"Si fractus illabatur orbis,"
"Si fractus illabatur orbis,"
it is to find the well-bred Englishman as it would have found the just Roman—and, above all things, it is not to derange the imperturbable disdain with which he is enfeoffed to his inferiors. Lady D. was going to Scotland: a violent storm arose. Her ladyship was calmly dressing her hair, when the stewardknocked at the cabin-door. "My lady," said the man, "I think it right to tell you there is every chance of our being drowned." "Do not talk to me, you impertinent fellow, about drowning," said her aristocratical ladyship, perfectly unmoved—"that's the captain's business, and not mine."
Our great idea of civility is, that the person who is poor should be exceedingly civil to the person who is wealthy: and this is the difference between the neighboring nations. Your Frenchman admits no one to be quite his equal—your Englishman worships every one richer than himself as undeniably his superior. Judge us from our servants and our shopkeepers, it is true we are the politest people in the world. The servants, who are paid well, and the shopkeepers, who sell high—scrape, and cringe, and smile. There is no country where those who have wealth are treated so politely by those to whom it goes; but at the same time there is no country where those who are well off live on such cold, and suspicious, and ill-natured, and uncivil terms among themselves.
The rich man who travels in France murmurs at every inn and at every shop; not only is he treated no better for being a rich man—he is treated worse in many places, from the idea that because he is rich he is likely to give himself airs. But if the lower classes are more rude to the higher classes than with us, the higher classes in France are far less rude to one another. The dandy who did not look at an old acquaintance, or who looked impertinently at a stranger, would have his nose pulled and his body run through with a small-sword—or damaged by a pistol-bullet—before the evening was well over. Where every man wishes to be higher than he is, there you find people insolent to their fellows, and exacting obsequiousness from their inferiors—where men will allow no one to be superior to themselves, there you see them neither civil to those above them, nor impertinent to those beneath them, nor yet very courteous to those in the same station. The manners, checkered in one country by softness and insolence, are not sufficiently courteous and gentle in the other. Time was in France, (it existed in England to a late date,) when politeness was thought to consist in placing every one at his ease. A quiet sense of their own dignity rendered persons insensible to the fear of its being momentarily forgotten. Upon these days rested the shadow of a bygone chivalry, which accounted courtesy as one of the virtues. The civility of that epoch, as contrasted with the civility of ours, was not the civility of the domestic or the tradesman, meant to pamper the pride of their employer, but the civility of the noble and the gentleman, meant to elevate the modesty of those who considered themselves in an inferior state. Corrupted by the largesses of an expensive and intriguing court, the "grand seigneur," after the reign of Louis XIV., became over-civil and servile to those above him. Beneath the star of the French minister beat the present heart of the British mercer—and softly did the great man smile on those from whom he had any thing to gain. As whatever was taught at Versailles was learnt in the Rue St. Denis, when the courtier had the air of a solicitor, every one aped the air of the courtier; and the whole nation with one hand expressing a request, and the other an obligation, might have been taken in the attitude of the graceful old beggar, whose accost made such an impression upon me.
But a new nobility grew up in rivalry to the elder one; and as the positions of society became more complicated and uncertain, a supreme civility to some was seen side by side with a sneering insolence to others—a revolution in manners, which embittered as it hastened the revolution of opinions. Thus the manners of the French in the time of Louis XVI. had one feature of similarity with ours at present. A moneyed aristocracy was then rising into power in France, as a moneyed aristocracy is now rising into power in England. This is the aristocracy which demands obsequious servility—which is jealous and fearful of being treated with disrespect; this is the aristocracy which is haughty, insolent, and susceptible; which dreams of affronts and gives them: this is the aristocracy which measures with an uncertain eye the height of an acquaintance; this is the aristocracy which cuts and sneers—this aristocracy, though the aristocracy of the revolution of July, is now too powerless in France to be more than vulgar in its pretensions. French manners, then, if they are not gracious, are at all events not insolent; while ours, unhappily, testify on one hand the insolence, while they do not on the other represent the talent and the grace of that society which presided over the later suppers of the old regime. We have no Monsieur de Fitz-James, who might be rolled in a gutter all his life, as was said by a beautiful woman of his time, "without ever contracting a spot of dirt." We have no Monsieur de Narbonne, who stops in the fiercest of a duel to pick up the ruffled rose that had slipped in a careless moment from his lips during the graceful conflict! You see no longer in France that noble air, that "great manner," as it was called, by which the old nobility strove to keep up the distinction between themselves and their worse-born associates to the last, and which of course those associatesassiduously imitated.
That manner is gone: the French, so far from being a polite nation at the present day, want that easiness of behavior which is the first essential to politeness. Every man you meet is occupied with maintaining his dignity, and talks to you ofhisposition. There is an evident effort and struggle, I will not say to appear better than you are, but to appearallthatyou are, and to allow no person to think that you consider him better than you. Persons,no longer ranked by classes, take each by themselves an individual place in society. They are so many atoms, not forming a congruous or harmonious whole. They are too apt to strut forward singly, and to say with a great deal of action, and a great deal of emphasis, "I am—nobody." The French are no longer polite, but in the French nation, as in every nation, there is an involuntary and traditionary respect which hallows what is gone-by; and among the marvels of modern France is a religion which ranks an agreeable smile and a graceful bow as essential virtues of its creed.
Nor does the Père Enfantin stand alone. There is something touching in the language of the old "seigneur," who, placed as it were between two epochs, looking backwards and forwards to the graces of past times and the virtues of new, thus expresses himself:
"Les progrès de la lumière et de la liberté ont certainment fait faire de grands pas à la raison humaine; mais aussi dans sa route, n'a-t-elle rien perdu? Moi qui ne suis pas un de ces opiniâtres prôneurs de ce bon vieux temp qui n'est plus, je ne puis m'empêcher de regretter ce bon goût, cette grâce, cette fleur d'enjouement et d'urbanité qui chassait de la societé tout ennui en permettant au bon sens de sourire et à la sagesse de se parer. Aujourd 'hui beaucoup de gens ressemblent à un propriétaire morose, qui, ne songeant qu'a l'utile, bannirait de son jardin les fleurs, et ne voudrait y voir que du blé, des foins et des fruits."
