Chapter IX: Letter VI (4)

"You did not know the Countess three years ago because you were then in Germany, Saint-Clair," went on Alphonse de Thémines, with aggravating coolness. "You cannot form any idea, therefore, of her as she was then; lovely, with the freshness of a rose, and as light-hearted and gay as a butterfly. Perhaps you do not know that among all her many admirers Massigny was the one she honoured with her favours? The most stupid and ridiculous of men turned the head of the most fascinating amongst women. Do you suppose that a deformed person could have done as much? Nonsense; believe me, with a good figure and a first-rate tailor, only boldness in addition is needed."

Saint-Clair was in a most awkward position. He longed to fling back the lie direct in the speaker's face, but was restrained from fear of compromising the Countess. He would have liked to have said something to defend her, but he was tongue-tied. His lips trembled with rage, and he tried to find some indirect means of forcing a quarrel, but could not.

"What," exclaimed Jules, with astonishment, "Madam de Coursy gave herself to Massigny? Frailty, thy name is woman!"

"The reputation of a woman being of such small moment, it is, of course, allowable to pull it to pieces for the sake of a little sport," observed Saint-Clair in a dry and scornful tone, "and--"

But as he spoke he remembered with dismay a certain Etruscan vase that he had noticed a hundred times upon the mantelpiece in the Countess's house in Paris. He knew that it was a gift from Massigny, who had brought it back with him from Italy; and--overwhelming coincidence!--it had been taken by the Countess from Paris to her country house. Every evening when Mathilde took the flowers out of her dress she put them in this Etruscan vase.

Speech died upon his lips. He could neither see nor think of anything but of that Etruscan vase.

"How absurd," cries a critic, "to suspect his mistress from such a trifle!"

"Have you ever been in love, my dear critic?"

Thémines was in too good a humour to take offence at the tone Saint-Clair had used when speaking to him, and replied lightly and with great good nature--

"I can only repeat what I heard in Society. It passed as a true story while you were in Germany. However, I scarcely know Madam de Coursy. It is eighteen months since I was at her house. Very likely I am wrong, and the story was a fabrication of Massigny's. But let us return to our discussion, for whether my illustration be false or not does not affect my point. You all know that the cleverest woman in France, whose works--"

The door opened, and Théodore Néville came in. He had just returned from Egypt.

"Théodore, you have soon come back!" He was overwhelmed with questions.

"Have you brought back a real Turkish costume?" asked Thémines. "Have you got an Arabian horse and an Egyptian groom?"

"What sort of man is the Pasha?" said Jules. "When will he make himself independent? Have you seen a head cut off with a single stroke of the sabre?"

"And the _aimées_," said Roquantin. "Are the Cairo women beautiful?"

"Did you meet General L----?" asked Colonel Beaujeu. "Has he organised the army of the Pasha? Did Colonel C---- give you a sword for me?"

"And the Pyramids? The cataracts of the Nile? And the statue of Memnon? Ibrahim Pasha?" etc. They all talked at once; Saint-Clair only brooded on the Etruscan vase.

Théodore sat cross-legged. He had learnt that habit in Egypt, and did not wish to lose it in France. He waited till his questioners were tired, and then spoke as fast as he could to save himself from being easily interrupted.

"The Pyramids! upon my word they are a regular humbug. They are not so high as I expected. Strasburg Cathedral is only four yards lower. I passed by the antiquities. Do not talk to me about them. The very sight of hieroglyphics makes me faint. There are plenty of travellers who worry themselves over these things! My object was to study the nature and manners of all the strange people that jostle against each other in the streets of Alexandria and of Cairo. Turks, Bedouins, Copts, Fellahs, Môghrebins. I drew up a few hasty notes when I was in the quarantine hospital. What infamous places they are! I hope none of you fellows are nervous about infection! I smoked my pipe calmly in the midst of three hundred plague-stricken people. Ah! Colonel, you would admire the well-mounted cavalry out there. I must show you some superb weapons that I have brought back. I have a _djerid_ which belonged to a famous Mourad Bey. I have a _yataghan_ for you, Colonel, and a _khandjar_ for Auguste. You must see my _metchlà_ and _bournous_ and _khaick_. Do you know I could have brought back any number of women with me? Ibrahim Pasha has such numbers imported from Greece that they can be had for nothing.... But I had to think of my mother's feelings.... I talked much with the Pasha. He is a thoroughly intelligent and unprejudiced man. You would hardly credit it, but he knows everything about our affairs. Upon my honour, he knows the smallest secrets of our Cabinet. I gleaned much valuable information from him on the state of parties in France.... Just now he is taken up with statistics. He subscribes to all our papers. Would you believe it?--he is a pronounced Bonapartist, and talks of nothing but Napoleon. 'Ah! what a great man _Bounabardo_ was!' he said to me; 'Bounabardo,' that is how he pronounces Bonaparte."

"Giourdina, meaning Jourdain," murmured Thémines.

