Chapter IX: Toulon, June 17

You now know the manner of my life for the past two months, my dear friend, and although you have not let me hear from you for such a length of time, I am going to tell you something of myself, to call forth your advice. Young persons and the eternally young gods need the remonstrances of the sages, and you are a sage, you who do not scorn satyrs. You know that the manner of their life exposes them to unpleasant adventures among mortals more infatuated with the idea of love than with love itself.

It seems that some sort of Olympic games are being celebrated at Turin and that different representatives from the whole world have come there to dispute for the embossed cups and laurel wreaths. A director of the performances who traveled through this place became enamoured of Cydalise’s face and entreated her to represent the goddesses, in unveiled poses, before the assembled throngs. He supposes that a beautiful body always follows from a fine figure and I must confess to you that he was not deceived, in this instance. Cydalise is like myself; she has no false modesty and she would even consider it criminal obstinately to conceal from the world what the supreme Creator of men and satyrs has formed for the delight of eyes. She therefore accepted,—she has since then laughingly told me that the tyrant of this country, whom I thought more humane, far from wishing to lighten the draperies of goddesses, insists on their being very opaque and heavy; but this is a secondary point in the story, so we will pass it by,—without concealing the fact that there was a question of me; this embarrassed her greatly. She said that she feared all sorts of dangers for her dear Antiphilos, and Antiphilos who preferred to remain at Toulon hastened to reveal a scandalous joy in the idea of the trip. So she has left me here, promising—and her director has agreed to this—to return once a week to spend a day with me.

She faithfully returns, as she has promised, bringing on each trip a quantity of golden money with the most diverse effigies: I would never have supposed that the world contained so many tyrants. If they wage war, as was customary in the old days, in what state must the earth be, O master of Olympus? I am the guardian of this treasure, which steadily increases. I do not yet know very well what can be done with this gold; I have other means of persuasion, but Cydalise knows, and I content myself with fulfilling my office which is to stuff all this gold in a bag, make it fast and be silent.

I have other means of persuasion. They are apparent in the eagerness of my eyes which are not, as the poet says, “hard, brilliant and sad,” but soft, brilliant and joyous, eyes of a lover, eyes of a magnet, eyes which attract hearts and eyes, as the magic stone, sapphires. You have guessed that my conquest of the Admiralty café has fallen into my arms and that she was satisfied to be there. She is far from being as comely as Cydalise and hardly gives me any pleasure outside that of variety. Yet she, too, knows the rules of the game and all its finesse. What especially stimulates her is the idea of deceiving Cydalise, whom she knows and who has never wanted to associate with her. Let us hope, O god of the winged heel, that she proceeds not to boast of her good fortune! I will make a sacrifice to Harpocrates so that he may place a seal on her lips. I have called her Erebus; why, she does not know. Her body is like those gilded flambeaux, smudged with black, that I remember having seen at Ephesis after the conflagration. As we were strolling on the wharf the other day, a sailor sang:

Elle est un peu brunette,
Ce sont les plus belles gens.

She began to listen and laugh:

“Is that so, Satyros?”

“Yes, Erebus.”

I have not confided anything to her, but she has beheld, carved on the poop of a Greek vessel, a satyr’s head that resembled me; and a sailor spelled for her the name with which she calls me. All this amuses me. The Phrygian Oreads used to call me this name for the fun of provoking me, and they would stamp a figure on the ground, telling of my victory. O sweet land of Phrygia!

All the same, I have entreated her to keep this name for our intimacy, for the satyrs have more and more acquired a bad reputation in this country and it maddens me. Did not Erebus have the idea, the other day, to buy and read aloud a newspaper proudly called _The Journal of Satyrs_:

“Ah! Ah! there is the paper for you! The only thing it lacks is your picture.”

By Apollo! What incoherencies! What nonsense! What idea, anyway, have the slaves who write these pages, of a satyr? Despite my debonair attitude of mind, I grew angry both against the journal and against the archons who have thrown, it seems, the slaves into prison. They are but fools. They hardly merit the punishment with which Priapus threatens plunderers of the orchards: _inrumabo!_ I explained all this to Erebus: she became serious. We began to speak of other things.

This is to what you expose your satyr, Cydalise, in letting him stroll through the streets, while the Olympic youths drain the enchased cups, filled with a dark wine, in your honor. Erebus only likes champagne. I am always faithful to my milk with the paper taste and, when Erebus is astonished at this, I tell her that milk is the wine of satyrs. She quickly assumes a smiling expression: it is her manner of intimating that she has understood.

When Cydalise returns, we pass every minute at our home, the days as well as the nights. Thus I avoid chance meetings and explanations, which would cause me to lose my head, for my only diplomacy consists in taking to flight and in concealing myself behind a tree trunk. How fettered I feel myself with your civilization and how unreasonable women are! This they call treason, betrayal. But I love them all. Do they not all belong to me, since I can satisfy them all? Neither they, nor you perhaps, yet know what it is to be a satyr, the quality of that force of nature unchained by desire. Cydalise will have to make a decision and admit that satyrs are not formed for constancy and that caprice is a divine thing.

O caprice, diversity of forms under the eternal law, caprice with changing eyes!

Caprice, slender maiden with breasts of brass, matron where autumn and its colors are enthroned!

Caprice, nymphs stained with blackberries, with argil backs, with cheeks cut by brambles, pure or impure like the earth,—and dry leaves rustle in their entangled tresses!

Caprice, the young shepherds run towards the cot, and the shepherdesses takes each other by the hand, crying like fowl surprised by a fox, and turning round to laugh between their cries!

Caprice, pungent odor of ferns, odor of shoulders under willows and of limbs in streams still white with the foam of the daughter of Latona bathing there!

Caprice!

Let not this flight of fancy surprise you. The summer has mounted to my head.

ANTIPHILOS,
_Satyr._

X

DIOGENES