What followed the events related in our last number gave Ashburner a lesson against making up his mind too hastily on any points of character, national or individual. A fortnight after his arrival at Oldport he would have said that the Americans were the most communicative people he had ever fallen in with, and particularly, that the men of "our set" were utterly incapable of keeping secret any act or purpose of their lives, any thing that had happened, or was going to happen.Nowhe was surprised at the discretion shown by the men cognizant of the late row (and they comprised all the fashionables left in the place, and some of the outsiders, like Simpson); their dexterity and careful management, first, to prevent the affair from coming to a fight, and then, if that were impossible, to keep it from publicity until the parties were safe over the border into Canada, where they might "shoot each other like gentlemen," as a young gentleman from Alabama expressed it. Sedley himself, whose officiousness had precipitated the quarrel, did all in his power to prevent any further mischief, and was as sedulous for the promotion ofsilencioandmisterio, as if he had been leader of a chorus of Venetian Senators.The Sewerreporters, who, in their eagerness to collect every bit of gossip and scandal, would have given the ears which an outraged community had permitted them to retain for a knowledge of the fracas and its probable consequences, never had the least inkling of it. Indeed, so quietly was the whole managed, that Ashburner never made out the cause of the old feud, nor was able to form any opinion on the probability of its final issue. On the former point he could only come to the conclusion from what he heard, that Hunter had been mythologizing, as his wont was, something to Benson's discredit several years before, and had been trying to make mischief between him and some of his friends or relations; but what the exact offence was, whether Sumner was involved in the quarrel from the first, and if so, to what extent; and whether the legend about the horse was a part of, or only an addition to the original grievance;—on these particulars he remained in the dark. As to the latter, he knew that Hunter had not challenged Benson, and that he had left the place, but whether to look up a friend or not, no one seemed to know, or if they did, no one cared to tell. At any rate, he did not return for a week and more, during which time Ashburner had full opportunity of studying the behavior and feelings of a man with a duel in prospect.
Those who defend and advocate the practice of duelling, if asked to explain the motives leading a gentleman to fight, would generally answer somewhat to this effect: in the first place, personal courage which induces a man to despise danger and death, in comparison with any question affecting his own honor, or that of those connected with him; secondly, a respect for the opinion of the society in which he moves, which opinion, to a certain extent, supplies and fixes the definition of honor. Hence it would follow that, given a man who is neither physically brave, nor bound by any particular respect for the opinion of his daily associates, and the world he moves in, such a man would not be likely to give or accept a challenge. The case under Ashburner's observation afforded a palpable contradiction to this conclusion.
Henry Benson was not personally valorous; what courage he possessed was rather of a moral than a physical kind. Where he appeared to be daring and heedless, it proved on examination to be the result of previous knowledge and practice, which gave him confidence and armed him with impunity. Thus he would drive his trotters at any thing, and shave through "tight places" on rough and crowded roads, his whiffle-trees tipping and his hubs grazing the surrounding wheels in a way that at first made Ashburner shudder in spite of himself; but it was because his experience in wagon-driving enabled him to measure distances within half-an-inch, and to catch an available opening immediately. On the other hand, in their pedestrian trips across country in Westchester, he was very chary of jumping fences or ditches till he had ascertained bycareful practice his exact capacity for that sort of exercise. He would ride his black horse, Daredevil, who was the terror of all the servants and women in his neighborhood, because he had made himself perfectly acquainted with all the animal's stock of tricks, and was fully prepared for them as they came; but he never went the first trip in a new steamboat or railroad line. He ate and drank many things considered unhealthy, because he understood exactly from experience what and how much he could take without injury; but you could not have bribed him to sit fifteen minutes in wet boots. In short, he was a man who took excellent care of himself,cannyas a Scot or a New-Englander, loving the good things of life, and not disposed to hazard them on slight grounds. Then as to the approbation or disapprobation of those about him, he was almost entirely careless of it. On any point beyond the cut of a coat, the decoration of a room, the concoction of a dish, or the merits of a horse, there were not ten people in his own set whose opinion he heeded. To the remarks of foreigners he was a little more sensitive, but even these he was more apt to retort upon by atu quoquethan to be influenced by. Add to all this, that he had the convenient excuse of being a communicant at church, which, in America, implies something like a formal profession of religion. Yet at this time he was not only willing, but most eager to fight. The secret lay in his state of recklessness. A moment of passion had overturned all his instincts, principles, and common-sense, and inspired him with the feverish desire to pay off his old debts to Storey Hunter, at whatever cost. And as neither the possession of extraordinary personal courage, nor a high sense of conventional honor, nor a respect for the opinion of society, necessarily induces a feeling of recklessness, so neither does the absence of these qualities prevent the presence of this feeling, exactly the most favorable one to make a man engage in a duel. Moralists have called such a condition one of temporary madness, and it has probably as good grounds to be classed with insanity as many of the pleas known to medical and criminal jurisprudence.
Be this as it may, Ashburner had a good opportunity of observing—and the example, it is to be hoped, was of service to him—the demoralization induced upon a man by the mere impending possibility of a duel. Benson seemed careless what he did. He danced frantically, and drank so much at all hours, that the Englishman, though pretty strong-headed himself, wondered how he could keep sober. He was openly seen readingThe Blackguard's Own, a weekly ofThe Sewerspecies. He made up trotting-matches with every man in the place who owned a "fast crab," and with some acquaintances at a distance, by correspondence. He kept studiously out of the way of his wife and child, lest their influence might shake his determination. All this time he practised pistol-shooting most religiously. Neither of the belligerents had ever given a public proof of skill in this line. Hunter's ability was not known, and Benson's shooting so uncertain and variable when any one looked on, that those in the secret suspected him of playing dark and disguising his hand. All which added to the interest of the affair.
But when eleven days had passed without signs or tidings of Hunter, and it seemed pretty clear that he had gone away "for good," Benson started up one morning, and went off himself to New-York, at the same time with Harrison, whose brief and not very joyous holidays had come to a conclusion. He accompanied the banker, in accordance with the true American principle, always to have a lion for your companion when you can; and as Harrison was still a man of note in Wall-street, however small might be his influence in his own household, Benson liked to be seen with him, and to talk any thing—even stocks—to him, though he had no particular interest in the market at that time. But whether an American is in business himself or not, the subject of business is generally an interesting one to him, and he is always ready to gossip about dollars. The unexampled material development of the United States is only maintained by a condition of society which requires every man to take a share in assisting that development, and the most frivolous and apparently idle men are found sharp enough in pecuniary matters. This trait of national character lies on the surface, and foreigners have not been slow to notice it, and to draw from it unfavorable conclusions. The supplementary and counterbalancing features of character to be observed in these very people,—that it is rather the fun of making the money than the money itself which they care for; that when it is made, they spend it freely, and part with it more readily than they earned it; that they are more liberal both in their public and private charities (considering the amount of their wealth, and of the claims upon it) than any nation in the world,—all these traits strangers have been less ready to dwell upon and do justice to.
