Chapter IV (2)

“I like to lie comfortably,” he said.

They readily gratified him; then the adjutant gave the signal for departure, bade adieu to Mateo, who made no reply, and marched down at a rapid pace towards the plain.

Nearly ten minutes passed before Mateo opened his mouth. The child glanced uneasily, now at his mother and now at his father, who, leaning upon his gun, gazed at him with an expression of intense wrath.

“You begin well!” said Mateo at last, in a voice which, although calm, was terrifying to one who knew the man.

“Father!” cried the child stepping forward, with tears in his eyes, as if to throw himself at his feet.

But Mateo cried:

“Away from me!”

And the child stopped and stood still, sobbing, a few steps from his father.

Giuseppa approached. She had spied the watch chain, one end of which protruded from Fortunato’s shirt.

“Who gave you that watch?” she asked in a harsh tone.

“My cousin the adjutant.”

Falcone seized the watch, and hurled it against a stone, breaking it into a thousand pieces.

“Woman,” he said, “is this child mine?”

Giuseppa’s brown cheeks turned a brick red.

“What do you say, Mateo? Do you know who you’re talking to?”

“Well, this child is the first of his race that ever did an act of treachery.”

Fortunato’s sobs and hiccoughs redoubled in force, and Falcone still kept his lynx-eyes fastened on him. At last he struck the butt of his gun on the ground, then threw it over his shoulder again and started back toward the _maquis_, calling to Fortunato to follow him. The child obeyed.

Giuseppa ran after Mateo and grasped his arm.

“He is your son,” she said in a trembling voice, fixing her black eyes on her husband’s, as if to read what was taking place in his mind.

“Let me alone,” replied Mateo, “I am his father.”

Giuseppa embraced her son and entered her cabin, weeping. She fell on her knees before an image of the Virgin and prayed fervently. Meanwhile Falcone walked some two hundred yards along the path, and did not stop until they reached a narrow ravine into which he descended. He sounded the earth with the butt of his rifle, and found it soft and easy to dig. It seemed to him a suitable spot for his design.

“Fortunato, go and stand by that big stone.”

The child did what he ordered, then knelt.

“Say your prayers.”

“Father, father, don’t kill me!”

“Say your prayers!” Mateo repeated, in a terrible voice.

The child, stammering and sobbing, repeated the _Pater_ and the _Credo_. The father, in a loud voice, said _Amen!_ at the end of each prayer.

“Are those all the prayers you know?”

“I know the _Ave Maria_, too, father, and the litany my aunt taught me.”

“That’s very long, but no matter.”

The child finished the litany in a feeble voice.

“Have you finished?”

“Oh, father! mercy! forgive me! I won’t do it again! I will pray so hard to my uncle the _caporal_ that he’ll forgive Gianetto!”

He continued to speak; Mateo had cocked his gun, and he took aim at him, saying:

“May God forgive you!”

The child made a desperate effort to rise and grasp his father’s knees; but he had not time. Mateo fired, and Fortunato fell stark dead.

Without glancing at the body, Mateo returned to his house to fetch a spade, in order to bury his son. He had taken only a few steps, when he met Giuseppa, who was running after them, terrified by the report.

“What have you done?” she cried.

“Justice.”

“Where is he?”

“In the ravine. I am going to bury him. He died the death of a Christian; I will have a mass sung for him. Send word to my son-in-law Tiodoro Bianchi to come and live with us.”

1829.

FOOTNOTES:

[40] In olden times the _caporals_ were the leaders chosen by the Corsican communes when they rebelled against the feudal lords. To-day the name is sometimes given to a man who, by reason of his property, his alliances, and his clientage, exerts a certain influence and acts as a sort of magistrate in a _pieve_ or a canton. The Corsicans, by an ancient custom, divide themselves into _gentlemen_ (some of whom are _magnificoes_, others _signori_), _caporali_, _citizens_, _plebeians_, and _foreigners_.

[41] The word is in this instance synonymous with outlaw.

[42] A corps levied within a few years by the government and employed on police duty, concurrently with the gendarmerie.

[43] The uniform of the voltigeurs consisted of a brown coat with a yellow collar.

[44] A leather girdle used as cartridge-box and as wallet.

The Venus of Ille

Ἰλεὼς ἣν δ' ἐγὼ, ἔστω ὁ ἀνδρίας
Καὶ ἤπιος, οὔτως ἀνδρεῖος ὢν.

ΛΟΥΚΙΑΝΟΥ ΦΙΛΟΨΕΥΔΗΣ.

I was descending the last slope of Canigou, and, although the sun had already set, I could distinguish in the plain below the houses of the little town of Ille, for which I was bound.

“You know,” I said to the Catalan who had been acting as my guide since the preceding day, “you know, doubtless, where Monsieur de Peyrehorade lives?”

“Do I know!” he cried; “why, I know his house as well as I do my own; and if it wasn’t so dark, I’d show it to you. It’s the finest house in Ille. He has money, you know, has Monsieur de Peyrehorade; and his son is going to marry a girl that’s richer than himself.”

“Is the marriage to take place soon?” I asked.

“Soon! It may be that the fiddles are already ordered for the wedding. To-night, perhaps, or to-morrow, or the day after, for all I know! It’s to be at Puygarrig; for it’s Mademoiselle de Puygarrig that the young gentleman is going to marry.”

