“Que d’ane et de beu je saiDans ce royaume de Gaule,Que d’ane et de beu je saiQui n’en a rien pas tan fai.”
And my good master replied in a weaker voice:
“Mais le pu beo de l’histoireCe fut que l’ane et le beuAinsin passire to deuLa nuit sans manger ni boireQue d’ane et de beu je saiCouver de pane et de moireQue d’ane et de beu je saiQue n’en a rien pas tan fai!”
Then he let his head fall on the pillow and sang no more.
“There is good in this Christian,” said the vicar, “much good, and a while ago he really edified me with his beautiful sentences. But I am not without a certain apprehension, as everything depends on the end, and nobody knows what’s hidden at the bottom of the basket God in His kindness wills that one single moment brings us salvation, but this moment must be the last one, so that everything depends on a single minute, in comparison with which the whole life does not count. That’s what makes me tremble for the patient, over whom angels and devils are furiously quarrelling. But one must never despair of divine mercy.”
Two days passed in cruel alternations. After that my good master became extremely weak.
“There is no more hope,” M. Coquebert told me. “Look how his head lies on the pillow, how thin his nose is.”
As a fact, my good master’s nose, formerly big and red, was nothing now but a bent blade, livid like lead.
“Tournebroche, my son,” he said to me in a voice still full and strong but of a sound quite strange to me, “I feel that I have but a short time to live. Go and fetch that good priest, that he may listen to my confession.”
The vicar was in his vineyard. There I went.
“The vintage is finished,” he said, “and more abundant than I had hoped for; now let’s go and help that poor fellow.”
I conducted him to my master’s bedside and we left him alone with the dying.
An hour later he came out again and said:
“I can assure you that M. Jérôme Coignard dies in admirable sentiments of piety and humility. At his request, and in consideration of his fervour, I’ll give him the viaticum. During the time necessary for putting on my holy garments, you, Madame Coquebert, will do me the favour to send to the vestry the boy who serves me at mass every morning and make the room ready for the reception of God.”
Madame Coquebert swept the room, put a white coverlet on the bed, placed a little table at the bedside, and covered it with a cloth; she put two candlesticks on the table and lit the candles, and an earthenware bowl wherein a sprig of box swam in the holy water.
Soon we heard the tinkling of the little bell, saw the cross coming in, carried by a child, and the priest clad in white carrying the holy vessels. Jahel, M. d’Anquetil, Madame Coquebert and I fell on our knees.
“Pax huic domui,” said the priest.
“Et omnibus habiantibus in en,” replied the servitor.
Then the vicar took holy water and sprayed it over the patient and the bed.
A moment longer he meditated and then he said with much solemnity:
“My son, have you no declaration to make?”
“Yes, sir,” said M. Abbe Coignard, with a firm voice, “I forgive my murderer.”
Then the priest gave him the holy wafer:
“Ecce Agnus Dei, qui tollit peccata mundi.”
My good master replied with a sigh:
“May I speak to my Lord, I who am naught but dust and ashes? How can I dare to come unto you, I who do not feel any good in me to give me courage? How can I introduce you into me, after having so often wounded your eyes full of kindness?”
And the Abbe Coignard received the holy viaticum in profound silence, interrupted by our sobs and by the great noise Madame Coquebert made blowing her nose.
After having received, my good master made me a sign to come near him, and said with a feeble but distinct voice:
“Jacques Tournebroche, my son, reject, along with the example I gave you, the maxims which I may have proposed to you during my period of lifelong folly. Be in fear of women and of books for the softness and pride accords the little ones a clearer intelligence than the wise one takes in them. Be humble of heart and spirit. God can give them. ‘Tis He who gives all science. My boy, do not listen to those who, like me, subtilise on the good and the evil. Do not be taken in by the beauty and acuteness of their discourses, for the kingdom of God does not consist of words but of virtue.”
