Many cases are on record, showing how complex and unexpected are the

checks and relations between organic beings which have to struggle

together in the same country. I will give only a single instance, which

though a simple one interested me. In Staffordshire, on the estate of a

relation where I had ample means of investigation, there was a large and

extremely barren heath which had never been touched by the hand of man;

but several hundred acres of exactly the same nature had been inclosed

twenty-five years previously and planted with Scotch fir. The change in

the native vegetation of the planted part of the heath was most

remarkable, more than is generally seen in passing from one quite

different soil to another: not only the proportional numbers of the

heath-plants were wholly changed, but twelve species of plants (not

counting grasses and carices) flourished in the plantations, which could

not be found on the heath. The effect on the insects must have been

still greater, for six insectivorous birds were very common in the

plantations which were not to be seen on the heath; and the heath was

frequented by two or three distinct insectivorous birds. Here we see how

potent has been the effect of the introduction of a single tree, nothing

whatever else having been done, with the exception of the land having

been inclosed so that cattle could not enter.

But how important an element inclosure is, I plainly saw near Farnham in

Surrey. Here there are extensive heaths with a few clumps of old Scotch

firs on the distant hill-tops: within the last ten years large spaces

have been inclosed, and self-sown firs are now springing up in

multitudes, so close together that all cannot live. When I ascertained

that these young trees had not been sown or planted, I was so much

surprised at their numbers that I went to several points of view, whence

I could examine hundreds of acres of the uninclosed heath, and literally

I could not see a single Scotch fir except the old planted clumps. But

on looking closely between the stems of the heath, I found a multitude

of seedlings and little trees which had been perpetually browsed down by

the cattle. In one square yard, at a point some hundred yards distant

from one of the old clumps, I counted thirty-two little trees; and one

of them, with twenty-six rings of growth, had during many years tried to

raise its head above the stems of the heath, and had failed. No wonder

that as soon as the land was inclosed it became thickly clothed with

vigorously growing young firs. Yet the heath was so extremely barren and

so extensive that no one would ever have imagined that cattle would have

so closely and effectually searched it for food.

Here we see that cattle absolutely determine the existence of the Scotch

fir; but in several parts of the world insects determine the existence

of cattle. Perhaps Paraguay offers the most curious instance of this;

for here neither cattle nor horses nor dogs have ever run wild, though

they swarm southward and northward in a feral state; and Azara and

Rengger have shown that this is caused by the greater number in Paraguay

of a certain fly, which lays its eggs in the navels of these animals

when first born. The increase of these flies, numerous as they are, must

be habitually checked by some means, probably by other parasitic

insects. Hence if certain insectivorous birds were to decrease in

Paraguay, the parasitic insects would probably increase; and this would

lessen the number of the navel-frequenting flies; then cattle and horses

would become feral, and this would certainly greatly alter (as indeed I

have observed in parts of South America) the vegetation; this again

would largely affect the insects; and this, as we have just seen in

Staffordshire, the insectivorous birds,--and so onwards in ever

increasing circles of complexity. Not that under nature the relations

will ever be as simple as this. Battle within battle must be continually

recurring with varying success; and yet in the long run the forces are

so nicely balanced that the face of nature remains for long periods of

time uniform, though assuredly the merest trifle would give the victory

to one organic being over another. Nevertheless, so profound is our

ignorance and so high our presumption, that we marvel when we hear of

the extinction of an organic being; and as we do not see the cause, we

invoke cataclysms to desolate the world, or invent laws on the duration

of the forms of life!

OF NATURAL SELECTION; OR THE SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST

From the 'Origin of Species'

Several writers have misapprehended or objected to the term Natural

Selection. Some have even imagined that Natural Selection induces

variability, whereas it implies only the preservation of such variations

as arise and are beneficial to the being under its conditions of life.

No one objects to agriculturists speaking of the potent effects of man's

selection; and in this case the individual differences given by nature,

which man for some object selects, must of necessity first occur. Others

have objected that the term selection implies conscious choice in the

animals which become modified; and it has even been urged that as plants

have no volition, Natural Selection is not applicable to them! In the

literal sense of the word, no doubt. Natural Selection is a false term;

but who ever objected to chemists speaking of the elective affinities of

the various elements?--and yet an acid cannot strictly be said to elect

the base with which it in preference combines. It has been said that I

speak of Natural Selection as an active power or Deity; but who objects

to an author speaking of the attraction of gravity as ruling the

movements of the planets? Every one knows what is meant and is implied

by such metaphorical expressions; and they are almost necessary for

brevity. So again it is difficult to avoid personifying the word Nature;

but I mean by nature only the aggregate action and product of many

natural laws, and by laws the sequence of events as ascertained by us.

With a little familiarity such superficial objections will be forgotten.

We shall best understand the probable course of Natural Selection by

taking the case of a country undergoing some slight physical change; for

instance, of climate. The proportional numbers of its inhabitants will

almost immediately undergo a change, and some species will probably

become extinct. We may conclude, from what we have seen of the intimate

and complex manner in which the inhabitants of each country are bound

together, that any change in the numerical proportions of the

inhabitants, independently of the change of climate itself, would

seriously affect the others. If the country were open on its borders,

new forms would certainly immigrate, and this would likewise seriously

disturb the relations of some of the former inhabitants. Let it be

remembered how powerful the influence of a single introduced tree or

mammal has been shown to be. But in the case of an island, or of a

country partly surrounded by barriers, into which new and better adapted

forms could not freely enter, we should then have places in the economy

of nature which would assuredly be better filled up if some of the

original inhabitants were in some manner modified; for had the area been

open to immigration, these same places would have been seized on by

intruders. In such cases, slight modifications which in any way favored

the individuals of any species by better adapting them to their altered

conditions, would tend to be preserved; and Natural Selection would have

free scope for the work of improvement.

We have good reason to believe, as shown in the first chapter, that

changes in the conditions of life give a tendency to increased

variability; and in the foregoing cases the conditions have changed, and

this would manifestly be favorable to Natural Selection by affording a

better chance of the occurrence of profitable variations. Unless such

occur, Natural Selection can do nothing. Under the term of "variations,"

it must never be forgotten that mere individual differences are

included. As man can produce a great result with his domestic animals

and plants by adding up in any given direction individual differences,

so could Natural Selection, but far more easily from having incomparably

longer time for action. Nor do I believe that any great physical change,

as of climate, or any unusual degree of isolation to check immigration,

is necessary in order that new and unoccupied places should be left, for

Natural Selection to fill up by improving some of the varying

inhabitants. For as all the inhabitants of each country are struggling

together with nicely balanced forces, extremely slight modifications in

the structure or habits of one species would often give it an advantage

over others; and still further modifications of the same kind would

often still further increase the advantage, as long as the species

continued under the same conditions of life and profited by similar

means of subsistence and defense. No country can be named, in which all

the native inhabitants are now so perfectly adapted to each other and to

the physical conditions under which they live, that none of them could

be still better adapted or improved; for in all countries the natives

have been so far conquered by naturalized productions that they have

allowed some foreigners to take firm possession of the land. And as

foreigners have thus in every country beaten some of the natives, we may

safely conclude that the natives might have been modified with

advantage, so as to have better resisted the intruders.

As man can produce, and certainly has produced, a great result by his

methodical and unconscious means of selection, what may not Natural

Selection effect? Man can act only on external and visible characters;

Nature, if I may be allowed to personify the natural preservation or

survival of the fittest, cares nothing for appearances, except in so far

as they are useful to any being. She can act on every internal organ, on

every shade of constitutional difference, on the whole machinery of

life. Man selects only for his own good; Nature only for that of the

being which she tends. Every selected character is fully exercised by

her, as is implied by the fact of their selection. Man keeps the

natives of many climates in the same country; he seldom exercises each

selected character in some peculiar and fitting manner; he feeds a long

and a short-beaked pigeon on the same food; he does not exercise a

long-backed or long-legged quadruped in any peculiar manner; he exposes

sheep with long and short wool to the same climate. He does not allow

the most vigorous males to struggle for the females. He does not rigidly

destroy all inferior animals, but protects during each varying season,

as far as lies in his power, all his productions. He often begins his

selection by some half-monstrous form; or at least by some modification

prominent enough to catch the eye or to be plainly useful to him. Under

Nature, the slightest differences of structure or constitution may well

turn the nicely balanced scale in the struggle for life, and so be

preserved. How fleeting are the wishes and efforts of man! How short his

time, and consequently how poor will be his results, compared with those

accumulated by Nature during whole geological periods! Can we wonder

then that Nature's productions should be far "truer" in character than

man's productions; that they should be infinitely better adapted to the

most complex conditions of life, and should plainly bear the stamp of

far higher workmanship?

It may metaphorically be said that Natural Selection is daily and hourly

scrutinizing, throughout the world, the slightest variations; rejecting

those that are bad, preserving and adding up all that are good; silently

and insensibly working, _whenever and wherever opportunity offers_, at

the improvement of each organic being in relation to its organic and

inorganic conditions of life. We see nothing of these slow changes in

progress until the hand of time has marked the lapse of ages, and then

so imperfect is our view into long-past geological ages, that we see

only that the forms of life are now different from what they formerly

were.

In order that any great amount of modification should be effected in a

species, a variety when once formed must again, perhaps after a long

interval of time, vary or present individual differences of the same

favorable nature as before; and these must be again preserved, and so

onward step by step. Seeing that individual differences of the same kind

perpetually recur, this can hardly be considered as an unwarrantable

assumption. But whether it is true, we can judge only by seeing how far

the hypothesis accords with and explains the general phenomena of

nature. On the other hand, the ordinary belief that the amount of

possible variation is a strictly limited quantity, is likewise a simple

assumption.

Although Natural Selection can act only through and for the good of each

being, yet characters and structures, which we are apt to consider as of

very trifling importance, may thus be acted on. When we see leaf-eating

insects green, and bark-feeders mottled gray; the Alpine ptarmigan white

in winter, the red grouse the color of heather,--we must believe that

these tints are of service to these birds and insects in preserving them

from danger. Grouse, if not destroyed at some period of their lives,

would increase in countless numbers; they are known to suffer largely

from birds of prey; and hawks are guided by eyesight to their prey--so

much so, that on parts of the Continent persons are warned not to keep

white pigeons, as being the most liable to destruction. Hence Natural

Selection might be effective in giving the proper color to each kind of

grouse, and in keeping that color, when once acquired, true and

constant. Nor ought we to think that the occasional destruction of an

animal of any particular color would produce little effect: we should

remember how essential it is in a flock of white sheep to destroy a lamb

with the faintest trace of black. We have seen how the color of hogs

which feed on the "paint-root" in Virginia, determines whether they

shall live or die. In plants, the down on the fruit and the color of the

flesh are considered by botanists as characters of the most trifling

importance; yet we hear from an excellent horticulturist, Downing, that

in the United States smooth-skinned fruits suffer far more from a

beetle, a curculio, than those with down; that purple plums suffer far

more from a certain disease than yellow plums; whereas another disease

attacks yellow-fleshed peaches far more than those with other colored

flesh. If with all the aids of art, these slight differences make a

great difference in cultivating the several varieties, assuredly, in a

state of nature, where the trees would have to struggle with other trees

and with a host of enemies, such differences would effectually settle

which variety, whether a smooth or downy, a yellow or a purple-fleshed

fruit, should succeed.

