Now, this is what has happened. The newspapers have been infamous; they have said that the play was revolting in its immorality. I shall say but one thing to you about that: read it! It may not be very good, but it is eminently moral. Thereupon, the minister, to screen the royal fury, made the pretext of immorality, which was cowardly and base. One thing you may believe in, namely: terrible attacks on my part on that tottering throne. It shall not have two farthings. I will be the emulator and assistant of M. de Cormenin, and you shall see the effect of my change from a peace footing to a war footing. I will have neither truce nor armistice until I have driven——
[1] Frédérick Lemaître, with or without satirical intention, dressed himself as a Mexican general in a way to resemble Louis Philippe, especially by wearing a wig rising to a point, giving his head the famous pear shape for which that of Louis-Philippe was ridiculed.—TR.
May, 1840.
Nothing can better paint to you my life than this interruption. After six weeks' delay I must finish a sentence left unfinished in my desk without the possibility of returning to it. The end of that sentence is: "claws of steel into their hearts." I resume my narrative.
They came and offered me indemnities; five thousand francs to begin with. I blushed to the roots of my hair, and replied that I accepted no alms; that I had earned two hundred thousand francs' worth of debts in doing sundry masterpieces which counted for something in the sum total of the glory of France in the nineteenth century; that I had been three months rehearsing "Vautrin," during which time I might have earned by other work twenty-five thousand francs; that a pack of creditors were after me, but that if I could not pay them all, I did not care whether I was hunted by fifty or a hundred of them; and that my dose of courage to resist was the same. The director of the Beaux-Arts, Cavé, went away, saying that he was full of esteem and admiration for me. "This is the first time," he said, "that I have ever been refused." "So much the worse," I replied.
Since I wrote you the two preceding pages my life has been that of a stag at bay. I have come and gone about Paris helped by friends. And now, without a farthing, I begin the fight once more. Frédérick Lemaître will entice other actors, and I have obtained permission to present a new play, in five acts, at one of the closed theatres; about six weeks hence we shall re-appear, and then we shall see!
Aux Jardies, May 10.
Cara, I have just received your last letter, and again I must complain of the rarity of those letters. Oh! do not let what I have written of my distresses keep you from writing to me monthly. If I do not write to you as often in my periods of trouble, do not blame my heart. I often make my prayer to Hope, turning my face toward the Ukraine. Do not punish me for my confidences, which may, which must sadden you. Alas! with what rapidity time is flying. How many white hairs are in my head, faithful to all, even to toil.
You are laughing at me, and that is not right. Madame Visconti is an Englishwoman, not an Italian; and I have no vanity in my friendships; you know that. A man as busy as I am can attend very little to trifles. Certainly, I will acknowledge that I am not without the vanity of love, and I think that when we love we ought to love in all ways, and be very happy to see la dilecta carry off the palm from others in even the smallest things,—her toilet, for instance. I should have all those weaknesses, including blazons. But this was no ground on which to twit me; look in your mirror, dress yourself very elegantly to-morrow, and vindicate me, cara.
Every one comes up to me in Paris, admiring my courage as much and even more than the rest. They thought me crushed, buried under my disaster, and hearing that I am about to deliver battle once more, both friends and enemies have been equally surprised.