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The Illustrious Gaudissart-Part3_Honore de Balzac(1799-1850)_Translated Works(翻译文学)-第2页

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that little cricket Lamard to the big Bulot at the cafe, when he



told him the story.

"I leave to-morrow for Amboise. I shall do up Amboise in two days,



and I will write next from Tours, where I shall measure swords

with the inhabitants of that colorless region; colorless, I mean,



from the intellectual and speculative point of view. But, on the

word of a Gaudissart, they shall be toppled over, toppled down--



floored, I say.

"Adieu, my kitten. Love me always; be faithful; fidelity through



thick and thin is one of the attributes of the Free Woman. Who is

kissing you on the eyelids?



"Thy Felix Forever."

CHAPTER III



Five days later Gaudissart started from the Hotel des Faisans, at

which he had put up in Tours, and went to Vouvray, a rich and populous



district where the public mind seemed to him susceptible of

cultivation. Mounted upon his horse, he trotted along the embankment



thinking no more of his phrases than an actor thinks of his part which

he has played for a hundred times. It was thus that the illustrious



Gaudissart went his cheerful way, admiring the landscape, and little

dreaming that in the happy valleys of Vouvray his commercial



infallibility was about to perish.

Here a few remarks upon the public mind of Touraine are essential to



our story. The subtle, satirical, epigrammatic tale-telling spirit

stamped on every page of Rabelais is the faithful expression of the



Tourangian mind,--a mind polished and refined as it should be in a

land where the kings of France long held their court; ardent,



artistic, poetic, voluptuous, yet whose first impulses subside

quickly. The softness of the atmosphere, the beauty of the climate, a



certain ease of life and joviality of manners, smother before long the

sentiment of art, narrow the widest heart, and enervate the strongest



will. Transplant the Tourangian, and his fine qualities develop and

lead to great results, as we may see in many spheres of action: look



at Rabelais and Semblancay, Plantin the printer and Descartes,

Boucicault, the Napoleon of his day, and Pinaigrier, who painted most



of the colored glass in our cathedrals; also Verville and Courier. But

the Tourangian, distinguished though he may be in other regions, sits



in his own home like an Indian on his mat or a Turk on his divan. He

employs his wit in laughing at his neighbor and in making merry all



his days; and when at last he reaches the end of his life, he is still

a happy man. Touraine is like the Abbaye of Theleme, so vaunted in the



history of Gargantua. There we may find the complying sisterhoods of

that famous tale, and there the good cheer celebrated by Rabelais



reigns in glory.

As to the do-nothingness of that blessed land it is sublime and well



expressed in a certain popular legend: "Tourangian, are you hungry, do

you want some soup?" "Yes." "Bring your porringer." "Then I am not



hungry." Is it to the joys of the vineyard and the harmonious

loveliness of this garden land of France, is it to the peace and



tranquillity of a region where the step of an invader has never

trodden, that we owe the soft compliance of these unconstrained and



easy manners? To such questions no answer. Enter this Turkey of sunny

France, and you will stay there,--lazy, idle, happy. You may be as



ambitious as Napoleon, as poetic as Lord Byron, and yet a power

unknown, invisible, will compel you to bury your poetry within your



soul and turn your projects into dreams.

The illustrious Gaudissart was fated to encounter here in Vouvray one



of those indigenous jesters whose jests are not intolerable solely

because they have reached the perfection of the mocking art. Right or



wrong, the Tourangians are fond of inheriting from their parents.

Consequently the doctrines of Saint-Simon were especially hated and



villified among them. In Touraine hatred and villification take the

form of superbdisdain and witty maliciousness worthy of the land of



good stories and practical jokes,--a spirit which, alas! is yielding,

day by day, to that other spirit which Lord Byron has characterized as



"English cant."

For his sins, after getting down at the Soleil d'Or, an inn kept by a



former grenadier of the imperial guard named Mitouflet, married to a

rich widow, the illustrious traveller, after a brief consultation with






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