Chapter III: Part 3

Succeeding the study on hashish is one on the subject of opium. But here Baudelaire had for his guidance a book, singularly celebrated in England, "Confessions of an English Opium Eater," by De Quincey, a distinguished Hellenist, a leading writer, and a man of great respectability, who has dared, with tragical candour, in a country the most hardened by cant in the world, to avow his passion for opium, to describe this passion, representing the phases, the intermittences, the relapses, the combats, the enthusiasms, the prostrations, the ecstasies and the phantasmagoria followed by inexpressible anguish. De Quincey, incredible as it may seem, had, augmenting little by little each dose, come to taking eight thousand drops a day. This, however, did not prevent him from living till the age of seventy-five, for he only died in the month of December 1859, making the doctors, to whom, in a fit of _humour_, he had mockingly left his corpse as a subject for scientific experiment, wait a long time. This habit did not prevent him from publishing a crowd of literary and learned works in which nothing announced the fatal influence which he himself described as "the black idol." The _dénouement_ of the book leaves it understood that only with superhuman efforts was the author brought to the state of self-correction; but that could only have been a sacrifice to morals and conventions, like the recompense of virtue and the punishment of crime at the end of a melodrama, final impenitence being a bad example. And De Quincey pretends that, after seventeen years of use and eight years of abuse of opium, he has been able to renounce this dangerous substance! It is unnecessary to discourage the _theriakis_ of good-will. But what of the love, however expressed, in the lyrical invocation to the brown liqueur?

"O just, subtle, and all-conquering opium! thou who, to the hearts of rich and poor alike, for the wounds that will never heal, and for the pangs of grief that 'tempt the spirit to rebel' bringest an assuaging balm;--eloquent opium! that with thy potent rhetoric stealest away the purposes of wrath, pleadest effectually for relenting pity, and through one night's heavenly sleep callest back to the guilty man the visions of his infancy, and hands washed pure from blood;--O just and righteous opium! that to the chancery of dreams summonest, for the triumphs of despairing innocence, false witnesses; and confoundest perjury; and dost reverse the sentences of unrighteous judges;--thou buildest upon the bosom of darkness, out of the fantastic imagery of the brain, cities and temples, beyond the art of Phidias and Praxiteles--beyond the splendours of Babylon and Hekatompylos; and, 'from the anarchy of dreaming sleep,' callest into sunny light the faces of long-buried beauties, and the blessed household countenances, cleansed from the 'dishonours of the grave.' Thou only givest these gifts to man; and thou hast the keys of Paradise, O just, subtle, and mighty opium!"

Baudelaire does not translate De Quincey's book entirely. He takes from it the most salient parts, of which he writes in an analysis intermingled with digressions and philosophical reflections, in such a way that he presents the entire work in an abridgment. Nothing is more curious than the biographical details which open these confessions. They show the flight of the scholar to escape from the tyrannies of his tutors, his miserable and starving life in the great desert of London, his sojourn in the lodgings turned into a garret by the negligence of the proprietor. We read of his liaison with a little half-idiot servant, Ann, a poor child, sad violet of the highways, innocent and virginal so far; his return in grace to his family and his becoming possessed of a fortune, considerable enough to allow him to give himself up entirely to his favourite studies in a charming cottage, in company with a noble woman, whom this Orestes of opium called his Electra. For, after his neuralgic pains, he had got into that ineradicable habit of taking the poison of which he absorbed, without disastrous results, the enormous quantity of forty grains a day.

To the most striking visions which shone with the blue and silver of Paradise or Elysium succeeded others more sombre than Erebus, to which one can apply the frightful lines of the poet:

"As when some great painter dips
His pen in gloom of earthquake and eclipse."

De Quincey, who was a precocious and distinguished humanist--he knew both Greek and Latin at the age of ten--had always taken great pleasure in reading Livy, and the words "Consul Romanus" resounded in his ears like a magical and peremptorily irresistible formula. These five syllables struck upon his ear like the blasts of trumpets, sounding triumphal fanfares, and when, in his dreams, multitudes of enemies struggled on a field of battle lighted with livid glimmerings, with the rattling of guns and heavy tramping, like the surge of distant waters, suddenly a mysterious voice would cry out these dominating words: "Consul Romanus." A great silence would fall, oppressed by anxious waiting, and the consul would appear mounted on a white horse, in the midst of a great crowd, like the Marius of the "Batailles des Cimbres" of Decamps, and, with a fatidical gesture, decide the victory.

At other times, people seen in reality would be mixed up in his dreams, and would haunt them like obstinate spectres not to be chased away by any formula of exorcism.

One day, in the year 1813, a Malay, of a yellow and bilious colour, with sad, home-sick eyes, coming from London and seeking some haven, knowing not one word of any European language, knocked to see if he could rest a while, at the door of the cottage. Not wishing to fall short in the eyes of his domestics and neighbours, De Quincey spoke to him in Greek; the Asiatic replied in Malay, and his honour as a linguist was saved. After having given him some money, the master of the cottage, moved by the charity which causes a smoker to offer a cigar to a poor devil whom he supposes has long been without tobacco, gave the Malay a large piece of opium, which the man swallowed in a mouthful. There was enough to kill seven or eight unaccustomed people, but the yellow-skinned man was in the habit of taking it, for he went away with signs of great satisfaction and gratitude. He was not seen again, at least in the flesh, but he became one of the most assiduous frequenters of De Quincey's visions. The Malay of the saffron face and the strangely black eyes was a kind of genus of the extreme Orient who had the keys of India, Japan, China, and other countries of repute in a chimerical and impossible distance. As one obeys a guide whom one has not called, but whom one must follow by one of those fatalities that a dream admits of, De Quincey, in the steps of the Malay, plunged into regions of fabulous antiquity and inexpressible strangeness that caused him the profoundest terror. "I know not," says he in his "Confessions," "if others share my feelings on this point; but I have often thought that, if I were compelled to forgo England, and to live in China, among Chinese manners and methods and scenery, I should go mad.... A young Chinese seems to me an antediluvian man renewed. ... In China, over and above what it has in common with the rest of Southern Asia, I am terrified by the modes of life, by the manners, by the barrier of utter abhorrence placed between myself and _them_, by counter-sympathies deeper than I can analyse. I could sooner live with lunatics, with vermin, with crocodiles or snakes."

