Part 38

I have taken my mother to Poissy, to a very agreeable _pension_. I took her by the railroad, by which one goes very fast. My heart bled in taking her there; I, who have dreamed of making her a comfortable end of life with a fine fortune, and who advance so little that my poverty is becoming, as I told you, burlesque. It has taken more diplomacy to get wood to burn this month than it would take to negotiate a treaty of peace between France and any power you please ten years hence. And the comedy gets on but slowly; it is like my portrait, which I was told yesterday had arrived, but the despatching agent did not know in what town! I hope it is Brody. God grant the same may not happen to my comedy! What I perceive most at this moment is the immense judgment that is needed for the poet of comedy. Every word must be a verdict pronounced on the manners and morals of an epoch. The subjects chosen must not be thin or paltry. The poet must go to the bottom of things; he must steadily embrace the whole social state and judge it under a pleasing form. There are a thousand things to say, but only the good things must be said. This work confounds me. I need not say that in saying this I am considering works of genius; for as to the thirty thousand plays given to us in the last forty years, nothing would be easier to write. I am absorbed by this comedy; I think of nothing else, and each thought extends the difficulties. It is not only the doing of it, there is also the representing of it, and it may fail. I am in despair at not having gone to Wierzchownia and shut myself up this winter to keep to this work in your cenobitic life. I should have done like Beaumarchais, who ran to read his comedy, scene by scene, to women, and rewrote it by their advice.

I am now at a moment of extreme depression. Coffee does nothing for me; it does not bring to the surface the inner man, who stays in his prison of flesh and bones. My sister is ill, and when Laure is ill the universe seems to me topsy-turvy. My sister is all to me in my poor existence. I am not working with facility. I do not believe in what they call my talent. I spend nights in despairing.

"La Maison Nucingen" is there in proofs before me, and I cannot touch it; yet it is the last link in my chain, and with three days' work I should break it. The brain will not stir. I have taken two cups of clear coffee; it is just as if I had drunk water. I am going to try a change of place and go to Berry, to Madame Carraud, who has been expecting me these two years; every three months I have said that I am going to see her. My little house will not be ready till December; the workmen will be in it until my return.

To crown all troubles, no letters from you. You might write to me every week, but you scarcely write every fortnight. You have much more time than I have, in your steppe, where there are neither symphonies of Beethoven, asphalt boulevards, operas, newspapers, books to write, proofs to correct, nor other miseries, and where you have a forest of a hundred thousand acres. _Dieu!_ if you had that near Paris you would have an income of two millions, and your forest would be worth fifty millions. All is in juxtaposition; I am here, and you are there.

November 12

Reparation to the poor miss. She drinks nothing but water; it was my unexpected visit that intoxicated her. I retract all I wrote to you, and leave it for my punishment; but you will not think me the worse or the better for it.

I am about to start for Marseille, to go to Corsica and from there to Sardinia. I shall try to be back the first week in December. It is an affair of fortune of the highest importance that takes me there, and I can only tell you about it if it fails; for if it succeeds I must whisper it into the tube of your ear. It is now three weeks since I began to think of this journey; but the money for it lacks and I do not know where to find it. I need about twelve hundred francs to go and get a "yes" or a "no" about a fortune, a rapid fortune, to be made in a few months.[1]

[Footnote 1: For the amusing history of this chimera, see his sister's account of it; "Memoir of Balzac," pp. 103-107.--TR.]

_Addio, cara._ Here are three letters that I have written you against your one. I have never seen Provence or Marseille, and I promise myself a little diversion on this trip. I shall go by the mail-cart to the sea; the rest of the way by steamboat; so that I hope to have finished my errand in fifteen days, for no one must perceive my absence. My publishers would grumble.

The tontine is withdrawn; my works will appear purely and simply in parts, with steel engravings inserted in the text. So we fall back once more into the rut of publications such as have been made for the last hundred years in France.

November 13.

My comedy has begotten a preliminary. It is impossible to make "Prudhomme parvenu" without first showing "Prudhomme se mariant;" all the more because "Le Mariage de Prudhomme" is excellent comedy and full of comic situations. So here I am, with eight acts on my hands instead of five.

November 14.

Adieu; I must throw myself into unexpected labour which may give me an _arachnitis_. I am offered twenty thousand francs for "César Birotteau" by December 10. It is one volume and a half to do, but my poverty has made me promise it. I must work twenty-five nights and twenty-five days. So, to you all tender things. I must rush to Sèvres and find the manuscript already begun and the proofs of the work. There are only nine _feuilles_ done, and forty-six are needed; thirty-five to do. There's not a minute to be lost. Adieu, I must be twenty-five days without writing to you.

