Cornélie

“ And a black-lace veil on her head, with brilliants. She was going to Nice next day, with the marchesa and Gilio, to see their flat.
When she was gone after begging Cornélie to come and admire her trousseau, Cornélie said, with a smile:
"She is happy. After all, happiness is something different for everybody, A trousseau and a title would not make me happy."
"These are the small people," he said, "who cross our lives now and again. I prefer to get out of their way." ”

“ Cornélie found the obliging stout gentleman, whom the German ladies called Mr. Rudyard, sitting opposite her and her fiasco of Genzano beside her plate. She thanked Mr. Rudyard with a smile and made the usual remarks: how she had been for a drive that afternoon and had made her first acquaintance with Rome, the Forum, the Pincio. She talked to the German ladies and to the English one, who was always so tired with her sight-seeing; and the Germans, a Baronin and the Baronesse her daughter, laughed with her at the two æsthetes whom Cornélie had come upon that morning in the drawing-room. ”

“ But Corneille was Cornélien even when he wrote rhymed comedy—he could not have been anything else—and he never would have fallen into rhyme had he not wished to make concessions to the prevailing fashion. [69]
Even when engaged in the most absorbing of [171] intrigues his lovers pretend that they are their own masters, and that they feel only such sentiments as they have elected to feel. At that early day—when Médée and Clitandre were written—the culte of the will had germinated; and time proved that it was predestined to become the chief director of Corneille's work. ”

“ My occasional appearance in literary circles will not be misconstrued, as I have the reputation of unusual erudition." He began to write: "Cornelia!" He paused. "Cornelia! It was a lofty spirit that gave her this proud name; is she a true child of this spirit? I almost believe it. That she glides into the cells of the lowest criminals does not spring from humility,--it is the defiance of compassion against the harshness of force, and the consciousness of the joy-giving power of her own individuality. Woe to him who ventured to wound her pride! He would have lost her." ”

“ CHAPTER XV THE MECHANISM OF THE CORNELIAN TRAGEDY
The ideal of the deliberative will, then, formed the real, living passion of this man devoid of passions; for no one that lives can withhold himself from passion: he is only able to change its object by passing from one to the other. The judgment that holds Corneille to be an intrinsically prosaic, ratiocinatory and casuistical genius is therefore to be looked upon as lacking of penetration. Had he been a casuist, it seems clear that he would have composed casuistical works. ”

“ Cornelli has cost me neither patience, care, nor trouble. If by a little love I have been able to draw out the good kernel of her nature and bring it to happy development, then that is all I have done. Cornelli has never made my task hard for me. We have all become so fond of her that we had to think with sorrow of the time when she would leave us. I shall never forget what happy hours Dino had with Cornelli during his illness and how she constantly entertained my sociable little Mux with her constant merriment and kindness. ”

“ Not that she put away any more’n a lady should,—at the Clover Blossom,—but she had tackled a dry Martini first, and then she kept on tastin’ and tastin’ her glass of fizz, and the waiter keeps fillin’ it up, and that twinkle in her eye develops more and more, and her conversation gets livelier and livelier. So does Cornelia’s. They gets off some real bright things, too. You’d never guess there was so much fun in Cornie, or that she could look so much like a stunner. ”

“ Mux called out louder and louder: “Oh, Cornelli, take me along!” He could not realize that he was really going, too. There were still many days and even weeks before their bliss would come true, but with this heavenly prospect before them the children performed their remaining duties only too joyfully.
It was different for Cornelli. Her longing for her home had grown more violent every day. Wherever she saw a green tree or a bush, she saw the garden at home, the meadows, and the flowers in Iller-Stream before her mind’s eye. ”

“ You must learn to give proper answers, Cornelli, do you hear?” said the cousin. “You are like a wild hare which does everything in leaps and bounds. You can go to see the woman after finishing your work for your teacher. I am sure you must have some to do for to-morrow.”
Cornelli assented to this, and as soon as the ladies had left the room to retire to their bedrooms for the hottest hours of the day, she sat down at her little table in the corner. Here she wrote down a page with lightning speed, then taking up her book she read her lesson over and over again till she knew it by heart. ”