Benson was gone, and Ashburner stayed. Why? He had been at Oldport nearly a month; the place was not particularly beautiful, and the routine of amusements not at all to his taste. Why did he stay? He had his secret, too.
It is a melancholy but indisputable fact, that even in the most religious and moral country in the world, the bulwark of evangelical faith, and the home of the domestic virtues (meaning, of course, England), a great many mothers who have daughters to marry, are not so anxious about the real welfare, temporal and eternal, of their young ladies, as solicitous that they should acquire riches, titles, and other vanities of the world,—nay, that many of the daughters themselves act as if their everlasting happiness depended on their securing in matrimony a proper combination of the aforesaidvanities, and put out of account altogether the greatest prize a woman can gain—the possession of a true and loving heart, joined to a wise head. Now, Ashburner being a very goodpartiat home, and having run the gauntlet of one or two London seasons, had become very skittish of mammas, and still more so of daughters. He regarded the unmarried female as a most dangerous and altogether to be avoided animal, and when you offered to introduce him to a young lady, looked about as grateful as if you had invited him to go up in a balloon. He expected to be rather more persecuted, if any thing, in America than he had been at home; and when he met Miss Vanderlyn at Ravenswood, if his first thought had found articulate expression, it would probably have been something like this:—"Now that young woman is going to set her cap at me; what a bore it will be!"
Never was a man more mistaken in his anticipations. He encountered many pretty girls, not at all timid, ready enough to talk, and flirty enough among their own set, but not one of them threw herself at him, and least of all did Miss Vanderlyn. Not that the young lady was the victim of a romantic attachment, for she was perfectly fancy free and heart whole; nor, on the other hand, that she was at all insensible to the advantages of matrimony, for she kept a very fair lookout in that direction, and had, if not absolutely down on her books, at least engraved on the recording tablets of her mind, four distinct young gentlemen, combining the proper requisites, any of whom would suit her pretty well, and one of whom—she didn't much care which—she was pretty well resolved to marry within the next two years. And as she was stylish and rather handsome, clever enough, and tolerably provided with the root of all evil, besides having that fortunate good humor and accommodating disposition which go so far towards making a woman a belle and a favorite, there was a sufficient probability that before the expiration of that time, one of the four would offer himself. But all her calculations were founded on shrewd common sense; her imagination took no flights, and her aspirations only extended to the ordinary and possible. That this young and strange Englishman, travelling as a part of education, the son of a great man, and probably betrothed by proxy to some great man's daughter, or going into parliament to be a great man himself, and remain a bachelor for the best part of his life,—that between him and herself there should by any thing in common, any point of union which could make even a flirtation feasible, never entered into her head. She would as soon have expected the King of Dahomey to send an embassy with ostrich feathers in their caps, and rings in their noses, formally to ask her hand in marriage. Nay, even if the incredible event had come to pass, and the young stranger had taken the initiative, even then she would not by any means have jumped at the bait. For in the first place, she was fully imbued with the idea that the Vanderlyns were quite as good as any other people in the world, and that (the ordinary conceit of an American belle) to whatever man she might give her hand, all the honor would come from her side, and all the gain be his; therefore she would not have cared to come into a family who might suspect her of having inveigled their heir, and look down upon her as something beneath them, because she came from a country where there were no noblemen. Secondly, there is a very general feeling among the best classes in America, that no European worth any thing at home comes to America to get married. The idea is evidently an imperfect generalization, and liable to exceptions; but the prevalence of it shows more modesty in the "Upper Ten's" appreciation of themselves than they usually have credit for. As soon, therefore, as a foreigner begins to pay attention to a young lady in good society, it isprimâ facieground of suspicion against him. The reader will see from all this how little chance there was of Ashburner's running any danger from the unmarried women about him. With the married ones the case was somewhat different. It may be remembered, that at his first introduction to Mrs. Henry Benson, the startling contrast she exhibited to the adulation he had been accustomed to receive, totally put him down; and that afterwards she softened off the rough edge of her satire, and became verypiquanteand pleasing to him. And as she greatly amused him, so he began to suspect that she was rather proud of having such a lion in her train, as no doubt she was, notwithstanding the somewhat rough and cub-like stage of his existence. So he began to hang about her, and follow her around in his green awkward way, and look large notes of admiration at her; and she was greatly diverted, and not at all displeased at his attentions. I don't know how far it might have gone; Ashburner was a very correct and moral young man, as the world goes, but rather because he had generally business enough on hand to keep him out of mischief, than from any high religious principle; and I am afraid that in spite of the claims of propriety, and honor, and friendship, and the avenging Zeus of hospitality, and every other restraining motive, he would have fallen very much in love with Mrs. Benson but for one thing.
He was hopelessly in love with Mrs. Harrison. How or when it began he couldn't tell; but he found himself under the influence imperceptibly, as a man feels himself intoxicated. Sometimes he fancied that there had been a kind of love at first sight—that with the first glimpse he had of her, something in his heart told him that that woman was destined to exert a mastery over him; yet his feelings must have undergone a change and growth, for he would not now have listened to any one speaking of her as Benson had done at that time.Whyit was, he could stillless divine. His was certainly not the blind admiration which sees no fault in its idol; he saw her faults plainly enough, and yet could not help himself. He often asked himself how it happened that if hewasdoomed to endure an illicit and unfortunate passion, it was not for Mrs. Benson rather than Mrs. Harrison; for the former was at least as clever, certainly handsomer, palpably younger, indubitably more lady-like, and altogether a higher style of woman. Yet with this just appreciation of them, there was no comparison as to his feelings towards the two. The one amused and delighted him when present; the other, in her absence, was ever rising up before his mind's eye, and drawing him after her; and when they met, his heart beat quicker, and he was more than usually awkward and confused.—Perhaps there had been, in the very origin of his entanglement and passion, some guiding impulse of honor, some sense that Benson had been his friend and entertainer, and that to Harrison he was under no personal obligations. For there are many shades of honor and dishonor in dishonorable thoughts, and a little principle goes a great way with some people, like the wind commemorated by Joe Miller's Irishman, of which there was not much,but what there was, was very high.
Be this as it may, he was loving to perdition—or thought so, at least; and it is hard to discriminate in a very young man's case between the conceit and the reality of love. His whole heart and mind were taken up with one great, all-pervading idea of Mrs. Harrison, and he was equally unable to smother and to express his flame. He was dying to make her a present of something, but he could send nothing without a fear of exciting suspicion, except bouquets; and of these floral luxuries, though they were only to be procured at Oldport with much trouble and expense, she had always a supply from other quarters. He did not like to be one of a number in his offerings; he wanted to pay her some peculiar tribute. He would have liked to fight some man for her, to pick a quarrel with some one who had said something against her. Proud and sensitive to ridicule as he was, he would have laid himself down in her way, and let her walk over him, could he have persuaded himself that she would be gratified by such a proof of devotion, and that it would help his cause with her.