In looking at many small points of difference between species, which, as

far as our ignorance permits us to judge, seem quite unimportant, we

must not forget that climate, food, etc., have no doubt produced some

direct effect. It is also necessary to bear in mind that owing to the

law of correlation, when one part varies, and the variations are

accumulated through Natural Selection, other modifications, often of the

most unexpected nature, will ensue.

As we see that those variations which under domestication appear at any

particular period of life, tend to reappear in the offspring at the same

period;--for instance, in the shape, size, and flavor of the seeds of

the many varieties of our culinary and agricultural plants; in the

caterpillar and cocoon stages of the varieties of the silkworm; in the

eggs of poultry, and in the color of the down of their chickens; in the

horns of our sheep and cattle when nearly adult; so in a state of nature

Natural Selection will be enabled to act on and modify organic beings at

any age, by the accumulation of variations profitable at that age, and

by their inheritance at a corresponding age. If it profit a plant to

have its seeds more and more widely disseminated by the wind, I can see

no greater difficulty in this being effected through Natural Selection,

than in the cotton-planter increasing and improving by selection the

down in the pods on his cotton-trees. Natural Selection may modify and

adapt the larva of an insect to a score of contingencies wholly

different from those which concern the mature insect; and these

modifications may effect, through correlation, the structure of the

adult. So, conversely, modifications in the adult may affect the

structure of the larva; but in all cases Natural Selection will insure

that they shall not be injurious: for if they were so, the species would

become extinct.

Natural Selection will modify the structure of the young in relation to

the parent, and of the parent in relation to the young. In social

animals it will adapt the structure of each individual for the benefit

of the whole community, if the community profits by the selected change.

What Natural Selection cannot do, is to modify the structure of one

species, without giving it any advantage, for the good of another

species; and though statements to this effect may be found in works of

natural history, I cannot find one case which will bear investigation. A

structure used only once in an animal's life, if of high importance to

it, might be modified to any extent by Natural Selection; for instance,

the great jaws possessed by certain insects, used exclusively for

opening the cocoon, or the hard tip to the beak of unhatched birds, used

for breaking the eggs. It has been asserted that of the best

short-beaked tumbler-pigeons a greater number perish in the egg than

are able to get out of it; so that fanciers assist in the act of

hatching. Now if Nature had to make the beak of a full-grown pigeon very

short for the bird's own advantage, the process of modification would be

very slow, and there would be simultaneously the most rigorous selection

of all the young birds within the egg, which had the most powerful and

hardest beaks, for all with weak beaks would inevitably perish; or more

delicate and more easily broken shells might be selected, the thickness

of the shell being known to vary like every other structure.

It may be well here to remark that with all beings there must be much

fortuitous destruction, which can have little or no influence on the

course of Natural Selection. For instance, a vast number of eggs or

seeds are annually devoured, and these could be modified through Natural

Selection only if they varied in some manner which protected them from

their enemies. Yet many of these eggs or seeds would perhaps, if not

destroyed, have yielded individuals better adapted to their conditions

of life than any of those which happened to survive. So again a vast

number of mature animals and plants, whether or not they be the best

adapted to their conditions, must be annually destroyed by accidental

causes, which would not be in the least degree mitigated by certain

changes of structure or constitution which would in other ways be

beneficial to the species. But let the destruction of the adults be ever

so heavy, if the number which can exist in any district be not wholly

kept down by such causes,--or gain, let the destruction of eggs or seeds

be so great that only a hundredth or a thousandth part are

developed,--yet of those which do survive, the best adapted individuals,

supposing that there is any variability in a favorable direction, will

tend to propagate their kind in larger numbers than the less well

adapted. If the numbers be wholly kept down by the causes just

indicated, as will often have been the case, Natural Selection will be

powerless in certain beneficial directions; but this is no valid

objection to its efficiency at other times and in other ways; for we are

far from having any reason to suppose that many species ever undergo

modification and improvement at the same time in the same area.

PROGRESSIVE CHANGE COMPARED WITH INDEPENDENT CREATION

From the 'Origin of Species'

Authors of the highest eminence seem to be fully satisfied with the view

that each species has been independently created. To my mind it accords

better with what we know of the laws impressed on matter by the Creator,

that the production and extinction of the past and present inhabitants

of the world should have been due to secondary causes, like those

determining the birth and death of an individual. When I view all beings

not as special creations, but as the lineal descendants of some few

beings which lived long before the first bed of the Cambrian system was

deposited, they seem to me to become ennobled. Judging from the past, we

may safely infer that not one living species will transmit its unaltered

likeness to a distant futurity. And of the species now living, very few

will transmit progeny of any kind to a far distant futurity; for the

manner in which all organic beings are grouped shows that the greater

number of species in each genus, and all the species in many genera,

have left no descendants, but have become utterly extinct. We can so far

take a prophetic glance into futurity as to foretell that it will be the

common and widely spread species, belonging to the larger and dominant

groups within each class, which will ultimately prevail and procreate

new and dominant species. As all the living forms of life are the lineal

descendants of those which lived long before the Cambrian epoch, we may

feel certain that the ordinary succession by generation has never once

been broken, and that no cataclysm has desolated the whole world. Hence

we may look with some confidence to a secure future of great length. And

as Natural Selection works solely by and for the good of each being, all

corporeal and mental endowments will tend to progress towards

perfection.

It is interesting to contemplate a tangled bank, clothed with many

plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various

insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth,

and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms, so different

from each other, and dependent upon each other in so complex a manner,

have all been produced by laws acting around us. These laws, taken in

the largest sense, being Growth with Reproduction; Inheritance, which

is almost implied by reproduction; Variability from the indirect and

direct action of the conditions of life, and from use and disuse: a

Ratio of Increase so high as to lead to a Struggle for Life, and as a

consequence to Natural Selection, entailing Divergence of Character and

the Extinction of less-improved forms. Thus from the war of nature, from

famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of

conceiving,--namely, the production of the higher animals,--directly

follows. There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several

powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms

or into one; and that whilst this planet has gone cycling on according

to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms

most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved.

CREATIVE DESIGN

From 'The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication'

Some authors have declared that natural selection explains nothing,

unless the precise cause of each slight individual difference be made

clear. If it were explained to a savage utterly ignorant of the art of

building, how the edifice had been raised stone upon stone, and why

wedge-formed fragments were used for the arches, flat stones for the

roof, etc.; and if the use of each part and of the whole building were

pointed out, it would be unreasonable if he declared that nothing had

been made clear to him, because the precise cause of the shape of each

fragment could not be told. But this is a nearly parallel case with the

objection that selection explains nothing, because we know not the cause

of each individual difference in the structure of each being.

The shape of the fragments of stone at the base of our precipice may be

called accidental, but this is not strictly correct; for the shape of

each depends on a long sequence of events, all obeying natural laws: on

the nature of the rock, on the lines of deposition or cleavage, on the

form of the mountain, which depends on its upheaval and subsequent

denudation, and lastly on the storm or earthquake which throws down the

fragments. But in regard to the use to which the fragments may be put,

their shape may be strictly said to be accidental. And here we are led

to face a great difficulty, in alluding to which I am aware that I am

traveling beyond my proper province. An omniscient Creator must have

foreseen every consequence which results from the laws imposed by him.

But can it be reasonably maintained that the Creator intentionally

ordered, if we use the words in any ordinary sense, that certain

fragments of rock should assume certain shapes so that the builder might

erect his edifice? If the various laws which have determined the shape

of each fragment were not predetermined for the builder's sake, can it

be maintained with any greater probability that he specially ordained

for the sake of the breeder each of the innumerable variations in our

domestic animals and plants;--many of these variations being of no

service to man, and not beneficial, far more often injurious, to the

creatures themselves? Did he ordain that the crop and tail-feathers of

the pigeon should vary, in order that the fancier might make his

grotesque pouter and fantail breeds? Did he cause the frame and mental

qualities of the dog to vary in order that a breed might be formed of

indomitable ferocity, with jaws fitted to pin down the bull for man's

brutal sport? But if we give up the principle in one case,--if we do not

admit that the variations of the primeval dog were intentionally guided

in order that the greyhound, for instance, that perfect image of

symmetry and vigor, might be formed,--no shadow of reason can be

assigned for the belief that variations, alike in nature and the result

of the same general laws, which have been the groundwork through natural

selection of the formation of the most perfectly adapted animals in the

world, man included, were intentionally and specially guided. However

much we may wish it, we can hardly follow Professor Asa Gray in his

belief that "variation has been led along certain beneficial lines,"

like a stream "along definite and useful lines of irrigation." If we

assume that each particular variation was from the beginning of all time

preordained, then that plasticity of organization which leads to many

injurious deviations of structure, as well as the redundant power of

reproduction which inevitably leads to a struggle for existence, and as

a consequence, to the natural selection or survival of the

fittest,--must appear to us superfluous laws of Nature. On the other

hand, an omnipotent and omniscient Creator ordains everything and

foresees everything. Thus we are brought face to face with a difficulty

as insoluble as is that of free-will and predestination.

THE ORIGIN OF THE HUMAN SPECIES

From 'The Descent of Man'

The main conclusion arrived at in this work--namely, that man is

descended from some lowly organized form--will, I regret to think, be

highly distasteful to many persons. But there can hardly be a doubt that

we are descended from barbarians. The astonishment which I felt on first

seeing a party of Fuegians on a wild and broken shore will never be

forgotten by me, for the reflection at once rushed into my mind--Such

were our ancestors. These men were absolutely naked and bedaubed with

paint.... They possessed hardly any arts, and like wild animals, lived

on what they could catch; they had no government, and were merciless to

every one not of their own small tribe. He who has seen a savage in his

native land will not feel much shame if forced to acknowledge that the

blood of some more humble creature flows in his veins. For my own part,

I would as soon be descended from that heroic little monkey who braved

his dreaded enemy in order to save the life of his keeper; or from that

old baboon who, descending from the mountains, carried away in triumph

his young comrade from a crowd of astonished dogs,--as from a savage who

delights to torture his enemies, offers up bloody sacrifices, practices

infanticide without remorse, treats his wives like slaves, knows no

decency, and is haunted by the grossest superstitions.

Man may be excused for feeling some pride at having risen, though not

through his own exertions, to the very summit of the organic scale; and

the fact of his having thus risen, instead of having been aboriginally

placed there, may give him hopes for a still higher destiny in the

distant future. But we are not here concerned with hopes or fears, only

with the truth as far as our reason allows us to discover it. I have

given the evidence to the best of my ability; and we must acknowledge,

as it seems to me, that Man with all his noble qualities, with sympathy

which feels for the most debased, with benevolence which extends not

only to other men but to the humblest living creature, with his godlike

intellect which has penetrated into the movements and constitution of

the solar system,--with all these exalted powers, Man still bears in his

bodily frame the indelible stamp of his lowly origin.

