Book: The Parisians, Book 6.

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Produced by David Widger

THE PARISIANS

By Edward Bulwer-Lytton

BOOK VI.

CHAPTER I.

A few weeks after the date of the preceding chapter, a gay party of men
were assembled at supper in one of the private salons of the Maison
Doree. The supper was given by Frederic Lemercier, and the guests were,
though in various ways, more or less distinguished. Rank and fashion
were not unworthily represented by Alain de Rochebriant and Enguerrand de
Vandemar, by whose supremacy as "lion" Frederic still felt rather
humbled, though Alain had contrived to bring them familiarly together.
Art, Literature, and the Bourse had also their representatives in Henri
Bernard, a rising young portrait-painter, whom the Emperor honoured with
his patronage, the Vicomte de Braze, and M. Savarin. Science was not
altogether forgotten, but contributed its agreeable delegate in the
person of the eminent physician to whom we have been before introduced,
--Dr. Bacourt. Doctors in Paris are not so serious as they mostly are in
London; and Bacourt, a pleasant philosopher of the school of Aristippus,
was no unfrequent nor ungenial guest at any banquet in which the Graces
relaxed their zones. Martial glory was also represented at that social
gathering by a warrior, bronzed and decorated, lately arrived from
Algiers, on which arid soil he had achieved many laurels and the rank of
Colonel. Finance contributed Duplessis. Well it might; for Duplessis
had just assisted the host to a splendid coup at the Bourse.

"Ah, _cher_ Monsieur Savarin," says Enguerrand de Vandemar, whose
patrician blood is so pure from revolutionary taint that he is always
instinctively polite, "what a masterpiece in its way is that little paper
of yours in the 'Sens Commun,' upon the connection between the national
character and the national diet! so genuinely witty!--for wit is but
truth made amusing."

"You flatter me," replied Savarin, modestly; "but I own I do think there
is a smattering of philosophy in that trifle. Perhaps, however, the
character of a people depends more on its drinks than its food. The
wines of Italy, heady, irritable, ruinous to the digestion, contribute to
the character which belongs to active brains and disordered livers. The
Italians conceive great plans, but they cannot digest them. The English
common-people drink beer, and the beerish character is stolid, rude, but
stubborn and enduring. The English middle-class imbibe port and sherry;
and with these strong potations their ideas become obfuscated. Their
character has no liveliness; amusement is not one of their wants; they
sit at home after dinner and doze away the fumes of their beverage in the
dulness of domesticity. If the English aristocracy are more vivacious
and cosmopolitan, it is thanks to the wines of France, which it is the
mode with them to prefer; but still, like all plagiarists, they are
imitators, not inventors; they borrow our wines and copy our manners.
The Germans--"

"Insolent barbarians!" growled the French Colonel, twirling his mustache;
"if the Emperor were not in his dotage, their Sadowa would ere this have
cost them their Rhine."

"The Germans," resumed Savarin, unheeding the interruption, "drink acrid
wines, varied with beer, to which last their commonalty owes a quasi
resemblance in stupidity and endurance to the English masses. Acrid
wines rot the teeth Germans are afflicted with toothache from infancy.
All people subject to toothache are sentimental. Goethe was a martyr
to toothache. 'Werther' was written in one of those paroxysms which
predispose genius to suicide. But the German character is not all
toothache; beer and tobacco step in to the relief of Rhenish acridities,
blend philosophy with sentiment, and give that patience in detail which
distinguishes their professors and their generals. Besides, the German
wines in themselves have other qualities than that of acridity. Taken
with sourkrout and stewed prunes, they produce fumes of self-conceit.
A German has little of French vanity; he has German self-esteem. He
extends the esteem of self to those around him; his home, his village,
his city, his country,--all belong to him. It is a duty he owes to
himself to defend them. Give him his pipe and his sabre, and, Monsieur
le Colonel, believe me, you will never take the Rhine from him."

"P-r-r," cried the Colonel; "but we have had the Rhine."

"We did not keep it. And I should not say I had a francpiece if I
borrowed it from your purse and had to give it back the next day."

Here there arose a very general hubbub of voices, all raised against M.
Savarin. Enguerrand, like a man of good ton, hastened to change the
conversation.

"Let us leave these poor wretches to their sour wines and toothaches. We
drinkers of the champagne, all our own, have only pity for the rest of
the human race. This new journal 'Le Sens Commun' has a strange title,
Monsieur Savarin."

