The Story of the Abbé’s Life
“As you see me,” he said, “or rather as you do not see me, young,
slender, with ardent eyes and black hair, I was a teacher of liberal
arts at the College of Beauvais under Messrs Dugué, Guérin, Coffin
and Baffier. I had been ordained, and expected to make a big name in
letters. But a woman upset my hopes. Her name was Nicole Pigoreau and
she kept a bookseller’s shop at the _Golden Bible_ on the square near
the college. I went there frequently to thumb the books she received
from Holland and also those bipontic editions illustrated with notes,
comments and commentaries of great erudition. I was amiable and Mistress
Pigoreau became aware of it, which was my misfortune.
“She had been pretty, and still knew how to be pleasing. Her eyes spoke.
One day the Cicero, Livy, Plato and the Aristotle, Thucydides, Polybius
and Varro, the Epictetus, Seneca, Boethius and Cassiodorus, the Homer,
Æschylus. Sophocles, Euripides, Plautus and Terence, the Diodorus of
Sicily and Dionysius of Halicarnassus, St John Chrysostom and St Basil,
St Jerome and St Augustine, Erasmus, Saumaise, Turnebe and Scaliger, St
Thomas Aquinas, St Bonaventure, Bossuet dragging Ferri with him, Lenain,
Godefroy, Mézeray, Maimbourg, Fabricius, Father Lelong and Father Pitou,
all the poets, all the historians, all the fathers, all the doctors, all
the theologians, all the humanists, all the compilers, assembled high
and low on the walls, became witnesses to our kisses.
“‘I could not resist you,’ she said to me; ‘don’t conceive a bad opinion
of me.’
“She expressed her love for me in singular raptures. Once she made me
try on neck and wrist bands of fine lace, and finding them suit me
well she insisted on my accepting them. I did not want to. But on
her becoming irritated by my refusal, which she considered an offence
against love, I finally consented to accept them, afraid to offend her.
“My good fortune lasted till I was to be replaced by an officer. I
became spiteful over it, and in the ardour of avenging myself I informed
the College Regents that I did not go any longer to the _Golden Bible_,
for fear of seeing there expositions rather offensive to the modesty of
a young clerical. To say the truth, I had not to congratulate myself
on this contrivance. Madame Pigoreau, becoming aware of my sayings,
publicly accused me of having robbed her of a set of lace neck and wrist
bands. Her false complaint reached the ears of the College Regents,
who had my boxes searched; therein was found the garment, a matter of
considerable value. I was expelled from college and had, like Hippolyte
and Bellerophon, to put up with the wiles and wickedness of woman.
“Finding myself in the streets with my few rags and my copybooks, I ran
great risk of starving, when, dressed in my clerical suit, I recommended
myself to a Huguenot gentleman, who employed me as secretary and
dictated to me libels on our religion.”
“Ah!” exclaimed my father, “that was wrong of your reverence. An honest
man ought not to lend his hand to such abominations. And as far as I am
concerned, although ignorant, and of a working condition, I cannot bear
the smell of Colas’ cow.”
“You’re quite right, my host,” continued the priest. “It is the worst
point in my life. The very one I am most sorry for. But my man was a
Calvinist. He employed me to write against Lutherans and Socinians only;
these he could not stand at all, and, I assure you, he compelled me to
treat them worse than ever it was done at the Sorbonne.”
“Amen,” said my father. “Lambs graze together while wolves devour one
the other.”
The priest continued his narrative:
“Besides, I did not remain for long with that gentleman, who made more
fuss about the letters of Ulric von Hutten than of the harangues of
Demosthenes, and in whose house water was the only drink. Afterwards I
followed various callings, but all without success. I became a pedlar, a
strolling player, a monk, a valet, and at last, by resuming my clerical
garb, I became secretary to the Bishop of Séez and edited the catalogue
of the precious MSS. contained in his library. This catalogue consists
of two volumes in folio, which were placed in his gallery, bound in red
morocco, with his crest on and the edges gilded. I venture to say it was
a good work.
“It would have depended on myself alone to get old and grey in studies
and peace with the right reverend prelate, but I became enamoured of the
waiting-maid of the bailiff’s lady. Do not blame me severely. Dark she
was, buxom, vivacious, fresh. St Pacomus himself would have loved her.
One day she took a seat in the stage coach to travel to Paris in quest
of luck. I followed her. But I did not succeed as well as she did. On
her recommendation I entered the service of Mistress de Saint Ernest,
an opera dancer, who, aware of my talents, ordered me to write after
her dictation a lampoon on Mademoiselle Davilliers, against whom she
had some grievance. I was a pretty good secretary, and well deserved the
fifty crowns she had promised me. The book was printed at Amsterdam
by Marc-Michel Key, with an allegoric frontispiece, and Mademoiselle
Davilliers received the first copy of it just when she went on the stage
to sing the great aria of Armida.
“Anger made her voice hoarse and shaky. She sang false and was hooted.
Her song ended, she ran as she was, in powder and hoop petticoats, to
the Intendant of the Privy Purse, who could not refuse her anything.
She fell on her knees before him, shed abundant tears and shouted for
vengeance. And soon it became known that the blow was struck by Mistress
de Saint Ernest.
“Questioned, hard pressed, sharply threatened, she denounced me as the
author, and I was put into the Bastille, where I remained four years.
There I found some consolation in reading Boethius and Cassiodorus.
“Since then I have kept a public scrivener’s stall at the Cemetery of
the Saints Innocent, and lend to servant girls in love a pen, which
should rather have described the illustrious men of Rome and commented
on the writings of the holy fathers. I earn two farthings for every love
letter, and it is a trade by which I rather die than live. But I do not
forget that Epictetus was a slave and Pyrrho a gardener.
“Just now, unexpectedly, I have been paid a whole crown for an anonymous
letter. I have not had anything to eat for two days. Therefore I at once
looked out for a cook-shop. From outside in the street I perceived your
illuminated sign and the fire of your chimney throwing joyful flaming
lights on the windows. On your threshold I smelt delicious odours. I
came in, and now, my dear host, you have the history of my life.”
“I have become aware that it is the life of a good man,” said my father,
“and with the exception of Colas’ cow there is hardly anything to
complain of. Give me your hand! We are friends, what’s your name?”
“Jérôme Coignard, doctor of divinity, master of arts.”