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The Lily of the Valley-Part4_Honore de Balzac(1799-1850)_Translated Works(翻译文学)-第2页

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did go there lately to the ball given to the Duc d'Angouleme, who was

very gracious to her husband."



"It was she!" I exclaimed.

"She! who?"



"A woman with beautiful shoulders."

"You will meet a great many women with beautiful shoulders in



Touraine," he said, laughing. "But if you are not tired we can cross

the river and call at Clochegourde and you shall renew acquaintance



with those particular shoulders."

I agreed, not without a blush of shame and pleasure. About four



o'clock we reached the little chateau on which my eyes had fastened

from the first. The building, which is finelyeffective in the



landscape, is in reality very modest. It has five windows on the

front; those at each end of the facade, looking south, project about



twelve feet,--an architecturaldevice which gives the idea of two

towers and adds grace to the structure. The middle window serves as a



door from which you descend through a double portico into a terraced

garden which joins the narrow strip of grass-land that skirts the



Indre along its whole course. Though this meadow is separated from the

lower terrace, which is shaded by a double line of acacias and



Japanese ailanthus, by the country road, it nevertheless appears from

the house to be a part of the garden, for the road is sunken and



hemmed in on one side by the terrace, on the other side by a Norman

hedge. The terraces being very well managed put enough distance



between the house and the river to avoid the inconvenience of too

great proximity to water, without losing the charms of it. Below the



house are the stables, coach-house, green-houses, and kitchen, the

various openings to which form an arcade. The roof is charmingly



rounded at the angles, and bears mansarde windows with carved mullions

and leaden finials on their gables. This roof, no doubt much neglected



during the Revolution, is stained by a sort of mildew produced by

lichens and the reddish moss which grows on houses exposed to the sun.



The glass door of the portico is surmounted by a little tower which

holds the bell, and on which is carved the escutcheon of the Blamont-



Chauvry family, to which Madame de Mortsauf belonged, as follows:

Gules, a pale vair, flanked quarterly by two hands clasped or, and two



lances in chevron sable. The motto, "Voyez tous, nul ne touche!"

struck me greatly. The supporters, a griffin and dragon gules,



enchained or, made a pretty effect in the carving. The Revolution has

damaged the ducal crown and the crest, which was a palm-tree vert with



fruit or. Senart, the secretary of the committee of public safety was

bailiff of Sache before 1781, which explains this destruction.



These arrangements give an elegant air to the little castle, dainty as

a flower, which seems to scarcely rest upon the earth. Seen from the



valley the ground-floor appears to be the first story; but on the

other side it is on a level with a broad gravelled path leading to a



grass-plot, on which are several flower-beds. To right and left are

vineyards, orchards, and a few acres of tilled land planted with



chestnut-trees which surround the house, the ground falling rapidly to

the Indre, where other groups of trees of variegated shades of green,



chosen by Nature herself, are spread along the shore. I admired these

groups, so charmingly disposed, as we mounted the hilly road which



borders Clochegourde; I breathed an atmosphere of happiness. Has the

moral nature, like the physical nature, its own electrical



communications and its rapid changes of temperature? My heart was

beating at the approach of events then unrevealed which were to change



it forever, just as animals grow livelier when foreseeing fine

weather.



This day, so marked in my life, lacked no circumstance that was needed

to solemnize it. Nature was adorned like a woman to meet her lover. My



soul heard her voice for the first time; my eyes worshipped her, as

fruitful, as varied as my imagination had pictured her in those



school-dreams the influence of which I have tried in a few unskilful

words to explain to you, for they were to me an Apocalypse in which my



life was figuratively foretold; each event, fortunate or unfortunate,

being mated to some one of these strange visions by ties known only to



the soul.

We crossed a court-yard surrounded by buildings necessary for the farm



work,--a barn, a wine-press, cow-sheds, and stables. Warned by the




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