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Page 1 of 21928 · PDF PAGE 12
II THE DESPAIR OF THE OLD WOMAN THE little shrivelled-up old woman felt her- self happy again in looking on the pretty child, to whom everyone was paying court, whom everyone was trying to please; a pretty crea- ture, as fragile as the little old woman herself, and like her, too, without teeth or hair. And she approached it, wooing it with baby-talk and pleasing faces. But the frightened baby struggled in the arms of the hag, and filled the house with its screams. Then the good old woman withdrew herself again into her eternal solitude, and wep…
1928 · PDF PAGE 8
CONTENTS I. THE STRANGER II. THE DESPAIR OF THE OLD WOMAN III. THE ARTISTS CONFESSION IV. A JESTER V. THE DOUBLE ROOM VI. EVERYONE HAS HIS CHIMERA VII. THE MADMAN AND THE VENUS VIII. THE DOG AND THE FLACK IX. THE BAD GLAZIER X. ONE OCLOCK IN THE MORNING XI. THE WILD WOMAN AND THE SPOILT DARLING XII. CROWDS XIII. WIDOWS XIV. THE OLD MOUNTEBANK XV. THE CAKE XVI. THE CLOCK XVII. A WORLD IN A MANE XVIII. WILL YOU COME WITH ME XIX. THE POOR MANS TOY XX. THE FAIRY GIFTS XXI. THE TEMPTATIONS: OR, LOVE RICHES AND GLORY XXII. THE TWILIGHT OF EVEN XXI…
1928 · PDF PAGE 131
… what passes behind the glass. In this black or shin- ing cavity life lives, life dreams, life suffers. Beyond the waves of roof I see a woman, middle-aged, already wrinkled, poor, always bending over something, who never goes out. With her face, her clothing, her gesture, almost nothing, I have re-constructed the story of this woman;or rather, her legend. And some- times I tell it to myself, and weep. If it had been a poor old man, I could have reconstructed his history just as easily. And I lie down to sleep, proud of having lived and suffer…
1928 · PDF PAGE 44
…to one of those concerts whose regimental music the people of Paris so enjoy. That was doubtless the little debauch of this innocent old woman, or shall I say of this puri- fied old woman; the well-earned consolation of one of these heavy, friendless days, conversa- tionless, joyless, bare of intimacy, these days which God let fall upon her since many days which God let fall upon her since many years may-be; three-hundred-and-sixty-five times in the year. And yet another. I can never prevent myself from casting a glance, if not wholly sympa- th…
1928 · PDF PAGE 37
…hape imi- tates, vaguely enough, your own. This monster is one of those animals which one generally calls My angel; that is to say, a woman. The other monster, he who, a stick in his hand, cries loud enough to break your head in, is a husband. He has put his lawful wife in irons like a wild animal, and he is showing her in the suburbs;on fair days, needless to say, with a licence from the magistrate. Pay close attention. See with what voracity (perhaps genuine) she tears to pieces the liv- ing rabbits and the cackling fowls which her keepe…
1928 · PDF PAGE 39
…am not the dupe that you would like to think; and if you weary me too often with your affected complainings I will treat you like a wild woman of the woods or throw you out of the window like an empty bottle.
1928 · PDF PAGE 186
…now, Satan, fount of soul- devouring harms, I went not there to shed vain tears in dolor- ous mood, But, like a shrewd old lecher in his womans arms, To drink deep of the lures of this lewd be- hemoth, Who keeps my youth aflame with necro- mantic charms. Whether past noon youre still in bed, asth- matic, wroth And torpid, or quitting the dim haunt you inhabit, You prance in trailing veils of evenings gold-spun cloth,
1928 · PDF PAGE 36
XI THE WILD WOMAN AND THE SPOILT DARLING REALLY, my dear, you tire me without measure or pity! One would say, to hear you sigh, that you suffered more than sixty-year- old gleaners, or the old beggar women who pick up broken crusts at the doors of dirty inns. If at least your sighs expressed remorse, they would do you some honour; but they only interpret your satiety of well-being, and that you are overwhelmed with rest; and then, you go on for ever spreading yourself in vain words: Love me well; I have so much need of it; console me here, c…
1928 · PDF PAGE 137
…And as my eyes remained fastened on the place wherein was buried my treasure, I saw (on a sudden) a little person who resembled the dead woman strangely; who, stamping on the fresh earth with a strange and hysterical violence, shouted with laughter, and said, I am the real Benedicta, and a rare bitch I am! and for the punishment of your folly and blind- ness you shall love me all the same. I, furi-
1928 · PDF PAGE 152
…te occupation of all of us, is it not? And he offered politely his hand to his be- loved, delicious, execrable wife, to the myste- rious woman to whom he owes so many pleas- ures, so many sorrows, and perhaps also a great part of his genius. Several balls struck far from the bulls-eye; one of them even buried itself in the ceiling. And as the charming creature laughed wildly, in mockery of her husbands bad shooting, he turned sharply towards her and said, You see that doll down there on the right with its nose in the air and so haughty an ex…
1928 · PDF PAGE 70
…Fairy, turning her back upon him, and rejoining her companions, she said to them, What do you think of this empty-headed little French- woman who wishes to understand everything; and who, having obtained for his son the best of all gifts, still dares to ask questions and to discuss the inscrutable?
