“Because you are right and he is right; you are wrong and he is wrong. But he believes what he says.”
To him, truth was of no importance—the question was belief—and this seems to me to be the secret of his whole philosophy.
There is a corner in Paris where Arthur Cosslet Smith says, if you sit there long enough, you will meet everyone of importance of your day—the corner of the Café de la Paix. Here one day I was sitting, having an apéritif before lunch; at a table in the corner was gathered a group of jeunesses dorées and a little farther back I noticed Barbey d’Aurevilly. The young men began to discuss literature with that cocksureness that is the quality of youth the world over. Victor Hugo was still alive, and it was the fashion to “knock” him, which they proceeded to do, outrageously. Finally, one said, so the whole café could hear:
“Oh, your Victor Hugo, he is stupid.”
At that I felt a figure rise behind me and come forward; then I saw this wonderful vision. About seventy, handsome, tall, dressed with the most exquisite care, lace at his sleeves and neck; D’Aurevilly was a count and noted duelist and distinctly of the old school. Looking as if he had stepped straight out of a book of Dumas’, he walked up to the young men. Instantly, their conversation was hushed. He did not present himself, but said:
“My young friends, I also care for literature; and that is my excuse for speaking to you. I heard your talk of Victor Hugo and I came to tell you that I agree with you in your estimate of him. Alas! he is stupid—stupid as the Himalayas!” (“Il est bête——bête comme les Himalays!”)
We are fond of saying that things are not the same as they were when we were young, but I fear we are wrong. The change is in ourselves. When I went back to Paris in 18—— I visited some of the old familiar haunts. One was the little café, where I used to breakfast every morning when a student. Everything looked the same—the dingy walls, dirty floor, but spotless tables—as the French tables always are; the waiters calling out the orders for their well-known patrons as soon as they showed their faces in the doorway; the poor, half-starved grisettes eating their sou’s worth of bread—I could hardly believe I had been away for so many years.
But why did the food taste so strange? The croissons were soggy, and the coffee, with its abominable taste of chicory—bah! Was it possible I could once have lived on this fare and actually liked it? I could not even call back one old thrill.
After such a disappointment, I was almost afraid to visit Julian’s, but with rather a sinking heart I turned into the Passage de Panorama, around the corner to the galerie, up the still dirty stairway, and opened the door. Instantly I was greeted with French oaths and comments, and I found myself running a barricade of paint tubes and what seemed to me all the furniture in the room, hurled at my head. I stopped and swore in every language I knew, crying:
“If anyone here is as old an ancien as I, I’ll kneel to him, but if not, get down on your knees, the whole crowd of you!”