"She has ended like the Empire."
Another of Balzac's literary friends was Madame Laure Junot, the Duchesse d'Abrantes. She was an intimate friend of Madame de Girardin and it was in the salon of the latter's mother, Madame Sophie Gay, that Balzac met her.
The Duchesse d'Abrantes, widow of Marechal Junot, had enjoyed under the Empire all the splendors of official life. Her salon had been one of the most attractive of her epoch. Being in reduced circumstances after the downfall of the Empire and having four children (Josephine, Constance, Napoleon and Alfred) to support, her life was a constant struggle to obtain a fortune and a position for her children. But as she had no financial ability, and had acquired very extravagant habits, the money she was constantly seeking no sooner entered her hands than it vanished. Wishing to renounce none of her former luxuries, she insisted upon keeping her salon as in former days, trying to conceal her poverty by her gaiety; but it was a sorrowful case of la misere doree.
Feeling that luxury was as indispensable to her as bread, and finding her financial embarrassment on the increase, she decided to support herself by means of her pen. She might well have recalled the wise words of Madame de Tencin when she warned Marmontel to beware of depending on the pen, since nothing is more casual. The man who makes shoes is sure of his pay; the man who writes a book or a play is never sure of anything.
Though the Generale Junot belonged to a society far different from Balzac's they had many things in common which brought him frequently to her salon. Balzac realized the necessity of frequenting the salon, saying that the first requisite of a novelist is to be well-bred; he must move in society as much as possible and converse with the aristocratic monde. The kitchen, the green-room, can be imagined, but not the salon; it is necessary to go there in order to know how to speak and act there.
Though Balzac visited various salons, he presented a different appearance in the drawing-room of Madame d'Abrantes. The glories of the Empire overexcited him to the point of giving to his relations with the Duchesse a vivacity akin to passion. The first evening, he exclaimed: "This woman has seen Napoleon as a child, she has seen him occupied with the ordinary things of life, then she has seen him develop, rise and cover the world with his name! She is for me a saint come to sit beside me, after having lived in heaven with God!" This love of Balzac for Napoleon underwent more than one variation, but at this time he had erected in his home in the rue de Cassini a little altar surmounted by a statue of Napoleon, with this inscription: "What he began with the sword, I shall achieve with the pen."
When Balzac first met the Duchesse d'Abrantes, she was about forty years of age. It is probably she whom he describes thus, under the name of Madame d'Aiglemont, in La Femme de trente Ans:
"Madame d'Aiglemont's dress harmonized with the thought that
dominated her person. Her hair was gathered up into a tall coronet
of broad plaits, without ornament of any kind, for she seemed to
have bidden farewell forever to elaborate toilets. Nor were any of
the small arts of coquetry which spoil so many women to be
detected in her. Only her bodice, modest though it was, did not
altogether conceal the dainty grace of her figure. Then, too, the
luxury of her long gown consisted in an extremely distinguished
cut; and if it is permissible to look for expression in the
arrangement of materials, surely the numerous straight folds of
her dress invested her with a great dignity. Moreover, there may
have been some lingering trace of the indelible feminine foible in
the minute care bestowed upon her hand and foot; yet, if she
allowed them to be seen with some pleasure, it would have tasked
the utmost malice of a rival to discover any affectation in her
gestures, so natural did they seem, so much a part of old childish
habit, that her careless grace absolves this vestige of vanity.
All these little characteristics, the nameless trifles which
combine to make up the sum of a woman's beauty or ugliness, her
charm or lack of charm, can not be indicated, especially when the
soul is the bond of all the details and imprints on them a
delightful unity. Her manner was in perfect accord with her figure
and her dress. Only in certain women at a certain age is it given
to put language into their attitude. Is it sorrow, is it happiness
that gives to the woman of thirty, to the happy or unhappy woman,
the secret of this eloquence of carriage? This will always be an
enigma which each interprets by the aid of his hopes, desires, or
theories. The way in which she leaned both elbows on the arm of
her chair, the toying of her inter-clasped fingers, the curve of
her throat, the freedom of her languid but lithesome body which
reclined in graceful exhaustion, the unconstraint of her limbs,
the carelessness of her pose, the utter lassitude of her
movements, all revealed a woman without interest in life. . . ."
Balzac's parents having moved from Villeparisis to Versailles, he had an excellent opportunity of seeing the Duchess while visiting them, as she was living at that time in the Grand-Rue de Montreuil No. 65, in a pavilion which she called her ermitage. In La Femme de trente Ans, Balzac has described her retreat as a country house between the church and the barrier of Montreuil, on the road which leads to the Avenue de Saint-Cloud. This house, built originally for the short-lived loves of some great lord, was situated so that the owner could enjoy all the pleasures of solitude with the city almost at his gates.