He remained quiet, exhausted. I took his hand, lying on the sheet, and covered it with kisses and tears. I told him that he was our master, our friend, our father, and that I could not live without him.
And for long hours I remained waiting at the foot of his bed.
He passed so peaceful a night that I conceived a quite desperate hope. In this state he remained part of the following day. But towards the evening he became agitated and pronounced words so indistinctly that they remained a secret between God and himself.
At midnight he fell into a kind of swoon, and nothing could be heard but the slight scratching of his finger nails on the sheet. He no longer knew me.
About two o’clock the death rattle began. The hoarse and rapid breathing which came from his breast was loud enough to be heard far away in the village street, and my ears were so full of it that I fancied I heard it long after that unhappy day. At daybreak he made a sign with his hand which we could not understand, and sighed long and deeply. It was his last. His features took in death a majesty worthy of the genius that had animated him, and the loss of which will never be repaired.
The Vicar of Vallars prepared a worthy funeral for M. Jerome Coignard. He chanted the death mass and gave the benediction.
My good master was carried to the graveyard close by the church; and M. d’Anquetil offered supper at Gaulard’s to all the people who had assisted at the funeral. They drank new wine and sang Burgundian songs.
Afterwards I went with M. d’Anquetil to the vicar to thank him for his good offices.
“Ah!” he said, “that priest has given us a grand consolation by his edifying end. I have seldom seen a Christian die in such admirable sentiments, and I think it fit to fix his memory by a suitable inscription on his tombstone. Both of you, gentlemen, are learned enough to do that successfully, and I engage myself to have the epitaph of the defunct engraved on a large white stone, in the manner and style wherein you compose it. But remember, in making the stone speak, to make it proclaim nothing but the praise of God.”
I begged of him to believe that I should apply all my zeal to this work, and M. d’Anquetil promised to give the matter a gallant and graceful turn.
“I will,” he said, “try to write French verse in the style of M. Chapelle.”
“That’s right!” said the vicar. “But are you not curious to look at my winepress? The wine will be good this year, and I have made enough for my own and my servants’ use. Alas! save for thefleureberswe should have had far more.”
After supper M. d’Anquetil called for ink, and began the composition of his French verses. But he soon became impatient and threw up in the air the pen, ink and paper.
“Tournebroche,” he said, “I’ve made two verses only, and I am not quite sure that they are good. They run as follows:
‘Ci-dessus git monsieur CoignardII faut bien mourir tot ou tard.’”
I replied that the best of it was, that he had noi written a third one.
And I passed the night composing the following epitaph in Latin:
D. O. M.HIC JACETIN SPE BEATAE AETERNITATISDOMINUS HIERONYMUS COIGNARDPRESBYTERQUONDAM IN BELLOVACENSI COLLEGIOELOQUENTILE MAGISTER ELOQUENTISSIMUSAGIENSIS EPISCOPI BIBLIOTHECARIUS SOLERTISSIMUSZOZIMI PANOPOLITANI INGENIOSISSIMUSTRANSLATOROPERE TAMEN IMMATURATA MORTE INTERCEPTOPERIIT ENIM CUM LUGDUNUM PETERETJUDEA MANU NEFANDISSIMAID EST A NEPOTE CHRISTI CARNIFICUMIN VIA TRUCIDATUSANNO AET. LIICOMITATE FUIT OPTIMA DOCTISSIMO CONVITUINGENIO SUBLIMIFACETIIS JUCUNDUS SENTENTTIS PLENUSDONORUM DEI LAUDATORTIDE DEVOTISSIMA PER MULTAS TEMPESTATlSCONSTANTER MUNITTJSHUMILITATE SANCTISSIMA ORNATUSSALUTI SUAE MAGIS INTENTUS
QUAM VANO ET FALLACI HOMINUM JUDICIOSIC HONORIBUS MUNDANISNUNQUAM QUIESITISSIBI GLORIAM SEMPITERNAMMERUIT
which may be translated:
HERE SLEEPSIn the hope of a happy eternityTHE REVEREND JEROME COIGNARDPriestFormerly a very eloquent professor of eloquenceAt the college of BeauvaisVery zealous librarian to the Bishop of SeezAuthor of a fine translation of Zosimus the PanopolitanWhich he unhappily left unfinishedWhen overtaken by his premature deathHe was stabbed on the road to LyonsIn the 52nd year of his ageBy the very villainous hand of a JewAnd thus perished the victim of a descendant of the murdererOf Jesus ChristHe was an agreeable companionOf a learned conversationOf an elevated geniusAbounding in cheerful speech and in good maximsAnd praising God in his worksHe preserved amid the storms of life an unshakable faithIn his truly Christian humilityMore attentive to the salvation of his soulThan to the vain and erroneous opinions of menIt was by living without honour in this worldThat he walked towards eternal glory
Three days after the demise of my good master, M. d’Anquetil decided to continue his journey. The carriage had been repaired. He gave the postboys the order to be ready on the following morning. His company had never been agreeable to me; in the state of sorrow I was in, it became odious. I could not bear the idea of following him and Jahel. I resolved to look for employment at Tournus or at Macon, and to remain hidden till the storm had calmed down sufficiently to enable me to return to Paris, where I was sure to be received with outstretched arms by my dear parents. I imparted my intention to M. d’Anquetil, and excused myself for not accompanying him any farther. He tried to retain me with a gracefulness I was not prepared for, but soon willingly gave me leave to go where I wished. With Jahel the matter was more difficult, but, being naturally reasonable, she accepted the reasons I had for leaving her.
On the night before my departure, while M. d’Anquetil drank and played cards with the barber-surgeon, Jahel and I went to the market place to get a breath of air. It was embalmed by the scent of herbs and full of the song of crickets.
“What a night!” I said to Jahel. “The year cannot produce another like it, and perhaps all my life long I shall never see one so sweet.”
The flower-decked village graveyard extended before our eyes its motionless turf, and the moonlight whitened the scattered graves on the dark grass. The same thought came to both of us to say a last farewell to our friend. The place where he was put to eternal rest was marked by a tear-sprinkled cross planted deep in the mellow earth. The stone whereon the epitaph was to be engraved had not yet been placed. We seated ourselves very close to the grave on the grass, and there, by an insensible but natural inclination, we fell into one another’s arms without fearing to offend by our kisses the memory of a friend whom deep wisdom had rendered indulgent to human weakness.
Suddenly, Jahel whispered in my ear, where her mouth was already placed:
“I see M. d’Anquetil, who, from the top of the wall, looks eagerly towards us.”
“Can he see us in this shadow?” I asked.
“He certainly sees my white petticoat,” she said; “it’s enough, I think, to tempt him to look for more.”
I first thought to draw my sword, and was quite decided to defend two existences, which were at this moment still very much mixed. Jahel’s calm surprised me, neither her movements nor her voice showed any fear.
“Go,” she said to me, “fly, and don’t fear for me. It’s a surprise I have rather wished for. He began to get tired of me, and this encounter is quite efficacious to reanimate his desires and season his love. Go and leave the alone. The first moment will be hard, for he is of a very violent disposition. He’ll strike me, but after, t shall be still dearer to him. Farewell!”
“Alas!” I exclaimed, “did you take me then, Jahel, for Nothing but to sharpen the desires of my rival?”
“I wonder that you also want to quarrel with me. Go, I say!”
“What! leave you like this?”
“It’s necessary. Farewell! He must not meet you here, I want to make him jealous, but in a delicate manner. I Farewell! Farewell.”
I had hardly gone a few steps between the labyrinth of tombstones when M. d’Anquetil, having come forward to enable him to recognise his mistress, began to shout and to curse loud enough to awaken the village dead. I was anxious to tear Jahel away from his rage; I thought he would kill her. I glided between the tombstones to her assistance. But after a few minutes, observing them very closely, I saw M. d’Anquetil pulling her out of the cemetery and leading her towards Gaulard’s inn with a remainder of fury she was easily capable of calming, alone and without help.