Had Benson been in Oldport now, there might have been trouble, inasmuch as he was not particular about what he said, and not too well disposed towards Mrs. Harrison, while Ashburner was just in a state of mind to have fought with his own father on that theme. But Benson was away, and his absence at this time was not a source of regret to Ashburner, who felt a little afraid of him, and with some reason, for our friend Harry was as observant as if he had a fly's allowance of eyes, and had a knack of finding out things without looking for them, and of knowing things without asking about them; and he would assuredly have noticed that Ashburner began to be less closely attached to his party, and to follow in the train of Mrs. Harrison. As for Clara Benson, she never troubled herself about the Englishman's falling off in his attentions to her; if any thing, she was rather glad of it; her capricious disposition made her tire of a friend in a short time; she could not endure any one's uninterrupted company—not even her husband's, who therefore wisely took care to absent himself from her several times every year.
Moreover, though Ashburner was seen in attendance on the lioness, it was not constantly or in a pointed manner. He was still fighting with himself, and, like a man run away with, who has power to guide his horse though not to stop him, he was so far able to manage his passion as to keep it from an open display. So absolutely no one suspected what was the matter with him, or that there was any thing the matter with him, except the lady herself. Catch a woman not finding out when a man is in love with her! Sometimes she may delude herself with imagining a passion where none exists, but she never makes the converse mistake of failing to perceive it where it does. And how did the gay Mrs. Harrison, knowing and perceiving herself to be thus loved, make use of her knowledge? What alteration did it produce in her conduct and bearing towards her admirer? Absolutely none at all. Precisely as she had treated him at their first introduction did she continue to treat him—as if he were one of her everyday acquaintances, and nothing more. And it is precisely this line of action that utterly breaks down a man's defences, and makes him more hopelessly than ever the slave of his fair conqueror. If a woman declares open hostilities against him, runs him down behind his back, snubs him to his face, shuns his society,—this at least shows that she considers his attachment of some consequence—consequence enough to take notice of, though the notice be unfavorable. His self-respect may come to the rescue, or his piqued vanity may save him by converting love into enmity. But a perseverance in never noticing his love, and feigning to be ignorant of its existence, completely establishes her supremacy over him.
A Frenchman, who has conceived designs against a married lady, only seeks to throw dust in the husband's eyes, and then if he cannot succeed in his final object, at least to establish sufficient intimacy to give him a plausible pretext for saying that he has succeeded; for in such a matter he is not scrupulous about lying a little—or a great deal. An American, bad enough for a similar intention (which usually presupposes a considerable amount ofParisianization), acts as much like a Frenchman—if anything, rather worse. An Englishman is not usually moved to the desire of an intrigue by vanity, but driven into it by sheer passion, and his first impulse is to run bodily off with the object of his misplaced affection; to take her and himself out of the country, as if he could thereby travel out of his moral responsibilities.Reader, did you ever notice, or having noticed, did you ever ponder upon the geographical distribution of morals and propriety which is so marked and almost peculiar a feature of the Anglo-Saxon mind? In certain outward looks and habits, the English may be unchangeable and unmistakeable all over the globe; but their ethical code is certainly not the same at home and abroad. It is pretty much so with an American, too, before he has become irreparably Parisianized. When he puts on his travelling habits, he takes off his puritan habits, and makes light of doing things abroad which he would be the first to anathematize at home. Observe, we are not speaking of the deeply religious, nor yet of the openly profligate class in either country, but of the general run of respectable men who travel; they regard a great part of their morality and their manners as intended solely for home consumption; while a Frenchman or a German, if his home standard is not so high, lives better up to it abroad. And yet many Englishmen, and some Americans, wonder why their countrymen are so unpopular as foreign travellers!
Ashburner, then, wanted to run away with Mrs. Harrison. How he could have supported her never entered into his thoughts, nor did he consider what the effect would be on his own prospects. He did not reflect, either, how miserably selfish it was in him, after all, to expect that this woman would give up her fortune and position, her children, her unbounded legitimate domination over her husband, for his boyish passion, and how infinitesimally small the probability that she would do so crazy a thing. Nor did Harrison ever arise before his mind as a present obstacle or future danger; and this was less frantic than most of his overlookings. The broker was a strong and courageous man, and probably had been once very much in love with his wife; but at that time, so far from putting a straw in the way of any man who wanted to relieve him of her, he would probably have been willing to pay his expenses into the bargain.
But how to declare his passion—that was the question. He saw that the initiatory steps, and very decided ones, must be taken on his part; and it was not easy to find the lady alone ten minutes together. People lived at Newport as if they were in the open air, and the volunteer police of ordinary gossip made private interviews between well-known people a matter of extreme difficulty. A Frenchman similarly placed would have brought the affair to a crisis much sooner: he would have found a thousand ways of disclosing his feelings, and at the same time dexterously leaving himself a loop-hole of escape. Very clever at these things are the Gauls; they will make an avowal in full ball-room, under cover of the music, if there is no other chance to be had. But tact in love affairs is not a characteristic of the Englishman, especially at Ashburner's age. He had none of this mischievous dexterity; perhaps it is just as well when a man has not, both for himself and for society. He thought of writing, and actually began many letters or notes, or billet-doux, or whatever they might be called; but they always seemed so absurd (as truly they were), that he invariably tore them up when half-finished. He thought of serving up his flame in verse (for about this time the unhappy youth wrote many verses, which on his return to sanity he very wisely made away with); but his emotion lay too deep for verse, and his performances seemed even to himself too ridiculous for him to dream of presenting them. Still he must make a beginning somehow; he could not ask her to run away with him apropos of nothing.
One of his great anxieties, you may be sure, was to find out if any other man stood in his way, and who that man might be. His first impulses were to be indiscriminately jealous of every man he saw talking or walking with her; but on studying out alone the result of his observations, he could not discover that she affected any one man more than another. For this was one of her happy arts, that she made herself attractive to all without showing a marked preference for any one. White, who among his other accomplishments had a knack of quoting the standard poets, compared her to Pope's Belinda—saying, that her lively looks disclosed a sprightly mind, and that she extended smiles to all, and favors to none. So that Ashburner's jealousy could find no fixed object to light on. At one time he had been terribly afraid of Le Roi, chiefly from having heard the lady praise him for his accomplishments and agreeable manners. But once he heard Sedley say, that Mrs. Harrison had been worrying Le Roi half out of his wits, and quite out of his temper.