Soon after their meeting, a sympathetic friendship was formed between the two writers; they had the same literary aspirations, the same love for work, the same love of luxury and extravagant tastes, the same struggles with poverty and the same trials and disappointments.
Since Balzac was attracted to beautiful names as well as to beautiful women, that of the Duchesse d'Abrantes appealed to him, independently of the wealth of history it recalled. He was happy to make the acquaintance of one who could give him precise information of the details of the Directoire and of the Empire, an instruction begun by the commere Gay. Thus the Duchesse d'Abrantes was to exercise over him, though in a less degree, the same influence for the comprehension of the Imperial world that Madame de Berry did for the Royalist world, just as the Duchesse de Castries later was to initiate him into the society of the Faubourg Saint-Germain.
Madame d'Abrantes, pleased as she was to meet literary people, welcomed most cordially the young author who came to her seeking stories of the Corsican. Owing to financial difficulties she was leading a rather retired and melancholy life, and the brilliant and colorful language of Balzac, fifteen years her junior, aroused her heart from its torpor, and her friendship for him took a peculiar tinge of sentiment which she allowed to increase. It had been many years since she had been thus moved, and this new feeling, which came to her as she saw the twilight of her days approaching, was for her a love that meant youth and life itself.
Hence her words pierced the very soul of Balzac and kindled an enthusiasm which made her appear to him greater than she really was; she literally dazzled and subjugated him. Her gaiety and animation in relating incidents of the Imperial court, and her autumnal sunshine, its rays still glowing with warmth as well as brightness, compelled Balzac to perceive for the second time in his life the insatiability of the woman who has passed her first youth—the woman of thirty, or the tender woman of forty. The fact is, however, not that Balzac created la femme sensible de guarante ans, as is stated by Philarete Chasles, so much as that two women of forty, Madame de Berny and Madame d'Abrantes, created him.
This affection savored of vanity in both; she was proud that at her years she could inspire love in a man so much younger than herself, while Balzac, whose affection was more of the head than of the heart, was flattered—it must be confessed—in having made the conquest of a duchess. Concealing her wrinkles and troubles under an adorable smile, no woman was better adapted than she to understand "the man who bathed in a marble tub, had no chairs on which to sit or to seat his friends, and who built at Meudon a very beautiful house without a flight of stairs."[1]
But the love on Balzac's side must have been rather fleeting, for many years later, on March 17, 1850, he wrote to his old friend, Madame Carraud, announcing his marriage with Madame Hanska: "Three days ago I married the only woman I have ever loved." Evidently he had forgotten, among others, the poor Duchess, who had passed away twelve years before.
But how could Balzac remain long her ardent lover, when Madame de Berny, of whom Madame d'Abrantes was jealous, felt that he was leaving her for a duchess? And how could he remain more than a friend to Madame Junot, when the beautiful Duchesse de Castries was for a short time complete mistress of his heart,[2] and was in her turn to be replaced by Madame Hanska? The Duchess could probably understand his inconstancy, for she not only knew of his attachment to Madame de Castries but he wrote her on his return from his first visit to Madame Hanska at Neufchatel, describing the journey and saying that the Val de Travers seemed made for two lovers.
Knowing Balzac's complicated life, one can understand how, having gone to Corsica in quest of his Eldorado just before the poor Duchess breathed her last, he could write to Madame Hanska on his return to Paris: "The newspapers have told you of the deplorable end of the poor Duchesse d'Abrantes. She has ended like the Empire. Some day I will explain her to you,—some good evening at Wierzschownia."
Balzac wished to keep his visits to Madame d'Abrantes a secret from his sister, Madame Surville, and some obscurity and a "mysterious pavilion" is connected with their manner of communication. For a while she visited him frequently in his den. He enjoyed her society, and though oppressed by work, was quite ready to fix upon an evening when they could be alone.
It was not without pain that she saw his affection for her becoming less ardent while hers remained fervent. She wrote him tender letters inviting him to dine with her, or to meet some of her friends, assuring him that in her ermitage he might feel perfectly at home, and that she regarded him as one of the most excellent friends Heaven had preserved for her.
"Heaven grant that you are telling me the truth, and that indeed I
may always be for you a good and sincere friend. . . . My dear
Honore, every one tells me that you no longer care for me. . . . I
say that they lie. . . . You are not only my friend, but my
sincere and good friend. I have kept for you a profound affection,
and this affection is of a nature that does not change. . . . Here
is Catherine, here is my first work. I am sending it to you, and
it is the heart of a friend that offers it to you. May it be the
heart of a friend that receives it! . . . My soul is oppressed on
account of this, but it is false, I hope."
