1.F.3.4. THOLOMYES IS SO MERRY THAT HE SINGS A SPANISH DITTY
THAT day was composed of dawn, from one end to the
other. All nature seemed to be having a holiday, and to be
laughing. The flower-beds of Saint-Cloud perfumed the air;
the breath of the Seine rustled the leaves vaguely; the
branches gesticulated in the wind, bees pillaged the jasmines;
a whole bohemia of butterflies swooped down upon the yarrow,
the clover, and the sterile oats; in the august park of the King
of France there was a pack of vagabonds, the birds.
The four merry couples, mingled with the sun, the fields,
the flowers, the trees, were resplendent.
And in this community of Paradise, talking, singing, running,
dancing, chasing butterflies, plucking convolvulus,
wetting their pink, open-work stockings in the tall grass, fresh,
wild, without malice, all received, to some extent, the kisses of
all, with the exception of Fantine, who was hedged about
with that vague resistance of hers composed of dreaminess and
wildness, and who was in love. "You always have a queer
look about you," said Favourite to her.
Such things are joys. These passages of happy couples are
a profound appeal to life and nature, and make a caress and
light spring forth from everything. There was once a fairy
who created the fields and forests expressly for those in love, —
in that eternal hedge-school of lovers, which is forever beginning
anew, and which will last as long as there are hedges
and scholars. Hence the popularity of spring among thinkers.
The patrician and the knife-grinder, the duke and the peer,
the limb of the law, the courtiers and townspeople, as they
used to say in olden times, all are subjects of this fairy.
They
laugh and hunt, and there is in the air the brilliance of an
apotheosis — what a transfiguration effected by love! Notaries'
clerks are gods. And the little cries, the pursuits
through the grass, the waists embraced on the fly, those
jargons which are melodies, those adorations which burst
forth in the manner of pronouncing a syllable, those cherries
torn from one mouth by another, — all this blazes forth and
takes its place among the celestial glories. Beautiful women
waste themselves sweetly. They think that this will never
come to an end. Philosophers, poets, painters, observe these
ecstasies and know not what to make of it, so greatly are they
dazzled by it. The departure for Cythera! exclaims Watteau;
Lancret, the painter of plebeians, contemplates his bourgeois,
who have flitted away into the azure sky; Diderot stretches
out his arms to all these love idyls, and d'Urfe mingles druids
with them.
After breakfast the four couples went to what was then
called the King's Square to see a newly arrived plant from
India, whose name escapes our memory at this moment, and
which, at that epoch, was attracting all Paris to Saint-Cloud.
It was an odd and charming shrub with a long stem, whose
numerous branches, bristling and leafless and as fine as
threads, were covered with a million tiny white rosettes; this
gave the shrub the air of a head of hair studded with flowers.
There was always an admiring crowd about it.
After viewing the shrub, Tholomyes exclaimed, "I offer you
asses!" and having agreed upon a price with the owner of the
asses, they returned by way of Vanvres and Issy. At Issy an
incident occurred. The truly national park, at that time
owned by Bourguin the contractor, happened to be wide open.
They passed the gates, visited the manikin anchorite in his
grotto, tried the mysterious little effects of the famous cabinet
of mirrors, the wanton trap worthy of a satyr become a millionaire
or of Turcaret metamorphosed into a Priapus. They
had stoutly shaken the swing attached to the two chestnut-trees
celebrated by the Abbe de Bernis. As he swung these
beauties, one after the other, producing folds in the fluttering
skirts which Greuze would have found to his taste, amid peals
of laughter, the Toulousan Tholomyes, who was somewhat of
a Spaniard, Toulouse being the cousin of Tolosa, sang, to a
melancholy chant, the old ballad
gallega, probably inspired
by some lovely maid dashing in full flight upon a rope between
two trees: —
"Soy de Badajoz, "Badajoz is my home,
Amor me llama, And Love is my name;
Toda mi alma, To my eyes in flame,
Es en mi ojos, All my soul doth come;
Porque ensenas, For instruction meet
A tuas piernas. I receive at thy feet"
Fantine alone refused to swing.
"I don't like to have people put on airs like that," muttered
Favourite, with a good deal of acrimony.
After leaving the asses there was a fresh delight; they
crossed the Seine in a boat, and proceeding from Passy on
foot they reached the barrier of l'Etoile. They had been up
since five o'clock that morning, as the reader will remember;
but bah! there is no such thing as fatigue on Sunday, said
Favourite; on Sunday fatigue does not work.
About three o'clock the four couples, frightened at their
happiness, were sliding down the Russian mountains, a singular
edifice which then occupied the heights of Beaujon, and
whose undulating line was visible above the trees of the
Champs Elysees.
From time to time Favourite exclaimed: —
"And the surprise? I claim the surprise."
"Patience," replied Tholomyes.