[1]We see by this that, according to Maubreuil, it was M. de Talleyrand himself with whom he had had to deal. We have not wished to endorse the accusation blindly and, in our account, we have accepted the intermediate agency of Roux-Laborie.
[1]We see by this that, according to Maubreuil, it was M. de Talleyrand himself with whom he had had to deal. We have not wished to endorse the accusation blindly and, in our account, we have accepted the intermediate agency of Roux-Laborie.
The last shot of Waterloo—Temper of the provinces in 1817, 1818 and 1819—TheMesséniennes—TheVêpres siciliennes,—Louis IX.—Appreciation of these two tragedies—A phrase of Terence—My claim to a similar sentiment—Three o'clock in the morning—The course of love-making—Valeat res ludrica
The last shot of Waterloo—Temper of the provinces in 1817, 1818 and 1819—TheMesséniennes—TheVêpres siciliennes,—Louis IX.—Appreciation of these two tragedies—A phrase of Terence—My claim to a similar sentiment—Three o'clock in the morning—The course of love-making—Valeat res ludrica
I am not sure who said—perhaps I said it myself—that the Revolution of 1830 was the last shot of Waterloo. It is very true. Setting aside those whose family interest, position or fortune attached them to the Bourbon dynasty, it is impossible to conceive any idea of the ever growing feeling of opposition which spread throughout the provinces; it got to such a pitch that, without knowing why, in spite of every reason that my mother and I had to curse Napoleon, we hated the Bourbons far more, though they had never done anything to us, or had even done us good rather than harm.
Everything tended to the unpopularity of the reigning house: the invasion of French territory by the enemy; the disgraceful treaties of 1815; the three years' occupation which had followed the second restoration of the Bourbons; the reactionary movements in the South; the assassination of Ramel at Toulouse, and the Brune assassination at Avignon; Murat, who was always popular, in spite of his stupidity and his treachery, shot at Pizzo: the proscriptions of 1816; defections, disgraceful deeds, shameful bargains, came to light daily; the verses of Émile Debraux, the songs of Béranger, theMesséniennesof Casimir Delavigne and thetabatières à la charte, the Voltaire-Touquetsand Rousseaus of all kinds, unpublished rhymes of the type I have quoted; anecdotes, true or false, attributed to the Duc de Berry, in which the ancient glories of the Empire were always sacrificed to some youthful aristocratic ambition; all, down to the king with his black gaiters, his blue coat with gilt buttons, his general's epaulettes and the little tail of his wig,—all tended, I say, to depreciate the ruling power—or rather, worse still, to make it absurd.
Vêpres sicilienneswas played at the Odéon on 23 November 1819 with overwhelming success. It would be difficult to explain why, to anyone who has read the piece dispassionately. Why did a crowd wait outside the doors of the Odéon from three o'clock? Why was that splendid building crowded to suffocation, instead of there being, as usual, plenty of room for everyone? Just to hear four lines thought to contain an allusion to the political encroachments in which the king's favourite minister was said to indulge. These are the four lines. They seemed innocent enough on the face of them:—
"De quel droit un ministre, avec impunity,Ose-t-il attenter à notre liberté?Se reposant sur vous des droits du diadème,Le roi vous a-t-il fait plus roi qu'il n'est lui-même?"
All the same, these four lines roused thunders of applause and rounds of cheering. And then one heard on every side the concert of admiration which all the Liberal papers sounded in praise of the patriotic young poet. The whole party petted him, praised him, exalted him.
Some time after theVêpres sicilienneshad been played at the Odéon, the Théâtre-Français, on 5 November 1819, putLouis IX.on the stage. This was the Royalist reply which the leading theatre gave to the Nationalist tragedy at the Odéon.
At that period Ancelot and Casimir Delavigne were about equally celebrated and, in the eyes of impartial critics,Louis IX.was as good asVêpres siciliennes.But all the popularity, all the applause, all the triumph went to theLiberal poet. It was as though the nation were breathing again, after its suspension of animation from '93 onward, as though it were urging the public spirit to take the path of liberty.
I recollect that because of the noise these two controversial plays made throughout the whole of the literary world, I, who was just beginning to feel the first breath of poetry stir within me, was anxious to read them. I wrote to de Leuven, who sent me both the Liberal and the Royalist work. The Liberal work was the most praised, and, with that in my hand, I ran to announce to our young friends, Adèle, Albine and Louise, the good fortune which had befallen us from Paris. It was decided that the same evening we should read the masterpiece aloud, and, as I was the owner of the work, I was naturally promoted to the office of reader.
Alas! we were but simple children, without knowledge of either side of the case, artless young folk, who wanted to amuse ourselves by clapping our hands and to be stirred to the heart by admiration. We were greatly surprised at the end of the first act, more surprised still by the end of the second, that so much fuss and noise should have been aroused by, and so much praise bestowed upon, a work, estimable, no doubt, in its way, but one which did not cause a single thrill of sentiment or passion, or rouse an echoing memory. We did not yet understand that a political passion is the most prejudiced of all passions, and that it vibrates to the innermost feeling of a disturbed country. Our reading was interrupted at the second act, and the tragedy ofVêpres sicilienneswas never finished, at any rate as a joint reading. Our audience had naïvely confessed that Montfort, Lorédan and Procida bored them to death, and that they much preferred Tom Thumb, Puss in Boots and other fairy tales of like nature. But this attempt did not satisfy me. When I went home to my mother, I read not only the whole ofVêpres siciliennesbut alsoLouis IX.
Well, it is with feelings of great satisfaction that I date from that time the impartial appreciation for contemporary workswhich I possess—an appreciation borrowed far more from my feelings than from my judgment; an appreciation which neither political opinion nor literary hatred has ever been able to influence: my critical faculty, when considering the work of myconfrères,asks not whether it be the work of a friend or of an enemy, whether of one intimately known to me or of a stranger. However, I need hardly say that neitherVêpres siciliennesnorLouis IX.belong to that order of literature which I was to be called upon later to feel and to understand, whose beauties I endeavoured to reproduce. I remained perfectly unmoved by these two tragedies, although I slightly preferredLouis IX.I have never read them again since, and probably I shall never re-read them; but I feel convinced that if I were to re-read them, my opinion upon them would be just the same to-day that' it was then. What a difference there was between the tame and monotonous feeling I then experienced and the glowing emotionHamletroused in me, though it was the curtailed, bloodless, nervelessHamletof Ducis! I had an innate instinct for truth and hatred of conventional standards; Terence's line has always seemed to me one of the finest lines ever written: "I am a man, and nothing that is human is alien unto me." And I was fast laying claim to my share in that line. I was growing more manly every day; my mother was the only person who continued to look upon me as though I were still a child. She was therefore greatly astonished when one evening I did not return at my usual time of coming home—and when at last I did come in, towards three in the morning, my heart leaping joyfully, I slipped into my room, which for the last three months I had obtained leave to have to myself, apart from my mother, foreseeing what was going to take place. I found my mother in tears, seated by my window, where she had been watching for my return, ready to give me the lecture such a late, or rather, early, return deserved!
