SONG.Tread thou the mountain, brother, brother!Tread thou the mountain wild!In each other land men betray one another;Be thou then the mountain's child.I.Hark! how hidalgo to hidalgo vows,To serve him he'd hazard his life--But woe to the foolish and confident spouseIf he leave him alone with his wife.--Tread then the mountain, brother, brother!Tread then the mountain wild!In each other land men betray one another;Be thou then the mountain's child.II.Lo! how the merchant to merchant will say,His credit and purse to command:But let him fall bankrupt, I doubt, well-a-day!No credit he'll have at his hand.Tread then the mountain, brother, brother!Tread then the mountain wild!In each other land men betray one another;Be thou then the mountain's child.III.Lo! how the statesman will promise his tool,To raise him to honours some day:But when he's done all he would wish, the poor foolWill regret taking fine words for pay.Tread then the mountain, brother, brother!Tread then the mountain wild!In each other land men betray one another;Be thou then the mountain's child.IV.Hark! what the courtier vows to his king,To serve him whatever befal;But if evil luck dark misfortune should bring,The courtier turns sooner than all.Tread then the mountain, brother, brother!Tread then the mountain wild!In court, crowd, and city, men cheat one another;Be thou then the mountain's child.
"He says true! By Saint Jago, he says true!" cried Garcias, who had been listening as well as myself. "Thank God, for being born a mountaineer!"
He ended his self-gratulation with a long whistle, so shrill that it reached the ears of the singer, to whom the noise of our voices had not arrived from the height we were above him, although his song by the natural tendency of sounds had come up to us. He answered the signal of his captain immediately, and we instantly began to descend, making steps of the boles and roots of the trees, till lighting once more on somewhat level ground, we stood beside his watch-fire. The singer was a tall, fine Arragonese, about my own age, or perhaps somewhat older, who had been thrown out as a sentinel to guard the little encampment of the smugglers, which lay a couple of hundred yards farther down the ravine. He bore a striking resemblance to Garcias, whom he called cousin, and also seemed to possess some portion of his gigantic strength, if one might judge by the swelling muscles of his legs and arms, which were easily discernible through the tight netted silk breeches and stockings he wore in common with most of his companions.
He gazed upon me for a moment or two with some surprise, and I returned his look with one of equal curiosity. In truth, I should not particularly have liked to encounter him as an adversary; for with his long gun, his knife, and his pistols, added to the vigour and activity indicated by his figure, he would have offered as formidable an opponent as I ever beheld. No questions, however, did he ask concerning me. Not a word, not an observation did he make; but resuming the characteristic gravity of the Spaniard, from which, perhaps, he thought his song might have somewhat derogated in the eyes of a stranger, he merely replied to a question of his cousin, that all had passed tranquilly during his absence, and cast himself down upon his checkered cloak, by the side of the watch-fire, with an air of the most perfect indifference.
At another time I might have smiled to see how true it is that nations have their affectations as well as individuals, but I was in no smiling mood, and were I to own the truth, I turned away with a feeling of contemptuous anger at his arrogation of gravity, fully as ridiculous in me as even his mock solemnity. What had I to do to be angry with him? I asked myself, after a moment's reflection: I was not born to be the whipper of all fools; and if I was, I thought my castigation had certainly better begin with myself.
Garcias led me on to the rest of his companions, who were stretched sleeping on the ground; some wrapped in their cloaks, some partly sheltered from the winds, which in those mountains lose not their wintry sharpness till summer is far advanced, by little stone walls, built up from the various masses of rock that from time to time had rolled down the mountain, and strewed the bottom of the ravine. The younger men, though engaged in a life of danger and risk, slept on with the fearless slumber of youth; but four or five of the elder smugglers, whom ancient habits of watchful anxiety rendered light of sleep, started up with musket and dagger in their hands, long before our steps had reached their halting-place.
The figure of Garcias, however, soon quieted their alarm; and I was astonished to see how little agitation the return of their absent leader, from what had been, and always must be, a dangerous part of their enterprise, caused amongst them; nor did my presence excite any particular attention. Garcias informed them simply, that I was a friend he had long known, who now came to join them; on which they welcomed me cordially, without farther inquiry, giving me merely theBuenas noches tenga usted caballero, and assigning me a spot to sleep in, near the horses, which was indeed the place of honour, being more sheltered than any other.