"At first," continued Théodore, "Mohamed Ali was extremely reserved with me. All the Turks are very suspicious, you know, and he took me for a spy or a Jesuit, the devil he did! He had a perfect horror of Jesuits. But, after several visits, he recognised that I was an unprejudiced traveller, anxious to inform myself at first hand of Eastern manners, customs and politics. Then he unbosomed himself and spoke freely to me. At the third and last audience he granted me I ventured to ask His Excellency why he did not make himself independent of the Porte. 'By Allah!' he replied, 'I wish it indeed, but I fear the Liberal papers which govern your country would not support me if I proclaimed the independence of Egypt.' He is a fine old man, with a long white beard. He never smiles. He gave us some first-rate confections; but the gift that pleased him most of all I offered him was a collection of costumes of the Imperial Guard by Charlet."

"Is the Pasha of a romantic turn of mind?" asked Thémines.

"He does not trouble himself much about literature; but you know, of course, that Arabian literature is entirely romantic. They have a poet called Melek Ayatalnefous-Ebn-Esraf, who has recently published a book of Meditations, compared with which Lamartine's read like classic prose. I took lessons in Arabic directly I got to Cairo, in order to read the Koran. I did not need to have many lessons before I was able to judge of the supreme beauty of the prophet's style, and of the baldness of all our translations. Look here, would you like to see Arabian handwriting? This word in gold letters is _Allah_, which means God."

As he spoke he showed them a very dirty letter, which he took out of a scented silk purse.

"How long were you in Egypt?" asked Thémines.

"Six weeks."

And the traveller proceeded to hold forth on everything from beginning to end. Saint-Clair left soon after his arrival, and went in the direction of his country house. The impetuous gallop of his horse prevented him from thinking consecutively, but he felt vaguely that his happiness in life had gone for ever, and that it had been shattered by a dead man and an Etruscan vase.

After reaching home he threw himself on the same couch upon which he had dreamed for so long and so deliciously, and analysed his happiness the evening before. His most cherished dream had been that his mistress was different from other women, that she had not loved nor ever would love anyone but himself. Now this exquisite dream must perish in the light of a sad and cruel reality. "I have had a beautiful mistress, but nothing more. She is clever; she is therefore all the more to be blamed for loving Massigny!... I know she does love me now ... with her whole soul ... as she can love. But to be loved in the same fashion as Massigny has been loved!... She has yielded herself up to my attentions, my importunities, my whims. But I have been deceived. There has been no sympathy between us. Whether her lover were Massigny or myself was equally the same to her. He is handsome, and she loves him for his good looks. She amuses herself with me for a time. 'I may as well love Saint-Clair,' she says to herself, 'since the other is dead! And if Saint-Clair dies, or I tire of him, who knows?'

"I firmly believe the devil listens invisible behind a tortured wretch like myself. The enemy of man-kind is tickled by the spectacle, and as soon as the victim's wounds begin to heal, the devil is waiting to reopen them."

Saint-Clair thought he heard a voice murmur in his ears--

"The peculiar honour
Of being the successor...."

He sat up on the couch and threw a savage glance round him. How glad he would have been to find someone in his room! He would have torn him limb from limb without any hesitation.

The clock struck eight. At eight-thirty the Countess expected him. Should he disappoint her? Why, indeed, should he ever see Massigny's mistress again? He lay down again on the couch and shut his eyes. "I will try to sleep," he said. He lay still for half a minute, then he leapt to his feet and ran to the clock to see how the time was going. "How I wish it were half-past eight!" he thought. "It would be too late then for me to start." If only he were taken ill. He had not the courage to stop at home unless he had an excuse. He walked up and down his room, then he sat down and took a book, but he could not read a syllable. He sat down in front of his piano, but had not enough energy to open it. He whistled; then he looked out of his window at the clouds, and tried to count the poplars. At length he looked at the clock again, and saw that he had not succeeded in whiling away more than three minutes. "I cannot help loving her," he burst out, grinding his teeth and stamping his feet; "She rules me, and I am her slave, just as Massigny was before me. Well, since you have not sufficient courage to break the hated chain, poor wretch, you must obey."

He picked up his hat and rushed out.

When we are carried away by a great passion it is some consolation to our self-love to look clown from the height of pride upon our weakness. "I certainly am weak," he said to himself; "but what if I wish to be so?"

As he walked slowly up the footpath which led to the garden gate, he could see in the distance a white face standing out against the dark background of trees. She beckoned to him with her handkerchief. His heart beat violently, and his knees trembled under him; he could not speak, and he had become so nervous that he feared lest the Countess should read his ill-humour.

He took the hand she held out to him, and kissed her brow, because she threw herself into his arms. He followed her into her sitting-room in silence, though scarce able to suppress his bursting sighs.

A single candle lighted the Countess's room. They sat down, and Saint-Clair noticed his friend's coiffure; a single rose was in her hair. He had given her, the previous evening, a beautiful English engraving of Leslie's "Duchess of Portland" (whose hair was dressed in the same fashion), and Saint-Clair had merely remarked to the Countess, "I like that single rose better than all your elaborate coiffures." He did not like jewels, and inclined to the opinion of a noble lord who once remarked coarsely, "The devil has nothing left to teach women who overdress themselves and coil their hair fantastically." The night before, while playing with the Countess's pearl necklace (he always would have something between his hands when talking), Saint-Clair had said, "You are too pretty, Mathilde, to wear jewels; they are only meant to hide defects." To-night the Countess had stripped herself of rings, necklaces, earrings and bracelets, for she stored up his most trivial remarks. He noticed, above everything else in a woman's toilet, the shoes she wore; and, like many other men, he was quite mad on this point. A heavy shower had fallen at sunset, and the grass was still very wet; in spite of this the Countess walked on the damp lawn in silk stockings and black satin slippers.... Suppose she were to take cold?

