A History of the French Novel. Volume 2. To the Close of the 19th Century

154

This remarkable person deserves at least a note here "for one thing that he did" – the novel of Fragoletta (1829), which many should know of– though they may not know it– from Mr. Swinburne's poem, and some perhaps from Balzac's own review. It is one of the followings of La Religieuse, and is a disappointing book, not from being too immoral nor from being not immoral enough, but because it does not "come off." There is a certain promise, suggestion, "atmosphere," but the actual characterisation is vague and obscure, and the story is told with no grasp. This habit of "flashing in the pan" is said to have been characteristic of all Latouche's work, which was fairly voluminous and of many different kinds, from journalism to poetry; and it may have been partly due to, partly the cause of, a cross-grained disposition. He had, however, a high repute for spoken if not written criticism, had a great influence as a trainer or mentor on George Sand, and perhaps not a little on Balzac himself. During the later years of his fairly long life he lived in retirement and produced nothing.

155

One of the friends who have read my proofs takes a more Alexandrian way with this objection and says "But there are." I do not know that I disagree with him: but as he does not disagree with what follows in itself, both answers shall stand.

156

Cf. Maupassant's just protest against this, to which we shall come.

157

An actual reduction of Balzac's books to smaller but still narrative scale is very seldom possible and would be still more rarely satisfactory. The best substitute for it is the already glanced at Répertoire of MM. Christophe and Cerfbeer, a curious but very satisfactory Biographical Dictionary of the Comedy's personae.

158

"Sans génie je suis flambé," as he wrote early to his sister.

159

This is about the best of the batch, and I agree with those who think that it would not have disfigured the Comédie. Indeed the exclusion of these juvenilia from the Édition Définitive was a critical blunder. Even if Balzac did once wish it, the "dead hand" is not to be too implicitly given way to, and he was so constantly changing his views that he probably would have altered this also had he lived.

160

A certain kind of commentator would probably argue from Mr. Browning's well-known words "fifty volumes long" that he had, and another that he had not read the Œuvres de Jeunesse.

161

He would not have liked the name "patriot" because of its corruption, but he was one.

162

Not a few things, some of them very good, came between – the pleasant Maison du Chat-qui-Pelote, several of the wonderful short stories, and the beginning of the Contes Drolatiques. But none of them had the "importance" – in the artistic sense of combined merit and scale – of the Peau.

163

I mean, of course, as far as books go. We have positive testimony that there was a live Becky, and I would I had known her!

164

Originally and perhaps preferably called La Rabouilleuse from the early occupation of its heroine, Flore Brazier, one of Balzac's most notable figures.

165

It is one of the strangest instances of the limitations of some of the best critics that M. Brunetière declined even to speak of this great book.

166

The immense influence of Maturin in France, and especially on Balzac, is an old story now, though it was not always so.

167

It is possible that some readers may miss a more extended survey, or at least sample, of these characters. But the plea made above as to abstract of the stories is valid here. There is simply not room to do justice to say, Lucien de Rubempré, who pervades a whole block of novels and stories, or to others from Rastignac to Corentin.

168

It has sometimes occurred to me that perhaps the skin was that of Job's onager.

169

He does try a sort of pseudo-poetical style sometimes; but it is seldom successful, and sometimes mere "fine-writing" of no very fine kind. The close of Peau de Chagrin and Séraphita contain about the best passages.

170

The two next paragraphs are, by the kind permission of the Editor and Publisher of the Quarterly Review, reprinted, with some slight alterations, from the article above referred to.

171

I have known this denied by persons of authority, who would exalt the gift of conversation even above the pure narrative faculty. I should admit the latter was commoner, but hardly that it was inferior.

172

I believe I may speak without rashness thus, for a copy of the sixteen-volume (was it not?) edition was a cherished possession of mine for years, and I even translated a certain amount for my own amusement – especially Die unsichtbare Loge.

173

I have said nothing here on a point of considerable interest to myself – the question whether Balzac can be said ever (or at least often) to have drawn a gentleman or a lady. It would require too much "justification" by analysis of particular characters. And this would pass into a more general enquiry whether these two species exist in the Balzacium Sidus itself. Which things open long vistas. (V. inf. on Charles de Bernard.)

174

It is attested by the well-known story, more excusable in a man than creditable to a gentleman, of her earliest or earliest known lover, Jules Sandeau (v. inf.), seeing a photograph of her in later days, turning to a companion and saying, "Et je l'ai connue belle!"

175

It is possible that some readers may not know the delightfully unexpected, and not improbably "more-expressive-than-volumes" third line —

"Not like the woman who lies under the next stone."