After more than a year of attentions, signs, loving-making, little favours granted, refused, snatched by force, the inexorable door which shut me out at eleven o'clock would be softly reopened at half-past eleven, and behind that door I found twotrembling lips, two caressing arms, a heart beating against my heart, burning sighs and lingering tears. Adèle too had managed to get a room to herself, apart from her mother, just as I had. This room was better than an ordinary room: it was a tiny summer-house which projected into a long garden enclosed only by hedges. A passage between the room occupied by her brother and the room occupied by her mother led to the garden, and consequently to the summer-house, which was only separated from the passage by a staircase leading to the first storey. It was the door of this passage, opening on one side into the street, and on the other, as I have said, into the garden, which was reopened to me at half-past eleven at night and was not closed behind me until three in the morning, on that night when my mother stood anxiously waiting, all in tears, at the window of my room, just ready to go and seek for me in the six hundred houses of the town. But what plagued my mother still more was—as I quickly discovered—that though she had not the least doubt as to the reason for my misconduct, she could not guess who was the young lady at the bottom of it. She had not seen me come back the way she had expected. The reason for that was simple enough. The little girl who had given her heart to me, after more than a year's struggle, was so pure, so innocent, so modest, that although my love and pride were ready to reveal everything, my conscience told me that honour and every fine feeling I had demanded that the secret be kept with the utmost care. Therefore, so that no one should see me at such an hour, either in the neighbourhood of her house, or in the street leading to it, when at three in the morning I came out of the blest passage that had served me in good stead, I made my exit by a little by-street, and gained the fields. From the fields I entered the park, leaping a ditch like the one over which I had given proofs of my agility to Mademoiselle Laurence, under such different circumstances, at Whitsuntide. Finally, from the park I reached what was called with us the "manège," and I re-entered the town by the rue du Château. It so happened, therefore, that my mother, who was watching in an entirelyopposite direction, did not see me return, and, not guessing the ruse I had made use of to foil the cruel and ready slander little towns are so prone to set going, should matters so turn out, she puzzled her wits in despair to know where I had come from. My mother's ignorance and the suspicions that grew up in her mind later in connection with another girl had a sufficiently serious influence upon my future life for me to dwell on the subject for a moment: these details are not so trivial as they may appear at first sight. Is it not the case that some minds regard everything as trivial, whilst others (and I am much inclined to think that these latter, without wishing to speak evil of the former class of people, are the true thinkers and the true philosophers), who try to follow the thread Providence holds in His hands, with which He guides men from birth to death, from the unknown to the unknown, look upon every detail as of importance, because the slightest has its part in the great mass of details which we call life? Well, I was well scolded by my mother, who did not scold me long,
I however, for I kissed her the whole time she scolded me; besides, her uneasiness was somewhat allayed, and with the eye of a mother and perhaps even more with the insight of a woman, which sees to the very heart of things, she saw I was profoundly happy. Joy is as much a mystery as sorrow; excessive joy approaches so nearly the border of pain, that, like suffering, it too has its measure of tears. My mother left me to go to bed, not because she was tired out, poor mother! but because she felt I wanted to be alone with myself, with my recent memories, which I clasped as closely to my throbbing heart as one holds to one's breast a young nestling which is trying to fly away.
Oh! but Maître Mennesson's office was deserted that day! How beautiful the park looked to me! The tall trees with their whispering leaves, the birds singing above my head, and the frightened roebuck on the skyline—all seemed to make a frame which could scarce contain my smiling thoughts, my thoughts which danced like a joyous nymph! Love—first love—the welling-up of the sap, opens out life to us! It flows through the most secret recesses of our being; it gives life to the most remote of our senses; it is a vast realm wherein every man imprisoned in this world imprisons in turn the whole world in himself.
Return of Adolphe de Leuven—He shows me a corner of the artistic and literary world—The death of Holbein and the death of Orcagna—Entrance into the green-rooms—Bürger'sLénore—First thoughts of my vocation
Return of Adolphe de Leuven—He shows me a corner of the artistic and literary world—The death of Holbein and the death of Orcagna—Entrance into the green-rooms—Bürger'sLénore—First thoughts of my vocation
In the meantime, de Leuven returned to Villers-Cotterets, after five or six months' absence. His return was to open out new fields for my ambitions—ambitions, however, which I believed were capable of being fulfilled. If you throw a stone into a lake, however large the lake may be, the first circle it will make round it, after its fall, will go on growing and multiplying itself, even as do our days and our desires, until the last one touches the bank—that is to say, eternity.
Adolphe returned and brought Lafarge back with him. Poor Lafarge! Do you remember the brilliant head clerk, who returned to his native place in an elegant carriage, drawn by a mettlesome steed? Well, he had bought a practice, but there the progress of his rising fortune had stopped. By some inconceivable fatality, although he was young, good-looking, clever, perhaps even because he possessed all these gifts, which are perfectly useless to a lawyer, he had not found a wife to pay for the practice, so he had been obliged to sell it again, and, disgusted with the law, he had taken to literature. De Leuven, who had taken notice of him in Villers-Cotterets, found him out in Paris and returned with him. Some of his ancient splendour still stuck to the poor fellow, but you might seek in vain for any real stability at the base of his fresh plans for the future; those fleeting clouds hardly got beyond the stage of hopes. During his stay in Paris a great change hadcome over Adolphe's character—a change which was to react on me.
At M. Arnault's house, in which he had been a guest, Adolphe had had a closer view of the literary world than he had previously caught glimpses of in the house of Talma. He had there made the acquaintance of Scribe, who was already at the zenith of his fame. He met Mademoiselle Duchesnois there, who at that time was Telleville's mistress, and who recitedMarie Stuart.There he became acquainted with M. de Jouy, who had finished hisSylla;Lucien Arnault, who had begun hisRégulus; Pichat, who, while composing hisBrennusand thinking out hisLéonidasandWilliam Tell, was facing a future in which, his first wreath on his head and his first palm in his hand, Death lurked, waiting for him. He had then dropped from these lofty heights in the regions of art to inferior places, where he became acquainted with Soulié, who was publishing poems in theMercure; with Rousseau, that Pylades of Romieu whom Orestes had left one day at the turning of the road which led to his sub-prefecture; with Ferdinand Langlé, the fickle lover of poor little Fleuriet, upon whom, it is said, a notorious poisoner tried the deadly powder with which he was later to kill his friend; with Théaulon, that delightful person and indefatigable worker, who worked only in the hope that some day he would be able to be idle, but who never had time to be idle, who was cradled for a brief time in the arms of Love, but who was never really to rest until he lay on the bosom of Death. This poor Epicurean, who by dint of imagination saw his life in rosy garb, although for him it was clothed in black, wrote these four lines on the door of his study: they express at once his easy carelessness and his gentle philosophy—
Loin du sot, du fat et du traître,Ici ma constance attendra:Et l'amour qui viendra peut-être,Et la mort qui du moins viendra!
