The Countess Anna accompanied her mother, and was in the highest spirits; and the witnesses were the Comte Georges Mniszech, the Comte Gustave Olizar brother-in-law to the Abbe Comte Czarouski, and the cure of the parish of Berditchef. Madame Honore de Balzac had given her capital to her children, but received in exchange a large income, a fact which she wisely concealed because of Balzac's creditors; and Balzac speaks with admiration of her noble generosity and disinterestedness, in this denuding herself of her fortune.
The newly-married couple travelled back to Wierzchownia, arriving, quite tired out, at half-past ten at night; and the next morning, as soon as he woke, Balzac wrote to inform his mother of the great event. He explained, with a well-adjusted prevision of future discord, if the elder Madame de Balzac's dignity were not sufficiently considered, that his wife had intended writing herself to offer her respects, but that her hands were so swollen with rheumatic gout that she could not hold a pen. He further informed his family, who had hitherto been kept in ignorance of the fact, that from the same cause she was often unable to walk. However, this did not depress him, as he remarked with his usual cheerfulness, that she would certainly be cured in Paris, where she would be able to take exercise and would follow a prescribed treatment. On the same day he penned a delighted letter to his sister, containing the exultant words: "For twenty-four hours, therefore, there has now existed a Madame Eve de Balzac, nee Rzewuska, or a Madame Honore de Balzac, or a Madame de Balzac the younger." He could hardly believe in his own good fortune, and the joyful letter finishes with the words, "Ton frere Honore, au comble du bonheur!"
Two days later, Balzac wrote to Madame Carraud a letter in which he said: "Three days ago I married the only woman I have ever loved, whom I love more than ever, and whom I shall love till death. This union is, I think, the recompense which God has had in reserve for me after so much adversity, so many years of work, so much gone through and overcome. I did not have a happy youth or happy springtide; I shall have the most brilliant of summers and the sweetest of autumns." In his newly-found happiness he did not forget that his old friend was now in straitened circumstances, but begged her from himself and Madame Honore to consider their house as her own: "Therefore, whenever you wish to come to Paris you will come to us, without even giving us notice. You will come to us in the Rue Fortunee as if to your own home, just as I used to go to Frapesle. This is my right. I must remind you of what you said to me one day at Angouleme, when, having broken down after writing 'Louis Lambert,' I was afraid of madness, and talked of the way in which people afflicted in this manner were neglected. On that occasion you said, 'If you were to become mad I should take care of you!' I have never forgotten those words, or your look and expression. I am just the same now as I was in July, 1832. It is because of those words that I claim you to-day, for I am nearly mad with happiness."[*]
[*] "Correspondance," vol. ii. p. 448.
In another part of the letter he tells her: "Ah! I never forget your maternal love, your divine sympathy with suffering. Therefore, thinking of all you are worth, and of the way in which you are struggling with trouble, I, who have so often waged war with that rough adversary, tell you that, knowing your unhappiness, I am ashamed of my happiness; but we are both too great for these littlenesses. We can say to each other that happiness and unhappiness are only conditions in which great hearts live intensely, that as much strength of mind is required in one position as in the other, and that misfortune with true friends is perhaps more endurable than happiness surrounded by envy."
Balzac was not, after all, destined to start on his journey homeward as quickly as he had intended. His health was terribly bad, his eyes had become so weak that he could neither read nor write, and the chronic heart and lung malady was gaining ground so rapidly, that his breathing was affected if he made the slightest movement. It was absolutely necessary that he should rest for a time at Wierzchownia before attempting any further exertion. Another delay was caused by the young Countess being attacked by measles. Her devoted mother, who in her crippled state could not attempt any active nursing, sat by her daughter's bedside all day, and refused to leave Wierzchownia till her anxiety about her darling's health should be over.
It was, therefore, not till the end of April that M. and Madame Honore de Balzac started for what proved to be a terrible journey. They did not arrive in Dresden till about May 10th, having taken three weeks to go to a distance which ought naturally to have been accomplished in five or six days. The roads were in a fearful condition, and their lives were in danger not once, but a hundred times a day. Sometimes fifteen or sixteen men were required to hoist the carriage out of the mud-holes into which it had fallen. It is a wonder that Balzac survived the torture of the journey, and it must have been very trying to the rheumatic Madame Honore. When at last they arrived at Dresden they were both utterly exhausted, while Balzac was extremely ill, and felt ten years older than when he started. His sight was so bad that he could not see the letters that he was tracing on the paper, and was obliged to apologise to his correspondents for his extraordinary hieroglyphics, while he told Madame Surville that the swollen condition of his wife's hands still rendered it impossible for her to write.
However, Madame Honore was well enough to amuse herself by visits to the jewellers' shops, where she bought a magnificent pearl necklace, a purchase of which Balzac evidently approved, as he remarked that it was so beautiful that it would make a saint mad! On his part, he was greeted on his arrival by a new vexation; as letters from Paris told him of "Vautrin" being put on the stage without his permission, and, as we have seen, he wrote with much indignation, to put a stop to this infringement of his rights.
An interesting letter already referred to, which is now in the possession of the Vicomte de Spoelberch de Lovenjoul, is dated from Frankfort, the travellers' next stopping-place. It is written to the Countess Anna, and was begun by Balzac, and finished by his wife. About Balzac's part of the letter there is not much to remark, except that he was evidently very fond of his step-daughter, that he told her how ill he was, and that the handwriting is the scrawl of a man who could not see. His high spirits indeed have disappeared, but this change of tone is easily accounted for by the state of his health. It is Madame Honore's part of the letter which strikes the reader as curiously inadequate. It is dated May 16th, only five days after Balzac's letter from Dresden informing his family of his wife's inability to hold a pen, and is perfectly written; so that her rheumatic gout must have abated suddenly. She begins her letter by commenting placidly on the sadness of seeing the sufferings of our "poor dear friend," says she tries in vain to cheer him, and contrasts regretfully the difference between her feelings during this journey, and her happiness when she last visited the same places, with her darling child at her side. The principal subject in her present rather wearying life, is the wonderful pearl necklace, which she takes out of its case conscientiously every day, that the air may preserve the whiteness of the pearls. She states, indeed, that she does not care much about it, and has only bought it to please her husband; but it seems to have pressed the unfortunate husband rather into the background, and to have become the chief centre of its owner's thoughts and solicitude.
The chilling unsatisfactory impression the letter leaves on the reader, however, is not conveyed so much by what is said by Balzac's newly-married wife, as by what she leaves unsaid. It must be remembered that the Countess Eve possessed the power of expressing herself with the utmost warmth, and with even exaggerated emphasis, when she saw fit occasion for the display of feeling. We must also keep the fact in mind, that in writing to the daughter who was her intimate friend, she would naturally give some indications of her real self; and though it might be impossible for one of her curiously secretive temperament to lift the veil altogether, and to open her heart without reserve, she would be likely in some way to enable the reader to realise her mental attitude. Therefore it is disconcerting and disquieting to discover that the one noticeable characteristic of the letter, is utter want of feeling. No anxiety is expressed about the growing illness of the sick man, not a word tells of fears so terrible that she hardly dares breathe them, about the ultimate result of his malady; on the contrary, everything is taken as a matter of course, and as though the writer had expected it beforehand. There is not even a recognition of Balzac as her husband; he is merely "our poor dear friend," a person for whom she feels vague pity, and in whom Anna's degree of interest is likely to be the same as her own.