Pia mater, Plus quam se sapere, et virtutibus esse priorem Vult, et ait
prope vera.--Horace.
Vere mihi festus atras Eximet curas.--Horace.
The next morning I received a letter from my mother.
“My dear Henry,” began my affectionate and incomparable parent--
“My dear Henry,
“You have now fairly entered the world, and though at your age my advice
may be but little followed, my experience cannot altogether be useless.
I shall, therefore, make no apology for a few precepts, which I hope may
tend to make you a wiser and better man.
“I hope, in the first place, that you have left your letter at the
ambassador’s, and that you will not fail to go there as often as
possible. Pay your court in particular to Lady--. She is a charming
person, universally popular, and one of the very few English people to
whom one may safely be civil. Apropos, of English civility, you have, I
hope, by this time discovered, that you have to assume a very different
manner with French people than with our own countrymen: with us, the
least appearance of feeling or enthusiasm is certain to be ridiculed
every where; but in France, you may venture to seem not quite devoid of
all natural sentiments: indeed, if you affect enthusiasm, they will
give you credit for genius, and they will place all the qualities of the
heart to the account of the head. You know that in England, if you
seem desirous of a person’s acquaintance you are sure to lose it; they
imagine you have some design upon their wives or their dinners; but in
France you can never lose by politeness: nobody will call your civility
forwardness and pushing. If the Princess De T--, and the Duchesse de
D--, ask you to their houses (which indeed they will, directly you have
left your letters), go there two or three times a week, if only for a
few minutes in the evening. It is very hard to be acquainted with great
French people, but when you are, it is your own fault if you are not
intimate with them.
“Most English people have a kind of diffidence and scruple at calling in
the evening--this is perfectly misplaced: the French are never ashamed
of themselves, like us, whose persons, families, and houses are never
fit to be seen, unless they are dressed out for a party.
“Don’t imagine that the ease of French manners is at all like what we
call ease: you must not lounge on your chair--nor put your feet upon a
stool--nor forget yourself for one single moment when you are talking
with women.
“You have heard a great deal about the gallantries of the French ladies;
but remember that they demand infinitely greater attention than English
women do; and that after a month’s incessant devotion, you may lose
every thing by a moment’s impolitesse.
“You will not, my dear son, misinterpret these hints. I suppose, of
course, that all your liaisons are platonic.
“Your father is laid up with the gout, and dreadfully ill-tempered and
peevish; however, I keep out of the way as much as possible. I dined
yesterday at Lady Roseville’s: she praised you very much, said your
manners were particularly good, and that you had already quite the usage
du monde. Lord Vincent is, I understand, at Paris: though very tiresome
with his learning and Latin, he is exceedingly clever and repandu; be
sure to cultivate his acquaintance.
“If you are ever at a loss as to the individual character of a person
you wish to gain, the general knowledge of human nature will teach you
one infallible specific,--flattery! The quantity and quality may vary
according to the exact niceties of art; but, in any quantity and in any
quality, it is more or less acceptable, and therefore certain to please.
Only never (or at least very rarely) flatter when other people, besides
the one to be flattered, are by; in that case you offend the rest, and
you make even your intended dupe ashamed to be pleased.
“In general, weak minds think only of others, and yet seem only occupied
with themselves; you, on the contrary, must appear wholly engrossed
with those about you, and yet never have a single idea which does not
terminate in yourself: a fool, my dear Henry, flatters himself--a wise
man flatters the fool.
“God bless you, my dear child, take care of your health--don’t forget
Coulon; and believe me your most affectionate mother,
“F. P.”
By the time I had read this letter and dressed myself for the evening,
Vincent’s carriage was at the porte cocher. I hate the affection
of keeping people waiting, and went down so quickly, that I met his
facetious lordship upon the stairs. “Devilish windy,” said I, as we were
getting into the carriage.
“Yes,” said Vincent; “but the moral Horace reminds us of our remedies as
well as our misfortune--
“‘Jam galeam Pallas, et aegida, Currusque parat,’--
that is, ‘Providence that prepares the gale, gives us also a great coat
and a carriage.’”
We were not long driving to the Palais Royal. Very’s was crowded to
excess--“A very low set!” said Lord Vincent, (who, being half a liberal,
is of course a thorough aristocrat) looking round at the various English
who occupied the apartment.
There was, indeed, a motley congregation; country esquires; extracts
from the Universities; half-pay officers; city clerks in frogged coats
and mustachios; two or three of a better looking description, but in
reality half swindlers, half gentlemen. All, in short, fit specimens of
that wandering tribe, which spread over the continent the renown and the
ridicule of good old England. I know not why it is that we should look
and act so very disgracefully abroad; but I never meet in any spot
out of this happy island, a single Englishman, without instinctively
blushing for my native country.
“Garcon, garcon,” cried a stout gentleman, who made one of three at the
table next to us. “Donnez-nous une sole frite pour un, et des pommes de
terre pour trois!”
“Humph!” said Lord Vincent; “fine ideas of English taste these garcons
must entertain; men who prefer fried soles and potatoes to the various
delicacies they can command here, might, by the same perversion of
taste, prefer Bloomfield’s poems to Byron’s. Delicate taste depends
solely upon the physical construction; and a man who has it not in
cookery, must want it in literature. Fried sole and potatoes!! If I had
written a volume, whose merit was in elegance, I would not show it
to such a man!--but he might be an admirable critic upon ‘Cobbett’s
Register,’ or ‘Every Man his own Brewer.’”
“Excessively true,” said I; “what shall we order?”
“D’abord des huitres d’Ostende,” said Vincent; “as to the rest,” taking
hold of the carte, “deliberare utilia mora utilissima est.”
We were soon engaged in all the pleasures and pains of a dinner.
“Petimus,” said Lord Vincent, helping himself to some poulet a
l’Austerlitz, “petimus bene vivere--quod petis, hic est?”
We were not, however, assured of that fact at the termination of dinner.
If half the dishes were well conceived and better executed, the other
half were proportionably bad. Very is, indeed, no longer the prince of
Restaurateurs. The low English who have flocked there, have entirely
ruined the place. What waiter--what cook can possibly respect men who
take no soup, and begin with a roti; who know neither what is good nor
what is bad; who eat rognons at dinner instead of at breakfast, and fall
into raptures over sauce Robert and pieds de cochon; who cannot tell,
at the first taste, whether the beaune is premiere qualite, or the
fricassee made of yesterday’s chicken; who suffer in the stomach after
champignon, and die with indigestion of a truffle? O! English people,
English people! why can you not stay and perish of apoplexy and
Yorkshire pudding at home?
By the time we had drank our coffee it was considerably past nine
o’clock, and Vincent had business at the ambassador’s before ten; we
therefore parted for the night.
“What do you think of Very’s?” said I, as we were at the door.
“Why,” replied Vincent, “when I recal the astonishing heat of the place,
which has almost sent me to sleep; the exceeding number of times in
which that becasse had been re-roasted, and the extortionate length
of our bills, I say of Very’s, what Hamlet said of the world, ‘Weary,
stale, and unprofitable!’”