame is deserved.

I remember little Raymond (that was the name we gave him); he did not know anything, and his mind was

not a mind capable of absorbing any solid learning; but he was very fond of his mother. We took very good

care never to utter a hint of the ignorance of so perfect a son; and, thanks to our forbearance, little Raymond

made his way to the highest positions. He had lost his mother then; but honours of all kinds were showered

upon him. He became omnipotentto the grievous injury of his colleagues and of science.... But here comes

"Good evening, Gelis. You look very happy today. What good fortune has come to you, my dear lad?"

His good fortune is that he has been able to sustain his thesis very creditably, and that he has taken high rank

in his class. He tells me this with the additional information that my own words, which were incidentally

referred to in the course of the examination, had been spoken of by the college professors in terms of the most

"That is very nice," I replied; "and it makes me very happy, Gelis, to find my old reputation thus associated

with your own youthful honours. I was very much interested, you know, in that thesis of yours;but some

domestic arrangements have been keeping me so busy lately that I quite forgot this was the day on which you

Mademoiselle Jeanne made her appearance very opportunely, as if in order to suggest to him something about

the nature of those very domestic arrangements. The giddy girl burst into the City of Books like a fresh

breeze, crying at the top of her voice that her room was a perfect little wonder. Then she became very red

Monsieur Gelis asked her how she was with the tone of a young fellow who presumes upon a previous

acquaintance, and who proposes to put himself forward as an old friend. Oh, never fear!she had not

forgotten him at all; that was very evident from the fact that then and there, right under my nose, they

resumed their last year's conversation on the subject of the "Venetian blond"! They continued the discussion

after quite an animated fashion. I began to ask myself what right I had to be in the room at all. The only thing

I could do in order to make myself heard was to cough. As for getting in a word, they never even gave me a

chance. Gelis discoursed enthusiastically, not only about the Venetian colourists, but also upon all other

matters relating to nature or to mankind. And Jeanne kept answering him, "Yes, Monsieur, you are right." ...

"That is just what I supposed, Monsieur." ... "Monsieur, you express so beautifully just what I feel."... "I am

When I speak, Mademoiselle never answers me in that tone. It is only with the very tip of her tongue that she

will even taste any intellectual food which I set before her. Usually she will not touch it at all. But Monsieur

Gelis seems to be in her opinion the supreme authority upon all subjects. It was always, "Oh, yes!""Oh, of

course!"to all his empty chatter. And, then, the eyes of Jeanne! I had never seen them look so large before;

I had never before observed in them such fixity of expression; but her gaze otherwise remained what it

always isartless, frank, and brave. Gelis evidently pleased her; she liked Gelis, and her eyes betrayed the

fact. They would have published it to the entire universe! All very fine, Master Bonnard! you have been so

deeply interested in observing your ward, that you have been forgetting you are her guardian! You began

only this morning to exercise that function; and you can already see that it involves some very delicate and

difficult duties. Bonnard, you must really try to devise some means of keeping that young man away from

I have picked up a book at random from the nearest shelf; I open it, and I enter respectfully into the middle of

a drama of Sophocles. The older I grow, the more I learn to love the two civilisations of the antique world;

and now I always keep the poets of Italy and of Greece on a shelf within easy reach of my arm in the City of

Monsieur and Mademoiselle finally condescend to take some notice of me, now that I seem too busy to take

any notice of them. I really think that Mademoiselle Jeanne has even asked me what I am reading. No,

indeed, I will not tell her what it is. What I am reading, between ourselves, is the chant of that smooth and

luminous Chorus which rolls out its magnificent tunefulness through a scene of passionate violencethe

Chorus of the Old Men of ThebesEros anichate... "Invincible Love, O Thou who descendest upon rich

houses,Thou who dost rest upon the delicate cheek of the maiden, Thou who dost traverse all

seas,surely none among the Immortals can escape Thee, nor indeed any among men who live but for a

little space; and he who is possessed by Thee, there is a madness upon him." And when I had reread that

delicious chant, the face of Antigone appeared before me in all its passionless purity. What images! Gods and

goddesses who hover in the highest height of heaven! The blind old man, the longwandering beggarking,

led by Antigone, has now been buried with holy rites; and his daughter, fair as the fairest dream ever

conceived by human soul, resists the will of the tyrant and gives pious sepulture to her brother. She loves the

son of the tyrant, and that son loves her also. And as she goes on her way to execution, the victim of her own

sweet piety, the old men sing, "Invincible Love, O Thou who dost descend upon rich houses,Thou who

"Mademoiselle Jeanne, are you really very anxious to know what I am reading? I am reading,

MademoiselleI am reading that Antigone, having buried the blind old man, wove a fair tapestry

I am not an egotist. But I am prudent. I have to bring up this child; she is much too young to be married now.