Balzac continued to visit her occasionally, and there exists a curious specimen of his handwriting written (October, 1835) in the album of her daughter, Madame Aubert. He sympathized with the unfortunate Duchess who, raised to so high a rank, had fallen so low, and tried to cheer her in his letters:
"You say you are ill and suffering, and without any hope that finer
weather will do you any good. Remember that for the soul there
arises every day a fresh springtime and a beautiful fresh morning.
Your past life has no words to express it in any language, but it
is scarcely a recollection, and you cannot judge what your future
life will be by that which is past. How many have begun to lead a
fresh, lovely, and peaceful life at a much more advanced age than
yours! We exist only in our souls. You cannot be sure that your
soul has come to its highest development, nor whether you receive
the breath of life through all your pores, nor whether as yet you
see with all your eyes."
Being quite a linguist, Madame d'Abrantes began her literary career by translations from the Portuguese, Spanish and Italian, and by writing novels, in the construction of which, Balzac advised her. As she had no business ability, he was of great assistance to her also in arranging for the publication of her work:
"In the name of yourself, I entreat you, do not enter into any
engagement with anybody whatsoever; do not make any promise, and
say that you have entrusted your business to me on account of my
knowledge of business matters of this kind, and of my unalterable
attachment to yourself personally. I believe I have found what I
may call living money, seventy thousand healthy francs, and some
people, who will jump out of themselves, to dispose in a short
time of 'three thousand d'Abrantes,' as they say in their slang.
Besides, I see daylight for a third and larger edition. If
Mamifere (Mame) does not behave well, say to him, 'My dear sir, M.
de Balzac has my business in his charge still as he had on the day
he presented you to me; you must feel he has the priority over the
preference you ask for.' This done, wait for me. I shall make you
laugh when I tell you what I have concocted. If Everat appears
again, tell him that I have been your attorney for a long time
past in these affairs, when they are worth the trouble; one or two
volumes are nothing. But twelve or thirteen thsousand francs, oh!
oh! ah! ah! things must not be endangered. Only manoeuver
cleverly, and, with that finesse which distinguishes Madame the
Ambassadress, endeavor to find out from Mame how many volumes he
still has on hand, and see if he will be able to oppose the new
edition by slackness of sale or excessive price.
"Your entirely devoted."
(H. DE BALZAC.)
Such assistance was naturally much appreciated by a woman so utterly ignorant of business matters. But if Balzac aided the Duchess, he caused her publishers much annoyance, and more than once he received a sharp letter rebuking him for interfering with the affairs of Madame d'Abrantes.
It was doubtless due to the suggestion of Balzac that Madame d'Abrantes wrote her Memoires. He was so thrilled by her vivid accounts of recent history, that he was seized with the idea that she had it in her power to do for a brilliant epoch what Madame Roland attempted to do for one of grief and glory. He felt that she had witnessed such an extraordinary multiplicity of scenes, had known a remarkable number of heroic figures and great characters, and that nature had endowed her with unusual gifts.
A few years before her death, La Femme abandonnee was dedicated:
"To her Grace the Duchesse d'Abrantes,
"from her devoted servant,
"HONORE DE BALZAC."
If such was the role played by Balzac in the life of Madame d'Abrantes, how is she reflected in the Comedie humaine?
It is a well known fact that Balzac not only borrowed names from living people, but that he portrayed the features, incidents and peculiarities of those with whom he was closely associated. In the Avant-propos de la Comedie humaine, he writes: "In composing types by putting together traits of homogeneous natures, I might perhaps attain to the writing of that history forgotten by so many historians,—the history of manners."
In fact, he too might have said: "I take my property wherever I find it;" accordingly one would naturally look for characteristics of Madame d'Abrantes in his earlier works.
According to M. Joseph Turquain, Mademoiselle des Touches, in Beatrix, generally understood to be George Sand, has also some of the characteristics of Madame d'Abrantes. Balzac describes Mademoiselle des Touches as being past forty and un peu homme, which reminds one that the Countess Dash describes Madame d'Abrantes as being rather masculine, with an organe de rogome, and a virago when past forty. Calyste became enamored of Beatrix after having loved Mademoiselle des Touches, while Balzac became infatuated with Madame de Castries after having been in love with Madame d'Abrantes, in each case, the blonde after the brunette.
