Part 6

My dear wife of love, let Anna [her daughter] wear the little cross I shall have made of her pebbles; I shall engrave on the back, _Adoremus in eternum_. That is a delicious woman's motto, and you will never see the cross without thinking of him who says to you ceaselessly those divine words from the young girl's little talisman.

My darling Eva, here then is a new life delightfully begun for me. I have seen you, I have spoken to you; our persons have made alliance like our souls, and I have found in you all the perfections that I love. Every one has his, and you have realized all mine.

Bad one! did you not see in my eyes all that I desired. Be tranquil! all the desires that a woman who loves is jealous of inspiring, I have felt them; and if I did not tell you with what ardour I wished that you might come some morning it was because I was so stupidly lodged. But in Geneva, oh! my adored angel, I shall have more wits for our love than it takes for ten men to be witty.

I have found here everything _bad_ beyond my expectations. Those who owed me money and gave me their word to pay it have not done so. But my mother, whom I know to be embarrassed, has shown me sublime devotion. But, my dear flower of love, I must repair the folly of my journey, a folly I would renew to-morrow if you wrote me that you had twenty-four hours' liberty. So now I must work day and night. Fifteen days of happiness at Geneva to earn; those are the words that I find engraved inside my forehead, and they give me the proudest courage I have ever had. I think there will come more blood to my heart, more ideas to my brain, more strength to my being from that thought. Therefore I do not doubt that I shall do finer things inspired by that desire.

During the next month, therefore, excessive toil,--all to see you. You are in all my thoughts, in all the lines I write, in all the moments of my life, in all my being, in my hair that is growing for you.

After to-morrow, Monday, you will receive my letters only once a week; I shall post them punctually on Sundays; they will contain the lines I write to you every evening; for every evening before I go to bed, to sleep in your heart, I shall say to you my little prayer of love and tell you what I have been doing during the day. I rob you to enrich you. Henceforth there is nothing but you and work, work and you; sleep in peace, my jealous one. Besides, you will soon know that I am as exclusive as a woman, that I love as a woman, and that I dream all delicacies.

Yes, my adored flower, I have all the fears of jealousy about you; and behold, I have come to know that guardian of the heart, jealousy, of which I was ignorant because I was loved in a manner that gave no fears. _La dilecta_ lived in her chamber, and you, everybody can see you. I shall only be happy when you are in Paris or at Wierzchownia.

My celestial love, find an impenetrable place for my letters. Oh! I entreat you, let no harm come to you. Let Henriette be their faithful guardian, and make her take all the precautions that the genius of woman dictates in such a case.

I begin to-morrow, without delay, on "Privilège," for I must work. I am frightened about it. I do not wish to start for Geneva until I have returned Nodier's dinner, and I cannot help making it splendid. Thus I have to work as much for the necessary superfluities of luxury as for the superfluous necessity of my existence.

To-morrow, Monday, I begin a journal of my life, which will only stop during the happy days when my fortunate star permits me to see you. The gaps will show my happiness. May there be many of them! _Mon Dieu!_ how proud I am to be still of an age to appreciate all the treasures that there are in you, so that I can love you as a young man full of beliefs, a man who has a hand upon the future. Oh, my mysterious love! let it be forever like a flower buried beneath the snow, a flower unseen. Eva, dear and only woman whom the world contains for me, and who fills the world, forgive me all the little wiles [_ruses_] I shall employ to hide the secret of our hearts.

_Mon Dieu_, how beautiful I thought you, Sunday, in your pretty violet gown. Oh! how you touched me in all my fancies! Why do you ask me so often to tell you what I would fain express only in my looks? All such thoughts lose much in words. I would communicate them, soul to soul, by the flame of a glance only.

Now, my wife, my adored one, remember that whatever I write you, pressed by time, happy or unhappy, there is in my soul an immense love; that you fill my heart and my life, and that although I may not always express this love well, nothing can alter it; that it will ever flower, more beautiful, fresher, more graceful, because it is a true love, and a true love must ever increase. It is a beautiful flower, of many years, planted in the heart, which spreads its branches and its palms, doubling each season its clusters and its perfume; and you, my dear life, tell me, repeat to me, that nothing shall gall its bark or bruise its tender foliage, that it shall grow in our two hearts, beloved, free, treasured as a life within our lives--a single life! Oh! I love you! and what balm that love sheds all about me; I feel no sorrows more. You are my strength; you see it.

