A Distinguished Provincial at Paris

Lucien told Berenice to order a funeral which should not cost more than two hundred francs, including the service at the shabby little church of the Bonne-Nouvelle. As soon as she had gone out, he sat down to a table, and beside the dead body of his love he composed ten rollicking songs to fit popular airs. The effort cost him untold anguish, but at last the brain began to work at the bidding of Necessity, as if suffering were not; and already Lucien had learned to put Claude Vignon’s terrible maxims in practice, and to raise a barrier between heart and brain. What a night the poor boy spent over those drinking songs, writing by the light of the tall wax candles while the priest recited the prayers for the dead!

Morning broke before the last song was finished. Lucien tried it over to a street-song of the day, to the consternation of Berenice and the priest, who thought that he was mad: —

 
Lads, ‘tis tedious waste of time
To mingle song and reason;
Folly calls for laughing rhyme,
Sense is out of season.
Let Apollo be forgot
When Bacchus fills the drinking-cup;
Any catch is good, I wot,
If good fellows take it up.
Let philosophers protest,
Let us laugh,
And quaff,
And a fig for the rest!
 
 
As Hippocrates has said,
Every jolly fellow,
When a century has sped,
Still is fit and mellow.
No more following of a lass
With the palsy in your legs?
– While your hand can hold a glass,
You can drain it to the dregs,
With an undiminished zest.
Let us laugh,
And quaff,
And a fig for the rest!
 
 
Whence we come we know full well.
Whiter are we going?
Ne’er a one of us can tell,
‘Tis a thing past knowing.
Faith! what does it signify,
Take the good that Heaven sends;
It is certain that we die,
Certain that we live, my friends.
Life is nothing but a jest.
Let us laugh,
And quaff,
And a fig for the rest!
 

He was shouting the reckless refrain when d’Arthez and Bianchon arrived, to find him in a paroxysm of despair and exhaustion, utterly unable to make a fair copy of his verses. A torrent of tears followed; and when, amid his sobs, he had told his story, he saw the tears standing in his friends’ eyes.

“This wipes out many sins,” said d’Arthez.

“Happy are they who suffer for their sins in this world,” the priest said solemnly.

At the sight of the fair, dead face smiling at Eternity, while Coralie’s lover wrote tavern-catches to buy a grave for her, and Barbet paid for the coffin – of the four candles lighted about the dead body of her who had thrilled a great audience as she stood behind the footlights in her Spanish basquina and scarlet green-clocked stockings; while beyond in the doorway, stood the priest who had reconciled the dying actress with God, now about to return to the church to say a mass for the soul of her who had “loved much,” – all the grandeur and the sordid aspects of the scene, all that sorrow crushed under by Necessity, froze the blood of the great writer and the great doctor. They sat down; neither of them could utter a word.

Just at that moment a servant in livery announced Mlle. des Touches. That beautiful and noble woman understood everything at once. She stepped quickly across the room to Lucien, and slipped two thousand-franc notes into his hand as she grasped it.

“It is too late,” he said, looking up at her with dull, hopeless eyes.

The three stayed with Lucien, trying to soothe his despair with comforting words; but every spring seemed to be broken. At noon all the brotherhood, with the exception of Michel Chrestien (who, however, had learned the truth as to Lucien’s treachery), was assembled in the poor little church of the Bonne-Nouvelle; Mlle. de Touches was present, and Berenice and Coralie’s dresser from the theatre, with a couple of supernumeraries and the disconsolate Camusot. All the men accompanied the actress to her last resting-place in Pere Lachaise. Camusot, shedding hot tears, had solemnly promised Lucien to buy the grave in perpetuity, and to put a headstone above it with the words:

CORALIE AGED NINETEEN YEARS

August, 1822

Lucien stayed there, on the sloping ground that looks out over Paris, until the sun had set.

“Who will love me now?” he thought. “My truest friends despise me. Whatever I might have done, she who lies here would have thought me wholly noble and good. I have no one left to me now but my sister and mother and David. And what do they think of me at home?”