Sleep--calm, natural sleep--was not, however, to be procured so soon; and though I laid down and remained quiet, in imitation of the smugglers, what, what would I not have given for the slumber they enjoyed! I need not go farther into my feelings--I need not tell all the bitter and agonising reflections that reiterated themselves upon my brain, till I thought reason would have abandoned me. What I had been--what I was--what I was to be--each one of them had some peculiar pang; so that on neither the past, the present, nor the future, could my mind rest without torture; and yet I could not sleep.
It may easily be conceived, then, that the two hours which elapsed, between our arrival at the rendezvous and the break of day, was a space too dreadful to be rested on without pain, even now, when the whole has been given over to the more calm dominion of remembrance:--remembrance, that has the power to rob every part of the past of its bitter, except remorse; and to mingle some sweet with even the memory of pain and misfortune, provided our own heart finds nothing therein for reproach.
As soon as the very first faint streaks of light began to interweave themselves with the grey clouds in the east, the smugglers were upon their feet, and, gathering round Garcias and myself, began to ask a great many more questions than they had ventured on the night before. My dress and my person became objects of some curiosity among them; and it so unfortunately happened that more than one of the smugglers, who had seen me at the mill in former days, instantly recognised me at present. However, as probably no one of them would have found it agreeable himself to assign his exact reasons for joining the lawless band with which he consorted, I escaped all questions as to the cause of my appearing amongst them. Each, probably, attributed it to some separate imagination of his own; but the high favour in which our house stood with this honourable fraternity, assured me the most enthusiastic reception; and they mutually rivalled one another in their endeavours to serve me, and render my situation comfortable.
It was in vain now to attempt concealing from any one of the band my rank in life; but in order that accident should not extend my real name beyond the mere circle of those who knew me, I followed a custom which I found they generally adopted themselves--that of distinguishing themselves, each by a different appellation, when actually engaged in any of their hazardous enterprises, from that by which they were ordinarily known in the world. I therefore took the name of De l'Orme, to which I was really entitled by birth; the Comté de l'Orme having been in our family from time immemorial.
These arrangements, the quick questions of the smugglers, their wild, strange manners, and picturesque appearance, all formed a relief to a mind anxious to escape from itself; and perhaps no society into which I could have fallen would have afforded me so much the means of abstracting my thoughts from all that was painful in my situation. After having satisfied their curiosity in regard to me, the Spaniards, to the number of twenty, gathered round Garcias to hear how he had disposed of the smuggled goods, which had been deposited at the mill; and certainly, never did a more picturesque group meet my view, than that which they presented, with their fine muscular limbs, rich coloured dresses, deep sun-burnt countenances, and flashing black eyes; while each cast himself into some of those wild and picturesque attitudes, which seem natural to mountaineers; and the form of Garcias towering above them all, looked like that of the Farnesian Hercules, fresh from the garden of the Hesperides.
Garcias' story was soon told. He informed them simply, that all was safe, produced the little bag which contained the profits of their last adventure, and told them how much the miller expected to gain for the goods at present in his hands. I remarked, however, he wisely said not a word of the death of Derville the douanier, although undoubtedly it would have met with the high approbation of his companions; and probably would have given him still greater sway, than even that which he already possessed, over the minds of a class of men, on whom anything striking and bold is never without its effect.
All this being concluded, instant preparation was made for our departure. A horse was assigned to me from amongst those which had borne the smuggled wares across the mountains; and all the worthy fraternity being mounted, we had already begun to wind down the ravine, in an opposite direction from that on which Garcias and myself had arrived, when the sound of voices, heard at a little distance before us, made us halt in our march. In a moment after, one of the smugglers, who had been sent out as a sort of piquette in front, and whose voice we had heard, returned, dragging along a poor little man, in whom I instantly recognised the unfortunate player apothecary, who had given me so much relief by his chirurgical applications a day or two before. He had a small bundle strapped upon his back, as if equipped for travelling; and seemed to be in mortal fear, holding back with all his might, while the smuggler pulled him along by the arm, as we often see a boy drag on an unwilling puppy by the collar, while the obstinate beast hangs back with its haunches, and sets its four feet firmly forward, contending stoutly every step that it is forced to make in advance.
"Here is a spy," cried the smuggler, pulling his prisoner forward into the midst of the wild group, that our halt had occasioned; "I caught him dodging about in the bushes there, at the entrance of the ravine; and, depend on it, thegabellateursare not far off."
The poor player, who understood not one word of this Spanish accusation, gazed about, with open mouth, and starting eyes, upon the dark countenances of the smugglers, who, I believe, were only meditating whether it would be better to throw him over the first precipice, or hang him up on the first tree; and whose looks, in consequence, did not offer anything re-assuring.