"Yes; 'Le Sens Commun' is not common in Paris, where we all have too much
genius for a thing so vulgar."

"Pray," said the young painter, "tell me what you mean by the title 'Le
Sens Commun.' It is mysterious."

"True," said Savarin; "it may mean the _Sensus communis_ of the Latins,
or the Good Sense of the English. The Latin phrase signifies the sense
of the common interest; the English phrase, the sense which persons of
understanding have in common. I suppose the inventor of our title meant
the latter signification."

"And who was the inventor?" asked Bacourt.

"That is a secret which I do not know myself," answered Savarin.

"I guess," said Enguerrand, "that it must be the same person who writes
the political leaders. They are most remarkable; for they are so unlike
the articles in other journals, whether those journals be the best or the
worst. For my own part, I trouble my head very little about politics,
and shrug my shoulders at essays which reduce the government of flesh and
blood into mathematical problems. But these articles seem to be written
by a man of the world, and as a man of the world myself, I read them."

"But," said the Vicomte de Breze, who piqued himself on the polish of his
style, "they are certainly not the composition of any eminent writer. No
eloquence, no sentiment; though I ought not to speak disparagingly of a
fellow-contributor."

"All that may be very true;" said Savarin; "but M. Enguerrand is right.
The papers are evidently the work of a man of the world, and it is for
that reason that they have startled the public, and established the
success of 'Le Sens Commun.' But wait a week or two longer, Messieurs,
and then tell me what you think of a new _roman_ by a new writer, which
we shall announce in our impression to-morrow. I shall be disappointed,
indeed, if that does not charm you. No lack of eloquence and sentiment
there."

"I am rather tired of eloquence and sentiment," said Enguerrand. "Your
editor, Gustave Rameau, sickens me of them with his 'Starlit Meditations
in the Streets of Paris,' morbid imitations of Heine's enigmatical
'Evening Songs.' Your journal would be perfect if you could suppress the
editor."

"Suppress Gustave Rameau!" cried Bernard, the painter; "I adore his
poems, full of heart for poor suffering humanity."

"Suffering humanity so far as it is packed up in himself," said the
physician, dryly,--"and a great deal of the suffering is bile. But
_a propos_ of your new journal, Savarin, there is a paragraph in it
to-day which excites my curiosity. It says that the Vicomte de Mauleon
has arrived in Paris, after many years of foreign travel; and then,
referring modestly enough to the reputation for talent which he had
acquired in early youth, proceeds to indulge in a prophecy of the future
political career of a man who, if he have a grain of _sens common_, must
think that the less said about him the better. I remember him well; a
terrible _mauvais sujet_, but superbly handsome. There was a shocking
story about the jewels of a foreign duchess, which obliged him to leave
Paris."

"But," said Savarin, "the paragraph you refer to hints that that story is
a groundless calumny, and that the true reason for De Mauleon's voluntary
self-exile was a very common one among young Parisians,--he had lavished
away his fortune. He returns, when, either by heritage or his own
exertions, he has secured elsewhere a competence."

"Nevertheless I cannot think that society will receive him," said
Bacourt. "When he left Paris, there was one joyous sigh of relief among
all men who wished to avoid duels, and keep their wives out of
temptation. Society may welcome back a lost sheep, but not a
reinvigorated wolf."

"I beg your pardon, _mon cher_," said Enguerrand; "society has already
opened its fold to this poor ill-treated wolf. Two days ago Louvier
summoned to his house the surviving relations or connections of De
Mauleon--among whom are the Marquis de Rochebriant, the Counts de Passy,
De Beauvilliers, De Chavigny, my father, and of course his two sons--and
submitted to us the proofs which completely clear the Vicomte de Mauleon
of even a suspicion of fraud or dishonour in the affair of the jewels.
The proofs include the written attestation of the Duke himself, and
letters from that nobleman after De Mauleon's disappearance from Paris,
expressive of great esteem, and indeed, of great admiration, for the
Vicomte's sense of honour and generosity of character. The result of
this family council was that we all went in a body to call on De Mauleon;
and he dined with my father that same day. You know enough of the Comte
de Vandemar, and, I may add, of my mother, to be sure that they are both,
in their several ways, too regardful of social conventions to lend their
countenance even to a relation without well weighing the pros and cons.
And as for Raoul, Bayard himself could not be a greater stickler on the
point of honour."

