Part 21

Adieu; this scrap of a letter is scribbled on a pile of proofs that would frighten even a proof-reader. A thousand homages, and kindly present my obeisances to M. Hanski. I return to my work with fury, and I wish you the realization of all the wishes you make. Find here the expression of the most sincere and most respectful of attachments.

PARIS, March 1, 1835.

I have received, madame, the letter in which you announce to me your departure for your lonely Wierzchownia. I shall therefore not see you in Vienna. I shall delay my trip to Essling and Wagram till the end of the summer, so that when I go, I can push on to the Ukraine.

Well, you will be accompanied by the sincerest prayers for your happiness and for that of those about you. As for me, after a few days' diversion, necessitated by lassitude, I have just returned to the deepest seclusion, in order to finish up my two agreements with Madame Bêchet and Werdet, and to grow, to enlarge myself, to raise my name to the height of the esteem you give to it, that you be not proud in vain of having granted me a few days of gracious friendship; my pride, mine, will ever be legitimate enough. I tell you once more, with a sort of religious emotion, that you are, together with her of whom I have so often spoken, the most beauteous soul, the noblest heart, the most attractive person that I have seen in this world, the most superior mind and the best instructed. Let me tell you this that I think, at the moment when you are about to put as great a distance of time between us as there is already.

I have been measuring the amount of work that remains for me to do; it will take six months to finish it. For six months, therefore, I shall try to rise higher, to send you fine works, the flowers of my brain,--the only flowers that can cross that great distance unwithered,--which will reach you, like those I have sent already, in their coarse germ and their first dress. Accept them always as a proof of my respect and admiration, as a proof of that constancy that you yourself advise, as the pledge of a pure and holy friendship, and as a testimony in favour of calumniated France, accused of levity, but where are still to be found chivalrous souls, lofty, strong, who do not treat lightly true affections. You have given me the desire to raise, to improve myself; let me be grateful in my own way.

On returning to my retreat, I found Grosclaude on the threshold. He asked me to let him make my portrait, full length, in my working-dress. He told me that in case he did it, you and Monsieur Hanski had asked for a copy. You will not refuse the person painted when you already possess the first impulsion of his thought in manuscript. I am so happy in this friendship of which you and M. Hanski do not reject the proofs. We are so far off! Let me approach you as materially as I can. You will say yes, will you not?

I have just broken all the threads by which Lilliput-Paris held me garoted; I have made myself a secret retreat, where I shall live six months [rue des Batailles, Chaillot]. I was seized with profound emotion on entering it; for it is here that my last battle will be fought, here that I must grasp the sceptre. If I succumb! If I should not succeed! If (in spite of a regimen prescribed by doctors who have traced me a manner of living so that I may struggle without danger through my work), _if_ I fall ill! A crowd of such thoughts seized me, inspired by the gravity of the things I am undertaking. At last, in the early morning, I went to the window, and I saw, shining above my head, the star of that delicious hour. I had confidence, I was joyful as a child, after being feeble as a child; I went back to my table, crying out the "Ha, ha!" of the horse of Scripture. Then I determined to begin by writing you these lines. Bring me luck, you and the star, will you? The second thing I have to do is the end of "Séraphita," an immense work, that I have meditated for three or four months, and which rises ever higher. I have now only to write it. You know it belongs to you.

You ought, at this moment when I am writing, to have read "Le Père Goriot." How shall I send you my manuscripts when you are in Russia? You must tell me. As for the books, it will be equally difficult. You must give me your instructions. Mine to you are that you shall be well in health, that M. Hanski be gay, have no black butterflies, that his enterprises shall prosper, that Anna shall jump and laugh and grow without accidents; and that all about you be well and happy.

At the beginning of the autumn, therefore, if it please God, and if I have fruitfully worked, you will see a pilgrim arriving and ringing at your castle gate, asking for a few days' hospitality, who would fain repay you by laying at your feet the laurels won in the literary tournament--as if glory could ever be anything else than a grain of incense on the altar of friendship! One word is worth more than these puffs of wind; and that word of gratitude I shall ever say to you.