Death came, poor Théaulon! Came all too soon, for thee as for Pichat, for Soulié, for Balzac; for there are two Deathscharged by Providence with the task of hurling men into eternity: the one inexorable, icy, impassive, obeying the sad laws of destruction; the Death of Holbein, the Death in the cemetery of Bâle, the Death which is ever intermingled with life, hiding its skeleton face under the most capricious of masks, veiling its bony body beneath the king's mantle, in the gilded dress of the courtesan, under the filthy rags of the beggar, walking side by side with us; an invisible but ever present spectre; a lugubrious guest, a sepulchral comrade, the supreme friend who receives us in its arms when we fall over the edge of life, and who gently lays us to rest for ever under the cold damp stones of the tomb;—the other, sister of the above, daughter too of Erebus and of Night, unexpected, spiteful, lies in ambush at a turning-point of happiness or prosperity, ready like a vulture or a panther to pounce or spring out upon its prey; this is the Death of Orcagna, the Death of the Campo-Santo in Pisa; Death in life, envious, with cadaverous hue, hair flying wildly in the wind, eyes flashing like those of a lynx, the Death which took Petrarch in the midst of his triumph, Raphael in the midst of his love affairs; before whom all joy and glory and riches pale; that power which, passing rapidly, heedlessly and inexorably over the unfortunate victims who appeal to it, strikes down in the midst of their flowers, their wine and their perfumes, the handsome youth crowned with myrtle, the lovely maiden rose-crowned, the laurel-wreathed poet, and drags them brutally to the grave, their eyes open, their hearts yet beating, their arms stretched out towards the light, the day and the sunshine! Orcagna! Orcagna, great sculptor, great painter and, above all, great poet! how many times have I trembled as I touched the hand of a beloved child, or kissed the face of a mistress who had made me happy! for I had an inward vision of that Death of the Campo-Santo at Pisa, passing in the distance, dark, threatening like a sailing cloud; then, the next day, I heard the words, "He is dead!" or "She is dead!" and it was almost always a young genius whose light had gone out, a young soul that had gone to its Maker.
This then, was the world de Leuven had seen during his stayin Paris, and he brought a reflection of its unknown brilliance to me, the poor provincial lad, buried in the depths of a little town. De Leuven had done more than look into it: he had entered the tabernacle, he had touched the ark! He had been permitted the honour of having some of his work read before M. Poirson, the high priest of the Gymnase, and before his sacristan, M. Dormeuil. Of course the work was declined after it had been read; but—like the pebble which lies near the rose and shares the scent of the queen of flowers—there remained to de Leuven, from his declined work, an entry into the green-rooms. Oh! that entree to the green-rooms, what a weariness it is to those who have attained it, whilst by those who have not attained it, it is regarded as the most coveted thing on earth! Adolphe, however, had been in it for such a short time thatennuihad not yet had time to spring up, and so the dazzling glow of the honour still remained with him. It was the spirit of this enchantment which he transferred to me. At that time, Perlet was at his best, Fleuriet in the heyday of her beauty, Léontine Fay at the height of her popularity. The latter, poor child, at the age of eight or nine, had been forced to learn a craft in which a grown-up woman might have succumbed; but what did that matter? They had consoled themselves in advance for everything, even for her death; for they had already made so much money out of her, that, in the event of her death, they could afford to go to her burial in fine style.
Adolphe's return, then, was a great event to me; like Don Cléophas, I hung on the cloak of my finediable boiteux, and he, telling me what he had seen in the theatres, made me see also. What long walks we took together! How many times did I stop him, as he passed from one artiste to another, saying, after he had exhausted all the celebrities of the Gymnase, "And Talma? And Mademoiselle Mars and Mademoiselle Duchesnois?" And he good-naturedly held forth upon the genius and talent and good-fellowship of those eminent artistes, playing upon the unknown notes of the keyboard of my imagination, causing ambitious and sonorous chords to vibratewithin me that had hitherto lain dormant, the possession of which astonished me greatly when I began to realise their existence. Then poor Adolphe little by little conceived a singular idea, which was to make me share, on my own behalf, the hopes he had indulged in for himself; to rouse in me the ambition to become, if not a Scribe, an Alexandre Duval, an Ancelot, a Jouy, an Arnault or a Casimir Delavigne, at least a Fulgence, a Mazère or a Vulpian. And it must be admitted the notion was ambitious indeed; for, I repeat, I had never received any proper education, I knew nothing, and it was not until very much later, in 1833 or 1834, on the publication of the first edition of myImpressions de Voyage, that people began to perceive I had genius. In 1820 I must confess I had not a shadow of it.
A week before Adolphe's return had brought to me the first vivifying gleam of light from the outside world 3 the hemmed-in and restricted life of a provincial town had seemed to me the limit of my ambition, a salary of say fifteen or eighteen hundred francs 3 for I never dreamt of becoming a solicitor: first because I had no vocation for it; for although I had spent three years in copying deeds of sale, bonds and marriage contracts, at Maître Mennesson's, I was no more learned in the law than I was in music, after three years of solfeggio with old Hiraux. It was evident, therefore, that the law was no more my vocation than music, and that I should never expound the Code any better than I played on the violin. This distressed my mother dreadfully, and all her kind friends said to her—
"My dear, just listen to what I say: your son is a born idler, who will never do anything."
And my mother would heave a sigh, and say, as she kissed me, "Is it true, my dear boy, what they tell me?"
And I would answer naïvely, "I don't know, mother!"
What else could I reply? I could see nothing beyond the last houses in my natal town, and even though I might find something that responded to my heart inside the city boundary, I searched in vain therein for anything that could satisfy my mind and imagination.
De Leuven made a gap in the wall which closed me in, andthrough that gap I began to perceive something to aim at as yet undefined on the infinite horizon beyond.
De la Ponce also influenced me at this period. As before related, I had translated with him the beautiful Italian romance—or rather diatribe—ofUgo Foscolo, that imitation of Goethe'sWertherwhich the author of the poem calledSépulcrescontrived, by dint of patriotic feeling and talent, to develop into a national epic. Moreover, de la Ponce, who wished to make me regret that I had abandoned the study of the German language, translated for my benefit Bürger's beautiful balladLénore.The reading of this work, which belonged to a type of literature of which I was completely ignorant, produced a deep impression on my mind; it was like one of those landscapes one sees in dreams, in which one dares not enter, so different is it from everyday surroundings. The terrible refrain which the sinister horseman repeats over and over again to the trembling betrothed whom he carries off on his spectre-steed,
"Hourra!—fantôme, les morts vont vite!"
bears so little resemblance to the conceits of Demoustier, to Parny's amorous rhymes or to the elegies of the Chevalier Bertin, that the reading of the tragic German ballad made a complete revolution in my soul. That very night, I tried to put it into verse; but, as may well be understood, the task was beyond my powers. I broke the wings of my poor fledgeling Muse, and I began my literary career as I had begun my first love-making, by a defeat none the less terrible because it was a secret one, but quite as incontestable in my own estimation.
