CHAPTER I

_Le Fils de l'Émigré_--I learn the news of my premature death--I am advised to take a voyage for prudence and health's sake--I choose Switzerland--Gosselin's literary opinion on that country--First effect of change of air--From Châlon to Lyons by a low train--The ascent of Cerdon--Arrival at Geneva

On the morning of 7 June, Harel came to my house. "Come," he said, "dear friend, you must lose no time. Peace is re-established; as is the case after all great upheavals, there is going to be a reaction in favour of the theatres. People must forget the cholera and the riotings; the cholera has died a natural death; the insurrection is killed; which proves that Louis-Philippe is stronger than Broussais. Where have you got to in _Le Fils de l'Émigré_?"

"My dear friend, three acts are done."

"Done ... written out?"

"Done and written out! but I declare to you that, for the moment, I am unequal to set to it again. I am broken down with fatigue, consumed with fever and have lost all appetite!"

"Finish _Le Fils de l'Émigré,_ and then go a journey.... You will make prodigious sums of money this summer; you can very well take a little rest!"

"Have you any money to give me?"

"How much do you want?"

"A thousand francs or so ... two perhaps ... and authority to draw upon you for as much."

"Give me my two last acts and I will give you the money and a draft."

"You know I think it execrable."

"What?"

"_Le Fils de l'Émigré._"

"Bah! You told us the same about _La Tour de Nesle...._ Georges is delighted with the prologue, and Provost also."

"All right, when you go, ask Anicet to come and see me.... I will try to do my best."

Anicet came to me in a quarter of an hour's time. He is a conscientious worker and an indefatigable hunter-up of things; no one could do his part more generously in a collaboration. I have already said that he brought me the plan of _Térésa_ almost entirely done. I gave him the idea of _Angèle_; and, at the same time, it was he who discovered not _Muller médecin_ but _Muller malade de la poitrine,_ namely, the profoundly melancholy side of the work. The idea of _Le Fils de l'Émigré_ was his; the execution--specially in the three first acts--was entirely mine. We did the two last acts together during 7 and 8 June.

On 9 June I read in a Legitimist newspaper that I had been taken with arms upon me in the affair at the Cloître Saint-Merry, judged by court-martial during the night and shot at three in the morning. They deplored the premature death of a young author of such hopeful promise! The news wore such a stamp of truth; the details of my execution, that I had, by the way, borne with the greatest courage, were so circumstantial; the information was derived from such a good source that, for the moment, I had my doubts and felt myself all over. For the first time the newspaper said something nice of me; but then the editor believed I was dead. I sent him my card and wrote on it, "_Avec tous mes remercîments._"

As my messenger went out, another came in, bringing a letter from Charles Nodier. It was couched in these terms:--

"MY DEAR ALEXANDRE,--I have at this moment read in a newspaper that you were shot on 6 June at three in the morning. Be so good as to tell me if it will prevent you from coming to dine to-morrow at the Arsenal, with Dauzats, Taylor, Bixio and in fact our usual friends.--Your very good friend, CHARLES NODIER

"who will be delighted at the opportunity to ask you for news of the other world."

I made answer to my beloved Charles that I had just read the same news in the same paper; that I was not sure myself whether I was alive; but that, body or shade, I would be with him next day at the hour named. However, as I had not eaten much for the last six weeks, I added that it would be more a question of my shadow than my body; I was not dead, but distinctly very ill! Moreover, I had been warned by an aide-de-camp of the king that the possibility of my arrest had been seriously discussed; I was advised to go and spend a month or two abroad, then to return to Paris, and on my return no more would be said. My doctor gave me the same advice in hygiene as His Majesty's aide-de-camp gave me in politics. I had always had a great desire to visit Switzerland. It is a magnificent country, the backbone of Europe, the source of three great rivers which flow to the north, east and south of our continent. Further it is a republic, and, small as it was, I was not at all sorry to see a republic. Moreover I had a notion I should be able to turn my travels to account.