I had a letter of introduction to M. de Peyrehorade from my friend M. de P. He was, so my friend had told me, a very learned antiquarian, and good-natured and obliging to the last degree. He would take pleasure in showing me all the ruins within a radius of ten leagues. Now, I relied upon him to accompany me about the country near Ille, which I knew to be rich in monuments of ancient times and of the Middle Ages. This marriage, of which I now heard for the first time, might upset all my plans.

“I shall be an interloper,” I said to myself.

But I was expected; as my arrival had been announced by M. de P., I must needs present myself.

“I’ll bet you, monsieur,” said my guide, as we reached the foot of the mountain, “I’ll bet you a cigar that I can guess what you are going to do at Monsieur de Peyrehorade’s.”

“Why, that is not very hard to guess,” I replied, offering him a cigar. “At this time of day, when one has walked six leagues over Canigou, the most urgent business is supper.”

“Yes, but to-morrow? Look you, I’ll bet that you have come to Ille to see the idol! I guessed that when I saw you drawing pictures of the saints at Serrabona.”

“The idol! what idol?” The word had aroused my curiosity.

“What! didn’t any one at Perpignan tell you how Monsieur de Peyrehorade had found an idol in the ground?”

“You mean a terra-cotta, or clay statue, don’t you?”

“No, indeed! I mean a copper one, and it’s big enough to make a lot of big sous. It weighs as much as a church bell. It was way down in the ground, at the foot of an olive tree, that we found it.”

“So you were present at the discovery, were you?”

“Yes, monsieur. Monsieur de Peyrehorade told us a fortnight ago, Jean Coll and me, to dig up an old olive tree that got frozen last year--for it was a very hard winter, you know. So, while we were at work, Jean Coll, who was going at it with all his might, dug his pick into the dirt, and I heard a _bimm_--just as if he’d struck a bell.--‘What’s that?’ says I. We kept on digging and digging, and first a black hand showed; it looked like a dead man’s hand sticking out of the ground. For my part, I was scared. I goes to monsieur, and I says to him: ‘Dead men under the olive tree, master. You’d better call the curé.’

“‘What dead men?’ he says.

“He went with me, and he’d no sooner seen the hand than he sings out: ‘An antique! an antique!’ You’d have thought he had found a treasure. And to work he went with the pick and with his hands, and did as much as both of us together, you might say.”

“Well, what did you find?”

“A tall black woman more than half naked, saving your presence, monsieur, of solid copper; and Monsieur de Peyrehorade told us that it was an idol of heathen times--of the time of Charlemagne!”

“I see what it is: a bronze Blessed Virgin from some dismantled convent.”

“A Blessed Virgin! oh, yes! I should have recognised it if it had been a Blessed Virgin. It’s an idol, I tell you; you can see that from its expression. It fastens its great white eyes on you; you’d think it was trying to stare you out of countenance. Why, you actually lower your eyes when you look at it.”

“White eyes? They are incrusted on the bronze, no doubt. It may be some Roman statue.”

“Roman! that’s it. Monsieur de Peyrehorade says she’s a Roman.--Ah! I see that you’re a scholar like him.”

“Is it whole, well preserved?”

“Oh! it’s all there, monsieur. It’s even handsomer and finished better than the plaster-of-Paris bust of Louis Philippe at the mayor’s office. But for all that, I can’t get over the idol’s face. It has a wicked look--and she is wicked, too.”

“Wicked! what harm has she done you?”

“None to me exactly; but I’ll tell you. We had got down on all fours to stand her up, and Monsieur de Peyrehorade, he was pulling on the rope, too, although he hasn’t any more strength than a chicken, the excellent man! With a good deal of trouble we got her on her feet. I was picking up a piece of stone to wedge her, when, _patatras!_ down she went again, all in a heap. ‘Stand from under!’ says I. But I was too late, for Jean Coll didn’t have time to pull out his leg.”

“And he was hurt?”

“His poor leg broken off short like a stick! _Pécaïre!_ when I saw that, I was furious. I wanted to smash the idol with my pickaxe, but Monsieur de Peyrehorade held me back. He gave Jean Coll some money, but he’s been in bed all the same ever since it happened, a fortnight ago, and the doctor says he’ll never walk with that leg like the other. It’s a pity, for he was our best runner, and next to monsieur’s son, the best tennis player. I tell you, it made Monsieur Alphonse de Peyrehorade feel bad, for Coll always played with him. It was fine to see how they’d send the balls back at each other. Paf! paf! They never touched the ground.”

Chatting thus we entered Ille, and I soon found myself in M. de Peyrehorade’s presence. He was a little old man, still hale and active, with powdered hair, a red nose, and a jovial, bantering air. Before opening M. de P.’s letter, he installed himself in front of a bountifully spread table, and introduced me to his wife and son as an illustrious archæologist, who was destined to rescue Roussillon from the oblivion in which the indifference of scholars had thus far left it.

While eating with a hearty appetite--for nothing is more conducive thereto than the keen mountain air--I examined my hosts. I have already said a word or two of M. de Peyrehorade; I must add that he was vivacity personified. He talked, ate, rose from his chair, ran to his library, brought books to me, showed me prints, filled my glass; he was never at rest for two minutes in succession. His wife, who was a trifle too stout, like all the Catalan women after they have passed forty, impressed me as a typical provincial, who had no interests outside of her household. Although the supper was ample for at least six persons, she ran to the kitchen, ordered pigeons killed, all sorts of things fried, and opened Heaven knows how many jars of preserves. In an instant the table was laden with dishes and bottles, and I should certainly have died of indigestion if I had even tasted everything that was offered me. And yet, with every new dish that I declined, there were renewed apologies. She was afraid that I would find myself very badly off at Ille. One had so few resources in the provinces, and Parisians were so hard to please!

