Chapter 2

Surely it would have been better if he had never gone to Paris, but, like his friend Mistral, had remained in Provence and devoted his essentially poetic genius to an expression of the spirit of the south. His keenly sensitive nature was too delicate for intercourse with the virility of a Zola or the subtlety of a Goncourt. Paris made of him a realist, and the world lost by the transformation.

Daudet's love for his native land was intense. Its images were ever present to him; its poetry haunted him throughout his life. He urged young men ambitious of literary laurels to remain in their native provinces, to draw their inspiration from the soil, confident that something great and beautiful would result. Why did he not take for himself the counsel he so incessantly offered to others? An untiring curiosity which accompanied a remarkable acuteness of all the senses, and an emotional and intellectual receptivity which rendered him quickly and profoundly impressionable, equipped Daudet to express the poetic spirit of the south in its epic as well as its lyric qualities. He was aware of this himself. "I believe that I shall carry away with me," he said, "many curious observations on my race, its virtues, its faults".[1] And in speaking of the "Lettres de mon moulin," the only volume of his works in which his southern nature is given free rein, he says many years after its publication, after he had written his best novels, "That is still my favorite book."

[Footnote 1: Léon Daudet, "Alphonse Daudet," p. 183; read the whole chapter. "En lisant Eugénie de Guérin, je m'écrie: 'Pourquoi n'avoir pas tous vécu chez nous, dans nos coins?' Comme nos esprits y auraient gagné au point de vue de l'originalité au sens étymologique du mot, c'est-à-dire vertu d'origine."--"Notes sur la vie," p. 141.]

Daudet's remarkable power of observation was innate. From his youth he exercised this instinct and carried a notebook in which he set down impressions, studies, and sketches of characters and scenes. These notebooks proved to be of inestimable value to the realist; and the natural inclination to seek the naked truth, to which they bear witness, strengthened the determination of the postbellum Daudet to enter the ranks of the sociological novelists. So far as possible, he borrowed every detail of character and environment from real life; almost all his characters represent real persons whom he studied with a view of using them in his books. Daudet's is a microscopic, notebook realism quite different from the universal verity of Balzac, but there are many pages prompted by an exquisite sympathy or a violent passion in which the indomitable personality of the author breaks through the impassiveness imposed by the accepted masters of the craft. Sadness is the prevailing tone in his work, the sort of sadness that proceeds from pity. Where sadness does not dominate in Daudet, irony takes its place. These two qualities, sadness which is inspired by pity for human suffering and irony which betrays impatience with human folly, these two qualities which are the heart and soul of Daudet's work are the enemies of that impassiveness which is the indispensable attitude of the realist, and which Daudet tried in vain to acquire.

Paris, the war, his intercourse with Flaubert and Goncourt and Zola, were the influences, then, that transformed Daudet, most easily susceptible to impressions from without. The Daudet of the great novels is not the real Daudet, however; the real Daudet is the author of "Les Amoureuses," of the "Lettres de mon moulin," and of "Tartarin de Tarascon."

But even in the "Tartarin" series he is not entirely himself. The pure stream of his native simplicity and naïveté is already tinged with the worldly-wiseness of the Parisian. In the "Lettres de mon moulin" the writer is still in sympathy with his native land, while in the earliest of the "Tartarin" series, "Tartarin de Tarascon," there is already a spirit of disdainful raillery which Daudet learned in Paris. Tarascon was piqued when "Tartarin de Tarascon" appeared. Indeed, there is more than a little in the book that may well offend local pride.

In "Numa Roumestan" the satire is still less sympathetic and less good-natured. Numa is utterly detestable. He is a visionary; we readily forgive such a weakness, and we are amused by this characteristic trait of the south in Bompard and Tartarin. These two are visionaries and liars; they are cowards too, boastful and conceited. But they have never had the happiness of others in their hands. If a true child of the south, such as Tartarin or Bompard, were placed in a position of trust, he would not prove equal to the occasion and the result would be a Numa Roumestan. That is Daudet's verdict, and certainly his decision is not flattering to the south. Is this the decision of the better Daudet? is it not a Parisian Daudet, whose sympathy for his native land has been warped by the play of Parisian mockery on his sensitive, easily convinced nature?