I went in search of Gosselin, to whom I offered to write a couple of volumes on Switzerland. Gosselin shook his head: according to him, Switzerland was a played-out country about which there was no more to write; everybody had been there. It was in vain I told him that if everybody had been there everybody would go, and that, supposing those who had been there would not read my book, I should at all events be read by those who were going; but I could not succeed in convincing him. I, therefore, decided to regard the two or three months I was to spend in Switzerland as time wasted. I sent Harel the last two acts of the _Fils de l'Émigré_; he gave me the 3000 francs promised, and I received a draft to draw upon him for another 2000 francs. At last, provided with a proper passport, I started on the night of 21 July.[1]

As will be well understood, I have no intentions of beginning over again here my _Impressions de Voyage:_ I will only tell in my Memoirs what has not found a place in my first narrative, it will not be much for frankness is one of my qualities: it has made me many enemies, but I do not thank God any the less for having given me this virtue. The reader may, then, make himself easy: I am going to take him as rapidly as possible over the route on which, in my _Impressions de Voyage,_ I was obliged to stop at every step.

The day after my departure from Paris, I arrived at Auxerre. The change of air began to produce its effect upon my health; at Auxerre, seated at the table where the diligence dinner was served, I regained a little appetite. An enormous dish of cray-fish drove away all my doubts! I ate, so I should not be long before I was better. I slept at Auxerre, wishful to give the good fairy we call Sleep time to complete his work. The ancients called Sleep the brother of Death; but, exact as they were in their definitions, in my opinion, they are ungrateful to Sleep: it is the restorer of strength; the source whence youth derives its energy, and health conceals its treasury. Ah, good gentle sleep of youth! how well one feels that thou art life! Lose love, lose fortune, even hope, if only sleep comes: for the time being, it will return to you all that you have lost. _For the moment_, I say, indeed; but it is exactly by means of the sorrow you take up again directly you open your eyes that you understand how sweet and potent sleep is!

We stopped afresh at Châlon. A friend who was there suggested to me that, instead of the urban curiosities, the great cellars like catacombs, we should visit a freak of nature and a ruin made by time: the Reaux-Chignon and the château de la Roche-Pot. I have described the one and told about the other; it will all be found in my _Impressions de Voyage._ The drought had interrupted the service of steamboats for some time; however, on returning to Châlon, we learnt that a boat drawing eighteen inches of water only was going to attempt the voyage. We embarked next day about noon, and reached Mâcon, indeed, but it was impossible to go further: it was too much to expect eighteen inches of water of the Saône. Places in the carriages had been reserved for three days past. I was very simple-minded at that period. Alas! I must say I have kept that silly characteristic intact. Boatmen came seeing my predicament, and as the wind was favourable, proposed to row me to Lyons in six hours. I allowed them eight; they deemed there was no need for such an addition of time, and that I had been too generous. Consequently, we settled the fare, and they took me to a big boat in which a dozen innocents like myself were packed together. Among them were three or four who had a double right to this title--some poor babies of five or six months old, accompanied by their nurses. I made a grimace when I saw the company into which I was brought; but bah! six hours are soon passed! It was one o'clock in the afternoon, by seven we should be at Lyons. But, instead of starting at one, we did not leave till three. Our boatmen thought us too comfortable, seated on top of one another as we were, and they probably counted on putting a second row across us. Luckily, they did not succeed. After two hours of fruitless waiting, they at last unmoored. The wind kept the promise it had made us on starting pretty much for an hour, and during that hour we made a league or a league and a half. Then the wind fell. I had thought that, should occasion arise, our boatmen would apply themselves to the oars; but no! we descended the Saône at the same rate as a drowned dog which floated twenty paces from us! Next day, at three in the afternoon, just at the same time as our drowned dog, which kept us company faithfully, we recognised the île Barbe. We reached Lyons fifty minutes later. My health must have been already much stronger to withstand the night I had just passed on the Saône. We stayed three days in Lyons, and, on the third, at three in the afternoon, we took carriage for Geneva. At six in the morning the conductor opened the carriage door, saying, "If the gentlemen would like to do a bit of the way on foot they will have time." It was an invitation offered us by our horses who found that the carriage was quite heavy enough to pull up the incline of Cerdon without us. This climb begins the first slopes of the Alps; it leads to the fort de l'Écluse, posted astride the road, under the arch of which they scrutinise passports. After three hours' walk, on coming from Saint-Genis the conductor, whom I had begged to tell me the exact moment when I got into Switzerland, turned round towards me and said--

"Monsieur, you are no longer in France."

"How far are we from Geneva?"

"An hour and a half's walk."

"Then let me get out and I will walk the remainder of the way."

The conductor complied with my request and, at the end of an hour and a half's walk, I entered the birthplace of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and of Pradier.

[Footnote 1: See Appendix.]