If this history has no other effect than to inspire the possessors of precious relics with holy fear, and induce them to make codicils to secure these touching souvenirs of joys that are no more by bequeathing them to loving hands, it will have done an immense service to the chivalrous and romantic portion of the community; but it does, in truth, contain a far higher moral. Does it not show the necessity for a new species of education? Does it not invoke, from the enlightened solicitude of the ministers of Public Instruction, the creation of chairs of anthropology,—a science in which Germany outstrips us? Modern myths are even less understood than ancient ones, harried as we are with myths. Myths are pressing us from every point; they serve all theories, they explain all questions. They are, according to human ideas, the torches of history; they would save empires from revolution if only the professors of history would force the explanations they give into the mind of the provincial masses. If Mademoiselle Cormon had been a reader or a student, and if there had existed in the department of the Orne a professor of anthropology, or even had she read Ariosto, the frightful disasters of her conjugal life would never have occurred. She would probably have known why the Italian poet makes Angelica prefer Medoro, who was a blond Chevalier de Valois, to Orlando, whose mare was dead, and who knew no better than to fly into a passion. Is not Medoro the mythic form for all courtiers of feminine royalty, and Orlando the myth of disorderly, furious, and impotent revolutions, which destroy but cannot produce? We publish, but without assuming any responsibility for it, this opinion of a pupil of Monsieur Ballanche.
No information has reached us as to the fate of the negroes’ heads in diamonds. You may see Madame du Val-Noble every evening at the Opera. Thanks to the education given her by the Chevalier de Valois, she has almost the air of a well-bred woman.
Madame du Bousquier still lives; is not that as much as to say she still suffers? After reaching the age of sixty—the period at which women allow themselves to make confessions—she said confidentially to Madame du Coudrai, that she had never been able to endure the idea of dying an old maid.
ADDENDUM
The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy.
(Note: The Collection of Antiquities is a companion piece to The Old Maid. In other Addendum appearances they are combined under the title of The Jealousies of a Country Town.)
Bordin
The Gondreville Mystery
The Seamy Side of History
The Commission in Lunacy
Bousquier, Du (or Du Croisier or Du Bourguier)
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
The Middle Classes
Bousquier, Madame du (du Croisier) (Mlle. Cormon)
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
Casteran, De
The Chouans
The Seamy Side of History
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
Beatrix
The Peasantry
Chesnel (or Choisnel)
The Seamy Side of History
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
Coudrai, Du
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
Esgrignon, Charles-Marie-Victor-Ange-Carol, Marquis d’ (or Des Grignons)
The Chouans
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
Esgrignon, Marie-Armande-Claire d’
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
Gaillard, Madame Theodore (Suzanne)
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
A Bachelor’s Establishment
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Beatrix
The Unconscious Humorists
Granson, Athanase
The Government Clerks (mentioned only)
Lenoncourt, Duc de
The Lily of the Valley
Cesar Birotteau
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
The Gondreville Mystery
Beatrix
Navarreins, Duc de
Colonel Chabert
The Muse of the Department
The Thirteen
The Peasantry
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
The Country Parson
The Magic Skin
The Gondreville Mystery
The Secrets of a Princess
Cousin Betty
Pombreton, Marquis de
Lost Illusions
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
Ronceret, Du
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
Beatrix
Ronceret, Madame Du
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
Simeuse, Admiral de
Beatrix
The Gondreville Mystery
Troisville, Guibelin, Vicomte de
The Seamy Side of History
The Chouans
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
The Peasantry
Valois, Chevalier de
The Chouans
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)
Verneuil, Duc de
The Chouans
The Collection of Antiquities (companion piece)