ALPHONSE DAUDET

(1840-)

BY AUGUSTIN FILON

[Illustration: ALPHONSE DAUDET.]

Forty years have now elapsed since a lad of seventeen, shivering under

his light summer dress in a cold misty morning, was waiting, with an

empty stomach, for the opening of a "dairy" in the Quartier Latin. Young

as he was, he looked still younger: a pale, eager, intellectual face,

with flashing eyes, delicately carved features, and a virgin forest of

dark hair falling low on his brow. He had been an usher for a

twelvemonth at a small college in the South of France, and he had just

arrived in Paris after a two-days' journey in a third-class railway

carriage, during which time he had tasted no food and no drink except a

few drops of brandy from the flask of some charitable sailors. And there

he was, with two francs left in his pocket, and an unlimited supply of

courage, cheerfulness, and ambition, fully determined to make the whole

world familiar with the obscure name of Alphonse Daudet.

We all know how well he has succeeded in winning for himself a foremost

place in the ranks of French contemporary literature, and indeed of

literature in general. There is no doubt that he was admirably equipped

for the great struggle on which he was about to enter; but it may be

also remarked that he had not to fight it out alone and with his own

solitary resources, but found at the very outset useful and strong

auxiliaries. He was to have a powerful though somewhat selfish and

indolent patron in the famous Duke of Morny, who admitted him among his

secretaries before he was twenty years old. Then he had the good fortune

to attract the attention and to take the fancy of Villemessant, the

editor of the Figaro, who at first sight gave him a place in his nursery

of young talents. He had a kind and devoted brother, who cheerfully

shared with him the little money he had to live upon, and thus saved him

from the unspeakable miseries which would inevitably attend a literary

debut at such an early age and under such inauspicious circumstances.

Later on, he was still more fortunate in securing a loving and

intelligent wife, who was to be to him, in the words of the holy

Scriptures, "a companion of his rank," a wife who was not only to become

a help and a comfort, but a literary adviser, a moral guide, and a

second conscience far more strict and exacting than his own; a wife who

taught him how to direct and husband his precious faculties,--how to

turn them to the noblest use and highest ends.

But before that was to come, the first thing was to find a publisher;

and after long looking in vain for one throughout the whole city, he at

last discovered the man he wanted, at his door, in the close vicinity of

that Hotel du Sinat, in the Rue de Tournon, where the two brothers

Daudet had taken up their abode. That publisher was Jules Tardieu,

himself an author of some merit (under the transparent pseudonym of J.

T. de St. Germain): a mild, quiet humorist of the optimistic school, a

Topffer on a small scale and with reduced proportions.

And thus it happened that a few months after the lad's arrival in Paris

an elegant booklet, with the attractive title 'Les Amoureuses' (Women in

Love) printed in red letters on its snow-white cover, made its

appearance under the _galeries de l'Odeon_, where in the absence of

political emotions, the youth of the Quartier was eagerly looking for

literary novelties, and where Daudet himself had been wandering often,

in the hope of an occasional acquaintance with the great critics and

journalists of the day who made the _galeries_ their favorite resort.

I have read that the book was a failure; that the young author was

unable to pay the printer, and was accordingly served with stamped paper

at the official residence of Morny, where he was then acting as

secretary; that the duke, far from showing any displeasure at the

occurrence, was delighted to find his secretary in hot water with the

bailiffs, and that he arranged the matter in the most paternal spirit.

This may be a pretty little story, but I fear it is a "legend." I cannot

reconcile it with the fact that four years after the first publication,

the same publisher gave the public another edition of 'Les Amoureuses'

and that the young poet dedicated it to him as a token of respect and

gratitude. The truth is that Daudet's little volume not only did not

pass unnoticed, but received a good deal of attention, chiefly from the

young men. Many thought that a new Musset was born in their midst, only

a few months after the real one had been laid down to his last sleep in

the Pere Lachaise, under the trembling shadow of his favorite

willow-tree. Young Daudet alluded to the unfortunate poet--

"... mort de degout, de tristesse, et d'absinthe;"--

and he tried to imitate the half cynical, half nostalgic skepticism

which had made the author of 'Les Nuits' so powerful over the minds of

the new generation and so dear to their hearts.

But it did not seem perfectly genuine. When Daudet said, "My heart is

old," no one believed it, and he did not believe it himself, for he

entitled the piece 'Fanfaronnade'; and in fact it was nothing more than

a fanfaronnade. The book was full of the freshness, buoyancy, and

frolicsome petulance of youth. Here and there a few reminiscences might

be traced to the earliest poets of the sixteenth century, more

particularly to Clement Marot. A tinge of the expiring romanticism

lingered in 'Les Amoureuses' with a much more substantial admixture of

the spirit of an age which made pleasure-hunting its paramount

occupation. The precocious child could modulate the 'Romance a Madame'

as well as the page of Beaumarchais, if not better; but he could also

laugh it down in Gavroche's sneering way; he could intersperse a song of

love with the irony of the boulevard or the more genial humor of his

native South. He was at his best in the tale of 'Les Prunes'--

"Si vous voulez savoir comment

Nous nous aimames pour des prunes"--

That exquisite little piece survived long the youthful volume of 'Les

Amoureuses.' In those days, when Coquelin's monologues and _saynetes_

were yet unknown, the brothers Lionnet, then in the height of their

vogue, delighted the drawing-rooms with the miniature masterpiece.

Still, those who had prophesied the advent of a new poet were doomed to

disappointment. Every one knows what Sainte-Beuve once said about the

short-lived existence, in most of us, of a poet whom the real man is to

survive. Shall we say that this was the case with Daudet, who never, as

far as the world knows, wrote verses after twenty-five? No; the poet was

not to die in him, but lived on and lives still to this day. Only he has

always written in prose.

After his successful debut, Daudet felt his way in different directions.

In collaboration with M. Ernest Lepine, who has since made a reputation

under the name of Quatrelles, he had a drama, 'The Last Idol' performed

at the Odeon theatre,--at that same Odeon which in his first days of

Paris seems to have been the centre of his life and of his ambitions.

But he more frequently appeared before the public as a journalist and a

humorist, a writer of light articles and short stories. Nothing can give

a more true, more vivacious, and on the whole more favorable impression

of the Daudet of the period than the 'Lettres de Mon Moulin' (Letters

from My Windmill). They owe their title to an old deserted windmill

where Alphonse Daudet seems to have lived some time in complete

seclusion, forgetting, or trying to forget, the excitement of Parisian

life. The preface, most curiously disguised under the form of a mock

contract which is supposed to transfer the ownership from the old

proprietor to the poet, and professes to give the _etat de lieux_ or

description of the place, is an amusing parody of legal jargon. The next

chapter describes the installation of the new master in the same happy

vein, with all the odd circumstances attending it.

Throughout the rest of the volume, Daudet disappears and reappears, as

his fancy prompts him to do. Now he lets himself be carried back to past

memories and distant places; now he gives us a mediaeval tale or a

domestic drama of to-day compressed into a few brief pages, or a picture

of rural life, or a glimpse of that literary hell from which he had just

escaped and to which he was soon to return. He changed his tone and his

subject with amazing versatility, from the bitterest satire to idyllic

sweetness, or to a pleasant kind of clever naivete which is truly his

own. We see him musing among the firs and the pine-trees of his native

Provence, or riding on the top of the diligence under the scorching sun

and listening, in a Sterne-like fashion, to the conversation which took

place between the facetious baker and the unhappy knife-grinder, or

chatting familiarly with Frederic Mistral, who takes him into the

confidence of his poetical dreams. Then, again, we see him sitting down

at the table of an Algerian sheik; or wandering on the gloomy rocks

where the Semillante was lost, and trying to revive the awful tragedy of

her last minutes; or shut up in a solitary light-house with the keepers

for weeks and weeks together, content with the society and with the fare

of those poor, rough, uncultivated men, cut off from the whole world,

alone with the stormy winds and his stormy thoughts. Wherever his morbid

restlessness takes him, whatever part he chooses to assume, whether he

wants to move us to laughter or to tears, we can but follow him

fascinated and spell-bound, and in harmony with his moods. Daudet when

he wrote those letters was already a perfect master of all the resources

of the language. What he had seen or felt, he could make us see and

feel. He could make old words new with the freshness, ardor, and

sincerity of the personal impressions which he was pouring into them

unceasingly.

The 'Letters from My Mill' had been scattered here and there through

different newspapers, and at different times. They were reprinted in the

form of a book in 1868. The year before he had given to the public 'Le

Petit Chose' (A Little Chap), which is better known, I believe, to the

English-speaking races under the rather misleading title of 'My Brother

Jack.' 'Le Petit Chose' was a commercial success, but it is doubtful

whether it will rank as high among Daudet's productions as the 'Lettres

de Mon Moulin.' He began to compose it in February 1866, during one of

those misanthropic fits to which he was subject at periodical intervals,

and which either paralyzed altogether, or quickened into fever, his

creative faculties. He finished the work two years later in a very

different mood, immediately after his marriage. As might have been

expected, the two parts are very dissimilar, and it must be confessed

greatly unequal. 'Le Petit Chose' has reminded more than one reader of

'David Copperfield'; and it cannot be denied that the two works bear

some resemblance both as regards manner and matter. But though Dickens

was then widely read and much admired in France, plagiarism is out of

the question. If there is a little of Dickens about 'Le Petit Chose,'

there is a great deal more of Daudet himself in it. Young Eyssette, the

hero of the novel, starts in life as Daudet had done and at the same

period of life, in the quality of an usher at a small provincial

college. Whether we take it as a fiction, with its innumerable bits of

delicate humor, lovely descriptions of places and glimpses of characters

in humble life, or whether we accept it as an autobiography which is

likely to bring us into closer acquaintance with the inner soul of a

great man, the first part is delightful reading. But we lose sight of

him through all the adventures, at once wild and commonplace, which are

crowding in the second part, to culminate into the most unconvincing

denouement. Even when speaking of himself, Daudet is sometimes at a

disadvantage, perhaps because, as he justly observed, "it is too early

at twenty-five to comment upon one's own past career." Only the old man

is able to look at his former self through the distance of years and to

see it as it stood once, in its true light and with its real

proportions.