"How so?"
"Oh, she was praising you, and saying how much she liked the English character, and how true and honest your countrymen were—so much more to be depended on than the French—and more manly, too; and altogether she worked him up into such a rage againstces insulaires, that he went off ready to swear."
And then Ashburner suspected what he afterwards became certain of—that this was only one of the pleasant little ways the woman had of amusing herself. Whenever she found two men who were enemies, or rivals, or antagonists in any way, she would praise each to the other, on purpose to aggravate them: and very successful she was in her purpose; for she had the greatest appearance of sincerity, and whatever she said seemed to come right out of her heart. But if any lingering fears of Le Roi still haunted the Englishman's mind, they were dispelled by his departure along with the main body of the exclusives. Though always proud to be seen in the company of a conspicuous character like Mrs. Harrison, the Vicomte more particularly cultivated the fashionables proper, and gladly embraced the opportunity of following, in the train of the Robinsons.
Perhaps, after all, Ashburner would havepreferred being able to concentrate his suspicions upon one definite person, to feeling a vague distrust of somebody he knew not whom, especially as the presence of a rival might have brought the affair to a crisis sooner. To a crisis it was approaching, nevertheless, for his passion now began to tell on him. He looked pale, and grew nervous and weak—lay awake at nights, which he had never done before, except when going in for the Tripos at Cambridge—and was positively off his feed, which he had never been at any previous period of his life. He thought of tearing himself away from the place—the wisest course, doubtless; but, just as he had made up his mind to go by the next stage, Mrs. Harrison, as if she divined what he was about, would upset all his plans by a few words, or a look or smile—some little expression which meant nothing, and could never be used against her; but which, by a man in his state, might be interpreted to mean a great deal.
One morning the crisis came—not that there was any particular reason for it then more than at any other time, only he could hold out no longer. It was a beautiful day, and they had been strolling in one of the few endurable walks the place afforded—a winding alley near the hotel, but shrouded in trees, and it was just at the time when most of the inhabitants were at ten-pins, so that they were tolerably alone. Now, if ever, was the time; but the more he tried to introduce the subject, the less possible he found it to make a beginning, and all the while he could not avoid a dim suspicion that Mrs. Harrison knew perfectly well what he was trying to drive at, and took a mischievous pleasure in saying nothing to help him along. So they talked about his travels and hers, and great people in England and France, and all sorts of people then at Oldport, and the weather even—all manner of ordinary topics; and then they walked some time without saying anything, and then they went back to the hotel. There he felt as if his last chance was slipping away from him, and in a sudden fit of desperate courage he followed her up to her parlor without waiting for an invitation. Hardly was the door closed—he would have given the world to have locked it—when he begged her to listen to him a few minutes on a subject of the greatest importance. The lady opened her large round eyes a little wider; it was the only sign she gave of any thing approaching to surprise. Then the young man unbosomed himself just as he stood there—not upon his knees; people used to do that—in books, at least—but nobody does now. He told her how long he had been in love with her—how he thought of her all day and all night, and how wretched he was—how he had tried to subdue his passion, knowing it was very wrong, and so forth; but really he couldn't help it, and—and—there he stuck fast; for all the time he had been making this incoherent avowal, like one in a dream, hardly knowing what he was about, but conscious only of taking a decisive step, and doing a very serious thing in a very wild way—all this time, nevertheless, he had most closely watched Mrs. Harrison, to anticipate his sentence in some look or gesture of hers. And he saw that there did not move a line in her face, or a muscle in her whole figure—not a fibre of her dress even stirred. If she had been a great block of white marble, she could not have shown less feeling, as she stood up there right opposite him. If he had asked her to choose a waistcoat pattern for him, she could not have heard him more quietly. As soon as he had fairly paused, so that she could speak without immediate interruption, she took up the reply. It was better that he should go no further, as she had already understood quite enough. She was very sorry to give him pain—it was always unpleasant to give pain to any one. She was also very sorry that he had so deceived himself, and so misapprehended her character, or misunderstood her conversation. He was very young yet, and had sense enough to get over this very soon. Of course, she would never hear any repetition of such language from him; and, on her part, she would never mention what had occurred to any one—especially not to Mr. Harrison (it was the first time he had ever heard her allude to the existence of that gentleman); and then she wound up with a look which said as plainly as the words could have done, "Now, you may go."
Ashburner moved off in a more than usual state of confusion. As he approached the door it opened suddenly, and he nearly walked over one of the little Bleeckers, a flourishing specimen of Young New-York, with about three yards of green satin round his throat, and both his hands full of French novels, which he had been commissioned to bring from the circulating library. Ashburner felt like choking him, and it was only by a great effort that he contrived to pass him with a barely civil species of nod. But as he went out, he could not refrain from casting one glance back at Mrs. Harrison. She had taken off her bonnet (which in America is denominated a hat), and was tranquilly arranging her hair at the glass.
Somehow or other he found his way down stairs, and rushed off into the country on a tearing walk, enraged and disgusted with every thing, and with himself most of all. When a man has made up his mind to commit a sin, and then has been disappointed in the fruition of it—when he has sold the birthright of his integrity, without getting the miserable mess of pottage for it which he expected, his feelings are not the most enviable. Ashburner was angry enough to marry the first heiress he met with. First, he half resolved to get up a desperate flirtation with Mrs. Benson; but the success of his first attempt was not encouraging to the prosecution of a second. To kill himself was not in hisline; but he felt very like killing some one else. He still feared he might have been made a screen for some other man. But if the other man existed, he could only be reached by fighting successively all the single men of "our set," and a fair sprinkling of those in the second set. Then he thought he must at least leave the place, but his pride still revolted at the idea of running away before a woman. Finally, after walking about ten miles, and losing his dinner, he sobered down gradually, and thought what a fool he had been; and the issue of his cogitations was a very wise double conclusion. He formed a higher opinion of the virtue of American women, and he never attempted any experiments on another.
There is no distinctive term more frequently employed, and less generally understood, than the word "Tact." It is in every one's mouth, and many have a vague notion of its meaning, who yet, if required, would find no slight difficulty in giving its definition. It is the application of perceptive common-sense to life's practical details; the correct adaptation of means to ends, from an intuitive knowledge of character, blended with a careful concealment, a discreet evasion of our own, except when amiable faults are avowed, to enhance the impression of our candor. Cameleon-like, "tact" assumes the color of contingent circumstances,—is the vague, yet potent spirit, with its shadowless finger arresting the impulses; an unseen ruler of the thoughts, winding its gossamer yet adamantine meshes like a spell; the uncaught "hic et ubique" arbiter of mortal destinies embodied in a fellow-mortal.