Amid all the goings and comings of his parents, M. Alphonse de Peyrehorade sat as motionless as the god Terminus. He was a tall young man of twenty-six, with a handsome and regular face, which however lacked expression. His figure and his athletic proportions fully justified the reputation of an indefatigable tennis player which he enjoyed throughout the province. On this evening he was dressed in the height of fashion, exactly in accordance with the engraving in the last number of the _Journal des Modes_. But he seemed ill at ease in his clothes; he was as stiff as a picket in his velvet stock, and moved his whole body when he turned. His rough, sunburned hands and short nails formed a striking contrast to his costume. They were the hands of a ploughman emerging from the sleeves of a dandy. Furthermore, although he scrutinised me with interest from head to foot, I being a Parisian, he spoke to me but once during the evening, and that was to ask me where I bought my watch chain.

“Look you, my dear guest,” said M. de Peyrehorade, as the supper drew to a close, “you belong to me, you are in my house; I shall not let you go until you have seen everything of interest that we have in our mountains. You must learn to know our Roussillon, and you must do her justice. You have no suspicion of all that we are going to show you: Phœnician, Celtic, Roman, Arabian, Byzantine monuments--you shall see them all, from the cedar to the hyssop. I will take you everywhere, and I will not let you off from a single brick.”

A paroxysm of coughing compelled him to pause. I seized the opportunity to say that I should be distressed to incommode him at a season so fraught with interest to his family. If he would simply give me the benefit of his excellent advice as to the excursions it would be well for me to make, I could easily, without putting him to the trouble of accompanying me----

“Ah! you refer to this boy’s marriage,” he exclaimed, interrupting me. “That’s a mere trifle--it will take place day after to-morrow. You must attend the wedding with us, _en famille_, as the bride is in mourning for an aunt whose property she inherits. So there are to be no festivities, no ball. It is too bad, for you might have seen our Catalan girls dance. They are very pretty, and perhaps you would have felt inclined to follow my Alphonse’s example. One marriage, they say, leads to others.--Saturday, when the young people are married, I shall be free, and we will take the field. I ask your pardon for subjecting you to the ennui of a provincial wedding. For a Parisian, sated with parties of all sorts--and a wedding without a ball, at that! However, you will see a bride--a bride--you must tell me what you think of her. But you are a serious man, and you don’t look at women any more. I have something better than that to show you. I will show you something worth seeing! I have a famous surprise in store for you to-morrow.”

“Mon Dieu!” said I, “it is difficult to keep a treasure in one’s house without the public knowing all about it. I fancy that I can divine the surprise that you have in store for me. But if you refer to your statue, the description of it that my guide gave me has served simply to arouse my curiosity and to predispose me to admiration.”

“Ah! so he spoke to you about the idol--for that is what they call my beautiful Venus Tur--but I will tell you nothing now. You shall see her to-morrow, by daylight, and tell me whether I am justified in considering her a _chef-d’œuvre_. Parbleu! you could not have arrived more opportunely! There are some inscriptions which I, poor ignoramus that I am, interpret after my manner. But a scholar from Paris! It may be that you will make fun of my interpretation--for I have written a memoir--I, who speak to you, an old provincial antiquary, have made a start; I propose to make the printing-presses groan. If you would kindly read and correct me, I might hope. For example, I am very curious to know how you will translate this inscription on the pedestal: CAVE--but I won’t ask you anything yet. Until to-morrow! until to-morrow! Not a word about the Venus to-day!”

“You are quite right, Peyrehorade,” said his wife, “to let your old idol rest. You must see that you are keeping monsieur from eating. Bah! monsieur has seen much finer statues than yours in Paris. There are dozens of them at the Tuileries, and bronze ones, too.”

“There you have the ignorance, the blessed ignorance of the provinces!” interrupted M. de Peyrehorade. “Think of comparing an admirable antique to Coustou’s insipid figures!

“‘With what irreverence
Doth my good wife speak of the gods!’

Would you believe that my wife wanted me to melt my statue and make it into a bell for our church! She would have been the donor, you see. A _chef-d’œuvre_ of Myron, monsieur!”

“_Chef-d’œuvre! chef-d’œuvre!_ a pretty _chef-d’œuvre_ she made! to break a man’s leg!”

“Look you, my wife,” said M. de Peyrehorade in a determined tone, extending his right leg encased in a stocking of Chinese silk, in her direction, “if my Venus had broken this leg, I should not regret it.”

“Gracious Heaven! how can you say that, Peyrehorade? Luckily the man is getting better. Still, I can’t make up my mind to look at the statue that causes such accidents as that. Poor Jean Coll!”

“Wounded by Venus, monsieur,” said M. de Peyrehorade, with a chuckle, “wounded by Venus, the clown complains:

“‘Veneris nec præmia noris.’

“Who has not been wounded by Venus?”

M. Alphonse, who understood French better than Latin, winked with a knowing look, and glanced at me as if to ask:

“And you, Monsieur le Parisien, do you understand?”

