No More Learning

»
Prederic Police
A REMEMBRANCE
From (Çà et Là)
T*
HE Angelus was ringing. It rang softly, slowly, for a long
time. We fell on our knees, praying silently. There was
something broken and plaintive in the tone of the bell.
do not know why my heart was suddenly inclined to distrust life
and happiness. A serene and profound silence veiled all the joy,
all the splendor, of that beautiful day.


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15332
LOUIS VEUILLOT
(
»
“No, I went on, continuing the thought of my prayer, -
“no, the spirit is not deceived in the disquiet which human joy
imparts to it! It justly fears to grow fond of these intoxica-
tions, and to fall asleep in them. It aspires higher.
It aspires higher. I dare not
ask God for trials; nevertheless, his will be done. And if the
sunbeam which now brightens my life must vanish, I consent. ”
“And I,” she said in her turn, “thank God beforehand for
the sorrows he will send me. As I receive the good things, so
I protest I wish also to receive the evil things from him. I
firmly believe that he will send them to me out of love. O
Lord Jesus, who loved us unto death upon the cross, make us,
through the blossoms and delights we now enjoy, to love the
road to Calvary and the weight of the cross. ”
We pressed each other's hands and were silent. I see the
spot, I recall the words and their accent. Of that incident alone,
of all those of the journey, I have forgotten nothing. The sun
has vanished, the perfumes have fled, all the joyous sounds have
fallen into eternal silence, and even the bell which accompanied
our prayer will ring no more.
If I were to return to Chamonix, I should recognize only the
spot by the way, and the tuft of grass on which she knelt; and
I should go back only to see and kiss the spot. No, my God,
my kind just master, I would not weep; or if I did, my tears
would not accuse thee! I have always known thy mercy, and in
thy punishments have always felt thy love.
All that thou gavest me for the time passed with the time.
What matters it that the blossoms have perished, that the songs
are stifled, that darkness has followed the sunshine? What thou
gavest me for eternity I still possess, although I no longer see it.
At thy bidding, death entered my home full of cradles. He took
the young mother, he took my little children; and yet I denied
death.
In the presence of death, thy Church, our immortal mother,
lights torches symbolic of life, and with firm voice sings thy
victory over death. Those who are no longer with me, O Lord,
are with thee! I know that they live, I know that I shall live.
They have gone from life, but not from my life. Can I think
dead what is living in my heart ?
But, O God! how can they support life,- all those one meets
in the world who do not know thee, who run after joy and fear
death? Some in mockery have asked me what is hell, and I
have answered, “It is protracted life. ”


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LOUIS VEUILLOT
15333
TIGRUCHE
From (Les Odeurs de Paris )
I
Bless my lot: I have seen Tigruche!
There is a literary man in Paris who is the second cor-
respondent of a foreign journal. Do not build an air-castle.
This foreign journal is not English; it pays little, does little
business. The first correspondent, charged with furnishing French
news, which must eventually return to France, receives some-
thing from the State for divulging its secrets; he can, or at least
he could, pay his rent. The second correspondent is only charged
with overthrowing European kings and their ministers: that does
not bring in much. Nevertheless he does not do it sparingly.
But after all, his thunderbolts are not resounding, and the Euro-
pean kings and their ministers do not tremble at all.
This sec-
ond correspondent is named Péquet. It is Tigruche.
Péquet is the scourge of kings, Tigruche is the friend of
artists.
Those who know Péquet do not know Tigruche; those who
know Tigruche do not know Pequet. I have seen Péquet — as
one may see him; I have seen Tigruche.
It was one night toward morning. My good fortune led me
into a café on the boulevard where they were stipping. I
learned later that the artists of the neighboring theatres were
accustomed to go there to regale upon a certain popular soup
and certain ragoûts.
They entered in couples; and soon the café was full. Among
this crowd some were noted, even famous. They talked noisily in
a free language, coarse rather than original, startling rather than
picturesque. Men and women were called my old woman,"
my little old woman,” “my little olive-oil. It is current, and
”
has endured a long time. They thee-and-thou'd each other, I
listened without finding the scene as interesting as I should have
expected.
I saw the prima donna of a little theatre come in.
She was
accompanied by her master of earlier in the evening, and her
slave of a quarter of an hour. The master was not yet tired,
the slave not yet emancipated. She had also her companion,
who was very plump. She was a person of important duties,
however: she was intrusted with showing out the poets who
brought her mistress the conceptions of their genius. Twenty of