"She loves me," said Saint-Clair to himself.

He sighed at his folly, but smiled at Mathilde in spite of himself, tossed between his sorry mood and the gratification of seeing a pretty woman, who had sought, by those trifles which have such priceless value in the eyes of lovers, to please him.

The Countess was radiant with love, playfully mischievous and bewitchingly charming. She took something from a Japanese lacquered box and held it out to him in her little firmly closed hand.

"I broke your watch the other night," she said; "here it is, mended."

She handed the watch to him and looked at him tenderly, and yet mischievously, biting her lower lip as though to prevent herself from laughing. Oh, what beautiful white teeth she had! and how they gleamed against the ruby red of her lips! (A man looks exceedingly foolish when he is being teased by a pretty woman, and replies coldly.)

Saint-Clair thanked her, took the watch and was about to put in his pocket.

"Look at it and open it," she continued. "See if it is mended all right. You, who are so learned, you, who have been to the Polytechnic School, ought to be able to tell that."

"Oh, I didn't learn much there," said Saint-Clair.

He opened the case in an absent-minded way, and what was his surprise to find a miniature portrait of Madam de Coursy painted on the interior of the case? How could he sulk any longer? His brow cleared; he thought no longer of Massigny; he only remembered that he was by the side of a beautiful woman, and that this woman loved him.

* * * * * *

"The lark, that harbinger of dawn," began to sing, and long bands of pale light stretched across the eastern clouds. At such an hour did Romeo say farewell to Juliet, and it is the classic hour when all lovers should part.

Saint-Clair stood before a mantelpiece, the key of the garden gate in his hand, his eyes intently fixed on the Etruscan vase, of which we have already spoken. In the depths of his soul he still bore it a grudge, although he was in a much better humour. The simple explanation occurred to his mind that Thémines might have lied about it. While the Countess was wrapping a shawl round her head in order to go to the garden gate with him he began to tap the detested vase with the key, at first gently, then gradually increasing the force of his blows until it seemed as though he would soon smash it to atoms.

"Oh, do be careful!" Mathilde exclaimed. "You will break my beautiful Etruscan vase!"

She snatched the key out of his hands.

Saint-Clair was very angry, but he resigned himself and turned his back on the chimney-piece to avoid temptation. Opening his watch, he began to examine the portrait that had just been given him.

"Who painted it?" he asked.

"Monsieur R----, and it was Massigny who introduced him to my notice. (After Massigny had been in Rome he discovered that he had exquisite taste in art, and constituted himself the Macænas of all young painters.) I really think the portrait is like me, though it is a little too flattering."

Saint-Clair had a burning desire to fling the watch against the wall, to break it beyond all hope of mending. He controlled himself, however, and put the watch in his pocket. Then he noticed that it was daylight, and, entreating Mathilde not to come out with him, he left the house and crossed the garden with rapid strides, and was soon alone in the country.

"Massigny! Massigny!" he burst forth with concentrated rage. "Can I never escape him?... No doubt the artist who painted this portrait painted another for Massigny.... What a fool I am to imagine for a moment that I am loved with a love equal to my own!... just because she put aside her jewels and wore a rose in her hair!... Jewels! why, she has a chest full.... Massigny, who thought of little else save a woman's toilette, was a lover of jewellery!... Yes, she has a gracious nature, it must be granted; she knows how to gratify the tastes of her lovers. Damn it! I would rather a hundred times that she were a courtesan and gave herself for money. Just because she was my mistress and unpaid I thought she loved me indeed."

Soon another still more unhappy idea presented itself. In a few weeks' time the Countess would be out of mourning, and Saint-Clair had promised to marry her as soon as her year of widowhood was over. He had promised. Promised? No. He had never spoken of it, but such had been his intention and the Countess had understood it so. But for him this was as good as an oath. Last night he would have given a throne to hasten the time for acknowledging his love publicly; now the very thought of marrying the former mistress of Massigny filled him with loathing.

"Nevertheless, I owe it to her to marry her," he said to himself, "and it shall be done. No doubt she thinks, poor woman, I heard all about her former _liaison_; it seems to have been generally known. Besides, she did not then know me.... She cannot understand me; she thinks that I am only such another lover as Massigny."

Then he said to himself, and not without a certain pride--

"For three months she has made me the happiest man living; such happiness is worth the sacrifice of my life."

He did not go to bed, but rode about among the woods the whole of the morning. In one of the pathways of the woods of Verrières he saw a man mounted on a fine English horse, who called him immediately by his name while he was still far off. It was Alphonse de Thémines. To a man in Saint-Clair's state of mind solitude is particularly desirable, and this encounter with Thémines changed his bad humour into a furious temper. Thémines did not notice his mood, or perhaps took a wicked pleasure in thwarting it. He talked and laughed and joked without noticing that he did not receive any response. Saint-Clair soon tried to turn his horse aside into a narrow track, hoping the bore would not follow him; but it was of no use, bores do not leave their prey so easily. Thémines pulled the bridle in the same direction, increased his horse's pace to keep by Saint-Clair's side and complacently continued the conversation.