The inclosed autograph is that of a friend of mine who may become something some day; there is one remarkable thing about him which will recommend him to your _heraldicomaniacal_ favour; he is descended from Jeanne d'Arc, through her brother Gautier. His name is Edouard Gautier d'Arc, Baron du Lys, and he bears the arms of France, supported by a woman, on his shield. Is not that one of the finest things in the present day? Well, of a man whom we ought to make peer of France with a fine entailed estate, we have made a consul at Valentia! He has ambition.

PARIS, March 11, 1835.

I have just received your good letter of the 3rd instant. It has given me pleasure and pain. Pleasure, you are better; pain, you have been ill. You see, I had the time to go to Vienna, and now I cannot. I shall go and see you at Wierzchownia for after taking measures for "La Bataille" at Wagram, I shall not think anything of a few hundred more leagues to say good-day to you.

You are always so good you will let me take you for confessor, tell you all, be confiding, and have in you a soul?

You will find inclosed the dedication of "Séraphita." Have the kindness to answer me by return courier, that I may know if you approve it. In a thing of this kind there must be no point left to object to; dedications cannot be _corrected_. "Séraphita" will be finished by the first Sunday in April, therefore you have time to throw a "yes" into the post on receiving this letter. Your silence will mean disapproval. The "Revue de Paris" is horribly anxious to get this end; it has received complaints without number.

When the number is out I will send it to you through Sina; but I own that I do not like to risk the manuscript. What shall I do, therefore? You will receive the fourth Part of the "Études de Mœurs," the second edition of "Goriot," "Melmoth réconcilié," the manuscripts of "La Fille aux yeux d'or," and the "Duchesse de Langeais," and, perhaps, that of "Séraphita;" perhaps also the second Part of the "Études Philosophiques."

What shall I tell you about all this? The finishing of "Séraphita" kills me, crushes me. I have fever every day. Never did so grand a conception rise before any man. None but myself can know what I put into it; I put my life into it! When you receive this letter the work will have been cast.

There never was a success equal to that of "Goriot." This stupid Paris, which neglected the "Absolu," has just bought twelve hundred copies of the first edition of "Goriot" [in book form], before its announcement. Two other editions are in press. I will send you the second.

Here I am, with piles of gold, compared to my late situation; for I still have seven thousand ducats to pay [70,000 frs.], but in three months "Goriot" gives one thousand ducats. During the last three months I have regularly paid off four thousand ducats a month with the product of my pen![1]

Besides "Séraphita," I am finishing "L'Enfant Maudit," remaking "Louis Lambert," and completing "La Fille aux yeux d'or." I have finished a rather important work, entitled, "Melmoth réconcilié," and I am preparing a great and beautiful work, called "Le Lys dans la Vallée," the figure of a charming woman, full of heart and having a sulky husband, but virtuous. This will be, under a form purely human, terrestrial perfection, just as "Séraphita" will be celestial perfection. The "Lys dans la Vallée" is the last picture in the "Études de Mœurs," just as "Séraphita" will be the last picture in the "Études Philosophiques." Then, the third _dizain_.

You will have received the letter in which I tell you of my seclusion. It is deep. No one comes here. No, no more Lormois. Why do you trouble yourself about things I pay no heed to? I have renounced pleasures. No more Opera, no more Bouffons, no more anything; solitude and work. Séraphita! There, will be my great stroke; there, I shall receive the cold mockery of Parisians, but there, too, I shall strike to the heart of all privileged beings. In it is a treatise on prayer, headed "The Path to God," in which are the last words of the angel, which will surely give desire to live by the soul. These mystical ideas have filled me. I am the artist-believer. Pygmalion and his statue are no longer a fable to me. "Goriot" could be done every day; "Séraphita" but once in a lifetime.

So, then, since my last letter I have had no events in my material life, but many in the life of my heart, because my heart is involved in this majestic occupation.