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15334
LOUIS VEUILLOT
them presented themselves every day. It was necessary to show
them out politely, because some of them might slip into the lit-
tle journals, and embarrass Madame. So she said; and her hat
astonished me.
The star was immediately surrounded, and warmly felicitated
upon her last creation, in which she sang "J'suis rincée,” which
will be the national song of the season.
She received all this
homage disdainfully, and said at last, « This bothers me. I wasn't
made for stale jokes, and to amuse good-for-naughts. I have
poetry in my heart. ” – I recalled Molière, so ambitious of play-
ing tragedy, and who felt so severely the blows which his writ-
ings drew upon him. But the shiny hat of the lady companion
stified the spark of compassion which these words had inspired,
If poetry were in your heart, old lady, your lady companion
would have another hat!
I might note that the great artist ordered the popular soup
and three poached eggs; but these details are in contemporary
chronicles.
My interest was languishing, and I was thinking of withdraw-
ing from the company of these stars, when a hurly-burly of a
hundred cries, making noise enough, rose from all the tab? es:
«Tigruche! uche! uche! Here, Tigruche! - Aren't you shabby,
—
Gruguche! Aren't you ugly! - You get crazier from hour to hour,
my jewel! - And your King of Prussia, won't he part with an
overcoat, then ? — And your scum of Norway, isn't he coming ? -
You haven't thrashed your Bismarck enough, Tigruche: go at it
again! uche! uche ! »
Thus made his entry, Péquet, the Terror of Princes!
In truth, Péquet is not prepossessing in appearance. I have
never seen man who looks more like a wet dog. He went
from table to table offering his hand and receiving fillips. Shall
I tell it? I who read Péquet sometimes, and who am not his
political friend, experienced something which might pass for pity.
The poor fellow took everything so gently! He offered so affec-
tionately his poor paws which no one touched cordially. I could
not make out from his face whether he was humiliated or con-
tent with the terrible familiarity shown him. One person alone
did not insult him, - the lady companion of the star. But the
star in return, when he went to salute her, bowing almost to the
ground, repulsed him in such a fashion that he asked mercy.
“My little Nini,” he said to her, “don't be as hard toward me
a


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LOUIS VEUILLOT
15335
C
>
(
as I am devoted to you! » There were tears in the heart of
Tigruche, but how could a tear issue from the eye of Péquet ?
Nevertheless, such was his accent that Nini herself was touched.
« Come,” she said, “Tigruche, go and see if my eggs are ready. ”
He precipitated himself toward the kitchen, and soon returned
sparkling: "My little angel, they are going to serve you. ”
This was growing sad; another accident appeared tragic to
me.
A waiter planted himself before the lady companion, and
asked in a half-bantering tone what he could serve her with.
"Nothing,” she said stoically: "I am not hungry. ” A fat man
with a rather silly air was listening. “You are not hungry! ” he
said, “and in a minute you'll be picking in our plates. " “If I
don't pick in yours," answered the lady companion, “what does
it matter to you ? " “Now lose your temper! ” went on the fat
man. “Why don't you say that you haven't a cent ? Every one
has seen hard-up days. ” “And every one may see them again,
""
answered the companion more sharply. She added, “I don't ask
for anything. ”
"No," said the other, but you take without asking. Never
mind, I'll pay! Order what you want. I like that better than
to see you picking a little here and a little there, as you always
do. "
But the poor thing — oh, cruel honor! -dared not accept. «If
I order, I'll pay. I have money. ”
I have money. " I think the woman has been
an actress.
The fat man lost patience. «You have money? You? Oh,
come now! Ha! ha! Let us see your money, then. Attention,
ladies and gentlemen: Dolorès is going to show her money! ”
There was silence of a sort. Dolorès glanced around with
stormy eyes. Tigruche snatched the star's eggs from the waiter,
and placed them before that lady, who attacked them at once.
Everybody looked at the companion. A mocking voice arose:
« Dolorès, my little one, show us your pretty money! ”
Dolorès began to cry. "Stupid thing! ” said the fat man.
Dolorès was left in peace. A few minutes later, her eyes dry
again, she was picking right and left in her neighbors' plates,-
that of the fat man included.
Tigruche, friend of the star, was offered nothing and took
nothing: he was as disinterested and as unfortunate as Péquet,
the Terror of Princes.
(
-


