At length I began to see the villages growing nearer and nearer together; separate houses highly ornamented and decorated, yet not large enough to dignify themselves with the name of châteaux; troops of people seemingly returning from some great city to their homes in the country; strings of carts and horses; and, in short, everything announcing the proximity of a metropolis; while at the same time the sound of a multitude of bells came borne upon the wind towards me, telling me that I arrived at some moment of great public rejoicing. I will not stop to inquire why that sound fell so heavily upon my heart; but so it did, and all the increasing gaiety I met as I began to enter into the suburbs but rendered me the more melancholy.
It was by this time beginning to grow dusk, and directing my horse towards the Quartier St. Eustache, I alighted at a small auberge which our landlord at Marseilles had recommended as the best in Paris. Having taken off my baggage with my own hands, and paid my postilion, I looked about in the little courtyard for some one to show me an apartment. It was long, however, before I could find any one; and even at last, the only person I could meet with was an old woman, the great-grandmother of mine host, I believe, who told me that all the world were out at the fête, and that I might sit down in the salle-à-manger if I liked, till they came back.
This seemed but poor entertainment for the best auberge in Paris; but I was forced to content myself with what I found, for it was too late to seek another lodging, even had I not appointed Achilles to meet me there. Nor, indeed, was my companion, the old woman, very entertaining; for she was so deaf that she heard not one word I said, and merely replied to all my inquiries, on whatever subject they were made, by informing me that every one was at the fête, repeating the precise words she made use of before.
Thus passed the time for an hour; but then the face of affairs altered. The host--a jolly aubergiste as ever roasted a capon--rushed in, in his best attire, followed by his wife and his sister, and his sister's husband, all half inebriated with good spirits; and I was soon at my desire shown to an apartment, which, though small, was sufficiently clean; and having been told that supper would be ready at the table d'hôte in an hour, I waited, while the various odours rising up from the kitchen to my window seemed sent on purpose to inform me, step by step, of the progress of the meal.
Alone--in Paris--unknown to a soul--with a vacant hour lying open before me--it was impossible any longer to avoid that unkind friend, thought. For a moment or two, I walked up and down the little chamber, whose antique furniture--the precise allotted portion which a traveller could not do without--called to my mind the old but splendid garnishing of my apartments at the Château de l'Orme.
Where--I asked myself--where were all the familiar objects that habit had rendered dear to my eye?--where all the little trifles, round which memory lingers, even after time has torn her away from things of greater import?--where were the grand mountains whose vast masses would even now have been stretching dark and sublime across the twilight sky before my windows?--where the free breeze that wafted health with every blast?--where were the eyes whose glance was sunshine, and the voices whose tones were music, and the hearts whose happiness had centred in me alone? What had I instead? A petty chamber, in a petty inn--the rank close atmosphere of a swarming city, and the eternal clang of scolding, lying, blaspheming tongues, rising up with a din that would have deafened a Cyclop--while misery, and vice, and want, and sorrow, cabal, and treason, and treachery, and crime, were working around me, in the thousand narrow, jammed-up cells of that great infernal hive. Such was the picture that imagination contrasted with the sweet calm scene which memory portrayed; and casting myself down on the bed, I hid my face on the clothes, giving way to a burst of passionate sorrow, that relieved me with unmanly but still with soothing tears.
While I yet lay there, I heard some one move in the chamber; and starting suddenly up, I saw a man carefully examining my baggage, with a very suspicious and nonchalant air. "Who the devil are you?" cried I, laying my hand on my sword.
"Garçon de l'auberge, ne vous deplaise, Monsieur," replied the man.
"Then Monsieur Garçon de l'auberge," said I, "beware how you touch my baggage; for though there be nothing in it but my clothes and a packet for his eminence the cardinal, I shall take care to slit your nose if you finger it without orders."
The man started back at the name of the cardinal as if he had touched a viper, gave me the monseigneur immediately, and replied, that he came to tell me supper was served, and the guests about to place themselves at table.