With malicious irony, the Malay, who seemed to understand the repugnance of the opium-eater, took care to lead him to the centre of great towns, to the ivory towers, to rivers full of junks crossed by bridges in the form of dragons, to streets encumbered with an innumerable population of baboons, lifting their heads with obliquely set eyes, and moving their tails like rats, murmuring, with forced reverence, complimentary mono-syllables.

The third and last part of the dreams of an opium-eater has a lamentable title, which, however, is well justified, "Suspiria de profundis." In one of these visions appeared three unforgettable figures, mysteriously terrible like the Grecian "Moires" and the "Mothers" of the second "Faust." These are the followers of Levana, the austere goddess who takes up the new-born babe and perfects it by sorrow. As there were three Graces, three Fates, three Furies, three Muses in the primitive ages, so there were three goddesses of sorrow; they are our Notre-Dame des Tristesses. The eldest of the three sisters is called Mater lacrymarum, or Our Lady of Tears; the second Mater suspiriorum, Our Lady of Sighs; the third and youngest, Mater tenebrarum, Our Lady of Darkness, the most redoubtable of all, and of whom the strongest cannot dream without a secret terror. These mournful spectres do not speak the language of mortals; they weep, they sigh, and make terrible gestures in the shadows. Thus they express their unknown sorrows, their nameless anguish, the suggestions of solitary despair, all that there is of suffering, bitterness, and sorrow in the depths of the human soul. Man ought to take warning from these initiators: "Thus will he see things that ought not to be seen, sights which are abominable, and unspeakable secrets; thus will he read the ancient truths, the sad, great, and terrible truths."

One can imagine that Baudelaire did not spare De Quincey the reproaches he addressed to all those who sought to attain the supernatural by material means; but, in regard to the beauty of the pictures painted by the illustrious and poetical dreamer, he showed him great good will and admiration.

About this time Baudelaire left Paris and pitched his tent in Brussels. One must not presume that this journey was taken with any political idea, but merely from the desire of a more tranquil and reposeful life, far away from the distractions and excitements of Paris. This change does not appear to have been a particularly profitable one for him. He worked little at Brussels, and his papers contain only sketchy notes, summaries almost hieroglyphical, which he alone could resolve. His health, instead of improving, was impaired, more deeply than he himself was aware, as the climate did not agree with him. The first symptoms manifested themselves in a certain slowness of speech, and a more and more marked hesitation in the choice of his words; but, as Baudelaire often expressed himself in a solemn and sententious way, one did not take much notice of this embarrassment in speech, which was the preface to the terrible malady that carried him off.

The rumour of Baudelaire's death spread in Paris with the winged rapidity of bad news, faster than an electric current along its wire. Baudelaire was still living, but the news, though false, was only premature; he could not recover from the attack. Brought back from Brussels by his family and friends, he lived some months, unable to speak, unable to write, as paralysis had broken the connecting thread between thought and speech. _Thought_ lived in him always--one could see that from the expression of his eyes; but it was a prisoner, and dumb, without any means of communication, in the dungeon of clay which would only open in the tomb. What good is it to go into the details of this sad end? It is not a happy way to die; it is sorrowful, for the survivors, to see so fine and fruitful an intelligence pass away, to lose in a more and more deserted path of life a companion of youth.

Besides the "Flowers of Evil," translations of Edgar Poe, the "Artificial Paradises," and art criticisms, Baudelaire left a little book of "poems in prose" inserted at various periods in journals and reviews, which soon became without interest for vulgar readers and forced the poet, in his noble obstinacy, which would allow of no concession, to take the series to a more enterprising or literary paper. This is the first time that these pieces, scattered and difficult to find, are bound in one volume, nor will they be the least of the poet's titles to the regard of posterity.

In the short Preface addressed to Arsène Houssaye, which precedes the "Petits poèmes en prose," Baudelaire relates how the idea of employing this hybrid form, floating between verse and prose, came to him.

"I have a little confession to make to you. It was in turning over, for the twentieth time, the famous 'Gaspard de la nuit' of Aloysius Bertrand (a book known to me, to you, and several of our friends--has it not the right to be called famous?) that the idea came to me to attempt something analogous and to apply to the description of modern life, or rather to a modern and more abstract life, the process that he has applied to the painting of an ancient time, so strangely picturesque.

"Who among us, in these days of ambition, has not dreamt of the miracle of poetical, musical prose, without rhythm, without rhyme, supple enough and apt enough to adapt itself to the movements of the soul, to the swaying of a dream, to the sudden throbs of conscience?"

It is unnecessary to say that nothing resembles "Gaspard de la nuit" less than the "Poems in Prose." Baudelaire himself saw this after he commenced work, and he spoke of an _accident_, of which any other than he would have been proud, but which only humiliated a mind which looked upon the accomplishment of _exactly_ what it had intended as an honour.

We have seen that Baudelaire always claimed to direct his inspiration according to his own will, and to introduce infallible mathematics into his art. He blamed himself for producing anything but that upon which he had resolved, even though it is, as in the present case, an original and powerful work.

