The Jealousies of a Country Town - Honoré de Balzac (read full novel .TXT) 📗

died one of the last representatives of that great and beautiful thing, Service; giving to that often discredited word its original meaning, the relation between feudal lord and servitor. That relation, only to be found in some out-of-the-way province, or among a few old servants of the King, did honor alike to a noblesse that could call forth such affection, and to a bourgeoisie that could conceive it. Such noble and magnificent devotion is no longer possible among us. Noble houses have no servitors left; even as France has no longer a King, nor an hereditary peerage, nor lands that are bound irrevocably to an historic house, that the glorious names of the nation may be perpetuated. Chesnel was not merely one of the obscure great men of private life; he was something more--he was a great fact. In his sustained self-devotion is there not something indefinably solemn and sublime, something that rises above the one beneficent deed, or the heroic height which is reached by a moment's supreme effort? Chesnel's virtues belong essentially to the classes which stand between the poverty of the people on the one hand, and the greatness of the aristocracy on the other; for these can combine homely burgher virtues with the heroic ideals of the noble, enlightening both by a solid education.

Victurnien was not well looked upon at Court; there was no more chance of a great match for him, nor a place. His Majesty steadily refused to raise the d'Esgrignons to the peerage, the one royal favor which could rescue Victurnien from his wretched position. It was impossible that he should marry a bourgeoise heiress in his father's lifetime, so he was bound to live on shabbily under the paternal roof with memories of his two years of splendor in Paris, and the lost love of a great lady to bear him company. He grew moody and depressed, vegetating at home with a careworn aunt and a half heart-broken father, who attributed his son's condition to a wasting malady. Chesnel was no longer there.

The Marquis died in 1830. The great d'Esgrignon, with a following of all the less infirm noblesse from the Collection of Antiquities, went to wait upon Charles X. at Nonancourt; he paid his respects to his sovereign, and swelled the meagre train of the fallen king. It was an act of courage which seems simple enough to-day, but, in that time of enthusiastic revolt, it was heroism.

"The Gaul has conquered!" These were the Marquis' last words.

By that time du Croisier's victory was complete. The new Marquis d'Esgrignon accepted Mlle. Duval as his wife a week after his old father's death. His bride brought him three millions of francs for du Croisier and his wife settled the reversion of their fortunes upon her in the marriage-contract. Du Croisier took occasion to say during the ceremony that the d'Esgrignon family was the most honorable of all the ancient houses in France.

Some day the present Marquis d'Esgrignon will have an income of more than a hundred thousand crowns. You may see him in Paris, for he comes to town every winter and leads a jolly bachelor life, while he treats his wife with something more than the indifference of the grand seigneur of olden times; he takes no thought whatever for her.

"As for Mlle. d'Esgrignon," said Emile Blondet, to whom all the detail of the story is due, "if she is no longer like the divinely fair woman whom I saw by glimpses in my childhood, she is decidedly, at the age of sixty-seven, the most pathetic and interesting figure in the Collection of Antiquities. She queens it among them still. I saw her when I made my last journey to my native place in search of the necessary papers for my marriage. When my father knew who it was that I had married, he was struck dumb with amazement; he had not a word to say until I told him that I was a prefect.

"'You were born to it,' he said, with a smile.

"As I took a walk around the town, I met Mlle. Armande. She looked taller than ever. I looked at her, and thought of Marius among the ruins of Carthage. Had she not outlived her creed, and the beliefs that had been destroyed? She is a sad and silent woman, with nothing of her old beauty left except the eyes, that shine with an unearthly light. I watched her on her way to mass, with her book in her hand, and could not help thinking that she prayed to God to take her out of the world."


LES JARDIES, July 1837.


ADDENDUM

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

Note: The Old Maid is a companion piece to The Collection of Antiquities. In other Addendum appearances they are combined under the title of The Jealousies of a Country Town.

Blondet (Judge)
Beatrix

Blondet, Emile
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
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
The Secrets of a Princess
The Peasantry
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
Another Study of Woman
The Member for Arcis
A Daughter of Eve

Bousquier, Du (or Du Croisier or Du Bourguier)
The Old Maid
The Middle Classes

Bousquier, Madame du (or du Croisier)
The Old Maid

Camusot de Marville
Cousin Pons
The Commission in Lunacy
Scenes from a Cuortesan's Life

Camusot de Marville, Madame
The Vendetta
Cesar Birotteau
Scenes from a Courtesan's Life
Cousin Pons

Cardot (Parisian notary)
The Muse of the Department
A Man of Business
Pierre Grassou
The Middle Classes
Cousin Pons

Casteran, De
The Chouans
The Seamy Side of History
The Old Maid
Beatrix
The Peasantry

Chesnel (or Choisnel)
The Seamy Side of History
The Old Maid

Coudrai, Du
The Old Maid

Esgrignon, Charles-Marie-Victor-Ange-Carol, Marquis d' (or Des Grignons)
The Chouans
The Old Maid

Esgrignon, Victurnien, Comte (then Marquis d')
Letters of Two Brides
A Man of Business
The Secrets of a Princess
Cousin Betty

Esgrignon, Marie-Armande-Claire d'
The Old Maid

Herouville, Duc d'
The Hated Son
Modeste Mignon
Cousin Betty

Lenoncourt, Duc de
The Lily of the Valley
Cesar Birotteau
The Old Maid
The Gondreville Mystery
Beatrix

Leroi, Pierre
The Chouans
The Seamy Side of History

Marsay, Henri de
The Thirteen
The Unconscious Humorists
Another Study of Woman
The Lily of the Valley
Father Goriot
Ursule Mirouet
A Marriage Settlement
Lost Illusions
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
Letters of Two Brides
The Ball at Sceaux
Modest Mignon
The Secrets of a Princess
The Gondreville Mystery
A Daughter of Eve

Maufrigneuse, Duchesse de
The Secrets of a Princess
Modeste Mignon
The Muse of the Department
Scenes from a Courtesan's Life
Letters of Two Brides
Another Study of Woman
The Gondreville Mystery
The Member for Arcis

Michu, Francois
The Gondreville Mystery
The Member for Arcis

Pamiers, Vidame de
The Thirteen

Ronceret, Du
The Old Maid
Beatrix

Ronceret, Madame du
The Old Maid

Ronceret, Fabien-Felicien du (or Duronceret)
Beatrix
Gaudissart II

Scherbelloff, Princesse (or Scherbellof or Sherbelloff)
The Peasantry

Thirion
The Vendetta
Cesar Birotteau

Troisville, Guibelin, Vicomte de
The Seamy Side of History
The Chouans
The Old Maid
The Peasantry

Valois, Chevalier de
The Chouans
The Old Maid

Verneuil, Duc de
The Chouans
The Old Maid

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Publication Date: 07-21-2010

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