I returned to my room after they had entered theirs I could not sleep the whole of the night, and looking out at daybreak, through an opening in the window curtains I saw them crossing the courtyard apparently the best of friends.
Jahel’s departure augmented my sorrow. I stretched myself full length on my stomach on the floor of my room, and with my face in my hands cried until the evening.
I am pardoned and return to Paris—Again at theQueen Pedauque—I go as Assistant to M. Blaizot—Burning of the Castle of Sablons—Death of Mosaide and of M. d’Asterac.
From now onwards my life loses the interest which events had lent it, and my destiny, having again become in conformity with my character, offers nothing but ordinary occurrences. If I should prolong my memoirs my narrative would very soon become tiresome. I’ll bring it to a close with but few words. The Vicar of Vallars gave me a letter of introduction to a wine merchant at Macon, with whom I was employed for a couple of months, after which my father wrote to me that he had arranged my affair and that I was free to return to Paris.
I took coach immediately and travelled with some recruits. My heart beat violently when I again saw the Rue Saint Jacques, the clock of Saint Benoit le Betourne, the signboard of theThree Virginsand theSaint Catherineof M. Blaizot.
My mother cried when she saw me; I also cried, and we embraced and cried together again.
My father came in haste from theLittle Bacchusand said with a moving dignity:
“Jacquot, my son, I cannot and will not deny that I Was very angry when I saw the constables enter theQueen Pedauquein search of you, or, in default of you, arresting me. They would not listen to any sort of remonstrance, alleging that I could easily explain myself after being taken to jail. They looked for you on a complaint of M. de la Gueritude. I conceived a most horrible idea of your disorders. But having been informed by letter that it was a question only of some peccadillo I had no other thought but to see you again. Many a time I consulted the landlord of theLittle Bacchuson the means to hush up your affair. He always replied: ‘Master Leonard, go to the judge with a big bag full of crown pieces and he will give you back your lad as white as snow.’ But crown pieces are scarce with us, and there is neither hen nor goose nor duck who lays golden eggs in my house. At present I hardly get sufficient by my poultry to pay the expenses of the roasting. By good luck, your saintly and worthy mother had the good idea of going to the mother of M. d’Anquetil whom we knew to be busy in favour of her son, who was sought after at the same time as you were, and for the identical affair. I am quite aware, my Jacquot, that you played the man about town in company with a nobleman, and my head is too well placed not to feel the honour which it reflects on our whole family. Mother dressed as if she intended to go to mass; and Madame d’Anquetil received her with kindness. Thy mother, Jacquot, is a holy woman, but she has not the best of society manners, and at first she talked without aim or reason. She said: ‘Madame, at our age, besides God Almighty nothing remains to us but our children.’ That was not the right thing to say to that great lady who still has her gallants.”
“Hold your tongue, Leonard,” exclaimed my mother. “The behaviour of Madame d’Anquetil is unknown to you, and it appears that I spoke to her in the right way, because she said to me: ‘Don’t be troubled, Madame Menetrier; I will employ my influence in favour of your son; be sure of my zeal.’ And you know, Leonard, that we received before the expiration of two months the assurance that our Jacquot could return unmolested to Paris.”
We supped with a good appetite. My father asked me if was my intention to re-enter the service of M. d’Asterac. I replied that after the lamented death of my kind master I did not wish to encounter that cruel Mosaide in the house of a nobleman who paid his servants with fine speeches and nothing else. My father very kindly invited me to turn the spit as in former days.
“Latterly, Jacquot,” he said, “I gave the place to Friar Ange, but he did not do as well as Miraut or yourself. Don’t you want to take your old place at the corner of the fireside?”