1928 · PDF PAGE 89
…obliged to put aside copper after copper so as to buy the freedom of her little sister; who has all of eleven years and who is already a woman, and so beautiful. She will succeed, no doubt, this good Dorothy; the childs master is so miserly, too miserly to understand any other beauty than that of gold.
1928 · PDF PAGE 150
past. How many times did I not hold myself back from leaping at her throat and crying, Be imperfect then for once, wretched woman, that I may love you without discomfort and anger. For several years I admired her, my heart full of hatred. In the end it was not I who died of it. Ah, said the others, she died, then? Yes, it could not go on like that. Love had become for me a crushing nightmare; to con- quer or die, as the political phrase goes, was the alternative which Fate laid upon me. One evening in a wood by the shore of a mere, af- …
1928 · PDF PAGE 43
…e, or she who is quite alone? I do not know. . . . Once upon a time it happened to me that I fol- lowed during long hours a mournful old woman of this type; stiff, straight, under a little word- out shawl; she bore herself in all her being with stoical pride. She was evidently condemned by absolute solitude to the habits of a celibate of long standing, and the masculine character of her manners added something mysteriously pi- quant to their austerity. I do not know in what
1928 · PDF PAGE 88
… the fine sand, for Dorothy is so prodigiously coquettish that the pleasure of being admired is more to her than the pride of the freed- woman; and although she is free, she walks bare-foot. Thus she moves on, a harmony; happy in living, smiling an ivory smile as if she beheld afar off in space a mirror reflecting her move- ment and her beauty. At the hour when the very dogs groan with pain under the biting sun, what powerful mo- tive can have sent the idle Dorothy, beautiful and cold as bronze, upon her journeyings? Why has she left her coquet…
1928 · PDF PAGE 38
Such are the domestic matters of these de- scendants of Adam and Eve; these works of Thine hands, O my God! This woman is incon- testably unhappy, although after all perhaps the titillating pleasures of glory are not un- known to her. There are more irremediable misfortunes; there are misfortunes that have no compensation. But in the world into which she has been thrown she had never been able to believe that women could ever deserve an- other fate. Now, between ourselves, my affected dar- ling; to see the hells with which the world is crowde…
1928 · PDF PAGE 146
… to complain of but my- self. Happiness came to live with me, and I did not realize it. Destiny had lately granted me the enjoyment of a woman who was indeed the sweetest, the most submissive and the most devoted creature possible, always ready, and without enthusiasm!I should like it very much, if it is agreeable to you, was her ordi-
1928 · PDF PAGE 149
…f, nervous as I know you to be, you, G, easy-going and light-hearted as you are, K and J, if you had been harnessed with a certain woman that I knew, you would have either fled or died. I have survived, as you see. Imagine to yourself a person incapable of committing an error of sentiment or of calcula- tion. Imagine to yourselves a devastating se- renity of character, a devotion without comedy and without emphasis, a sweetness without weakness, an energy without violence. The his- tory of my love resembles an interminable voyage upon a p…
1928 · PDF PAGE 45
…s and calico, I saw a being whose nobil- ity made a startling contrast with all the sur- rounding triviality. It was a tall and majestic woman, so noble in her whole bearing that I do not remember to have ever seen her equal in the galleries of the aristocratic beauties of the past. A perfume of haughty virtue emanated from her whole per- son; her face, sad and thin, was perfectly in keeping with the full mourning in which she was dressed; she too, like the Plebs with which she had mingled, and which she did not see, she too gazed upon that gli…
1928 · PDF PAGE 164
are poor people who are able to send him nothing. That gave me confidence; after all, I am a beautiful woman, though not too young. I said to him, Come and see me; come and see me often, and do not worry yourself on my ac- count, I have no need of money. But you must understand that I made clear to him in a hun- dred different ways. I did not say it to him crudely; I was so afraid of shaming him; I should like him to come and see me with his case of instruments and his apron; even with a little blood on them. She said that frankly and sensib…