The Red and the Black: A Chronicle of the Nineteenth Century

by Stendhal

  'If he's leaving us so soon, it's to go and see M. Comte,' * said the Comte Chalvet, and everyone laughed.

  Surrounded by several great lords who said nothing, and the schemers--most of them corrupt, but all of them sharpwitted--who were arriving in succession that evening at M. de La Mole's salon (there was talk of him for a ministry), little Tanbeau was making his début. If his perceptions as yet lacked

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  subtlety, he made up for it, as we shall see, by the energy of his words.

  'Why not condemn this man to ten years' imprisonment?' he was saying as Julien drew near his group. 'The depths of a dungeon is the place to lock up reptiles; they must be left to die in the dark, otherwise their poison is stimulated and becomes more dangerous. What's the point of fining him a thousand crowns? He's poor, I grant you--so much the better; but his party will pay on his behalf. What was called for was a fine of five hundred francs and ten years in the dungeons.'

  Good grief! whoever is this monster they are talking about, then? thought Julien, admiring the vehement tones and staccato gestures of his colleague. The thin, drawn little face of the academician's favourite nephew was hideous at that moment. Julien soon discovered that the man in question was the greatest poet of the age. *

  'You monster!' exclaimed Julien half out loud, and warmhearted tears welled up in his eyes. Ah, you little beggar! he thought, I'll get even with you for those words.

  Yet these, thought Julien, are the lost children of the party which has the marquis as one of its leaders! And as for the illustrious man he's slandering--just imagine how many medals, how many sinecures he might have collected if he had sold himself, I'm not saying to the servile ministry of M. de Nerval, * but to one or other of that succession of reasonably honest ministers we've seen in office!

  Father Pirard signalled to Julien from a distance; M. de La Mole had just said something to him. But when Julien, who at that moment was listening with lowered gaze to the moanings of a bishop, was free at last and could make his way over to his friend, he found him monopolized by the abominable little Tanbeau. This little monster loathed Father Pirard for being the source of the favour shown to Julien, and was there to win him over.

  When will death deliver us from this man of corruption? It was in these terms, biblical in their force, that the little man of letters was referring at that moment to the respectable Lord Holland. * It was to his credit that he was thoroughly versed in the biographies of living men, and he had just done a rapid

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  review of all the men who could aspire to some influence under the reign of the new king of England. *

  Father Pirard moved off into an adjoining room; Julien followed him.

  'The marquis doesn't like scribblers, I warn you; it's his only aversion. Make sure you know Latin and Greek--if you can, the history of the Egyptians, the Persians, etc., and he will honour you and give you patronage as a scholar. But don't go writing a single page in French, and above all not on serious matters above your station in society, or he might call you a scribbler and take against you. How come you five in a great lord's house and don't know the Duc de Castries's * saying about d'Alembert and Rousseau: "Express an opinion on everything, they would, and they haven't so much as a thousand crowns in income".'

  Everything gets found out, thought Julien, here just as in the seminary! He had written nine or ten fairly bombastic pages: it was a sort of historical eulogy of the old army surgeon who, he wrote, had made him into a man. And this little notebook, said Julien to himself, has always been kept under lock and key! He went up to his room, burnt his manuscript and returned to the drawing-room. The brilliant rogues had left, only the men with medals remained.

  Round the table, which the servants had just brought in ready set out, there were seven or eight women aged between thirty and thirty-five, exceedingly well born, exceedingly pious, and exceedingly affected. The dazzling Maréchale * de Fervaques came in making excuses for the lateness of the hour. It was past midnight; she went over and took a seat beside the marquise. Julien was deeply stirred: she had the eyes and the look of Mme de Rênal.

  Mlle de La Mole still had a good gathering around her. She and her friends were busy making fun of the poor Comte de Thaler. He was the only son of the notorious Jew famous for the wealth he had amassed by lending money to kings * to make war on the common people. The Jew had just died, leaving his son an income of a hundred thousand crowns a month, and a name that was alas only too well known. This

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  unusual position should have called for simplicity of character or a great deal of will-power.

  Unfortunately the count was no more than a decent fellow adorned with all sorts of pretensions induced in him by his flatterers.

  M de Caylus maintained that they had implanted in the count a resolve to ask for Mlle de La Mole's hand in marriage (she was being courted by the Marquis de Croisenois, who was to become a duke with an income of a hundred thousand pounds).

  'Ah! don't accuse him of having any resolve,' said Norbert pityingly.

  What this poor Comte de Thaler perhaps lacked the most was the faculty of will. This side of his character would have made him worthy of being a king. Constantly seeking counsel from everyone, he did not have the courage to follow any advice through to the end.

