The Adventures of Gil Blas of Santillane, Alain René le Sage [most read books .txt] 📗

and the rigid propriety of her behaviour.

Far from taking after those little wanton vagrants, who are hey-go-mad after striplings, and give themselves up to the

fascinations of exterior appearance, she has a proper insight

into things, staid, ripe, and judicious: what she wants is the

bon� fide spirit and discretion of a man; a lover who has served

an apprenticeship to his trade, in preference to all the flashy

fellows of the modern school. This is but an epitome of the

panegyric, which the noble dupe Don Gonzales pronounced upon his

mistress. He burdened himself with the task of proving her a

compendium of all human perfection; but the lecture was little

calculated for the conviction of the hearer. I had attended an

experimental course among the actresses; and had always found

that the elderly candidates had been plucked in their amours.

Yet, as a matter of courtesy, it was impossible not to put on the

semblance of giving implicit credit to my master’s veracity; I

even added chivalry to courtesy, and threw down my glove on

Euphrasia’s penetration and the correctness of her taste. My

impudence went the length of asserting, that it was impossible

for her to have selected a better-provided crony. The grown-up

simpleton was not aware that I was fumigating his nostrils at the

expense of his addled brain; on the contrary, he bristled at my

praises; so true is it, that a flatterer may play what game he

likes against the pigeons of high life! They let you look over

their hand, and then wonder that you beat them.

 

The old crawler, having scribbled through his billet-doux,

restrained the luxuriance of a straggling hair or two with his

tweezers; then bathed his eyes in the nostrum of some perfumer to

give them a brilliancy which their natural gum would have

eclipsed. His ears were to be picked and washed, and his hands to

be cleansed from the effects of his other ablutions; and the

labours of the toilette were to be closed, by pencilling every

remaining hair in the disforested domain of his whiskers,

pericranium, and eyebrows. No old dowager, with a purse to buy a

second husband, ever took more pains to assure herself by the

cultivation of her charms, that the person and not the fortune

should be the object of attraction. The assassin stab of time was

parried by the quart and tierce of art. Just as he had done

making himself up, in came another old fogram of his

acquaintance, by name the Count of Asumar. This genius made no

secret of his grey locks; leant upon a stick, and seemed to plume

himself on his venerable age instead of wishing to appear in the

hey-day of his prime. Signor Pacheco, said he as he came in, I am

come to take potluck with you to-day. You are always welcome,

count, rejoined my master. No sooner said than done! they

embraced with a thousand grimaces, took their seats opposite to

one another, and began chatting till dinner was served.

 

Their conversation turned at first upon a bull-feast which had

taken place a few days before. They talked about the cavaliers,

and who among them had displayed most dexterity and vigour;

whereupon the old count, like another Nestor, whom present events

furnish with a topic of expatiating on the past, said with a

deep-drawn sigh: Alas! where will you meet with men now-a-days,

fit to hold a candle to my contemporaries? The public diversions

are a mere bauble, to what they were when I was a young man. I

could not help chuckling in my sleeve at my good lord of Asumar’s

whim; for he did not stop at the handywork of human invention.

Would you believe it? At table, when the fruit was brought in, at

the sight of some very fine peaches, this ungrateful consumer of

the earth’s produce exclaimed: In my time, the peaches were of a

much larger size than they are now; but nature sinks lower and

lower from day to day. If that is the case, said Don Gonzales

with a sneer, Adam’s hot house fruit must have been of a most

unwieldy circumference.

 

The Count of Asumar staid till quite evening with my master, who

had no sooner got rid of him, than he sallied forth with me in

his train. We went to Euphrasia’s, who lived within a stone’s

throw of our house, and found her lodged in a style of the first

elegance. She was tastefully dressed, and for the youthfulness of

her air might have been taken to be in her teens, though thirty

bonny summers at least had poured their harvests in her lap. She

had often been reckoned pretty, and her wit was exquisite.

Neither was she one of your brazen-faced jilts, with nothing but

flimsy balderdash in their talk, and a libertine forwardness in

their manners: here was modesty of carriage as well as propriety

of discourse; and she threw out her little sallies in the most

exquisite manner, without seeming to aspire beyond natural good

sense. Oh heaven! said I, is it possible that a creature of so

virtuous a stamp by nature should have abandoned herself to

vicious courses for a livelihood? I had taken it for granted,

that all women of light character carried the mark of the beast

upon their foreheads. It was a surprise therefore to see such

apparent rectitude of conduct; neither did it occur to me that

these hacks for all customers could go at any pace, and assume

the polish of well-bred society, to impose upon their cullies of

the higher ranks. What if a lively petulance should be the order

of the day? they are lively and petulant. Should modesty take its

turn in the round of fashion, nothing can exceed their outward

show of prudent and delicate reserve. They play the comedy of

love in many masks; and are the prude, the coquette, or the

virago, as they fall in with the quiz, the coxcomb, or the bully.