“ The only thing was that he blessed her for bringing it back. "Ah, the ideas of people now—!"
"Yes, their ideas are certainly not about us." But he ruefully faced it. "We've none the less, however, to live with them."
"With their ideas—?" Cornelia questioned.
"With them—these modern wonders; such as they are!" Then he went on: "It must have been to help me you've come back."
She said nothing for an instant about that, only nodding instead at his photograph. "What has become of yours? I mean of her." ”

“ ACT II—SEVERUS. FABIAN SEV. Let Felix bow to Jove and incense pour, I seek a dearer shrine, for I adore Nor Jove, nor Mars, nor Fortune—but Pauline. This fruit now ripening late my hand would glean: You know, my friend, the god who wings my way, You know the only goddess I obey: What reck the gods on high our sacrifice and prayer? An earthly worship mine, sole refuge from despair! FABIAN. Ah! You may see her—— SEV. Blessed be thy tongue! O magic word, that turns my grief to song! ”

“ Cornelli, looking up from her cup, glanced incredulously at the letter.
“It is really for you. Listen! Miss Cornelli Hellmut, Iller-Stream, Iron Foundry,” the father read. “Here it is!”
Cornelli opened the letter under great suspense and read:
DEAR CORNELLI:
Only think! I am ill and have to lie in bed. The doctor has forbidden me to read and write, so this letter will be very short. It is very tiresome to be sick, for my sisters are in school all day. Mama always has a lot to attend to and Mux is still a very useless little fellow. ”

“ But the difficulty can only exist for persons who are insensible to dramatic excellence, or who so strongly object to the forms of the French drama that they cannot relish anything so presented. Rodrigue, Chimène, Don Diègue are not of any age, but of all time. The conflicting passions of love, honour, duty, are here represented as they never had been on a French stage, and in the “strong style” which was Corneille’s own. Of the many objections urged against the play, perhaps the weightiest is that which condemns the frigid and superfluous part of the Infanta. ”

“ You can see for yourself what comes of it! If only you would not frown like this, Cornelli. You look exactly as if you had two little horns growing on your forehead, one on each side. There are many other and better amusements for you than spending your life in the stable. Are you able to embroider?”
“No,” Cornelli answered curtly.
“Children of your age ought to be able to, though,” said the cousin. “But we have not come here to teach you that; have we, Betty? You probably do not even know how to hold the needle in your hand.” ”

“ O Cornelius, it won't be lucky for us when father hears about
Ellen and Matt.
CORNELIUS
That's true. No man sees his house afire but looks to his rick.
SALLY Come down a bit of the road with me, Cornelius. The sow will be grunting and grunting, reminding father that I'm away. Och, a minute ago I was as contented as if there was no land or pigs, or harsh words to trouble one. (She goes to the door) The boys and girls for America are coming here.
CORNELIUS Give me your hands to hold, Sally. (She gives him her hands) We are as young as any of them after all. ”

“ The fact that one of the characters jumps on another’s back, and the rather promiscuous kissing which takes place, are nothing to the liberties usually taken in contemporary plays. A worse fault is the στιχομυθία, or, to borrow Butler’s expression, the Cat-and-Puss dialogue, which abounds. But the common objection to the play at the time was that it was too natural and too devoid of striking incidents. Corneille accordingly, as he tells us, set to work to cure these faults, and produced a truly wonderful work, Clitandre. Murders, combats, escapes and outrages of all kinds are provided ”

“ Such is the singular passion that fills Corneille's tragedies. The creatures that give utterance to it are hardly human beings: they are embodiments of will, force, intellect and pride. The situations in which they are placed are calculated to expose these qualities to the utmost; and all Corneille's masterpieces are concerned with the same subject—the combat between indomitable egoism and the forces of Fate. It is in the meeting of these 'fell incensed opposites' that the tragedy consists. ”