My mother, plain and simple as she was, did not want common-sense and said:
“M. Blaizot, the bookseller of theImage of Saint Catherine, is in want of an assistant. This employment, Jacquot, ought to suit you like a glove. Thy dispositions are sweet, thy manners are good, and that’s what’s wanted to sell Bibles.”
I went at once to M. Blaizot, who took me into his service.
My misfortunes had made me wise. I did not feel discouraged by the humbleness of my employment, and I fulfilled my duties with exactitude, handling the duster and broom to the satisfaction of my employer.
One of my duties was to pay a visit to M. d’Asterac. I went to the great alchemist on the last Sunday of November, after the midday dinner. It’s a long way from the Rue Saint Jacques to the Croix-des-Sablons, and the almanac does not lie when it announces that in November the days are short. “When I arrived at the Roule it was quite dark, and a black haze covered the deserted road. And sorrowful were my thoughts in the darkness.
“Alas,” I said to myself, “it will soon be a full year since I first walked on this road, in the snow, in company with my dear master, who now rests in a small village in Burgundy encircled by vineyards. He sleeps in the hope of eternal life. And it is but right to have the same hope as a man as wise as he. God preserve me from ever doubting of the immortality of the soul! But, one must confess to oneself, all that is connected with a future existence and another world is of those verities in which one believes without being moved and which have neither taste nor savour of any kind, so that one swallows them without perceiving it. As for me I find no consolation in the idea of meeting again the Abbe Coignard in Paradise. Surely I could not recognise him, and his speeches would not contain the agreeableness which he derived from circumstances.”
Occupied with these reflections, I saw before me a fierce light covering one-half of the sky; the fog was reddened by it, and the light palpitated in the centre. A heavy smoke mixed with the vapours of the air. I at once became afraid that the fire had broken out at the d’Asterac castle. I quickened my steps, and very soon ascertained that my fears were but too well founded. I discovered the calvary of the Sablons, an opaque black on a background of flame, and I saw nearly all the windows of the castle flaring as for a sinister feast. The little green door was broken in. Shadows gesticulated in the park and murmured the horror they felt. They were the inhabitants of the borough of Neuilly, who had come for curiosity’s sake and to bring help. Some threw water from a fire engine on the burning edifice, making a fiery rain of sparks arise. A thick volume of smoke rose over the castle. A shower of sparks and of cinders fell round me, and I soon became aware that my garments and my hands were blackened. With much mortification I thought that all that burning dust in the air was the end of so many fine books and precious manuscripts, which were the joy of my dear master, the remains, perhaps, of Zosimus the Panopolitan, on which we had worked together during the noblest hours of my life.
I had seen the Abbe Jerome Coignard die. Now, it was his soul, his sparkling and sweet soul, which I fancied reduced to ashes together with the queen of libraries. The wind strengthened the fire and the flames roared like voracious beasts.
Questioning a man of Neuilly still blacker than myself, and wearing only his vest, I asked him if M. d’Asterac and his people had been saved.
“Nobody,” he said, “has left the castle except an old Jew, who was seen running laden with packages in the direction of the swamps. He lived in the keeper’s cottage on the river, and was hated for his origin and for the crimes of which he was suspected. Children pursued him. And in running away he fell into the Seine. He was fished out when dead, pressing on his heart a cup and six golden plates. You can see him on the river bank in his yellow gown. With his eyes open he is horrible.”
“Ah!” I replied, “his end is due to his crimes. But his death does not give me back the best of masters whom he slew. Tell me again; has nobody seen M. d’Asterac?”
At the very moment when I put the question I heard near me one of the moving shadows cry out:
“Thereof is falling in!”
And now I recognised with unspeakable horror the great black form of M. d’Asterac running along the gutters. The alchemist shouted with a sounding voice:
“I rise on wings of flame up to the seat of life divine!”
So he said, and suddenly the roof fell in with a tremendous crash, and the flames as high as mountains enveloped the friend of the Salamanders.