PARIS, December 20, 1837.

I have just finished, as I promised to do, and I wrote you hastily in my last letter I should do, "César Birotteau." I had to do at the same time "La Maison Nucingen" for the "Presse." That is enough to tell you that I am worn-out, in a state of inexpressible annihilation. It requires a certain effort to write to you, and I do it under the inspiration of horrible fears and anxieties. I have heard nothing from you since your number 34, dated October 6. You have never left me so long without news of you, and you could scarcely believe how, in the midst of my work, this silence has alarmed me, for I know it is not without some reason that you have failed to write to me.

To-day I can only write in haste, to tell you that I am not dead with fatigue or inflammation of the brain; that "César Birotteau" and the third _dizain_ are both out; that "La Maison Nucingen," finished a month ago, will soon appear; that I am about to finish "Massimilla Doni;" that the edition called "Balzac Illustrated" will appear, and will be an astounding thing in typography and engraving; that for twenty-five days I have only slept a few hours; that I have been within an ace of apoplexy; that I shall never again undertake such a feat of strength; that my cot at Sèvres is nearly built; and that you can now always address your letters to "Madame Veuve Durand, 13 rue des Batailles," because I am still obliged to stay there to finish certain pressing works which need constant communication between the printing-office and me. My house will not be ready till February 15 at the earliest.

My portrait makes my head swim. I don't know precisely where it is. In any case, write to M. Halperine, who ought to have it, or could reclaim it on the road between Strasburg and Brody. M. Hanski may not know that the Rothschilds do not do business with the Halperines, and their couriers do not take charge of such large packages.

I have no interesting news to give you, for I have not left my study and proofs since my last letter. Heine came to see me and told me all about the L... affair. It goes beyond anything I had imagined, as much for the illness as for the family details. The English lords are infamous. Koreff and Wolowski are demigods; I do not think a million could pay them. We will talk of this later in the chimney-corner.

Perhaps you have been away; perhaps you have left Wierzchownia to nurse your sister. My imagination rushes through all the possibilities in the circumference of suppositions till it reaches the absurd. What has happened to you? I see no case in which you would leave me without one word from you or another. Adieu. Find here the expression of an old and tried friendship and the effusions of an affection that resembles no other. I cannot write more, for I am in such a state of exhaustion that nothing can better prove my attachment than this very letter. Nevertheless, I must, in a few days, resume my yoke of misery. Then I can write to you more at length and tell you all that I keep in my heart.

Remember me to all of yours, and beg M. Hanski to claim the portrait from the Halperines, so that they in turn may inquire for it all along the line. I have been to see the shippers here, and I shall sue them if you do not get the picture within a fortnight. Therefore, answer me by a line on this subject.

Your devoted

NORÉ.

VI.

LETTERS DURING 1838.

CHAILLOT, January 20, 1838.

I am relieved of anxiety. I have your numbers 36 and 37. Number 35 has not reached me, remember that. Number 34 is dated October 6; number 36 December 10. So you did not leave me from October 6 to December 10 without a letter. Now, as I only receive at the end of January the 36 and 37, you can imagine how uneasy I have been, left _two_ months without a word!

These two letters are pricked in every direction, stigmata of the fears inspired by the plague, and perhaps it is to an earlier fumigation that I owe the loss of number 35. In any case, I ought to tell you of this loss, as it explains the doleful letter I wrote you last. To me it was a grief that consumed all others--your silence. I am the object of such atrocious calumnies that I ended by thinking that you had been told of them, and had believed those monstrous things: that I had eaten human flesh, that I had married an Ellsler, or a fishwoman, that I was in prison, that--that--etc. I have, perhaps, enemies in the Ukraine. Distrust all that you hear of me from any but myself, for you have almost a journal of my life.

Now, as to the affair that takes me to the Mediterranean, it is neither marriage nor anything adventurous or silly. It is a serious and scientific affair about which it is impossible to say a word because I am pledged to secrecy. Whether it turns out well or ill, I risk nothing but a journey, which will always be a pleasure or a diversion for me.