Poor distinguished provincial! He went back to the Rue de la Lune; but the sight of the rooms was so acutely painful, that he could not stay in them, and he took a cheap lodging elsewhere in the same street. Mlle. des Touches’ two thousand francs and the sale of the furniture paid the debts.

Berenice had two hundred francs left, on which they lived for two months. Lucien was prostrate; he could neither write nor think; he gave way to morbid grief. Berenice took pity upon him.

“Suppose that you were to go back to your own country, how are you to get there?” she asked one day, by way of reply to an exclamation of Lucien’s.

“On foot.”

“But even so, you must live and sleep on the way. Even if you walk twelve leagues a day, you will want twenty francs at least.”

“I will get them together,” he said.

He took his clothes and his best linen, keeping nothing but strict necessaries, and went to Samanon, who offered fifty francs for his entire wardrobe. In vain he begged the money-lender to let him have enough to pay his fare by the coach; Samanon was inexorable. In a paroxysm of fury, Lucien rushed to Frascati’s, staked the proceeds of the sale, and lost every farthing. Back once more in the wretched room in the Rue de la Lune, he asked Berenice for Coralie’s shawl. The good girl looked at him, and knew in a moment what he meant to do. He had confessed to his loss at the gaming-table; and now he was going to hang himself.

“Are you mad, sir? Go out for a walk, and come back again at midnight. I will get the money for you; but keep to the Boulevards, do not go towards the Quais.”

Lucien paced up and down the Boulevards. He was stupid with grief. He watched the passers-by and the stream of traffic, and felt that he was alone, and a very small atom in this seething whirlpool of Paris, churned by the strife of innumerable interests. His thoughts went back to the banks of his Charente; a craving for happiness and home awoke in him; and with the craving, came one of the sudden febrile bursts of energy which half-feminine natures like his mistake for strength. He would not give up until he had poured out his heart to David Sechard, and taken counsel of the three good angels still left to him on earth.

As he lounged along, he caught sight of Berenice – Berenice in her Sunday clothes, speaking to a stranger at the corner of the Rue de la Lune and the filthy Boulevard Bonne-Nouvelle, where she had taken her stand.

“What are you doing?” asked Lucien, dismayed by a sudden suspicion.

“Here are your twenty francs,” said the girl, slipping four five-franc pieces into the poet’s hand. “They may cost dear yet; but you can go,” and she had fled before Lucien could see the way she went; for, in justice to him, it must be said that the money burned his hand, he wanted to return it, but he was forced to keep it as the final brand set upon him by life in Paris.

ADDENDUM

Note: A Distinguished Provincial at Paris is part two of a trilogy. Part one is entitled Two Poets and part three is Eve and David. In other addendum references parts one and three are usually combined under the title Lost Illusions.

The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy.

Barbet

A Man of Business

The Seamy Side of History

The Middle Classes

Beaudenord, Godefroid de

The Ball at Sceaux

The Firm of Nucingen

Berenice

Lost Illusions

Bianchon, Horace

Father Goriot

The Atheist’s Mass

Cesar Birotteau

The Commission in Lunacy

Lost Illusions

A Bachelor’s Establishment

The Secrets of a Princess

The Government Clerks

Pierrette

A Study of Woman

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Honorine

The Seamy Side of History

The Magic Skin

A Second Home

A Prince of Bohemia

Letters of Two Brides

The Muse of the Department

The Imaginary Mistress

The Middle Classes

Cousin Betty

The Country Parson

In addition, M. Bianchon narrated the following:

Another Study of Woman

La Grande Breteche

Blondet, Emile

Jealousies of a Country Town

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Modeste Mignon

Another Study of Woman

The Secrets of a Princess

A Daughter of Eve

The Firm of Nucingen

The Peasantry

Blondet, Virginie

Jealousies of a Country Town

The Secrets of a Princess

The Peasantry

Another Study of Woman

The Member for Arcis

A Daughter of Eve

Braulard

Cousin Betty

Cousin Pons

Bridau, Joseph

The Purse

A Bachelor’s Establishment

A Start in Life

Modeste Mignon

Another Study of Woman

Pierre Grassou

Letters of Two Brides

Cousin Betty

The Member for Arcis

Bruel, Jean Francois du

A Bachelor’s Establishment

The Government Clerks

A Start in Life

A Prince of Bohemia

The Middle Classes

A Daughter of Eve

Bruel, Claudine Chaffaroux, Madame du

A Bachelor’s Establishment

A Prince of Bohemia

Letters of Two Brides

The Middle Classes

Cabirolle, Agathe-Florentine

A Start in Life

Lost Illusions

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Camusot

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Cousin Pons

The Muse of the Department

Cesar Birotteau

At the Sign of the Cat and Racket

Canalis, Constant-Cyr-Melchior, Baron de

Letters of Two Brides

Modeste Mignon

The Magic Skin

Another Study of Woman

A Start in Life

Beatrix

The Unconscious Humorists

The Member for Arcis

Cardot, Jean-Jerome-Severin

A Start in Life

Lost Illusions

A Bachelor’s Establishment

At the Sign of the Cat and Racket

Cesar Birotteau

Carigliano, Duchesse de

At the Sign of the Cat and Racket

The Peasantry

The Member for Arcis

Cavalier

The Seamy Side of History

Chaboisseau

The Government Clerks

A Man of Business

Chatelet, Sixte, Baron du

Lost Illusions

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

The Thirteen

Chatelet, Marie-Louise-Anais de Negrepelisse, Baronne du

Lost Illusions

The Government Clerks

Chrestien, Michel

A Bachelor’s Establishment

The Secrets of a Princess

Collin, Jacques

Father Goriot

Lost Illusions

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

The Member for Arcis

Coloquinte

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Coralie, Mademoiselle

A Start in Life

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Dauriat

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Modeste Mignon

Desroches (son)

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Colonel Chabert

A Start in Life

A Woman of Thirty

The Commission in Lunacy

The Government Clerks

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

The Firm of Nucingen

A Man of Business

The Middle Classes

Arthez, Daniel d’

Letters of Two Brides

The Member for Arcis

The Secrets of a Princess

Espard, Jeanne-Clementine-Athenais de Blamont-Chauvry, Marquise d’

The Commission in Lunacy

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Letters of Two Brides

Another Study of Woman

The Gondreville Mystery

The Secrets of a Princess

A Daughter of Eve

Beatrix

Finot, Andoche

Cesar Birotteau

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

The Government Clerks

A Start in Life

Gaudissart the Great

The Firm of Nucingen

Foy, Maximilien-Sebastien

Cesar Birotteau

Gaillard, Theodore

Beatrix

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

The Unconscious Humorists

Gaillard, Madame Theodore

Jealousies of a Country Town

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Beatrix

The Unconscious Humorists

Galathionne, Prince and Princess (both not in each story)

The Secrets of a Princess

The Middle Classes

Father Goriot

A Daughter of Eve

Beatrix

Gentil

Lost Illusions

Giraud, Leon

A Bachelor’s Establishment

The Secrets of a Princess

The Unconscious Humorists

Giroudeau

A Start in Life

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Grindot

Cesar Birotteau

Lost Illusions

A Start in Life

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Beatrix

The Middle Classes

Cousin Betty

Lambert, Louis

Louis Lambert

A Seaside Tragedy

Listomere, Marquis de

The Lily of the Valley

A Study of Woman

Listomere, Marquise de

The Lily of the Valley

Lost Illusions

A Study of Woman

A Daughter of Eve

Lousteau, Etienne

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

A Daughter of Eve

Beatrix

The Muse of the Department

Cousin Betty

A Prince of Bohemia

A Man of Business

The Middle Classes

The Unconscious Humorists

Lupeaulx, Clement Chardin des

The Muse of the Department

Eugenie Grandet

A Bachelor’s Establishment

The Government Clerks

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Ursule Mirouet

Manerville, Paul Francois-Joseph, Comte de

The Thirteen

The Ball at Sceaux

Lost Illusions

A Marriage Settlement

Marsay, Henri de

The Thirteen

The Unconscious Humorists

Another Study of Woman

The Lily of the Valley

Father Goriot

Jealousies of a Country Town

Ursule Mirouet

A Marriage Settlement

Lost Illusions

Letters of Two Brides

The Ball at Sceaux

Modeste Mignon

The Secrets of a Princess

The Gondreville Mystery

A Daughter of Eve

Matifat (wealthy druggist)