I have said that the path was a narrow one. The two horses could hardly walk abreast. It was not, therefore, to be wondered at that even so good a horseman as Thémines should graze against Saint-Clair's foot as he walked along with him. This put the finishing touch to his anger, and he could not contain himself any longer. He rose in his stirrups and struck Thémines' horse sharply across the nose with his whip.

"What the devil is the matter with you, Auguste?" cried Thémines. "Why do you strike my horse?"

"Why do you pursue me?" roared Saint-Clair.

"Have you lost your senses, Saint-Clair? You forget to whom you are talking."

"I know quite well that I am talking to a puppy."

"Saint-Clair!... you must be mad, I think.... Listen to me. To-morrow you will either apologise to me, or you will account for your insolent conduct."

"To-morrow, then, sir--"

Thémines stopped his horse; Saint-Clair pushed his on, and very soon disappeared among the trees.

He was calmer now. He was silly enough to believe in presentiments. He felt sure he would be killed on the morrow, and that would be a suitable ending to his condition. Only one more day of anxieties and torments to endure. He went home and sent a note by his servant to Colonel Beaujeu. He wrote several letters, after which he dined with a good appetite, and was promptly at the little garden gate by 8.30.

* * * * *

"What is the matter with you to-day, Auguste?" said the Countess. "You are unusually lively, and yet your gaiety does not move me to laugh. Last night you were just a trifle dull, and I was the gay one! We have changed parts to-day. I have a racking headache."

"Dear one, I admit it. Yes, I was very tedious yesterday, but to-day I have been out, I took exercise, and I feel quite excited."

"On the other hand, I overslept myself this morning, and rose late. I had bad dreams."

"Ah! dreams? Do you believe in dreams?"

"What nonsense!"

"I believe in them. I am sure that you had a dream which foretold some tragic event."

"Good heavens! I never remember my dreams. Once I recollect ... that I saw Massigny in my dream; so, you see, it was not very entertaining."

"Massigny! But I should have thought you would have been pleased at seeing him again!"

"Poor Massigny!"

"Why 'poor Massigny'?"

"Please tell me, Auguste, what is wrong with you to-night. Your smile is perfectly diabolic, and you seem to be making game of yourself."

"Ah! now you are treating me as badly as your old dowager friends treat me."

"Yes, Auguste, you wear the same expression to-day that you put on before people whom you do not like."

"That is unpardonable in me. Come, give me your hand."

He kissed her hand with ironical gallantry, and they gazed at each other studiously for a minute. Saint-Clair was the first to drop his eyes.

"How difficult it is," he exclaimed, "to live in this world without being thought ill of! One ought really never to talk of anything but the weather and hunting, or eagerly to discuss with your old friends the reports of their benevolent societies."

He picked up a paper from the table near him.

"Come, here is your lace-cleaner's bill. Let us discuss that, sweetheart; then you cannot say I am ill-tempered."

"Really, Auguste, you amaze me...."

"This handwriting puts me in mind of a letter I found this morning. I must explain that I have fits of untidiness occasionally, and I was arranging my papers. Well, then, I found a love-letter from a dressmaker with whom I fell in love at sixteen. She had a trick of writing each word most fantastically, and her style was equal to her writing. Well, I was foolish enough then to be vexed that my mistress could not write as well as Madame de Sévigné, and I left her abruptly. In reading over this letter to-day I see that this dressmaker really did love me."

"Really! a woman whom you kept?"

"In line style on fifty francs a month. But I could not afford more, as my guardian only allowed me a little money at a time, for he said that youths who had money ruined themselves and others."

"What became of this woman?"

"How should I know?... Probably she died in a hospital."

"Auguste,... if that were true you would not speak so flippantly."

"Well, then, to tell you the truth, she is married to a respectable man, and when I came of age I gave her a small dowry."

"How good of you!... But why do you try to make yourself out so evil?"

"Oh, I am good enough.... The more I think of it the more I persuade myself that this woman really did care for me.... But on the other hand, it is difficult to discern true feeling under such a ridiculous expression of it."

"You ought to have shown me your letter. I should not have been jealous.... We women have finer tact than you, and we can tell at a glance, from the style of a letter, whether the writer is sincere, or feigning a passion he does not really feel."

"But what a number of times you have allowed yourself to be taken in by fools and rogues!"

As he spoke he looked at the Etruscan vase with a threatening glance, to which his voice responded, but Mathilde went on without noticing anything.

"Come, now, all you men wish to pose as Don Juans. You fancy you are making dupes when often you have encountered only Doña Juana, who is much more cunning than yourselves."

"I perceive that with your superior wit you ladies scent out rakes in every place. I doubt not also that our friend Massigny, who was both a stupid and a coxcomb, became, when dead, spotless and a martyr."

"Massigny? He was not a fool; then too there are silly women to be found. I must tell you a story about Massigny. But surely have I not told it you already?"

"Never," replied Saint-Clair tremblingly.

