Prosper Mérimée

“ CCCIII Paris, November 8, 1867.
Dear Friend: I send you a word in haste, written in the midst of the errand which I am compelled to do. I leave to-morrow for Cannes, seriously ill; but there I hope to live in sunlight and warmth. Here we have it cold and almost frosty. I no longer go out at night, and never put my nose out of doors except when the temperature becomes a little milder.
I do not know how long I shall be able to stay away; it depends somewhat on the Pope, on Garibaldi, and on M. de Bismarck. Like every one else, I am more or less in the hands of these gentlemen. ”

“ To prove that I am thinking of you, here is a little flower which I plucked in my walk at sunset. It is the only kind that I can send. All other varieties are colossal.
What are you doing? Of what are you thinking? You never tell me what you really think, and it is folly for me to ask you. I have had but few comfortable moments since I came away. Skies of leaden gray, all sorts of accidents, and all sorts of discomforts; a broken wheel, a bruised eye—but they are all patched up now in some sort of fashion. But what I find most difficult to become accustomed to is solitude. ”

“ Tell me, please, if it is not infinitely more creditable for this little girl to lead the life she does, than for you who enjoy the singular good fortune of an irreproachable environment, and of a temperament of such refinement that it seems to me to sum up the qualities of an entire civilisation. I must tell you the truth. I can endure the society of ignoble people only at rare intervals, and then only because of an inexhaustible curiosity which I feel for every variety of the human species. I can never tolerate low society among men. ”

“ It is possible that I shall be in Paris again about the beginning of October; but if I have the least courage I shall go to Strasburg, to Lyons, and from there to Marseilles. I fear this courage will be lacking, especially if you think of returning. During your absence I have made from memory two full-length portraits of you. They are both like you, but need to be retouched. We shall see if you will like them. I am bored to death, and should like to see it rain in torrents, but the weather is perfectly dry. Nothing falls but the leaves. There will remain not the sign of one in October. ”

“ Without intending any flattery, I should have struck fear into the heart of the boldest brigand of melodrama. At Constantinople I saw the Sultan, in patent-leather boots, and a frock-coat, and again, afterwards, covered with diamonds in the procession of the Baïram. On the same occasion, a handsome woman, on whose toe I had stepped by accident, slapped me severely and called me a giaour. This constituted my only intercourse with the Turkish beauties. At Athens, and in Asia, I saw the most splendid monuments in the world, and the loveliest landscapes possible to imagine. ”

“ Have you come to a passage in the Odyssey that I consider wonderful? It is where Ulysses is living with Alcinoüs, still unknown, and after dinner a poet comes before him and sings of the war of Troy. The little that I have seen of Greece gives me a clearer understanding of Homer. Everywhere throughout the Odyssey is seen that amazing love cherished by the Greeks for their native land. There is in modern Greek a charming word: it is ξενιτεἱα, an alien. To be in a strange land is for a Greek the greatest of misfortunes, but to die there is the most terrible calamity of which they can conceive. ”

“ On their little feet they wear cinnamon stockings, of the colour of Marseilles mud, coarse in quality, and darned with twenty different shades of cotton. Their gowns are badly made, and are always shabby and soiled. Their beautiful black hair owes its glossiness almost entirely to the use of candle tallow. Add to this an atmosphere of garlic mixed with the fumes of rancid oil, and you have a picture of the Marseilles beauty. What a pity it is that in this world nothing should be perfect! Ah, well, they are charming, the Marseilles women, in spite of it all. ”

“ I eat ravenously, and walk a great deal, but I do not sleep as much as I should like. I am in society constantly, which I do not enjoy any too well. Crinoline is not worn here as universally as it is with us; but so quickly do one’s eyes become accustomed to fashions, that I am scandalised, and the women all look as if they were dressed up in chemises.
You can have no conception of the beauty of the British Museum on Sunday, when there is absolutely no one there but M. Panizzi and me. ”

“ Yet, why should there be any question of pride, that is to say, selfishness, between us? Is the joy of self-forgetfulness for the other’s sake a matter of indifference to you? That extraordinary sentiment of affection which we both sometimes feel, which this morning, for instance, took us where we had not the slightest reason for going—is not the influence of such an emotion far sweeter and more intense than that exerted by your demon of pride? ”

“ I am in a city which is particularly odious to me, alone in an inn, listening to a frightful south-east wind. It parches everything it touches, and the harmonies produced as it whistles down the corridors are enough to bring the devil up to earth. The result is that I am furious with all nature. I am writing to you in order to cheer me a little, and I am comforted by the thought that in your approaching journey you will have many such days as this. I saw in Saint Vincent’s church an exceedingly pretty young girl making stations. ”

“ Of three days, I have had two good ones; the third even has not been very bad; a slight attack of suffocation not to be compared to the sensation of strangling which a Paris winter brings on.
Why is it that, fond of travelling as you are, and having, moreover, souls in your charge, you do not spend your winters in Pisa or in any place where the great arbiter of the health of humanity, my lord, the Sun, is to be seen? ”