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15336
LOUIS VEUILLOT
A BON-MOT
From "Les Odeurs de Paris)
A
N ACTRESS had lost her mother, whom she adored. She re-
ceived from the theatre an order to attend a rehearsal. She
wrote a touching letter, requesting a few days to give to
her grief. The director, furious, fined her.
Doesn't she mean to play,” he said, “while her mother is
dead ? »
This is what is called a bon-mot. The journal which cites one
is called upon to invent it. There are people whose business it
is to make bons-mots. They are paid as much as three or four
sous a line, and they make some which are not bad. But this
director's bon-mot was not invented, I think, but fell from the
true lips of nature.
BÉTINET, AVENGER OF LETTERS
From (Les Odeurs de Paris)
A
YOUNG man of letters undertakes to prove that bad literature
has no effect upon morals; or rather that with reference to
morals, there is neither good nor bad literature. He is not
pleading his own cause: let us render him that justice! No one
ever heard it said that his literature did the least harm; and
although he has been writing for some time, he is as innocent
as a new-born child. I have a sure presentiment that he will die
in his innocence, enveloped in the pages in which he appeared.
He is named Bétinet, and he has money.
I am sure of not vexing him by pointing out his attempt;
but I desire too that my observations should not make him think
too well of himself. In all sincerity the paradox is a little too
much for him. It is evident that he cudgels his brains, and
works, and does his best. He boldly attacks his adversaries,-
those who might believe literature not without influence upon
society. He compares them in the first place to dogs who make
an absurd” uproar; then he calls them “a troop of guardians
«
of public morality”; then “the condottiéri of the army of good”;
then "bastards of Erostratus,” etc. He puts half a dozen of these
attacks in each of his paragraphs: and ahs! and hows! and eh,
good Lords ! everywhere he can; and even elsewhere. As for


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LOUIS VEUILLOT
15337
exclamation points, the article bristles with them. Unfortunately,
a point of exclamation cannot take the place of a point of wit.
As to the argument, which should be the most carefully prepared
part of such a work, there is none.
If I had the honor of knowing young Bétinet, who has money,
I would advise him to observe the very serious influence of
money upon literature, and the still more serious influence of lit-
erature upon money.
Assuredly, assuredly, by means of money there may be suc-
cess in literature, and a success which may be far-reaching! The
world has seen Academicians of the fork, - that is, those who
knew how to get themselves elected because they knew how to
set a good table. But then that requires a good deal of money,
and knowledge how to employ it; for literature devours money.
Yes, young Bétinet, it devours money; and when all is devoured
there is no
And if you count upon the period
of success brought about by money, — that you will have made
yourself a name to insure success and bring in money,— you
are mistaken, young Bétinet. Wealth by way of the kitchen,
even had it advanced you to the Academy, would not bring you
back more than your fifteen hundred francs and the Cross of
Honor. It would not even repay your dinners.
Behold, Bétinet, something upon which to meditate at your
leisure.
As to knowing the social effect of the books of Gaivaudin,
Papion, and others, and the fate of the old moons, what business
is it of yours, and why the devil should people concern them-
selves with what you think? What difference does it make what
more success.
-
you think?
Thus you have already printed three or four volumes and
dozens of articles, and supported a crowd of literary men. You
have lent them twenty francs, thirty francs, a hundred francs
perhaps; and not one of them has had the humanity to inform
you that you were not born to enlighten the world, nor to draw
ten sous a page for "copy. ”
Bétinet, you are deceived! ! !


