To Madame Récamier[343]
"Lyons, Wednesday 18 May 1831.
"Here I am, too far away from you. I have never made so sad a journey: wonderful weather, nature all arrayed, the nightingale singing, a starry night; and all this for whom? I shall indeed have to return to where you are, unless you be willing to come to my aid[344]."
To Madame Récamier
"Lyons, Friday 20 May.
"I spent the day, yesterday, in wandering beside the Rhone; I contemplated the town where you were born, the hill upon which rose the convent where you were chosen as the fairest: an expectation which you did not disappoint; and you are not here, and years have elapsed, and you have since been exiled to your birth-place, and Madame de Staël is no more, and I am leaving France! One singular personage[345] belonging to those old days has appeared before me: I send you his note, because of its unexpectedness and its surprise. This personage, whom I had never seen, is planting pines in the mountains of Lyonnais. It is a long cry from there to the Rue Feydeau and the Maison à vendre: what different parts men play on earth!
"Hyacinthe has told me of the regrets and the newspaper articles: I am not worth all that You know that I sincerely think so for twenty-three hours out of the twenty-four; the twenty-fourth is dedicated to vanity, which, however, is of slight duration and soon passes. I wanted to see nobody here; M. Thiers, who was on his way to the South, forced my door."
Note enclosed in the above letter
"A neighbour, your fellow-countryman, who has no other claim upon you than a profound admiration for your glorious talent and your admirable character, would like to have the honour of seeing you and offering you the homage of his respect. This next-door neighbour at your hotel, this fellow-countryman is called
"Elleviou."
To Madame Récamier
"Lyons, Sunday 22 May.
"We leave to-morrow for Geneva, when I shall find more memories of you. Shall I ever see France again, after I have once crossed the frontier? Yes, if you will, that is to say, if you remain there. I do not wish for the events which might offer me another chance of returning; I shall never allow the misfortunes of my country to enter among the number of my hopes. I shall write to you on Tuesday, the 24th, from Geneva. When shall I again see your little hand-writing, the younger sister of mine[346]?"
Letters to Madame Récamier.
"Geneva, Tuesday 24 May.
"We arrived here yesterday and are looking at houses. We shall probably make shift with a little summer-house on the edge of the lake. I cannot tell you how sad I feel as I busy myself with these arrangements. Again another future! Again to begin anew a life which I thought I had ended! I mean to write you a long letter when I am a little at rest: I dread that rest, for then I shall be contemplating without distraction those dim years upon which I am entering with a heart so much oppressed."
9 June 1831.
"You know that a 'reformed' sect has been established in the midst of the Protestants. One of the new pastors of the new church has been to see me and has written me two letters worthy of the first Apostles. He wants to convert me to his faith, and I want to turn him into a 'Papist.' We argue as though living in Calvin's[347] day, but loving each other in Christian brotherhood and without burning one another. I do not despair of his salvation; he is quite shaken by my arguments in favour of the Popes. You cannot conceive the pitch of exaltation to which he has risen, and his candour is admirable. If you come to me, accompanied by my old friend Ballanche, we shall do wonders. In one of the Geneva newspapers, a Protestant controversial book is advertised, and the authors are urged to 'stand firm' because 'the author of the Génie du Christianisme is close at hand.'
"There is a certain consolation in finding a little free people, administered by the most distinguished men, among which religious ideas form the basis of liberty and the chief occupation of life.
"I lunched at M. de Constant's[348], beside Madame Necker[349], who is unfortunately deaf, but a woman of rare qualities and the greatest distinction: we spoke only of yourself. I had received your letter and I told M. de Sismondi the amiable things you had said for his benefit. You see I am taking your lessons.
"Lastly, here are some verses. You are my 'star' and I am waiting for you to go to that enchanted island.
"Delphine[350] married: O Muses! I have told you in my last letter why I could write neither on the peerage nor on the war: I should be attacking a contemptible body to which I have belonged and preaching honour to those who no longer possess it.
"It needs a sailor to read the verses and understand them. I put myself in M. Lenormant's hands. Your intelligence will suffice for the last three stanzas, and the key to the riddle is at the foot[351]."
"Geneva, 18 June 1831.
"You have received all my letters. I am constantly expecting a few words from you; I can see that there will be nothing for me, but still I am always surprised when the post brings me only newspapers. Not a soul writes to me, except yourself; not a soul remembers me, except yourself, and that is a great charm. I love your solitary letter, which does not arrive as it used to arrive in the days of my magnificence, in the midst of packets of dispatches and of all those letters of attachment, admiration and meanness which vanish with fortune. After your little letters, I shall see your fair self, if I do not go to join you. You shall be my testamentary executrix; you shall sell my poor retreat; the price will enable you to travel towards the sun. At this moment, the weather is admirable: as I write to you I can see Mont Blanc in its splendour; from the top of Mont Blanc one sees the Apennines: it seems to me as though I have but three steps to take to arrive in Rome, where we shall go, for all will get settled in France.
"Our glorious country lacked but one thing in order to have passed through every form of wretchedness: to have a government of cowards; she has it now, and her youth is about to be swallowed up in doctrine, literature and debauch, according to the particular character of the individual. The chapter of accidents remains; but, when a man drags along life's road, as I do, the most likely accident is the end of the journey.
"I do no work, I can do nothing more: I am bored; it is my nature, and I am like a fish in water: nevertheless, if the water were a little less deep, perhaps I should be better pleased in it"
Geneva.
Journal from the 12th of July to the 1st of September 1831
The Pâquis, near Geneva.
I am settled at the Pâquis[352] with Madame de Chateaubriand; I have made the acquaintance of M. Rigaud, Chief Syndic of Geneva: above his house, by the edge of the lake, going up the Lausanne Road, you find the villa of two clerks of M. de Lapanouze[353], who have spent 1,500,000 francs in building it and laying out their gardens. When I pass on foot before their dwelling-house, I wonder at Providence, which has placed witnesses of the Restoration at Geneva in them and in me. What a fool I am! What a fool! The Sieur de Lapanouze went through royalism and misery with me: see to what his clerks have risen for having favoured the Conversion of the Funds, which I had the simplicity to oppose and by virtue of which I was turned out Here are the gentlemen: they drive up in an elegant tilbury, hat on ear, and I am obliged to step into a ditch lest the wheel should carry off a skirt of my old frock-coat. And yet I have been a peer of France, a minister, an ambassador, and in a cardboard box I have all the principal Orders of Christendom, including the Holy Ghost and the Golden Fleece. If the clerks of the Sieur César de Lapanouze, now millionaires, cared to buy my box of ribbons for their wives, they would do me a lively pleasure.