Our poetical language, it must be acknowledged, in spite of the valiant effort of the new school to render it flexible and malleable, hardly lends itself to rare and subtle detail, especially when the subject is _la vie moderne_, familiar or luxurious. Without having, as at one time, a horror for the calculated word and a love of circumlocution, French verse, by its very construction, refuses particularly significant expressions and if forced into direct statement, immediately becomes hard, rugged, and laborious. "The Poems in Prose" came very opportunely to supply this deficiency, and in this form, which demands perfect art and where each word must be thrown, before being employed, into scales more easy to weigh down than those of the "Peseurs d'or" of Quintin Metsys--for it is necessary to have the standard, the weights, and the balance--Baudelaire has shown a precious side of his delicate and bizarre talent. He has been able to approach the almost inexpressible and to render the fugitive nuances which float between sound and colour, and those thoughts which resemble arabesque _motifs_ or themes of musical phrases. It is not only to the physical nature, but to the secret movements of the soul, to capricious melancholy, to nervous hallucinations that this form is aptly applied. The author of the "Flowers of Evil" has drawn from it marvellous effects, and one is sometimes surprised that the language carries one through the transparencies of a dream, in the blue distances, marks out a ruined tower, a clump of trees, the summit of a mountain, and shows one things impossible to describe, which, until now, have never been expressed in words. This should be one of the glories, if not the greatest, of Baudelaire, to bring within the range of style a series of things, sensations, and effects unnamed by Adam, the great nomenclator. A writer can be ambitious of no more beautiful title, and this the author of the "Poems in prose" undoubtedly merits.

It is very difficult, without writing at great length--and, even then, it is better to direct the reader straight to the poems themselves--to give a just idea of these compositions; pictures, medallions, bas-reliefs, statuettes, enamels, pastels, cameos which follow each other rather like the vertebrae in the spine of a serpent. One is able to pick out some of the rings, and the pieces join themselves together, always living, having each its own soul writhing convulsively towards an inaccessible ideal.

Before closing this Introduction, which, although already too long--for we have simply chased through the work of the author and friend whose talent we endeavour to explain--it is necessary to quote the titles of the "Poems in Prose"--very superior in intensity, concentration, profoundness, and elegance to the delicate fantasies of "Gaspard de la nuit," which Baudelaire proposed to take as models. Among the fifty pieces which comprise the collection, each different in tone and composition, we will number "Le Gâteau, "La Chambre double," "Le Foules," "Les Veuves," "Le vieux saltimbanque," "Une Hémisphère dans une chevelure," "L'Invitation au voyage," "La Belle Dorothée," "Une Mort héroïque," "Le Thyrse," Portraits de maîtresses," "Le Désir de peindre," "Un Cheval de race" and especially "Les Bienfaits de la lune," an adorable poem in which the poet expresses, with magical illumination, what the English painter Millais has missed so completely in his "Eve of St. Agnes"--the descent of the nocturnal star with its phosphoric blue light, its grey of iridescent mother-of-pearl, its mist traversed by rays in which atoms of silver beat like moths. From the top of her stairway of clouds, the Moon leans down over the cradle of a sleeping child, bathing it in her baneful and splendid light; she dowers the sweet pale head like a fairy god-mother, and murmurs in its ear: "Thou shalt submit eternally to the influence of my kiss, thou shalt be beautiful after my fashion. Thou shalt love what I love and those that love me: the waters, the clouds, the silence, the night, the great green sea, the shapeless and multiform waters, the place where thou art not, the lover whom thou knowest not, the prodigious flowers, the perfumes that trouble the mind, the cats which swoon and groan like women in hoarse or gentle voices."

We know of no other analogy to this perfect piece than the poetry of Li-tai-pe, so well translated by Judith Walter, in which the Empress of China draws, among the rays, on the stairway of jade made brilliant by the moon, the folds of her white satin robe. A _lunatique_ only is able to understand the moon and her mysterious charm.

When we listen to the music of Weber we experience at first a sensation of magnetic sleep, a sort of appeasement which separates us without any shock from real life. Then in the distance sounds a strange note which makes us listen attentively. This note is like a sigh from the supernatural world, like the voice of the invisible spirits which call us. Oberon just puts his hunting-horn to his mouth and the magic forest opens, stretching out into blue vistas peopled with all the fantastic folk described by Shakespeare in "A Midsummer Night's Dream." Titania herself appears in the transparent robe of silver gauze.

The reading of the "Poems in Prose" has often produced in us these impressions; a phrase, a word--one only--bizarrely chosen and placed, evoke for us an unknown world of forgotten and yet friendly faces. They revive the memories of early life, and present a mysterious choir of vanished ideas, murmuring in undertones among the phantoms of things apart from the realities of life. Other phrases, of a morbid tenderness, seem like music whispering consolation for unavowed sorrows and irremediable despair. But it is necessary to beware, for such things as these make us homesick, like the "Ranz des vaches" of the poor Swiss lansquenet in the German ballad, in garrison at Strasbourg, who swam across the Rhine, was retaken and shot "for having listened too much to the sound of the horn of the Alps."

THÉOPHILE GAUTIER.

_February_ 20_th_, 1868.

SELECTED POEMS OF CHARLES BAUDELAIRE

DONE INTO ENGLISH VERSE

BY GUY THORNE

EXOTIC PERFUME

(_Parfum exotique_)

With eve and Autumn in mine eyes confest,
I breathe an incense from thy heart of fire,
And happy hill-sides tired men desire
Unfold their glory in the weary West.