Mademoiselle Josephine, the elder and beloved daughter of Madame d'Abrantes, entered the Convent of the Sisters of Charity of Saint-Vincent de Paul, contrary to the desires of her mother. In writing to the Duchess (1831), Balzac asks that Sister Josephine may not forget him in her prayers, for he is remembering her in his books. Balzac may have had her in mind a few years later when he said of Mademoiselle de Mortsauf in Le Lys dans la Vallee: "The girl's clear sight had, though only of late, seen to the bottom of her mother's heart. . . ." for Mademoiselle Josephine entered the convent for various reasons, one being in order to relieve the financial strain and make marriage possible for her younger sister, another perhaps being to atone for the secret she probably suspected in the heart of her mother, and which she felt was not complimentary to the memory of her father. And also, in La Recherche de l'Absolu: "There comes a moment, in the inner life of families, when the children become, either voluntarily or involuntarily, the judges of their parents."
In writing the introduction to the Physiologie du Mariage, Balzac states that here he is merely the humble secretary of two women. He is doubtless referring to Madame d'Abrantes as one of the two when he says:
"Some days later the author found himself in the company of two
ladies. The first had been one of the most humane and most
intellectual women of the court of Napoleon. Having attained a
high social position, the Restoration surprised her and caused her
downfall; she had become a hermit. The other, young, beautiful,
was playing at that time, in Paris, the role of a fashionable
woman. They were friends, for the one being forty years of age,
and the other twenty-two, their aspirations rarely caused their
vanity to appear on the same scene. 'Have you noticed, my dear,
that in general women love only fools?'—'What are you saying,
Duchess?'"
In La Femme abandonnee, Madame de Beauseant resembles the Duchess as portrayed in this description:
"All the courage of her house seemed to gleam from the great lady's
brilliant eyes, such courage as women use to repel audacity or
scorn, for they were full of tenderness and gentleness. The
outline of that little head, . . . the delicate, fine features,
the subtle curve of the lips, the mobile face itself, wore an
expression of delicate discretion, a faint semblance of irony
suggestive of craft and insolence. It would have been difficult to
refuse forgiveness to those two feminine failings in her in
thinking of her misfortunes, of the passion that had almost cost
her her life. Was it not an imposing spectacle (still further
magnified by reflection) to see in that vast, silent salon this
woman, separated from the entire world, who for three years had
lived in the depths of a little valley, far from the city, alone
with her memories of a brilliant, happy, ardent youth, once so
filled with fetes and constant homage, now given over to the
horrors of nothingness? The smile of this woman proclaimed a high
sense of her own value."
In the postscript to the Physiologie du Mariage, Balzac mentions a gesture of one of these "intellectual" women, who interrupts herself to touch one of her nostrils with the forefinger of her right hand in a coquettish manner. In La Femme abandonnee, Madame de Beauseant has the same gesture. Another gesture of Madame de Beauseant in La Femme abandonnee indicates that Balzac had in mind the Duchesse d'Abrantes: ". . . Then, with her other hand, she made a gesture as if to pull the bell-rope. The charming gesture, the gracious threat, no doubt, called up some sad thought, some memory of her happy life, of the time when she could be wholly charming and graceful, when the gladness of her heart justified every caprice, and gave one more charm to her slightest movement. The lines of her forehead gathered between her brows, and the expression of her face grew dark in the soft candle-light. . . ." The Duchesse d'Abrantes had on two occasions rung to dismiss her lovers, M. de Montrond and General Sebastiani. Balzac had doubtless heard her relate these incidents, and they are contained in the Journal intime, which she gave him.[4]
In La Femme abandonnee, Balzac describes Madame de Beauseant as having taken refuge in Normandy, "after a notoriety which women for the most part envy and condemn, especially when youth and beauty in some way excuse the transgression." Can it be that the novelist thus condones the fault of this noted character because he wishes to pardon the liaison of Madame d'Abrantes with the Comte de Metternich?
Is it then because so many traces of Madame d'Abrantes are found in La Femme abandonnee, and allusions are made to minute episodes known to them alone, that he dedicated it to her?
Was Balzac thinking of the Duchesse d'Abrantes when, in Un Grand Homme de Province a Paris, speaking of Lucien Chardon, who had just arrived in Paris at the beginning of the Restoration, he writes: "He met several of those women who will be spoken of in the history of the nineteenth century, whose wit, beauty and loves will be none the less celebrated than those of queens in times past."
In depicting Maxime de Trailles, the novelist perhaps had in mind M. de Montrond, about whom the Duchess had told him. Again, many characteristics of her son, Napoleon d'Abrantes, are seen in La Palferine, one of the characters of the Comedie humaine.