What mattered it? These were indubitably my first steps towards the future God had destined, untried totterings like the steps of a child just learning to walk, who stumbles and falls as soon as he tears himself away from his nurse's leading-strings, but who picks himself up again and, aching after every fall, continues to advance, urged forward by hope, which whispers in his ear, "Walk, child, walk! it is by means of suffering that you become a man, by perseverance that you become great!"
The Cerberus of the rue de Largny—I tame it—The ambush—Madame Lebègue—A confession
The Cerberus of the rue de Largny—I tame it—The ambush—Madame Lebègue—A confession
Six months passed by between my first love-makings and my first attempts at work. Besides our meetings at Louise Brézette's every night, Adèle and I used to see each other two or three times a week, in the summer-house, which, to our great delight, her mother had allowed her to have as her new chamber. It was necessary for Adèle to open the door of the passage-way for me, and for me to pass in front of her mother's bedroom door: these two courses were fraught with so many dangers that I had for a long time been contemplating some other means of access to my lady-love. After much pondering, I settled upon a way. I carefully examined the topography of the surrounding district and discovered, three doors off Adèle's house, a door, which led through a kind of passage into a small garden. One wall and two hedges separated this garden from Adèle's. I carefully studied the position all round, from Adèle's garden, to which I had free entree during the daytime, and I saw that all difficulties would be overcome if I could open the street door, cross the passage, enter the garden, scale the wall and stride over the two hedges. Then I had only to knock on the outside shutter, Adèle would open to me, and the thing would be done. But, as I had noticed, the door had to be opened and the passage crossed.
The door was locked, and the passage was guarded at night by a dog who was less a match from his size and from the fight he might make, than from the noise he could set up. It took me a week to make my investigations. One night I ascertained,Muphti (that was the dog's name) barking loudly all the time, that the lock only turned once, and that I could open the door with my knife-blade; the remaining seven nights I cultivated Muphti's acquaintance, seducing him little by little, by poking bits of bread and chicken bones under the door. The last two or three nights, Muphti, grown used to the windfalls I brought him, impatient for my arrival, expecting me long before I appeared, heard me come when I was twenty paces off, and, at my approach, scratched with both paws at the door and whined gently at the obstacle that separated us. On the eighth day, or rather the eighth night, feeling sure that Muphti was now no longer an enemy but an ally, I opened the door, and, according to my expectations, Muphti leapt upon me in the greatest friendliness, delighted to find himself in direct communication with a man who brought him such dainty scraps: I had only one fault to find with his greeting, namely, that it was expressed in rather too noisy a fashion. However, as all enthusiasm calms down in time, Muphti's enthusiasm died down, and, passing into expressions of a gentler affection, allowed me to venture farther. I chose, for my first attempt at housebreaking, a dark, moonless autumn night: I stepped very lightly, with my ears on the alert; I advanced without making a single grain of sand crunch beneath my feet. I thought I heard a door open behind me; I hastened my steps; I reached a large patch of beans growing up on sticks, into which I flung myself as did Gulliver in his wheat-field, with Muphti hidden between my legs, his neck held between both my hands, ready to be able to intercept the slightest sound he might wish to make—and there I waited. It was indeed one of the inhabitants to whom the passage belonged: he had heard the noise. In order to find out what caused it, he took a turn in the garden, passed within a couple of steps of me, without seeing me, coughed as though he were beginning with a cold, and went indoors again. I let Muphti go; I made for the palings; I leapt to the other side of the wall; I straddled over the two hedges, and I ran to the shutters. But I did not need to knock. Before I reached them, I heard someone breathing, I saw ashadow, I felt two trembling arms stretch out to enfold me and drag me inside the summer-house, and the door shut behind us.
Oh! had I only been a poet in those days, what ravishing lines I could have made in honour of those first flowers which flourished in the garden of our love! But, alas! I was not a poet then, and I had to be satisfied with repeating to Adèle Parny's and Bertin's elegies, which I believe only bored her. I have already remarked,aproposofVêpres sicilienneswhat good taste this little girl possessed.
I left her, as usual, towards two or three in the morning. As usual, also, I returned by the park, and reached home by a roundabout way. I have explained the way I took, and how I had to leap a wide ditch so as to reach the park from the open country. In order to avoid making the same jump three or four times a week, which was a very perilous feat on dark nights, I made a very big heap of stones in one corner of the ditch, so that I had only to make for this particular corner and then make my jump in two leaps.
On this particular night, as I leapt into the ditch, I noticed a shadow four paces off me, that looked slightly less caressing than that which had awaited me in the garden, and drawn me inside the summer-house. This shadow held an actual, stout stick—not the shade of one—in all its knotty reality. Directly I attained to manhood's estate, and whenever danger faced me, whether by night or by day, I may proudly record that I always marched straight on towards that danger. I walked right up to the man with the stick. The stick rose, and I clutched it in my hand. Then followed, in that dark ditch, one of the severest tussles I have ever had in my life. I was indeed the person he was lying in wait for, the person he wished to meet. The man who was waiting for me had blackened his face; consequently I could not recognise him; but without recognising him I guessed who he was. He was a young man of twenty-four or twenty-five; I was scarcely eighteen, but I was well broken in to all physical exercises, especially to wrestling. I succeeded in taking hold of himround the body and twisting him under me. His head struck on a stone with a heavy sound. No word passed on either side; but he must have been hurt. I felt him fumbling in his pocket, and I knew he was hunting for his knife. I seized his hand above the wrist, and managed to twist him so that his fingers opened, and the knife dropped. Then, by a quick move, I got hold of the knife. For one second a terrible temptation assailed me, to do what was indeed my right, namely, to open the knife and to plunge it into my antagonist's breast. That moment a man's life hung by a thread: had my anger broken that thread, the man would have been killed! I had sufficient control over myself to get up. I still held the knife in one hand, I took the stick by the other, and, fortified by these two weapons, I allowed my adversary to rise too. He took a step backwards, and stooped to pick up the stone against which he had hurt his head; but just as he was lifting himself up, I hit him with the end of the stick on the chest and he fell back ten paces. This time he seemed to lose consciousness completely, for he did not get up again. I climbed the embankment from the ditch and got away from the place as fast as I could: this unexpected attack had revealed such a spirit of hatred that I feared treachery might follow. No one else put in an appearance, and I reached home very much upset, I must confess, by this incident. I had certainly escaped from one of the most serious dangers I had ever incurred in my life.
This event brought very serious consequences to a person who had had nothing to do with the affair, and led me to commit the only evil action I have to reproach myself with during the course of my life. The blame attaching to this evil deed is all the greater as it was committed against a woman. I can only say that it was committed without any premeditation. I reached home, as I have said, very glad to have escaped with nothing worse than a few bruises, and very proud at the end of the fray to have overthrown my enemy.