You ask me how it is that, knowing all, observing and penetrating all, I can be duped and deceived. Alas! would you like me if I were never duped, if I were so prudent, so observing that no misfortunes ever happened to me? But, leaving the question of the heart aside, I will tell you the secret of this apparent contradiction. When a man becomes such an accomplished whist-player that he knows at the fifth card played where all the others are, do you think he does not like to put science aside and watch how the game will go by the laws of chance? Just so, dear and pious Catholic, God knew in advance that Eve would succumb, and he let her do so! But, putting aside that way of explaining the thing, here is another which you will like better. When, night and day, my strength and my faculties are strained to the utmost to compose, write, render, paint, remember; when I take my flight slowly, painfully, often wounded, across the mental fields of literary creation, how can I be at the same moment on the plane of material things? When Napoleon was at Essling he was not in Spain. Not to be deceived in life, in friendships, in business, in relations of all kinds, dear countess secluded and solitary, one must do nothing else than be purely and simply a financier, a man of the world, a man of business. I do see plainly enough that persons deceive me, and are going to do so, that such a man is betraying me, or will betray me, and depart carrying with him a portion of my fleece. But at that moment when I feel it, foresee it, know it, I am forced to go and fight elsewhere. I see it when I am being carried away by some necessity of a work or event, by a sketch that would be lost if I did not complete it. Often I am building a cot in the light of my burning houses. I have neither friends nor servants; all desert me; I know not why--or rather, I do know it too well; because no one likes or serves a man who works night and day, who does nothing for their profit, who stays where he is and obliges them to go to him, and whose power, if power there be, will have no fruition for twenty years; it is because that man has the personality of his toil, and that all personality is odious if it is not accompanied by power. Now that is enough to convince you that one must be _an oyster_ (do you remember that?) or an angel to cling to such great human rocks. Oysters and angels are equally rare in humanity. Believe me, I see myself and things as they are; never did any man bear a more cruel burden than mine. Do not be surprised, therefore, to see me attach myself to those beings and those things that give me courage to live and go onward. Never blame me for taking the cordial that enables me to get one stage farther on my way.

It is twelve years that I have been saying of Walter Scott what you have now written to me. Beside him Lord Byron is nothing, or almost nothing. But you are mistaken as to the plot of "Kenilworth." To the minds of all makers of romance, and to mine, the plot of that work is the grandest, most complete, most extraordinary of all; the book is a masterpiece from this point of view, just as "St. Ronan's Well" is a masterpiece for detail and patience of finish, as the "Chronicles of the Canongate" are for sentiment, as "Ivanhoe" (the first volume, be it understood) is for history, "The Antiquary" for poesy, and "The Heart of Midlothian" for profound interest. All these works have each their especial merit, but genius shines throughout them all. You are right; Scott will be growing greater when Byron is forgotten, except for his form and his powerful inspiration. Byron's brain never had any other imprint than that of his own personality; whereas the whole world has posed before the creative genius of Scott, and has there, so to speak, beheld itself.

As for what is called "Balzac Illustrated," do not be anxious; it is the whole of my work, except the "Contes Drolatiques." It is the work called "Études Sociales."

M. Hanski is very kind to imagine that women fall in love with authors. I have, and shall have nothing to fear on that score. I am not only invulnerable, but secure from attack. Reassure him. The Englishwoman of the times of Crébillon the younger is not the Englishwoman of to-day.

I am now beginning to work at my plays and at the "Mémoires d'une jeune Mariée," or else at "Sœur Marie des Anges;" those, for the time being, are my chosen subjects. But from one moment to another all may change. The continuation of "Illusions Perdues" ("Un Grand homme de Province à Paris") tempts me much; that, with "La Torpille," could be finished this year. How many stones I bring and heap up!

The text of the illustrated edition is revised with so much care that it ought to be considered the only one existing; it differs much from all preceding editions. This typographic seriousness has reacted on the language, and I have discovered many additional faults and follies; so that I earnestly desire that the number of subscribers may enable the publication to be continued, which will give me the opportunity to succeed in doing my best for my work, so far as purity of language is concerned.

The arrival of the _cassolette_ gave me as much pleasure as it did you; it is as if I had sent you two different things. I now hope that by this time Boulanger's portrait has reached you. Brullon, the colour and canvas dealer whom all the great artists here employ, and who despatched the case, is in despair; we consult each other as to going to law about it; but as such a suit would bring M. Hanski's name before the public, and the newspapers would get hold of it and make their thousand and one calumnious comments,--for my name would whet their appetite,--we keep to the line of correspondence. Brullon has sent thousands of pictures to all parts of the world, and nothing of the kind ever happened before. It is true that the case was sent by waggon, because, as the canvas was not rolled, its size would not allow of its going by diligence. You could not believe what errands, steps, and tramps that luckless picture has necessitated; but I will not say more about them, lest I make the portrait disagreeable to you. I have written to-day to the MM. Halperine at Brody to know if, when my letter reaches them, they have the picture. If not, we may have to come to an arbitration here on the matter.

