Part 33

I have met Frankowski twice, once in Milan and again in Venice; he will take to you my New-Year's souvenir, or else he will send it to you. Each time that I have seen him the acquaintance ripens. I think him a man of honour and high integrity. He is a Pole of the _vieille roche_; his sentiments are frank. You could, that is, M. Hanski could do him a great service. You have property, I think, that is difficult to manage, and which, until now, has been badly managed by unfaithful stewards. Well, I think this brave colonel does not know where to turn for a living. He came to Paris to see what he could do with a novel. A man must be at the end of his hopes to land himself in a foreign country where publishers are refusing two or three hundred manuscripts a year. He asked me for a letter to M. de Metternich,--as if I could do anything for him with the prince, whom I never saw, as you know. However delicate such business is, if M. Hanski is thinking to send an honest man to manage his distant property and make it profitable, giving an honourable share to him who would bring it under cultivation, he might save a married man who, I think, despairs of his present position, and would blow his brains out rather than fail in the sternest honour. In case M. Hanski should think of trying this colonel, write me a line; I will then write to Frankowski to know if the place suits him; and if he answers affirmatively, I will give him a note for M. Hanski. Besides, the time this correspondence would take brings me to the period of my visit to Poland, and he could be useful to me as a guide in your country. I have a conviction that M. Hanski would do a good business for himself in doing this good action. I have had means of studying the colonel; and besides, M. Hanski is too prudent not to study his compatriot himself. When you see Frankowski, don't speak to him of the letter he asked of me for Metternich, for he asked it in a letter that was mad with despair, and I have known so well the despair of an honest man struggling against misfortune that I divined everything. I hope that this idea of mine may reach you in time. But, in all such cases, one should always save a man of honour the terrible shock of an interest caused only by compassion. This sentiment, in me, is stripped of what makes it so wounding; but others are not expected to know that. If all the world knew my heart, of what value would be the opening of it to those I love? So after explaining all this to you, you will read it to M. Hanski, and he will do what he thinks proper. But, in any case, it would be better to find an honest man to manage his estates well than to sell them; for after the late rise in value of the lands of Europe there is no doubt that those who possess them, in whatever part of Europe they may be, will have in the course of some years an enormous capital.

Not knowing that I should be detained in quarantine, and thinking to be absent only one month, I ordered my letters to be kept for me; so that I am without news of you since the last of February. Do you know, this seemed so hard to me that I inquired at Genoa if there was a vessel going to Odessa; they told me it took a month to go from Genoa to Odessa. Then I gazed into the sky at the point where the Ukraine must be, and I sent it a sorrowful farewell. At that moment I was capable, had it taken but twelve days to go to Odessa, of going to see you and not returning to Paris without my play. But then my debts, my obligations came back to my memory. What a life! Fame, when I have it, and if I have it, can never be a compensation for all my privations and all my sufferings!

I saw yesterday at La Pergola, a Princess Radziwill and a Princess Galitzin (who is not Sophie). There seem to be a good many Princesses Radziwill and Galitzin! There was also a Countess Orloff, who used to be an actress in Paris under the name of Wentzell. I hoped to enjoy my dear incognito; but, as at Milan and at Venice, I was recognized by strangers. Also I met the husband of a cousin of Madame de Castries, and Alexandre de Périgord, son of the Duc de Dino. Happily, I came to Florence _en polisson_, as they used to say for the trips to Marly. I have neither clothes nor linen nor anything suitable to go into society, and so I preserve my dear independence.

April 13.

I have seen the gallery of the Medici, but in a hurry. I must come back here if I want to study art. A letter from the consul at Livorno, just received, tells me there will be no steamer till the 20th, and I must be in Paris from the 20th to 25th. So there is nothing for me to do but to take the mail-cart, and I leave in a few hours. I close my letter, which I would like to make longer, but will write again at Milan, through which I pass and where I shall stop two days, for I go by Como and the Saint-Gothard.

Adieu, _cara contessina_. I hope that all is well and that I shall find good news of you in Paris. At this moment of writing, you ought to have received my little souvenirs, if Frankowski is a faithful man. In a few months I shall have the happiness of seeing you, and that hope will render life and time the easier to bear. Do not forget to remember me to all, and permit your moujik to send you the expression--not new, but ever increasing in strength--of his devoted sentiments and tenderest thoughts.

PARIS, May 10, 1837.

Here I am, back in Paris. My health is perfect, and my brain so much refreshed that it seems as though I had never written anything. I found three long letters from you which are delightful to me. I fished them out of the two hundred which awaited me and read them in the bath I took to unlimber me after my fatiguing journey; and certainty, I count that hour as the most delightful of all my trip. Before beginning my work, I am going to give myself the festival of a long talk with you.