Next morning I went to de la Ponce. As such an attack might be renewed under more disadvantageous circumstancesthan those from which I had just escaped, I wanted to borrow from him the pocket-pistols I had seen in his rooms. It was difficult to borrow them from him without telling him why I wanted them. I told him. But as it would have revealed, or almost revealed, the house I came away from, if I had told him the true locality of the struggle, I indicated another place altogether. I selected, hap-hazard, a spot near themanège, in a little narrow street, where three houses had their entrances. The first of these three houses was inhabited by Hippolyte Leroy, the ex-body-guardsman of whom I have already spoken in connection with our misadventures at M. Collard's, and who was soon to become my cousin by marrying Augustine; the second by the de Leuven family; and the third by the lawyer to whom Maître Mennesson had related the misadventures of my early love-making and who, as I have already mentioned, had married Éléonore, the second daughter of M. Deviolaine by his first marriage. I have related also, when speaking of M. Lebègue, how the charming nature and sociable spirit of his wife had roused suspicion and dislike in a little town, where superiority of any kind is a reason for jealousy. Now I had told others besides de la Ponce of the nocturnal attack of which I had very nearly been a victim; and to others also, as well as to de la Ponce, in order to divert suspicions, I had mentioned the same locality by themanègeof which I have just spoken. Where could I have been coming from, at two in the morning, when I was attacked near themanage!It could not have been from Hippolyte Leroy's; it could not have been from Adolphe de Leuven's. It must then have been from M. Lebègue's—or rather, from Madame Lebègue's. This wicked suggestion, entirely incorrect as it was, could only be supported by some semblance of a foundation.
I was a very easy prey to being teased, perhaps because I laid myself open to it by my defenceless condition, and neither Madame Lebègue nor her sisters spared me. Madame Lebègue was pretty, witty and a flirt: she waved the most charming and gracious gestures imaginable to her friends at a distance;whilst at closer quarters she allowed them to look at, admire and even kiss her hand, with that aristocratic indifference assumed by women who are the possessors of pretty hands. It was her only sin, poor woman. The crime was great, but the hand was pretty. I was exceedingly fond of Madame Lebègue; I liked her, I can confess to-day, with a feeling that might even have got beyond the bounds of friendly affection, if she had consented to more; but she had never given me the least encouragement, and whenever I was near her, her superior wit, her woman-of-the-world manners, her fine-lady airs, would send me into the deepest depths of that shyness of which I had given such glaring proofs during my earliest love-makings.
One day, without knowing whence this rumour had sprung, without suspecting the cause that had given rise to it, I heard it whispered that I was Madame Lebègue's lover. I ought at once to have quenched this rumour with indignant denials; I ought to have treated the calumny with the justice it deserved. I was wicked enough to refute it half-heartedly, and in such a fashion that my vain denial bore every appearance of a confession. And of course the ill-natured rumour served my own purposes to perfection. Poor silly fool that I was! I had a momentary delight, an hour's pride, in this rumour, which ought to have made me blush with shame, for I had allowed an untrue statement to be believed. I soon suffered for my mean action. First of all, the rumour set me at variance with the person herself whom it concerned: Madame Lebègue thought me more guilty than I was; she accused me of having started the scandal. She was mistaken there: I had allowed it to live, allowed it to grow, that was all. True, that was bad enough. She forbade me her house, the house my mother and I both loved, and it became hostile to us both ever after. Madame Lebègue never forgave me. On two or three occasions during my life I have felt the prick of the needle of the vengeance she vowed against me. I never attempted to return the injuries received; I felt, in my heart of hearts, I had deserved them. Whenever since I have met Madame Lebègue, I haveturned away my head and lowered my eyes before her glance. The guilty one tacitly confessed his crime. To-day he openly avows it. But now the confession has been made, I can boldly face the rest of the world of men or women and say, "You may look me in the face and try to make me blush, if you can!"
The day after my struggle I had the curiosity to visit the scene of battle. I had not been mistaken: the stone on which my enemy's head had crashed was stained with blood at its sharpest end, and the colour of a few hairs, stuck to the bloody stone, confirmed my suspicions—which now became a definite certainty when furnished with this last proof. That night I saw Adèle: she was still ignorant of what had happened to me. I told her everything; I told her whom I suspected: she refused to believe it.
Just at that moment, a surgeon, named Raynal, went past; I had seen him that morning come from the direction which led to the house of my wounded enemy. I went up to him.
"What is the matter?" I asked him. "Why have you been sent for this morning?"
"What is the matter, boy?" he replied in his Provençal accent.
"Yes."
"Why, he cannot have seen plainly last night, and, hurrying home, he gave himself a knock in the chest against a carriage pole. It was such a violent blow that he fell on his back and split his head open in falling."
"When shall you pay him a second visit?"
"To-morrow, at the same time as to-day."
"Very well, doctor; tell him from me that, last night, passing by the same place where he fell, after him, I found his knife, and I send it back to him. Tell him, doctor, that it is a good weapon, but that, nevertheless, a man who has no other arms but this with him is unwise to attack a man who possesses two such pistols as these...."
I fancy the doctor understood.
"Oh yes; very good," he said. "I'll tell him, never fear."
I presume that the man who owned the knife also understood, for I never heard the matter spoken of again, although, fifteen days later, I dancedvis-à-viswith him at the park ball.
De Leuven makes me his collaborator—TheMajor de Strasbourg—My firstcouplet-Chauvin—TheDîner d'amis—TheAbencérages
De Leuven makes me his collaborator—TheMajor de Strasbourg—My firstcouplet-Chauvin—TheDîner d'amis—TheAbencérages
I had naïvely told de Leuven of my failure to translate Bürger's beautiful ballad; but as he had made up his mind to make me a dramatic author, he consoled me by telling me it was his father's opinion that some German works were absolutely untranslatable, and that the ballad ofLénorewas first among these. Seeing that de Leuven did not lose hope, I gradually regained mine. I may even venture to say that, a few days after this, I achieved a success.
Lafarge had laughed hugely at de Leuven's idea of making me his collaborator. For, indeed, what notice would the Parisian stage take of an uneducated child; a poor provincial lad, buried away in a small town in the Ile-de-France; ignorant both of French and foreign literatures; hardly acquainted with the names of the great; feeling only a tepid sympathy with their most highly praised masterpieces, his lack of artistic education having veiled their style from him; setting to work without knowing the theory of constructing a plot, an action, a catastrophe, adénoûment; having never read to the end ofGil Blas, orDon Quixote, orle Diable boiteux—books which are held by all teachers to be worthy of universal admiration, and in which, I confess to my shame, the man who has succeeded to the child does not even to-day feel a very lively interest; reading, instead, all that is bad in Voltaire, who was then regarded as the very antithesis of politics and religion; having never opened a volume of Walter Scott or of Cooper, those two great romance-writers, one of whom understood menthoroughly, the other of whom divined God's workings marvellously; whilst, on the contrary, he had devoured all the naughty books of Pigault-Lebrun, raving over them,le Citateurin particular; ignorant of the name of Goethe, or Schiller, or Uhland, or André Chénier; having heard Shakespeare mentioned, but only as a barbarian from whose dunghill Ducis had collected those pearls calledOthello,HamletandRomeo and Juliet, but knowing by heart his Bertin, his Parny, his Legouvé, his Demoustier.