'Tartarin of Tarascon' saw the light for the first time in 1872. Strange

to say, the readers of the Petit Moniteur, to whom it was first offered

in a serial form, did not like it. In consequence of their marked

disapproval, the publication had to be abandoned and was then resumed

through the columns of another newspaper. This time the mistake was

entirely on the side of the public. For--apart from the fact that the

immortal Tartarin was not yet Tartarin, but answered to the much less

typical name of Chapatin--the general outlines of the character were

already visible in all their distinctness from the beginning, as all

those who have read the introductory chapters will readily admit. And

the same lines were to be followed with an undeviating fixity of

artistic purpose and with unfailing verve and spirit to the last. 'The

Prodigious Adventures of Tartarin,' 'Tartarin on the Alps,' and

'Port-Tarascon,' form a trilogy; and I know of no other example in

modern French literature of so long and so well sustained a joke. How is

it then that we never grow tired of Tartarin? It is probably because

beneath the surface of Daudet's playful absurdity there underlies a rich

substratum of good common-sense and keen observation. Since 'Don

Quixote' was written, no caricature has ever been more human or more

true than Tartarin.

Frenchmen are not, as is frequently asserted by their Anglo-Saxon

critics, totally unfit to appreciate humor, when it is mingled with the

study of man's nature and seasoned with that high-spiced irony of which

they have been so fond at all times, from the days of Villon to those of

Rochefort. Still, Daudet would never have acquired such a complete

mastery over the general public in his own country, if he had not been

able to gratify their taste for that graphic and faithful description of

manners and characters, which in other centuries put the moralists into

fashion. Realism never disappears altogether from French literature: it

was at that moment all-powerful. Zola was coming to the front with the

first volumes of the well-known 'Rougon-Macquart' and Daudet in 1874

entered on the same path, though in a different spirit, with 'Fromont

Jeune et Risler Aine.' The success was immediate and immense. The French

_bourgeoisie_ accepted it at once as a true picture of its vices and its

virtues. The novel might, it is true, savor a little of Parisian

cockneyism. Fastidious critics might discover in it some mixture of weak

sentimentalism, or a few traces of Dickensian affectation and cheap

tricks in story-telling. Young men of the new social school might take

exception to that old-fashioned democracy which had its apotheosis in

Risler senior. Despite all those objections, it was pronounced a

masterpiece of legitimate pathos and sound observation. Even the minor

characters were judged striking, and Delobelle's name, for instance,

occurs at once to our mind whenever we try to realize the image of the

modern _cabotin_.

'Jack,' which came next, exceeded the usual length of French novels.

"Too much paper, my son!" old Flaubert majestically observed with a

smile when the author presented him with a copy of his book. As for

George Sand, she felt so sick at heart and so depressed when she had

finished reading 'Jack,' that she could work no more and had to remain

idle for three or four days. A painful book, indeed, a distressing book,

but how fascinating! And is not its wonderful influence over the readers

exemplified in the most striking manner by the fact that it had the

power to unnerve and to incapacitate for her daily task that most

valiant of all intellectual laborers, that hardest of hard workers,

George Sand?

The lost ground, if there had been any lost at all, was soon regained

with 'Le Nabab' (The Nabob) and 'Les Rois en Exil' (Kings in Exile).

They took the reader to a higher sphere of emotion and thought, showed

us greater men fighting for greater things on a wider theatre than the

middle-class life in which Fromont and Risler had moved. At the same

time they kept the balance more evenly than 'Jack' had done between the

two elements of human drama, good and evil, hope and despair, laughter

and tears. But a higher triumph was to be achieved with 'Numa

Roumestan,' which brought Daudet's literary fame to its zenith.

'Tartarin' had not exhausted all that the author had to say of

meridional ways and manners. The Provencal character has its dramatic as

well as its comic aspect. In 'Numa Roumestan' we have the farce and the

tragedy blended together into a coherent whole. We have a Tartarin whose

power over man and woman is not a mockery but a reality, who can win

love and sympathy and admiration, not in little Tarascon, mind you, but

in Paris; who sends joy abroad and creates torture at home; a charming

companion, a kind master, a subtle politician, a wonderful talker, but a

light-hearted and faithless husband, a genial liar, a smiling and

good-natured deceiver; the true image of the gifted adventurer who

periodically emerges from the South and goes northward finally to

conquer and govern the whole country.

As Zola has remarked, the author of 'Numa Roumestan' poured himself out

into that book with his double nature, North and South, the rich

sensuous imagination, the indolent easy-going optimism of his native

land, and the stern moral sensitiveness which was partly characteristic

of his own mind, partly acquired by painful and protracted experience.

To depict his hero he had only to consult the most intimate records of

his own lifelong struggle. For he had been trying desperately to evince

Roumestan out of his own being. He had fought and conquered, but only

partially conquered. And on this partial failure we must congratulate

him and congratulate ourselves. He said once that "Provencal landscape

without sunshine is dull and uninteresting." The same may be said of his

literary genius. It wants sunshine, or else it loses half its loveliness

and its irresistible charm. 'Roumestan' is full of sunshine, and there

is no other among his books, except 'Tartarin,' where the bright and

happy light of the South plays more freely and more gracefully.

The novel is equally strong if you examine it from a different

standpoint. Nothing can be artistically better and more enchanting than

the Farandole scene, or more amusing than Roumestan's intrigue with the

young opera singer; nothing can be more grand than old Le Quesnoy's

confession of sin and shame, or more affecting than the closing scene

where Rosalie is taught forgiveness by her dying sister. Other parts in

Daudet's work may sound hollow; 'Numa Roumestan' will stand the most

critical scrutiny as a drama, as a work of art, as a faithful

representation of life. Daudet's talents were then at their best and

united in happy combination for that splendid effort which was not to be

renewed.

In 'Sapho' Daudet described the modern courtesan, in 'L'Evangeliste' a

desperate case of religious madness. In 'L'Immortel' he gave vent to his

feelings against the French Academy, which had repulsed him once and to

which he turned his back forever in disgust. The angry writer pursued

his enemy to death. In his unforgiving mood, he was not satisfied before

he had drowned the Academy in the muddy waters of the Seine, with its

unfortunate Secretaire-perpetuel, Astier-Rehu. The general verdict was

that the vengeance was altogether out of proportion to the offense; and

that despite all its brilliancy of wit and elaborate incisiveness of

style, the satire was really too violent and too personal to give real

enjoyment to unbiased and unprejudiced readers.

At different periods of his career Daudet had tried his hand as a

dramatist, but never succeeded in getting a firm foot on the French

stage. Play-goers still remember the signal failure of 'Lise Tavernier,'

the indifferent reception of 'L'Arlesienne,' or more recently, of

'L'Obstacle.' All his successful novels have been dramatized, but their

popularity in that new form fell far short of the common expectation. As

an explanation of the fact various reasons may be suggested. Daudet, I

am inclined to think, is endowed with real dramatic powers, not with

scenic qualities; and from their conventional point of view, old stagers

will pronounce the construction of his novels too weak for plays to be

built upon them. Again, in the play-house we miss the man who tells the

story, the happy presence--so unlike Flaubert's cheerless

impassibility--the generous anger, the hearty laugh, the delightful

humor, that strange something which seems to appeal to every one of us

in particular when we read his novels. Dickens was once heard to say, on

a public occasion, that he owed his prodigious world-wide popularity to

this: that he was "so very human." The words will apply with equal

felicity to Daudet's success. He never troubles to conceal from his

readers that he is a man. When the critic of the future has to assign

him a place and to compare his productions with the writings of his

great contemporary and fellow-worker Emile Zola, it will occur to him

that Daudet never had the steady-going indomitable energy, the ox-like

patience, the large and comprehensive intellect which are so

characteristic in the master of Medan; that he recoiled from assuming,

like the author of 'Germinal' and 'Lourdes,' a bold and definite

position in the social and religious strife of our days; that he never

dreamt for a moment of taking the survey of a whole society and covering

the entire ground on which it stands with his books.

Such a task--the critic will say--would have been uncongenial to him.

The scientist is careful to explain everything and to omit nothing; he

aims at completeness. But Daudet is an artist, not a scientist. He is a

poet in the primitive sense of the word, or, as he styled himself in one

of his books, a "trouvere." He has creative power, but he has at the

same time his share of the minor gift of observation. He had to write

for a public of strongly realistic tendencies, who understood and

desired nothing better than the faithful, accurate, almost scientific

description of life. Daudet could supply the demand, but as he was not

born a realist, whatever social influences he had been subjected to, he

remained free from the faults and excesses of the school. He borrowed

from it all that was good and sound; he accepted realism as a practical

method, not as an ultimate result and a consummation. Again, he was

preserved from the danger of going down too deep and too low into the

unclean mysteries of modern humanity, not so much perhaps by moral

delicacy as by an artistic distaste for all that is repulsive and

unseemly. For those reasons, it would not be surprising if--when Death

has made him young again--Alphonse Daudet was destined to outlive and

outshine many who have enjoyed an equal or even greater celebrity during

this century. He will command an ever increasing circle of admirers and

friends, and generations yet unborn will grow warm in his sunshine.

[Illustration: signature of Augustin Filon]

THE TWO TARTARINS

From 'Tartarin of Tarascon'

Answer me, you will say, how the mischief is it that Tartarin of

Tarascon never left Tarascon, with all this mania for adventure, need of

powerful sensations, and folly about travel, rides, and journeys from

the Pole to the Equator?

For that is a fact: up to the age of five-and-forty, the dreadless

Tarasconian had never once slept outside his own room. He had not even

taken that obligatory trip to Marseilles which every sound Provencal

makes upon coming of age. The most of his knowledge included Beaucaire,

and yet that's not far from Tarascon, there being merely the bridge to

go over. Unfortunately, this rascally bridge has so often been blown

away by the gales, it is so long and frail, and the Rhone has such a

width at this spot that--well, faith! you understand! Tartarin of

Tarascon preferred _terra firma_.

We are afraid we must make a clean breast of it: in our hero there were

two very distinct characters. Some Father of the Church has said: "I

feel there are two men in me." He would have spoken truly in saying this

about Tartarin, who carried in his frame the soul of Don Quixote, the

same chivalric impulses, heroic ideal, and crankiness for the grandiose

and romantic; but, worse is the luck! he had not the body of the

celebrated hidalgo, that thin and meagre apology for a body, on which

material life failed to take a hold; one that could get through twenty

nights without its breast-plate being unbuckled, and forty-eight hours

on a handful of rice. On the contrary, Tartarin's body was a stout

honest bully of a body, very fat, very weighty, most sensual and fond of

coddling, highly touchy, full of low-class appetite and homely

requirements--the short, paunchy body on stumps of the immortal Sancho

Panza.

Don Quixote and Sancho Panza in the one same man! you will readily

comprehend what a cat-and-dog couple they made! what strife! what

clapperclawing! Oh, the fine dialogue for Lucian or Saint-Evremond to

write, between the two Tartarins--Quixote-Tartarin and Sancho-Tartarin!

Quixote-Tartarin firing up on the stories of Gustave Aimard, and

shouting, "Up and at 'em!" and Sancho-Tartarin thinking only of the

rheumatics ahead, and murmuring, "I mean to stay at home."

THE DUET

QUIXOTE-TARTARIN SANCHO-TARTARIN

[_Highly excited_] [_Quite calmly_]

Cover yourself with glory, Tartarin, cover yourself with

Tartarin. flannel.