This declaration was followed by a silence that had the character of
stupor.

At last Duplessis said, "But what has Louvier to do in this galere?
Louvier is no relation of that well-born _vaurien_; why should he summon
your family council?"

"Louvier excused his interference on the ground of early and intimate
friendship with De Mauleon, who, he said, came to consult him on arriving
at Paris, and who felt too proud or too timid to address relations with
whom he had long dropped all intercourse. An intermediary was required,
and Louvier volunteered to take that part on himself; nothing more
natural nor more simple. By the way, Alain, you dine with Louvier
to-morrow, do you not?--a dinner in honour of our rehabilitated kinsman.
I and Raoul go."

"Yes, I shall be charmed to meet again a man who, whatever might be his
errors in youth, on which," added Alain, slightly colouring, "it
certainly does not become me to be severe, must have suffered the most
poignant anguish a man of honour can undergo,--namely, honour suspected;
and who now, whether by years or sorrow, is so changed that I cannot
recognize a likeness to the character I have just heard given to him as
_mauvais sujet_ and _vaurien_."

"Bravo!" cried Enguerrand; "all honour to courage!--and at Paris it
requires great courage to defend the absent."

"Nay," answered Alain, in a low voice. "The _gentilhomme_ who will not
defend another _gentilhomme_ traduced, would, as a soldier, betray a
citadel and desert a flag."

"You say M. de Mauleon is changed," said De Breze; "yes, he must be
growing old. No trace left of his good looks?"

"Pardon me," said Enguerrand; "he is _bien conserve_, and has still a
very handsome head and an imposing presence. But one cannot help
doubting whether he deserved the formidable reputation he acquired in
youth; his manner is so singularly mild and gentle, his conversation so
winningly modest, so void of pretence, and his mode of life is as simple
as that of a Spanish hidalgo."

"He does not, then, affect the role of Monte Cristo," said Duplessis,
"and buy himself into notice like that hero of romance?"

"Certainly not: he says very frankly that he has but a very small income,
but more than enough for his wants,--richer than in his youth, for he has
learned content. We may dismiss the hint in 'Le Sens Commun' about his
future political career,--at least he evinces no such ambition."

"How could he as a Legitimist?" said Alain, bitterly. "What department
would elect him?"

"But is he a Legitimist?" asked De Breze.

"I take it for granted that he must be that," answered Alain, haughtily,
"for he is a De Mauleon."

"His father was as good a De Mauleon as himself, I presume," rejoined De
Breze, dryly; "and he enjoyed a place at the Court of Louis Philippe,
which a Legitimist could scarcely accept. Victor did not, I fancy,
trouble his head about politics at all, at the time I remember him; but
to judge by his chief associates, and the notice he received from the
Princes of the House of Orleans, I should guess that he had no
predilections in favour of Henri V."

"I should regret to think so," said Alain, yet more haughtily, "since the
De Mauleons acknowledge the head of their house in the representative of
the Rochebriants."

"At all events," said Duplessis, "M. de Mauleon appears to be a
philosopher of rare stamp. A Parisian who has known riches and is
contented to be poor is a phenomenon I should like to study."

"You have that chance to-morrow evening, Monsieur Duplessis," said
Enguerrand.

"What! at M. Louvier's dinner? Nay, I have no other acquaintance with
M. Louvier than that of the Bourse, and the acquaintance is not cordial."

"I did not mean at M. Louvier's dinner, but at the Duchesse de Tarascon's
ball. You, as one of her special favourites, will doubtless honour her
_reunion_."

"Yes; I have promised my daughter to go to the ball. But the Duchesse is
Imperialist. M. de Mauleon seems to be either a Legitimist, according to
Monsieur le Marquis, or an Orleanist, according to our friend De Breze."

"What of that? Can there be a more loyal Bourbonite than De
Rochebriant?--and he goes to the ball. It is given out of the season,
in celebration of a family marriage. And the Duchesse de Tarascon is
connected with Alain, and therefore with De Mauleon, though but
distantly."

"Ah! excuse my ignorance of genealogy."

"As if the genealogy of noble names were not the history of France,"
muttered Alain, indignantly.

CHAPTER II.