Lafarge was unquestionably in the right, and Adolphe must have had plenty of time to waste to undertake such a task, the hopelessness of which alone could take away from its ridiculousness. But Adolphe, with that Anglo-German stolidness of his, manfully persevered in the work undertaken, and we sketched out a scheme of a comedy in one act, entitled theMajor de Strasbourg: it was neither good nor bad. Why the Major of Strasbourg, any more than the Major of Rochelle or of Perpignan? I am sure I cannot tell. And I have also completely forgotten the plot or development of that embryonic dramatic work.
But there was one incident I have not forgotten, for it procured me the first gratification myamour-proprereceived. It was the epoch of patriotic pieces; a great internal reaction had set in against our reverses of 1814 and our defeat of 1815. The national couplet and Chauvinism were all the rage: provided you madeFrançaisrhyme withsuccèsat the end of a couplet, andlaurierswithguerriers,you were sure of applause. So, of course, de Leuven and I were quite content not to strike out any fresh line, but to follow and worship in the footsteps of MM. Francis and Dumersan. Therefore ourMajor de Strasbourgwas of the family of those worthy retreating officers whose patriotism continued to fight the enemy in couplets consecrated to the supreme glory of France, and to the avenging of Leipzig and Waterloo on the battlefields of the Gymnase and the Varies. Now, our major, having become a common labourer, was discovered by a father and son, who arrived on the scene, I know not why, at the moment when, instead of digging hisfurrows, he was deserting his plough, in order to devote himself to the reading of a book which gradually absorbed him to such an extent that he did not see the entrance of this father and son—a most fortunate circumstance, since the brave officer's preoccupation procured the public the following couplet:—
JULIEN(apercevant le major)N'approchez pas, demeurez où vous etes:Il lit ...LE COMTESans doute un récit de combats,Ce livre?JULIEN(regardant par-dessus l'épaule du major, et revenant à son père)C'estVictoires et Conquêtes.LE COMTETu vois, enfant, je ne me trompais pas:Son cœur revole aux champs de l'Allemagne!Il croit encor voir les Français vainqueurs....JULIENMon père, il lit la dernière campagne,Car de ses yeux je vois couler des pleurs.
When my part of the work was done, I handed it over to de Leuven, who, I ought to mention, was very indulgent to me; but this time, when he came to the couplet I am about to quote, his indulgence ascended into enthusiasm: he sang the couplet out loud—
"Dis-moi, soldat, dis-moi, t'en souviens-tu?"
He sang it over twice, four times, ten times, interrupting himself to say—
"Oh! oh! that couplet will be done to death if the Censorship lets it pass."
For, from that time, the honourable institution called the Censorship was in full vigour, and it has gone on increasing and prospering ever since.
I confess I was very proud of myself; I did not think such a masterpiece was in me. Adolphe ran off to sing the couplet to his father, who, as he chewed his toothpick, asked—
"Did you make it?"
"No, father; Dumas did."
"Hum! So you are writing a comic opera with Dumas?"
"Yes."
"Why not make room in it for yourfroide Ibérie? It would be just the place for it."
Adolphe turned on his heels and went off to sing my couplet to Lafarge.
Lafarge listened to it, winking his eyes.
"Ah! ah! ah!" he cried, "did Dumas compose that?"
"Yes, he made it."
"Are you sure he did not crib it from somewhere?"
Then, with touching confidence, Adolphe replied—
"I am quite certain of it: I know every patriotic couplet that has been sung in every theatre in Paris, and I tell you this one has never yet been sung."
"Then it is a fluke, and he will soon be undeceived."
De la Ponce read the couplet too; it tickled his soldierly taste, remainding him of 1814, and he took an early opportunity to compliment me on it.
Alas! poor couplet, but indifferently good though thou wert, accept nevertheless thy due meed of praise, at any rate from me. Whether gold or copper, thou wert, at all events, the first piece of literary coin I threw into the dramatic world! Thou wert the lucky coin one puts in a bag to breed more treasure therein! To-day the sack is full to overflowing: I wonder if the treasure that came and covered thee up was much better than thyself? The future alone will decide—that future which to poets assumes the superb form of a goddess and the proud name of Posterity!
The reader knows what an amount of vanity I possessed. My pride did not need to be encouraged to come out of the vase in which it was enclosed and swell like the giant in theArabian Nights:I began to believe I had written a masterpiece. From that day I thought of nothing else but dramatic literature, and, as Adolphe was some day to return to Paris, we set ourselves to work, so that he could carry away with him a regular cargo of works of the style of theMajor de Strasbourg.We never doubted that such distinguished works would meet with the success they deserved, from the enlightened public of Paris, and open out to me in the capital of European genius a path strewn with crowns and pieces of gold. What would the well-disposed people say then, who had declared to my mother that I was an idle lad and that I should never do anything? Go spin, you future Schiller! Spin, you future Walter Scott! spin!... From this time a great force awoke in my heart, which held its place against all comers: determination—a great virtue, which although certainly not genius, is a good substitute for it—and perseverance.
Unluckily, Adolphe was not a very sure guide; he, like myself, was groping blindly. Our choice of subjects revealed that truth. Our second opera was borrowed from the venerable M. Bouilly'sContes à ma fille.It was entitled leDîner d'amis.Our first drama was borrowed from Florian'sGonzalve de Cordoue: it was entitledles Abencérages.
O dear Abencérages! O treacherous Zégris! with what crimes of like nature you have to reproach yourselves! O Gonzalve de Cordoue! what young poets you have led astray into the path upon which we entered so full of hope, from which we returned shattered and broken.
Poor lisa Mercœur! I saw her die hugging to her heart that Oriental chimera; only she stuck fast to it, like a drowning man to a floating plank; while we, feeling how little it was to be relied on, had the courage to abandon it and to let it float where it would on that dark ocean where she encountered it and stuck to it.
But then we did not know what might be the future of these children, wandering on the highways, whom we sought to seduce from their lawful parents, and whom we saw die of inanition, one after the other, in our arms.
These labours took up a whole year, from 1820 to 1821. During that year two great events came about, which passed unnoticed by us, so bent on our work were we, and so preoccupied by it: the assassination of the Duc de Berry, 13 February 1820; the death of Napoleon, 5 May 1821.