No! I am not an egotist, but I must certainly keep her with me for a few years morekeep her alone with me.

She can surely wait until I am dead! Fear not, Antigone, old OEdipus will find holy burial soon enough.

In the meanwhile, Antigone is helping our housekeeper to scrape the carrots. She says she likes to do

WHO would recognise the City of Books now? There are flowers everywhereeven upon all the articles of

furniture. Jeanne was right: those roses do look very nice in that blue china vase. She goes to market every

day with Therese, under the pretext of helping the old servant to make her purchases, but she never brings

anything back with her except flowers. Flowers are really very charming creatures. And one of these days I

must certainly carry out my plan, and devote myself to the study of them, in their own natural domain, in the

For what have I to do here? Why should I burn my eyes out over these old parchments which cannot now tell

me anything worth knowing? I used to study them, those old texts, with the most ardent enjoyment. What

was it which I was then so anxious to find in them? The date of a pious foundationthe name of some

monkish imagier or copyistthe price of a loaf, of an ox, or of a field some judicial or administrative

enactmentall that, and yet something more, a Something vaguely mysterious and sublime which excited

my enthusiasm. But for sixty years I have been searching in vain for that Something. Better men than I the

masters, the truly great, the Fauriels, the Thierrys, who found so many thingsdied at their task without

having been able, any more than I have been, to find that Something which, being incorporeal, has no name,

and without which, nevertheless, no great mental work would ever be undertaken in this world. And now that

I am only looking for what I should certainly be able to find, I cannot find anything at all; and it is probable

that I shall never be able to finish the history of the Abbots of SaintGermaindesPres.

I look, and I see a little grey head poking itself out of the handkerchief. It is the head of a little grey cat. The

handkerchief opens; the animal leaps down upon the carpet, shakes itself, pricks up first one ear and then the

other, and begins to examine with due caution the locality and the inhabitants thereof.

Therese, out of breath, with her basket on her arm, suddenly makes her appearance in time to take an

objective part in this examination, which does not appear to result altogether in her favour; for the young cat

moves slowly away from her, without, however, venturing near my legs, or approaching Jeanne, who

displays extraordinary volubility in the use of caressing appellations. Therese, whose chief fault is her

inability to hide her feelings, thereupon vehemently reproaches Mademoiselle for bringing home a cat that

she did not know anything about. Jeanne, in order to justify herself, tells the whole story. While she was

passing with Therese before a chemist's shop, she saw the assistant kick a little cat into the street. The cat,

astonished and frightened, seemed to be asking itself whether to remain in the street where it was being

terrified and knocked about by the people passing by, or whether to go back into the chemist's even at the risk

of being kicked out a second time. Jeanne thought it was in a very critical position, and understood its

hesitation. It looked so stupid; and she knew it looked stupid only because it could not decide what to do. So

she took it up in her arms. And as it had not been able to obtain any rest either indoors or outofdoors, it

allowed her to hold it. Then she stroked and petted it to keep it from being afraid, and boldly went to the

..."Now there!" adds Jeanne, by way of conclusion; and then she changes her voice again to a flutetone in

"He is horribly thin," I observe, looking at the wretched animal;"moreover, he is horribly ugly." Jeanne

thinks he is not ugly at all, but she acknowledges that he looks even more stupid than he looked at first: this

time she thinks it not indecision, but surprise, which gives that unfortunate aspect to his countenance. She

asks us to imagine ourselves in his place;then we are obliged to acknowledge that he cannot possibly

understand what has happened to him. And then we all burst out laughing in the face of the poor little beast,

which maintains the most comical look of gravity. Jeanne wants to take him up; but he hides himself under

the table, and cannot even be tempted to come out by the lure of a saucer of milk.

We all turn our backs and promise not to look; when we inspect the saucer again, we find it empty.

"Jeanne," I observe, "your protege has a decidedly tristful aspect of countenance; he is of a sly and suspicious

disposition; I trust he is not going to commit in the City of Books any such misdemeanours as might render it

necessary for us to send him back to his chemist's shop. In the meantime we must give him a name. Suppose

we call him 'Don Gris de Gouttiere'; but perhaps that is too long. 'Pill,' 'Drug,' or 'Castoroil' would be short

enough, and would further serve to recall his early condition in life. What do you think about it?"