When we speak of the "man of tact," as of one in whom this quality predominates,—as hereafter we shall speak of the man of honor, of genius, and of sense, we must confess that above most other characteristics, this is especially absorbent in its influence, and generally usurps the government of the whole man. It collects into its own stream the channels of other motives, which it renders tributary, until it pervades the whole moral surface with one obliterating deluge. If not watched, it will hence induce a general deceptiveness, for the other impulses will partake of its color, shrewdness will become cunning, discretion will change into artful dexterity. Its very progress is sinuous and oblique, never more so than when assuming the guise of straightforwardness and truth; but if divested of its baser elements, it will soar into the higher intellectuals, and will claim affinity to practical observation, or, to speak phrenologically, to causality. In this view it combines with prudence, also with self-discipline, in the regulation of the temper; in fact, is the child of judgment, inheriting with its parent's calmness somewhat of her coldness too.
Observe that man sitting in the private room of one of our largest mercantile establishments. Risen from a low grade to the direction of a vast concern, at one time intrusted with a mission abroad of a most important yet delicate character, he owes the eminence he has attained entirely to tact. The features are now in repose, take your opportunity to watch them (for they are seldom so, and if he were aware of observation, would assume a different expression); how the wear upon nerves, even of such flexibility, imparts to the fatigued countenance an air of study, ceaseless even in comparative inaction. The open and bald forehead, clear, expansive, impending over deep-set, small, yet fathomless eyes, restless and anxious in their motion; the lips fullish, wearing at the corner a half-contemptuous yet good-humored self-contentment, which tells of the owner's disdain for the game of life, and yet of triumphant complacency at his own successful skill in it. He smiles! Ah! he is thinking of how he deluded that shallow fop, Lord F——, whom fortune raised kindly to conceal his puerilites by a coronet; or perhaps (as his eye dilates with haughtier gaze) he dreams of having struck a nobler quarry, when he outwitted the subtle Count de P——; for neither thought they were following aught but the suggestion of their own will. This is the mystery and mastery of tact. Had his victims seen that smile, the game would have been lost; but he was different to each, the man was changed. The lordling saw before him a free hearty abettor of youthful folly, an Apicius, not a Mentor, one versed in life's vanities, yet still ready to quaff the draught he satirized; sagacious in criticising pleasure, yet reckless as the youngest in its pursuit; but to the Count, the deferential air, the silent evidence of every action, so sedulously courteous, yet so artless, attesting the listener's (for he spoke but to inquire as if of an oracle, and demurred but to render conviction more gracefully attractive) reverence for the old diplomatist's sagacity; the rejoinder dexterously introduced to confirm confidence in his visitor that he was not wasting his instruction,—these and the thousand nameless points of tact, dipped in the fountain of his own deep counsel, instilled the wary practiser's motives into the mind of one, apparently his confessed master in the art of diplomacy, convinced the Count that he was regarded as the condensation of profound thought, of astute sagacity; and it so happened, that if there was one qualification in which the foreigner especially exulted more than any other, it was upon his dexterity in deciphering disposition—in his thorough knowledge of human nature!
We have said he was an adept in listening: indeed it was averred that he obtained a large estate by the quiet attention with which he listened to the toothless twaddle of a senile Dowager—age's garrulity—the echo of an empty hall which thought has quitted. He rarely, however, in any case interrupts thedriest drawler, for he has tutored attendants who understand not only whom to admit, but also a hint as to the proper duration of a conference, and these with ready message cut short the intruder's dull delay. If, also, in public or private he be himself interrupted, he never loses his temper or the point; resumes the thread just where it was broken, and with polite, yet unswerving pertinacity, directs the minds of all to the wished-for end, in spite of every purposed or involuntary attempt to distract them into devious channels. Some men, like jackdaws, proclaim with noisy loquaciousness their most private matters, alarming the public horizon with egotistical chatter about their own nests: "tact," as the master of it, Cromwell, knew, acknowledges the "safety of silence," and like the rat,—a subtle politician!—saps vast fabrics by an insidious, unheard gnawing underground!
Briefly, this man listens much, speaks little—mostly the latter when he would conceal his thoughts—keeps his eyes and ears open, his mouth and his heart closed. With numerous admirers, he has many enemies—the latter's hostility is however repressed by fear, and the regard of the other, somehow, never ripens into love; it may be that selfishness, the concomitant of tact, forbids affection. We have shown the fair side of the portrait hitherto drawn from the respectable sphere (as it is called) of life; but it has its evil counterpart or reverse to be seen in a notorious receiver of stolen property, ever watched by, yet ever baffling the police,—one, who, having helped many to the hulks, has by sheer cunning (tact in motley!) himself escaped. The consciences of both are similarly guided by the law of public not private morality—interest is the ruling principle of both; even the drudgery of each assimilates, for a life of dissimulation is a very hard one. What actor would bealwayson the stage? Both are commercial men in a sense, though one lives at the west-end, the other near Seven-dials; sometimes they meet,—the rich, upon—the poor, before, the bench—"the Justice" in silk "frowns" on the speciously "simple thief" in rags; yet nature has cut the countenances of both from the same piece, and true it is that her "one touch," the prevalence of tact, successful here,—in hard confronting there—renders both "akin."
Yet not always does "tact" array itself in silken softness, or "stoop to conquer:" some ply the trade with no less success under the guise of rough and candid honesty: these men declare loudly that they always speak their minds: come upon us with a bluff sincerity, disarming prudence by an appearance of incautious trust and open-heartedness. They "cannot cog," they cannot sue, they profess noisily to abhor "humbug," as they term it, in every shape:—a strange ingratitudeto what they chiefly thrive by; for certain it is, that though doubtlessly "all honorable men," these are the most insidious tacticians, and generally of the worst kind.
Hitherto we have spoken of "tact" in its deteriorated shape, and indeed the word seems to have got so bad a name that its bare mention breathes distrust. Yet there is a medium class of men who, like William of Orange, reduce violent feelings even to frigidity, and allowing discretion her widest scope, do not entirely obliterate the affections. Machiavelli says that "seldom men of mean fortunes attain to high degrees without force or fraud, and generally rather by the latter than the former," and hence he recommends guile to be adopted—but these, to whom we now allude, practise prudence, yet preserve their guileless sincerity. Here, though the term is rather univocal, and seems to apply only to our concerns with others, its healthy action is forcibly evinced on the individual's mind, for it disciplines the impulses and reviews for ready co-action reason's powers. So high did the ancients in their sense regard it, that they elevated it to a divinity—"Nullum numen adest si sit Prudentia," though, as Addison observes, "this sort of discretion has no place in private conversation between intimate friends. It occupies a neutral ground between caution and art, uses expediency instead of integrity, and hence deceives us by the first, when we look for the consistency of the latter." Almost ever combined with conceit (the pride of questionable success), it never possesses the magnanimity to confess an error; for this detracting from its arrogated infallibility might deteriorate its influence: it will acknowledge vices (if polite), but will never plead guilty to mistakes, since the grossest charge against the "man of tact" at the bar of self, much more of public judgment, is not the perpetration of a sin—but the commission of a blunder!