Unrecorded stories concerning the assassination of the Duc de Berry
Unrecorded stories concerning the assassination of the Duc de Berry
The assassination of the Duc de Berry hastened the down-fall of M. Decazes. A singular anecdote was circulated at the time. I took it down in writing at the house of my lawyer, who was a collector of historical documents. As well as I can remember, it was as follows. Three days before the Duc de Berry's assassination, King Louis XVIII. received a letter couched in these words:—
"SIRE,—Will your Majesty condescend to receive a person at eight o'clock to-morrow night, who has important revelations to make specially affecting your Majesty's family?"If your Majesty deigns to receive this person, let a messenger be sent at once to find a chip of Oriental alabaster, which rests on the tomb of Cardinal Caprara, at Ste. Geneviève."In addition to this, your Majesty must obtain, by means of some other agent, a loose sheet of paper, out of a volume of the works of St. Augustine [here the exact designation was given], the use of which will be indicated later by the writer of this letter."Under penalty of not obtaining any result from the promised revelations, you must not begin by sending to the Library, nor by sending at the same time to the Library and to Ste. Geneviève. The safety of the person who desires to offer good advice to His Majesty depends upon the execution of the two prescribed acts in their given order."
"SIRE,—Will your Majesty condescend to receive a person at eight o'clock to-morrow night, who has important revelations to make specially affecting your Majesty's family?
"If your Majesty deigns to receive this person, let a messenger be sent at once to find a chip of Oriental alabaster, which rests on the tomb of Cardinal Caprara, at Ste. Geneviève.
"In addition to this, your Majesty must obtain, by means of some other agent, a loose sheet of paper, out of a volume of the works of St. Augustine [here the exact designation was given], the use of which will be indicated later by the writer of this letter.
"Under penalty of not obtaining any result from the promised revelations, you must not begin by sending to the Library, nor by sending at the same time to the Library and to Ste. Geneviève. The safety of the person who desires to offer good advice to His Majesty depends upon the execution of the two prescribed acts in their given order."
The letter was unsigned. The mysterious bearing of this letter attracted the attention of Louis XVIII., and he sent for M. Decazes at seven o'clock on the following morning.Please be careful to note that I am not relating a historical fact, but an anecdote from memory, which I copied something like thirty years ago. Only later and in quite different circumstances of my life, it recurred to my mind as does effaced writing under the application of a chemical preparation.
So, as indicated above, Louis XVIII. sent next morning for M. Decazes.
"Monsieur," he said, as soon as he saw him, "you must go to the church of Ste. Geneviève; you must descend to the crypt, where you will find the tomb of Cardinal Caprara, and you must bring away the thing, no matter what it is, that you will find on the tomb."
M. Decazes went, and when he reached Ste. Geneviève, he went down to the crypt. There, to his great surprise, he found nothing on the tomb of Cardinal Caprara but a fragment of Oriental alabaster. However, his orders were precise: we might rather say they were positive. After a moment's hesitation, he picked up the bit of alabaster and took it back to the Tuileries. He expected the king to jeer at the servile obedience that brought him only an object so worthless, but quite the reverse was the case, for at the sight of the bit of alabaster the king trembled. Then, taking it in his hand and examining it minutely, he placed it on his desk.
"Now," said Louis XVIII., "send a trusted messenger to the Royal Library; he must ask for the works of St. Augustine, the 1669 edition, and in volume 7, between pages 404 and 405, he will find a sheet of paper."
"But, sire," asked M. Decazes, "why should not I myself go rather than entrust this commission to another?"
"Out of the question,mon enfant!" "Mon enfant" was the pet name by which the king called his favourite minister.
A trusted messenger was sent to the Royal Library: he opened St. Augustine at the given pages and found the paper described. It was a simple matter to take it away. The paper was a very thin, blank folio sheet oddly snipped here and there. While Louis XVIII. was searching for the mysteriousrevelations hidden in the jagged paper the secretary brought him a missive containing a leaf of the same size as that from the St. Augustine, but inscribed with apparently unintelligible letters. At the corner of the envelope in which this leaf came were written the two words: "Most urgent." The king understood that there was a connection between the two events and a likeness between the two leaves. He placed the cut sheet of paper over the written sheet and saw that the letters shown up through the holes in the upper leaf made sense. He dismissed the secretary and intimated to M. Decazes to leave him alone, and when both had gone, he made out the following lines:—
"King, thou art betrayed! Betrayed by thy minister and by theP.P.of thy S——."King, I alone can save thee.MARIANI."
"King, thou art betrayed! Betrayed by thy minister and by theP.P.of thy S——.
"King, I alone can save thee.MARIANI."
The reader will understand that I do not hold myself responsible for this note any more than for the rest of the anecdote. The king did not mention this note to anyone; but, that evening, the Minister of the Police,[1]who was dismissed next day, issued orders to find a man named Mariani.
The following day, which was Sunday the 13th of February, the king on opening his prayer-book at mass found this note inside:—
"They have found out what I wrote; they are hunting for me. Do your utmost to see me, if you would avoid great misfortunes for your house. I shall know if you will receive me, by means of three wafers which you should stick inside the panes of your bedroom windows."
Although the king was greatly interested by this last letter of advice, he did not think it sufficiently urgent to attend to it as directed. He waited and hesitated, and then left matters till the morrow. That evening there was a special performance atthe Opera, whenLe Rossignol,les Noces de Gamache, andle Carnaval de Venisewere played. The Duc and Duchesse de Berry were present. About eleven o'clock, at the close of the second act of the ballet, the duchess, feeling tired, told her husband that she wished to leave. The prince would not allow her to go alone, but himself conducted her out of the Opera House. When he reached their carriage, which stood in the rue Rameau, just as he was helping the princess up the step, and saying to her, "Wait for me, I will rejoin you in a moment," a man darted forward rapidly, passed like a flash of lightning between the sentinel on guard at the door of exit and M. de Clermont-Lodève, the gentleman-in-waiting, seized the prince by the left shoulder, leant heavily against his breast and plunged a thin, sharp small-sword, with a boxwood hilt, in his right breast. The man left the weapon in the wound, knocked three or four curious bystanders spinning and disappeared immediately round the corner of the rue de Richelieu and under the Colbert Arcade. For the moment nobody noticed that the prince was wounded; he himself had hardly felt any pain beyond the blow of a fist.
"Take care where you are going, you clumsy fellow!" M. de Choiseul, the prince's aide-de-camp, had exclaimed, pushing the assassin to one side, thinking he was simply an unduly inquisitive bystander. Suddenly the prince lost his breath, grew pale and tottered, crying out, as he put his hand to his breast—
"I have been assassinated!"
"Impossible!" exclaimed those about him.
"See," replied the prince, "here is the dagger." And giving effect to his words, he drew out and held up the bloodstained sword from his breast. The carriage door had not yet been shut. The duchess sprang out, trying to catch her husband in her arms; but the prince was already past standing, even with this support. He fell gently back into the arms of those surrounding him, and was carried into the drawing-room belonging to the king's box. There he received immediate attention.