The supper came to an end. I had eaten nothing for the last hour. I was tired and I could not succeed in dissembling the frequent yawns which escaped me. Madame de Peyrehorade was the first to notice my plight and observed that it was time to go to bed. Thereupon began a new series of apologies for the wretched accommodations I was to have. I should not be as comfortable as I was in Paris. One is so badly off in the provinces! I must be indulgent for the Roussillonnais. In vain did I protest that after a journey in the mountains a sheaf of straw would be a luxurious bed for me--she continued to beg me to excuse unfortunate country folk if they did not treat me as well as they would have liked to do. I went upstairs at last to the room allotted to me, escorted by M. de Peyrehorade. The staircase, the upper stairs of which were of wood, ended in the centre of a corridor upon which several rooms opened.

“At the right,” said my host, “is the apartment which I intend to give to Madame Alphonse that is to be. Your room is at the end of the opposite corridor. You know,” he added, with an expression meant to be sly, “you know we must put a newly married couple all by themselves. You are at one end of the house and they at the other.”

We entered a handsomely furnished room, in which the first object that caught my eye was a bed seven feet long, six feet wide, and so high that one had to use a stool to climb to the top. My host, having pointed out the location of the bell, having assured himself that the sugarbowl was full, and that the bottles of cologne had been duly placed on the dressing-table, and having asked me several times if I had everything that I wanted, wished me a good-night and left me alone.

The windows were closed. Before undressing I opened one of them to breathe the fresh night air, always delicious after a long supper. In front of me was Canigou, beautiful to look at always, but that evening, it seemed to me the most beautiful mountain in the world, lighted as it was by a brilliant moon. I stood for some minutes gazing at its wonderful silhouette, and was on the point of closing my window when, as I lowered my eyes, I saw the statue on a pedestal some forty yards from the house. It was placed at the corner of a quickset hedge which separated a small garden from a large square of perfectly smooth turf, which, as I learned later, was the tennis-court of the town. This tract, which belonged to M. de Peyrehorade, had been ceded by him to the commune, at his son’s urgent solicitation.

I was so far from the statue that I could not distinguish its attitude and could only guess at its height, which seemed to be about six feet. At that moment two young scamps from the town walked across the tennis-court, quite near the hedge, whistling the pretty Roussillon air, _Montagnes Régalades_. They stopped to look at the statue, and one of them apostrophised it in a loud voice. He spoke Catalan; but I had been long enough in Roussillon to understand pretty nearly what he said.

“So there you are, hussy! (The Catalan term was much more forcible.) So there you are!” he said. “So it was you who broke Jean Coll’s leg! If you belonged to me, I’d break your neck!”

“Bah! with what?” said the other. “She’s made of copper, and it’s so hard that Étienne broke his file, trying to file it. It’s copper of the heathen times, and it’s harder than I don’t know what.”

“If I had my cold-chisel”--it seemed that he was a locksmith’s apprentice--“I’d soon dig out her big white eyes, as easy as I’d take an almond out of its shell. They’d make more than a hundred sous in silver.”

They walked away a few steps.

“I must bid the idol good-night,” said the taller of the two, suddenly stopping again.

He stooped, and, I suppose, picked up a stone. I saw him raise his arm and throw something, and instantly there was a ringing blow on the bronze. At the same moment the apprentice put his hand to his head, with a sharp cry of pain.

“She threw it back at me!” he exclaimed.

And my two rascals fled at the top of their speed. It was evident that the stone had rebounded from the metal, and had punished the fellow for his affront to the goddess.

I closed my window, laughing heartily.

“Still another vandal chastised by Venus!” I thought. “May all the destroyers of our ancient monuments have their heads broken thus!”

And with that charitable prayer, I fell asleep.

It was broad daylight when I woke. Beside my bed were, on one side, M. de Peyrehorade in his _robe-de-chambre_; on the other a servant, sent by his wife, with a cup of chocolate in his hand.

“Come, up with you, Parisian! This is just like you sluggards from the capital!” said my host, while I hastily dressed myself. “It is eight o’clock, and you are still in bed! I have been up since six. This is the third time I have come upstairs; I came to your door on tiptoe; not a sound, not a sign of life. It will injure you to sleep too much at your age. And you haven’t seen my Venus yet! Come, drink this cup of Barcelona chocolate quickly. Genuine contraband, such chocolate as you don’t get in Paris. You must lay up some strength, for, when you once stand in front of my Venus, I shall not be able to tear you away from her.”

In five minutes I was ready--that is to say, half shaved, my clothes half buttoned, and my throat scalded by the chocolate, which I had swallowed boiling hot. I went down into the garden and found myself before a really beautiful statue.

It was, in truth, a Venus, and wonderfully lovely. The upper part of the body was nude, as the ancients ordinarily represented the great divinities; the right hand, raised as high as the breast, was turned with the palm inward, the thumb and first two fingers extended, the other two slightly bent. The other hand was near the hip and held the drapery that covered the lower part of the body. The pose of the statue recalled that of the Morra Player, usually known, I know not why, by the name of Germanicus. Perhaps the sculptor intended to represent the goddess playing the game of morra.

However that may be, it is impossible to imagine anything more perfect than the body of that Venus; anything more harmonious, more voluptuous than her outlines, anything more graceful and more dignified than her drapery. I expected to see some work of the later Empire; I saw a _chef-d’œuvre_ of the best period of statuary. What especially struck me was the exquisite verisimilitude of the forms, which one might have believed to have been moulded from nature, if nature ever produced such flawless models.