Well adieu, my cherished Eva, I must bid you adieu--no, not adieu, _au revoir_, and soon,--at Geneva on the 5th of November. If you are coming to Paris tell me so quickly.

After all, I have told you nothing of what I wished to say: how true and loving I thought you; how you answered to all the fibres of my heart, and even to my caprices. _Mon Dieu!_ often I was so absorbed, in spite of the general chatter I had to make, that I forgot to answer when you asked me if they did not bind books well in Saint-Petersburg.

Well, _à bientôt_. Work will make the time that separates us short. What beauteous days were those at Neufchâtel! We will make pilgrimages there some day. Oh, angel! now that I have seen you I can re-see you in thought.

Well, a thousand kisses full of my soul. Would I could enclose them. The sweetest of all, I dream of it still.

[Footnote 1: Here the tone of the letters changes, as told in the preface to this translation; and, as if to show its connection with the tale of the "Roman d'Amour," parts of the garbled letter in that book are given here in a foot-note in the French volume. From this time until March 11 all the letters (except twelve little notes written in Geneva) use the _tutoiement_. As it is impossible to put that form into readable English, the extreme familiarity of the tone of these letters is not given in the translation.--TR.]

PARIS, October 13, 1833.

My dearest love, it is now nearly three days since I have written to you, and this would be bad indeed if you were not my beloved wife. But work has been so enthralling, the difficulties are so great! Poor angel, I prefer to tell you the sweetness of which my soul is full for you than to recount to you my tribulations. As for my life it is unshakably fixed, as I have told you already, I believe. Going to bed at six after my dinner, rising at midnight, here I am, bending over the table that you know of, seated in this arm-chair that you can see, beside the fireplace which has warmed me for six years, and so working until midday. Then come rendezvous for business, the details of existence which must be attended to; often at four o'clock, a bath; five o'clock, dinner. And then I begin over again intrepidly, swimming in work, living in that white dressing-gown with the silk sash that you must know about. There are some authors who filch my time, taking from me an hour or two; but more often obligations and anxieties are fixtures; returns uncertain.

I am now in the midst of concluding an agreement which will echo through our world of envy, jealousy, and silliness; it will jaundice the yellow bile of those who have the audacity to want to walk in my shadow. A firm of rather respectable publishers buy the edition of the "Études de Mœurs au XIXe Siècle" for twenty-seven thousand francs; twelve volumes 8vo, including the third edition of the "Scènes de la Vie privée," the first of the "Scènes de la Vie de province," and the first of the "Scènes de la Vie Parisienne." Besides which, the printer, who owes me a thousand _écus_, pays them in the operation. This will give me ten thousand _écus_. That's enough to make all idlers, barkers, and the _gens de lettres_ roar! Here I am, barring what I owe to my mother, free of debt, and free in seven months to go where I please! If our _great affair_ succeeds I shall be rich; I can do what I wish for my mother, and have a pillow, a bit of bread, and a white handkerchief for my old days.

Alas! my beloved, to secure that treaty I have had to assume engagements, trot about, go out in the morning at nine o'clock after working all night. Nevertheless, I shall not be without anxiety as to the payments, for one always has to grant credit to publishers. My vigils, my work, all that there is most sacred in the world may be compromised. This publisher is a woman, a widow [Madame Charles Bêchet]. I have never seen her, and don't know her. I shall not send off this letter until the signatures are appended on both sides, so that my missive may carry you good news about my interests; but there are two other negotiations pending which are not less important, too long to explain to you, so that I shall only tell you results.

The "Aventures d'une idée heureuse" are one-quarter done, and I am well in the mood to finish them; "Eugénie Grandet," one of my most finished works, is half done. I am very content with it. "Eugénie Grandet" is like nothing that I ever did before. To invent "Eugénie Grandet" after Madame Jules--without vanity, that shows talent.