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15338
LOUIS VEUILLOT
HIC ALIQUIS DE GENTE HIRCOSA
From (Les Odeurs de Paris)
THE
HE sergeant was dominating in the car. Around his hairy
countenance, ravaged and arrogant, there were only smooth
faces, upon which was not even the vestige of a thought.
The abbé entered and took the only vacant place opposite the
sergeant.
Once seated, the abbé began to read his breviary. The ser-
geant twisted his beard. Some vague signs appeared upon one
of the smooth faces; by close examination a skilled eye could
have recognized the writing of Monsieur Guéroult.
The sergeant looked at the abbé, then at the smooth faces,
and said: “What I shall never understand is, how a man can be
low enough to kneel to another man as guilty as himself and
often more so. ”
The inspection of a smooth face indicated that this speech
was generally approved. Approbation was evident in the face
where certain signs already showed themselves: the writing of
Adolphus became quite recognizable there.
The abbé raised his gaze, rested it upon the sergeant for a
moment, then carried it back to his breviary.
The sergeant continued: “I think that when a man does his
duty he leaves a good reputation behind him. A good reputation
is paradise, - there is no other; and a bad reputation is hell, and
there is no other.
This speech again appeared (generally) very wise; and even,
in view of the abbé's presence, very opportune.
For what right
has an abbé to thrust himself into a car full of honest folk ?
Nevertheless, the Guéroult writing protested. The sergeant's eye
seemed astonished by this, and became interrogative. The Gué-
roult writing said: "All the great philosophers have believed in
the immortality of the soul. ” The sergeant answered, “I tell
>
you, no! »
After a silence he continued: “I will explain what it means
to do one's duty: it is to fight and die for France, and to make
France triumph. On the battle-field a man should cry (Live
France,' and die. And see!


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LOUIS VEUILLOT
15339
"I care nothing for king, emperor, or republic. I know only
France and liberty. See! And I would just as soon thrust my
bayonet through the Pope and all the priests, for they are enemies
of France and of liberty. See! ”
The sergeant went on in this manner, and more eloquently
still. He allowed himself a few jovialities. But as he grew very
excited, the smooth faces no longer laughed. They feared he
might proceed to acts.
The abbé finished saying his breviary.
At the station all the smooth faces dismounted, and at the
signal of departure scattered themselves in other compartments.
The sergeant alone, and the abbé, resumed their seats. They
found themselves tête-à-tête.
The abbé said: Sergeant, I see that you are a brave soldier.
Of the seven men who were here just now, you alone are not
afraid to stay in the same compartment with a priest. Honor to
French courage! ”
The sergeant drew out his pipe, and closed the windows.
When the pipe was well lighted, the priest lowered a window,
and took his rosary.
He showed it to the sergeant: “Sergeant,
I hope my rosary does not annoy you? ”
1?
The sergeant was no longer so fiery, or so free of voice. He
growled, “You neither - you're not afraid! ”
“Afraid of what ? ” said the abbé. "A soldier loves glory; and
you said a great many things just now to astonish those fellows:
but at heart you're not a bad fellow. ”
“Nevertheless I would kill you," answered the sergeant.
"Doubtless,” said the abbé, "but not in this car. ”
«Why not in this car ? " said the sergeant.
Because you have no order," said the abbé; "and your pro-
motion would suffer. Moreover, my dear fellow, I would forgive
you all the same. Come, sergeant, light your pipe again, and let
me tell my beads. "
»
>


