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The Collection of Antiquities-Part8_Honore de Balzac(1799-1850)_Translated Works(翻译文学)-第2页

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temperament, yet smitten with a terrible weakness at its core.

By the time the old town lay several miles away, Victurnien felt not



the slightest regret; he thought no more about the father, who had

loved ten generations in his son, nor of the aunt, and her almost



insanedevotion. He was looking forward to Paris with vehement ill-

starred longings; in thought he had lived in that fairyland, it had



been the background of his brightest dreams. He imagined that he would

be first in Paris, as he had been in the town and the department where



his father's name was potent; but it was vanity, not pride, that

filled his soul, and in his dreams his pleasures were to be magnified



by all the greatness of Paris. The distance was soon crossed. The

traveling coach, like his own thoughts, left the narrow horizon of the



province for the vast world of the great city, without a break in the

journey. He stayed in the Rue de Richelieu, in a handsome hotel close



to the boulevard, and hastened to take possession of Paris as a

famished horse rushes into a meadow.



He was not long in finding out the difference between country and

town, and was rather surprised than abashed by the change. His mental



quickness soon discovered how small an entity he was in the midst of

this all-comprehending Babylon; how insane it would be to attempt to



stem the torrent of new ideas and new ways. A single incident was

enough. He delivered his father's letter of introduction to the Duc de



Lenoncourt, a noble who stood high in favor with the King. He saw the

duke in his splendid mansion, among surroundings befitting his rank.



Next day he met him again. This time the Peer of France was lounging

on foot along the boulevard, just like any ordinary mortal, with an



umbrella in his hand; he did not even wear the Blue Ribbon, without

which no knight of the order could have appeared in public in other



times. And, duke and peer and first gentleman of the bedchamber though

he was, M. de Lenoncourt, in spite of his high courtesy, could not



repress a smile as he read his relative's letter; and that smile told

Victurnien that the Collection of Antiquities and the Tuileries were



separated by more than sixty leagues of road; the distance of several

centuries lay between them.



The names of the families grouped about the throne are quite different

in each successive reign, and the characters change with the names. It



would seem that, in the sphere of court, the same thing happens over

and over again in each generation; but each time there is a quite



different set of personages. If history did not prove that this is so,

it would seem incredible. The prominent men at the court of Louis



XVIII., for instance, had scarcely any connection with the Rivieres,

Blacas, d'Avarays, Vitrolles, d'Autichamps, Pasquiers,



Larochejaqueleins, Decazes, Dambrays, Laines, de Villeles, La

Bourdonnayes, and others who shone at the court of Louis XV. Compare



the courtiers of Henri IV. with those of Louis XIV.; you will hardly

find five great families of the former time still in existence. The



nephew of the great Richelieu was a very insignificant person at the

court of Louis XIV.; while His Majesty's favorite, Villeroi, was the



grandson of a secretary ennobled by Charles IX. And so it befell that

the d'Esgrignons, all but princes under the Valois, and all-powerful



in the time of Henri IV., had no fortune whatever at the court of

Louis XVIII., which gave them not so much as a thought. At this day



there are names as famous as those of royal houses--the Foix-Graillys,

for instance, or the d'Herouvilles--left to obscurity tantamount to



extinction for want of money, the one power of the time.

All which things Victurnien beheld entirely from his own point of



view; he felt the equality that he saw in Paris as a personal wrong.

The monster Equality was swallowing down the last fragments of social



distinction in the Restoration. Having made up his mind on this head,

he immediately proceeded to try to win back his place with such



dangerous, if blunted weapons, as the age left to the noblesse. It is

an expensive matter to gain the attention of Paris. To this end,



Victurnien adopted some of the ways then in vogue. He felt that it was

a necessity to have horses and fine carriages, and all the accessories



of modern luxury; he felt, in short, "that a man must keep abreast of

the times," as de Marsay said--de Marsay, the first dandy that he came



across in the first drawing-room to which he was introduced. For his




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