Did I tell you that our paper cannot be made at Angoulême? I received this answer yesterday from my friend in Angoulême. I am going there in a few days. I am obliged to rush to Saintes, the capital of Saintonge, to study the faubourg where Bernard de Palissy lived; he is the hero of the "Souffrances d'un Inventeur" ["David Séchard"], which I shall write very quickly at Angoulême, on my return from Saintes. Saintes is twelve leagues from Angoulême, farther on among the hills. I will bring you your _cotignac_ [quince marmalade] from Orléans myself. I have already got your peaches from Tours. I am waiting till my jeweller allows me to write to you openly, but Fossin is a king, a power, and when one wants things properly done one must kiss that devil's spur that men call patience.

I don't say that I received with great pleasure the letter in which you are no longer grieved, and in which you tell me the story of that monster of an Englishman. That's what husbands are; a lover would have wrung his neck. A duel? May the avenging God make him meet some inn servant girl who will render him diseased and cause him a thousand ills! Considering the nature of the gentleman, my wish will, I hope, be accomplished.

At least there is love in your letter, my dear love. The other was so gloomy. _Mon Dieu!_ how can you give way for a moment to doubt, or have a fear? _À propos_, friends have been here to tell me that the rumour is all about that I have been to Switzerland in search of a woman who positively came from Odessa. But happily other people say that I followed Madame de Castries, and others again that I have been to Besançon on a commercial enterprise. The author of the invention of the rendezvous is, I think, Gosselin, the publisher, who sent me a letter from Russia five months ago. And finally, others say that I never left Paris at all, but was put in Sainte Pélagie [prison], _where they saw me_. That is Paris.

My dear, idolized one, adieu! Nevertheless, I ought to tell you the thoughts on which I gallop for the last three days, the good little quarters of an hour which I give myself when I have done a certain number of pages. I rebehold the Val de Travers, I recommence my five days, and they fill the fifteen minutes with all their joys; the least little incidents come back to me. Sometimes a view of that fine forehead, then a word, or, better still, a flame lighted by Sev.... Oh! darling, you are adorably loving, but how stupid you are to have fears. No, no, my cherished Eva, I am not one of those who punish a woman for her love. Oh! I would I could remain half a day at your knees, my head on your knees, telling you my thoughts lazily, with delight, saying nothing sometimes, but kissing your gown. _Mon Dieu!_ how sweet would be the day when I could play at liberty with you, as a child with its mother. O my beloved Eva, day of my days, light of my nights, my hope, my adored, my all-beloved, my sole darling, when can I see you? Is it an illusion? Have I seen you? Have I seen you enough to say that I have seen you?

_Mon Dieu!_ how I love your rather broad accent, your mouth of kindness, of voluptuousness--permit me to say it to you, my angel of love!

I work night and day to go and see you for a fortnight in December. I shall cross the Jura covered with snow, but I shall think of the snowy shoulders of my love, my well-beloved. Ah! to breathe your hair, to hold your hand, to strain you in my arms! that's where my courage comes from. I have friends here who are stupefied at the fierce _will_ I am displaying at this moment. Ah! they don't know my darling [_ma mie_], my soft darling, her, whose mere sight robs pain of its stings! Yes, Parisina and her lover must have died without feeling the axe, as they thought of one another!

A kiss, my angel of earth, a kiss tasted slowly. Adieu. The nightingale has sung too long; I am allured to write to you, and Eugénie Grandet scolds.

Saturday, 12, midday.

The protocols are exchanged, our reflections made, to-morrow the signature. But to-morrow all may be changed. I have scarcely done anything to "Eugénie Grandet" and the "Aventures d'une idée." There are moments when the imagination jolts and will not go on. And then, "L'Europe littéraire" has not come. I am too proud to set foot there because they have behaved so ill to me. So, since my return I am without money. I wait. They ought to have come yesterday to explain matters; they did not. They ought to come to-day. At this moment the price of "Eugénie Grandet" is a great sum for me. So here I am, rebeginning my trade of anguish. Never shall I cease to resemble Raphael in his garret; I still have a year before me to enjoy my last poverty, to have noble, hidden prides.