Yes, the "Sens Commun" was a success: it had made a sensation at
starting; the sensation was on the increase. It is difficult for an
Englishman to comprehend the full influence of a successful journal at
Paris; the station--political, literary, social--which it confers on the
contributors who effect the success. M. Lebeau had shown much more
sagacity in selecting Gustave Rameau for the nominal editor than Savarin
supposed or my reader might detect. In the first place, Gustave himself,
with all his defects of information and solidity of intellect, was not
without real genius,--and a sort of genius that when kept in restraint,
and its field confined to sentiment or sarcasm, was in unison with the
temper of the day; in the second place, it was only through Gustave that
Lebeau could have got at Savarin, and the names which that brilliant
writer had secured at the outset would have sufficed to draw attention to
the earliest numbers of the "Sens Commun," despite a title which did not
seem alluring. But these names alone could not have sufficed to
circulate the new journal to the extent it had already reached. This was
due to the curiosity excited by leading articles of a style new to the
Parisian public, and of which the authorship defied conjecture. They
were signed Pierre Firmin,--supposed to be a _nom de plume_, as, that
name was utterly unknown in the world of letters. They affected the tone
of an impartial observer; they neither espoused nor attacked any
particular party; they laid down no abstract doctrines of government.
But somehow or other, in language terse yet familiar, sometimes careless
yet never vulgar, they expressed a prevailing sentiment of uneasy
discontent, a foreboding of some destined change in things established,
without defining the nature of such change, without saying whether it
would be for good or for evil. In his criticisms upon individuals, the
writer was guarded and moderate--the keenest-eyed censor of the press
could not have found a pretext for interference with expression of
opinions so polite. Of the Emperor these articles spoke little, but that
little was not disrespectful; yet, day after day, the articles
contributed to sap the Empire. All malcontents of every shade
comprehended, as by a secret of freemasonry, that in this journal they
had an ally. Against religion not a word was uttered, yet the enemies of
religion bought that journal; still, the friends of religion bought it
too, for those articles treated with irony the philosophers on paper who
thought that their contradictory crotchets could fuse themselves into any
single Utopia, or that any social edifice, hurriedly run up by the crazy
few, could become a permanent habitation for the turbulent many, without
the clamps of a creed.

The tone of these articles always corresponded with the title of the
journal,--"Common-sense." It was to common-sense that it appealed,--
appealed in the utterance of a man who disdained the subtle theories,
the vehement declamation, the credulous beliefs, or the inflated bombast,
which constitute so large a portion of the Parisian press. The articles
rather resembled certain organs of the English press, which profess to be
blinded by no enthusiasm for anybody or anything, which find their sale
in that sympathy with ill-nature to which Huet ascribes the popularity of
Tacitus, and, always quietly undermining institutions with a covert
sneer, never pretend to a spirit of imagination so at variance with
common-sense as a conjecture how the institutions should be rebuilt or
replaced.

Well, somehow or other the journal, as I was saying, hit the taste of the
Parisian public. It intimated, with the easy grace of an unpremeditated
agreeable talker, that French society in all its classes was rotten; and
each class was willing to believe that all the others were rotten, and
agreed that unless the others were reformed, there was something very
unsound in itself.

The ball at the Duchesse de Tarascon's was a brilliant event. The summer
was far advanced; many of the Parisian holiday-makers had returned to the
capital, but the season had not commenced, and a ball at that time of
year was a very unwonted event. But there was a special occasion for
this fete,--a marriage between a niece of the Duchesse and the son of a
great official in high favour at the Imperial Court.

The dinner at Louvier's broke up early, and the music for the second
waltz was sounding when Enguerrand, Alain, and the Vicomte de Mauleon
ascended the stairs. Raoul did not accompany them; he went very rarely
to any balls,--never to one given by an Imperialist, however nearly
related to him the Imperialist might be. But in the sweet indulgence of
his good-nature, he had no blame for those who did go,--not for
Enguerrand, still less, of course, for Alain.

Something too might well here be said as to his feeling towards Victor de
Mauleon. He had joined in the family acquittal of that kinsman as to the
grave charge of the jewels; the proofs of innocence thereon seemed to him
unequivocal and decisive, therefore he had called on the Vicomte and
acquiesced in all formal civilities shown to him. But such acts of
justice to a fellow-gentilhomme and a kinsman duly performed, he desired
to see as little as possible of the Vicomte de Mauleon. He reasoned
thus: "Of every charge which society made against this man he is
guiltless; but of all the claims to admiration which society accorded to
him before it erroneously condemned, there are none which make me covet
his friendship, or suffice to dispel doubts as to what he may be when
society once more receives him. And the man is so captivating that I
should dread his influence over myself did I see much of him."