It is precisely in "Numa Roumestan," where he is making his most complete study of the character of the southerner, that Daudet is most pessimistic. Le Quesnoy, the worthy northerner, deceives his wife as does Numa, the lying southerner. The spirit of the novel is epitomized in such sentiments as "Joie de rue, douleur de maison," "Au nord au midi--tous pareils, traîtres et parjures," "Grand homme pour tout le monde excepté pour sa femme." A decided pessimism pervades the great novels. Optimistic Daudet is frequently said to be. He was truly so by nature, he is so in the "Lettres de mon moulin" and in all his work before the war, but his pessimism is unquestionable in the great novels.

Surely nature did not intend Daudet to become a pessimist; he loved mankind, he had many devoted friends and no enemies. He carried happiness wherever he went. The attic of Auteuil, the rendezvous of the Goncourt group, is dark and gloomy. A serious, mirthless band surrounds the armchair of the patriarch. The door opens and Daudet enters. Old Goncourt rises to greet him: "Eh bien! mon petit, ça va?" "Assez bien, mon Goncourt" is the reply. The terrible malady has already seized the younger man, but he still radiates life and cheer: his lightness of heart dispels the gravity of the company; little by little his animation is communicated to them all, and the attic resounds with peals of laughter.

It was always so. The sympathy of Daudet, the man, was unfailing; his pity For the weak, his love for his family and friends, his hatred of villainy, were boundless. He delighted in little acts of charity the source of which remained unknown to the world and even to the recipient.

"My father said to me again and again," Léon Daudet tells us, "I should like, after I have accomplished my task, to set myself up as a merchant of happiness. My reward would be in my success!" This longing, so entirely characteristic of the man, is manifest everywhere in his earlier work, only rarely in the great novels; unfortunately the great novels were his "task."

If only he had continued as he began, if only he had remained the poet of the "Lettres de mon moulin"; if only he had not been led astray by his "task," he might have brought to the world of readers that happiness which he brought to his few friends in the attic of Auteuil.

* * * * *

We are told the story of the publication of "Tartarin de Tarascon" [1] by Daudet himself in his "Trente Ans de Paris." It began to appear in the _Petit Moniteur universel_, but did not appeal to the readers of this popular newspaper.

[Footnote 1: The other books of the "Tartarin" series are inferior to "Tartarin de Tarascon" (1872). "Tartarin sur les Alpes" (1885) relates the adventures of the hero while climbing the great mountains of Switzerland in order to prove that he is worthy of remaming P.C.A. (_Président du Club Alpin de Tarascon._) In "La Défense de Tarascon" (1886, only a dozen pages long) we have a characteristic picture of the city preparing to resist the German invasion. "Port-Tarascon" (1890) is the last and poorest of the series. Tartarin leads his compatriots in a colonizing expedition to the South Seas, and then brings them home again. Finally, in self-inflicted exile, "across the bridge" in Beaucaire (cf. note to _13_ 28), the great man dies.]

Publication was interrupted after some ten installments, and the work was carried to the _Figaro_, by whose more aristocratic clientele literary irony was not unappreciated. The hero was first called _Chapatin_, then _Barbarin_ (cf. note to _56_ 12), and finally _Tartarin_. "Tartarin de Tarascon" is a _galéjado, une plaisanterie, un éclat de rire_. Continuing Daudet says: "Only one who was raised in southern France, or knows it thoroughly, can appreciate how frequently the Tartarin type is to be met there, and how under the generous sun of Tarascon, which warms and electrifies, the natural drollery of mind and imagination is led astray into monstrous exaggerations, in form and dimension as various as bottle gourds."

