Sleep you content, Voltaire, and does your hideous smile
“Rolla,” Alfred de Musset, Complete Writings, vol. 2, p. 21
Flit o’er your fleshless skull in mockery the while?
I well remember that infernal joy
“Cup and the Lip,” Alfred de Musset, Complete Writings, vol. 1, p. 253
Of being ravaged while I ravished her,
And there she lay beside me, breathless, hot,
A creature wan and cloyed, with grinding teeth
No heavenly moments—rather fits from hell
I was looking in the air.
The Complete Writings of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 4, p. 29
I hate the poet who with tearful eye
Murmurs some name while gazing tow’rds a star,
Who sees no magic in the earth or sky
Unless Lizette or Ninon be not far.The bard who in all Nature nothing sees
Divine, unless a petticoat he ties
Amorously to the branches of the trees
Or nightcap to the grass, is scarcely wiseHe has not heard the eternal’s thunder tone
The Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 8, p. 278
The voice of Nature in her various moods,
Who cannot tread the dim ravines alone,
And of no woman dream ’mid whispering woods.
When we are young, our mornings are triumphant.
The Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 1, p. 182
Who comes? who calls?—No, all is well:
“La nuit de mai,” Alfred de Musset, Complete Writings, vol. 2, p. 308
’Twas but the tolling midnight bell.
O solitude! O poverty!
Caresses are merely restless transports,
The Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 10, p. 287
The vain efforts of poor Love to attempt
The impossible union of souls through the body.
Tell me in what far-off land
The Roman beauty, Flora, lives;
Hipparchia, Thais’ cousin, and
All the beauty nature gives;
Echo speak, thy voice awake
Over river, stream, and lake,
Where are beauty’s smiles and tears?
And where are the snows of other years?Blanche, as fair as lily’s chalice,
The Complete Writings of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 16, p. 196
Swinging sweet, with voice serene,
Bertha Broadfoot, Beatrice, Alice,
Emengarde, Le Mayne’s dear queen?
Where is Joan, the good Lorraine,
Whom th’ English brought to death and fame?
Where are all, O wisest seers,
And where the snows of other years?
I hate the poet who with tearful eye
Murmurs some name while gazing tow’rds a star,
Who sees no magic in the earth or sky
Unless Lizette or Ninon be not far.The bard who in all Nature nothing sees
Divine, unless a petticoat he ties
Amorously to the branches of the trees
Or nightcap to the grass, is scarcely wiseHe has not heard the eternal’s thunder tone
The Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 8, p. 278
The voice of Nature in her various moods,
Who cannot tread the dim ravines alone,
And of no woman dream ’mid whispering woods.
A woman changeth oft her mind:
The Complete Writings of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 7, p. 100
Yet fools still trust in womankind.
You only were, in those rarest days
The Complete Writings of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 17, p. 217
A common instrument under my art;
Like the bow, on the viol d’amour it plays
I dreamed my dream o’er your empty heart.
You are thin, my beloved, but what of that?
The Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 10, p. 390
One is nearer the heart when the breast is flat,
Like a bird in its little cage, I see
Love fluttering in your heart for me!
I’m sorry for the Lord, the Lord of Albion
The Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 10, p. 392–393
Whose praises are being sung in the salon,
If the Lord’s ears are tender in the least,
And he loves talent and beauty, He’s having a feast.
If He likes good music and wit and art
I pity the good Lord with all my heart.
Nothing is sacred to a pastor,
The Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 10, p. 393
Not even the dinner, or slumber, or
Ears of the poor traveler.
But do not let it happen again,
Or without delay I’ll take the first train.
Ruth a Moabite,
The Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 10, p. 397
Crouched at the feet of Boaz, with bare breast,
Hoping that some unknown ray of light
Would, at his awakening, reward her quest.
Even when the bird walks one feels that it has wings,
The Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 3, p. 200
Oh! how nice, how nice it is,
The Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 2, p. 73
To pick the sweet, wild strawberries.
The princess, in a hurry
The Complete Works of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 15, p. 193
Without bell, priest, or beadle,
But with some water only,
Had baptized it.
Two millions, two millions
The Complete Writings of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 16, p. 228
Are fine,
With five hundred thousand
And woman divine.
Always the companion of whose heart you are not sure.
The Complete Writings of Guy de Maupassant, vol. 15, p. 216
Waterspout. ↩
In eyes as of a painting that entrances.
“Love of Lies,” Poems of Baudelaire, p. 133
An Arab dish. ↩
Like blue letter-cards but used as telegrams, they are sent through special tubes. ↩
Colophon
Short Fiction
was compiled from short stories published between 1876 and 1921 by
Guy de Maupassant.
They were translated from French between 1901 and 1949 by
Ernest Boyd, Storm Jameson, Jeffery E. Jeffery, Lafcadio Hearn, M. Walter Dunne, Henry C. Olinger, Albert M. Cohn-McMaster, Dora