"'Pill' would not sound bad," answers Jeanne, "but it would be very unkind to give him a name which would

be always reminding him of the misery from which we saved him. It would be making him pay too dearly for

our hospitality. Let us be more generous, and give him a pretty name, in hopes that he is going to deserve it.

See how he looks at us! He knows that we are talking about him. And now that he is no longer unhappy, he is

beginning to look a great deal less stupid. I am not joking! Unhappiness does make people look stupid,I

Well, Jeanne, if you like, we will call your protege Hannibal. The appropriateness of that name does not seem

to strike you at once. But the Angora cat who preceded him here as an inmate of the City of Books, and to

whom I was in the habit of telling all my secretsfor he was a very wise and discreet personused to be

called Hamilcar. It is natural that this name should beget the other, and that Hannibal should succeed

Hannibal, greatly frightened by the strange sonority of his own name, ran to hide himself under a bookcase in

I was in a good humour for working that day, and I had just dipped the nib of my pen into the inkbottle

when I heard some one ring. Should any one ever read these pages written by an unimaginative old man, he

will be sure to laugh at the way that bell keeps ringing through my narrative, without ever announcing the

arrival of a new personage or introducing any unexpected incident. On the stage things are managed on the

reverse principle. Monsieur Scribe never has the curtain raised without good reason, and for the greater

enjoyment of ladies and young misses. That is art! I would rather hang myself than write a play,not that I

despise life, but because I should never be able to invent anything amusing. Invent! In order to do that one

must have received the gift of inspiration. It would be a very unfortunate thing for me to possess such a gift.

Suppose I were to invent some monkling in my history of the Abbey of SaintGermaindesPres! What

would our young erudites say? What a scandal for the School! As for the Institute, it would say nothing and

probably not even think about the matter either. Even if my colleagues still write a little sometimes, they

To be the least wise in order to become the most wisethis is precisely what those Buddhists are aiming at

without knowing it. If there is any wiser wisdom than that I will go to Rome to report upon it.... And all this

This young man has latterly changed his manner completely with Jeanne. He is now quite as serious as he

used to be frivolous, and quite as silent as he used to be chatty. And Jeanne follows his example.

We have reached the phase of passionate love under constraint. For, old as I am, I cannot be deceived about

it: these two children are violently and sincerely in love with each other. Jeanne now avoids himshe hides

herself in her room when he comes into the librarybut how well she knows how to reach him when she is

alone! alone at her piano! Every evening she talks to him through the music she plays with a rich thrill of

Well, why should I not confess it? Why should I not avow my weakness? Surely my egotism would not

become any less blameworthy by keeping it hidden from myself? So I will write it. Yes! I was hoping for

something else;yes! I thought I was going to keep her all to myself, as my own child, as my own

daughternot always, of course, not even perhaps for very long, but just for a few years more. I am so old!

Could she not wait? And, who knows? With the help of the gout, I would not have imposed upon her patience

too much. That was my wish; that was my hope. I had made my plansI had not reckoned upon the coming

of this wild young man. But the mistake is none the less cruel because my reckoning happened to be wrong.

And yet it seems to me that you are condemning yourself very rashly, friend Sylvestre Bonnard: if you did

want to keep this young girl a few years longer, it was quite as much in her own interest as in yours. She has

a great deal to learn yet, and you are not a master to be despised. When that miserable notary Mouchewho

subsequently committed his rascalities at so opportune a momentpaid you the honour of a visit, you

explained to him your ideas of education with all the fervour of high enthusiasm. Then you attempted to put

that system of yours into practice;Jeanne is certainly an ungrateful girl, and Gelis a much too seductive

But still,unless I put him out of the house, which would be a detestably illmannered and illnatured thing

to do,I must continue to receive him. He has been waiting ever so long in my little parlour, in front of

those Sevres vases with which, King Louis Philippe so graciously presented me. The Moissonneurs and the

Pecheurs of Leopold Robert are painted upon those porcelain vases, which Gelis nevertheless dares to call

frightfully ugly, with the warm approval of Jeanne, whom he has absolutely bewitched.

"My dear lad, excuse me for having kept you waiting so long. I had a little bit of work to finish."