Daudet, like our Dickens, succeeded in producing characters invested with such reality that in the minds of readers they become veritable beings. Of all his creations Tartarin is the most widely known, and the world's conception of a French southerner is derived from the portrait of this hero.

As is usual in the works of Daudet, the character of Tartarin is not wholly fictitious. The home of the cap-hunters was really not Tarascon, but a village five or six leagues away on the other side of the Rhône. It was from this village, and in company with the prototype of Tartarin, that Daudet set out for Africa in 1861, chiefly to recover his health and incidentally to hunt lions. The novel is a souvenir of the author's sojourn in the home of the real Tartarin and of the trip which the two made together[1], the whole being greatly modified by the play of the novelist's Provençal imagination.

[Footnote 1: See the following notes of this edition for evidence of the extent to which Daudet used the notes jotted down in Africa in the composition of "Tartarin": _70_ 21, _73_ 27, _81_ 5-6. See also "Souvenirs d'un homme de lettres," p. 44, where he speaks of the notebook from which he extracted "Tartarin" and other works.]

To appreciate "Tartarin de Tarascon" is not easy for a foreigner; and by foreigners is meant all those who have not lived in and do not know Provence. Americans and Parisians (see pages 16-17) look on Tartarin and his compatriots as mere liars.

They are not liars: they are suffering simply from the effects of a mirage. To understand what is meant by a mirage, you must go to the south of France. There you will find a magic sun which transforms everything, which takes a molehill and makes of it a mountain. Go to Tarascon, seek out a man who almost went to Shanghai, look steadfastly at him, and if the southern sun is shining upon him you will soon be convinced that he has actually gone to Shanghai.

In reading "Tartarin de Tarascon," therefore, remember that Tartarin's world is small and his imagination large; that he never lies, though he rarely tells the truth. Do not make the mistake of thinking Tartarin a lunatic. Just as his immortal predecessor Don Quixote was thoroughly sane except in that which touched the realm of chivalry, so Tartarin is a normal Frenchman except when he is under the influence of the southern mirage.

* * * * *

Daudet says in "Trente Ans de Paris," page 142, that the home of the real Tartarin was five or six miles from Tarascon on the other side of the Rhone. In an article which appeared in "Les Annales," July 6, 1913, Charles Le Goffic tells of a visit to the house in Tarascon known as _la maison de Tartarin_, and reports a conversation he had with Mistral, the great Provençal poet, an intimate friend of Daudet. Mistral said that the real Tartarin lived at Nîmes, eighteen miles from Tarascon, to the west of the Rhone, and was no other than Raynaud, Daudet's own cousin. "Raynaud," Mistral told Le Goffic, "had travelled among the _Teurs_ and talked about nothing but his lion hunts; he talked about them with his lower lip extended so as to form a terrible pout (_moue_), which gave a character of good-natured ferocity to the little gentleman's honest face. Raynaud recognized himself in Tartarin and became very angry with Daudet; the reconciliation between the cousins was not effected till toward the end of the novelist's life."

BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE

A definitive edition of the works of Daudet has been published by Houssiaux, in octavo, 1899 ff. (18 volumes). Convenient editions of most of them are published by Flammarion, Lemerre, Fasquelle, and others.

The best sources for the study of Daudet's life and works are his _Trente Ans de Paris, Souvenirs d'un homme de lettres, Notes sur la vie_ (Paris, 1899), his brother Ernest's _Mon Frère et moi_ (Paris, 1882), and his son Léon's _Alphonse Daudet_ (Paris, 1898).