I am a little fatigued; but the pain in my side has yielded to quiet sitting in my arm-chair, to that constant tranquillity of the body which makes a monk of me.

For the time being, my fancies are calmed; when there is famine in the house I don't think of my desires. My silver chafing-dishes are melted up. I don't mind that. No more dinners in October. But I enjoy so much in thought the things I have not, and these desires make them so precious when I do possess them. It is now two years that, month by month, I counted on a balance for my dishes, but they vanish. I have a crowd of little pleasures in that way. They make me love the little nest where I live; it is what makes me love you--a perpetual desire. Those who call me ill-natured, satirical, deceptive, don't know the innocence of my life, my life of a bird, gathering its nest twig by twig and playing with a straw before it uses it.

O dear confidant of my most secret thoughts, dear, precious conscience, will you some day know, you, the companion of love, how you are loved,--you, who, coming on faithful wing toward your mate, did not reject him after seeing him. How I feared that I might not please you! Tell me again that you liked the man, after liking his mind and heart--since the mind and heart have pleased you, I could not doubt it. My idol, my Eva, welcomed, beloved, if you only knew how all that you said and did laid hold upon me, oh! no, you would have no doubts, no dishonouring fears. Do not speak to me as you did, saying, "You will not love a woman who comes to you, who, who, who--" you know what I mean.

Angel, the angels are often forced to come down from heaven; we cannot go up to them. Besides, it is they who lift us on their white wings to their sphere, where we love and where pleasures are thoughts.

Adieu, you, my treasure, my happiness, you, to whom all my desires fly, you, who make me adore solitude because it is full of you.

Adieu, till to-morrow. At midday my people are coming for the agreement. This letter will wait to carry you good or bad news, but it will carry you so much love that you will be joyous.

Sunday, 13, nine o'clock.

My cherished love, my Eva, the business is completed! They will all burst with envy. My "Études de Mœurs au XIXe Siècle" has been bought for twenty-seven thousand francs. The publisher will make that ring. Since Chateaubriand's twenty-five volumes were bought for two hundred thousand francs for ten years there has not been such a sale. They take a year to sell....

Ah! here comes your letter. I read it.

My divine love, how stupid you are! Madame de S...!--I have quarrelled with her, have I, so that I never say a word to her; I will not even bow to her daughter? Alas! I have met her, Madame de S..., at Madame d'Abrantès' this winter. She came up to me and said: "_She_ is not here" (meaning Madame de Castries); "have you been so severe as you were at Aix?" I said, pointing to her lover, former lover of Mme. d'A., a Portuguese count, "But _he_ is here." The duchess burst out laughing.

Oh! my celestial angel, Madame de S...--if you could see her you would know how atrocious the calumny is.... Your Polish women saw too much of Madame de C... to pay attention to Madame de S... who was paying court to her. But I was at Aix with Madame de C... and we were dining together. As for the marquise, faith, the portrait you draw of her makes me die of laughing. There is something in it, but changed now. Fresh, yes; without heart, yes, at least I think so. She will always be sacred to me; but in the chatter of your Polish women there was just enough truth to make the slander pass.

My idolized love, no more doubts; never, do you understand? I love but you and can love none but you. Eva is your symbolic name. Better than that; I have never loved in the past as I feel that I love you. To you, all my life of love may belong.

Adieu, my breath. I would I could communicate to these pages the virtue of talismans, that you might feel my soul enveloping you. Adieu, my beloved. I kiss this page; I add a leaf of my last rose, a petal of my last jasmine. You are in my thought as the very base of intellect, the substance of all things.

"Eugénie Grandet" is enchanting. You shall soon have it in Geneva.

Well, adieu, you whom I would fain see, feel, press, adieu. Can I not find a way to press you? What impotent wishes imagination has! My dear light, I kiss you with an ardour, an embrace of life, an effusion of the soul, without example in my life.