But tradition has, I believe, mercifully omitted to identify this neighbouring antipode.

176

Details of personal scandal seldom claim notice here. But it may be urged with some show of reason that this scandal is too closely connected with the substance and the spirit of the novelist's whole work, from Indiana to Flamarande, to permit total ignoring of it. Lucrezia Floriani, though perhaps more suggestive of Chopin than of Musset, but with "tangency" on both, will be discussed in the text. That most self-accusing of excuses, Elle et Lui, with its counterblast Paul de Musset's Lui et Elle, and a few remarks on Un Hiver à Majorque (conjoined for a purpose, which will be indicated) may be despatched in a note of some length.

Note on Elle et Lui, etc.,

The rival novel-plaidoyers on the subject of the loves and strifes of George Sand and Alfred de Musset are sufficiently disgusting, and if they be considered as novels, the evil effect of purpose – and particularly of personal purpose – receives from them texts for a whole series of sermons. Reading them with the experience of a lifetime, not merely in literary criticism, but (for large parts of that lifetime) in study of evidence on historical, political, and even directly legal matters, I cannot help coming to the conclusion that, though there is no doubt a certain amount of suggestio falsi in both, the suppressio veri is infinitely greater in Elle et Lui. If the letters given in Paul de Musset's book were not written by George Sand they were written by Diabolus. And there is one retort made towards the finale by "Édouard de Falconey" (Musset) to "William Caze" (George Sand) which stigmatises like the lash of a whip, if not even like a hot iron, the whole face of the lady's novels.

"Ma chère," lui dit-il, "vous parlez si souvent de chasteté que cela devient indécent. Votre amitié n'est pas plus 'sainte' que celle des autres." [If he had added "maternité" the stigma would have been completer still.] And there is also a startling verisimilitude in the reply assigned to her:

"Mon cher, trouvez bon que je console mes amis selon ma méthode. Vous voyez qu'elle leur plaît assez, puisqu'ils y reviennent."

It was true: they did so, rather to their own discredit and wholly to their discomfort. But she and her "method" must have pleased them enough for them to do it. It is not so pleasing a method for an outsider to contemplate. He sees too much of the game, and has none of the pleasure of playing or the occasional winnings. Since I read Hélisenne de Crenne (v. sup. Vol. I, pp. 150-1) there has seemed to me to be some likeness between the earlier stage of her heroine (if not of herself) and that of George Sand in her "friendships." They both display a good deal of mere sensuality, and both seem to me to have been quite ignorant of passion. Hélisenne did not reach the stage of "maternal" affection, and perhaps it was well for her lover and not entirely bad for her readers. But the best face that can be put on the "method" will be seen in Lucrezia Floriani.

and on Un Hiver à Majorque.

The bluntness of taste and the intense concentration on self, which were shown most disagreeably in Elle et Lui, appear on a different side in another book which is not a novel at all – not even a novel as far as masque and domino are concerned, – though indirectly it touches another of George Sand's curious personal experiences – that with Chopin. Un Hiver à Majorque is perhaps the most ill-tempered book of travel, except Smollett's too famous production, ever written by a novelist of talent or genius. The Majorcans certainly did not ask George Sand to visit them. They did not advertise the advantages of Majorca, as is the fashion with "health resorts" nowadays. She went there of her own accord; she found magnificent scenery; she flouted the sentiments of what she herself describes as the most priest-ridden country in Europe by never going to church, though and while she actually lived in a disestablished and disendowed monastery. To punish them for which (the non sequitur is intentional) she does little but talk of dirt, discomfort, bad food, extortion, foul-smelling oil and garlic, varying the talk only to foul-smelling oil and garlic, extortion, bad food, discomfort, or dirt. The book no doubt yields some of her finest passages of descriptive prose, both as regards landscape, and in the famous record of Chopin's playing; but otherwise it is hardly worth reading.

177

She survived into the next decade and worked till the last with no distinct declension, but she did not complete it, dying in 1876. Her famous direction about her grave, Laissez la verdure, is characteristic of her odd mixture if theatricality and true nature. But if any one wishes to come to her work with a comfortable preoccupation in favor of herself, he should begin with her Letters. Those of her old age especially are charming.

178

Cf. Mr. Alfred Lammle on his unpoetical justice to Mr. Fledgeby in Our Mutual Friend.

179

Valentine has an elder sister who has a son, irregularily existent, but is as much in love with Benedict as if she were a girl and he were a gentleman; and this son marries the much older Athenais, a lovely peasant girl who has been the unwilling fiancée and wife of the ingenious pitchforker. You have seldom to go far in George Sand for an unmarried lady with a child for chastity, and a widow who marries a boy for maternal affection.

