During the course of this malady which attacks impoverished races,
sudden calms succeed an attack. Strangely enough, Des Esseintes awoke
one morning recovered; no longer was he tormented by the throbbing of
his neck or by his racking cough. Instead, he had an ineffable
sensation of contentment, a lightness of mind in which thought was
sparklingly clear, turning from a turbid, opaque, green color to a
liquid iridescence magical with tender rainbow tints.
This lasted several days. Then hallucinations of odor suddenly
appeared.
His room was aromatic with the fragrance of frangipane; he tried to
ascertain if a bottle were not uncorked--no! not a bottle was to be
found in the room, and he passed into his study and thence to the
kitchen. Still the odor persisted.
Des Esseintes rang for his servant and asked if he smelled anything.
The domestic sniffed the air and declared he could not detect any
perfume. There was no doubt about it: his nervous attacks had returned
again, under the appearance of a new illusion of the senses.
Fatigued by the tenacity of this imaginary aroma, he resolved to steep
himself in real perfumes, hoping that this homeopathic treatment would
cure him or would at least drown the persistent odor.
He betook himself to his dressing room. There, near an old baptistery
which he used as a wash basin, under a long mirror of forged iron,
which, like the edge of a well silvered by the moon, confined the
green dull surface of the mirror, were bottles of every conceivable
size and form, placed on ivory shelves.
He set them on the table and divided them into two series: one of the
simple perfumes, pure extracts or spirits, the other of compound
perfumes, designated under the generic term of bouquets.
He sank into an easy chair and meditated.
He had long been skilled in the science of smell. He believed that
this sense could give one delights equal to those of hearing and
sight; each sense being susceptible, if naturally keen and if properly
cultivated, to new impressions, which it could intensify, coordinate
and compose into that unity which constitutes a creative work. And it
was not more abnormal and unnatural that an art should be called into
existence by disengaging odors than that another art should be evoked
by detaching sound waves or by striking the eye with diversely colored
rays. But if no person could discern, without intuition developed by
study, a painting by a master from a daub, a melody of Beethoven from
one by Clapisson, no more could any one at first, without preliminary
initiation, help confusing a bouquet invented by a sincere artist with
a pot pourri made by some manufacturer to be sold in groceries and
bazaars.
In this art, the branch devoted to achieving certain effects by
artificial methods particularly delighted him.
Perfumes, in fact, rarely come from the flowers whose names they bear.
The artist who dared to borrow nature's elements would only produce a
bastard work which would have neither authenticity nor style, inasmuch
as the essence obtained by the distillation of flowers would bear but
a distant and vulgar relation to the odor of the living flower,
wafting its fragrance into the air.
Thus, with the exception of the inimitable jasmine which it is
impossible to counterfeit, all flowers are perfectly represented by
the blend of aromatic spirits, stealing the very personality of the
model, and to it adding that nuance the more, that heady scent, that
rare touch which entitled a thing to be called a work of art.
To resume, in the science of perfumery, the artist develops the
natural odor of the flowers, working over his subject like a jeweler
refining the lustre of a gem and making it precious.
Little by little, the arcana of this art, most neglected of all, was
revealed to Des Esseintes who could now read this language, as
diversified and insinuating as that of literature, this style with its
unexpected concision under its vague flowing appearance.
To achieve this end he had first been compelled to master the grammar
and understand the syntax of odors, learning the secret of the rules
that regulate them, and, once familiarized with the dialect, he
compared the works of the masters, of the Atkinsons and Lubins, the
Chardins and Violets, the Legrands and Piesses; then he separated the
construction of their phrases, weighed the value of their words and
the arrangement of their periods.
Later on, in this idiom of fluids, experience was able to support
theories too often incomplete and banal.
Classic perfumery, in fact, was scarcely diversified, almost colorless
and uniformly issuing from the mold cast by the ancient chemists. It
was in its dotage, confined to its old alambics, when the romantic
period was born and had modified the old style, rejuvenating it,
making it more supple and malleable.
Step by step, its history followed that of our language. The perfumed
Louis XIII style, composed of elements highly prized at that time, of
iris powder, musk, chive and myrtle water already designated under the
name of "water of the angels," was hardly sufficient to express the
cavalier graces, the rather crude tones of the period which certain
sonnets of Saint-Amand have preserved for us. Later, with myrrh and
olibanum, the mystic odors, austere and powerful, the pompous gesture
of the great period, the redundant artifices of oratorial art, the
full, sustained harmonious style of Bossuet and the masters of the
pulpit were almost possible. Still later, the sophisticated, rather
bored graces of French society under Louis XV, more easily found their
interpretation in the almond which in a manner summed up this epoch;
then, after the ennui and jadedness of the first empire, which misused
Eau de Cologne and rosemary, perfumery rushed, in the wake of Victor
Hugo and Gautier, towards the Levant. It created oriental
combinations, vivid Eastern nosegays, discovered new intonations,
antitheses which until then had been unattempted, selected and made
use of antique nuances which it complicated, refined and assorted. It
resolutely rejected that voluntary decrepitude to which it had been
reduced by the Malesherbes, the Boileaus, the Andrieuxes and the
Baour-Lormians, wretched distillers of their own poems.