"Messieurs! messieurs! respectable messieurs!" cried he, gazing round and round in an agony of terror, without being able to say any more; when suddenly his eye fell upon me, and darting forward with a quick spring, that loosed him from the smuggler's hold, he cast himself upon his knees, embracing my stirrup; while half-a-dozen guns were instantly pointed at his head, from the idea that he was about to make his escape. The clicking of the gun-locks increased his terror almost to madness; and, creeping under my horse's belly, he made a sort of shield for his head, with my foot and the large clumsy stirrup-iron, crying out with the most doleful accents, "Don't fire! don't fire! pray don't fire!--Monseigneur!--Illustrious scion of a noble house!--pray don't fire--exert thine influence benign, for the preservation of a lowly supplicant."
By this time, one of the smugglers had again got the player by the collar; and, dragging him out with some detriment to his doublet, he placed him once more in the midst. "Garcias," cried I, seeing them rather inclined to maltreat their captive, "do not let them hurt him; your companion is under a mistake. This poor little wretch, depend on it, had no more idea of spying upon your proceedings, than he had of spying into the intrigues of the moon. He is a miserable player, who is unemployed, and half starving, I believe. I will answer for his being no spy."
At my intercession, Garcias interfered to prevent any further annoyance being inflicted upon the hero of the buskin, and questioned him, in French, in regard to what he did there. For a moment or two, his terror and agitation deprived him of the power of explaining himself; but soon beginning to perceive that the storm had in some degree subsided, he took courage, and summoning up his most elevated style, he proceeded to explain his appearance amongst them, mingling, as he went on, a slight degree of satire with his bombast, which I was afraid might do him but little service with his hearers.
"Gentlemen!" cried he, "if ye be--as, from your gay attire and splendid arms, your noble bearing and your bronzed cheeks, I judge ye are--lords of the forest and the mountain--knights, wanderers of the wild--magistrates, executors of your own laws, and abrogators of the laws of every other person--I beseech ye, show pity and fellow-feeling towards one who has the honour of being fully as penniless as yourselves; who, though he never yet had courage enough to cut a purse, or talent enough to steal one, has ever been a great admirer of those bold and witty men, who maintain the blessed doctrine of the community of this world's goods at the point of the sword, and put down the villanous monopoly of gold and silver with a strong hand and a loaded pistol."
"Make haste, good friend!" cried Garcias, smiling; "we are not what you take us for, but we have as much need of concealment as if we were. Therefore, if you would escape hanging on that bough, give a true account of yourself in as few words as possible. Such active tongues as yours sometimes slip into the mire of falsehood. See that it be not the case with you. Say, how came you in this unfrequented part of the country, at this early hour?"
"Admirable captain!" cried the player, again beginning to tremble for his life, "you shall hear the strange mysterious turns of fate that conducted me hither, to a part of which, that noble scion of an illustrious house--who seems either to be your prisoner or your friend, I know not which; but who, in either capacity, is equally honourable and to be honoured--can bear witness. Know, then, magnanimous chief, no later than yesterday morning, towards the hour of noon, according to that illustrious scion's express command, I proceeded to the principal gate of the mighty Château de l'Orme, where I had expected a certain further fee or reward, which he promised me for having solaced and assuaged the pains of those wounds still visible upon his brow and hands. But judge of my surprise when, on entering the court-yard, I found the whole place in confusion and dismay; men mounting in haste, women screaming at leisure, dogs barking, horses neighing, and asses braying; and on my addressing myself to an elderly gentleman with a long nose, for all the world like a sausage of Bigorre, asking him, with a sweet respectful smile, if he could show me to my lord the young count, he bestowed a buffet on my cheek, which had even a greater effect than the buffet which Moses gave the rock, for it brought fire as well as water out of my eyes both at once."
"And what was the cause of all this tumult? Did you hear?" demanded Garcias, who had observed my eye, while the player told what he had seen at the Château de l'Orme, straining up his countenance with an anxiety that would bear no delay.