Raoul kept his reasonings to himself, for he had that sort of charity
which indisposes an amiable man to be severe on bygone offences. In the
eyes of Enguerrand and Alain, and such young votaries of the mode as they
could influence, Victor de Mauleon assumed almost heroic proportions. In
the affair which had inflicted on him a calumny so odious, it was clear
that he had acted with chivalrous delicacy of honour. And the turbulence
and recklessness of his earlier years, redeemed as they were, in the
traditions of his contemporaries, by courage and generosity, were not
offences to which young Frenchmen are inclined to be harsh. All question
as to the mode in which his life might have been passed during his long
absence from the capital was merged in the respect due to the only facts
known, and these were clearly proved in his pieces justificatives: First,
that he had served under another name in the ranks of the army in
Algiers; had distinguished himself there for signal valour, and received,
with promotion, the decoration of the cross. His real name was known
only to his colonel, and on quitting the service, the colonel placed in
his hands a letter of warm eulogy on his conduct, and identifying him as
Victor de Mauleon. Secondly, that in California he had saved a wealthy
family from midnight murder, fighting single-handed against and
overmastering three ruffians, and declining all other reward from those
he had preserved than a written attestation of their gratitude. In all
countries, valour ranks high in the list of virtues; in no country does
it so absolve from vices as it does in France.

But as yet Victor de Mauleon's vindication was only known by a few, and
those belonging to the gayer circles of life. How he might be judged by
the sober middle class, which constitutes the most important section of
public opinion to a candidate for political trusts and distinctions, was
another question.

The Duchesse stood at the door to receive her visitors. Duplessis was
seated near the entrance, by the side of a distinguished member of the
Imperial Government, with whom he was carrying on a whispered
conversation. The eye of the financier, however, turned towards the
doorway as Alain and Enguerrand entered, and passing over their familiar
faces, fixed itself attentively on that of a mach older man whom
Enguerrand was presenting to the Duchesse, and in whom Duplessis rightly
divined the Vicomte de Mauleon. Certainly if no one could have
recognized M. Lebeau in the stately personage who had visited Louvier,
still less could one who had heard of the wild feats of the _roi des
viveurs_ in his youth reconcile belief in such tales with the quiet
modesty of mien which distinguished the cavalier now replying, with
bended head and subdued accents, to the courteous welcome of the
brilliant hostess. But for such difference in attributes between the
past and the present De Mauleon, Duplessis had been prepared by the
conversation at the Maison Doree. And now, as the Vicomte, yielding his
place by the Duchesse to some new-comer, glided on, and, leaning against
a column, contemplated the gay scene before him with that expression of
countenance, half sarcastic, half mournful, with which men regard, after
long estrangement, the scenes of departed joys, Duplessis felt that no
change in that man had impaired the force of character which had made him
the hero of reckless coevals. Though wearing no beard, not even a
mustache, there was something emphatically masculine in the contour of
the close-shaven cheek and resolute jaw; in a forehead broad at the
temples, and protuberant in those organs over the eyebrows which are said
to be significant of quick perception and ready action; in the lips, when
in repose compressed, perhaps somewhat stern in their expression, but
pliant and mobile when speaking, and wonderfully fascinating when they
smiled. Altogether, about this Victor de Mauleon there was a nameless
distinction, apart from that of conventional elegance. You would have
said, "That is a man of some marked individuality, an eminence of some
kind in himself." You would not be surprised to hear that he was a
party-leader, a skilled diplomatist, a daring soldier, an adventurous
traveller; but you would not guess him to be a student, an author, an
artist.

While Duplessis thus observed the Vicomte de Mauleon, all the while
seeming to lend an attentive ear to the whispered voice of the Minister
by his side, Alain passed on into the ball-room. He was fresh enough to
feel the exhilaration of the dance. Enguerrand (who had survived that
excitement, and who habitually deserted any assembly at an early hour for
the cigar and whist of his club) had made his way to De Mauleon, and
there stationed himself. The lion of one generation has always a mixed
feeling of curiosity and respect for the lion of a generation before him,
and the young Vandemar had conceived a strong and almost an affectionate
interest in this discrowned king of that realm in fashion which, once
lost, is never to be regained; for it is only Youth that can hold its
sceptre and command its subjects.

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