In the first place, _cara carina_, put into that beautiful forehead, which shines with such sublime intelligence, that I have blind confidence in your literary judgment, and that I make you, in that respect, the heiress of the angel I have lost, and that what you write to me becomes the subject of long meditations. I now await your criticisms on "La Vieille Fille;" such as the dear conscience I once had, whose voice will ever echo in my ears, knew how to make them; that is to say, read the work over and point out to me, page by page, in the most exact manner, the images and the ideas that displease you; telling me whether I should take them out wholly and replace them, or modify them. Show neither pity nor indulgence; go boldly at it. _Cara_, should I not be most unworthy of the friendship you deign to feel for me if in our intimate correspondence I allowed the petty vanity of an author to affect me? So I entreat you, once for all, to suppress long eulogies. Tell me on three tones: that is good, that is fine, that is magnificent; you will then have a positive, comparative, and superlative, which are so grandiose in their line that I blush to offer them for your incense-pot. But they are still so far below the gracious praise you sometimes offer me that they are modest--though they might seem singular to a third person. I beg you therefore to be concise in praise and prolix in criticism; wait for reflection; do not write to me after the first reading. If you knew how much critical genius there is in what you said to me about my play you would be proud of yourself. But you leave that sentiment to your friends. Yes, Planche himself would not have been wiser; you have made me reflect so much that I am now employed in remodelling my ideas about it. Remember, _carina_, that I am sincere in all things, and especially in art; that I have none of that paternal silliness which ties so cruel a bandage round the eyes of many authors, and that if "La Vieille Fille" is bad, I shall have the courage to cut it out of my work.

I laughed much at what you write of the three heiresses of Warsaw, and at the tale you tell me, which was also told and invented in Milan. There they maintained _mordicus_ that I had just married an immensely rich heiress, the daughter of a dealer in silks. There is no absurd story of which I am not made the hero, and I will amuse you heartily by telling them all to you when I see you.

I received M. Hanski's letter two days ago from the Rothschilds, and the five hundred francs were at Rougemont de Löwenberg's. The portrait has just been returned from the Exhibition. Boulanger will make the copy in a few weeks and the picture will soon be with you. You are to have the original, which has had the utmost success at the Salon; many critics consider it among the best of our modern works, and it has given rise to arguments which must have enchanted Boulanger. I am very sorry that the admirable frame I unearthed in Touraine cannot adorn your gallery; but there is no use in opposing the rigours of the custom-house. The statue will reach you about the same time. You will, I dare say, order a little corner closet on which to place the statue, and in it you can keep the enormous collection of manuscripts you will receive from me; so that, knowing how much you have of the man's heart, you will have his labours as well. I shall then be wholly at Wierzchownia.

Your three letters, read all at once, bathed my soul in the purest and sweetest affections, as the native waters of the Seine refreshed my body; it was more to me to read again and again those pages full of your adorable little writing than to rest myself.

I have made a horribly beautiful return journey; but it is good to have made it. It was like our retreat from Russia. Happy he who has seen the Beresina and come out, safe and sound, upon his legs. I crossed the Saint-Gothard with fifteen feet of snow on the path I took; the road not even distinguishable by the tall stone posts which mark it. The bridges across the mountain torrents were no more visible than the torrents themselves. I came near losing my life several times in spite of the eleven guides who were with me. We crossed the summit at one o'clock in the morning by a sublime moonlight; and I saw the sunrise tint the snow. A man must see that once in his life. I came down so rapidly that in half an hour I passed from twenty-five degrees below freezing (which it was on the summit) to I don't know what degree of heat in the valley of the Reuss. After the horrors of the Devil's bridge, I crossed the Lake of the Four Cantons at four in the afternoon. It has been a splendid journey; but I must do it again in summer, to see all those noble sights under a new aspect. You see that I renounced my purpose of going by Berne and Neufchâtel. I returned by Lucerne and Bâle, having come by the Ticino and Como. I thought that route the most economical of time and money, whereas, on the contrary, I spent enormously of both. But I had the worth of my money; it was indeed a splendid journey; my excursion has been like a dream, but a dream in which presided the face of my faithful companion, of her of whom I have already told you the pleasure I had in seeing her, and _who did not suffer from the cold_ [her miniature].

Here I am, returned to my work. I am about to bring out immediately, one after the other: "César Birotteau," "La Femme Supérieure;" I shall finish "Illusions Perdues," then "La Haute Banque," and "Les Artistes." After that, I shall fly to the Ukraine, where, perhaps, I shall have the happiness to write a play which will end my financial agonies. Such is my plan of campaign, _cara contessina_.

May 11.