It is truly a great mistake to measure the interest of a journey by its duration, and that of a country by its remoteness; and one is deceived in supposing that it is necessary to go afar in quest of adventures, and make a voyage two years long in order to see curious sights. There is a certain author who has made "a journey around his room" more fruitful in incidents of all descriptions than the numberless voyages of an infinity of sailors that I know; and one may make, thank heaven! many an interesting trip without passing beyond the "neighboring shores" from which La Fontaine forbids us to wander. The only thing is, that it is less easy to travel after this fashion than the other, and that it requires a lengthened preparation.
In order to observe skilfully, one must be accustomed to look around one. We scarcely become curious except after long habit, and, strange to say, our curiosity seems to increase in proportion as we satisfy it. When we know a great deal we desire to know stillmore, and it is remarkable that those alone desire to see no sights who have never had any sights to see. Moreover, it is necessary to have contemplated the grandest spectacles of nature in order to understand and love her least conspicuous wonders; for nature does not surrender herself to the first comer. She is a chaste and severe divinity, who admits to her intimacy those alone who have deserved it by long contemplations and a constant worship: and I firmly believe that it is necessary to have travelled round the world in order profitably and agreeably to make the tour of one's garden. If many years of youth spent in wandering by land and sea, can render me an authority in regard to travels, then am I justified in declaring, that in none of my more distant courses have I found more interest and pleasure than in the little trip I am now about to narrate.
There were, then, four of us, all alike young, gay, active, clad in shooting costume, going straight ahead, without fixed plan or preconcerted itinerary, marching at hap-hazard in these desertlandes, respiring freely the pungent odor of the broom, roaming from hill to hill without other rallying point than the top of a mountain which pointed out the direction of the low lands. After four hours' walk we discovered that this mountain was still very far distant, and that the sun was sinking below the horizon. We had already left behind us the wildest part of the department of theCorreze. To woods of pine and birch succeeded enormous chestnut-trees; the sterile heath gave place to cultivated fields. Here and there some houses displayed their straw-colored roofs, and some scattered laborers beheld us pass by with gaping suspicion. To tell the truth, we had all of us a tolerably gallows look. In this wretched country, where every one lives on from day to day without quitting his little inclosure, without even hearing an echo from afar, four bearded marauders like ourselves, avoiding the beaten road, and marching rapidly across stubble and thicket, presented no ordinary rencontre. All on a sudden the clouds began to gather, and, by way of varying our sensations, a terrific tempest burst over our heads. It was the first incident of our journey. Drenched through in a moment by this diluvian rain, we rushed, with the ardor of soldiers mounting a breach, towards a village perched like a magpie's nest on the summit of the hill we were ascending. A house of capacious size, but of dismal and ruinous appearance, arose before us. We rushed in at a charging pace, and found that it was deserted, except that near the hearth, where smouldered the embers of the most miserable fire in the world, an infant was deposited in, or rather tied to, his cradle, according to the fashion of the country. By the aid of a stout bandage they had swaddled him up like a mummy, and duly sealed him to the planks of the little box, which served him for a bed. In addition, his head was carefully turned toward the fire, so that his cranium was in a state of continual ebullition, such being the appointed regimen of the neighborhood. At the sight of our strange visages, the little one, after staring at us for a moment or two, proceeded to utter the most lamentable outcries. I rocked his cradle with the most paternal solicitude, but could not succeed in quieting him. On the contrary, his screams became positively heart-rending, and we were almost ready to smother him outright in order to put a stop to his roaring. At this summons a woman entered abruptly into the house, and stared at us with an expression of alarm. It was incumbent on us to explain that we were no pilferers, and this was no easy matter. The young mother evidently looked on us with suspicion. She was not altogether a mere peasant,—at least she wore, instead of the little straw hat trimmed with black velvet, which is the ordinary head-dress of the countrywomen, a bonnet, which in the Limousin is a certain indication of pretensions to the rank of thebourgeoise. Her robe, besides, however inelegant it might be, was nevertheless town-made.
These matters I noticed at a glance, whilst one of my companions gave the needful explanations as to our pacific intentions. Our hostess pretended to be satisfied. She removed the cradle, threw some shavings into the fire to revive it, and sat herself down with a cold, constrained manner, in which I could discover at once considerable embarrassment, accompanied by a certain air of dignity. Never had I seen a Limousin peasant take a seat in the presence ofgentlemen, and I speedily made another discovery which not a little perplexed me. The fire as it revived had thrown a glow upon the hearthstone, which was of cast-iron, and presented a large armorial escutcheon. This display astonished me. I looked round again at the smoke-dried kitchen in which we sat; it was a miserable place. The ceiling was falling piecemeal; in the pavement, disjointed and worn, were three or four muddy holes but rarely cleared out, the dampness of which was kept up by the continual dripping of a dozen cream cheeses, suspended in a long basket of osiers. Two beds, a large table, and a few dilapidated chairs, composed the furniture of the apartment, which was pervaded by a sour and offensive smell, apparently very attractive to a huge sow whose grunting snout was ever and anon thrust into the entrance of the doorway. Whence, then, this curious hearthstone? I looked more attentively at the young woman, and discovered in her countenance a certain air of distinction. I then inquired of her at what place we were.
"Monsieur is jesting at me, doubtless," she pretty sharply replied.
I assured her I had no such intention, and was really ignorant of the name of the village.
"It is not a village, sir," she resumed, "it is a town. You are at the Puy d'Arnac, in the Canton of Beaulieu."
A native of Marseilles would hardly have named theCanebierewith greater satisfaction. I knew that the Puy d'Arnac gave its name to a celebrated growth of theCorreze, and I thought I understood the lofty tone of the reply. All on a sudden, one of my companions, whom we nicknamed the "Broker," because he groped into all sorts of places, and, with amusing perseverance, hunted out objects of art and curiosity even in hovels, touched my elbow, and asked me if I had noticed the picture which was half-hidden under the serge curtains of one of the beds. I had not yet observed it, and got up to look at it. It was the portrait of a general officer of the time of Louis XV. The frame, sculptured and gilt, struck me still more, being really beautiful. "This is a discovery indeed," said my friend to me, while I inquired of the young woman where such a portrait could have come from.