"Massigny fell in love with me after his return from Italy. My husband knew him and introduced him to me as a man of taste and culture. Those two were just made for each other. Massigny was most attentive to me from the first; he gave me some water-colour sketches which he had bought from Schroth, as his own paintings, and talked of music and art in the most divertingly superior manner. One day he sent me an incredibly ridiculous letter. He said, among other things, that I was the best woman in Paris; therefore he wished to be my lover. I showed the letter to my cousin Julie. We were then both very silly, and we resolved to play him a trick. One evening we had several visitors, among them being Massigny. My cousin said to me, 'I am going to read you a declaration of love which I received this morning.' She took the letter and read it amidst peals of laughter.... Poor Massigny!..."

Saint-Clair fell on his knees uttering a cry of joy. He seized the Countess's hand and covered it with tears and kisses. Mathilde was surprised beyond measure, and thought at first he had gone mad. Saint-Clair could only murmur, "Forgive me! forgive me!" When he rose to his feet he was radiant; he was happier than on the day when Mathilde had said to him for the first time, "I love you."

"I am the guiltiest and most stupid of men," he cried; "for two days I have misjudged you ... and never given you a chance to clear yourself...."

"You suspected me?... And of what?"

"Oh! idiot that I was!... they told me you had loved Massigny, and--"

"Massigny!" and she began to laugh; then soon quickly growing more earnest, "Auguste," she said, "how could you be so foolish as to harbour such suspicions, and so hypocritical as to hide them from me?"

Her eyes filled with tears.

"I implore you to forgive me."

"Of course I forgive you, beloved ... but let me first swear...."

"Oh! I believe you, I believe you; do not say any more about it."

"But in Heaven's name what put such an improbable notion in your head?"

"Nothing, nothing in the world except my accursed temper ... and ... would you believe it? that Etruscan vase which I knew Massigny had given you."

The Countess clasped her hands together in amazement, and then she burst into shouts of laughter.

"My Etruscan vase! my Etruscan vase!"

Saint-Clair was obliged to join in the laughter himself, although great tears rolled down his cheeks. He seized Mathilde in his arms. "I will not let you go," he said, "until you pardon me."

"Yes, I forgive you, though you are so foolish," she replied, kissing him tenderly. "You make me very happy to-day; it is the first time I have seen you shed tears, and I thought that you could not weep."

Then she struggled from his embrace, and, snatching the Etruscan vase, broke it into a thousand pieces on the floor. It was a valuable and unique work, painted in three colours, and represented the fight between a Lapithe and a Centaur.

For several hours Saint-Clair was the happiest and the most ashamed of men.

* * * * *

"Well," said Roquantin to Colonel Beaujeu, when he met him in the evening at Tortoni's, "is this news true?"

"Too true, my friend," answered the Colonel sadly.

"Tell me, how did it come about?"

"Oh! just as it should. Saint-Clair began by telling me he was in the wrong, but that he wished to draw Thémines' fire before begging his pardon. I could do no other than accede. Thémines wished to draw lots who should fire first. Saint-Clair insisted that Thémines should. Thémines fired; and I saw Saint-Clair turn round once and then fall stone dead. I have often remarked, in the case of soldiers when they have been shot, this strange turning round which precedes death."

"How very extraordinary!" said Roquantin. "But Thémines, what did he do?"

"Oh, what is usual on these occasions: he threw his pistol on the ground remorsefully, with such force that he broke the hammer. It was an English pistol of Manton's. I don't believe there is a gun-maker in Paris who could make such another."

* * * * *

The Countess shut herself up in her country house for three whole years without seeing anyone; winter and summer, there she lived, hardly going out of her room. She was waited upon by a mulatto woman who knew of the attachment between Saint-Clair and herself. She scarcely spoke a word to her day after day. At the end of three years her cousin Julie returned from a long voyage. She forced her way into the house and found poor Mathilde thin and pale, the very ghost of the beautiful and fascinating woman she had left behind. By degrees she persuaded her to come out of her solitude, and took her to Hyères. The Countess languished there for three or four months, and then died of consumption brought on by her grief--so said Dr. M----, who attended her.

1830.

THE VENUS OF ILLE

[Greek: Ileoos ein d'ego, esto o andrias
kai eipios, outoos andreios oon.

LOUKIANOU PHILOPSEUDES.]

I descended the last hillside at Canigou, and, although the sun had already set, I could distinguish the houses of the little town of Ille, in the plain, towards which my steps were turned.

"You know," I said to the Catalanian who had been my guide since the previous day--"no doubt you know where M. de Peyrehorade lives?"

"Do I know it!" he exclaimed. "I know his house as well as I know my own; and if it wasn't so dark I would point it out to you. It is the prettiest in Ille. M. de Peyrehorade is a rich man; and he is marrying his son to a lady even richer than himself."

"Is the marriage to take place soon?" I asked.

"Very soon; probably the violinists are already ordered for the wedding. Perhaps it will be to-night, or to-morrow, or the day after, for all I know. It will be at Puygarrig; for the son is to marry Mademoiselle de Puygarrig. It will be a very grand affair!"