[_Still more excitedly_] [_Still more calmly_]

Oh for the terrible double-barreled Oh for the thick knitted

rifle! Oh for bowie-knives, waist-coats!

lassos, and moccasins! and warm knee-caps!

Oh for the welcome padded

caps with ear-flaps!

[_Above all self-control_] [_Ringing up the maid_]

A battle-axe! fetch me a battle-axe! Now then, Jeannette, do bring

up that chocolate!

Whereupon Jeannette would appear with an unusually good cup of

chocolate, just right in warmth, sweetly smelling, and with the play of

light on watered silk upon its unctuous surface, and with succulent

grilled steak flavored with anise-seed, which would set Sancho-Tartarin

off on the broad grin, and into a laugh that drowned the shouts of

Quixote-Tartarin.

Thus it came about that Tartarin of Tarascon never had left Tarascon.

OF "MENTAL MIRAGE," AS DISTINGUISHED FROM LYING

From 'Tartarin of Tarascor'

Under one conjunction of circumstances, Tartarin did however once almost

start out upon a great voyage.

The three brothers Garcio-Camus, natives of Tarascon, established in

business at Shanghai, offered him the managership of one of their

branches there. This undoubtedly presented the kind of life he hankered

after. Plenty of active business, a whole army of understrappers to

order about, and connections with Russia, Persia, Turkey in Asia--in

short, to be a merchant prince.

In Tartarin's mouth, the title of Merchant Prince thundered out as

something stunning!

The house of Garcio-Camus had the further advantage of sometimes being

favored with a call from the Tartars. Then the doors would be slammed

shut, all the clerks flew to arms, up ran the consular flag, and zizz!

phit! bang! out of the windows upon the Tartars.

I need not tell you with what enthusiasm Quixote-Tartarin clutched this

proposition; sad to say, Sancho-Tartarin did not see it in the same

light, and as he was the stronger party, it never came to anything. But

in the town there was much talk about it. Would he go or would he not?

"I'll lay he will"--and "I'll wager he won't!" It was the event of the

week. In the upshot, Tartarin did not depart, but the matter redounded

to his credit none the less. Going or not going to Shanghai was all one

to Tarascon. Tartarin's journey was so much talked about that people got

to believe he had done it and returned, and at the club in the evening

members would actually ask for information on life at Shanghai, the

manners and customs and climate, about opium, and commerce.

Deeply read up, Tartarin would graciously furnish the particulars

desired, and in the end the good fellow was not quite sure himself about

not having gone to Shanghai; so that after relating for the hundredth

time how the Tartars came down on the trading post, it would most

naturally happen him to add:--

"Then I made my men take up arms and hoist the consular flag, and zizz!

phit! bang! out of the windows upon the Tartars."

On hearing this, the whole club would quiver.

"But according to that, this Tartarin of yours is an awful liar."

"No, no, a thousand times over, no! Tartarin is no liar."

"But the man ought to know that he has never been to Shanghai--"

"Why, of course, he knows that; but still--"

"But still," you see--mark that! It is high time for the law to be laid

down once for all on the reputation as drawers of the long bow which

Northerners fling at Southerners. There are no Baron Munchausens in the

South of France, neither at Nimes nor Marseilles, Toulouse nor Tarascon.

The Southerner does not deceive, but is self-deceived. He does not

always tell the cold-drawn truth, but he believes he does. His falsehood

is not falsehood, but a kind of mental mirage.

Yes, purely mirage! The better to follow me, you should actually follow

me into the South, and you will see I am right. You have only to look at

that Lucifer's own country, where the sun transmogrifies everything, and

magnifies it beyond life-size. The little hills of Provence are no

bigger than the Butte Montmartre, but they will loom up like the Rocky

Mountains; the Square House at Nimes--a mere model to put on your

sideboard--will seem grander than St. Peter's. You will see--in brief,

the only exaggerator in the South is Old Sol, for he does enlarge

everything he touches. What was Sparta in its days of splendor? a

pitiful hamlet. What was Athens? at the most, a second-class town; and

yet in history both appear to us as enormous cities. This is a sample of

what the sun can do.

Are you going to be astonished, after this, that the same sun falling

upon Tarascon should have made of an ex-captain in the Army Clothing

Factory, like Bravida, the "brave commandant"; of a sprout, an Indian

fig-tree; and of a man who had missed going to Shanghai one who had been

there?

THE DEATH OF THE DAUPHIN

From 'Letters from My Windmill'

The little Dauphin is ill; the little Dauphin will die. In all the

churches of the kingdom the Holy Sacrament is laid ready day and night,

and tapers are burning, for the recovery of the royal child. The streets

of the old town are sad and silent; the bells ring no more; the

carriages are driven very slowly. The curious townspeople are gathered

just outside the palace, and are staring in through the grating of the

gates at the guards, with their golden helmets, who walk the court with

an important air. The entire castle is in a state of anxiety; the

chamberlains and major-domos go up and down the staircase, and run

through the marble halls. The galleries are filled with pages and

courtiers in silk clothing, who go from group to group collecting later

news in a low voice. On the large porches can be seen the ladies of

honor, bathed in tears, bowing their heads and wiping their eyes with

pretty embroidered handkerchiefs. In the orangery is a numerous assembly

of doctors in long robes: one can see them through the panes

gesticulating in their long sleeves, and shaking their wigs knowingly.

The little Dauphin's tutor and squire are waiting before the door,

anxious for the decision of the faculty. Scullions pass by without

saluting them. The squire swears like a pagan; the tutor recites verses

from Horace. And during this time down by the stables one can hear a

long plaintive neighing. It is the Dauphin's little sorrel pony, whom

the grooms are neglecting, and who calls sadly from his empty manger.

And the King--where is his Majesty the King? The King has shut himself

up in a room in a remote part of the castle. Their Majesties do not like

to be seen weeping. But the Queen--that is different. Seated by the

little prince's pillow, her beautiful face bathed in tears, she sobs

bitterly before every one, just as a peasant mother would.

In his lace crib is the little Dauphin, whiter than the cushions on

which he reposes, with closed eyelids. They think he is sleeping; but

no, the little Dauphin does not sleep. He turns toward his mother, and

seeing that she weeps, he says to her, "Madame my Queen, why do you

weep? Do you think truly that I am going to die?" The Queen wishes to

reply, but sobs prevent her speaking. "Pray do not cry, Madame my

Queen. You forget that I am the Dauphin, and Dauphins cannot die thus."

The Queen sobs more bitterly still, and the little Dauphin begins to be

frightened. "Hola!" he says, "I do not wish to have Death come and take

me; and I shall know how to prevent his coming here. Bring forth forty

lancers, our strongest, to mount guard around our bed; a hundred cannon

night and day; torches lighted beneath our windows. And unhappy Death if

he dares to approach us then!" The Queen gives a sign to please the

royal child. Forthwith, one can hear heavy cannon being rolled across

the courtyard; and forty soldiers, halberds in hand, come and range

themselves around the room: they are veterans, with gray moustaches. The

little Dauphin claps his hands feebly as he sees them, and recognizing

one he calls him by name, "Lorrain! Lorrain!" The old soldier takes a

step towards the bed. "I love you well, my good Lorrain. Let me see your

big sword. If Death comes to take me, we must kill him, must we not?"

Lorrain replies, "Yes, Monseigneur," as the big tears run down his

bronzed cheeks.

At this moment the chaplain approaches the little Dauphin, and talks to

him for some time in a low tone, showing him a crucifix. The little

Dauphin listens with an astonished air; then suddenly interrupting, "I

understand well what you say, Monsieur l'Abbe; but after all, could not

my little friend Beppo die in my place, if we should give him a great

deal of money?"

The chaplain continues talking to him in a low voice, and the little

Dauphin looks more and more astonished. When the chaplain has finished,

the little Dauphin resumes, with a heavy sigh, "All that you tell me is

very sad, Monsieur l'Abbe, but one thing consoles me: up there, in the

paradise of stars, I shall still be the Dauphin. I know that our good

God is my cousin, and would not fail to treat me according to my rank."

Then he adds, turning to his mother, "Have my finest garments

brought--my ermine cloak and velvet slippers. I wish to array myself for

the angels, and enter paradise dressed as a Dauphin."

A third time the chaplain bends over the little prince, and talks a long

time in whispering tones. The royal child interrupts him in anger, in

the midst of his discourse, and cries, "Then it is no use to be

Dauphin,--it is nothing at all;" and not wishing to hear more, he turns

toward the wall weeping.

Translation of Mary Corey.

JACK IS INVITED TO TAKE UP A "PROFESSION"

From 'Jack'

"Do you hear, Jack?" resumed D'Argenton, with flashing eyes and

outstretched arm. "In four years you will be a good workman; that is to

say, the noblest, grandest thing that can exist in this world of slavery

and servitude. In four years you will be that sacred, venerated thing, a

good workman!"

Yes, indeed he heard it!--"a good workman." Only he was bewildered and

was trying to understand.

The child had seen workmen in Paris. There were some who lived in the

Passage des Douze Maisons, and not far from the Gymnase there was a

factory, from which he often watched them as they left work at about six

o'clock; a crowd of dirty-looking men with their blouses all stained

with oil, and their rough hands blackened and deformed by work.

The idea that he would have to wear a blouse struck him at once. He

remembered the tone of contempt with which his mother would say: "Those

are workmen, men in blouses,"--the care she took in the streets to avoid

the contact of their soiled garments. Labassindre's fine speeches on the

duties and influence of the working-man in the nineteenth century

attenuated and contradicted, it is true, these vague impressions. But

what he did understand, and that most clearly and bitterly, was that he

must go away, leave the forest whose tree-tops he saw from the window,

leave the Rivalses, leave his mother, his mother whom he had recovered

at the cost of so much pain, and whom he loved so tenderly.

What on earth was she doing at that window all this time, seeming so

indifferent to all that was going on around her? Within the last few

minutes, however, she had lost her immovable indifference. A convulsive

shudder seemed to shake her from head to foot, and the hand she held

over her eyes closed over them as if she were hiding tears. Was it then

so sad a sight that she beheld yonder in the country, on the far horizon

where the sun sets, and where so many dreams, so many illusions, so many

loves and passions sink and disappear, never to return?

"Then I shall have to go away?" inquired the child in a smothered voice,

and the automatic air of one who lets his thought speak, the one thought

that absorbed him.

At this artless question all the members of the tribunal looked at each

other with a smile of pity; but over there at the window a great sob was

heard.

"We shall start in a week, my lad," answered Labassindre briskly. "I

have not seen my brother for a long time. I shall avail myself of this

opportunity to renew my acquaintance with the fire of my old forge, by

Jove!"

As he spoke, he turned back his sleeve, distending the muscles of his

brawny, hairy, tattooed arm, till they looked ready to burst.

"He is superb," said Dr. Hirsch.

D'Argenton, however, who did not lose sight of the sobbing woman

standing at the window, had an absent air, and a terrible frown

gathering on his brow.