“ CCCXXIII Cannes, November 11, 1869.
Dear Friend: I am here in the most glorious weather imaginable, and the most persistently such; to the despair of the gardeners, who can not make their cabbages grow. I regret to see that I am hardly better than if the weather were bad. Mornings and evenings I have always very painful attacks of exhaustion. I can not walk without becoming tired and losing my breath; in fact, I am still good for nothing and miserable. ”

“ Imagine the effect produced on a being nervous as I, by rain, hail, and cold. One suffers here ten times more from all these than he would in Paris.
So, then, you have had an insurrection, which was as silly as the hero [45] who was its instigator. We present a melancholy spectacle of ourselves, by the fashion in which we make use of our liberty and of parliamentary government. It is impossible not to be struck by the really laughable audacity with which propositions of the most monstrous kind are presented and maintained in the Chambers, which no one would dare to utter in a salon. ”

“ As I write I weep constantly. Good-bye until Monday. Pray for sunshine. I shall bring you a book. Wear your seven-league boots.
LXV Paris, May 4, 1843.
I am unable to sleep, and am as cross as a bear. There are several things I should like to say about your letter, but I shall say none of them, on account of my bad humour, or rather, I shall try to restrain it a little. Your distinction between the two egos is very pretty, and is a proof of your profound selfishness. You love only yourself, and that is why you feel a sort of affection for the ego which resembles yours. ”

“ For two weeks I have been in a continuous rage, first with the weather, then with the architects, and finally with you and myself. The weather, which has been abominable all this time, cleared unexpectedly yesterday, but the heat is now overpowering, accompanied by a sirocco, which is most exhausting to the vitality. I spent twenty-four hours at the home of a representative, and if I had ever had the ambition to be a politician, that visit would have caused me to change my mind. What an occupation! What kinds of people one must visit, and be on good terms with, and flatter! ”

“ Here I am, at last, in Paris, but more dead than alive. I have not written, because I was too melancholy, and had only doleful things to tell you of myself and of this sublunary world. You will find me very miserable, but happy to see you again.
Friday morning, if the weather be fine, we might walk together to the Museum of the Louvre. I dare hardly go out, I have such a dread of the cold, but I am ordered to take exercise.
I send you the eighth volume of Guizot, which will entertain you. The dull weather depresses me, and makes me much worse. I hope you are still in great prosperity. ”

“ I spent three days with the Duke of Hamilton in an immense castle, situated in a very beautiful country. Near the castle, less than an hour’s journey, in fact, there is a herd of wild bulls, the last that exists in Europe. They seemed to me as tame as the deer of Paris. In every part of this castle there are paintings by the great masters, Grecian and Chinese vases that are magnificent, and books with bindings by the most noted amateurs of the last century. ”

“ Nothing makes me more melancholy than a wedding. The Turks, who bargain for a woman while they examine her as they would a fat sheep, are better than we, who have glossed over this vile trade with a varnish of hypocrisy which, alas! is only too transparent. I have asked myself often what I should find to say to a wife on the first day of my marriage, and I have thought of nothing possible, unless it were a compliment on her night-cap. Happily, the devil will be extremely clever if he ever entraps me into such an entertainment. The part which the woman plays is much easier than that of the man. ”

“ WHILE you are devoting yourself to the cultivation of enthusiasm, I continue to cough, and am very ill with a frightful cold. I hope you will be touched by this. I do not understand why you should remain three days in Lucerne, unless you spend your time on the lake. But it is useless to give you advice which will reach you too late. My only word of admonition, and one, I trust, by which you will profit, is not to forget your friends in France, in the beautiful country you are now visiting.
There is positively not a soul in Paris, but I am not averse to the solitude. ”

“ The workmen lie down in the shade and wrap themselves in their cloaks with an air as tragic as that of the Andalusians. Everywhere the odour of garlic and oil is mingled with that of oranges and jessamine. The streets are protected by canvas during the day, and the women have small, well-shod feet. Even the patois has in it a suggestion of the Spanish accent. Late in the season as it is, there is still a tremendous buzzing of gnats, fleas, and bugs, which are fatal to sleep. I must endure this life for two months still before looking on human beings again! ”

“ The business in which I am engaged is extremely fatiguing. All day I must walk or drive, and at night, no matter how tired, I must despatch a dozen pages of prose. I speak of commonplace writing only, for, from time to time, I have some extraordinary piece of work to do for my minister. But, since those things are never read, I can safely indulge in all manner of nonsense.
The country that I am exploring is charming, but the people are stupid to the last degree. No one ever opens his mouth that he does not sound his own praises, from the man who wears a frockcoat to the porter. ”

“ This, you have said to me, makes you happy, and to this sensation you abandon yourself, because a demonstration of humility is gratifying to your pride. You are willing that I should be a statue, so that you may breathe life into my soul, but you are not willing, in your turn, to be a statue; above all, you are unwilling that this equality of happiness should be reciprocal, because anything like equality is distasteful to you. ”

“ Why is it, when we have become all we are to each other, that you must reflect for several days before replying frankly to the simplest question of mine?... Between your reason and your heart, I never feel sure which will win; you do not know yourself, but you give the preference always to your reason.... If you have committed any wrong, it is assuredly that preference which you give to your pride over all the tenderness of your nature. The first sentiment is to the second as a colossus to a pygmy. And that pride of yours is at bottom nothing but a kind of selfishness. ”