A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy

THE ACT OF CHARITY. PARIS.

 The man who either disdains or fears to walk up a dark entry may be an excellent good man, and fit for a hundred things, but he will not do to make a good Sentimental Traveller. - I count little of the many things I see pass at broad noonday, in large and open streets. - Nature is shy, and hates to act before spectators; but in such an unobserved corner you sometimes see a single short scene of hers worth all the sentiments of a dozen French plays compounded together, - and yet they are absolutely fine; - and whenever I have a more brilliant affair upon my hands than common, as they suit a preacher just as well as a hero, I generally make my sermon out of ’em; - and for the text, - “Cappadocia, Pontus and Asia, Phrygia and Pamphylia,” - is as good as any one in the Bible.

There is a long dark passage issuing out from the Opera Comique into a narrow street; ’tis trod by a few who humbly wait for a fiacre, {2} or wish to get off quietly o’foot when the opera is done.  At the end of it, towards the theatre, ’tis lighted by a small candle, the light of which is almost lost before you get half-way down, but near the door - ’tis more for ornament than use: you see it as a fixed star of the least magnitude; it burns, - but does little good to the world, that we know of.

In returning along this passage, I discerned, as I approached within five or six paces of the door, two ladies standing arm-in-arm with their backs against the wall, waiting, as I imagined, for a fiacre; - as they were next the door, I thought they had a prior right; so edged myself up within a yard or little more of them, and quietly took my stand. - I was in black, and scarce seen.

The lady next me was a tall lean figure of a woman, of about thirty-six; the other of the same size and make, of about forty: there was no mark of wife or widow in any one part of either of them; - they seem’d to be two upright vestal sisters, unsapped by caresses, unbroke in upon by tender salutations. - I could have wish’d to have made them happy: - their happiness was destin’d that night, to come from another quarter.

A low voice, with a good turn of expression, and sweet cadence at the end of it, begg’d for a twelve-sous piece betwixt them, for the love of heaven.  I thought it singular that a beggar should fix the quota of an alms - and that the sum should be twelve times as much as what is usually given in the dark. - They both seemed astonished at it as much as myself. - Twelve sous! said one. - A twelve-sous piece! said the other, - and made no reply.

The poor man said, he knew not how to ask less of ladies of their rank; and bow’d down his head to the ground.

Poo! said they, - we have no money.

The beggar remained silent for a moment or two, and renew’d his supplication.

- Do not, my fair young ladies, said he, stop your good ears against me. - Upon my word, honest man! said the younger, we have no change. - Then God bless you, said the poor man, and multiply those joys which you can give to others without change! - I observed the elder sister put her hand into her pocket. - I’ll see, said she, if I have a sous.  A sous! give twelve, said the supplicant; Nature has been bountiful to you, be bountiful to a poor man.

- I would friend, with all my heart, said the younger, if I had it.

My fair charitable! said he, addressing himself to the elder, - what is it but your goodness and humanity which makes your bright eyes so sweet, that they outshine the morning even in this dark passage? and what was it which made the Marquis de Santerre and his brother say so much of you both as they just passed by?

The two ladies seemed much affected; and impulsively, at the same time they both put their hands into their pocket, and each took out a twelve-sous piece.

The contest betwixt them and the poor supplicant was no more; - it was continued betwixt themselves, which of the two should give the twelve-sous piece in charity; - and, to end the dispute, they both gave it together, and the man went away.

THE RIDDLE EXPLAINED. PARIS.

 I stepped hastily after him: it was the very man whose success in asking charity of the women before the door of the hotel had so puzzled me; - and I found at once his secret, or at least the basis of it: - ’twas flattery.

Delicious essence! how refreshing art thou to Nature! how strongly are all its powers and all its weaknesses on thy side! how sweetly dost thou mix with the blood, and help it through the most difficult and tortuous passages to the heart!

The poor man, as he was not straiten’d for time, had given it here in a larger dose: ’tis certain he had a way of bringing it into a less form, for the many sudden cases he had to do with in the streets: but how he contrived to correct, sweeten, concentre, and qualify it, - I vex not my spirit with the enquiry; - it is enough the beggar gained two twelve-sous pieces - and they can best tell the rest, who have gained much greater matters by it.

PARIS.

 We get forwards in the world, not so much by doing services, as receiving them; you take a withering twig, and put it in the ground; and then you water it, because you have planted it.

Monsieur le Count de B-, merely because he had done me one kindness in the affair of my passport, would go on and do me another, the few days he was at Paris, in making me known to a few people of rank; and they were to present me to others, and so on.

I had got master of my secret just in time to turn these honours to some little account; otherwise, as is commonly the case, I should have dined or supp’d a single time or two round, and then, by translating French looks and attitudes into plain English, I should presently have seen, that I had hold of the couvert{3} of some more entertaining guest; and in course should have resigned all my places one after another, merely upon the principle that I could not keep them. - As it was, things did not go much amiss.

I had the honour of being introduced to the old Marquis de B-: in days of yore he had signalized himself by some small feats of chivalry in the Cour d’Amour, and had dress’d himself out to the idea of tilts and tournaments ever since. - The Marquis de B- wish’d to have it thought the affair was somewhere else than in his brain.  “He could like to take a trip to England,” and asked much of the English ladies. - Stay where you are, I beseech you, Monsieur le Marquis, said I. - Les MessieursAnglois can scarce get a kind look from them as it is. - The Marquis invited me to supper.

Monsieur P-, the farmer-general, was just as inquisitive about our taxes.  They were very considerable, he heard. - If we knew but how to collect them, said I, making him a low bow.

I could never have been invited to Mons. P-’s concerts upon any other terms.

I had been misrepresented to Madame de Q- as an esprit. - Madame de Q- was an esprit herself: she burnt with impatience to see me, and hear me talk.  I had not taken my seat, before I saw she did not care a sous whether I had any wit or no; - I was let in, to be convinced she had.  I call heaven to witness I never once opened the door of my lips.

Madame de V- vow’d to every creature she met - “She had never had a more improving conversation with a man in her life.”

There are three epochas in the empire of a French woman. - She is coquette, - then deist, - then devote: the empire during these is never lost, - she only changes her subjects when thirty-five years and more have unpeopled her dominion of the slaves of love, she re-peoples it with slaves of infidelity, - and then with the slaves of the church.

Madame de V- was vibrating betwixt the first of those epochas: the colour of the rose was fading fast away; -