Array The griffin classics - The Collected Works of Honore de Balzac

To be the unceasing spring of happiness for a man who knows it and adds gratitude to love, ah! dear one, this is a conviction which fortifies the soul, even more than the most passionate love can do. The force thus developed — at once impetuous and enduring, simple and diversified — brings forth ultimately the family, that noble product of womanhood, which I realize now in all its animating beauty.

The old father has ceased to be a miser. He gives blindly whatever I wish for. The servants are content; it seems as though the bliss of Louis had let a flood of sunshine into the household, where love has made me queen. Even the old man would not be a blot upon my pretty home, and has brought himself into line with all my improvements; to please me he has adopted the dress, and with the dress, the manners of the day.

We have English horses, a coupe, a barouche, and a tilbury. The livery of our servants is simple but in good taste. Of course we are looked on as spendthrifts. I apply all my intellect (I am speaking quite seriously) to managing my household with economy, and obtaining for it the maximum of pleasure with the minimum of cost.

I have already convinced Louis of the necessity of getting roads made, in order that he may earn the reputation of a man interested in the welfare of his district. I insist too on his studying a great deal. Before long I hope to see him a member of the Council General of the Department, through the influence of my family and his mother’s. I have told him plainly that I am ambitious, and that I was very well pleased his father should continue to look after the estate and practise economies, because I wished him to devote himself exclusively to politics. If we had children, I should like to see them all prosperous and with good State appointments. Under penalty, therefore, of forfeiting my esteem and affection, he must get himself chosen deputy for the department at the coming elections; my family would support his candidature, and we should then have the delight of spending all our winters in Paris. Ah! my love, by the ardor with which he embraced my plans, I can gauge the depth of his affection.

To conclude here is a letter he wrote me yesterday from Marseilles, where he had gone to spend a few hours:

“MY SWEET RENEE, — When you gave me permission to love you, I began

to believe in happiness; now, I see it unfolding endlessly before

me. The past is merely a dim memory, a shadowy background, without

which my present bliss would show less radiant. When I am with

you, love so transports me that I am powerless to express the

depth of my affection; I can but worship and admire. Only at a

distance does the power of speech return. You are supremely

beautiful, Renee, and your beauty is of the statuesque and regal

type, on which time leaves but little impression. No doubt the

love of husband and wife depends less on outward beauty than on

graces of character, which are yours also in perfection; still,

let me say that the certainty of having your unchanging beauty, on

which to feast my eyes, gives me a joy that grows with every

glance. There is a grace and dignity in the lines of your face,

expressive of the noble soul within, and breathing of purity

beneath the vivid coloring. The brilliance of your dark eyes, the

bold sweep of your forehead, declare a spirit of no common

elevation, sound and trustworthy in every relation, and well

braced to meet the storms of life, should such arise. The keynote

of your character is its freedom from all pettiness. You do not

need to be told all this; but I write it because I would have you

know that I appreciate the treasure I possess. Your favors to me,

however slight, will always make my happiness in the far-distant

future as now; for I am sensible how much dignity there is in our

promise to respect each other’s liberty. Our own impulse shall

with us alone dictate the expression of feeling. We shall be free

even in our fetters. I shall have the more pride in wooing you

again now that I know the reward you place on victory. You cannot

speak, breathe, act, or think, without adding to the admiration I

feel for your charm both of body and mind. There is in you a rare

combination of the ideal, the practical, and the bewitching which

satisfies alike judgment, a husband’s pride, desire, and hope, and

which extends the boundaries of love beyond those of life itself.

Oh! my loved one, may the genius of love remain faithful to me,

and the future be full of those delights by means of which you

have glorified all that surrounds me! I long for the day which

shall make you a mother, that I may see you content with the

fulness of your life, may hear you, in the sweet voice I love and

with the thoughts, bless the love which has refreshed my soul and

given new vigor to my powers, the love which is my pride, and

whence I have drawn, as from a magic fountain, fresh life. Yes, I

shall be all that you would have me. I shall take a leading part

in the public life of the district, and on you shall fall the rays

of a glory which will owe its existence to the desire of pleasing

you.”

So much for my pupil, dear! Do you suppose he could have written like this before? A year hence his style will have still further improved. Louis is now in his first transport; what I look forward to is the uniform and continuous sensation of content which ought to be the fruit of a happy marriage, when a man and woman, in perfect trust and mutual knowledge, have solved the problem of giving variety to the infinite. This is the task set before every true wife; the answer begins to dawn on me, and I shall not rest till I have made it mine.

You see that he fancies himself — vanity of men! — the chosen of my heart, just as though there were no legal bonds. Nevertheless, I have not yet got beyond that external attraction which gives us strength to put up with a good deal. Yet Louis is lovable; his temper is wonderfully even, and he performs, as a matter of course, acts on which most men would plume themselves. In short, if I do not love him, I shall find no difficulty in being good to him.

So here are my black hair and my black eyes — whose lashes act, according to you, like Venetian blinds — my commanding air, and my whole person, raised to the rank of sovereign power! Ten years hence, dear, why should we not both be laughing and gay in your Paris, whence I shall carry you off now and again to my beautiful oasis in Provence?

Oh! Louise, don’t spoil the splendid future which awaits us both! Don’t do the mad things with which you threaten me. My husband is a young man, prematurely old; why don’t you marry some young-hearted graybeard in the Chamber of Peers? There lies your vocation.

XIV. THE DUC DE SORIA TO THE BARON DE MACUMER MADRID.

MY DEAR BROTHER, — You did not make me Duc de Soria in order that my actions should belie the name. How could I tolerate my happiness if I knew you to be a wanderer, deprived of the comforts which wealth everywhere commands? Neither Marie nor I will consent to marry till we hear that you have accepted the money which Urraca will hand over to you. These two millions are the fruit of your own savings and Marie’s.

We have both prayed, kneeling before the same altar — and with what earnestness, God knows! — for your happiness. My dear brother, it cannot be that these prayers will remain unanswered. Heaven will send you the love which you seek, to be the consolation of your exile. Marie read your letter with tears, and is full of admiration for you. As for me, I consent, not for my own sake, but for that of the family. The King justified your expectations. Oh! that I might avenge you by letting him see himself, dwarfed before the scorn with which you flung him his toy, as you might toss a tiger its food.