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15340
LOUIS VEUILLOT
A DUEL
From Les Odeurs de Paris)
ot long ago we had one of these heroic spectacles.
It was
NT
N° very exciting
The men had stripped to their suspenders and taken
their swords in hand. Complications arose. One of the oppo-
nents was in doubt as to the other's identity, and thought, not
without reason, that a proxy was before him. The seconds ar-
gued somewhat hotly; the adversaries, more favorable to peace,
separated the seconds. .
To be concluded at another
meeting! At the following meeting the trouble begins again.
Postponement. The public is palpitating, the fire is rekindled,
the interest increases. Nothing is accomplished; the public talks
of nothing else; to-morrow in the field! They strip to their sus-
penders, they even remove their suspenders; they take swords,
cross them, the steel emits sparks. One, two! One, two! . They
thrust, they ward off. The fencer thrusts, the thruster fences.
One, two! Thrusts here, thrusts there, thrusts everywhere! Flic,
flac! More thrusts! What thrusts, what fire in the steel, what
steel in fire, what fire in the hearts! The sweat pours and is not
wiped ! At last one of those cruel swords touches one of those
cruel men; the blood starts. Stop, rash fellows! Honor is sat-
isfied!
The wounded lost a few hairs of his left eyebrow.


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15341
ALFRED DE VIGNY
(1797-1863)
BY GRACE KING
(
LFRED VICTOR, Comte de Vigny, is represented in the volu-
minous literature of his country in the nineteenth century
by. a mere handful of books: briefly, by two volumes of
poetry, Poésies Antiques et Modernes' and Les Destinées); by a
novel, Cinq Mars'; a comedy, “Quitte pour la Peur' (Let Off with a
Scare); a prose epic, “Stello'; four tales from military life, Military
Servitude and Grandeur'; a play, Chatter-
ton'; and The Journal of a Poet. ' And
in the resounding fame of great contem-
poraries and successors in literature, De
Vigny's name and this handful of books
might, with easy supposition, have been rel-
egated to the position of a dwindling and
expiring reminiscence of the past; the fate
of long catalogues of successful writers and
books of his day. De Vigny's name and
work, however, have gained rather than lost
lustre by the friction of time upon them;
and the eulogy by Théophile Gautier, that
he was “the purest glory of the romantic ALFRED DE VIGNY
school,” is as fresh in its truth to-day, as
when it was penned over a half-century ago. Of all the romanticists,
he remains, to the critical eyes of to-day, as the most genuine, the
most sincere, and the least illogical; in short, as a romanticist by
blood, birth, and traditions, not by school or profession of faith.
He was born at Loches in Touraine, in 1797, the last descendant
of a once wealthy and distinguished family. Through his mother, he
was connected with great admirals and sea captains; through his
father, with courtiers, army officers, and princely seigneurs. Ruined
by the Revolution, his parents removed to Paris; where they con-
secrated their life, and what fortune remained to them, to his edu-
cation. On the knees of his white-haired father, an old courtier of
Louis XV. and a crippled veteran of the Seven Years' War, the child
learned to know Louis XV. , the great Frederick, Voltaire, and the

»


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15342
ALFRED DE VIGNY
history of the great campaigns of the past century; and was taught
war, he relates, by his father's wounds, by the parchments and
escutcheons of his family, by the portraits in armor of his ancestors,
— the nobility acting the rôle of a great family of hereditary soldiers.
He was barely sixteen when the Restoration opened to him the
predestined career, as he saw it, of the sons of the nobles of France.
He entered the household troops of the King, a company composed
of young men of family, all graded as sous-lieutenants. But France,
as he says, had sheathed her sword «in the scabbard of the Bour-
bons”: with Napoleon the glory of army life had departed; only
the dullness and routine of it remained. To while away the bur-
densome hours of ennui during his garrison life, the young officer
returned to his early and precocious passion for poetry. His haver-
sack library, consisting of the Bible and a few classics, ministered
to him as Muse. In 1822 he published the collection of these first
essays, - 'Poems Ancient and Modern. ' It contained some of his
best pieces: Moses,' (The Deluge,' (The Adulterous Woman. ' The
following year he published his Eloa. ' The historical novel of
Cinq Mars) (1826) was however the maker of De Vigny's reputation
in literature. Based upon a fine episode of the reign of Louis XIII. ,
its dramatic interest, the virile strength of its characters, its brilliant
coloring, and the elevated purity and elegance of its style and lan-
guage, insured it a success that has been prolonged until the book
has become fixed in its reputation as a modern classic.
After fourteen years of pacific and inglorious service, during which
he attained only to the rank of captain, De Vigny resigned from the
army. In Paris he retired into what Sainte-Beuve wittily called his
ivory tower,” a life of seclusion, aristocratic and mediæval in its lofty
isolation. He emerged but once,- in 1842, to take his seat in the
French Academy. He died in 1863, leaving ready for publication a
volume of poems, "Les Destinées,' and a collection of personal notes
and reflections which was published by his literary executor as “The
Journal of a Poet. ' This last volume contains some of the most
exquisite passages of his writings and of his life: the long painful
illness of his mother; his devotion, her death, and his grief; and
afterwards, the long years of devotion to his invalid wife.
Placed chronologically by birth between Victor Hugo and Lamar-
tine, De Vigny's intrinsic value as a poet receives its best illustra-
tion from the juxtaposition. His originality, as Sainte-Beuve says, “is
distinct from both, in its inspiration and filiation: we can connect
Victor Hugo and Lamartine with anterior French poetry, but in it
we vainly seek the parentage of Moses, Eloa, and Dolorida. ”
De Vigny's earliest conception of the fatal and sublime gift of
genius, - condemning man to solitude and sadness, imprisoning him
»