"To speak the truth, most mighty potentate of the mountains," replied the stroller, "I asked no farther questions where such answers seemed amongst the most common forms of speech. I thought the striking reply of my first respondent quite sufficient, though not very satisfactory; and, judging he might like my back better than my face, I got my heels over the threshold, and came away as fast as possible. I did not return to the cottage where I had spent the last six weeks, for I had happily my pack on my back, and my worthy host and hostess were so much obliged to me for boarding and lodging with them all that time, that I doubt they would have retained my goods and chattels as a keepsake, if I had ventured myself within reach of their affectionate embraces; though, God help me! they had already kept, as a remembrance, the gold piece which monseigneur gave me at first. I, last night, made my way to Argelez, and liberally offered the gross-mindedaubergisteof the place, to treat himself and his company to the whole of 'The Cid,' to be enacted by myself alone, for the simple consideration of a night's lodging and a dinner; but he, most grovelling brute! fingered my doublet with his cursed paw, and said he was afraid the dresses and decorations would be too expensive, as they must evidently all be new. Indignantly I turned upon my heel, and walked on till I came to this valley, where I found a nice warm bush, and slept out my night after Father Adam's fashion. This morning, hearing voices, and knowing not whence they came, I began to look about with some degree of caution, when suddenly pounces upon me this dark-browed gentleman, and drags me hither, to the manifest injury of my poor doublet, which, God help it! has had so many a pull from old mischievous Time, that it can ill bear the rude touch of any other fingers. This is my tale, renowned sir; and if it be not true, may the buskin never fit my foot, may the dagger break in my grasp, and the bowl tumble out of my fingers!"
The latter part of the poor player's speech had been sufficiently long to give me the time necessary for recovering from the effect of that portion of it which had personally affected myself, and I pointed out to Garcias that his tale must undoubtedly be true, begging him at the same time, to free the poor little man and send him away.
"No, no!" replied the smuggler, "that must not be. He has found his way to a retreat which none but ourselves knew; such secrets are heavy things to carry, and he might drop his burden at somedouanier'sdoor who would pay for it in gold. No, no! willing or unwilling, he must come with us to Spain, and we will teach him a better trade than ranting other people's nonsense to amuse as great fools as himself."
The little player at first seemed somewhat astounded at such an unexpected alteration in his prospects; but learning that, in the very first place, board and lodging was to be provided for him, and a horse as soon as one could be procured, his countenance brightened up, and he trudged contentedly after the band of smugglers, eating a large lump of cheese and a biscuit, which Garcias had given him as occupation on the road. Strange, strange world, where the most abject poverty is the surest buckler against misfortune! When I stood and considered that wretched player's feelings and my own, and saw how little he was affected by things which would have pained me to the very soul--how little he heeded being torn from his native land, with nothing but blank uncertainty before him--and how he enjoyed the crust which fortune had given him--I could hardly help envying his very misery, which so armoured him against all the shafts of adversity to which I stood nakedly opposed.
My present journey through the Pyrenees, though tending very nearly in the same direction as the first, lay amongst scenes of a still wilder description, for the smugglers carefully avoid all the ordinary paths, and, though now unburdened with any seizable goods, as heedfully guarded against a meeting with the officers of thedouaneas if they were escorting a whole cargo. They seemed to take a delight in the mystery and secrecy of their ways; but, in truth they found it necessary to keep the whole world, except those concerned, in perfect ignorance of the great extent to which their contraband traffic was carried on, and for this purpose, glided along through the deepest shades of the pine forests, and over the highest and least frequented parts of the hills, by paths impracticable to any but themselves.
Towards the close of the first day, we halted by the side of a small mountain-lake, whose calm, still, shadowy waves, I almost hoped were the waters of oblivion. Round about, the mountains rose up on every side, seeming to shelter it from a world, and not a breath of wind rippled the surface of the water, so that the reflections of the high snowy peaks of the hills above, the dark rocks that dipped themselves in its waves, and the gloomy pines that skirted it to the east, were all seen looking up like ghosts from below, while ever and anon a light evening cloud skimming over the sky found there its reflection too, and was seen gliding over the bosom of the calm expanse. The turf that spread from the margin of the lake to the bases of the mighty rocks that towered up around, was covered with every kind of flower, though at so great an elevation; and the rhododendron in full blossom, vied with the beautiful pink saffron, as if striving which should most embellish that favoured spot of green that nature seemed to have fancifully placed there, as a contrast between the cold dark waters and the stern grey rock.
When, after alighting from my horse, I gazed round on the whole scene, and then thought of returning to the world, with its idle bustle, and its thronging pains, and its vain babble, and unbroken discontent, I was tempted to cast it all from me at once, and become a hermit even there, spending my time in the contemplation of eternity; but the thoughts that thronged upon me during one brief half hour of solitude, while the smugglers were occupied in making their arrangements for the night, showed me that the gayest scenes of the busy world would still leave me, perhaps, more time for memory than I could wish memory to fill.