I had been introduced to M. de Peyrehorade by my friend M. de P., who told me he was a very learned antiquarian and of extreme good nature. It would give him pleasure to show me all the ruins for ten leagues round. So I was looking forward to visit with him the district surrounding Ille, which I knew to be rich in monuments belonging to ancient times and the Middle Ages. This marriage, of which I now heard for the first time, would upset all my plans. I said to myself, I should be a kill-joy; but I was expected, and as M. de P. had written to say I was coming, I should have to present myself.

"I will bet you, Monsieur," said my guide to me, when we were in the plain--"I will bet you a cigar that I can guess why you are going to M. de Peyrehorade's."

"But that is not a difficult thing to guess," I replied, holding out a cigar to him. "At this hour, after traversing six leagues amongst the Canigou hills, the grand question is supper."

"Yes, but to-morrow?... Wait, I will bet that you have come to Ille to see the statue. I guessed that when I saw you draw pictures of the Saints at Serrabona."

"The statue! What statue?" The word had excited my curiosity.

"What! did no one tell you at Perpignan that M. de Peyrehorade had found a statue in the earth?"

"Did you mean a statue in terra-cotta, or clay?"

"Nothing of the kind. It is actually in copper, and there is enough of it to make heaps of coins. It weighs as much as a church bell. It is deep in the ground, at the foot of an olive tree that we dug up."

"You were present, then, at the find?"

"Yes, sir. M. de Peyrehorade told Jean Coll and me, a fortnight ago, to uproot an old olive tree which had been killed by the frost last year, for there was a very severe frost, you will remember. Well, then, whilst working at it with all his might, Jean Coll gave a blow with his pickaxe, and I heard bimm!... as though he had struck on a bell. 'What is that?' I said. He picked and picked again, and a black hand appeared, which looked like the hand of a dead man coming out of the ground. I felt frightened; I went to the master and said to him: 'There are dead folk, master, under the olive tree; I wish you would send for the priest.' 'What dead folk?' he asked. He came, and had no sooner seen the hand than he cried out, 'An antique statue! an antique statue!' You might have thought he had discovered a treasure. And then he set to with pickaxe and hands, and worked hard; he did almost as much work as the two of us together."

"And what did you find in the end?"

"A huge black woman, more than half naked, saving your presence, sir, all in copper, and M. de Peyrehorade told us that it was an idol of pagan times ... perhaps as old as Charlemagne!"

"I see what it is ... some worthy Virgin in bronze which belonged to a convent that has been destroyed."

"The Blessed Virgin! Well, I never!... I should very soon have known if it had been the Blessed Virgin. I tell you it is an idol; you can see that plainly from its appearance. It stares at you with its great white eyes.... You might have said it was trying to put you out of countenance. It was enough to make one ashamed to look at her."

"White eyes were they? No doubt they are inlaid in the bronze; it might perhaps be a Roman statue."

"Roman! that's it. M. de Peyrehorade said that it was Roman. Ah! I can see you are as learned as he is."

"Is it whole and in good preservation?"

"Oh, it is all there, sir. It is much more beautiful and better finished than the painted plaster bust of Louis Philippe, which is at the town hall. But for all that the idol's face is not very nice to look at. She looks wicked ... and she is so, too."

"Wicked! What mischief has she done you?"

"No mischief to me exactly; but I will tell you. We were down on all fours to raise her up on end, and M. de Peyrehorade was also tugging at the rope, although he had no more strength than a chicken, good man! With much trouble he got her straight. I picked up a tile to prop her up, when, good Lord! she fell upside down all in a heap. 'Look out there below!' I said, but I was not quick enough, for Jean Coll had not time to draw his leg out...."

"And was it hurt?"

"His poor leg was broken as clean as a pole. Goodness! when I saw it I was furious. I wanted to break up the idol with my pickaxe, but M. de Peyrehorade would not let me. He gave some money to Jean Coll, who, all the same, has been in bed the whole fortnight since it happened, and the doctor says that he will never walk with that leg again so well as with the other. It is a sad pity; he was our best runner, and, after M. de Peyrehorade's son, he was the cleverest tennis player. M. Alphonse de Peyrehorade was dreadfully sorry, for it was Coll against whom he played. It was fine to see them send the balls flying. Whizz! whizz! they never touched the ground."

And so we chatted till we reached Ille, and I very soon found myself in the presence of M. de Peyrehorade. He was a little old man, still hale and active; he was powdered, had a red nose, and his manner was jovial and bantering. When he had opened M. de P.'s letter he installed me in front of a well-appointed table and presented me to his wife and son as an illustrious archaeologist, whose desire it was to raise the province of Roussillon from obscurity, in which it had been left by the neglect of the learned.

Whilst I was eating with a good appetite--for nothing makes one so hungry as mountain air--I examined my hosts. I have said a word or two about M. de Peyrehorade; I should add that he was vivacity itself. He talked and ate, got up, ran to his library to bring me books, showed me engravings, and poured out drinks for me; he was never still for two minutes. His wife was rather too stout, like most Catalanian women over forty, and she seemed to me a regular provincial, solely taken up with the cares of her household. Although the supper was ample for six people at least, she ran to the kitchen, had pigeons killed and dozens of them fried, besides opening I don't know how many pots of preserves. In a trice the table was loaded with dishes and bottles, and I should assuredly have died of indigestion if I had even tasted all that was offered me. However, at each dish that I refused there were fresh excuses. They were afraid I did not get what I liked at Ille--there are so few means of getting things in the provinces, and Parisians are so hard to please!