But this language had not remained stationery since the period of
1830. It had continued to evolve and, patterning itself on the
progress of the century, had advanced parallel with the other arts.
It, too, had yielded to the desires of amateurs and artists, receiving
its inspiration from the Chinese and Japanese, conceiving fragrant
albums, imitating the _Takeoka_ bouquets of flowers, obtaining the
odor of _Rondeletia_ from the blend of lavender and clove; the
peculiar aroma of Chinese ink from the marriage of patchouli and
camphor; the emanation of Japanese _Hovenia_ by compounds of citron,
clove and neroli.
Des Esseintes studied and analyzed the essences of these fluids,
experimenting to corroborate their texts. He took pleasure in playing
the role of a psychologist for his personal satisfaction, in taking
apart and re-assembling the machinery of a work, in separating the
pieces forming the structure of a compound exhalation, and his sense
of smell had thereby attained a sureness that was all but perfect.
Just as a wine merchant has only to smell a drop of wine to recognize
the grape, as a hop dealer determines the exact value of hops by
sniffing a bag, as a Chinese trader can immediately tell the origin of
the teas he smells, knowing in what farms of what mountains, in what
Buddhistic convents it was cultivated, the very time when its leaves
were gathered, the state and the degree of torrefaction, the effect
upon it of its proximity to the plum-tree and other flowers, to all
those perfumes which change its essence, adding to it an unexpected
touch and introducing into its dryish flavor a hint of distant fresh
flowers; just so could Des Esseintes, by inhaling a dash of perfume,
instantly explain its mixture and the psychology of its blend, and
could almost give the name of the artist who had composed and given it
the personal mark of his individual style.
Naturally he had a collection of all the products used by perfumers.
He even had the real Mecca balm, that rare balm cultivated only in
certain parts of Arabia Petraea and under the monopoly of the ruler.
Now, seated in his dressing room in front of his table, he thought of
creating a new bouquet; and he was overcome by that moment of wavering
confidence familiar to writers when, after months of inaction, they
prepare for a new work.
Like Balzac who was wont to scribble on many sheets of paper so as to
put himself in a mood for work, Des Esseintes felt the necessity of
steadying his hand by several initial and unimportant experiments.
Desiring to create heliotrope, he took down bottles of vanilla and
almond, then changed his idea and decided to experiment with sweet
peas.
He groped for a long time, unable to effect the proper combinations,
for orange is dominant in the fragrance of this flower. He attempted
several combinations and ended in achieving the exact blend by joining
tuberose and rose to orange, the whole united by a drop of vanilla.
His hesitation disappeared. He felt alert and ready for work; now he
made some tea by blending cassie with iris, then, sure of his
technique, he decided to proceed with a fulminating phrase whose
thunderous roar would annihilate the insidious odor of almond still
hovering over his room.
He worked with amber and with Tonkin musk, marvelously powerful; with
patchouli, the most poignant of vegetable perfumes whose flower, in
its habitat, wafts an odor of mildew. Try what he would, the
eighteenth century obsessed him; the panier robes and furbelows
appeared before his eyes; memories of Boucher's _Venus_ haunted him;
recollections of Themidor's romance, of the exquisite Rosette pursued
him. Furious, he rose and to rid himself of the obsession, with all
his strength he inhaled that pure essence of spikenard, so dear to
Orientals and so repulsive to Europeans because of its pronounced odor
of valerian. He was stunned by the violence of the shock. As though
pounded by hammer strokes, the filigranes of the delicate odor
disappeared; he profited by the period of respite to escape the dead
centuries, the antiquated fumes, and to enter, as he formerly had
done, less limited or more recent works.
He had of old loved to lull himself with perfumes. He used effects
analogous to those of the poets, and employed the admirable order of
certain pieces of Baudelaire, such as _Irreparable_ and _le Balcon_,
where the last of the five lines composing the strophe is the echo of
the first verse and returns, like a refrain, to steep the soul in
infinite depths of melancholy and languor.
He strayed into reveries evoked by those aromatic stanzas, suddenly
brought to his point of departure, to the motive of his meditation, by
the return of the initial theme, reappearing, at stated intervals, in
the fragrant orchestration of the poem.