O lazy Isle! where each exotic tree
Is hung with delicate fruits, and slender boys
Mingle with maidens in a dance of joys
That knows not shame, where all are young and free.

Yes I thy most fragrant breasts have led me home
To this thronged harbour; and at last I know
Why searching sailors venture on the foam....

--'Tis that they may to Tamarisk Island go.
For there old slumberous sea-chants fill the air
Laden with spices, and the world is fair.

THE MURDERER'S WINE

(_Le vin de l'assassin_)

My wife is stiffened into wax.
--Now I can drink my fill.
Her yellings tore my heart like hooks,
They were so keen and shrill.
'Tis a King's freedom that I know
Since that loud voice is still.

The day is tender blue and gold,
The sky is clear above ...
Just such a summer as we had
When first I fell in love.
... I'm a King now! Such royal thoughts
Within me stir and move!

I killed her; but I could not slake
My burning lava-wave
Of hideous thirst--far worse than that
Of some long-tortured slave--
If I had wine enough to fill
Her solitary, deep grave.

In slime and dark her body lies;
It echoed as it fell.
(I will remember this no more.)
Her tomb no man can tell.
I cast great blocks of stone on her,
The curb-stones of the well.

We swore a thousand oaths of love;
Absolved we cannot be
Nor ever reconciled, as when
We both lived happily;
... 'Twas evening on a darkling road
When the mad thing met me.

We all are mad, this I well think.
... The madness of my wife
Was to come, tired and beautiful,
To a madman with a knife!
I loved her far too much, 'twas why
I hurried her from life.

I am alone among my friends,
And of our sodden crowd
No single drunkard understands
I sit apart and vowed.
They do not weave all night, and throw
Wine-shuttles through a shroud!

True love has black enchantments; chains
That rattle, and damp fears;
Wan phials of poison, dead men's bones,
And horrible salt tears.
Of this the iron-bound drunkard knows
Nothing, nor nothing hears.

I am alone. My wife is dead,
And dead-drunk will I be
This self-same night, a clod on earth
With naught to trouble me.
A dog I'll be, in a long dog-sleep,
Oblivious and free!

The chariot with heavy wheels
Comes rumbling through the night.
Crushed stones and mud are on its wheels,
It is a thing of might!
The wain of retribution moves
Slowly, as is most right.

It comes, to crack my guilty head
Or crush my belly through,
I care not who the driver is;
God and the devil too
--Sitting side by side--can do no more
Than that they needs must do!

MUSIC

(_La Musique_)

Music can lead me far, and far
O'er mystical sad seas,
Where burns my pale, high-hanging star
Among the mysteries
Of Pleiades.

My lungs are taut of sweet salt air;
The pregnant sail-cloths climb
The long, gloom-gathering ocean stair.
I don the chord-shot cloak of Time
While the waves chime!

Fierce winds and sombre tempests come
And bludgeon heavily
All our vibrating timbers ... drum
Most passionately. O Sea!
Liberate me!

So shall thy mighty void express
Both depths and surface. There
Opens thy magic mirror; men confess
To Thee their sick despair
... No otherwhere.

THE GAME

(_Le jeu_)

In faded chairs old courtesans
With painted eyebrows leer.
The stones and metal rattle in
Each dry and withering ear,
As lackadaisical they loll,
And preen themselves, and peer.

Their mumbling gums and lipless masks
--Or lead-white lips--are prest
Around the table of green cloth;
And withered hands, possest
Of Hell's own fever, vainly search
In empty purse or breast.

Beneath the low, stained ceiling hang
Enormous lamps, which shine
On the sad foreheads of great poets
Glutted with things divine,
Who throng this ante-room of hell
To find the anodyne.

I see these things as in a dream,
With the clairvoyant eye,
And in a cottier of the den
A crouching man descry;
A silent, cold, and envying man
Who watches. It is I!

I envy those old harlots' greed
And gloomy gaiety;
The gripping passion of the game,
The fierce avidity
With which men stake their honour for
A ruined chastity.

I dare not envy many a man:
Who runs his life-race well;
Whose brave, undaunted peasant blood
Death's menace cannot quell.
Abhorring _nothingness_, and strong
Upon the lip of Hell.

THE FALSE MONK

(_Le mauvais moine_)

Upon the tall old cloister walls there were
Some painted frescoes showing Truth; so we,
Seeing them thus so holy and so fair,
Might for a space forget austerity.

For when the Lord Christ's seeds were blossoming,
Full many a simple, pious brother found
Death but a painted phantom with no sting,
--And took for studio a burial-ground.

But my soul is a sepulchre, where I,
A false Franciscan, dwell eternally,
And no walls glow with pictured mysteries.

When shall I rise from living death, to take
My pain as rich material, and make
Work for my hands, with pleasure for mine eyes?

AN IDEAL OF LOVE

(_L'Idéal_)

I hate those beauties in old prints,
Those faded, simpering, slippered pets;
Vignetted in a room of chintz,
And clacking silly castanets.

I leave Gavarni all his dolls,
His sickly harems, pale and wan,
The beauties of the hospitals
I do not wish to look upon.

Red roses are the roses real!
Among the pale and virginal
Sad flowers, I find not my ideal
... Vermilion or cardinal!

The panther-women hold my heart--
Macbeth's dark wife, of men accurst,
... A dream of Æschylus thou art,
'Tis such as thou shall quench my thirst!

... Or Michelangelo's daughter, Night,
Who broods on her own beauty, she
For whose sweet mouth the Giants fight,
Queen of my ideal love shall be!

THE SOUL OF WINE

(_L'Âme du vin_)

Vermilion the seals of my prison,
Cold crystal its walls, and my voice
Singeth loud through the evening; a vision
That bid'st thee rejoice!