“ By nature, there can be little doubt that Corneille was a romantic. His fiery energy, his swelling rhetoric, his love of the extraordinary and the sublime, bring him into closer kinship with Marlowe than with any other writer of his own nation until the time of Victor Hugo. But Corneille could not do what Marlowe did. He could not infuse into the free form of popular drama the passion and splendour of his own genius, and thus create a type of tragedy that was at once exuberant and beautiful. ”

“ I can't, because, oh, Cornelia, he seems to have passed out of my life! I get his dear letters, but they are all about people I have never seen and don't want to see, because they are there with him, seeing him every day, and I am not. He is loving the life—you know how he would—and the boys with whom he lives in the mess, himself the biggest boy of all.
In every letter I can sense the buoyancy of spirit that comes with the laying down of responsibility. ”

“ The little Frenchman rose, with a quiet and graceful air, full of sadness, yet of courtesy; and I knew then that he was no longer my guest and entertainer, but once more the chapman with his wares.
"Monsieur, Cornelia is under my protection. You will comprehend that—after that—she has not escaped with impunity. Some little strings snapped in the harp. She is touchée, here," said he, resting one finger lightly upon his forehead,—"but 'tis all for the best, sans doute. She is quiet, peaceable,—and she does not remember. She sits in my house, working, and the bird sings to her ever. ”

“ Cornelia scarce could stand, for she Began her guardian to entreat; Seizing his busy arm, to flee Far from the fawn before her feet. The youth her painful terror saw, And with a manly sterness said, In a firm voice, inspiring awe, "Cornelia I must be obeyed." "True love is brave, whate'er may chance— Behind this tree's protecting bole Stand thou—nor fear the Stag's advance, But trust to thy Fortunio's soul!" The faithful maid, in double dread, Fear'd to offend him more than death; And now, as near the fierce foe sped, Behind the tree, she pants for breath. ”

“ It was after that fashion he might easily have been moved, and with almost no transition, to break out to Cornelia—quite as if taking up some old talk, some old community of gossip, just where they had left it; even with the consciousness perhaps of overdoing a little, of putting at its maximum, for the present harmony, recovery, recapture (what should he call it?) the pitch and quantity of what the past had held for them. ”

“ His house, with the surrounding garden, the luminous meadow with the view toward the valley and the distant mountains beyond, was painted in such fresh and absolutely natural colors that Mr. Hellmut was quite overcome. This was the view he had loved so passionately from his childhood.
“Cornelli, come here!” the father called. “Just look at this picture! Don’t you have a beautiful home? Do you love your home as much as your father loves it?”
“Oh yes, Papa, I love it so much!” said Cornelli. ”

“ Cornish said feebly: "Oh, well...."
Before she willed it, she was telling him:
"He didn't. He didn't leave me," she cried with passion. "He had another wife." Incredibly it was as if she were defending both him and herself.
"Lord sakes!" said Cornish.
She poured it out, in her passion to tell some one, to share her news of her state where there would be neither hardness nor censure.
"We were in Savannah, Georgia," she said. "We were going to leave for Oregon—going to go through California. We were in the hotel, and he was going out to get the tickets. He started to go. Then he came back. ”

“ Corney was bound 'prentice to a brogue-maker, in his native place—which is Drogheda; but, as he tells us, he was too much the lad o' wax to stick to his last, and left a good home, to seek his fortune on the wide ocean. But there's many of us have done as bad: so we shouldn't cry out upon Corney, you know;—should we, now?—The sea is the sole and only thing in the world that an English, Irish, Scotch, or Welch boy, ever feels truly and deeply in love with. ”

“ Corneille, who was not, like Racine, a subtle student of emotions, never outgrew the conception of love he had learned from Spanish plays and heroic romances,—a conception in full harmony with the romantic theme and spirit of plays like Le Cid and Don Sanche d'Aragon,—much less so with more essentially tragic themes. But with this qualification it may be admitted that the next three tragedies which Corneille produced—Horace (1640) , Cinna (1640) , and Polyeucte (1643) —are the flower of his work in interest of situation and character. ”