180

There is also an Irish priest called Magnus, who, like everybody else, is deeply and (in the proper sense of sans espoir) desperately in love with Lélia. He is, on the whole, quite the maddest – and perhaps the most despicable – of the lot.

181

If any one says, "So, then, there are several 'most intolerables,'" let me point out that intolerableness is a more than "twy-peaked" hill or range. Julien Sorel and Marius were not designed to be gentlemen.

182

It is bad for Amélie, who, in a not unnatural revulsion from her fiancé's neglects and eccentricities, lets herself be fooled by the handsome Italian.

183

George Sand's treatment of the great Empress, Marie Antoinette's mother, is a curious mixture of half-reluctant admiration and Republican bad-bloodedness.

184

Porpora is included, but the amiable monarch, who has heard that the old maestro speaks freely of him, gives private orders that he shall be stopped at the frontier.

185

Cow's breath has, I believe, been prescribed in such cases by the faculty; hardly children's.

186

She does not make the delicate distinction once drawn by another of her sex: "I can tell you how many people I have kissed, but I cannot tell you how many have kissed me."

187

She is rather fond of taking her readers into confidence this way. I have no particular objection to it; but those who object to Thackeray's parabases ought to think this is a still more objectionable thing.

188

The Count Albani plays his difficult part of thirdsman very well throughout, though just at first he would make an advance on "auld lang syne" if Lucrezia would let him. But later he is on strict honour, and quarrels with the Prince for his tyranny.

189

It is very pleasing to see, as I have seen, this famous phrase quoted as if it had reference to the joys of Arcadia.

190

If any among my congregation be offended by apparent flippancy in this notice of a book which, to my profound astonishment, some people have taken as the author's masterpiece, I apologise. But if I spoke more seriously I should also speak more severely.

191

He is a frantic devotee of the Astrée, and George Sand brings in a good deal about the most agreeable book, without, however, showing very intimate or accurate knowledge of it.

192

The Spaniard (rather his servant with his connivance) has murdered and robbed Bois-Doré's brother.

193

He is also very handsome, and so makes up for the plurality of the title.

194

Alvimar lies dying for hours with the infidel Bohemians and roistering Protestant reîtres not only disturbing his death-bed, but interfering with the "consolation of religion"; the worst of the said Bohemians is buried alive (or rather stifled after he has been half-buried alive) by the little gipsy girl, Pilar, whom he has tormented; and Pilar herself is burnt alive on the last page but one, after she has poisoned Bellinde.

195

Taking her work on the whole. The earlier part of it ran even Trollope hard.

196

Her points of likeness to her self-naming name-child, "George Eliot," are too obvious to need discussion. But it is a question whether the main points of unlikeness – the facility and extreme fecundity of the French George, as contrasted with the laborious book-bearing of the English – are not more important than the numerous but superficial and to a large extent non-literary resemblances.

197

I have said little or nothing of the short stories. They are fairly numerous, but I do not think that her forte lay in them.

198

Some years after its original appearance Mr. Andrew Lang, in collaboration with another friend of mine, who adopted the nom de guerre of "Paul Sylvester," published a complete translation under the title of The Dead Leman; and I believe that the late Mr. Lafacido Hearn more recently executed another. But this last I have never seen. (The new pages which follow to 222, it may not be superfluous to repeat, appeared originally in the Fortnightly Review for 1878, and were reprinted in Essays on French Novelists, London, 1891. The Essay itself contains, of course, a wider criticism of Gautier's work than would be proper here.)

199

For, as a rule, the critical faculty is like wine – it steadily improves with age. But of course anybody is at liberty to say, "Only, in both cases, when it is good to begin with."

200

I suppose this was what attracted Mr. Hearn; but, as I have said, I do not know his book itself.

201

I do not know how many of the users of the catchword "purely decorative," as applied to Moore, knew what they meant by it; but if they meant what I have just said, I have no quarrel with them.

202

Yet even inside poetry not so very much before 1830.

203

Of course I know what a dangerous word this is; how often people who have not a glimmering of it themselves deny it to others; and how it is sometimes seen in mere horseplay, often confounded with "wit" itself, and generally "taken in vain." But one must sometimes be content with φωνηεντα or φωναντα (the choice is open, but I prefer the latter) συνετοισι, and take the consequences of them with the ασυνετοι.