The following may also be consulted:

J. BRIVOIS, _Essai de bibliographie des oeuvres de M. Alphonse Daudet_, Paris, 1895. H. CÉARD, introduction to the definitive edition. B. DIEDERICH, _Alphonse Daudet_, Berlin, 1900. R. DOUMIC, in _Portraits d'écrivains_ and _Études sur la littérature française_, Vol. III. HENRY JAMES, in _Partial Portraits_. J. LEMAÎTRE, in _Les Contemporains_, Vol. II. R. H. SHERARD, _Alphonse Daudet_, London, 1894. B. W. WELLS, in _A Century of French Fiction_, New York, 1903. E. ZOLA, in _Les Romanciers naturalistes_.

The illustrations in the following articles are of interest:

J. A. HAMMERTON, "The Town of Tartarin," in _The Critic_, vol. 47, pp 317 ff. A. B. MAURICE, "The Trail of Tartarin," in _The Bookman_, vol. 14, pp. 128 ff.; vol. 15, pp. 520 ff.

WORKS OF ALPHONSE DAUDET

POEMS, NOVELS, TALES, AND SKETCHES

Les Amoureuses, poèmes et fantaisies (including La Double Conversion, Le Roman du Chaperon rouge, and other poems) 1857-1861. Le Petit Chose, 1868. Lettres de mon moulin, 1869. Lettres à un absent, 1871. Aventures prodigieuses de Tartarin de Tarascon, 1872. Contes du lundi, 1873. Les Femmes d'artistes, première série (not continued), 1874. Fromont jeune et Risler aîné, 1874. Robert Helmont, 1874. Jack, 1876. Le Nabab, 1877. Les Rois en exil, 1879. Numa Roumestan, 1881. L'Évangéliste, 1883. Sapho, 1884. Tartarin sur les Alpes, 1885. La Belle Nivernaise, 1886. La Défense de Tarascon, 1886. Trente Ans de Paris, 1888. L'Immortel, 1888. Souvenirs d'un homme de lettres, 1888. Port Tarascon, 1890. Rosé et Ninette, 1892. Entre les frises et la rampe, 1894. La Petite Paroisse, 1895. La Fédor, 1897. Le Trésor d'Arlatan, 1897. Soutien de famille, 1898. Notes sur la vie, publié par Mme A. Daudet, 1899.

PLAYS

La Dernière Idole, 1862 (with E. L'Épine). Les Absents, 1864. L'oeillet blanc, 1865 (with E. Manuel). Le Frère aîné, 1867 (with E. Manuel). Le Sacrifice, 1869. Lise Tavernier, 1872. L'Arlésienne, 1872. Fromont jeune et Risler aîné, 1876 (with A. Belot). Le Char, 1878 (with P. Arène). Le Nabab, 1880 (with P. Elzéar). Jack, 1881 (with H. Lafontaine). Sapho, 1885 (with A. Belot). Numa Roumestan, 1887. La Lutte pour la vie, 1889 (taken from "L'Immortel"). l'Obstacle, 1890. La Menteuse, 1892 (with L. Hennique).

A MON AMI GONZAGUE PRIVAT

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Rénald Lévesque, for DISTRIBUTED PROOFREADERS AND GUTENBERG PROJECT.

TARTARIN DE TARASCON

_En France tout le monde est un peu de Tarascon_.

PREMIER ÉPISODE

A TARASCON

I

Le jardin du baobab.

Page 1

Ma première visite à Tartarin de Tarascon est restée dans ma vie comme une date inoubliable; il y a douze ou quinze ans de cela, mais je m'en souviens mieux que d'hier. L'intrépide Tartarin habitait alors, à l'entrée de la ville, la troisième maison [5]à main gauche sur le chemin d'Avignon. Jolie petite villa tarasconnaise avec jardin devant, balcon derrière, des murs très blancs, des persiennes vertes, et sur le pas de la porte une nichée de petits Savoyards jouant à la marelle ou dormant au bon soleil, la tête sur leurs boîtes à cirage.

[10]Du dehors, la maison n'avait l'air de rien.

Jamais on ne se serait cru devant la demeure d'un héros. Mais quand on entrait, coquin de sort!...