Disinherited! outcast!--I call thee
To pour, and my song in despite
Of the World shall enfold and enthrall thee
Pulsating with light!

Long labours, fierce ardours, and blazing
Of suns on far hill-sides, and strife
Of the toilers have gone to the raising
Of me into life!

I forget not their pains, for I render
Rewards; yea! in full-brimming bowl
To those who have helped to engender
My passionate soul!

My joys are unnumbered, unending,
When I rise from chill cellars to lave
The hot throat of Labour, ascending
As one from the grave.

The Sabbath refrains that thou hearest,
The whispering hope in my breast,
Shalt call thee, dishevelled and dearest!
To ultimate rest.

The woman thy youthfulness captured,
Who bore thee a son--this thy wife--
I will give back bright eyes, which enraptured
Shall see thee as Life!
Thy son, a frail athlete, I dower
With all my red strength, and the toil
Of his life shall be king-like in power,
... Anointed with oil!

To thee I will bow me, thou fairest
Gold grain from the Sower above.
Ambrosia I wedded, and rarest
The fruits of our love.
High God round His feet shall discover
The verses I made, in the hours
When I was thy slave and thy lover,
Press upwards like flowers!

THE INVOCATION

(_Prière_)

Glory to thee, Duke Satan. Reign
O'er kings and lordly state.
Prince of the Powers of the Air
And Hell; most desolate,
Dreaming Thy long, remorseful dreams
And reveries of hate!

O let me lie near thee, and sleep
Beneath the ancient Tree
Of Knowledge, which shall shadow thee
Beelzebub, and me!
While Temples of strange sins upon
Thy brows shall builded be.

THE CAT

(_Le Chat_)

Most lovely, lie along my heart,
Within your paw your talons fold,
Let me find secrets in your eyes--
Your eyes of agate rimmed with gold!

For when my languid fingers move
Along your rippling back, and all
My senses tingle with delight
In softness so electrical,

My wife's face flashes in my mind;
Your cold, mysterious glances bring,
Sweet beast, strange memories of hers
That cut and flagellate and sting!

From head to foot a subtle air
Surrounds her body's dusky bloom,
And there attends her everywhere
A faint and dangerous perfume.

THE GHOST

(_Le Revenant_)

With some dark angel's flaming eyes
That through the shadows burn,
Gliding towards thee, noiselessly,
--'Tis thus I shall return.

Such kisses thou shalt have of me
As the pale moon-rays give,
And cold caresses of the snakes,
That in the trenches live.

And when the livid morning comes,
All empty by thy side,
And bitter cold, thou'lt find my place;
Yea, until eventide.

Others young love to their embrace
By tenderness constrain,
But over all thy youth and love
I will by terror reign.

LES LITANIES DE SATAN

O Satan, most wise and beautiful of all the angels,
God, betrayed by destiny and bereft of praise,
_Have pity on my long misery!_

Prince of Exile, who hast been trodden down and vanquished,
But who ever risest up again more strong,
_O Satan, have pity on my long misery!_

Thou who knowest all; Emperor of the Kingdoms
that are below the earth,
Healer of human afflictions,
_Have pity on my long misery!_

Thou who in love givest the taste of Paradise
To the Leper, the Outcast and those who are accursed,
_O Satan, have pity on my long misery!_

O thou who, of Death, thy strong old mistress,
Hast begotten the sweet madness of Hope,
_Have pity on my long misery!_

Thou who givest outlaws serenity, and the pride
Which damns a whole people thronging round the scaffold,
_O Satan, have pity on my long misery!_

Thou who knowest in what corners of the envious earth
The jealous God hath hidden the precious stones,
_Have pity on my long misery!_

Thou whose clear eye knoweth the deep arsenals
Wherein the buried metals are sleeping,
_O Satan, have pity on my long misery!_

Thou whose great hand hideth the precipice
And concealeth the abyss from those who walk in sleep,
_Have pity on my long misery!_

Thou who by enchantment makest supple the bones
of the drunkard
When he falleth under the feet of the horses,
_O Satan, have pity on my long misery!_

Thou who didst teach weak men and those who suffer
To mix saltpetre and sulphur,
_Have pity on my long misery!_

Thou, O subtle of thought! who settest thy mask
Upon the brow of the merciless rich man,
_O Satan, have pity on my long misery!_

Thou who fillest the eyes and hearts of maidens
With longing for trifles and the love of forbidden things,
_Have pity on my long misery!_

Staff of those in exile, beacon of those who contrive
strange matters,
Confessor of conspirators and those who are hanged,
_O Satan, have pity on my long misery!_

Sire by adoption of those whom God the Father
Has hunted in anger from terrestrial paradise,
_Have pity on my long misery!_

ILL-STARRED!

(_Le Guignon_)

To raise this dreadful burden as I ought
It needs thy courage, Sisyphus, for I
Well know how long is Art, and Life how short.
--My soul is willing, but the moments fly.

Towards some remote churchyard without a name
In forced funereal marches my steps come;
Far from the storied sepulchres of fame.
--My heart is beating like a muffled drum.

Full many a flaming jewel shrouded deep
In shadow and oblivion, lies asleep,
Safe from the toiling mattocks of mankind.

Sad faery blossoms secret scents distil
In trackless solitudes; nor ever will
The lone anemone her lover find!

Note.--It seems fairly obvious--and perhaps this is a discovery --that Baudelaire must have read Gray's "Elegy." As we know, he was a first-class English scholar, and whether he plagiarised or unconsciously remembered the most perfect stanza that Gray ever wrote, one can hardly doubt that the gracious music of the French was borrowed from or influenced by the no less splendid rhythm of--

"Full many a gem of purest ray serene
The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air."