204

Some would allow it to Plautus, but I doubt; and even Martial did not draw as much of it from Spanish soil as must have been latent there – unless the Goths absolutely imported it. Perhaps the nearest approach in him is the sudden turn when the obliging Phyllis, just as he is meditating with what choice and costly gifts he shall reward her varied kindnesses, anticipates him by modestly asking, with the sweetest preliminary blandishments, for a jar of wine (xii. 65).

205

La Fontaine may be desiderated. His is certainly one of the most humouresque of wits; but whether he has pure humour I am not sure.

206

This is an exception to the rule of tout passe, if not of tout casse. You can still buy avanturine wax; only, like all waxes, except red and black, it seals very badly, and makes "kisses" in a most untidy fashion. Avanturine should be left to the original stone – to peat-water running over pebbles with the sun on it – and to eyes.

207

I once knew an incident which might have figured in these scenes, and which would, I think, have pleased Théo. But it happened just after his own death, in the dawn of the aesthetic movement. A man, whom we may call A, visited a friend, say B, who was doing his utmost to be in the mode. A had for some time been away from the centre; and B showed him, in hopes to impress, the blue china the Japanese mats and fans, the rush-bottomed chairs, the Morris paper and curtains, the peacock feathers, etc. But A looked coldly on them and said, "Where is your brass tray?" And B was saddened and could only plead, "It is coming directly; but you know too much."

208

They are both connected with the "orgie" – mania, and the last is a deliberate burlesque of the originals of P. L. Jacob, Janin, Eugène Sue, and Balzac himself.

209

It is here that the famous return of a kiss revu, corrigé et considérablement augmenté is recorded.

210

He (it is some excuse for him that this suggested a better thing in certain New Arabian Nights) buys, furnishes, and subsequently deserts an empty house to give a ball in, and put his friends on no scent of his own abode; but he makes this "own abode" a sort of Crystal Palace in the centre of a whole ring-fence of streets, with the old fronts of the houses kept to avert suspicion of the Seraglio of Eastern beauties, the menagerie and beast fights, and the slaves whom (it is rather suggested than definitely stated) he occasionally murders. He performs circus-rider feats when he meets a lady (or at least a woman) in the Bois de Boulogne; he sets her house on fire when it occurs to him that she has received other lovers there; and we are given to understand that he blows up his own palace when he returns to the East. In fact, he is a pure anticipated cognition of a Ouidesque super-hero as parodied by Sir Francis Burnand (and independently by divers schoolboys and undergraduates) some fifty years ago.

211

I have seen an admirable criticism of this "thing" in one word, "Cold!"

212

On the cayenne-and-claret principle which Haydon (one hopes libellously, in point of degree) attributed to Keats. (It was probably a devilled-biscuit, and so quite allowable.)

213

"Théo" has no repute as a psychologist; but I have known such repute attained by far less subtle touches than this.

214

For more on them, with a pretty full abstract of Le Capitaine Fracasse, see the Essay more than once mentioned.

215

V. sup. Vol. I. p. 279-286. Of course the duplication, as literature, is positively interesting and welcome.

216

I – some fifty years since – knew a man who, with even greater juvenility, put pretty much the same doctrine in a Fellowship Essay. He did not obtain that Fellowship.

217

It might possibly have been shortened with advantage in concentration of effect. But the story (pleasantly invented, if not true) of Gautier's mother locking him up in his room that he might not neglect his work (of the nature of which she was blissfully ignorant) nearly excuses him. A prisoner will naturally be copious rather than terse.

218

It may amuse some readers to know that I saw the rather famous lithograph (of a lady and gentleman kissing each other at full speed on horseback), which owes its subject to the book, in no more romantic a place that a very small public-house in "Scarlet town," to which I had gone, not to quench my thirst or for any other licentious purpose, but to make an appointment with – a chimney-sweep.

219

Some might even say he had too much.

220

For reference to previous dealings of mine with Mérimée see Preface.

221

It is sad, but necessary, to include M. Brunetière among the latter class.

222

He was never a professor, but was an inspector; and, though I may be biassed, I think the inspector is usually the more "donnish" animal of the two.

223

And perhaps in actual life, if not in literature, I should prefer a young woman who might possibly have me murdered if she discovered a blood-feud between my ancestors and hers, to one in whose company it would certainly be necessary to keep a very sharp look-out on my watch. The two risks are not equally "the game."

224

Many a reader, I hope, has been reminded, by one or the other, or both, of the Anatomy of Melancholy, which also contains the story: and has gone to it with the usual consequence of reading nothing else for some time.

225

"Mérimée était gentilhomme: Sainte-Beuve ne l'était pas." I forget who said this, but it was certainly said, and I think it was true.