M. Alphonse de Peyrehorade stirred no more than a statue in the midst of his parents' comings and goings. He was a tall young man of twenty-six, with beautiful and regular features, but they were wanting in expression. His figure and athletic build quite justified the reputation he had gained in the country as an indefatigable tennis player. He was that evening exquisitely dressed, exactly like the latest fashion plate. But he seemed to me to be uneasy in his garments; he was as stiff as a post in his velvet collar, and could not turn round unless with his whole body. His fat and sunburnt hands, with their short nails, contrasted strangely with his costume. They were the hands of a labouring man appearing below the sleeves of a dandy. For the rest, he only addressed me once throughout the whole evening, and that was to ask me where I had bought my watch-chain, although he studied me from head to foot very inquisitively in uncapacity as a Parisian.

"Ah, now, my honoured guest," said M. de Peyrehorade to me when supper drew to its conclusion, "you belong to me. You are in my house, and I shall not give you any rest until you have seen all the curiosities among our mountains. You must learn to know our Roussillon and to do it justice. You have no idea what we can show you--Phoenician, Celtic, Roman, Arabesque and Byzantine monuments. You shall see them all--lock, stock and barrel. I will take you everywhere, and will not let you off a single stone."

A fit of coughing compelled him to stop. I took advantage of it to tell him I should be greatly distressed if I disturbed him during the interesting event about to take place in his family. If he would kindly give me the benefit of his valuable advice about the excursion I ought to take, I should be able to go without putting him to the inconvenience of accompanying me....

"Ah, you are referring to this boy's marriage!" he exclaimed, interrupting me. "That is all nonsense. It takes place the day after to-morrow. You shall celebrate the wedding with us; it will take place quietly, for the bride is in mourning for an aunt, whose heiress she is. Therefore there is to be neither fête nor ball.... It is a pity.... You would have seen our Catalanian women dance.... They are pretty, and you might perhaps have been tempted to follow Alphonse's example. One marriage, they say, leads to others.... On Saturday, after the young people are married, I shall be at liberty, and we will set out. I ask your forgiveness for the irksomeness of a provincial wedding. To a Parisian blasé with fêtes ... and a wedding without a ball too! However, you will see a bride ... such a bride ... you must tell me what you think of her.... But you are not a frivolous man, and you take no notice of women. I have better things than women to show you. I am going to show you something! I have a fine surprise for you to-morrow."

"Ah," I replied, "it is not easy to have a treasure in your house without the public knowing all about it. I think I can guess the surprise you have in store for me. You are thinking of your statue. I am quite prepared to admire it, for my guide's description if it has roused my curiosity."

"Ah! he told you about the idol, for that is what they call my beautiful Venus Tur--but I will not talk of it. To-morrow, as soon as it is daylight, you shall see her, and you shall tell me if I am not right in considering her a _chef-d'oeuvre._ Upon my word, you could not have arrived at a better time! There are inscriptions which poor ignorant I explain after my own fashion ... but a savant from Paris!... You will probably laugh at my interpretation, for I have written a treatise on it.... I--an old provincial antiquarian--I am going to venture.... I mean to make the press groan. If you would be so good as to read and correct it, I should be hopeful.... For example, I am curious to know how you would translate this inscription on the pedestal: '_CAVE_' ...--but I do not want to ask you anything yet! To-morrow, to-morrow! Not a single word about the Venus to-day."

"You are quite right, Peyrehorade," said his wife, "to stop talking about your idol; you ought to see that you are preventing the gentleman from eating. Why, he has seen far more beautiful statues in Paris than yours. There are dozens of them in the Tuileries, and in bronze too."

"Just look at her ignorance--the blessed ignorance of the provinces!" interrupted M. de Peyrehorade. "Fancy, comparing a splendid antique statue to the flat figures of Coustou!

"'How irreverently of my affairs
The gods are pleased to talk!'

"Do you know my wife wanted to have my statue melted down to make a bell for our church? She would have been its godmother--one of Myro's _chef-d'oeuvres_."

"_Chef-d'oeuvre! chef-d'oeuvre!_ a fine _chef-d'oeuvre_ it is to break a man's leg!"

"Look here, wife," said M. de Peyrehorade in a determined voice, as he extended his right leg towards her, clad in a fine silk stocking, "if my Venus had broken this leg I should not have minded."

"Good gracious! Peyrehorade, how can you talk like that? Fortunately, the man is going on well.... And yet I cannot bring myself to look at the statue which did such an evil thing as that. Poor Jean Coll!"

"Wounded by Venus, sir," said M. de Peyrehorade, laughing loudly. "The rascal complains of being wounded by Venus!

"'Veneris nec praemia nôris.'

Who has not suffered from the wounds of Venus?"

M. Alphonse, who understood French better than Latin, winked with an understanding air, and looked at me as though to say, "Do you understand that, you Parisian?"