Cesar Birotteau

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Lost Illusions

The Firm of Nucingen

Cousin Pons

Meyraux

Louis Lambert

Montcornet, Marechal, Comte de

Domestic Peace

Lost Illusions

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

The Peasantry

A Man of Business

Cousin Betty

Montriveau, General Marquis Armand de

The Thirteen

Father Goriot

Lost Illusions

Another Study of Woman

Pierrette

The Member for Arcis

Nathan, Raoul

Lost Illusions

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

The Secrets of a Princess

A Daughter of Eve

Letters of Two Brides

The Seamy Side of History

The Muse of the Department

A Prince of Bohemia

A Man of Business

The Unconscious Humorists

Nathan, Madame Raoul

The Muse of the Department

Lost Illusions

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

The Government Clerks

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Ursule Mirouet

Eugenie Grandet

The Imaginary Mistress

A Prince of Bohemia

Negrepelisse, De

The Commission in Lunacy

Lost Illusions

Nucingen, Baron Frederic de

The Firm of Nucingen

Father Goriot

Pierrette

Cesar Birotteau

Lost Illusions

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Another Study of Woman

The Secrets of a Princess

A Man of Business

Cousin Betty

The Muse of the Department

The Unconscious Humorists

Nucingen, Baronne Delphine de

Father Goriot

The Thirteen

Eugenie Grandet

Cesar Birotteau

Melmoth Reconciled

Lost Illusions

The Commission in Lunacy

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Modeste Mignon

The Firm of Nucingen

Another Study of Woman

A Daughter of Eve

The Member for Arcis

Palma (banker)

The Firm of Nucingen

Cesar Birotteau

Gobseck

Lost Illusions

The Ball at Sceaux

Pombreton, Marquis de

Lost Illusions

Jealousies of a Country Town

Rastignac, Eugene de

Father Goriot

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

The Ball at Sceaux

The Commission in Lunacy

A Study of Woman

Another Study of Woman

The Magic Skin

The Secrets of a Princess

A Daughter of Eve

The Gondreville Mystery

The Firm of Nucingen

Cousin Betty

The Member for Arcis

The Unconscious Humorists

Rhetore, Duc Alphonse de

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Letters of Two Brides

Albert Savarus

The Member for Arcis

Ridal, Fulgence

A Bachelor’s Establishment

The Unconscious Humorists

Rubempre, Lucien-Chardon de

Lost Illusions

The Government Clerks

Ursule Mirouet

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Samanon

The Government Clerks

A Man of Business

Cousin Betty

Sechard, David

Lost Illusions

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Sechard, Madame David

Lost Illusions

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

Tillet, Ferdinand du

Cesar Birotteau

The Firm of Nucingen

The Middle Classes

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Pierrette

Melmoth Reconciled

The Secrets of a Princess

A Daughter of Eve

The Member for Arcis

Cousin Betty

The Unconscious Humorists

Touches, Mademoiselle Felicite des

Beatrix

Lost Illusions

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Another Study of Woman

A Daughter of Eve

Honorine

Beatrix

The Muse of the Department

Vandenesse, Comte Felix de

The Lily of the Valley

Lost Illusions

Cesar Birotteau

Letters of Two Brides

A Start in Life

The Marriage Settlement

The Secrets of a Princess

Another Study of Woman

The Gondreville Mystery

A Daughter of Eve

Vernou, Felicien

A Bachelor’s Establishment

Lost Illusions

Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life

A Daughter of Eve

Cousin Betty

Vignon, Claude

A Daughter of Eve

Honorine

Beatrix

Cousin Betty

The Unconscious Humorists