The great Tronchin cured the headaches of young girls which you mention, by making them eat a roll soaked in milk on waking; the thing is innocent enough to try.

Be very sure that you will know all I do at the moment of doing it, or as soon as I can manage it. I wrote you of my departure for Sion a year ago, at this time, or very near it. I did not leave Paris a month ago, after finishing "César Birotteau." As I had been twenty-five days without sleep, I have now been a month employed in sleeping sixteen hours a day and in doing nothing the other eight. I am renewing my brain to spend it again immediately. Financial crises are dreadful; they prevent me from amusing myself; for society is expensive, and I am not sure whether I may not, within a week or ten days, go to Sardinia. But I will not start without letting you know.

I never read the newspapers, so that I was ignorant of what you tell me about Jules Janin. Some persons had casually said to me that the papers, and Janin especially, had greatly praised me in connection with a little play taken from "La Recherche de l'Absolu" which failed. But I am, as you know, indifferent to both the blame and the eulogy of those who are not the elect of my heart; and especially so to the opinions of the press and the crowd; therefore I know nothing to tell you about the conversion of a man I neither like nor esteem, and one who will never obtain anything from me. As I do not know his friends or his enemies, I am ignorant of his motives for this praise, which, from what you tell me of it, seems treacherous.

Every time that you hear it said that I have failed on points of honour and personal self-respect, do not believe it.

You have misunderstood me; I like much that a woman should write and study; but she ought to have the courage, as you have, to burn her works. Sophie is the daughter of Prince Koslevski, whose marriage was never recognized; you must have heard of that very witty diplomatist, who is with Prince Paskevitch in Warsaw. The English lady is the Countess Guidoboni-Visconti, at whose house I met the bearer of the _cassolette_. Mrs. Somerville is the illustrious mathematician, daughter of Admiral Fairfax, who is now in the Russian service. I send you her autograph, for she is one of the great lights of modern science, and parliament has given her a national pension.

You will know from others that the Italian Operahouse was burned down at the same time as the Royal Exchange in London and the Imperial Palace at Saint-Petersburg. I will tell you nothing of all that. The winter is severe in Paris; we do not know how to protect ourselves from cold,--careless Frenchmen that we are.

Monday, January 22.

Four Parts of "La Peau de Chagrin" have appeared, this frosty winter. In spite of the cold I meet in the Champs Élysées _fiacres_ driven slowly along with their blinds down, which shows that people love each other in Paris in spite of everything; and those _fiacres_ seem to me as magnificently passionate as the two lovers whom Diderot surprised in a pouring rain, bidding each other good-night in the street beneath a gutter!

Do not end your letters gloomily, as, for instance, by thinking that I shall never visit Wierzchownia; I shall come soon, believe me; but I am not the master of circumstances, which are peculiarly hard upon me. It would take too long to explain to you how my new editors interpret the agreement which binds me to them, and this letter is already very long.

After idling a little for a month, going two or three times to the Opera, twice to La Belgiojoso, and often to La Visconti (speaking Italianly), I am now beginning, once more my twelve or fifteen hours' work a day. When my house is built, when I am well installed there, when I have earned a certain number of thousand francs, then I am pledged to myself as a reward to go and see you, not for one or two weeks, but for two or three months. You shall work at my comedies, and we, M. Hanski and I, will go to the Indies astride of those _smoking_ benches you tell me of.

I don't know what "César Birotteau" is. You will tell me before I am in a state to make myself into the public that reads it. I have the deepest disgust for it, and I am ready to curse it for the fatigues it has caused me. If my ink looks pale to you, it is because it freezes every night in my study.

You have heard about La Belgiojoso and Mignet. The princess is a woman much outside of other women, little attractive, twenty-nine years old, pale, black hair, Italian-white complexion, thin, and playing the vampire. She has the good fortune to displease me, though she is clever; but she tries for effect too much. I saw her first five years ago at Gérard's; she came from Switzerland, where she had taken refuge. Since then, she has recovered her fortune through influence of the Foreign Office, and now holds a salon, where people say good things. I went there one Saturday, but that will be all.