"You can go, Jack," he said to the child, "and prepare to start in a

week."

Jack went down-stairs, dazed and stupefied, repeating to himself, "In a

week! in a week!" The street door was open; he rushed out, bare-headed,

just as he was, dashed through the village to the house of his friends,

and meeting the Doctor, who was just going out, informed him in a few

words of what had taken place.

Monsieur Rivals was indignant.

"A workman! They want to make a workman of you? Is that what they call

looking after your prospects in life? Wait a moment. I am going to speak

myself to monsieur your step-father."

The villagers who saw them pass by, the worthy Doctor gesticulating and

talking out loud, and little Jack, bare-headed and breathless from

running, said, "There is certainly some one very ill at Les Aulnettes."

No one was ill, most assuredly. When the Doctor arrived they were

sitting down to table; for on account of the capricious appetite of the

master of the house, and as in all places where _ennui_ reigns supreme,

the hours for the meals were constantly being changed.

The faces around were cheerful; Charlotte could even be heard humming on

the stairs as she came down from her room.

"I should like to say a word to you, M. d'Argenton," said old Rivals

with quivering lips.

The poet twirled his moustache:--

"Well, Doctor, sit down there. They shall give you a plate and you can

say your word while you eat your breakfast."

"No, thank you, I am not hungry; besides, what I have to say to you as

well as to Madame"--he bowed to Charlotte, who had just come in--"is

strictly private."

"I think I can guess your errand," said D'Argenton, who did not care for

a _tete-a-tete_ conversation with the Doctor. "It is about the child, is

it not?"

"You are right; it is about the child."

"In that case you can speak. These gentlemen know the circumstances, and

my actions are always too loyal and too disinterested for me to fear the

light of day."

"But, my dear!" Charlotte ventured to say, shocked for many reasons at

the idea of this discussion before strangers.

"You can speak, Doctor," said D'Argenton coldly.

Standing upright in front of the table, the Doctor began:--

"Jack has just told me that you intend to send him as an apprentice to

the iron works at Indret. Is this serious? Come!"

"Quite serious, my dear Doctor."

"Take care," pursued M. Rivals, restraining his anger; "that child has

not been brought up for so hard a life. At a growing age you are going

to throw him out of his element into new surroundings, a new atmosphere.

His health, his life are involved. He has none of the requisites needed

to bear this. He is not strong enough."

"Oh! allow me, my dear colleague," put in Dr. Hirsch solemnly.

M. Rivals shrugged his shoulders, and without even looking at him, went

on:--

"It is I who tell you so, Madame."

He pointedly addressed himself to Charlotte, who was singularly

embarrassed by this appeal to her repressed feelings.

"Your child cannot possibly endure a life of this sort. You surely know

him, you who are his mother. You know that his nature is a refined and

delicate one, and that it will be unable to resist fatigue. And here I

only speak of the physical pain. But do you not know what terrible

sufferings a child so well gifted, with a mind so capable and ready to

receive all kinds of knowledge, will feel in the forced inaction, the

death of intellectual faculties to which you are about to condemn him?"

"You are mistaken, Doctor," said D'Argenton, who was getting very angry.

"I know the fellow better than any one. I have tried him. He is only fit

for manual labor. His aptitudes lie there, and there only. And it is

when I furnish him with the means of developing his aptitudes, when I

put into his hands a magnificent profession, that instead of thanking

me, my fine gentleman goes off complaining to strangers, seeking

protectors outside of his own home."

Jack was going to protest. His friend however saved him the trouble.

"He did not come to complain. He only informed me of your decision, and

I said to him what I now repeat to him before you all:--'Jack, my child,

do not let them do it. Throw yourself into the arms of your parents, of

your mother who loves you, of your mother's husband, who for her sake

must love you. Entreat them, implore them. Ask them what you have done

to deserve to be thus degraded, to be made lower than themselves!'"

"Doctor," exclaimed Labassindre, bringing his fist heavily down upon the

table, making it tremble and shake, "the tool does not degrade the man,

it ennobles him. The tool is the regenerator of mankind. Christ handled

a plane when he was ten years of age."

"That is indeed true," said Charlotte, who at once conjured up the

vision of her little Jack dressed for the procession of the Fete-Dieu as

the child Jesus, armed with a little plane.

"Don't be taken in by such balderdash, Madame," said the exasperated

doctor. "To make a workman of your son is to separate him from you

forever. If you were to send him to the other end of the world, he could

not be further from your mind, from your heart; for you would have, in

this case, means of drawing together again, whereas social distances are

irremediable. You will see. The day will come when you will be ashamed

of your child, when you will find his hands rough, his language coarse,

his sentiments totally different from yours. He will stand one day

before you, before his mother, as before a stranger of higher rank than

himself,--not only humbled, but degraded."

Jack, who had hitherto not uttered a word, but had listened attentively

from a corner near the sideboard, was suddenly alarmed at the idea of

any possible disaffection springing up between his mother and himself.

He advanced into the middle of the room, and steadying his voice:--

"I will not be a workman," he said in a determined manner.

"O Jack!" murmured Charlotte, faltering.

This time it was D'Argenton who spoke.

"Oh, really! you will not be a workman? Look at this fine gentleman who

will or who will not accept a thing that I have decided. You will not be

a workman, eh? But you are quite willing to be clothed, fed, and amused.

Well, I solemnly declare that I have had enough of you, you horrid

little parasite; and that if you do not choose to work, I for my part

refuse to be any longer your victim."

He stopped abruptly, and passing from his mad rage to the chilly manner

which was habitual to him:--

"Go up to your room," he said; "I will consider what remains to be

done."

"What remains to be done, my dear D'Argenton, I will soon tell you."

But Jack did not hear the end of Monsieur Rivals's phrase, D'Argenton

with a shove having thrust him out.

The noise of the discussion reached him in his room, like the various

parts in a great orchestra. He distinguished and recognized all the

voices, but they melted one into the other, united by their resonance,

and made a discordant uproar through which some bits of phrases were

alone intelligible.

"It is an infamous lie."

"Messieurs! Messieurs!"

"Life is not a romance."

"Sacred blouse, _beuh_! _beuh_!"

At last old Rivals's voice could be heard thundering as he crossed the

threshold:--

"May I be hanged if ever I put my foot in your house again!"

Then the door was violently slammed, and a great silence fell on the

dining-room, broken only by the clatter of knives and forks.

They were breakfasting.

"You wish to degrade him, to make him something lower than yourself."

The child remembered that phrase, and he felt that this was indeed his

enemy's intention.

Well, no; a thousand times no--he would not be a workman.

The door opened, and his mother came in.

She had cried a great deal, had shed real tears, tears such as furrow

the cheek. For the first time, a mother showed herself in that pretty

woman's face, an afflicted and sorrowing mother.

"Listen to me, Jack," she said, striving to appear severe; "I must speak

very seriously to you. You have made me very unhappy by putting yourself

in open rebellion against your real friends, and by refusing to accept

the situation they offer you. I am well aware that there is in the new

existence--"

While she spoke, she carefully avoided meeting the child's eyes, for

they had such an expression of desperate grief and heartfelt reproach

that she would not have been able to resist their appeal.

"--That there is, in the new existence we have chosen for you, an

apparent inconsistency with the life you have hitherto been leading. I

confess that I was myself at first rather startled by it, but you heard,

did you not, what was said to you? The position of a workman is no

longer what it used to be; oh no! not at all the same thing, not at all.

You must know that the time of the working-man has now come. The middle

classes have had their day, the aristocracy likewise. Although, I must

say, the aristocracy--Moreover, is it not more natural at your age, to

allow yourself to be guided by those who love you, and who are

experienced?"

A sob from the child interrupted her.

"Then you too send me away; you too send me away."

This time the mother could no longer resist. She took him in her arms,

clasped him passionately to her heart:--

"I send you away? How can you imagine such a thing? Is it possible?

Come, be calm; don't tremble and give way like that. You know how I love

you, and how, if it only depended on me, we would never leave each

other. But we must be reasonable, and think a little of the future.

Alas! the future is already dark enough for us."

And in one of those outbursts of words that she still had sometimes when

freed from the presence of the master, she endeavored to explain to

Jack, with all kinds of hesitations and reticences, the irregularity of

their position.

"You see, my darling, you are still very young; there are many things

you cannot understand. Some day, when you are older, I will reveal to

you the secret of your birth; quite a romance, my dear! Some day I will

tell you the name of your father, and the unheard-of fatality of which

your mother and yourself have been the victims. But for the present,

what you must know and thoroughly comprehend, is that nothing here

belongs to us, my poor child, and that we are absolutely dependent on

him. How can I therefore oppose your departure, especially when I know

that he wants you to leave for your good? I cannot ask him for anything

more. He has already done so much for us. Besides, he is not rich, and

this terrible artistic career is so expensive! He could not undertake

the expense of your education. What will become of me between you two?

We must come to a decision. Remember that it was a profession you were

being given. Would you not be proud of being independent, of gaining

your own livelihood, of being your own master?"

She saw at once by the flash in the child's eye that she had struck

home; and in a low tone, in the caressing, coaxing voice of a mother,

she murmured:--

"Do it for my sake, Jack; will you? Put yourself in a position that will

enable you soon to gain your livelihood. Who knows if some day I may not

be obliged myself to have recourse to you as my only protector, my only

friend?"

Did she really think what she said? Was it a presentiment, one of those

sudden glimpses into the future which unfold to us our destiny and

reveal the failure and disappointments of our existence? Or had she been

merely carried away in the whirlwind words of her impulsive

sentimentality?

In any case she could not have found a better argument to convince that

little generous spirit. The effect was instantaneous. The idea that his

mother might want him, that he could help her by his work, suddenly

decided him.

He looked her straight in the face.

"Swear that you will always love me, that you will never be ashamed of

me when my hands are blackened!"

"If I shall love you, my Jack!"

Her only answer was to cover him with kisses, hiding her agitation and

her remorse under her passionate embraces; but from that moment the

wretched woman knew remorse, knew it for the rest of her life; and could

never think of her child without feeling a stab in her heart.

He however, as though he understood all the shame, uncertainty, and

terror concealed under these caresses, dashed towards the stairs, to

avoid dwelling on it.

"Come, mamma, let us go down. I am going to tell him I accept his

offer."

Down-stairs the "Failures" were still at table. They were all struck by

the grave and determined look on Jack's face.

"I beg your pardon," he said to D'Argenton. "I did wrong in refusing

your proposal. I now accept it, and thank you."

THE CITY OF IRON AND FIRE

From 'Jack'

The singer rose and stood upright in the boat, in which he and the child

were crossing the Loire a little above Paimboeuf, and with a wide

sweeping gesture of the arms, as if he would have clasped the river

within them, exclaimed:--

"Look at that, old boy; is not that grand?"

Notwithstanding the touch of grotesqueness and commonplace in the

actor's admiration, it was well justified by the splendid landscape

unrolling before their eyes.