At length my meditations were disturbed by the approach of the little player, who seemed quite contented with his fate. As he came near, he stretched forth his hand, threw back his head, and was beginning with his usual emphasis to address me as "Illustrious scion of a noble house," when I stopped him in the midst somewhat peevishly, bidding him drop his high-flown style if he would have me listen to him, and never to use it to me again if he wished not such a reply as had been bestowed upon him by my father'smaître d'hôtel. This warning and threat had a very happy effect, for he seldom afterwards poured forth any of his rodomontade upon me; and when denuded of its frippery, his conversation was not without poignancy.
"Well, sir," said he, after my rebuff, "I will treat you to plain prose, as you love not the high and metaphorical. Be it known then unto your worship, that our friends with the dark faces have prepared something for dinner, and invite you to partake of some excellent Bayonne ham, and some unfortunate young trout, that an artful vagabond with an insinuating countenance has seduced out of the protecting bosom of their parent lake, and abandoned to the vile appetite of his companions. Added to this, you will find some excellentbotargis, which you doubtless are aware is manufactured out of the roe of the mullet, and provokes drinking, a propensity that you may satisfy at discretion, out of certain skins of wine for that purpose made and provided--as my poor dear supposed father used to say, who turned me out of his house when I was nine years old."
I had too little love for my own thoughts to remain any longer alone than I could avoid, and rising, I followed the little player to a spot where the smugglers had spread out their supper upon Nature's table. This was the first meal I had seen amongst them, and I found that they ate but once a day: but to do them all manner of justice, when they did apply themselves to satisfy their hunger, they amply compensated for their abstinence; and as they intended to proceed no farther that night, they were not more sparing of their wine than of their other viands. Gradually, as the potent juice of the grape began to warm their veins, all Spanish reserve wore away, and mirth and jocularity succeeded. Jest, and tale, and song went round; and even Garcias seemed to banish every circumstance of the past, and to enjoy himself as fully, as forgetfully as the rest.
To what was this owing? I asked myself.--To the wine-cup!--It had taught them forgetfulness!--it was temporary oblivion!--it was happiness!--and I drained it, and redrained it, to obtain the same blessing for myself. Strange how one error ever brings on another! and thus it is that amendment is still so difficult to those who have done wrong--'tis not alone that they have to renounce the fault they have once committed, but that they have also to struggle against all those which that one brings in its train.
I drank deep for forgetfulness; and certainly, amongst the companions into whose society circumstances had thrown me, I was not without encouragement. The wine they had brought with them was excellent and abundant; and when any one began to flag in his potation, the rest seemed to cry him on, as soldiers encourage one another in a march. Sometimes it was a story, sometimes a jest, sometimes a song; and of the latter, they had more amongst them than I had supposed could be invented on one subject. The last that I remember, was sung by the same musical youth whom Garcias and myself had found acting as sentinel when we joined the smugglers near Argelez. His single voice gave out the separate verses of the song to a merry Spanish air, while all the rest joining in at the end, raised a deafening din with the very absurd chorus.
SONG."Woman first invented wine,Ere man found out to drink it;[4]If otherwise she wer'n't divine,For this we're bound to think it.CHORUS.Malaga and Alicant,Xeres and La Mancha!Whatever cup she offers man,We'll take it, and we'll thank her!Cold water's but a sober thing,That's only fit for asses--"* * * * * *
But before he had concluded, or his companions began roaring again about Malaga and Alicant, my cup fell out of my hand, and I slept.
I believe my sleep would have lasted longer than the night, had Garcias not woke me towards daybreak, and told me that they were preparing to depart. Amongst the smugglers, every one took care of his own horse, and of course I could not expect to be exempt from the same charge in their wandering republic, where the only title to require service oneself was the having shown it to others. I started up, therefore, in order to repair, as much as I could, my negligence of the night before. To my surprise, however, I found that the horse had been already rubbed down and saddled by the little player; who, having drunk more cautiously than myself, had woke early in the morning; and, after having shown this piece of attention to me, was engaged in tricking out, for his own use, an ass, which one of the smugglers had procured from some acquaintance at the foot of the mountain. I thanked the little man for his civility; when, laying his hand upon his heart, he professed his pleasure in serving me, and begged, in humble terms, if I had any thought of engaging a servant in the expedition wherein we were both engaged, that he might be preferred to that high post.
"The post would certainly be more honourable than profitable, my good friend," replied I, with some very melancholy feelings concerning my own destitute condition, for my whole fortune consisted of about thirty Louis d'ors and a diamond ring, the value of which I did not know. "I must tell you thus much concerning my situation," I added; "I am now quitting my father's house and my native land, from circumstances which concern me alone, but which may render my absence long; and during that absence, I expect no supply or pecuniary aid from any one. You may now judge," I proceeded, with somewhat of a painful smile, "whether such a man's service be the one to suit you."