The hair, which was brushed back from the forehead, seemed to have been gilded formerly. The head, which was small, like those of almost all Greek statues, was bent slightly forward. As for the face, I shall never succeed in describing its peculiar character; it was of a type which in no wise resembled that of any antique statue that I can remember. It was not the tranquil, severe beauty of the Greek sculptors, who systematically imparted a majestic immobility to all the features. Here, on the contrary, I observed with surprise a clearly marked intention on the part of the artist to express mischievousness amounting almost to deviltry. All the features were slightly contracted; the eyes were a little oblique, the corners of the mouth raised, the nostrils a little dilated. Disdain, irony, cruelty could be read upon that face, which none the less was inconceivably lovely. In truth, the more one looked at that marvellous statue, the more distressed one felt at the thought that such wonderful beauty could be conjoined to utter absence of sensibility.

“If the model ever existed,” I said to M. de Peyrehorade,--“and I doubt whether Heaven ever produced such a woman--how I pity her lovers! She must have delighted in driving them to death from despair. There is something downright savage in her expression, and yet I never have seen anything so beautiful!”

“’T is Venus all intent upon her prey!” quoted M. de Peyrehorade, delighted with my enthusiasm.

That expression of infernal irony was heightened perhaps by the contrast between the very brilliant silver eyes and the coating of blackish green with which time had overlaid the whole statue. Those gleaming eyes created a certain illusion which suggested reality, life. I remembered what my guide had said, that she made those who looked at her lower their eyes. That was almost true, and I could not help feeling angry with myself as I realised that I was perceptibly ill at ease before that bronze figure.

“Now that you have admired her in every detail, my dear colleague in antiquarian research,” said my host, “let us open a scientific conference, if you please. What do you say to this inscription, which you have not noticed as yet?”

He pointed to the base of the statue, and I read there these words:

CAVE AMANTEM.

“_Quid dicis, doctissime?_” (“What do you say, most learned of men?”) he asked, rubbing his hands. “Let us see if we shall agree as to the meaning of this _cave amantem_.”

“Why, there are two possible meanings,” I said. “It may be translated: ‘Beware of him who loves you--distrust lovers.’ But I am not sure that _cave amantem_ would be good Latin in that sense. In view of the lady’s diabolical expression, I should be inclined to believe rather that the artist meant to put the spectator on his guard against that terrible beauty. So that I should translate: ‘Look out for yourself if _she_ loves you.’”

“Humph!” ejaculated M. de Peyrehorade; “yes, that is a possible translation; but, with all respect, I prefer the first, which I will develop a little, however. You know who Venus’s lover was?”

“She had several.”

“Yes, but the first one was Vulcan. Did not the artist mean to say: ‘Despite all your beauty, and your scornful air, you shall have a blacksmith, a wretched cripple, for a lover’? A solemn lesson for coquettes, monsieur!”

I could not help smiling, the interpretation seemed to me so exceedingly far-fetched.

“The Latin is a terrible language, with its extraordinary conciseness,” I observed, to avoid contradicting my antiquary directly; and I stepped back a few steps, to obtain a better view of the statue.

“One moment, colleague!” said M. de Peyrehorade, seizing my arm, “you have not seen all. There is still another inscription. Stand on the pedestal and look at the right arm.”

As he spoke, he helped me to climb up.

I clung somewhat unceremoniously to the neck of the Venus, with whom I was beginning to feel on familiar terms. I even looked her in the eye for an instant, and I found her still more diabolical and still lovelier at close quarters. Then I saw that there were some letters, in what I took to be the antique cursive hand, engraved on the right arm. With the aid of a strong glass I spelled out what follows, M. de Peyrehorade repeating each word as I pronounced it, and expressing his approbation with voice and gesture. I read:

VENERI TVRBVL--

EVTYCHES MYRO

IMPERIO FECIT

After the word _tvrbvl_ in the first line several letters seemed to have become effaced, but _tvrbvl_ was perfectly legible.

“Which means?”--queried my host, with a beaming face, and winking maliciously, for he had a shrewd idea that I would not easily handle that _tvrbvl_.

“There is one word here which I do not understand as yet,” I said; “all the rest is simple. ‘Eutyches made this offering to Venus by her order.’”

“Excellent. But what do you make of _tvrbvl_? What is _tvrbvl_?”

“_Tvrbvl_ puzzles me a good deal. I have tried in vain to think of some known epithet of Venus to assist me. What would you say to _Turbulenta_? Venus, who disturbs, who excites--as you see, I am still engrossed by her evil expression. _Turbulenta_ is not a very inapt epithet for Venus,” I added modestly, for I was not very well satisfied myself with my explanation.

“Turbulent Venus! Venus the roisterer! Ah! so you think that my Venus is a wine-shop Venus, do you? Not by any means, monsieur; she is a Venus in good society. But I will explain this _tvrbvl_ to you. Of course you will promise not to divulge my discovery before my memoir is printed. You see, I am very proud of this find of mine. You must leave us poor devils in the provinces a few spears to glean. You are so rich, you Parisian scholars!”

From the top of the pedestal, whereon I was still perched, I solemnly promised him that I would never be guilty of the baseness of stealing his discovery.

“_Tvrbvl_--monsieur,” he said, coming nearer to me and lowering his voice, for fear that some other than myself might hear--“read _tvrbvlneræ_.”

“I don’t understand any better.”

“Listen. About a league from here, at the foot of the mountain, is a village called Boulternère. That name is a corruption of the Latin word _Turbulnera_. Nothing is more common than such inversions. Boulternère, monsieur, was a Roman city. I have always suspected as much, but I have never had a proof of it. Here is the proof. This Venus was the local divinity of the city of Boulternère; and this word Boulternère, whose antique origin I have just demonstrated, proves something even more interesting--namely, that Boulternère, before it became a Roman city, was a Phœnician city!”