He actually wished to saunter through an astonishing, diversified
landscape, and he began with a sonorous, ample phrase that suddenly
opened a long vista of fields for him.
With his vaporizers, he injected an essence formed of ambrosia,
lavender and sweet peas into this room; this formed an essence which,
when distilled by an artist, deserves the name by which it is known:
"extract of wild grass"; into this he introduced an exact blend of
tuberose, orange flower and almond, and forthwith artificial lilacs
sprang into being, while the linden-trees rustled, their thin
emanations, imitated by extract of London tilia, drooping earthward.
Into this _decor_, arranged with a few broad lines, receding as far as
the eye could reach, under his closed lids, he introduced a light rain
of human and half feline essences, possessing the aroma of petticoats,
breathing of the powdered, painted woman, the stephanotis, ayapana,
opopanax, champaka, sarcanthus and cypress wine, to which he added a
dash of syringa, in order to give to the artificial life of paints
which they exhaled, a suggestion of natural dewy laughter and
pleasures enjoyed in the open air.
Then, through a ventilator, he permitted these fragrant waves to
escape, only preserving the field which he renewed, compelling it to
return in his strophes like a ritornello.
The women had gradually disappeared. Now the plain had grown solitary.
Suddenly, on the enchanted horizon, factories appeared whose tall
chimneys flared like bowls of punch.
The odor of factories and of chemical products now passed with the
breeze which was simulated by means of fans; nature exhaled its sweet
effluvia amid this putrescence.
Des Esseintes warmed a pellet of storax, and a singular odor, at once
repugnant and exquisite, pervaded the room. It partook of the
delicious fragrance of jonquil and of the stench of gutta percha and
coal oil. He disinfected his hands, inserted his resin in a
hermetically sealed box, and the factories disappeared.
Then, among the revived vapors of the lindens and meadow grass, he
threw several drops of new mown hay, and, amid this magic site for the
moment despoiled of its lilacs, sheaves of hay were piled up,
introducing a new season and scattering their fine effluence into
these summer odors.
At last, when he had sufficiently enjoyed this sight, he suddenly
scattered the exotic perfumes, emptied his vaporizers, threw in his
concentrated spirits, poured his balms, and, in the exasperated and
stifling heat of the room there rose a crazy sublimated nature, a
paradoxical nature which was neither genuine nor charming, reuniting
the tropical spices and the peppery breath of Chinese sandal wood and
Jamaica hediosmia with the French odors of jasmine, hawthorn and
verbena. Regardless of seasons and climates he forced trees of diverse
essences into life, and flowers with conflicting fragrances and
colors. By the clash of these tones he created a general, nondescript,
unexpected, strange perfume in which reappeared, like an obstinate
refrain, the decorative phrase of the beginning, the odor of the
meadows fanned by the lilacs and lindens.
Suddenly a poignant pain seized him; he felt as though wimbles were
drilling into his temples. Opening his eyes he found himself in his
dressing room, seated in front of his table. Stupefied, he painfully
walked across the room to the window which he half opened. A puff of
wind dispelled the stifling atmosphere which was enveloping him. To
exercise his limbs, he walked up and down gazing at the ceiling where
crabs and sea-wrack stood out in relief against a background as light
in color as the sands of the seashore. A similar _decor_ covered the
plinths and bordered the partitions which were covered with Japanese
sea-green crepe, slightly wrinkled, imitating a river rippled by the
wind. In this light current swam a rose petal, around which circled a
school of tiny fish painted with two strokes of the brush.
But his eyelids remained heavy. He ceased to pace about the short
space between the baptistery and the bath; he leaned against the
window. His dizziness ended. He carefully stopped up the vials, and
used the occasion to arrange his cosmetics. Since his arrival at
Fontenay he had not touched them; and now was quite astonished to
behold once more this collection formerly visited by so many women.
The flasks and jars were lying heaped up against each other. Here, a
porcelain box contained a marvelous white cream which, when applied on
the cheeks, turns to a tender rose color, under the action of the
air--to such a true flesh-color that it procures the very illusion of
a skin touched with blood; there, lacquer objects incrusted with
mother of pearl enclosed Japanese gold and Athenian green, the color
of the cantharis wing, gold and green which change to deep purple when
wetted; there were jars filled with filbert paste, the serkis of the
harem, emulsions of lilies, lotions of strawberry water and elders for
the complexion, and tiny bottles filled with solutions of Chinese ink
and rose water for the eyes. There were tweezers, scissors, rouge and
powder-puffs, files and beauty patches.
