EDGAR DE MEILHAN _to_ MADAME GUERIN,
Pont-de-l'Arche (Eure).
RICHEPORT, July 23d 18--.
Louise, I write to you, although the resolution that I have taken
should, no doubt, he silently carried out; but the swimmer struggling
with the waves in mid-ocean cannot help, although he knows it is
useless, uttering a last wild cry ere he sinks forever beneath the
flood. Perhaps a sail may appear on the desert horizon and his last
despairing shout be heard! It is so hard to believe ourselves finally
condemned and to renounce all hope of pardon! My letter will be of no
avail, and yet I cannot help sending it.
I am going to leave France, change worlds and skies. My passage is taken
for America. The murmur of ocean and forest must soothe my despair. A
great sorrow requires immensity. I would suffocate here. I should
expect, at every turn, to see your white dress gleaming among the trees.
Richeport is too much associated with you for me to dwell here longer;
your memory has exiled me from it for ever. I must put a huge
impossibility between myself and you; six thousand miles hardly suffice
to separate us.
If I remained, I should resort to all manner of mad schemes to recover
my happiness; no one gives up his cherished dream with more reluctance
than I, especially when a word could make it a reality.
Louise, Louise, why do you avoid me and close your heart against me! You
have not understood, perhaps, how much I love you? Has not my devotion
shone in my eyes? I have not been able, perhaps, to convey to you what I
felt? You have no more comprehended my adoration than the insensate idol
the prayers of the faithful prostrated before it.
Nevertheless, I was convinced that I could make you happy; I thought
that I appreciated the longings of your soul, and would be able to
satisfy them all.
What crime have I committed against heaven to be punished with this
biting despair? Perhaps I have failed to appreciate some sincere
affection, repulsed unwittingly some simple, tender heart that your
coldness now avenges; perhaps you are, unconsciously, the Nemesis of
some forgotten fault.
How fearful it is to suffer from rejected love! To say to oneself: "The
loved one exists, far from me, without me; she is young, smiling,
lovely--to others; my despair is only an annoyance to her, I am
necessary to her in nothing; my absence leaves no void in her life; my
death would only provoke from her an expression of careless pity; my
good and noble qualities have made no impression upon her; my verses,
the delight of other young hearts, she has never read; my talents are as
destructive to me as if they were crimes; why seek a hell in another
world; is it not here?"
And besides, what infinite tenderness, what perpetual care, what timid
and loving persistence, what obedience to every unexpressed wish, what
prompt realization of even the slightest fancy! for what! for a careless
glance, a smile that the thought of another brings to her lips! How can
it be helped! he who is not beloved is always in the wrong.
I go away, carrying the iron in my wound; I will not drag it out, I
prefer to die with it. May you live happy, may the fearful suffering
that you have caused me never be expiated. I would have it so; society
punishes murder of the body, heaven punishes murders of the soul. May
your hidden assassination escape Divine vengeance as long as possible.
Farewell, Louise, farewell.