He paused a moment to take breath and to enjoy my surprise. I succeeded in restraining a very strong inclination to laugh.

“It is a fact,” he continued, “_Turbulnera_ is pure Phœnician; _Tur_, pronounced _Tour_--_Tour_ and _Sour_ are the same word, are they not? _Sour_ is the Phœnician name of Tyre; I do not need to remind you of its meaning. _Bul_ is Baal; Bal, Bel, Bul--slight differences in pronunciation. As for _nera_--that gives me a little trouble. I am inclined to believe, failing to find a Phœnician word, that it comes from the Greek word νηρός, damp, swampy. In that case the word would be a hybrid. To justify my suggestion of νηρός, I will show you that at Boulternère the streams from the mountain form miasmatic pools. On the other hand, the termination _nera_ may have been added much later, in honour of Nera Pivesuvia, wife of Tetricus, who may have had some property in the city of Turbul. But on account of the pools I prefer the etymology from νηρός.”

And he took a pinch of snuff with a self-satisfied air.

“But let us leave the Phœnicians and return to the inscription. I translate then: ‘To Venus of Boulternère, Myron, at her command, dedicates this statue, his work.’”

I had no idea of criticising his etymology, but I did desire to exhibit some little penetration on my own part; so I said to him:

“Stop there a moment, monsieur. Myron dedicated something, but I see nothing to indicate that it was this statue.”

“What!” he cried, “was not Myron a famous Greek sculptor? The talent probably was handed down in the family; it was one of his descendants who executed this statue. Nothing can be more certain.”

“But,” I rejoined, “I see a little hole in the arm. I believe that it was made to fasten something to--a bracelet, perhaps, which this Myron presented to Venus as an expiatory offering.--Myron was an unsuccessful lover; Venus was irritated with him and he appeased her by consecrating a gold bracelet to her. Observe that _fecit_ is very often used in the sense of _consecravit_; they are synonymous terms. I could show you more than one example of what I say if I had Gruter or Orellius at hand. It would be quite natural for a lover to see Venus in a dream and to fancy that she ordered him to give a gold bracelet to her statue. So Myron consecrated a bracelet to her; then the barbarians, or some sacrilegious thief----”

“Ah! it is easy to see that you have written novels!” cried my host, giving me his hand to help me descend. “No, monsieur, it is a work of the school of Myron. Look at the workmanship simply and you will agree.”

Having made it a rule never to contradict outright an obstinate antiquarian, I hung my head with the air of one fully persuaded, saying:

“It’s an admirable thing.”

“Ah! mon Dieu!” cried M. de Peyrehorade; “still another piece of vandalism! Somebody must have thrown a stone at my statue!”

He had just discovered a white mark a little above Venus’s breast. I observed a similar mark across the fingers of the right hand, which I then supposed had been grazed by the stone; or else that a fragment of the stone had been broken off by the blow and had bounded against the hand. I told my host about the insult that I had witnessed, and the speedy retribution that had followed. He laughed heartily, and, comparing the apprentice to Diomedes, expressed a hope that, like the Grecian hero, he might see all his companions transformed into birds.

The breakfast bell interrupted this classical conversation, and I was again obliged, as on the preceding day, to eat for four. Then M. de Peyrehorade’s farmers appeared; and while he gave audience to them, his son took me to see a calèche which he had bought at Toulouse for his fiancée, and which I admired, it is needless to say. Then I went with him into the stable, where he kept me half an hour, boasting of his horses, giving me their genealogies, and telling me of the prizes they had won at various races in the province. At last he reached the subject of his future wife, by a natural transition from a gray mare he intended for her.

“We shall see her to-day,” he said. “I do not know whether you will think her pretty; but everybody here and at Perpignan considers her charming. The best thing about her is that she’s very rich. Her aunt at Prades left her all her property. Oh! I am going to be very happy.”

I was intensely disgusted to see a young man more touched by the dowry than by the _beaux yeux_ of his betrothed.

“You know something about jewels,” continued M. Alphonse; “what do you think of this one? This is the ring that I am going to give her to-morrow.”

As he spoke, he took from the first joint of his little finger a huge ring with many diamonds, made in the shape of two clasped hands; an allusion which seemed to me exceedingly poetical. The workmanship was very old, but I judged that it had been changed somewhat to allow the diamonds to be set. On the inside of the ring were these words in Gothic letters: _Sempr’ ab ti_; that is to say, “Always with thee.”

“It is a handsome ring,” I said, “but these diamonds have taken away something of its character.”

“Oh! it is much handsomer so,” he replied, with a smile. “There are twelve hundred francs’ worth of diamonds. My mother gave it to me. It was a very old family ring--of the times of chivalry. It belonged to my grandmother, who had it from hers. God knows when it was made.”

“The custom in Paris,” I said, “is to give a very simple ring, usually made of two different metals, as gold and platinum, for instance. See, that other ring, which you wear on this finger, would be most suitable. This one, with its diamonds and its hands in relief, is so big that one could not wear a glove over it.”

“Oh! Madame Alphonse may arrange that as she pleases. I fancy that she will be very glad to have it all the same. Twelve hundred francs on one’s finger is very pleasant. This little ring,” he added, glancing fatuously at the plain one which he wore, “was given me by a woman in Paris one Mardi Gras. Ah! how I did go it when I was in Paris two years ago! That’s the place where one enjoys one’s self!”

And he heaved a sigh of regret.