LINES WRITTEN ON THE FLY-LEAF OF AN EXECRATED BOOK

(_Épigraphe pour un livre condamné_)

Sober, simple, artless man,
In these pages do not look,
Melancholy lurks within,
Sad and saturnine the book.

Cast it from thee. If thou know'st
Not of that dark learnèd band,
Whom wise Satan rules as Dean;
Throw! Thou would'st not understand.

Yet, if unperturbed thou canst,
Standing on the heights above,
Plunge thy vision in the abyss
--Read in me and learn to love.

If thy soul hath suffered, friend,
And for Paradise thou thirst,
Ponder my devil-ridden song
And pity me ... or be accurst!

THE END OF THE DAY

(_La Fin de la journée_)

Beneath a wan and sickly light
Life, impudent and noisy, sways;
Most meaningless in all her ways.
She dances like a bedlamite,

Until the far horizon grows
Big with sweet night, at last! whose name
Appeases hunger, soothes the shame
And sorrow that the poet knows.

My very bones seem on the rack;
My spirit wails aloud; meseems
My heart is thronged with funeral dreams.

I will lie down and round me wrap
The cool, black curtains of the gloom
That night hath woven in her loom.

LITTLE POEMS IN PROSE

VENUS AND THE FOOL

How glorious the day! The great park swoons beneath the Sun's burning eye, as youth beneath the Lordship of Love.

Earth's ecstasy is all around, the waters are drifting into sleep. Silence reigns in nature's revel, as sound does in human joy. The waning light casts a glamour over the world. The sun-kissed flowers plume the day with colour, and fling incense to the winds. They desire to rival the painted sky.

Yet, amidst the rout, I see one sore afflicted thing. A motley fool, a willing clown who brings laughter to the lips of kings when weariness and remorse oppress them; a fool in a gaudy dress, coiffed in cap and bells, huddles at the foot of a huge Venus. His eyes are full of tears, and raised to the goddess they seem to say:

"I am the last and most alone of mortals, inferior to the meanest animal, in that I am denied either love or friendship. Yet I, even I, am made for human sympathy and the adoration of immortal Beauty. O Goddess, have pity, have mercy on my sadness and despair."

But the implacable Venus stares through the world with her steady marble eyes.

THE DESIRE TO PAINT

Unhappy is the man, but happy the artist, to whom this desire comes.

I long to paint one woman. She has come to me but seldom, swiftly passing from my sight, as some beautiful, unforgettable object the traveller leaves behind him in the night. It is long ago since I saw her.

She is lovely, far more than that; she is all-sufficing. She is a study in black: all that she inspires is nocturnal and profound. Her eyes are two deep pools wherein mystery vaguely coils and stirs; her glance is phosphorescent; it is like lightning on a summer night of black velvet.

She is comparable to a great black Sun, if one could imagine a dark star brimming over with happiness and light. She stirs within one dreams of the moon, Night's Queen who casts spells upon her--not the white moon, that cold bride of summer idylls, but the sinister, intoxicating moon which hangs in the leaden vault of storm, among the driven clouds; not the pale, peaceful moon who visits the sleep of the pure; but the fiery moon, tom from the conquered heavens, before whom dance the witches of Thessaly.

Upon the brow determination sits; she is ever seeking whom she may enthrall. Her delicately curved and quivering nostrils breathe incense from unknown lands; a haunting smile lingers on her subtle lips--lips softer than sleep-laden poppy petals, kissed by the suns of tropic lands.

There are women who inspire one with the desire to woo and win. She makes me long to fall asleep at her feet, beneath her slow and steady gaze.

EACH MAN HIS OWN CHIMÆRA

Beneath a vault of livid sky, upon a far-flung and dusty plain where no grass grew, where not a nettle or a thistle dared raise its head, men passed me bowed down to the ground.

Each bore upon his back a great Chimæra, heavy as a sack of coal, or as the equipment of a foot-soldier of Rome.

But the monster was no dead weight. With her all-powerful and elastic muscles she encircled and oppressed her mount, clawing with two great talons at his breast. Her fabulous head reposed upon his brow, like a casque of ancient days whereby warriors struck fear to the hearts of their foes.

I questioned one of the wayfarers, asking why they walked thus. He replied that he knew nothing, neither he nor his companions, but that they moved towards an unknown land, urged on by irresistible impulse.

None of the wayfarers was discomforted by the foul thing which hung upon his neck. One said that it was part of himself.

Beneath the lowering dome of sky they journeyed on. They trod the dust-strewn earth--earth as desolate as the dusty sky. Their weary faces bore no witness to despair; they were condemned to hope for ever. So the pilgrimage passed and faded into the mist of the horizon, where the planet unveils itself to the human eye.

For some moments I tried to solve this mystery; but unconquerable Indifference fell upon me. And I was no more dejected by my burden than they by their crushing Chimæras.

INTOXICATION

To be drunken for ever: that is the only thing which matters! If you would escape Time's bruises and his heavy burdens which weigh you to the earth, you must be drunken.

But how? With the fruit of the wine, with poetry, with virtue, with what you will. But be drunken. And if, sometime, at the gates of a palace, on the green banks of a river, or in the shadowed loneliness of your own room, you should awake and find intoxication lessened or passed away, ask of the wind, of the wave, of the star, of the bird, of the timepiece; ask all that flies, all that sighs, all that revolves, all that sings, all that speaks--ask of these the hour. And the wind, the wave, the star, the bird, and the timepiece will answer you: "It is the hour to be drunken! Lest you be martyred slaves of Time, intoxicate yourselves, be drunken without cease! With wine, with poetry, with virtue, or with what you will."