  His face would have been enough on its own, Mlle de La Mole was saying, to fill her with eternal joy. It was a striking mixture of anxiety and disappointment; but from time to time you could very clearly discern in it surges of self-importance and of that decisive tone befitting the richest man in France, especially when he's rather good-looking and not yet thirtysix. 'He's timorously insolent,' said M. de Croisenois. The Comte de Caylus, Norbert and two or three young men with moustaches mocked him to their hearts' content without his noticing, and at length sent him packing as one o'clock was striking:

  'Have you got your famous Arabs waiting at the door for you in this weather?' Norbert asked him.

  'No; these horses are a new and much less costly pair,' replied M. de Thaler. 'I'm paying five thousand francs for the horse on the left, and the one on the right is only worth a hundred louis; but do me the honour of believing that it is only put into harness at night. The thing is, its trot is absolutely identical to the other one's.'

  Norbert's comment made the count think that it was respectable for a man like himself to have a passion for horses, and

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  that he shouldn't let his get wet. He set off, and the other gentlemen left a moment later, full of fun at his expense.

  So, thought Julien as he heard them laughing on the stairs, I've been granted a glimpse of the opposite extreme from my situation! I haven't so much as an income of twenty louis, and I've been standing side by side with a man who has an income of twenty louis an hour, and they were poking fun at him... It's a sight to cure you of envy.

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  CHAPTER 5

  Sensitivity and a great lady's piety

  An idea with any spark in it seems like a piece of rudeness there, so accustomed have people become to colourless words. Woe betide anyone who innovates in speech!

  FAUBLAS *

  AFTER several months of ordeals, this was the point Julien had reached on the day the steward of the household handed him the third quarterly instalment of his salary. M. de La Mole had put him in charge of supervising the administration of his estates in Brittany and Normandy. Julien visited them frequently. He was wholly in charge of the correspondence relating to the notorious lawsuit with the Abbé de Frilair. M. Pirard had briefed him.

  On the basis of the short notes that the marquis scribbled in the margins of all the various papers he received, Julien drafted letters which were almost invariably signed.

  His teachers at the theological college complained of his lack of application, but none the less considered him to be one of their most distinguished pupils. These different tasks, undertaken with all the keenness of frustrated ambition, had soon robbed Julien of the
fresh complexion he had brought from the provinces. His pallor was an asset in the eyes of his young contemporaries at the seminary; he found them much less spiteful, much less inclined to worship Mammon than their counterparts in Besançon; they thought he was suffering from consumption. The marquis had given him a horse.

  Fearful of being seen while out galloping, Julien had told them that this was exercise ordered by the doctors. Father Pirard had introduced him to several Jansenist societies. Julien was astonished; the idea of religion was inextricably bound up in his mind with that of hypocrisy and the hope of making money. He admired these pious, stern men who don't think about accounts. A number of Jansenists had befriended him and were offering him advice. A new world was opening up

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  before him. In Jansenist circles he met Count Altamira, who was nearly six foot tall, a liberal sentenced to death in his own country, and a religious man. He was struck by this strange contrast between religious devotion and a love of liberty.

  Relations were strained between Julien and the young count. Norbert had felt that Julien reacted too sharply to some of his friends' jokes. Having stepped beyond the bounds of propriety once or twice, Julien made a point of never addressing any remarks to Mlle Mathilde. Everyone was always perfectly polite to him at the Hôtel de La Mole, but he felt he was out of favour. His provincial common sense explained this outcome by appeal to the popular saying: new's beautiful.

  He was perhaps a little more perspicacious than at first, or else the first magic of Parisian sophistication had worn off.

  As soon as he stopped working he fell victim to deadly boredom; this is the withering effect of the politeness which distinguishes high society: it is admirable, but oh so measured, so perfectly calibrated in accordance with rank. Anyone with a sensitive nature sees straight through it.

  No doubt you can reproach the provinces with their common or rather uncivil way of talking; but people do show a bit of feeling when they answer you. Julien never had his pride wounded at the Hôtel de La Mole, but he often felt close to tears at the end of the day. In the provinces, a waiter will take an interest in you if you have some kind of accident as you set foot in his café; but if there is something about this accident that is hurtful to your pride, the waiter, while expressing his sympathy for you, will find ten occasions to repeat the word causing you such agonies. In Paris, they are considerate enough not to laugh at you to your face, but you are always a stranger.

  We shall pass over in silence a host of little adventures which would have made Julien look ridiculous if he had not been in some sense beneath ridicule. His exaggerated sensitivity made him commit thousands of blunders. All his pleasures were calculated ones: he practised pistol shooting every day, he was one of the good pupils of the most famous fencing masters. As soon as he had a moment to himself, instead of spending it reading as he used to do, he dashed to the riding school and

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  asked for the most vicious horses. When he went out with the riding master he was almost invariably thrown off his horse.

  The marquis found him easy to work with because of his dogged application, his silence and his intelligence; and little by little he entrusted him with the handling of any business that was the least bit tricky to sort out. At times when his soaring ambition left him some respite, the marquis was a shrewd businessman; with his ear close to the ground, he was in a position to speculate with success. He bought houses and forests; but he readily took offence. He gave away hundreds of louis and went to court over a few hundred francs. Rich men with noble hearts look to business for amusement, not results. The marquis needed a chief of general staff to introduce a system that was clear and easy to follow into all his financial affairs.