I am telling the truth. Meditation is work, but of course Gelis does not know what I mean; he thinks I am

referring to something archaeological, and, his question in regard to the health of Mademoiselle Jeanne

having been answered by a "Very well indeed," uttered in that extremely dry tone which reveals my moral

authority as guardian, we begin to converse about historical subjects. We first enter upon generalities.

Generalities are sometimes extremely serviceable. I try to inculcate into Monsieur Gelis some respect for that

"History, which was formerly an art, and which afforded place for the fullest exercise of the imagination, has

in our time become a science, the study of which demands absolute exactness of knowledge."

Gelis asks leave to differ from me on this subject. He tells me he does not believe that history is a science, or

"In the first place," he says to me, "what is history? The written representation of past events. But what is an

event? Is it merely a commonplace fact? Is it any fact? No! You say yourself it is a noteworthy fact. Now,

how is the historian to tell whether a fact is noteworthy or not? He judges it arbitrarily, according to his tastes

and his caprices and his ideasin short, as an artist? For facts cannot by reason of their own intrinsic

character be divided into historical facts and nonhistorical facts. But any fact is something exceedingly

complex. Will the historian represent facts in all their complexity? No, that is impossible. Then he will

represent them stripped of the greater part of the peculiarities which constituted them, and consequently

lopped, mutilated, different from what they really were. As for the interrelation of facts, needless to speak of

it! If a socalled historical fact be brought into noticeas is very possibleby one or more facts which are

not historical at all, and are for that very reason unknown, how is the historian going to establish the relation

of these facts one to another? And in saying this, Monsieur Bonnard, I am supposing that the historian has

positive evidence before him, whereas in reality he feels confidence only in such or such a witness for

sympathetic reasons. History is not a science; it is an art, and one can succeed in that art only through the

Monsieur Gelis reminds me very much at this moment of a certain young fool whom I heard talking wildly

one day in the garden of the Luxembourg, under the statue of Marguerite of Navarre. But at another turn of

the conversation we find ourselves face to face with Walter Scott, whose work my disdainful young friend

pleases to term "rococo, troubadourish, and only fit to inspire somebody engaged in making designs for cheap

"Why!" I exclaim, zealous to defend the magnificent creator of 'The Bride of Lammermoor' and 'The Fair

Maid of Perth,' "the whole past lives in those admirable novels of his;that is history, that is epic!"

And,will you believe it?this crazy boy actually tells me that no matter how learned one may be, one

cannot possibly know just how men used to live five or ten centuries ago, because it is only with the very

greatest difficulty that one can picture them to oneself even as they were only ten or fifteen years ago. In his

opinion, the historical poem, the historical novel, the historical painting, are all, according to their kind,

"In all the arts," he adds, "the artist can only reflect his own soul. His work, no matter how it may be dressed

up, is of necessity contemporary with himself, being the reflection of his own mind. What do we admire in

the 'Divine Comedy' unless it be the great soul of Dante? And the marbles of Michael Angelo, what do they

represent to us that is at all extraordinary unless it be Michael Angelo himself? The artist either

communicates his own life to his creations, or else merely whittles out puppets and dresses up dolls."

What a torrent of paradoxes and irreverences! But boldness in a young man is not displeasing to me. Gelis

gets up from his chair and sits down again. I know perfectly well what is worrying him, and whom he is

waiting for. And now he begins to talk to me about his being able to make fifteen hundred francs a year, to

which he can add the revenue he derives from a little property that he has inheritedtwo thousand francs a

year or more. And I am not in the least deceived as to the purpose of these confidences on his part. I know

perfectly well that he is only making his little financial statements in order to persuade me that he is

comfortably circumstanced, steady, fond of home, comparatively independentor, to put the matter in the

fewest words possible, able to marry. Quod erat demonstrandum,as the geometricians say.

He has got up and sat down just twenty times. He now rises for the twentyfirst time; and, as he has not been

The moment he has gone, Jeanne comes into the City of Books, under the pretext of looking for Hannibal.

She is also quite unhappy; and her voice becomes singularly plaintive as she calls her pet to give him some

milk. Look at that sad little face, Bonnard! Tyrant, gaze upon thy work! Thou hast been able to keep them

from seeing each other; but they have now both of them the same expression of countenance, and thou

mayest discern from that similarity of expression that in spite of thee they are united in thought. Cassandra,

be happy! Bartholo, rejoice! This is what it means to be a guardian! Just see her kneeling down there on the

Yes, caress the stupid animal!pity him!moan over him!we know very well, you little rogue, the real

cause of all those sighs and plaints! Nevertheless, it makes a very pretty picture. I look at it for a long time;

IT is done!they are betrothed. Gelis, who is an orphan, as Jeanne is, did not make his proposal to me in

person. He got one of his professors, an old colleague of mine, highly esteemed for his learning and

character, to come to me on his behalf. But what a love messenger! Great Heavens! A bearnot a bear of the

Pyrenees, but a literary bear, and this latter variety of bear is much more ferocious than the former.