If Madame de Berny is Madame de Mortsauf in Le Lys dans la Vallee, Madame d'Abrantes has some traits of Lady Dudley, of whom Madame de Mortsauf was jealous. The Duchess gave him encouragement and confidence, and Balzac might have been thinking of her when he made the beautiful Lady Dudley say: "I alone have divined all that you were worth." After Balzac's affection for Madame de Berny was rekindled, Madame d'Abrantes, who was jealous of her, had a falling out with him.
It was probably Madame Junot who related to Balzac the story of the necklace of Madame Regnault de Saint-Jean d'Angely, to which allusion is made in his Physiologie du Mariage, also an anecdote which is told in the same book abut General Rapp, who had been an intimate friend of General Junot. At this time Balzac knew few women of the Empire; he did not frequent the home of the Countess Merlin until later. While Madame d'Abrantes was not a duchess by birth, Madame Gay was not a duchess at all, and Madame Hamelin still further removed from nobility.
It is doubtless to Madame d'Abrantes that he owes the subject of El Verdugo, which he places in the period of the war with Spain; to her also was due the information about the capture of Senator Clement de Ris, from which he writes Une tenebreuse Affaire.
M. Rene Martineau, in proving that Balzac got his ideas for Une tenebreuse Affaire from Madame d'Abrantes, states that this is all the more remarkable, since the personage of the senator is the only one which Balzac has kept just as he was, without changing his physiognomy in the novel. The senator was still living at the time Madame d'Abrantes wrote her account of the affair, his death not having occurred until 1827. In her Memoires, Madame d'Abrantes refers frequently to the kindness of the great Emperor, and it is doubtless to please her that Balzac, in the denouement of Une tenebreuse Affaire, has Napoleon pardon two out of the three condemned persons. Although the novelist may have heard of this affair during his sojourns in Touraine, it is evident that the origin of the lawsuit and the causes of the conduct of Fouche were revealed to him by Madame Junot.
Who better than Madame d'Abrantes could have given Balzac the background for the scene of Corsican hatred so vividly portrayed in La Vendetta? Balzac's preference for General Junot is noticeable when he wishes to mention some hero of the army of the Republic or of the Empire; the Duc and Duchesse d'Abrantes are included among the noted lodgers in Autre Etude de Femme. It is doubtless to please the Duchess that Balzac mentions also the Comte de Narbonne (Le Medecin de Campagne).
Impregnating his mind with the details of the Napoleonic reign, so vividly portrayed in Le Colonel Chabert, Le Medecin de Campagne, La Femme de trente Ans and others, she was probably the direct author of several observations regarding Napoleon that impress one as being strikingly true. Balzac read to her his stories of the Empire, and though she rarely wept, she melted into tears at the disaster of the Beresina, in the life of Napoleon related by a soldier in a barn.
The Generale Junot had a great influence over Balzac; she enlightened him also about women, painting them not as they should be, but as they are.[5]
During the last years of the life of Madame d'Abrantes, a somber tint spread over her gatherings, which gradually became less numerous. Her financial condition excited little sympathy, and her friends became estranged from her as the result of her poverty. Under her gaiety and in spite of her courage, this distress became more apparent with time. Her health became impaired; yet she continued to write when unable to sit up, so great was her need for money. From her high rank she had fallen to the depth of misery! When evicted from her poverty-stricken home by the bailiff, her maid at first conveyed her to a hospital in the rue de Chaillot, but there payment was demanded in advance. That being impossible, the poor Duchess, ill and abandoned by all her friends, was again cast into the street. Finally, a more charitable hospital in the rue des Batailles took her in. Thus, by ironical fate, the widow of the great Batailleur de Junot, who had done little else during the past fifteen years than battle for life, was destined to end her days in the rue des Batailles.
Footnotes edit
- ↑ This house, Les Jardies, was at Ville-d'Avray and not at Meudon.
- ↑ It is an interesting coincidence that the Duchess whose star was waning had been in love with the fascinating Austrian ambassador, Comte de Metternich, and the Duchess who was to take her place, was just recovering from an amorous disappointment in connection with his son when she met Balzac.
- ↑ M. Turquain states that Madame Hamelin is one of these women and that the Duchesse d'Abrantes in incontestably the other. For a different opinion, see the chapter on Madame Gay. The italics are the present writer's.
- ↑ Madame d'Abrantes presented several objects of a literary nature to Balzac, among others, a book of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, a few leaves of which he presented to Madame Hanska for her collection of autographs.
- ↑ M. Joseph Turquain states that when the correspondence of Madame d'Abrantes and Balzac, to which he has had access, is published, one will be able to determine exactly the role she has played in the formation of the talent of the writer, and in the development of his character. His admirable work has been very helpful in the preparation of this study of Madame d'Abrantes.