 

Don Gonzales was a gentleman and a man of taste; he could not

stomach those beauties who call a spade a spade. Such were not

for his market; the rites of Venus must be consummated in the

temple of Vesta. Euphrasia had got up her part accordingly, and

proved by her performance that there is no comedy like that of

real life. I left my master, like another Numa with his Egeria,

and went down into a hall, where whom should fortune throw in my

way but an old abigail, whom I had formerly known as maid-of-all-work to an actress? The recognition was mutual. So! well met once

more, Signor Gil Blas, said she. Then you have turned off

Arsenia, just as I have parted with Constance. Yes, truly,

answered I, it is a long while ago since I went away, and

exchanged her service for that of a very different lady. Neither

the theatre nor the people about it are to my taste. I gave

myself my own discharge, without condescending to the slightest

explanation with Arsenia. You were perfectly in the right,

replied the new-found abigail, called Beatrice. That was pretty

much my method of proceeding with Constance. One morning early, I

gave in my accounts with a very sulky air; she took them from me

in moody silence, and we parted in a sort of well-bred dudgeon.

 

I am quite delighted, said I, that we have met again, where we

need not be ashamed of our employers. Donna Euphrasia looks for

all the world like a woman of fashion, and I am much deceived if

she has not reputation too. You are too clear-sighted to be

deceived, answered the old appendage to sin. She is of a good

family; and as for her temper, I can assure you it is

unparalleled for evenness and sweetness. None of your termagant

mistresses, never to be pleased, but always grumbling and

scolding about everything, making the house ring with their

clack, and fretting poor servants to a thread, whose places, in

short, are a hell upon earth! I have not in all this time heard

her raise her voice on any occasion whatever. When things happen

not to be done exactly in her way, she sets them to rights

without any anger, nor does any of that bad language escape her

lips, of which some high-spirited ladies are so liberal. My

master, too, rejoined I, is very mild in his disposition; the

very milk of human kindness; and in this respect we are, between

ourselves, much better off than when we lived among the

actresses. A thousand times better, replied Beatrice; my life

used to be all bustle and distraction; but this place is an

actual hermitage. Not a creature darkens our doors but this

excellent Don Gonzales. You will be my only helpmate in my

solitude, and my lot is but too greatly blessed. For this long

time have I cherished an affection for you: and many a time and

oft have I begrudged that Laura the felicity of engrossing you

for her sweetheart; but in the end I hope to be even with her. If

I cannot boast of youth and beauty like hers, to balance the

account, I detest coquetry, and have all the constancy as well as

affection of a turtle-dove.

 

As honest Beatrice was one of those ladies who are obliged to

hawk their wares, and cheapen themselves for want of cheapeners

in the market, I was happily shielded from any temptation to

break the commandments. Nevertheless, it might not have been

prudent to let her see in what contempt her charms were held; for

which reason I forced my natural politeness so far, as to talk to

her in a style not to cut off all hope of my more serious

advances. I flattered myself then, that I had found favour in the

eyes of an old dresser to the stage: but pride was destined to

have a fall, even on so humble an occasion. The domestic

trickster did not sharpen her allurements, from any longing for

my pretty person; her design in subduing me to the little soft

god was to enlist me for the purposes of her mistress, to whom

she had sworn so passive an obedience, that she would have sold

her eternal self to the old chapman, who first set up the trade

of sin, rather than have disappointed her slightest wishes. My

vain conceit was sufficiently evident on the very next morning,

when I carried an Ovidian letter from my master to Euphrasia. The

lady gave me an affable

reception, and made a thousand pretty speeches, echoed from the

practised lips of her chambermaid. The expression of my

countenance was peculiarly interesting to the one: but that

within which passeth shew was the flattering theme of the other.

According to their account, the fortunate Don Gonzales had picked

up a treasure. In short, my praises ran so high, that I began to

think worse of myself than I had ever done in the whole course of

my life. Their motive was sufficiently obvious; but I was

determined to play at diamond cut diamond. The simper of a

simpleton is no bad countermine to the attack of a sharper. These

ladies under favour were of the latter description, and they soon

began to open their batteries.

 

Hark you, Gil Blas, said Euphrasia, fortune declares in your

favour if you do not balk her. Let us put our heads together, my

good friend. Don Gonzales is old, and a good deal shaken in

constitution; so that a very little fever, in the hands of a very

great doctor, would carry him to a better place. Let us take time

by the forelock, and ply our arts so busily as to secure to me

the largest slice of his effects. If I prosper, you