  For all her restrained character, Mme de La Mole sometimes made fun of Julien. Great ladies are appalled by the unpredictable behaviour that heightened sensitivity produces; it is the very opposite of propriety. Once or twice the marquis spoke in Julien's defence: 'He may be ridiculous in your salon, but he scores in his office.' For his part Julien thought he had discovered the marquise's secret. She deigned to take an interest in everything as soon as the Baron de La Joumate was announced. He was a cold individual with an inscrutable countenance. He was short, thin, ugly, exceedingly well dressed, spent his life at Court and, as a rule, never said anything about anything. That was how his mind worked. Mme de La Mole would have been passionately happy, for the first time in her life, if she could have arranged for him to marry her daughter.

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  CHAPTER 6

  A matter of accent

  Their lofty mission is to pass calm judgement on the minor events in the daily lives of nations. Their wisdom must forestall mighty anger over small causes, or over events that the voice of fame transfigures when it carries them afar.

  GRATIUS

  FOR a newcomer who, out of pride, never asked any questions, Julien did not make himself look too foolish. One day, when he was driven into a café on the Rue Saint-Honoré by a sudden shower, a tall man in a beaver overcoat, surprised at his sullen stare, stared back at him exactly as Mlle Amanda's lover had done all that time ago in Besançon.

  Julien had reproached himself too often with having let this first insult pass to put up with such a stare now. He demanded an explanation for it. The man in the overcoat immediately poured out a torrent of foul abuse at him: the whole café clustered round them; passers-by stopped by the door. Like a true provincial, Julien always carried a pair of small pistols on him as a precaution; he clenched them tightly inside his pocket. However he was sensible and did no more than repeat to his man at regular intervals: Your address, sir! I despise you.

  The tenacity with which he stuck to these six words ended up by impressing the crowd.

  'Damn it all! the fellow doing all the talking must give him his address!' Hearing this verdict repeated so often, the man in the overcoat flung five or six cards in Julien's face. Luckily none of them struck him; he had vowed he would only use his pistols if he was hit. The man went away, not without turning round from time to time to shake his fist and shout abuse at him.

  Julien found himself bathed in sweat. So it's in the power of the meanest of mortals to get me as worked up as this! he said to himself in fury. How can I kill off my humiliating sensitivity?

  What about finding a second? He didn't have any friends. He had had a number of acquaintances; but every time, after

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  six weeks of seeing him, they had all become distant. I'm just not sociable, and now I'm cruelly punished for it, he reflected. At length he hit on the idea of seeking out a former lieutenant of the 96th called Liéven, a poor devil he often fenced with. Julien was quite open with him.

  'I'm willing to be your second,' said Liéven, 'but on one condition: if you don't wound your man, you'll fight a duel with me, on the spot.'

  'Agreed,' said Julien delightedly, and they went off in search of M. C. de Beauvoisis at the address indicated on his cards, in the depths of the Faubourg Saint-Germain.

  It was seven o'clock in the morning. It was only when giving his name at the door that it occurred to Julien that this might be the young relative of Mme de Rênal's who had worked at the Embassy in Rome or Naples in the past, and had given a letter of introduction to the singer Geronimo.

  Julien had handed a tall footman one of the cards flung at him on the previous day and one of his own.

  He and his second were kept waiting a good three-quarters of an hour; at length they were introduced into a marvellously elegant suite, where they found a tall young man dressed like a doll; his features were handsome with all the perfection and the insignificance of a Greek statue. His strikingly narrow head was crowned with a pyramid of the loveliest fair hair. It had been curled with the greatest of care; not a hair was out of place. Having his hair curled like that, thought the lieutenant from the 96th, was what caused this cursed fop to keep us waiting. The colourful dressing gown, the morning trousers, everything down to the em
broidered slippers was as it should be, and wonderfully soigné. His noble, empty face suggested that ideas would be conventional and rare: the cult of the agreeable gentleman, a horror of anything unexpected or humorous, a great deal of gravity.

  Julien, who had had it explained to him by his lieutenant from the 96th that keeping someone waiting for so long after rudely throwing a visiting card in his face was yet another insult, strode briskly into M. de Beauvoisis's room. He intended to be insolent, but he would dearly have liked to be perfectly polite at the same time.

  He was so struck by M. de Beauvoisis's gentle manners, by

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  his expression that was at once affected, self-important and smug, and by the marvellous elegance of his surroundings, that he abandoned in a flash any idea of being insolent. This wasn't his man from the day before. Such was his surprise at meeting so distinguished an individual in place of the vulgar character he had met in the café that he was at a loss for words. He handed him one of the cards that had been flung at him.