CANNES, _April 7, 1870_.
I have not written before, because I had only bad news to give you. I
have been constantly, if not ill, at any rate in pain. I am still so. I
am distressingly weak, and I am unable to walk a hundred steps from my
home without sitting down several times to rest. Frequently, especially
in the night, I have attacks of excruciating pain, which last a long
time. “Nerves!” they tell me. Now, medicine, as you know, is almost
ineffectual when it is a question of nerves.
Last Monday, wishing to make an experiment and find out if I could stand
the journey to Paris, I went to Nice, and made a few calls. I thought at
one time that I should be guilty of the indiscretion of dying in the
home of a person whom I did not know intimately enough to take that
liberty with. I returned here in a bad condition, and spent twenty-four
hours in a state of suffocation.
Yesterday I was a little better. I went out and walked along the
sea-shore, followed by a folding-chair on which I sat down every ten
steps. Such is my life. I hope by the end of the month to be able to
start for Paris. Will it be possible? I often wonder if I shall be
strong enough to climb my stairway. You, who know so many things, do you
know of some apartment in which I might put away my books and myself,
without climbing many steps? I should not care to be too far away from
the Institute.
I received a letter, very well turned, from M. Émile Ollivier,
soliciting my vote.[46] I replied to him that I was no longer of this
world. I think he will be elected without opposition.
How right you are in your judgment that we have gone mad! The clumsy
assertion that to consult the people concerning the constitution is to
create a despotism, is proof sufficient of what false metal it is cast!
But the saddest of all is that no one is revolted by such absurdity. In
reality, we are living in a period when there is no longer such a thing
as ridicule or absurdity. Anything is said and anything is printed
without shame.
I do not know when the review of Cervantes will appear; it will precede
a splendid and beautiful edition of _Don Quixote_, which I will make you
read one of these days. As for the story which I mentioned to you I
shall reserve it to come out with my posthumous works. Still, if you
wish to read it in manuscript, you may have this pleasure, which will
take a quarter of an hour.
Good-bye, dear friend. Take good care of yourself. Health is the best of
possessions. I shall not stir from here before the end of April. I
expect to find you in Paris. Again good-bye.