I have to do the "Mémoires d'une jeune Mariée," a work in filagree, which will be a wonder to the little women who find the pinions of "Séraphita" incomprehensible.

No, I cannot buy La Grenadière as yet; I need seven or eight thousand francs for that, which I don't possess. Though my cane with its ebullition of turquoises has made me notorious as a new Aboulcasem, I have nothing but debts. When I am free of those, I will see about getting the money for La Grenadière.

If I were in Vienna, I would make you laugh; oh, yes! I don't laugh now except with those who love me. Judge, therefore, how precious our friendship has become to me. Other laughs are compromising. I am taken seriously; so much so that Dantan has caricatured me. Would you like to see it? I will send it with the volumes I have for you. I have never lost any time in transmitting to you those of my poor works that you have the goodness to like.

My sobriety and regularity of life can alone save me under the ardent work I have to complete to win that liberty so longed-for. It is now twenty days that I have risen at midnight and gone to bed at six o'clock. I shall persevere until I am delivered from the Bêchet contract, and the fourth Part is given to Werdet.

I hope I can send the box to you April 17. I shall address it, in any case, to Baron Sina.

Madame Delphine P... was at the Opera Sunday, and gave birth to a child Monday.

I thank you for your glimpses of Viennese society. What I have learned about Germans in their relations elsewhere confirms what you say of them. Your story of General H... comes up periodically. There has been something like it in all countries, but I thank you for having told it to me. The circumstances give it novelty.

I respect your wishes in sending you the manuscript of "Goriot" in its dirty condition. It bears the trace of many worries and much fatigue.

Madame de Berny is a little better, but alas! this is only obtained by digitalis. I hope I may still keep that light of my life, that conscience so pure, that tenderness so delicate.

Madame Carraud is safely confined of a son.

I saw Borget this morning, returned from Italy, and I have your letter; so this has been a good day.

Well, I must say adieu; but remember that while writing a book that bears your name, I do not quit you.

The Emperor of Russia has prohibited "Goriot;" probably on account of Vautrin.

There is pleasure in breaking all one's bonds to society; one has no remorse; society does not cling to you, and one can only pity those who cling to it. I am happy. I can march on in solitude, led by a beautiful and noble thought.

I am sorry you have not seen the satirical preface I put to "Goriot;" you shall have it later. I won't make a package of that only.

I have a hundred thousand things to say, but when I begin to talk with you I seem to see you; I forget my ideas. However, I intend to begin a journal-letter, and put in every day some of my ideas.

At this moment I am a little drunk with work; my hand is tired; the heart is full, but the head is empty; you will get neither mind nor gaiety, but all that affection has of truest, all that memory has of freshest, and the tenderest gratitude.

You ask me what becomes of Madame de Nucingen. She will be, and so will her husband, a most comic dramatic personage in "Une Vue du Monde" long advertised by the "Revue de Paris." It is called "La Faillite de M. de Nucingen." But I need time for all these conceptions, and especially for their execution; above all when (as for Séraphita) I work often a year or two in thought before taking a pen. _Adoremus in æternum_ means for me, "Toil ever."

You speak of the stage. The stage might bring me in two hundred thousand francs a year. I know, beyond a doubt, that I could make my fortune there in a short time; but you forget that I have not six months to myself, not one month; and if I had I should not write a play, I should go and see you. Six months of my time represent forty thousand francs; and I must have that money in hand before I can do either "La Grande Mademoiselle" or "Philippe le Discret." Where the devil am I to get it? Out of my ink-pot. There is no Leo X. in these days. Work is the artist's bank.

If you knew the annoyances that Madame Bêchet's business embarrassments cause me. She cannot pay unless my numbers appear. So, when I am inspired for "Séraphita," when I listen to the music of angels, when I am sick with ecstasy, I must come down to corrections, I must finish that stupidity "La Fille aux yeux d'or," etc. It is horrible suffering. I would like to do the comedy of "La Grande Mademoiselle," but no! I must work for Werdet, who is ripping himself open to give me the money for my payments, my livelihood. Honesty has made a galley of my study. That is something you ought to know well. I have not a minute to myself, and I never take any distraction except when my brain comes down like a foundered horse.