Supper ended at last. For an hour I had not been able to eat any more. I was tired, and could not hide my frequent yawns. Madam de Peyrehorade saw it first, and said that it was time to retire. Then began fresh apologies for the poor entertainment I should find. I should not be comfortable as in Paris; in the country things are so different! I must make allowances for the people of Roussillon. It was in vain I protested that after a journey among the mountains a bundle of straw would seem a delicious bed. They still begged me to pardon their poor rustic servants if they did not behave as well as they should. At last, accompanied by M. de Peyrehorade, I reached the room put apart for my use. The staircase, the top steps of which were of wood, led to the centre of a corridor, out of which opened several rooms.

"To the right," said my host, "is the set of rooms that I intend for the future Madam Alphonse. Your room is at the end of the passage opposite. You will understand," he added, with a look which he meant to be sly--"you will readily understand that newly married people wish to be by themselves. You are at one end of the house and they at the other."

We entered a very handsomely furnished room, where the first object that caught my eye was a bed seven feet long, six broad, and such a height that one needed a stool to get into it. My host pointed out the position of the bell, and satisfied himself that the sugar-bowl was full, and the smelling-bottles of eau de Cologne in their proper places on the toilette table; then he asked me repeatedly if I had all I wanted, wished me good-night and left me alone.

The windows were shut. Before undressing, I opened one to breathe the cool night air, which was delicious after such a lengthy supper. In front was Canigou Mountain, which is at all times beautiful, but to-night it seemed the fairest in the world, lighted up as it was by a splendid moon. I stood a few minutes to contemplate its marvellous outline, and was just going to close my window when, lowering my gaze, I saw the statue on a pedestal about forty yards from the house. It was placed in a corner of the quick-set hedge which separated a little garden from a large, perfectly level court, which, I learnt later, was the tennis ground for the town. This ground had been M. de Peyrehorade's property, but he had given it to the public at his son's urgent entreaties.

From my distance away it was difficult to make out the form of the statue; I could only judge of its height, which I guessed was about six feet. At that moment two town larrikins passed along the tennis court, close to the hedge, whistling the pretty Roussillon air, "Montagnes régalades." They stopped to look at the statue, and one of them even apostrophised her in a loud voice. He spoke the Catalanian dialect, but I had been long enough in the province of Roussillon to be able to understand almost all he said.

"Chi-ike, huzzy!" (the Catalanian expression was more forcible than that). "Look here," he said, "you broke Jean Coll's leg for him! If you belonged to me I would have broken your neck."

"Bah! what with?" asked the other. "She is made of copper, and so hard that Stephen broke his file over it, trying to cut into it. It is copper from before the Flood, and harder than anything I can think."

"If I had my cold chisel" (apparently he was a locksmith's apprentice) "I would jolly soon scoop out her big white eyes; it would be like cracking a couple of nutshells for the kernels. I would do it for a bob."

They moved a few paces further off.

"I must just wish the idol good night," said the tallest of the apprentices, stopping suddenly.

He stooped, and probably picked up a stone. I saw him stretch out his arm and throw something, and immediately after I heard a resounding blow from the bronze. At the same moment the apprentice raised his hand to his head and yelled out in pain.

"She has thrown it back at me!" he cried.

And then the two scamps took to flight as fast as they could. The stone had evidently rebounded from the metal, and had punished the rascal for the outrage done to the goddess.

I shut the window and laughed heartily.

Yet another vandal punished by Venus! Would that all destroyers of our ancient monuments could have their heads broken like that!

And with this charitable wish I fell asleep.

It was broad day when I awoke. Near my bed on one side stood M. de Peyrehorade in a dressing-gown; on the other a servant sent by his wife with a cup of chocolate in his hand.

"Come now, Parisian, get up! How lazy you people from the capital are!" said my host, while I hastily dressed myself. "It is eight o'clock, and you still in bed. I got up at six o'clock. I have been upstairs three times; I listened at your door on tiptoe, but there was no sign of life at all. It is bad for you to sleep too much at your age. And my Venus waiting to be seen! Come, take this cup of Barcelona chocolate as fast as you can ... it is quite contraband. You can't get such chocolate in Paris. Take in all the nourishment you can, for when you are before my Venus no one will be able to tear you away."

I was ready in five minutes; that is to say, I was only half shaved, wrongly buttoned and scalded by the chocolate which I had swallowed boiling hot. I went downstairs into the garden and was soon in front of a wonderfully fine statue. It was indeed a Venus of extraordinary beauty. The top part of her body was bare, just as the ancients usually depicted their great deities; her right hand, raised up to her breast, was bent, with the palm inwards, the thumb and two first fingers extended, whilst the other two were slightly curved. The other hand was near the hips, and held up the drapery which covered the lower part of the body. The attitude of this statue reminded me of that of the Morra player, which, for some reason or other, goes by the name of Germanicus. Perhaps they wished to depict the goddess playing at the game of Morra.

However that might be, it is impossible to conceive anything more perfect than the body of this Venus; nothing could be more harmonious or more voluptuous than its outlines, nothing more graceful or dignified than its drapery. I expected some work of the Lower Empire, and I beheld a masterpiece of the most perfect period of sculpture. I was specially struck with the exquisite truth of form, which gave the impression that it had been moulded by nature itself, if nature ever produces such perfect specimens.