De la cave au grenier, tout le bâtiment avait l'air héroïque, même le jardin!...

[15]O le jardin de Tartarin, il n'y en avait pas deux comme celui-là en Europe. Pas un arbre du pays, pas une fleur de France; rien que des plantes exotiques, des gommiers, des calebassiers, des cotonniers, des cocotiers, des manguiers, des bananiers, des

Page 2.

palmiers, un baobab, des nopals, des cactus, des figuiers de Barbarie, à se croire en pleine Afrique centrale, à dix mille lieues de Tarascon. Tout cela, bien entendu, n'était pas de grandeur naturelle; ainsi les cocotiers n'étaient guère plus gros que des [5]betteraves, et le baobab (_arbre géant, arbos gigantea_) tenait à l'aise dans un pot de réséda; mais c'est égal! pour Tarascon c'était déjà bien joli, et les personnes de la ville, admises le dimanche à l'honneur de contempler le baobab de Tartarin, s'en retournaient pleines d'admiration.

[10]Pensez quelle émotion je dus éprouver ce jour-là en traversant ce jardin mirifique!... Ce fut bien autre chose quand on m'introduisit dans le cabinet du héros.

Ce cabinet, une des curiosités de la ville, était au fond du jardin, ouvrant de plain-pied sur le baobab par une porte [15]vitrée.

Imaginez-vous une grande salle tapissée de fusils et de sabres, depuis en haut jusqu'en bas; toutes les armes de tous les pays du monde: carabines, rifles, tromblons, couteaux corses, couteaux catalans, couteaux-revolvers, couteaux-poignards, krish [20]malais, flèches caraïbes, flèches de silex, coups-de-poing, casse-tête, massues hottentotes, lazos mexicains, est-ce que je sais!

Par là-dessus, un grand soleil féroce qui faisait luire l'acier des glaives et les crosses des armes à feu, comme pour vous donner encore plus la chair de poule.... Ce qui rassurait un [25]peu pourtant, c'était le bon air d'ordre et de propreté qui régnait sur toute cette yataganerie. Tout y était rangé, soigné, brossé, étiqueté comme dans une pharmacie; de loin en loin, un petit écriteau bonhomme sur lequel on lisait:

_Flèches empoisonnées, n'y touchez pas!_

[30]Ou:

_Armes chargées, méfiez-vous!_

Sans ces écriteaux, jamais je n'aurais osé entrer.

Page 3

Au milieu du cabinet, il y avait un guéridon. Sur le guéridon, un flacon de rhum, une blague turque, les Voyages du capitaine Cook, les romans de Cooper, de Gustave Aimard, des récits de chasse à l'ours, chasse au faucon, chasse à l'éléphant, [5]Etc.... Enfin, devant le guéridon, un homme était assis, de quarante à quarante-cinq ans, petit, gros, trapu, rougeaud, en bras de chemise, avec des caleçons de flanelle, une forte barbe courte et des yeux flamboyants, d'une main il tenait un livre, de l'autre il brandissait une énorme pipe à couvercle de fer, et, [10]tout en lisant je ne sais quel formidable récit de chasseurs de chevelures, il faisait, en avançant sa lèvre inférieure, une moue terrible, qui donnait à sa brave figure de petit rentier tarasconnais ce même caractère de férocité bonasse qui régnait dans toute la maison.

[15]Cet homme, c'était Tartarin, Tartarin de Tarascon, l'intrépide, le grand, l'incomparable Tartarin de Tarascon.

II

_Coup d'oeil général jeté sur la bonne ville de Tarascon; les chasseurs de casquettes._

Au temps dont je vous parle, Tartarin de Tarascon n'était pas encore le Tartarin qu'il est aujourd'hui, le grand Tartarin de Tarascon, si populaire dans tout le midi de la France. Pourtant [20]--même à cette époque--c'était déjà le roi de Tarascon.