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ALFRED DE VIGNY
15343
in his own greatness," as it has been expressed, - became his master
idea through life. It appeared first in Moses,' and reappeared in all
his writings, poetry and prose, in different reincarnations;- in the
Maison de Berger,' idyllic, in love; in Stello,' tragic, in the suffer-
ings of the modern poet; the idea reaches its culmination in moral
grandeur in Military Servitude and Grandeur,' where self-abnegation
and virile honor are depicted as the only ransom of greatness, and
the price of the happiness of the common mortal.
Grace Krug
MOSES
.
H*
E SAID unto the Lord:-“Shall I ne'er be done ?
Where wilt thou still that I my footsteps turn ?
Am I to live for aye, great, powerful, and alone ?
Give me, ah, give me leave to sleep the sleep of earth!
What did I to thee to be chosen thine elect?
Let now some other stand 'twixt thee and thine!
Some other curb thy wild steed, Israel!
I gladly make him heir to book and brazen rod.
Why needest thou have dried up all my hopes ?
Why not have left me man in all my ignorance?
Alas! thou madest me wise among the wise:
My finger showed thy wandering race its path,
I called down fire upon the heads of kings,
And future time will kneel before my laws.
I am the Great: my feet tread nations' necks,
My hand holds generations in its will.
Alas, my Lord! I am great - I am alone:
Give me — ah, give me leave to sleep the sleep of earth! )
ELOA
O
N THE snowy mountain crown of the hamlet,
The Spaniard has wounded the Asturian eagle
That threatened his white bounding flock.
With bristling plumes, and raining down blood,
The bird strikes upward to heaven, quick as a flash could descend,