"Where could it have come from, Monsieur?" she haughtily replied; "it is the portrait of my grandfather."
"Aha!" we exclaimed, all four of us, turning ourselves round with surprise. With one hand our hostess stirred the fire, with an indifference evidently affected, while with the other she rocked the little box in which her infant was asleep.
"Might I presume to inquire the name of Monsieur your grandfather?" said I, drawing near to her.
"He was the Count of Anteroches," was her reply.
"What, the Count of Anteroches, who commanded the French guards at the battle of Fontenoy?"[5]
"You have heard him spoken of, then?" resumed the peasant girl, with a smile.
My friend the Broker stood as if stupefied before the picture. All of a sudden he wheeled round, and, gravely removing his cap, repeated with a theatrical air the celebrated saying of M. d'Anteroches,—"Fire first,Messieurs les Anglais; we are Frenchmen, and must do you the honors!"
This anecdote is, to my thinking, the most charming and most thoroughly stamped with the image of the age of any recorded in history. With regard to these celebrated sayings uttered in battles, I must indeed confess that I am very skeptical. Little as I may be of a soldier, I have a notion that it is not in an engagement as at the Olympic Circus, and that in the midst of fire, smoke, and musketry, generals must have other work on their hands than to utter these pretty epigrams, which there is moreover no shorthand writer at hand to take down. I know that Cambronne was annoyed when they recalled to him his splendid exclamation at Waterloo, "La garde meurt et ne se rend pas!" (The guard dies, and does not surrender!) "an invention the more clumsy," said he, "that I am not yet dead, and that I really did surrender." I have even discovered that this saying was invented by a member of the Institute, for the greater satisfaction of the readers of the "Yellow Dwarf," in which he wrote, in 1815, together with Benjamin Constant and many other celebrated malcontents.[6]The speeches of Leonidas find me equally incredulous. But, wheresoever they may come from, I delight in these anecdotes, which personify an entire epoch, and engrave it upon the memory with a single stroke. We may defy the historian who seeks to characterize the end of the last century and the beginning of the present, to find two epigrams more striking than the words attributed to Anteroches and Cambronne—to two French officers—one commanding the French guards, the other the old guard; both fighting for their country, at an interval of seventy years, with the same enemy, and on the same ground: for it is a singular coincidence that Fontenoy and Waterloo are but little distant from each other, and Heaven saw fit to ordain that the game of success and reverse should be played out almost upon the same fields. "Fire first,Messieurs les Anglais!" Is it not the type of that easy and adorable, that ironical andblasénobility, who pushed the contempt of life even to insanity, and the worship of courtesy and honor even to the sublime?—who endowed their country with such a renown for elegance, high-breeding, and gallantry, that all its demagogic saturnalia never have effaced it, and never will?—a nobility reckless, if you please, but assuredly charming, and perfectly French withal, who gayly passed through life without ever doing the morrow the honor of thinking about it, and who, beholding one day the earth give way beneath their feet, looked into the abyss without a wink, without alarming themselves, without belying themselves, and went down alive and whole into the gulf, disdaining all defence, "without fear," if not "without reproach."
Between the saying of Anteroches and that of Cambronne there is a great gap; we find that the revolution has passed through it. The gentleman, refined even to exaggeration, has disappeared, and we have instead the rude language of democracy—"La garde meurt et ne se rend pas"—this is heroism, no doubt, but heroism of another sort. Never did thechauvinismof this present time light upon a more cornelian device, but do you not see in it the theatrical affectation, the melo-dramatic emphasis of another race? That he had no fear of death, and no idea of surrendering—this is what the gentleman of Fontenoy had no intention of declaring; it ought to have been well known—his followers had already given proof of it for ages past. To be brave alone to him was nothing—he must be as elegant in battle as he was at the ball. What signified death to that incomparable race whoafterwards composed madrigals in prison, and ascended the scaffold with a smile, their step elastic, and their hand in the waistcoat pocket, a cocked hat under their arm, and a rose-bud between their lips? This epoch was personified in my eyes by the handsome and gentle countenance of the Count of Anteroches. After more than a hundred years I had discovered by chance, myself, an obscure wayfarer, in an unknown and miserable cabin, where his grand-daughter was living in the midst of her poultry, the portrait of this brilliant officer, to whose name will ever attach an elegant and charming renown; for if, like Cambronne, Anteroches did not really utter the words attributed to him, they have still been lent to him, and if thus lent, assuredly because there were grounds for it.
After these over-lengthy reflections, I turned toward the peasant woman, who now inspired me with profound commiseration. She continued to rock to and fro her bandaged infant, who was in very right and deed the Count of Anteroches. I inquired what was the occupation of her husband.
"He is dead," she replied; "I was better off during his lifetime. He was agendarme, Monsieur."
"Agendarme!" I repeated with surprise.
"Yes," replied Madame d'Anteroches, who understood not the cause of my astonishment, "he had even passed as a brigadier during his latter years: we managed our little affairs very comfortably."
He was a brigadier of gendarmerie—content to be so—he managed his little affairs very comfortably—and his grandfather, as I find it in the "Military Records of France," had been named Marshal on the 25th of July, 1762; at the same time as the Marquis of Boufflers and the Duke of Mazarine! Would not the rabble of Paris do well to inquire a little before exclaiming so loudly against the privileges of the aristocracy? Moreover, it seems to me that the government of France should not allow the grandchildren of the Count of Anteroches to be sunk—as they are—into deplorable indigence. Apocryphal or otherwise the epigram of Fontenoy should at least be worth subsistence to all who bear this name. Many enjoy pensions and are maintained by France, who would find it very difficult to produce a similar claim, and the new republic would act wisely by repairing, when occasion turns up, the injustices of her eldest sister.
But it was now high time for us to leave. It was evident that we embarrassed our hostess, and since we had discovered her name we were no less embarrassed ourselves. I could not get over her coarse stuff gown, her filthy kitchen, and her familiar sow. It would have been cruel to ask for her hospitality, and how could we offer to pay our score? Besides, we knew that a rich proprietor of our acquaintance resided not far from Puy d'Arnac; we, therefore, took our leave of the high-born peasant with many excuses and thanks. At the moment I passed the threshold, I cast a parting glance upon the portrait. The fire lighted it up at that instant with so singular a brilliancy that it almost appeared animated. It seemed as if the countenance of M. d'Anteroches was alive, and that the handsome officer looked sadly down from the height of his gilded frame upon the utter misery of his descendants. "Oh! decadence! decadence of France!" I exclaimed to myself, and rushed bravely forth with my companions into the pelting rain.