He handled this collection, formerly bought to please a mistress who
swooned under the influence of certain aromatics and balms,--a
nervous, unbalanced woman who loved to steep the nipples of her
breasts in perfumes, but who never really experienced a delicious and
overwhelming ecstacy save when her head was scraped with a comb or
when she could inhale, amid caresses, the odor of perspiration, or the
plaster of unfinished houses on rainy days, or of dust splashed by
huge drops of rain during summer storms.
He mused over these memories, and one afternoon spent at Pantin
through idleness and curiosity, in company with this woman at the home
of one of her sisters, returned to him, stirring in him a forgotten
world of old ideas and perfumes; while the two women prattled and
displayed their gowns, he had drawn near the window and had seen,
through the dusty panes, the muddy street sprawling before him, and
had heard the repeated sounds of galoches over the puddles of the
pavement.
This scene, already far removed, came to him suddenly, strangely and
vividly. Pantin was there before him, animated and throbbing in this
greenish and dull mirror into which his unseeing eyes plunged. A
hallucination transported him far from Fontenay. Beside reflecting the
street, the mirror brought back thoughts it had once been instrumental
in evoking, and plunged in revery, he repeated to himself this
ingenious, sad and comforting composition he had formerly written upon
returning to Paris:
"Yes, the season of downpours is come. Now behold water-spouts
vomiting as they rush over the pavements, and rubbish marinates in
puddles that fill the holes scooped out of the macadam.
"Under a lowering sky, in the damp air, the walls of houses have black
perspiration and their air-holes are fetid; the loathsomeness of
existence increases and melancholy overwhelms one; the seeds of
vileness which each person harbors in his soul, sprout. The craving
for vile debaucheries seizes austere people and base desires grow
rampant in the brains of respectable men.
"And yet I warm myself, here before a cheerful fire. From a basket of
blossoming flowers comes the aroma of balsamic benzoin, geranium and
the whorl-flowered bent-grass which permeates the room. In the very
month of November, at Pantin, in the rue de Paris, springtime
persists. Here in my solitude I laugh at the fears of families which,
to shun the approaching cold weather, escape on every steamer to
Cannes and to other winter resorts.
"Inclement nature does nothing to contribute to this extraordinary
phenomenon. It must be said that his artificial season at Pantin is
the result of man's ingenuity.
"In fact, these flowers are made of taffeta and are mounted on wire.
The springtime odor filters through the window joints, exhaled from
the neighboring factories, from the perfumeries of Pinaud and Saint
James.
"For the workmen exhausted by the hard labors of the plants, for the
young employes who too often are fathers, the illusion of a little
healthy air is possible, thanks to these manufacturers.
"So, from this fabulous subterfuge of a country can an intelligent
cure arise. The consumptive men about town who are sent to the South
die, their end due to the change in their habits and to the nostalgia
for the Parisian excesses which destroyed them. Here, under an
artificial climate, libertine memories will reappear, the languishing
feminine emanations evaporated by the factories. Instead of the deadly
ennui of provincial life, the doctor can thus platonically substitute
for his patient the atmosphere of the Parisian women and of boudoirs.
Most often, all that is necessary to effect the cure is for the
subject to have a somewhat fertile imagination.
"Since, nowadays, nothing genuine exists, since the wine one drinks
and the liberty one boldly proclaims are laughable and a sham, since
it really needs a healthy dose of good will to believe that the
governing classes are respectable and that the lower classes are
worthy of being assisted or pitied, it seems to me," concluded Des
Esseintes, "to be neither ridiculous nor senseless, to ask of my
fellow men a quantity of illusion barely equivalent to what they spend
daily in idiotic ends, so as to be able to convince themselves that
the town of Pantin is an artificial Nice or a Menton.
"But all this does not prevent me from seeing," he said, forced by
weakness from his meditations, "that I must be careful to mistrust
these delicious and abominable practices which may ruin my
constitution." He sighed. "Well, well, more pleasures to moderate,
more precautions to be taken."
And he passed into his study, hoping the more easily to escape the
spell of these perfumes.
He opened the window wide, glad to be able to breath the air. But it
suddenly seemed to him that the breeze brought in a vague tide of
bergamot with which jasmine and rose water were blent. Agitated, he
asked himself whether he was not really under the yoke of one of those
possessions exercised in the Middle Ages. The odor changed and was
transformed, but it persisted. A faint scent of tincture of tolu, of
balm of Peru and of saffron, united by several drams of amber and
musk, now issued from the sleeping village and suddenly, the
metamorphosis was effected, those scattered elements were blent, and
once more the frangipane spread from the valley of Fontenay as far as
the fort, assailing his exhausted nostrils, once more shattering his
helpless nerves and throwing him into such a prostration that he fell
unconscious on the window sill.