It was about four o'clock in the afternoon. A July sun, a sun of melting

silver, spread a long luminous pathway of rays upon the waters. In the

air was a tremulous reverberation, a mist of light, through which

appeared the gleaming light of the river, active and silent, flashing

upon the sight with the rapidity of a mirage. Dimly seen sails high in

the air, which in this dazzling hour seem pale as flax, pass in the

distance as if in flight. They were great barges coming from

Noirmoutiers, laden to the very edge with white salt sparkling all over

with shining spangles, and worked by picturesque crews; men with the

great three-cornered hat of the Breton salt-worker, and women whose

great cushioned caps with butterfly wings were as white and glittering

as the salt. Then there were coasting vessels like floating drays, their

decks piled with sacks of flour and casks; tugs dragging interminable

lines of barges, or perhaps some three-master of Nantes arriving from

the other side of the world, returning to the native land after two

years' absence, and moving up the river with a slow, almost solemn

motion, as if bearing within it a silent contemplation of the old

country, and the mysterious poetry belonging to all things that come

from afar. Notwithstanding the July heat, a strong breeze blew freshly

over the lovely scene, for the wind came up from the coast with the

cheerful freshness of the open sea, and let it be guessed that a little

further away, beyond those hurrying waves already abandoned by the calm

tranquillity of still waters, lay the deep green of the limitless ocean,

with its billows, its fogs, and its tempests.

"And Indret? where is it?" asks Jack.

"There, that island in front of us."

In the silvery mist which enveloped the island, Jack saw confusedly

lines of great poplars and tall chimneys, whence issued a thick filthy

smoke, spreading over all, blackening even the sky above it. At the same

time he heard a clamorous and resounding din, hammers falling on wrought

and sheet iron, dull sounds, ringing sounds, variously re-echoed by the

sonority of the water; and over everything a continuous and perpetual

droning, as if the island had been a great steamer, stopped, and

murmuring, moving its paddles while at anchor, and its machinery while

yet motionless.

As the boat approached the shore, slowly and yet more slowly,--for the

tide ran strongly and was hard to fight against,--the child began to

distinguish long buildings with low roofs, blackened walls extending on

all sides with uniform dreariness; then, on the banks of the river as

far as the eye could reach, long lines of enormous boilers painted with

red lead, the startling color giving a wildly fantastic effect.

Government transports, steam launches, ranged alongside the quay, lay

waiting till these boilers should be put on board by means of a great

crane near at hand, which viewed from a distance looked like a gigantic

gibbet.

At the foot of this gallows stood a man watching the approach of the

boat.

"It is Roudic," said the singer; and from the deepest depths he brought

forth a formidable "hurrah!" which made itself heard even in the midst

of all the din of forging and hammering.

"Is that you, young 'un?"

"Yes, by Jove, it is I; are there two such notes as mine in the whole

world?"

The boat touched the shore, and the two brothers sprang into each

other's arms with a mighty greeting.

They were alike; but Roudic was much older, and wanting in that

embonpoint so quickly acquired by singers in the exercise of trills and

sustained notes. Instead of the pointed beard of his brother, he was

shaven, sunburnt; and his sailor's cap, a blue wool knitted cap, shaded

a true Breton face, tanned by the sea, cut in granite, with small eyes,

and a keen glance sharpened by the minute work of a fitter and adjuster.

"And how are all at home?" asked Labassindre. "Clarisse, Zenaide, every

one?"

"Every one is quite well, thank Heaven. Ah, ah! this is our new

apprentice. He looks like a nice little chap; only he doesn't look over

strong."

"Strong as a horse, my dear fellow, and warranted by the Paris doctors."

"So much the better, then, for ours is a roughish trade. And now, if you

are ready, let us go and see the manager."

They followed a long alley of fine trees that soon changed into a

street, such as is found in small towns, bordered by white houses, clean

and all alike. Here lived a certain number of the factory workmen, the

foremen, and first hands. The others were located on the opposite bank,

at Montagne or at Basse Indre.

At this hour all was silent, life and movement being concentrated within

the iron works; and had it not been for the linen drying at the windows,

the flower-pots ranged near the panes, the occasional cry of a child, or

the rhythmical rocking of a cradle heard through some half-opened door,

the place might have been deemed uninhabited.

"Oh! the flag's down," said the singer, as they reached the gate leading

to the workshops. "What frights that confounded flag has given me before

now."

And he explained to his "old Jack," that five minutes after the arrival

of the workmen for the opening hour, the flag over the gate was lowered,

and thus it was announced that the doors were closed. So much the worse

for those who were late; they were marked down as absent, and at the

third offense dismissed.

While he was giving these explanations, his brother conferred with the

gate-keeper, and they were admitted within the doors of the

establishment. The din was frightful; whistlings, groanings, grindings,

varying but never diminishing, were re-echoed from many vast

triangular-roofed sheds, standing at intervals on a sloping ground

intersected by numerous railways.

An iron city!

Their footsteps rang upon plates of metal incrusted in the earth. They

picked their way amid heaps of bar iron, pig iron, ingots of copper;

between rows of worn-out guns brought hither to be melted down, rusty

outside, all black within and almost smoking still, venerable masters of

fire about to perish by fire.

Roudic, as they passed along, pointed out the various quarters of the

establishment: "This is the setting-up room, these the workshops of the

great lathe and little lathe, the braziery, the forges, the foundry." He

had to shout, so deafening was the noise.

Jack, half dazed, looked with surprise through the workshop doors,

nearly all open on account of the heat, at a swarming of upraised arms,

of blackened faces, of machinery in motion in a cave-like darkness, dull

and deep, lit up by brief flashes of red light.

Out poured the hot air, with mingled odors of coal, burned clay, molten

iron and the impalpable black dust, sharp and burning, which in the

sunlight had a metallic sparkle, the glitter of coal that may become

diamond.

But what gave a special character to these formidable works was the

perpetual commotion of both earth and air, a continual trepidation,

something like the striving of a huge beast imprisoned beneath the

foundry, whose groans and burning breath burst hissing out through the

yawning chimneys. Jack, fearful of appearing too much of a novice, dared

not ask what it was made this noise, which even at a distance had so

impressed him....

As they talked, they passed along the streets of the iron-works laid

with rails, crowded at this hour, the working day just at an end, with a

concourse of men of all kinds and sizes and trades; a motley of blouses,

pilot jackets, the coats of the designers mixing with the uniforms of

the overseers.

The gravity with which this deliverance from toil was effected struck

Jack forcibly. He compared this scene with the cries, the jostling on

the pavements which in Paris enliven the exit from the workshops, and

make it as noisy as that of a school. Here, rule and discipline were

sensibly felt, just as on board a man-of-war.

A warm mist of steam floated over this mass of human beings, a steam

that the sea breeze had not yet dispersed, and which hung like a heavy

cloud in the stillness of this July evening. From the now silent

workshops evaporated the odors of the forge. Steam whistled forth in the

gutters, sweat stood on all the foreheads, and the panting that had

puzzled Jack a little while ago had given place to a breath of relief

from these two thousand chests wearied with the day's labor.

As he passed through the crowd, Labassindre was soon recognized.

"Hullo! young 'un, how are you?"

He was surrounded, his hand eagerly shaken, and from one to another

passed the words:--

"Here, look at Roudic's brother, the fellow who makes four thousand

pounds a year just by singing."

Every one wished to see him, for one of the legends of the workshops was

this supposed fortune of the quondam blacksmith, and since his departure

more than one young fellow-worker had searched to the very bottom of his

larynx, to try if the famous note, the note worth millions, were not by

some happy chance to be found there.

In the midst of this cortege of admirers, whom his theatrical costume

impressed still more, the singer walked along with his head in the air,

talking and laughing, casting "Good morning, Father So-and-so! Good

morning, Mother What-'s-your-name!" towards the little houses enlivened

by women's faces looking out, towards the public-houses and cook-shops

which were frequent in this part of Indret; where also hawkers of all

kinds held sway, exposing their merchandise in the open air: blouses,

shoes, hats, kerchiefs, all the ambulating trumpery to be found in the

neighborhood of camps, barracks, and factories.

As they made their way through this display of wares, Jack imagined he

saw a familiar face, a smile, parting the various groups to reach him;

but it was only a lightning flash, a mere vision swept away at once by

the ever changing tide of the mass flowing away and dispersing through

the great industrial city, and spreading itself over to the other side

of the river in long ferry-boats, active, numerous, heavily laden, as if

it were the passage of an army.

Evening was closing in over the dispersing crowd. The sun went down. The

wind freshened, moving the poplars like palms; and the spectacle was

imposing of the toiling island in its turn sinking to repose, restored

to nature for the night. As the smoke cleared, masses of verdure became

visible between the workshops. The river could be heard lapping the

banks; and the swallows, skimming the water with tiny twitter, fluttered

around the great boilers ranged along the quay.

THE WRATH OF A QUEEN

From 'Kings in Exile'

All the magic beauty of that June night poured in through the wide-open

casement in the great hall. A single lighted candelabrum scarcely

disturbed the mystery of the moonlight, which streamed in like a "milky

way." On the table, across some dusty old papers, lay a crucifix of

oxydized silver. By the side of the crucifix was a thick broad sheet of

parchment, covered with a big and tremulous writing. It was the

death-warrant of royalty, wanting nothing but the signature, one stroke

of the pen, and a strong and violent effort of will to give this; and

that was the reason why this weak King hesitated, sitting motionless,

his elbows resting on the table, by the lighted candles prepared for the

royal seal.

Near him, anxious, prying, yet soft and smooth, like a night-moth or the

black bat that haunts ruins, Lebeau, the confidential valet, watched him

and silently encouraged him; for they had arrived at the decisive moment

that the gang had for months expected, with alternate hopes and fears,

with all the trepidation, all the uncertainty attending a business

dependent upon such a puppet as this King. Notwithstanding the magnetism

of this overpowering desire, Christian, pen in hand, could not bring

himself to sign. Sunk down in his arm-chair, he gazed at the parchment,

and was lost in thought. It was not that he cared for that crown, which

he had neither wished for nor loved, which as a child he had found too

heavy, and that later in life had bowed him down and crushed him by its

terrible responsibilities. He had felt no scruple in laying it aside,

leaving it in the corner of a room which he never entered, forgetting it

as much as possible when he was out; but he was scared at the sudden

determination, the irrevocable step he was about to take. However, there

was no other way of procuring money for his new existence, no other

means of meeting the hundred and twenty thousand pounds' worth of bills

he had signed, on which payment would soon be due, and which the usurer,

a certain Pichery, picture-dealer, refused to renew. Could he allow an

execution to be put in at Saint-Mande? And the Queen, the royal child;

what would become of them in that case? If he must have a scene--for he

foresaw the terrible clamor his cowardice must rouse--was it not better

to have it now, and brave once for all anger and recriminations? And

then--all this was not really the determining reason.