THE MARKSMAN

As the carriage passed through the wood he told the driver to halt at a shooting-gallery, saying that he wished to have a few shots to kill time.

Is not the slaying of the monster Time the most usual and legitimate occupation of man?

So he graciously offered his hand to his dear, adorable, accursed wife; the mysterious woman who was his inspiration, to whom he owed many of his sorrows, many of his joys.

Several bullets went wide of the mark; one flew far away into the distance. His charming wife laughed deliriously, mocking at his clumsiness. Turning to her, he said brusquely:

"Look at that doll yonder, on your right, with its nose turned up and so supercilious an air. Think, sweet angel, I will picture to myself that it is you."

He closed his eyes, he pulled the trigger. The doll's head fell upon the ground.

Then, bending over his dear, adorable, accursed wife, his inevitable and merciless muse, he kissed her hand respectfully, and said: "Ah, sweet Angel, how I thank you for my skill!"

CORRESPONDENCE OF BAUDELAIRE

_Baudelaire to Sainte-Beuve_

19_th_ _March_, 1856.

Here, my dear patron, is a kind of literature which will not, perhaps, inspire you with as much enthusiasm as it does me, but which will most surely interest you. It is necessary--that is to say that I desire, that Edgar Poe, who is not very great in America, should become a great man in France. Knowing how brave you are and what a lover of novelty, I have boldly promised your support to Michel Lévy.

Can you write me a line telling me if you will do something in the "Athenæum" or elsewhere? Because, in that case, I would write to M. Lalanne not to entrust this to any one else--your pen having a peculiar authority of which I am in need.

You will see at the end of the Notice (which contradicts all the current opinions in the United States) that I announce new studies. I shall speak of the opinions of this singular man later, in the matter of sciences, philosophy, and literature.

I deliver my always troubled soul into your hands.

_Baudelaire to Sainte-Beuve_

_Wednesday_, 26_th_ _March_, 1856.

You well knew that this scrap of good news would enchant me. Lalanne had been warned by Asselineau, and it would have been necessary for the book to have been given to another person if you had not been able to write the article. Lalanne has received a volume.

I can, with respect to the remainder of your letter, give you some details which will perhaps interest you.

There will be a second volume and a second preface. The first volume is written to draw the Public: "Juggling, hypotheses, false rumours," etc. "Ligeia" is the only important piece which is morally connected with the second volume.

The second volume is more markedly fantastic: "Hallucinations, mental maladies, pure grotesqueness, the supernatural," etc.

The second Preface will contain the analysis of the words that I shall not translate, and, above all, the statement of the scientific and literary opinions of the author. It is even necessary that I should write to M. de Humboldt on this subject to ask him his opinion on a little book which is dedicated to him; it is "Eureka."

The first preface, that you have seen and in which I have tried to comprise a lively protestation against Americanism, is almost complete from the biographical point of view. We shall pretend to wish to consider Poe only as a juggler, but I shall come back at the finish to the supernatural character of his poetry and his stories. He is only American in so far as he is a juggler. Beyond that, the thought is almost anti-American. Besides, he has made fun of his compatriots as much as he could.

Now, the piece to which you allude makes part of the second volume. It is a dialogue between two souls, after the destruction of the earth. There are three dialogues of this kind that I shall be happy to lend you at the end of the month, before delivering my second volume to the printer.

Now, I thank you with all my heart; but you are so kind that you run risks with me. After the Poe will come two volumes of mine, one of critical articles and the other of poems. Thus, I make my excuses to you beforehand; and, besides, I fear that when I shall no longer speak with the voice of a great poet, I shall be for you a brawling and disagreeable being.

Yours ever.

At the end of the second volume of Poe I shall put some specimens of poetry.

I am persuaded that a man so careful as yourself would not wish me to ask him to take note of the orthography of the name [Edgar Poe]. No "d," no diæresis, no accent.

_Baudelaire to Sainte-Beuve_

9_th March_, 1857.

My dear friend, you are too indulgent to have taken exception to the impertinent point of interrogation that I have put after the word "souvenir" on the copy of the "Nouvelles histoires extraordinaires," that I laid aside for you yesterday at the "Moniteur." If you can be pleased, I shall think it very natural: you have spoilt me. If you cannot, I shall still find it very natural.

This second volume is of a higher and more poetic nature than two-thirds of the first. The third volume (in process of publication in the "Moniteur") will be preceded by a third notice.

The tale of the end of the world is called "Conversation of Eiros with Charmion."

A new pull has just been made of the first volume, in which the principal faults are corrected. Michel knows that he must keep a copy for you. If I have not the time to bring it to you, I shall have it sent to you.

Your affectionate.

_Baudelaire to Sainte-Beuve_

_Wednesday_, 18_th August_, 1857.

Ah! dear friend, I have something very serious, something very awkward to ask you. I wished to write to you, and then I would rather tell you. For a fortnight my ideas on this subject have been changing; but my lawyer (Chaix d'Est-Ange fils) insists that I talk to you about it, and I should be very happy if you could grant me a little conversation of three minutes to-day wherever you like, at your house or elsewhere. I did not wish to call on you unexpectedly. It always seems to me, when I take my way towards the rue Montparnasse, that I am going to visit that wonderful wise man, seated in a golden tulip, whose voice speaks to intruders with the resounding echo of a trumpet.

This morning I am awaiting some copies of my brochure; I will send you one at the same time.

Your very affectionate.

_Baudelaire to Sainte-Beuve_

_Tuesday_, 18_th May_, 1858.