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15344
ALFRED DE VIGNY
Gazing up at his sun! breathing it in with wide-open beak,
As if once again his life to retake from the empire of flame.
In the golden air he swims with great strokes,
Hovers a moment in rest, 'mid the bright darting rays, –
But the aim of the man was too sure:
The hot ball burns like a coal in his wound;
His wing drops its shafts, his royal mantle its plumes;
Dispossessed of his heights, his weight bears him down,-
He sinks into the snow of the mount, with wild heaving breast;
And the cold of the earth, with its heavy death sleep,
Shuts the eyes that held the respect of the sun.
LAURETTE, OR THE RED SEAL
T"
still sang
He grand route of Artois and Flanders is long and desolate.
It extends in a straight line, without trees, without ditches,
through countries flat and covered with yellow mud at all
times. In the month of March 1815 I passed along this route,
and had a rencontre which I have never since forgotten.
I was alone. My comrades were ahead on the route in the
suite of the King, Louis XVIII. I saw their white capes and
red capes at the very horizon of the north. A lost shoe retarded
my horse. He was young and strong. I urged him on to rejoin
my squadron; he started at a rapid trot. It still rained, and I
But I soon stopped, tired of hearing only my own
self; and then I heard only the rain, and my horses' feet which
plashed the beaten track. On examining intently this yellow
line of the road, I remarked at about a quarter of a mile dis-
tant a small black point which moved. This gave me pleasure:
it was some person. I hurried my steps. At about a hundred
paces I could clearly distinguish a little wagon of white wood,
covered with three circles and black oilcloth; it resembled a lit-
tle cradle placed on two wheels; the wheels sank to their hubs
in the mud. The little mule which dragged it was carefully
led by a man on foot who held the bridle. He was a man of
about fifty years, with white mustache, strong and tall. He had
a hard but good face, such as is frequently seen in the army.
Having seen his white cockade, I contented myself with show-
ing him the sleeve of my red coat, and then he replaced his gun
in the cart. —“Will you have a drop? ” -“Willingly," I replied,
approaching: "I have not drunk in twenty-four hours. ” He had
(C
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ALFRED DE VIGNY
15345
>
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»
.
at his neck a cocoanut very well carved, made into a flagon, with
a silver mouthpiece, of which he seemed rather proud. He
passed it to me, and I drank a little of the bad white wine with
much pleasure. I returned the cocoanut to him. We went on
for about a quarter of a mile without saying anything. Then
as he stopped to rest his poor little mule, which it pained me
to look at, I stopped too, to empty my boots of the water which
filled them. “Your boots begin to stick to your feet,” said he.
«It is four nights since I took them off,” said I. «Bah! in eight
«
days you will no longer think of them,” he replied in his hoarse
voice. "Do you know what I have in there? ” “No,” said I
to him. - “It is a woman. " — I said, “Ah! ” without too much
surprise, and I began to walk tranquilly on.
He followed me.
« You do not care ? What I said then ought to astonish you. ”
_“I am but little astonished,” I said. — “Oh! but if I should
tell you how I left the sea, we should see. ” — “Well,” replied I,
» «
“why not try? That would warm you up, and would make me
forget that the rain is running down my back and out at my
heels. ”
“You must know first, my boy, that I was born at Brest. I
started by being the child of the troop, earning my half-rations
and my half-stipend from the age of nine; my father being a
soldier in the guards. But as I loved the sea, - on a beautiful
night while I was on leave of absence in Brest, I hid myself in
the hold of a merchant vessel leaving for the Indies: I was only
discovered in mid-ocean, and the captain preferred making me
a cabin-boy to throwing me overboard. When the Revolution
came I had made my way, and had in my turn become captain of
a little merchant vessel, — full of zest, having skimmed the ocean
for fifteen years. As the royal ex-marine- ma foi! the good
old marine - all of a sudden found itself depopulated of officers,
captains were taken from the merchant marine. I had had some
filibustering affairs, of which I may tell you later. They gave
me command of a brig of war named the Marat. The 28th Fruc.
tidor 1797 I received orders to weigh for Cayenne. I was to
convey sixty soldiers; and one exile, who was left over from the
one hundred and ninety-three taken on board by the frigate
La Decade a few days before. I had orders to treat this individ-
ual with consideration; and the first letter of the Directoire con-
tained a second, closed with three red seals, one amongst them of
unusual size. I was forbidden to open this letter before the first
XXVI–960
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## p. 15346 (#294) ##########################################

15346
ALFRED DE VIGNY
degree of latitude north from the twenty-seventh to the twenty-
eighth of longitude, - that is, near to passing the line. This big
letter had a shape all its own. It was long, and so tightly closed
that I could not read between the angles, nor through the envel-
ope. I am not superstitious, but it made me afraid.
"I was occupied in putting this letter under the glass of the
clock when my exile entered my room; he held by the hand
a beautiful young girl, about seventeen years old. He told me
that he was nineteen; a fine-looking boy, though a little pale,
and too white for a man. His little wife was fresh and gay as
a child. They looked like two turtle-doves. It gave me pleasure
to see them. I said to them, 'Well, my children, you have come
to visit the old captain ? That is very good of you. I am tak-
ing you rather far away, but so much the better: we shall have
time to become acquainted. I am sorry to receive madame with-
out my coat, but I was nailing that great rascally letter 'way up
there.