Monsieur Prudhomme has realized fifteen hundred thousand francs on half his shares, and keeps the rest. He has made himself a banker; and, as happens to all imbeciles, he has prospered under the advice of his wife, who is an angelic and superior woman, full of propriety and good taste. She has known how to play the rôle of a woman of means. But her attachment to her husband, inspired by the really good qualities of that ridiculous man, strengthened by the passion that he has for her, by the comfort that he gives her through his wealth, is balanced by the maternal sentiment exalted to the highest pitch which Pamela bears to her first child, whom, thanks to this wealth, she was enabled to bring up, with an invisible hand, until two years earlier, when she introduced him into her own home, without his knowing the truth. Adolphe is made head clerk, and the poor mother has played her dreadful part so carefully that no one, not even Adolphe, suspects the great love that envelops him. M. Prudhomme is very fond of Adolphe. Mademoiselle Prudhomme is seventeen years old. The play is entitled "Le Mariage de Mademoiselle Prudhomme." M. Prudhomme, rich from the shares of Anzin, rich with the profits of his bank, and possessing much private property, will give his daughter a million. She is, therefore, with a million and expectations, one of the best matches in Paris.
I must tell you that, unlike the Antonys, Adolphe is a gay, practical young fellow, happy in his position, delighted not to have either father or mother, and never inquiring about them. In that lies a dreadful drama between the mother and her son, for poor Madame Prudhomme is tortured a dozen times a day by the indifference of her son in the matter of his mother, and by a crowd of circumstances I cannot explain here; they make the play itself.
The fortune of Mademoiselle Prudhomme tempts a young notary, who owes his business to his predecessor, who is eager to be paid for it. This old notary is a friend of Prudhomme; he has introduced the young notary to the house. Madame Prudhomme's tenderness for Adolphe does not escape his eye; he believes that she intends to give him her daughter; and the two notaries open Prudhomme's eyes to his wife's love for Adolphe. Here, then, is the wife unjustly accused of an imaginary sin, from which she does not know how to vindicate herself. The comedy comes, you understand, from the pathos of Prudhomme, and from his efforts to convict his wife. His wife accepts the singular combat of silencing her husband as if she were guilty, which is a satirical situation completely in the style of Molière. But she sees whence the blow has come. She fences with the two notaries, and, pressed by them, she shows them the infamy of their conduct, and declares that she will never give her daughter to a man capable of soiling the honour of the mother to obtain the daughter. They are forced to retract to Prudhomme, and the mother, to secure the tranquillity of her husband, is forced to separate from her son.
That is the main play; but, you understand, there is an enormous quantity of situations, scenes, movements. Servants are mixed up in it. It is a picture of our present bourgeoisie. There is a return of Adolphe's father, which complicates everything, and brings about the dénouement. There is a horrible scene in which Prudhomme, in order to get light on his wife's passion, proposes the marriage of brother and sister, and arms himself with his wife's terror. There is also the most fruitful of all subjects, great ridicule of men and things through Prudhomme's magniloquence. Madame Prudhomme is the Célimène of the bank, the true character of our women of the present day. But there is, above all, a keen satire on manners and morals. Prudhomme, accepting this false disaster, vanquished by the superiority of his wife, is a figure that was lacking to the stage. The solid happiness, marred by the slander of self-interested persons and restored by them for their own interests, has the true ring of comedy. Mademoiselle Prudhomme does not marry. Apparently, all this is vague; but the vagueness and want of outline is that of the "Misanthrope," the plot of which is in ten lines. The rôle of Madame Prudhomme, who is forty years old, can be played only by Mademoiselle Mars; but, with her tacit maternity, crushed down at every moment, she can be superb.
Ecco, cara, the card on which I am about to stake my whole future; for I have but that chance left, so deplorable is the state of the publishing business now; and I must, if our grand affair fails, have something to fall back upon. I shall not do that play only. I shall do two others at the same time, so as to obtain the receipts of two theatres at least.
Addio. I will write you between now and November 1, when I shall have got some pressing matters off my hands. But, I entreat you, do not forget, and continue to me the tale of your tranquil Ukrainean life. I have flowers beneath my windows, dahlias, plants that make me think of your gardens. When I open the book in which I put all the thoughts of my work, and so many other things, I turn ever to the one saying, "I will be Richelieu to preserve you." That, in this great corral of my ideas, is the flower that my eye caresses oftenest.
Be indulgent to the poor third dizain, the third of which was written at the hôtel de l'Arc. "Berthe la Repentie" is decidedly the finest thing in the "Contes Drolatiques." I gossip to you about my poor thoughts; my life is such a desert; there are so many misconceptions, recent betrayals, difficulties, that I dare not talk to you of my material life. It is too sad.
October 12.
The "Conte" is rewritten and sent to the printing-office, and I can say that I am heartily glad to have finished at last that eternally "in the press" dizain. I have many other books to finish also. "Massimilla Doni" lacks a chapter on "Moïse," which requires long studies of the score; and as I must make them with a consummate musician, I cannot be master of my own work. Next I have a preface to sew on, like a collaret, to "La Femme Supérieure;" and a fourth Part also, like a bustle; for the sixty-five columns in the "Presse" did not furnish forth a volume; hence the preface and the added end of the volume. You cannot imagine how these mendings, these replasterings, weary me; I am worn-out with such secondary toils.
I have forgotten to tell you, I think, about Mademoiselle de Fauveau, who remembers you very well. She and her sister are such Catholics that the latter made difficulties about marrying the son of Bautte (the millionaire jeweller of Geneva where you and I went together, you remember?) on account of his religion, and yet these two poor women are in great poverty. Is not that splendid in faith? Mademoiselle de Fauveau, to whom I said that many persons objected to what I made Madame de Mortsauf say before dying, fell into a holy wrath with such profane ones, for she holds in admiration the "Lys dans la Vallée." When I told her that I had modified the cries of the flesh she said:—