Disons d'où lui venait cette royauté.

Vous saurez d'abord que là-bas tout le monde est chasseur, depuis le plus grand jusqu'au plus petit. La chasse est la passion des Tarasconnais, et cela depuis les temps mythologiques [25]où la Tarasque faisait les cent coups dans les marais de la ville et où les Tarasconnais d'alors organisaient des battues contre elle. Il y a beau jour, comme vous voyez.

Page 4

Donc, tous les dimanches matin, Tarascon prend les armes et sort de ses murs, le sac au dos, le fusil sur l'épaule, avec un tremblement de chiens, de furets, de trompes, de cors de chasse. C'est superbe à voir.... Par malheur, le gibier manque, il [5]manque absolument.

Si bêtes que soient les bêtes, vous pensez bien qu'à la longue elles ont fini par se méfier.

A cinq lieues autour de Tarascon, les terriers sont vides, les nids abandonnés. Pas un merle, pas une caille, pas le moindre [10]lapereau, pas le plus petit cul-blanc.

Elles sont cependant bien tentantes, ces jolies collinettes tarasconnaises, toutes parfumées de myrte, de lavande, de romarin; et ces beaux raisins muscats gonflés de sucre, qui s'échelonnent an bord du Rhône, sont diablement appétissants aussi.... [15]Oui, mais il y a Tarascon derrière, et dans le petit monde du poil et de la plume, Tarascon est très mal noté. Les oiseaux de passage eux-mêmes l'ont marqué d'une grande croix sur leurs feuilles de route, et quand les canards sauvages, descendant vers la Camargue en longs triangles, aperçoivent de loin les clochers [20]de la ville, celui qui est en tête se met à crier bien fort: «Voilà Tarascon!... voilà Tarascon!» et toute la bande fait un crochet.

Bref, en fait de gibier, il ne reste plus dans le pays qu'un vieux coquin de lièvre, échappé comme par miracle aux septembrisades [25]tarasconnaises et qui s'entête à vivre là! A Tarascon, ce lièvre est très connu. On lui a donné un nom. Il s'appelle _le Rapide_. On sait qu'il a son gîte dans la terre de M. Bompard,--ce qui, par parenthèse, a doublé et même triplé le prix de cette terre,--mais on n'a pas encore pu l'atteindre.

[30]A l'heure qu'il est même, il n'y a plus que deux ou trois enragés qui s'acharnent après lui.

Les autres en ont fait leur deuil, et _le Rapide_ est passé depuis longtemps à l'état de superstition locale, bien que le Tarasconnais

Page 5

soit très peu superstitieux de sa nature et qu'il mange les hirondelles en salmis, quand il en trouve.

--Ah çà! me direz-vous, puisque le gibier est si rare à Tarascon, qu'est-ce que les chasseurs tarasconnais font donc tous les [5]dimanches?

Ce qu'ils font?

Eh mon Dieu! ils s'en vont en pleine campagne, à deux ou trois lieues de la ville. Ils se réunissent par petits groupes de cinq ou six, s'allongent tranquillement à l'ombre d'un puits, d'un [10]vieux mur, d'un olivier, tirent de leurs carniers un bon morceau de boeuf en daube, des oignons crus, un _saucissot_, quelques anchois, et commencent un déjeuner interminable, arrosé d'un de ces jolis vins du Rhône qui font rire et qui font chanter.

Après quoi, quand on est bien lesté, on se lève, on siffle les [15]chiens, on arme les fusils, et on se met en chasse. C'est à dire que chacun de ces messieurs prend sa casquette, la jette en l'air de toutes ses forces, et la tire au vol avec du 5, du 6, ou du 2,--selon les conventions.

Celui qui met le plus souvent dans sa casquette est proclamé [20]roi de la chasse, et rentre le soir en triomphateur à Tarascon, la casquette criblée au bout du fusil, au milieu des aboiements et des fanfares.