We were to dine that day at Puygarrig with the bride’s parents; we drove in the calèche to the château, about a league and a half from Ille. I was presented and made welcome as a friend of the family. I will say nothing of the dinner or of the conversation which followed it, and in which I took little part. M. Alphonse, seated beside his fiancée, said a word in her ear every quarter of an hour. As for her, she hardly raised her eyes, and whenever her future husband addressed her she blushed modestly, but replied without embarrassment.

Mademoiselle de Puygarrig was eighteen years of age; her supple and delicate figure formed a striking contrast to the bony frame of her athletic fiancé. She was not only lovely, but fascinating. I admired the perfect naturalness of all her replies; and her good-humoured air, which however was not exempt from a slight tinge of mischief, reminded me, in spite of myself, of my host’s Venus. As I made this comparison mentally, I asked myself whether the superiority in the matter of beauty which I could not choose but accord to the statue, did not consist in large measure in her tigress-like expression; for energy, even in evil passions, always arouses in us a certain surprise and a sort of involuntary admiration.

“What a pity,” I said to myself as we left Puygarrig, “that such an attractive person should be rich, and that her dowry should cause her to be sought in marriage by a man who is unworthy of her!”

On the way back to Ille, finding some difficulty in talking with Madame de Peyrehorade, whom, however, I thought it only courteous to address now and then, I exclaimed:

“You are very strong-minded here in Roussillon! To think of having a wedding on a Friday, madame! We are more superstitious in Paris; no one would dare to take a wife on that day.”

“Mon Dieu! don’t mention it,” said she; “if it had depended on me, they certainly would have chosen another day. But Peyrehorade would have it so, and I had to give way to him. It distresses me, however. Suppose anything should happen? There must surely be some reason for the superstition, for why else should every one be afraid of Friday?”

“Friday!” cried her husband; “Friday is Venus’s day! A splendid day for a wedding! You see, my dear colleague, I think of nothing but my Venus. On my honour, it was on her account that I chose a Friday. To-morrow, if you are willing, before the wedding, we will offer a little sacrifice to her; we will sacrifice two pigeons, if I can find any incense.”

“For shame, Peyrehorade!” his wife interposed, scandalised to the last degree. “Burn incense to an idol! That would be an abomination! What would people in the neighbourhood say about you?”

“At least,” said M. de Peyrehorade, “you will allow me to place a wreath of roses and lilies on her head:

“‘Manibus date lilia plenis.’

The charter, you see, monsieur, is an empty word; we have no freedom of worship!”

The order of ceremonies for the following day was thus arranged: everybody was to be fully dressed and ready at precisely ten o’clock. After taking a cup of chocolate, we were to drive to Puygarrig. The civil ceremony would take place at the mayor’s office of that village, and the religious ceremony in the chapel of the château. Then there would be a breakfast. After that, we were to pass the time as best we could until seven o’clock, when we were to return to Ille, to M. de Peyrehorade’s, where the two families were to sup together. The rest followed as a matter of course. Being unable to dance, the plan was to eat as much as possible.

At eight o’clock I was already seated in front of the Venus, pencil in hand, beginning for the twentieth time to draw the head of the statue, whose expression I was still absolutely unable to catch. M. de Peyrehorade hovered about me, gave me advice, and repeated his Phœnician etymologies; then he arranged some Bengal roses on the pedestal of the statue, and in a tragi-comic tone addressed supplications to it for the welfare of the couple who were to live under his roof. About nine o’clock he returned to the house to dress, and at the same time M. Alphonse appeared, encased in a tightly fitting new coat, white gloves, patent-leather shoes, and carved buttons, with a rose in his buttonhole.

“Will you paint my wife’s portrait?” he asked, leaning over my drawing; “she is pretty, too.”

At that moment a game of tennis began on the court I have mentioned, and it immediately attracted M. Alphonse’s attention. And I myself, being rather tired, and hopeless of being able to reproduce that diabolical face, soon left my drawing to watch the players. Among them were several Spanish muleteers who had arrived in the town the night before. There were Aragonese and Navarrese, almost all wonderfully skillful at the game. So that the men of Ille, although encouraged by the presence and counsels of M. Alphonse, were speedily beaten by these new champions. The native spectators were appalled. M. Alphonse glanced at his watch. It was only half after nine. His mother’s hair was not dressed. He no longer hesitated, but took off his coat, asked for a jacket, and challenged the Spaniards. I watched him, smiling at his eagerness, and a little surprised.

“I must uphold the honour of the province,” he said to me.

At that moment I considered him really handsome. He was thoroughly in earnest. His costume, which engrossed him so completely a moment before, was of no consequence. A few minutes earlier he was afraid to turn his head for fear of disarranging his cravat. Now, he paid no heed to his carefully curled locks, or to his beautifully laundered ruff. And his fiancée?--Faith, I believe that, if it had been necessary, he would have postponed the wedding. I saw him hastily put on a pair of sandals, turn back his sleeves, and with an air of confidence take his place at the head of the beaten side, like Cæsar rallying his legions at Dyrrhachium. I leaped over the hedge and found a convenient place in the shade of a plum-tree, where I could see both camps.

Contrary to general expectation, M. Alphonse missed the first ball; to be sure, it skimmed along the ground, driven with astounding force by an Aragonese who seemed to be the leader of the Spaniards.

He was a man of some forty years, thin and wiry, about six feet tall; and his olive skin was almost as dark as the bronze of the Venus.