"Exactly!" replied the little player, to my surprise; "for during the time you have nothing to give me, you will judge whether I am like to suit you when you can pay me well. I ask no wages but meat and drink. That, I am sure, you will give me while you can get any for yourself; and if a time should come when you can get none, perhaps it may be my turn to put my hand in fortune's bag, and pull out a dinner. Alone, and with no one to help me, I have never wanted food, but that one day at Argelez; and, God knows, I never knew from day to day where I should fill my cup or load my platter, but in company with your lordship--never fear, we shall always find plenty. Two people can accomplish a thousand things that one cannot. You can do a thousand that I do not know how to do, and I can do a thousand that you would be ashamed to do. Thank God, for having been turned out upon the world at nine years old, without a sous in my pocket. 'Twas the best school in nature for finishing my education."
I was hurt, I own, at the sort of companionship which the miserable little player seemed to have established, in his own mind, so completely between himself and me; and the haughty noble was rising with some acrimony to my lips, when I suddenly bethought me, what a thing I was to be proud over my fellow-worm! It was a thought to take down the high stomach of my nobility, and after a moment's pause, I merely replied, "Your life must afford a curious history, and doubtless has been full both of turns of fate and turns of ingenuity."
"Oh, 'tis a very simple history," answered the player, "as brief as the courtship of a widow. When your lordship has got on horseback, and I have clambered on my ass, I will tell it to you as we go along. 'Twill at least spend a long five minutes."
His proposal was not disagreeable to me, for my mind was in that state when anything which could fill up a moment with some external feeling or interest was in itself a blessing. Had he told such a tale as those with which they amuse children in a nursery, I should have been contented; and accordingly, as soon, after having mounted, as we were once more on our journey, I begged he would proceed, which he complied with as follows:--
"My mother's husband, who had the credit--if any honour was thereunto attached--of being my father, was, when I can first remember him, intendant to the estates of M. le Comte de Bagnols. He had originally studied the law; but not having money enough to purchase any charge at the bar, he was very glad to take the management of a young nobleman's estates, who, though not indeed careless and extravagant, was still young--consequently inexperienced--consequently plunderable, and consequently a hopeful speculation for one in my father's situation. The Count was liberal, and therefore the appointments were in themselves good, consisting of a separate house half a mile from the château, a considerable glebe of land, and a salary of a thousand crowns. I must remark here, that the intendant was the ugliest man in Christendom, but he had the advantage of possessing in my poor dear mother a very handsome wife, whose beauties he considered as a certain means of performing the curious alchymical process of the transmutation of metals; that is to say, the changing his own brass into the Count's gold.
"Now I should be most happy could I claim any kindred with the noble family of Bagnols, but sorry I am to say, I was several years old when the young Count returned to the château from his campaigns with the army. Nor, indeed, should I have been much better off had fortune decreed me to be born afterwards; for though the worthy intendant was as liberal as Cato in many respects, and the most decided foe to all sorts of jealousy, and though my mother also was a complete prodigal in the dispensation of her smiles, the Count was as cold as ice. Indeed, as his marriage with the beautiful Henriette de Vergne was soon after brought on the carpet, I can hardly blame him for thinking of no one else. All went on well for two years, during which time my mother had twice occasion to call upon Lucina, and the intendant was gratified by finding himself the father of two other sturdy children. At the end of that time, however, the marriage of the Count was broken off with Mademoiselle de Vergne, and the young lady was promised to the Marquis de St. Brie. You have heard all that sad story, I dare say! The Marquis not liking a rival at liberty--for they began to whisper that the Count still privately saw Mademoiselle de Vergne, and some even said was married to her--had him arrested and thrown into prison, on an accusation of aiding the rebels at Rochelle. The count, however, found means to write to the intendant a letter from the Bastille, containing two orders: one was to send him instantly a certain packet of papers containing the proofs of his innocence; the other, to sell as speedily as possible all the alienable part of his property, and to transmit the amount to a commercial house at Saragossa. The worthy intendant set himself to consider his own interests, and finding that it would be best to keep his lord in prison, he could never discover the papers. At the same time, the buying and selling of a large property is never without its advantage to the steward, and therefore he punctually obeyed the Count's command in this particular, selling all that he could sell, and transmitting the money to Spain, at the end of which transaction he found himself very comfortably off in the world. One night, while he sat counting his gains, however, he was somewhat surprised by a visit from the count, who had made his escape from the Bastille, and came to make his intendant a call, much more disagreeable than interesting.