He had promised the Comtesse to sign this renunciation; and on the faith

of this promise, Sephora had consented to let her husband start alone

for London, and had accepted the mansion Avenue de Messine, and the

title and name that published her to the world as the king's mistress,

reserving, however, anything further till the day when Christian himself

would bring her the deed, signed by his own hand. She assigned for this

conduct the reasons of a woman in love: he might, later on, return to

Illyria, abandon her for the throne and power; she would not be the

first person whom these terrible State reasons have made tremble and

weep. D'Axel, Wattelet, all the _gommeux_ of the Grand Club little

guessed when the king, quitting the Avenue de Messine, rejoined them at

the club with heavy fevered eyes, that he had spent the evening on a

divan, by turns repulsed or encouraged, his feelings played upon, his

nerves unstrung by the constant resistance; rolling himself at the feet

of an immovable, determined woman, who with a supple opposition

abandoned to his impassioned embrace only the cold little Parisian

hands, so skillful in defense and evasion, while she imprinted on his

lips the scorching flame of the enrapturing words:--"Oh! when you have

ceased to be king, I shall be all yours--all yours!" She made him pass

through all the dangerous phases of passion and coldness; and often at

the theatre, after an icy greeting and a rapid smile, would slowly draw

off her gloves and cast him a tender glance; then, putting her bare hand

in his, she would seem to offer it up to his ardent kiss.

"Then you say, Lebeau, that Pichery will not renew?"

"He will not, sire. If the bills are not paid, the bailiffs will be put

in."

How well he emphasized with a despairing moan the word "bailiffs," so as

to convey the feeling of all the sinister formalities that would follow:

bills protested, an execution, the royal hearth desecrated, the family

turned out of doors. Christian saw nothing of all this. His imagination

carried him far away to the Avenue de Messine: he saw himself arriving

there in the middle of the night, eager and quivering; ascending with

stealthy and hurried step the heavily carpeted stairs, entering the room

where the night-light burned, mysteriously veiled under lace:--"It is

done--I am no longer king. You are mine, mine." And the loved one held

out her hand.

"Come," he exclaimed, starting out of his fleeting dream.

And he signed.

The door opened and the Queen appeared. Her presence in Christian's

rooms at such an hour was so unforeseen, so unexpected, they had lived

so long apart, that neither the King in the act of signing his infamy,

nor Lebeau, who stood watching him, turned round at the slight noise she

made. They thought it was Boscovich coming up from the garden. Gliding

lightly like a shadow, she was already near the table, and had reached

the two accomplices, when Lebeau saw her. With her finger on her lips

she motioned him to be silent, and continued to advance, wishing to

convict the king in the very act of his treachery, and avoid all

evasion, subterfuge, or useless dissimulation; but the valet set her

order at defiance and gave the alarm, "The Queen, sire!"

The Dalmatian, furious, struck straight in the face of this malevolent

caitiff with the powerful hand of a woman accustomed to handle the

reins; and drawing herself up erect, waited till the wretch had

disappeared before she addressed the king.

"What has happened, my dear Frederique? and to what am I indebted

for--?"

Standing bent over the table that he strove to hide, in a graceful

attitude that showed off his silk jacket embroidered in pink, he smiled,

and although his lips were rather pale, his voice remained calm, his

speech easy, with that polished elegance which never left him when

addressing his wife, and which placed a barrier between them like a hard

lacquer screen adorned with flowery and intricate arabesques. With one

word, one gesture, she put aside the barrier behind which he would fain

have sheltered himself.

"Oh! no phrases, no grimacing--if you please. I know what you were

writing there. Do not try to give me the lie."

Then drawing nearer, overwhelming his timorous objection by her haughty

bearing:--

"Listen to me, Christian," and there was something in her tone that gave

an impression of solemnity to her words; "listen to me: you have made me

suffer cruelly since I became your wife. I have never said anything but

once--the first time, you remember. After that, when I saw that you had

ceased to love me, I left you to yourself. Not that I was ignorant of

anything you did--not one of your infidelities, not one of your follies

remained unknown to me. For you must indeed be mad, mad like your

father, who died of exhaustion, mad with love for Lola; mad like your

grandfather John, who died in a shameful delirium, foaming and framing

kisses with the death-rattle in his throat, and uttering words that made

the Sisters of Charity grow pale. Yes, it is the same fevered blood, the

same hellish passion that devours you. At Ragusa, on the nights of the

sortie, it was at Foedora's that they sought you. I knew it, I knew

that she had left her theatre to follow you. I never uttered a single

reproach. The honor of your name was saved. And when the King was absent

from the ramparts, I took care his place should not be empty. But here

in Paris--"

Till now she had spoken slowly, coldly, in a tone of pity and maternal

reproof, as though inspired thereto by the downcast eyes and pouting

mouth of the King, who looked like a vicious child receiving a scolding.

But the name of Paris exasperated her. A city without faith, a city

cynical and accursed, its blood-stained stones ever ready for sedition

and barricades! What possessed these poor fallen kings, that they came

to take refuge in this Sodom! It was Paris, it was its atmosphere

tainted by carnage and vice that completed the ruin of the historical

houses; it was this that had made Christian lose what the maddest of his

ancestors had always known how to preserve--the respect and pride of

their race. Oh! When on the very day of their arrival, the first night

of their exile, she had seen him so excited, so gay, while all around

him were secretly weeping, Frederique had guessed the humiliation and

shame she would have to undergo. Then in one breath, without pausing,

with cutting words that lashed the pallid face of the royal rake, and

striped it red as with a whip, she recalled one after the other all his

follies, his rapid descent from pleasure to vice, and vice to crime.

"You have deceived me under my very eyes, in my own house; adultery has

sat at my table, it has brushed against my dress. When you were tired of

that dollish little face who had not even the grace to conceal her

tears, you went to the gutter, wallowing shamelessly in the slime and

mud of the streets, and bringing back the dregs of your orgies, of your

sickly remorse, all the pollution of the mire. Remember how I saw you

totter and stammer on that morning, when for the second time you lost

your throne. What have you not done! Holy Mother of angels! What have

you not done! You have traded with the royal seal, you have sold crosses

and titles."

And in a lower tone, as though she feared lest the stillness and silence

of the night might hear, she added:--

"You have stolen, yes, stolen! Those diamonds, those stones torn from

the crown--it was you who did it, and I allowed my faithful Greb to be

suspected and dismissed. The theft being known, it was necessary to find

a sham culprit to prevent the real one ever being discovered. For this

has been my one, my constant preoccupation: to uphold the King, to keep

him untouched; to accept everything for that purpose, even the shame

which in the eyes of the world will end by sullying me. I had adopted a

watchword that sustained me, and encouraged me in my hours of trial:

'All for the crown!' And now you want to sell it--that crown that has

cost me such anguish and such tears; you want to barter it for gold, for

the lifeless mask of that Jewess, whom you had the indecency to bring

face to face with me to-day."

Crushed, bending low his head, he had hitherto listened without a word,

but the insult directed against the woman he loved roused him. Looking

fixedly at the queen, his face bearing the traces of her cutting words,

he said politely, but very firmly:--

"Well, no, you are mistaken. The woman you mention has had nothing to do

with the determination I have taken. What I am doing is done for you,

for me, for our common happiness. Tell me, are you not weary of this

life of privations and expedients? Do you think that I am ignorant of

what is going on here; that I do not suffer when I see you harassed by a

pack of tradespeople and duns? The other day when that man was shouting

in the yard I was coming in and heard him. Had it not been for Rosen I

would have crushed him under the wheels of my phaeton. And you--you were

watching his departure behind the curtains of your window. A nice

position for a Queen. We owe money to every one. There is a universal

outcry against us. Half the servants are unpaid. The tutor even has

received nothing for the last ten months. Madame de Silvis pays herself

by majestically wearing your old dresses. And there are days when my

councilor, the keeper of the royal seals, borrows from my valet the

wherewithal to buy snuff. You see I am well acquainted with the state of

things. And you do not know my debts yet. I am over head and ears in

debt. Everything is giving way around us. A pretty state of things,

indeed; you will see that diadem of yours sold one day at the corner of

a street with old knives and forks."

Little by little, gradually carried away by his own scoffing nature and

the jesting habits of his set, he dropped the moderate tone he commenced

with, and in his insolent little snuffling voice began to dwell upon the

ludicrous side of the situation, with jeers and mockery, borrowed no

doubt from Sephora, who never lost an opportunity of demolishing by her

sneering observations the few remaining scruples of her lover.

"You will accuse me of making phrases, but it is you who deafen yourself

with words. What, after all, is that crown of Illyria that you are

always talking about? It is worth nothing except on a king's head;

elsewhere it is obstruction, a useless thing, which for flight is

carried hidden away in a bonnet-box or exposed under a glass shade like

the laurels of an actor or the blossoms of a _concierge's_ bridal

wreath. You must be convinced of one thing, Frederique. A king is truly

king only on the throne, with power to rule; fallen, he is nothing, less

than nothing, a rag. Vainly do we cling to etiquette, to our titles,

always bringing forward our Majesty, on the panels of our carriages, on

the studs of our cuffs, hampering ourselves with an empty ceremonial. It

is all hypocrisy on our part, and mere politeness and pity on the part

of those who surround us--our friends and our servants. Here I am King

Christian II. for you, for Rosen, for a few faithful ones. Outside I

become a man like the rest, M. Christian Two. Not even a surname, only

'Christian,' like an actor of the Gaete."

He stopped, out of breath; he did not remember having ever spoken so

long standing. The shrill notes of the night-birds, the prolonged trills

of the nightingales, broke the silence of the night. A big moth that had

singed its wings at the lights flew about, thumping against the walls.

This fluttering distress and the smothered sobs of the Queen were the

only sounds to be heard; she knew how to meet rage and violence, but was

powerless before this scoffing banter, so foreign to her sincere nature;

it found her unarmed, like the valiant soldier who expects straight

blows and feels only the harassing stings of insects. Seeing her break

down, Christian thought her vanquished, and to complete his victory he

put the finishing touch to the burlesque picture he had drawn of kings

in exile. "What a pitiful figure they cut, all these poor princes _in

partibus_, figurants of royalty, who drape themselves in the frippery of

the principal characters, and declaim before the empty benches without a

farthing of receipts! Would they not be wiser if they held their peace

and returned to the obscurity of common life? For those who have money

there is some excuse. Their riches give them some right to cling to

these grandeurs. But the others, the poor cousins of Palermo for

instance, crowded together in a tiny house with their horrid Italian

cookery. It smells of onions when the door is opened. Worthy folk

certainly, but what an existence! And those are not the worst off. The

other day a Bourbon, a real Bourbon, ran after an omnibus. 'Full, sir,'

said the conductor. But he kept on running. 'Don't I tell you it is

full, my good man?' He got angry; he would have wished to be called

'Monseigneur'--as if that should be known by the tie of his cravat!

Operetta kings, I tell you, Frederique. It is to escape from this

ridiculous position, to insure a dignified and decent existence, that I

have made up my mind to sign this."