M. Alphonse dashed his racquet to the ground in a passion.

“It was this infernal ring,” he cried: “it caught my finger and made me miss a sure ball!”

He removed the diamond ring, not without difficulty, and I stepped forward to take it; but he anticipated me, ran to the Venus, slipped the ring on her third finger, and resumed his position at the head of his townsmen.

He was pale, but calm and determined. Thereafter he did not make a single mistake, and the Spaniards were completely routed. The enthusiasm of the spectators was a fine spectacle; some shouted for joy again and again, and tossed their caps in the air; others shook his hands and called him an honour to the province. If he had repelled an invasion, I doubt whether he would have received more enthusiastic and more sincere congratulations. The chagrin of the defeated party added still more to the splendour of his victory.

“We will play again, my good fellow,” he said to the Aragonese in a lofty tone; “but I will give you points.”

I should have been glad if M. Alphonse had been more modest, and I was almost distressed by his rival’s humiliation. The Spanish giant felt the insult keenly. I saw him turn pale under his tanned skin. He glanced with a sullen expression at his racquet, and ground his teeth; then he muttered in a voice choked with rage:

“_Me lo pagarás!_”

M. de Peyrehorade’s appearance interrupted his son’s triumph. My host, greatly surprised not to find him superintending the harnessing of the new calèche, was much more surprised when he saw him drenched with perspiration, and with his racquet in his hand. M. Alphonse ran to the house, washed his face and hands, resumed his new coat and his patent-leather boots, and five minutes later we were driving rapidly toward Puygarrig. All the tennis players of the town and a great number of spectators followed us with joyous shouts. The stout horses that drew us could hardly keep in advance of those dauntless Catalans.

We had reached Puygarrig, and the procession was about to start for the mayor’s office, when M. Alphonse put his hand to his forehead and whispered to me:

“What a fool I am! I have forgotten the ring! It is on the Venus’s finger, the devil take her! For Heaven’s sake, don’t tell my mother. Perhaps she will not notice anything.”

“You might send some one to get it,” I said.

“No, no! my servant stayed at Ille, and I don’t trust these people here. Twelve hundred francs’ worth of diamonds! that might be too much of a temptation for more than one of them. Besides, what would they all think of my absent-mindedness? They would make too much fun of me. They would call me the statue’s husband.--However, I trust that no one will steal it. Luckily, all my knaves are afraid of the idol. They don’t dare go within arm’s length of it.--Bah! it’s no matter; I have another ring.”

The two ceremonies, civil and religious, were performed with suitable pomp, and Mademoiselle de Puygarrig received a ring that formerly belonged to a milliner’s girl at Paris, with no suspicion that her husband was bestowing upon her a pledge of love. Then we betook ourselves to the table, where we ate and drank, yes, and sang, all at great length. I sympathised with the bride amid the vulgar merriment that burst forth all about her; however, she put a better face on it than I could have hoped, and her embarrassment was neither awkwardness nor affectation. It may be that courage comes of itself with difficult situations.

The breakfast came to an end when God willed; it was four o’clock; the men went out to walk in the park, which was magnificent, or watched the peasant girls of Puygarrig, dressed in their gala costumes, dance on the lawn in front of the château. In this way, we passed several hours. Meanwhile the women were hovering eagerly about the bride, who showed them her wedding gifts. Then she changed her dress, and I observed that she had covered her lovely hair with a cap and a hat adorned with feathers; for there is nothing that wives are in such a hurry to do as to assume as soon as possible those articles of apparel which custom forbids them to wear when they are still unmarried.

It was nearly eight o’clock when we prepared to start for Ille. But before we started there was a pathetic scene. Mademoiselle de Puygarrig’s aunt, who had taken the place of a mother to her, a woman of a very advanced age and very religious, was not to go to the town with us. At our departure, she delivered a touching sermon to her niece on her duties as a wife, the result of which was a torrent of tears, and embraces without end. M. de Peyrehorade compared this separation to the abduction of the Sabine women.

We started at last, however, and on the road we all exerted ourselves to the utmost to divert the bride and make her laugh; but it was all to no purpose.

At Ille supper awaited us, and such a supper! If the vulgar hilarity of the morning had disgusted me, I was fairly sickened by the equivocal remarks and jests which were aimed at the groom, and especially at the bride. M. Alphonse, who had disappeared a moment before taking his place at the table, was as pale as death and as solemn as an iceberg. He kept drinking old Collioure wine, almost as strong as brandy. I was by his side and felt in duty bound to warn him.

“Take care! they say that this wine----”

I have no idea what foolish remark I made, to put myself in unison with the other guests.

He pressed my knee with his and said in a very low tone:

“When we leave the table, let me have a word with you.”

His solemn tone surprised me. I looked at him more closely and noticed the extraordinary change in his expression.

“Are you feeling ill?” I asked him.

“No.”

And he returned to his drinking.

Meanwhile, amid shouts and clapping of hands, a child of eleven years, who had slipped under the table, exhibited to the guests a dainty white and rose-coloured ribbon which he had taken from the bride’s ankle. They called that her garter. It was immediately cut into pieces and distributed among the young men, who decorated their buttonholes with them, according to an ancient custom still observed in some patriarchal families. This episode caused the bride to blush to the whites of her eyes. But her confusion reached its height when M. de Peyrehorade, having called for silence, sang some Catalan verses, impromptu, so he said. Their meaning, so far as I understood it, was this:

“Pray, what is this, my friends? Does the wine I have drunk make me see double? There are two Venuses here----”