You know all that my heart contains of affection and good wishes for yours. Affectionate compliments to M. Hanski, and take all you will for yourself of my most devoted feelings.

Grosclaude is coming to make my full-length portrait. I have never dared to ask for a sketch of yours.

This is the dedication:--

"MADAME,--Here is the work you asked of me; and to you I dedicate it, happy in being able thus to prove the respectful and constant affection which you permit me to feel for you. But read it as some bad transcript of a hymn dreamed from my childhood; the fervent rhythm of which, heard on the summits of the azure mountains, and its prophetic poesy, revealed here and there at times in Nature, it is impossible to present in human language.

"If I have risked being accused of impotence in thus attempting a sacred book which demands the light of Orient beneath the translucent veil of our noble language, was it not you who urged me to the effort, by saying that the most imperfect drawing of that figure would still be something that would please you? Here, then, it is, that something. I could wish that this book were read by none but minds preserved, like yours, from worldly pettiness by solitude; such as they alone know how to complete this poem; to them it may be, perhaps, a stepping-stone, or else a rough and humble flag on which to kneel and pray within the temple!

"I am, with respect, your devoted servant."

[Footnote 1: Ducat: gold coin, value from ten to twelve francs, according to country (Littré).--TR.]

PARIS, March 30, 1835.

Do not be vexed with me for the irregularity of my letters. I am overwhelmed with work, and I feel the necessity of getting through with it if I want my dear liberty. Madame Bêchet has become singularly ill-natured and will hurt my interests much. In paying me, she charges me with corrections which amount on the twelve volumes to three thousand francs, and also for my copies, which will cost me fifteen hundred more. Thus four thousand five hundred francs less, and my discounts, diminish by six thousand the thirty-three thousand. She could not lose a great fortune more clumsily, for Werdet estimates at five hundred thousand francs the profits to be made out of the next edition of the "Études de Mœurs."

I find Werdet the active, intelligent, and devoted editor that I want. I have still six months before I can be rid of Madame Bêchet; for I have three volumes more to do, and it is impossible to count on less than two months to each volume. Thus you see I am held here till September. Between now and then I ought to give Werdet three Parts of the "Études Philosophiques," and do much work for the Revues. For the last twenty days I have worked steadily twelve hours a day on "Séraphita." The world is ignorant of this immense toil; it only sees, and should only see, results. But I have had to master the whole of mysticism to formulate it. "Séraphita" is a consuming work for those who believe. Unhappily, in this sad Paris the Angel may chance to furnish the subject for a ballet. I shall meet with sarcasm, but I will not go into society. I will stay here tranquilly and do "La Fleur des Poix," "L'Enfant Maudit," "Sœur Marie des Anges," and "Les Mémoires d'une jeune Mariée."

What has tired me horribly the last few days is the reprinting of "Louis Lambert," which I have tried to bring to a point of perfection that would leave me in peace as to that work; and Lambert's thoughts when he was at Villenoix remained to be done. I had put, as it were, a hat on that place to keep it, or the cover on a dish at a meal. However, it is all done now; it is a new formula for humanity, which is the tie that binds "Louis Lambert" to "Séraphita."

Next, I have twenty days' work in remaking the "Comtesse à deux Maris" ["Colonel Chabert"]. I think it detestable, wanting in taste and truth; and I have had the courage to begin it all over again on the press. It was in that way I did my last work on the "Chouans." At this rate my hair turns frightfully white. No, you will never recognize me.

Madame de Berny is rather better,--much better, she says. But she still has sudden attacks which show that the cause is there. I have wept much over her; I have prepared myself for a grief which will act upon my whole life. In May I shall go and spend a month with her.