I become a Bookseller—I have many learned and witty Customers but none to equal the Abbe Jerome Coignard, D. D., M. A.
There is no love will stand separation. The memory of Jahel, smarting at first, was smoothed down little by little, and nothing remained but a vague irritation, of which she was no longer the only object.
M. Blaizot aged quickly. He retired to Montrouge, to his cottage in the fields, and sold me his shop against a life annuity. Having become in his place the sworn bookseller of theImage of Saint Catherine, I took with me my father and mother, whose cookshop flourished no more. I liked my humble shop and took care to trim it up. I nailed on the doors some old Venetian maps and some theses ornamented with allegorical engravings, which made a decoration old and odd no doubt, but pleasant to friends of good learning. My knowledge, taking care to hide it cleverly, was not detrimental to my trade. It would have been worse had I been a publisher like Marc-Michel Rey, and obliged like him to gain my living at the expense of the stupidity of the public.
I keep in stock, as they say, the classical authors, and that is a merchandise in demand in that learned Rue Saint Jacques of which it would please me one day to write an account of its antiquities and celebrities. The first Parisian printer established his venerable presses there. The Cramoisys, whom Guy Patin calls the kings of the Rue Saint Jacques, published there the works of our historians. Before the erection of the College of France, the king’s readers, Pierre Danes, Francois Votable, Ramus, gave their lectures there in a shed which echoed with the quarrels between the street porters and the washerwomen. And how can we forget Jean de Meung, who composed in one of the little houses of this street theRoman de la Rose? [Footnote: Jacques Tournebroche did not know that Francois Villon also dwelt in the Rue Saint Jacques, at the Cloister Saint Benoit, in a house called thePorte Verte. The pupil of M. Jerome Coignard would no doubt have had great pleasure in recalling the memory of that ancient poet, who, like himself, had known various sorts of people.]
I have the whole house at my disposal: it is very old, and dates at least from the time of the Goths, as may be seen by the wooden joists crossed on the narrow front and by the mossy tiles. It has but one window on each floor. The one on the first floor is all the year round garnished with flowers, strings are attached, and all sorts of climbers run up them in springtime. My good old mother takes care of this.
It is the window of her room. She can be seen from the street, reading her prayers in a book printed in big letters over the image of Saint Catherine. Age, devotion and maternal pride have given her a grand air, and to see her wax-coloured face under her high white cap one could take his oath on her being a wealthy citizen’s wife.
My father, in getting old, also acquired some dignity. As he likes exercise and fresh air I employ him to carry books about town. First I employed Friar Ange, but he begged of my customers, made them kiss relics, stole their wine, caressed their servant girls, and left one-half of my books in the gutters. I soon gave him the sack. But my good mother, whom he makes believe that he is possessed of secrets for gaining heaven, gives him soup and wine. He is not a bad man, and in the end I became somewhat attached to him.
Several learned men and some wits frequent my shop And it is a great advantage to my trade to be in daily contact with men of merit. Among those who often come to look at new books and converse familiarly among themselves there are historians as learned as Tillemont, sacred orators the equals of Bossuet and Bourdaloue in eloquence, comic and tragic poets, theologians who unite purity of morals with solidity of doctrine, the esteemed authors of “Spanish” novels, geometers and philosophers capable, like M. Descartes, of measuring and weighing the universe. I admire them, I enjoy the least of their words. But not one, to my thinking, is equal in genius to my dear master, whom I had the misfortune to lose on the road to Lyons; not one reminds me of that incomparable elegance of thought, that sweet sublimity, that astonishing wealth of a soul always expanding and flowering, like the urns of rivers represented in marble in gardens; not one gives me that never-failing spring of science and of morals, wherein I had the happiness to quench the thirst of my youth, none give me more than a shadow of that grace, that wisdom, that strength of thought which shone in M. Jérôme Coignard. I hold him to be the most amiable spirit who has ever flourished on the earth.