"Right or wrong (in my opinion wrong) Gelis says that he does not want any dowry; he takes your ward with

nothing but her chemise. Say yes, and the thing is settled! Make haste about it! I want to show you two or

three very curious old tokens from Lorraine which I am sure you never saw before."

That is literally what he said to me. I answered him that I would consult Jeanne, and I found no small

Her dowrythere it is in front of me! It is my library. Henri and Jeanne have not even the faintest suspicion

about it; and the fact is I am commonly believed to be much richer than I am. I have the face of an old miser.

It is certainly a lying face; but its untruthfulness has often won for me a great deal of consideration. There is

I have consulted Jeanne,but what was the need of listening for her answer? It is done! They are betrothed.

It would ill become my character as well as my face to watch these young people any longer for the mere

purpose of noting down their words and gestures. Noli me tangere:that is the maxim for all charming love

affairs. I know my duty. It is to respect all the little secrets of that innocent soul intrusted to me. Let these

children love each other all they can! Never a word of their fervent outpouring of mutual confidences, never a

hint of their artless selfbetrayals, will be set down in this diary by the old guardian whose authority was so

At all events, I am not going to remain with my arms folded; and if they have their business to attend to, I

have mine also. I am preparing a catalogue of my books, with a view to having them all sold at auction. It is a

task which saddens and amuses me at the same time. I linger over it, perhaps a good deal longer than I ought

to do; turning the leaves of all those works which have become so familiar to my thought, to my touch, to my

sighteven out of all necessity and reason. But it is a farewell; and it has ever been in the nature of man to

This ponderous volume here, which has served me so much for thirty long years, how can I leave it without

according to it every kindness that a faithful servant deserves? And this one again, which has so often

consoled me by its wholesome doctrines, must I not bow down before it for the last time, as to a Master? But

each time that I meet with a volume which ever led me into error, which ever afflicted me with false dates,

omissions, lies, and other plagues of the archaeologist, I say to it with bitter joy: "Go! impostor, traitor,

falsewitness! flee thou far away from me for ever;vade retro! all absurdly covered with gold as thou art!

and I pray it may befall theethanks to thy usurped reputation and thy comely morocco attireto take thy

place in the cabinet of some bankerbibliomaniac, whom thou wilt never be able to seduce as thou hast

I laid aside some books I must always keepthose books which were given to me as souvenirs. As I placed

among them the manuscript of the "Golden Legend," I could not but kiss it in memory of Madame Trepof,

who remained grateful to me in spite of her high position and all her wealth, and who became my

benefactress merely to prove to me that she felt I had once done her a kindness.... Thus I had made a reserve.

It was then that, for the first time, I felt myself inclined to commit a deliberate crime. All through that night I

was strongly tempted; by morning the temptation had become irresistible. Everybody else in the house was

Ye powers of darkness! ye phantoms of the night! if while lingering within my home after the crowing of the

cock, you saw me stealing about on tiptoe in the City of Books, you certainly never cried out, as Madame

Trepof did at Naples, "That old man has a goodnatured round back!" I entered the library; Hannibal, with

his tail perpendicularly erected, came to rub himself against my legs and purr. I seized a volume from its

shelf, some venerable Gothic text or some noble poet of the Renaissancethe jewel, the treasure which I had

been dreaming about all night, I seized it and slipped it away into the very bottom of the closet which I had

reserved for those books I intended to retain, and which soon became full almost to bursting. It is horrible to

relate: I was stealing the dowry of Jeanne! And when the crime had been consummated I set myself again

sturdily to the task of cataloguing, until Jeanne came to consult me in regard to something about a dress or a

trousseau. I could not possibly understand just what she was talking about, through my total ignorance of the

current vocabulary of dressmaking and linendrapery. Ah! if a bride of the fourteenth century had come to

talk to me about the apparel of her epoch, then, indeed, I should have been able to understand her language!