I need seven or eight thousand francs to buy the Grenadière, and I cannot yet put my hand on that sum. If I finish "La Fleur des Poix" in April and go to Touraine in May, I may possibly return with the sacred title of land-owner. On the 20th of May (my birthday) or the 16th of May (my fête-day) we shall baptize my brother's child. I am godfather, with my niece Sophie as godmother. I always swore I would never be godfather to any child; but my brother is so unfortunate it is impossible to refuse. I should like to complete the fête by buying the Grenadière. It would be a first sign of prosperity.

I will put into my parcel of April 17th the two caricatures of me in plaster by Dantan, who has caricatured all the great men. The chief point of mine is the famous cane bubbling with turquoise on a chased gold knob, which has had more success in France than all my works. As for me, he has caricatured my stoutness. I look like Louis XVIII. These two caricatures have had such success that I have not as yet been able to get them. It is true that I go out little, and sit at my work for twenty hours. You can't imagine what success this jewelled cane has had; it threatens to become European. Borget, who has returned from Italy, and who did not say he was my friend, told me he heard of it in Naples and Rome. All the dandies in Paris are jealous, and the little journals have been supplied with items for six months. Excuse me for telling you this, but it seems to me it is biographical; and if they tell you on your travels that I have a fairy-cane, which summons horses, erects palaces, and spits diamonds, do not be surprised, but laugh as I do. Never did the tail of Alcibiades' dog wag harder. But I have three or four other tails of the same kind for the Parisians.

Our exhibition of paintings is quite fine this year. There are seven or eight leading masterpieces. Grosclaude's picture is much liked. He is honourably hung in the large Salon. But they think he has only colour and drawing, and lacks soul and composition. Gérard, however, thinks he is really a man of talent. He told him so sincerely; and repeated the same to me, adding that there was nothing for a man like him to do but to produce; he calls this a good and fine picture. There is much good luck for him in appearing without disadvantage in the large Salon, where there are ten or twelve splendid pictures. There is a landscape by Brascassat in which is a bull, which could be bought for six thousand francs, and may be worth a hundred thousand. It is, like Pagnest's "Portrait," the despair of artists. Brascassat is, like Pagnest, a poor young consumptive. He is a shepherd, taken, like Foyatier the sculptor, from his flocks, and, if he lives, he will be a great painter. Our nineteenth century will be great. We cannot doubt it. There is a deluge of talent here.

I regretted you much. I should have liked to see you in Paris this winter. The Exhibition, and the Italian opera have offered an unheard-of combination: Lablache, Tamburini, Rubini. Then Beethoven, executed at the Conservatoire as he is nowhere else. Besides which, Paris is being cleaned and completed, thanks to Louis-Philippe's trowel. But there's a hundred years' work still to do at the Louvre. When I pass along the quay of the Tuileries, my artist-heart bleeds to see the stones placed by Catherine de' Medici, corroded by the sun before being carved--and this for three hundred years.

Adieu! it is two in the morning. Here is an hour and a half stolen from "Séraphita." She groans, she calls; I must finish her, for the "Revue de Paris" groans too; it has advanced me nineteen hundred francs, and "Séraphita" must settle the account.

Adieu! imagine how I think of you in finishing the work that is yours. It is time it appeared. Literature here has decided that I shall never finish that work; they say it is impossible.

Graceful things to Anna, my respects to Mademoiselle Séverine, my regards to M. Hanski; and to you nothing, for all is yours. It would be giving you a bit of your own property to send you anything, and I have, in this low world, too few friendships to diminish the truest of them all.

PARIS, May 1, 1835.

MADAME,--I greeted M. le Prince de Schonberg as I never did any one, for he came from you. "Séraphita" exacts more work. I had hoped to send you the manuscript by the prince, but it cannot be finished before my fête-day, May 16, and the prince starts to-day or to-morrow. I cannot even profit by his journey to write you in detail about my life and occupations. I have perhaps presumed too far upon my strength in supposing I could do so many things in so little time. I shall be lucky indeed if I can get off and divert myself in September. But nothing shall hinder me when my obligations have been met.