By the mere appearance of the wound, the shape of the dagger and the length of its blade, the doctors recognised the serious nature of the case, and declared that the prince must not be taken to the Tuileries. They therefore carried him to the suite of rooms occupied by M. de Grandsire, the Secretary to the Opera Company, who lived at the theatre. By a singular coincidence, the bed on which the dying prince was laid was the same on which he had slept the first night of his joyful re-entry into France. M. de Grandsire was at that time at Cherbourg and he had lent this very bed to put in the Duc de Berry's room. Here the prince learnt the arrest of his murderer. He asked his name. They told him it was Louis-Pierre Louvel. He seemed to search his memory and then, as if speaking to himself, he said, "I cannot recollect ever having injured this man."
No, prince, no, you did nothing to him; but you bear on your forehead the fatal seal which carries the Bourbons to the grave or into exile. No, prince, you have not injured the man, but you are heir to the throne and that is sufficient in this country for the hand of God to be laid heavily upon you. Look back, prince, on what has happened to those who, for the last sixty years, have handled the fatal crown to which they aspired. Louis XVI. died on the scaffold. Napoleon died at St. Helena. The Duc de Reichstadt died at Schoenbrünn. Charles X. died at Frohsdorf. Louis-Philippe died at Claremont. And who knows, prince, where your son, the Count de Chambord, will die? Where your cousin the Count de Paris? I ask the question of you who are about to know the secret of that eternal life which hides away from us all the mysteries of life and of death. And we would further point out to you, prince, that not one of your race will die in the Tuileries, or will rest as kings in the tombs of their fathers.
But it was a good and noble heart that was about to cease to beat amidst all the distracting events of that period. And when Louis XVIII., who had been informed of the assassination, came at six in the morning, to receive his nephew's last wishes, the first words of the wounded prince were—
"Sire, pardon the man!"
Louis XVIII. neither promised nor refused to pardon.
"My dear nephew, you will survive this cruel act, I trust," he replied, "and we will then discuss the matter again. It is of grave import, moreover," he added, "and it must be looked into most carefully at some future time."
These words had scarcely been uttered by the king when the prince began to fight for his breath; he stretched out his arms and asked to be turned on his left side.
"I am dying!" he said, as they hastened to carry out his last wish.
And, indeed, they had hardly moved him when, at the stroke of half-past six, he died.
The grief of the duchess was inexpressible. She seized scissors from the mantelpiece, let down her beautiful fair hair, cut it off to the roots and threw the locks on the dead body of her husband.
The sorrow of King Louis was twofold: not knowing that the Duchesse de Berry was pregnant, he deplored even more than the death of a murdered nephew the extinction of a race.
When he withdrew to the Tuileries, he remembered the events of the two preceding days—the letter received on the very morning of the assassination, the warning of some great calamity threatening the royal family. Then, although there was nothing more to be expected from the mysterious stranger, the legend that we have given goes on to say that Louis XVIII. dragged his aching limbs to the window and stuck the three wafers on its panes as a signal of welcome to the unknown writer of the letters. Two hours later, the king received a letter wrapped in three coverings:—
"It is too late! Let a confidential person come and meet me on the pont des Arts, where I will be at eleven o'clock to-night.
"I rely on the honour of the king."
At a quarter-past eleven the mysterious stranger was introduced into the Tuileries and conducted to the king's private chamber. He remained with Louis till one o'clock inthe morning. No one ever knew what passed in that interview. The next day, M. Clausel de Coussergues proposed, in the Upper House, to impeach M. Decazes as an accomplice in the assassination of the Duc de Berry.
Thus, at the same time that the Napoleonic and Liberal party were disseminating the skits against the Bourbons which we have quoted, and distributing copies of the proceedings of the Maubreuil trial, the Extreme Right was attacking by similar means the Duc d'Orléans and M. Decazes; each in turn undermining and destroying one another, to the advantage of a fourth party, which was soon to make its appearance under the cloak of Carbonarism—we mean that Republican element which Napoleon, when he was dying in the island of St. Helena, prophesied would dominate the future.
But before tackling this question, one word more about Louvel. God forbid that we should glorify the assassin, no matter to what party he belonged! We would only indicate, from the historical point of view, the difference that may exist between one murderer and another. We have related how Louvel disappeared, first round the corner of the rue de Richelieu and then under the Colbert Arcade. He was just on the point of escaping when a carriage barred his course and compelled him to slacken his pace. During this moment of hesitation, the sentinel, who had thrown down his gun to pursue him and who had lost sight of him, had a glimpse of him again and redoubled his speed, caught up with him and seized him round the waist, a waiter from a neighbouring café; at the same time seizing hold of him by his collar. When he was captured, the assassin did not attempt any fresh effort. One would have thought that from motives of self-preservation he would have struggled to escape, but his one attempt at flight seemed to satisfy him, and had they let go their hold, he would not have taken his chance to regain liberty. Louvel was taken to the guard-house below the vestibule of the Opera.
"Wretch!" exclaimed M. de Clermont-Lodève, "what can have induced you to commit such a crime?"
"The desire to deliver France from one of its cruellest enemies."
"Who paid you to carry out the deed?"
"Paid me!" cried Louvel, tossing his head,—"paid me!" Then with a scornful smile he added, "Do you think one would do such a thing for money?"
Louvel's trial was carried to the Upper Chamber. On 5 June he appeared before the High Court. On the following day he was condemned to death. Four months had been spent in trying to find his accomplices, but not one had been discovered. He was taken back to the Conciergerie, an hour after his sentence had been pronounced, and one of his warders came to him.
"You would like," said the man to the prisoner, who throughout his trial had preserved the utmost calm and even the greatest decorum,—"you would like to send for a priest?" "What for?" asked Louvel.
"Why, to ease your conscience."
"Oh, my conscience is at ease: it tells me I did my duty."
"Your conscience deceives you. Listen to what I say and make your peace with God: that is my advice."
"And if I confess, do you suppose that will send me to Paradise?"
"May be: the mercy of God is infinite."
"Do you think the Prince de Condé, who has just died, will be in Paradise?"
"He should be, he was an upright prince."
"In that case, I would like to join him there; it would amuse me vastly to plague the oldémigré."
The conversation was here interrupted by M. de Sémonville, who came to try and extract information from the prisoner. Finding he could not get anything from him, he said to Louvel—
"Is there anything you want?"
"Monsieur le comte," replied the condemned man, "I have had to sleep between such coarse sheets in prison, I would like some finer ones for my last night."
The request was granted. Louvel had his fine sheets andslept soundly between them from nine at night till six o'clock the next morning. On 6 June, at six in the evening, he was taken from the Conciergerie: it was the time of the famous troubles of which we shall speak presently. The streets were blocked, and there were spectators even on the roofs. He wore a round red cap and grey trousers, and a blue coat was fastened round his shoulders. The papers next day announced that his features were changed and his gait enfeebled.
Nothing of the kind: Louvel belonged to the family of assassins to which Ravaillac and Alibaud were akin—that is to say, he was a man of stout courage. He mounted the scaffold without bombast and also without any trace of weakness, and he died as men do who have sacrificed their lives to an idea.
His cell was the last in the Conciergerie, to the right, at the bottom of the corridor; it was the same in which Alibaud, Fieschi and Meunier had been kept.