"So much did the intendant wish his lord at the devil, that he was civil to him beyond all precedent; and having gone up in the dark to the château, they spent two hours in diligent search for the papers, which they unfortunately could not find, for this very good reason--the intendant had taken care to remove them three or four days before, and had given them in charge to his dear friend and co-labourer, the Count's apothecary, to keep them as a sacred deposit as much out of the Count's way as possible."
"After all this, sorry to have lost the papers, but glad to find he had a considerable fortune placed securely in Spain, the Count set out to seek his fair Henriette, resolving to carry her to another land; and thinking all the while that his intendant was the honestest man in the world. Under this impression, he made him his chief agent in all his plans, told him of his private marriage, and, in short, did what very wise men often do, let the greatest rogue of his acquaintance into all his most important secrets.
"The Marquis de St. Brie very soon found out the proceedings of his friend the Count. The Count was of course assassinated, and thrown into the river; the Countess was put into a convent, where she died in childbirth, and God knows what became of the money in Spain. Matters being thus settled to the satisfaction of every one, the intendant found he had quite enough money to set up procureur, and went to live in the same town with his dear friend the apothecary."
"But what became of the papers?" demanded I; "and why do you always call him the intendant? Were you a son by some former marriage of your mother?"
"Be patient! be patient! Monsieur le Comte, and you shall hear," replied the little player. "I was just about to return to my mother, with regard to whom a man may feel himself tolerably certain. There is a proverb against human presumption in speaking of one's father, 'Sage enfant qui connoit son père!' However, my mother was, as I have said, a very handsome woman, and she made use of her advantages; but, at the same time, she was a very superstitious one, and though she governed her husband in all domestic matters with a rod of iron, she suffered herself to be governed by her confessor in a manner still more despotic. Never used she to fail in her attendance at the confessional, and yet I never heard the good priest complain she troubled him unnecessarily.
"At length it so happened that she fell ill, and the only thing that could have saved her, namely, the physicians giving her up, having been tried in vain, and she being both in the jaws of death and in a great fright, her priest would not give her absolution except upon a very hard condition, which she executed as follows--She sent for her husband, and having bade him adieu in very touching terms, upon which he wept--he could always weep when he liked--she sent for his dear friend the apothecary, for a worthy goldsmith of the city, and for a couple of young gentlemen our neighbours, and having brought them all into her bedroom, she acknowledged to her husband all her faults and failings, comprising many which I, in my filial piety, will pass over; after which she begged his forgiveness, and obtained it--requested and received in so touching a manner, that every one wept. She then made her excellent spouse embrace his injurers, which he did like a charitable soul and a sensible man, with a most solemn and edifying countenance. After this she called all her children, of which there were by this time four, round her, and having given us her blessing and her last advice in a very striking and instructive manner, she allotted us severally to the care of her friends. My next brother she bequeathed to the fatherly tenderness of the intendant himself; though there was an unfortunately small degree of likeness between them. I fell to the portion of the apothecary; the youngest son was assigned to the protection of the goldsmith, and so on. When this distribution was concluded, she found herself very much exhausted, and, sending us all away, fell into a profound sleep, from which she woke the next morning in a fair way for recovery. The confessor declared that it was the special interposition of Heaven, as a reward for her punctual obedience to his commands; but her husband thought it the handiwork of the devil; on which difference of conclusion I shall not offer an opinion. Suffice it, my mother recovered, and finding that the story had got abroad, and that every one she met laughed at or avoided her, she insisted on her husband changing his abode and carrying her and her family to another town. At length, however, her malady returned upon her after a year's absence, and she died for good and all, leaving her husband inconsolable for her loss. The moment the breath was out of her body, the excellent procureur took me to the door of his house, and told me tenderly to get along for a graceless little vagabond, and none of his. 'Go to Auch! go to Auch!' cried he, 'and tell that villain of an apothecary I have sent him his own.' To Auch I accordingly went, and delivered the procureur's message to the apothecary, who held up his hands and eyes at the hard-heartedness of his former friend, and giving me a silver piece of a livre tournois, he bade me go along, and not trouble him any more.
"The next morning, when my livre was spent, and I began to grow hungry, I naturally turned my steps towards the apothecary's, and hung about near his door without daring to enter, when suddenly I saw him driving out in fury the boy that carried his medicines, who had been guilty, I found afterwards, of drinking the wine set apart for making antimonial wine; and so great was the rage of my worthy parent, that he threw both the pestle and the mortar into the street after the culprit.