But Jeanne does not belong to my time, and I have to send her to Madame de Gabry, who on this important

...Night has come! Leaning from the window, we gaze at the vast sombre stretch of the city below us, pierced

with multitudinous points of light. Jeanne presses her hand to her forehead as she leans upon the

windowbar, and seems a little sad. And I say to myself as I watch her: All changes, even the most longed

for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves: we must die to one life before

PAGE eightyseven.... Only twenty lines more and I shall have finished my book about insects and flowers.

Page eightyseventh and last.... "As we have already seen, the visits of insects are of the utmost importance

to plants; since their duty is to carry to the pistils the pollen of the stamens. It seems also that the flower itself

is arranged and made attractive for the purpose of inviting this nuptial visit. I think I have been able to show

that the nectary of the plant distils a sugary liquid which attracts the insect and obliges it to aid unconsciously

in the work of direct or cross fertilisation. The last method of fertilisation is the more common. I have shown

that flowers are coloured and perfumed so as to attract insects, and interiorly so constructed as to offer those

visitors such a mode of access that they cannot penetrate into the corolla without depositing upon the stigma

the pollen with which they have been covered. My most venerated master Sprengel observes in regard to that

fine down which lines the corolla of the woodgeranium: 'The wise Author of Nature has never created a

single useless hair!' I say in my turn: If that Lily of the Valley whereof the Gospel makes mention is more

richly clad than King Solomon in all his glory, its mantle of purple is a weddinggarment, and that rich

apparel is necessary to the perpetuation of the species.* "BROLLES, August 21, 1869."

*Monsieur Sylvestre Bonnard was not aware that several very illustrious naturalists were making researches

at the same time as he in regard to the relation between insects and plants. He was not acquainted with the

labours of Darwin, with those of Dr. Hermann Muller, nor with the observations of Sir John Lubbock. It is

worthy of note that the conclusions of Monsieur Sylvestre Bonnard are very nearly similar to those reached

by the three scientists above mentioned. Less important, but perhaps equally interesting, is the fact that Sir

John Lubbock is, like Monsieur Bonnard, an archaeologist who began to devote himself only late in life to

Brolles! My house is the last one you pass in the single street of the village, as you go to the woods. It is a

gabled house with a slate roof, which takes iridescent tints in the sun like a pigeon's breast. The weathervane

above that roof has won more consideration for me among the country people than all my works upon history

and philology. There is not a single child who does not know Monsieur Bonnard's weathervane. It is rusty,

and squeaks very sharply in the wind. Sometimes it refuses to do any work at alljust like Therese, who

now allows herself to be assisted by a young peasant girlthough she grumbles a good deal about it. The

house is not large, but I am very comfortable in it. My room has two windows, and gets the sun in the

morning. The children's room is upstairs. Jeanne and Henri come twice a year to occupy it.

Little Sylvestre's cradle used to be in it. He was a very pretty child, but very pale. When he used to play on

the grass, his mother would watch him very anxiously; and every little while she would stop her sewing in

order to take him upon her lap. The poor little fellow never wanted to go to sleep. He used to say that when

he was asleep he would go away, very far away, to some place where it was all dark, and where he saw things

Then his mother would call me, and I would sit down beside his cradle. He would take one of my fingers into

Then I would tell him all kinds of stories, which he would listen to very seriously. They all interested him,

but there was one especially which filled his little soul with delight. It was "The Blue Bird." Whenever I

finished that, he would say to me, "Tell it again! tell it again!" And I would tell it again until his little pale

No! There was nothing extraordinary the matter with little Sylvestre. One evening last year his father called

I approached the cradle over which the mother hung motionless, as if tied down above it by all the powers of

Little Sylvestre turned his eyes towards me; their pupils had already rolled up beneath his eyelids, and could

I am too old now to feel very deeply; but how strangely painful a mystery is the death of a child!

Today, the father and mother have come to pass six weeks under the old man's roof. I see them now

returning from the woods, walking arminarm. Jeanne is closely wrapped in her black shawl, and Henri

wears a crape band on his straw hat; but they are both of them radiant with youth, and they smile very

sweetly at each other. They smile at the earth which sustains them; they smile at the air which bathes them;

they smile at the light which each one sees in the eyes of the other. From my window I wave my

Jeanne comes running lightly up the stairs; she kisses me, and then whispers in my ear something which I

divine rather than hear. And I make answer to her: "May God's blessing be with you, Jeanne, and with your

husband, and with your children, and with your children's children for ever!" ... Et nunc dimittis servum