I have been very egotistical. I began by speaking of myself, answering the first things that struck me in your letters, and I ought to have said at once how glad I was to know you relieved of the deplorable but sublime duty of nurse, which you fulfilled so courageously and successfully. The reproach you make me for harshness in a sentence of mine, I feel very much. That sentence, believe me, was only the expression of my desire to see you perfect; and perhaps that desire was rather senseless, for it may be that contrasts are necessary in a character. But, however it is, I will never complain again, even when you accuse me unjustly, reflecting that an affection as sincere and as old as ours can be troubled only on the surface.

We are going no doubt to bring out a new edition of the "Études Philosophiques," the one in which is "Les Ruggieri." I have just re-read that fragment, and I see that it shows the effect of the state of anguish in which I was when I wrote it, and the feebleness of a brain which had produced too much. It needs much retouching. I do not know what has been thought of that poor preface to a book called "Illusions Perdues." I am going now to write the continuation and complete the work.

Your monotonous life tempts me much; and especially after travelling about do your tales of it please me. I owe to you the sole Homeric laugh I have had for a year, when I read of your fib to the Countess Marie, and when I read her letter so full of oratorical sugarplums. I do not think that woman true, and I really don't know how to answer her, for I am as stupid when I have nothing in my heart as I often am when my heart is full.

May 13.

I have now been at home eight days, and for eight days I have been making vain efforts to resume my work. My head refuses to give itself to any intellectual labour; I feel it to be full of ideas, but nothing comes out. I am incapable of fixing my thought; of compelling it to consider a subject under all aspects and deciding its march. I don't know when this imbecility will cease; but perhaps it is only my broken habit that is in fault. When a workman drops his tools for a time, his hand gets divorced. He must renew the fraternity that comes from habit, that links the hand to the tool, as the tool to the hand.

May 14.

I went last night to see "La Camaraderie," and I think the play is immensely clever. Scribe knows the business, but he does not know art; he has talent, but he will never have genius. I met Taylor, the royal comissioner to the Théâtre-Français, who has just brought from Spain, for a million francs, four hundred Spanish pictures, very fine ones. In a very few minutes it was arranged between us that he should undertake to have accepted, rehearsed, and played a piece of mine at the Théâtre-Français, without my name being known until the time comes to name the author; also to give me as many rehearsals as I want, and to spare me all the annoyances which accompany the reception and representation of a play. Now, which shall I write? Oh! how many conversations with you I need; for you are the only person--now that I am widowed of that soul which uplifted, followed, strengthened my attempts--the only one in whom I have faith. Yes, persons whose hearts are as noble as their birth, who have contracted the habit of noble sentiments and of things lofty in all ways, they alone are my critics. It is now some time since I have accustomed myself to think with you, to put you as second in my ideas, and you would hardly believe what sweetness I find in again beginning, after this travelling interregnum, to write to you the life of my thought--for as to that of my heart I have no need; in spite of certain melancholy passages, you know well that souls high-poised change little. Like the summits I have just seen, the clouds may sometimes cover them, the day may light them variously; but their snow remains pure and dazzling.

I went yesterday to see Boulanger. The picture has come back to him from the Exhibition. He wants another three weeks to make the copy which I give to my mother, but the canvas will start for Berditchef early in June, so that you will get it before the statue.

Adieu, for to-day. I must examine my thoughts about the stage, and start upon a journey through the dramatic limbo, to find out to what I must give life or death. This affair is of the highest importance to my financial interests, and is very serious for my reputation as a writer. To-morrow I will close my letter and send it. If I failed to write to you during my journey you will see by the frequency of my letters that I am repairing omissions.

May 15.

This is the eve of my fête-day, still my poor fête-day, for my financial affairs are not beauteous. The law about the National Guard will oblige me to make a violent move,--that of living in the country two leagues from Paris; but this time I will live in a house by myself. I shall thus be obliged very seriously to work my sixteen hours a day for three or four months; but at least (if the friendly indorsements I gave to that poor stupid Werdet do not cause trouble) I am all but easy in mind on financial matters.

Adieu. You will receive still another letter this week. Many tender things to you and my remembrances to all about you. I reply this week to M. Hanski.

PARIS, May 20-29, 1837.

I write to you on rising, for this is my birthday, and I shall be all day long with my sister and mother.

_Mon Dieu!_ how I should like to have news of you; but I am deprived of it by my own fault, for you have put the _lex talionis_ into our correspondence by not writing to me when I do not write to you. But that is very wrong. I am a man, and subject to crises. At this moment, for instance, Werdet has gone into bankruptcy, and I am summoned to pay the indorsements I gave him out of kindness, just as he had given some to me; but with this difference, that I have paid all the notes he endorsed for me, and he has not paid those I guaranteed for him. So now I must work night and day to get out of the embarrassment into which I have put myself.

You could never believe how crushing this last misfortune is. My business agents all tell me now is the time to make a journey.