My angel, I don't answer about the cry I gave apropos of Madame de C... and the son M... dying for his mother-in-law. To-morrow for all that. You must have laughed at my pretended savagery.

Do not put _poste restante_ any longer.

PARIS, Sunday, October 20, 1833.

What! my love; fears, torments? You have received, I hope, the first two letters that I wrote you after my return. What shall I do not to give you the slightest trouble, to make you clear skies? What! could you not have reckoned on a day's delay, an hour of weariness. _Mon Dieu! Mon Dieu!_ what shall I do?

I write to you every day; if you want to receive a letter every third day instead of every eighth day, say so, speak, order. I will do all not to let a single evil thought come into your heart.

If you knew the harm your letter has done me. You do not know me yet. All that is bad. But I pardon the little grief your letter has caused me, because it is one way of telling me you love me.

I have good news to tell you. I think that the "Études de Mœurs" will be a settled business by Tuesday next, and that I shall have as debtor one of the most solid firms of publishers in the market. That is something.

Forgive me, my Eva of love, if I talk to you of my mercantile affairs; but it is my tranquillity; it will no doubt enable me to go to Geneva. Alas! I may not go till December, because I cannot leave till I have finished the first part of these "Études."

Adieu; I must return to "Eugénie Grandet," who is going on well. I have still all Monday and a part of Tuesday.

Adieu, my angel of light; adieu, dear treasure; do not ill-treat me. I have a heart as sensitive as that of a woman can be, and I love you better or worse, for I rest without fear on your dear heart, and kiss your two eyes--all!

Adieu; _à demain_.

PARIS, Wednesday, October 23, 1833.

To you, my love, to you a thousand tendernesses. Yesterday I was running about all day and was so tired that I permitted myself to sleep the night through, so that I made my idol only a mental prayer. I went to sleep in thy dear thought just as, if married, I should have fallen asleep in the arms of my beloved.

_Mon Dieu!_ I am frightened to see how my life belongs to you; with what rapidity it turns to your heart. Your arteries beat as much for me as for yourself. Adored darling, what good your letters do me! I believe in you, don't you see, as I believe in my respiration. I am like a child in this happiness, like a _savant_, like a fool who takes care of tulips. I weep with rage at not being near you. I assemble all my ideas to develop this love, and I am here, watching ceaselessly that it shall grow without harm. Does not that partake of the child, the _savant_, and the botanist? Thus, my angel, commit no follies. No, don't quit your tether, poor little goat. Your lover will come when you cry. But you make me shudder. Don't deceive yourself, my dear Eve; they do not return to Mademoiselle Henriette Borel a letter so carefully folded and sealed without looking at it. There are clever dissimulations. Now, I entreat you, take a carriage that you may never get wet in going to the post. Besides, it is always cold in the rue du Rhône. Go every Wednesday, because the letters posted here on Sunday arrive on Wednesday. I will never, whatever may be the urgency, post letters for you on any day but Sunday. Burn the envelopes. Let Henriette scold the post-office man who delivered her letter, which was _poste restante_; but scold him laughing, for officials are rancorous. They would be capable of saying some Wednesday there were no letters, and then delivering them in a way to cause trouble. O my angel, misfortunes only come through letters. I beg you, on my knees, find a place, a lair, a mine to hide the treasures of our love. Do it, so that you can have no uneasiness.

Now, the Countess Potoçka, is she not that beautiful Greek, beloved by P..., married to a doctor, married to General de W..., and then to Count L... P...? If she is, don't confide to her a single thing about your love, my poor lamb without mistrust. If she has proofs, then own to her; but such an avowal must not be made until you cannot do otherwise, and then, make a merit of a forced confession. You must judge of the opportunity; but when I am in Geneva, you understand that people who run two ideas and who suppose evil when it does not exist, will know well how to divine when true.

Now, when I read your letters I am in Geneva, I see all. _Mon Dieu_, what grace and prettiness in your letters! Eh! my angel of love, I shall be in Geneva precisely when you choose. But calculate that it takes your letter four days to reach me, and four days for me to arrive; that makes eight days.