I think that I drop in upon you as inconveniently as possible, do I not? You are engaged to-day; but, by coming to see you after four o'clock I shall perhaps be able to find you. In any case, whether I deceive myself or not, if you are busy this evening with your affairs, put me to the door like a true friend.

Yours always.

_Baudelaire to Sainte-Beuve_

14_th June_, 1858.

Dear Friend,

I have just read your work on "Fanny." Is there any need for me to tell you how charming it is and how surprising it is to see a mind at once so full of health, of herculean health, and at the same time most delicate, most subtle, most femininely fine! (On the subject of feminine fineness I wanted to obey you and to read the work of the stoic. In spite of the respect I ought to have for your authority, I decidedly do not wish that gallantry, chivalry, mysticism, heroism, in fact exuberance and excess, which are what is most charming even in honesty, should be suppressed.)

With you, it is necessary to be cynical; for you are too shrewd for deceit not to be dangerous. Ah well, this article has inspired me with terrible jealousy. So much has been said about Loëve-Weimars and of the service he has rendered to French literature! Shall I not find a champion who will say as much of me?

By some cajolery, most powerful friend, shall I obtain this from you? However, what I ask of you is not an injustice. Did you not offer it to me at first? Are not the "Adventures of Pym" an excellent pretext for a general sketch? You, who love to amuse yourself in all depths, will you not make an excursion into the depths of Edgar Poe? You guess that the request for this service is connected in my mind with the visit I must pay to M. Pelletier. When one has a little money and goes to dine with a former mistress one forgets everything. But there are days when the curses of all the fools mount to one's brain, and then one implores one's old friend, Sainte-Beuve.

Now, truly, of late I have been literally dragged in the mud, and (pity me, it is the first time that I have lacked dignity), I have had the weakness to reply.

I know how busy you are and how full of application for all your lessons, for all your work and duties, etc. But if, sometimes, a little strain were not put on friendliness, on kindness, where would the hero of friendliness be? And if one did not say too much good about brave men, how would they be consoled for the curses of those who only wish to say too much evil?

Finally, I will say to you, as usual, that all that you wish will be good.

Yours ever.

I like you more than I like your books.

_Baudelaire to Sainte-Beuve_

14_th August_, 1858.

Is it permitted to come and warm and fortify oneself a little by contact with you? You know what I think of men who are depressants and men who have a tonic influence. If, then, I unsettle you, you must blame your qualification, still more my weakness. I have need of you as of a douche.

_Baudelaire to Sainte-Beuve_

21_st February_, 1859.

My dear friend, I do not know if you take in the "Revue française." But, for fear that you should read it, I protest against a certain line (on the subject of "The Flowers of Evil"), page 171, in which the author--who, however, is very intelligent--is guilty of some injustice towards you.

Once, in a newspaper, I have been accused of ingratitude towards two chiefs of ancient romanticism _to whom I owe all_; it spoke, besides, with a judicial air, of this infamous trash.

This time, in reading this unfortunate line, I said to myself: "Mon Dieu! Sainte-Beuve, who knows my fidelity, but who knows that I am connected with the author, will perhaps believe that I have been capable of prompting this passage." It is exactly the contrary; I have quarrelled with Babou many a time in order to persuade him that you would always do everything you ought and could do.

A short time ago I was talking to Malassis of this great friendship, which does me honour and to which I owe so much good advice. The monster left me no peace until I gave him the long letter that you sent me at the time of my lawsuit, and which will serve, perhaps, as a plan for the making of a Preface. New "Flowers" are done, and passably out of the ordinary. Here, in repose, fluency has come back to me. There is one of them ("Danse macabre") which ought to have appeared on the 15th, in the "Revue contemporaine...."

I have not forgotten your Coleridge, but I have been a month without receiving any books, and to run through the 2,400 pages of Poe is some small labour.

Sincerely yours, and write to me _if you have time_.

Honfleur, Calvados (this address is sufficient).

What has become of the old rascal? (d'Aurevilly).

_Baudelaire to Sainte-Beuve_

28_th February_, 1859.

My dear friend, I learn that you have asked Malassis to communicate to you what you wrote to me on the subject of the "Flowers." Malassis is a little astounded; furthermore, he is ill. There were two letters; one, a friendly, complimentary letter; the other, a scheme of the address that you gave to me on the eve of my lawsuit. As, one day, I was classifying papers with Malassis, he begged me to give him that, and when I told him I intended to make use of it (not by copying but by paraphrasing and developing it) he said to me: "All the more reason. You will always find it again at my house. If your printer had it, it could not get lost."

I even think I remember having said to Malassis: "If I had pleaded my cause myself and if I had known how to develop this thesis, that a lawyer could not understand, I should doubtless have been acquitted."

I understand absolutely nothing of this nonsense in the "Revue française." The manager, however, seems to be a very well-bred young man. Every one knows that you have rendered many services to men younger than yourself. How has M. M---- printed this without making representations to Babou and without finding out what prejudice he had towards me?

Malassis, on whom I had not counted at all, has also seen the passage, and his letter is still more severe than yours.

I am going to Paris on the 4th or 5th. It would be very kind of you to write a word to Mme. Duval, 22, rue Beautreillis, to let me know if and when you wish to see me. I shall stay at her house.

Yours sincerely.

_Baudelaire to Sainte-Beuve_

3_rd_ or 4_th March_, 1859.

A thousand thanks for your excellent letter. It has reassured me, but I think you are too sensitive. If ever I attain as good a position as yours, I shall be a man of stone. I have just read a very funny article of the "rascal" on Chateaubriand and M. de Marcellus, his critic. He has not missed the over easy witticism: "Tu Marcellus eris!"