"Having had all my life a sort of instinctive dislike to the society of an angry man, I was in the act of gliding away as fast as I could, when his eye fell upon me, and beckoning me to him, he called me to come near, in a tone that made me obey instantly. 'Come hither,' cried he, 'come hither! Now I wager an ounce of kermes to a grain of jalap that thou hast been well taught to thieve and to lie! Hey? Is it not so?'--'No, your worship,' answered I, trembling every limb, 'but I dare say I shall soon learn under your teaching.'--'Holla! thou art malapert,' cried he; 'but come in; out of pure charity I will give thee the place of that thief I have just kicked out. But remember, it is out of pure charity--thou hast no claim on me whatever! mark that! But if thou servest me truly, and appliest thyself to my lessons, I will make thee a rival to Galen and Hippocrates.' Thus was I established as medicine-boy at my father the apothecary's, after having been turned out of my father the procureur's, and soon learned his mood and his practice. The first was somewhat arbitrary but despotic, and, by taking care never to contradict him, except where he wished to be contradicted, I soon ingratiated myself with him to a very high degree.
"His practice also was very simple. Whenever he was called in to any patient, he began by giving them an emetic, to clear away all obstructions, as he said. He next inquired if the complaint was local, and where? If it was in the head he put a blister on the soles of the feet; if it was in the lower extremities he placed one on the crown of the head; if it was between the two he took care to blister both. When the malady was general, he began by bleeding, and went on by bleeding, till the patient died or recovered; declaring all the while, that let the disease be as bad as it would, he would have it out of him one way or other. He had a good deal of practice when I came, and it rapidly increased, for he was always called in by poor dependents, who expected legacies, to their rich relatives; by young heirs of estates to old annuitants; by the expectants of abbeys, and persons possessing survivorships to their dear friends the long-lived incumbents: and he was also applied to frequently by young wives for their old husbands, and other cases of the kind, wherein he was supposed to practise very successfully. As I grew up, he initiated me into all the secrets of his profession, took me to the bedside of his patients; and, in fact gave me many a paternal mark of his regard! Nor did he confine his confidence in me entirely to professional subjects. It was from him that I learned the earlier part of my own history, and that of the Count de Bagnols, whose papers I had many an opportunity of seeing, for they lay wrapped in a piece of old sheepskin in the drawer with the syringes. Thus passed the time till a company of players visited Auch; and as every night of their performance I went to see them, I speedily acquired a taste--I may say a passion, for the stage, which evidently showed that nature had destined me to wear the buskin. From that moment I was seized with horror at the indiscriminate slaughter which I daily aided in committing, and I resolved to quit Auch the very first opportunity. This, however, did not occur immediately, for before I could prepare my plans the players had left the place, and I was obliged to remain in my sanguinary profession for another year, during which I learned by heart every play that had ever been written in the French language. One day, while I was sitting alone reading Rotrou, a man came in and addressed me with an air of cajolery which instantly put me on my guard; but when he gave me to understand, after a thousand doublings, that he wished to know if ever I had heard my father, or, as he called him, 'master,' talk of certain papers belonging to the late Count de Bagnols, which might be of the greatest service in clearing the honour of his family; and when, at the same time he offered me ten Louis d'ors if I could find the papers, I became as pliant as wax, slipped one hand into the drawer, took the money with the other, delivered the papers, and recommenced my book. My father never missed the papers; and when the players returned I lost no time, but addressed myself to their manager, who made me recite some verses, applauded me highly, declared he wanted a new star, and that if I would steal away from my gallipots and join the company a mile from Auch, I should meet with my desert. I took him at his word, and easily executed my plan during the apothecary's absence. My name was soon changed to Achilles Lefranc, and the provincial spectators found out that I was a genius of a superior class. Ambition, the fault of gods, misled our little troop; and thinking to carry all before us, we went to Paris, obtained permission to perform, and chose a deep tragedy, at which the malicious Parisians roared with laughter from beginning to end. We slunk out of Paris in the middle of the night, but the bond of union was gone amongst us, and we dispersed. Since then I have hawked my talents from village to village, and from company to company; sometimes I have risen to the highest flights of tragedy, and have trod the stage as a king or a hero, and at others I have descended to the lowest walk of comedy, and, for the sake of a mere dinner, performed the part of jester at a marriage entertainment or afête de village; I have been applauded and hissed, wept at and laughed at, but I have always contrived to make my way through the world, till here I am at last your lordship's--humble servant."