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The Magic Skin-Part12_Honore de Balzac(1799-1850)_Translated Works(翻译文学)-第2页

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be on the point of restoring to our house its ancient splendor.

"The Restoration, while it brought back considerable property to my



mother, was my father's ruin. He had formerly purchased several

estates abroad, conferred by the Emperor on his generals; and now for



ten years he struggled with liquidators, diplomatists, and Prussian

and Bavarian courts of law, over the disputed possession of these



unfortunate endowments. My father plunged me into the intricate

labyrinths of law proceedings on which our future depended. We might



be compelled to return the rents, as well as the proceeds arising from

sales of timber made during the years 1814 to 1817; in that case my



mother's property would have barely saved our credit. So it fell out

that the day on which my father in a fashion emancipated me, brought



me under a most galling yoke. I entered on a conflict like a

battlefield; I must work day and night; seek interviews with



statesmen, surprise their convictions, try to interest them in our

affairs, and gain them over, with their wives and servants, and their



very dogs; and all this abominable business had to take the form of

pretty speeches and polite attentions. Then I knew the mortifications



that had left their blighting traces on my father's face. For about a

year I led outwardly the life of a man of the world, but enormous



labors lay beneath the surface of gadding about, and eager efforts to

attach myself to influential kinsmen, or to people likely to be useful



to us. My relaxations were lawsuits, and memorials still furnished the

staple of my conversation. Hitherto my life had been blameless, from



the sheer impossibility of indulging the desires of youth; but now I

became my own master, and in dread of involving us both in ruin by



some piece of negligence, I did not dare to allow myself any pleasure

or expenditure.



"While we are young, and before the world has rubbed off the delicate

bloom from our sentiments, the freshness of our impressions, the noble



purity of conscience which will never allow us to palter with evil,

the sense of duty is very strong within us, the voice of honor clamors



within us, and we are open and straightforward. At that time I was all

these things. I wished to justify my father's confidence in me. But



lately I would have stolen a paltry sum from him, with secret delight;

but now that I shared the burden of his affairs, of his name and of



his house, I would secretly have given up my fortune and my hopes for

him, as I was sacrificing my pleasures, and even have been glad of the



sacrifice! So when M. de Villele exhumed, for our special benefit, an

imperial decreeconcerning forfeitures, and had ruined us, I



authorized the sale of my property, only retaining an island in the

middle of the Loire where my mother was buried. Perhaps arguments and



evasions, philosophical, philanthropic, and political considerations

would not fail me now, to hinder the perpetration of what my solicitor



termed a 'folly'; but at one-and-twenty, I repeat, we are all aglow

with generosity and affection. The tears that stood in my father's



eyes were to me the most splendid of fortunes, and the thought of

those tears has often soothed my sorrow. Ten months after he had paid



his creditors, my father died of grief; I was his idol, and he had

ruined me! The thought killed him. Towards the end of the autumn of



1826, at the age of twenty-two, I was the sole mourner at his

graveside--the grave of my father and my earliest friend. Not many



young men have found themselves alone with their thoughts as they

followed a hearse, or have seen themselves lost in crowded Paris, and



without money or prospects. Orphans rescued by public charity have at

any rate the future of the battlefield before them, and find a shelter



in some institution and a father in the government or in the procureur

du roi. I had nothing.



"Three months later, an agent made over to me eleven hundred and

twelve francs, the net proceeds of the winding up of my father's



affairs. Our creditors had driven us to sell our furniture. From my

childhood I had been used to set a high value on the articles of



luxury about us, and I could not help showing my astonishment at the

sight of this meagre balance.



" 'Oh, rococo, all of it!' said the auctioneer. A terrible word that

fell like a blight on the sacred memories of my childhood, and



dispelled my earliest illusions, the dearest of all. My entire fortune




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