Make a journey!--when I owe to Girardin, for the "Presse," "La Haute Banque" and "La Femme Supérieure;" to the "Figaro," "César Birotteau," and "Les Artistes;" to Schlesinger, for the "Gazette Musicale," "Gambara;" and the end of the third _dizain_ to Werdet's capitalist,--six works, all clamoured for by the four persons to whom I owe them, and which represent fifteen thousand francs, ten thousand of which have already been paid.

To pay my most pressing debts. I took all the money my new publishers gave me, and they only begin their monthly payments to me when I give them two unpublished volumes 8vo. I need at least three months to finish the six works named above as due, then three months for their two new volumes; so that here I am for six months without resources and without any means of getting money. Happily, the brain is in good health, thanks to my journey.

This is a bad birthday. I have begun it by dismissing my three servants and giving up my apartment in the rue des Batailles [Chaillot], though I don't know whether the proprietor will be willing to cancel the lease. And finally, I have heroically resolved to live, if necessary, as I lived in the rue Lesdiguières, and to make an end to a secret misery which is dishonouring to the conscience.

Apropos of misery; I wrote you from Florence under the impression of distresses revealed by one of your countrymen. I beg you not to be vexed with me. Tell M. Hanski that in view of what has just happened to me, I have made the good resolution never to guarantee any one, either financially or morally. I beg him to regard all I said about that man as not said, and, inasmuch as I recommended him through your gracious lips, I beg him to do nothing in his favour. Do not accuse me of carelessness, but of ignorance. Later I will explain by word of mouth the reason of this change. The present makes me alter the past.

May 23.

Boulanger has written me a very free and easy, ungrateful letter, he will not make the copy he engaged to make, which distresses my mother and sister. The packer is at this moment making the case for the original; it leaves in a few days, and I shall address it, according to M. Hanski's letter, to MM. Halperine, at Brody, by diligence, direct; for neither the Rothschilds nor Rougemont de Löwenberg are willing to take charge of so cumbersome a parcel, and the colour-merchant who is packing the canvas, assures me that he has sent the most valuable pictures in this way. That's enough about my effigy. It is one of the finest things of the school. The most jealous painters have admired it. I am glad you will not be disappointed after waiting so long. I shall write you a little line the day I put the parcel in the diligence, and tell you the route it will take.

I have persuaded my mother to go and live two years in Switzerland at Lausanne. The sight of my struggle and that of my brother kills her. She sees us always working without pecuniary result, and she suffers dreadfully without having the material conflict which calls up strength.

If you knew all I have done for Boulanger you would feel the bitterness that fills my soul at this betrayal; for if he had not trifled with me for nearly a year you would have had the portrait six months ago, and it has now become ridiculous.

May 28.

Here I am, as you have often desired to see me. I have broken away from every one, and I go, in a few weeks, to a hidden garret, having blocked all the roads about me. I have been making a recapitulation of my work, and I have enough to do for four years, without, even then, completing all the series of the "Études de Mœurs." My monk's gown must not be a lie. I have but two things which make me live: work, and the hope of finding all my secret desires realized at the close of this toil. To whoever can live by those two potent ideas, life is still grand; and if I do not find again in the solitude to which I return that noble Madame de Berny, whom my sister Laure now calls my Josephine, at least she is not replaced by a Marie-Louise, but by glorious hope, the sole companion of a poet in travail. This journey, in refreshing my brain, rejuvenated me, and gave me back my force; I need it to accomplish my last efforts.

I have just finished a work which is called "Massimilla Doni," the scene of which is in Venice. If I can realize all my ideas as they present themselves in my brain it will be, assuredly, a book as startling as "La Peau de Chagrin," better written, more poetic possibly. I will not tell you anything about it. "Massimilla Doni" and "Gambara" are, in the "Études Philosophiques," the apparition of Music, under the double form of _execution_ and _composition_, subjected to the same trial as Thought in "Louis Lambert:" that is to say, the work and its execution are killed by the too great abundance of the creative principle,--that which dictated to me the "Chef-d'œuvre inconnu" in respect to painting; a study which I rewrote last winter. You will soon receive two Parts of the "Études Philosophiques" in which the work has been tremendous.

I have just finished a little study, entitled "Le Martyr calviniste," which with "Le Secret des Ruggieri" and "Les Deux Rêves" completes my study of the character of Catherine de' Medici. I have begun to write "La Femme Supérieure" for the "Presse," and in a few days I shall have finished "César Birotteau." All this in manuscript only; for, after composition, comes the battle of the proofs. You see that my ideas for the stage are again drowned in the flood of my obligations and my other work.

As soon as the above manuscripts are done I shall go into Berry, to Madame Carraud, and there finish the third _dizain_, begun alas! in Geneva and dated from Eaux-Vives and the dear Pré-l'Évêque!