Memoirs of Chateaubriand Volume II — Part II Book II 2

* At the time of my departure from France we had greatly blinded ourselves regarding Madame de Beaumont's condition; she cried much, and her will has proved that she believed herself to be condemned.

Nevertheless her friends, refraining from communicating their fears to one another, sought to console each other; they believed in the miraculous powers of the waters, to be perfected later by the Italian sun; they separated and took different roads; appointments were made in Rome.

Fragments written by Madame de Beaumont in Paris, at Mont-Dore, in Rome, and discovered among her papers, display her state of mind: "PARIS.

"For some years past my health has been perceptibly declining.

Symptoms which I thought to be the signal for departure have supervened before I am ready to depart.

The illusions increase as the illness progresses.

I have seen many examples of that singular weakness, and I perceive that they will avail me nothing.

Already I find myself taking remedies which are as irksome as they are insignificant, and I shall doubtless have no greater strength to protect myself against the cruel remedies with which they never fail to martyrize those condemned to die of consumption.

Like the others, I shall abandon myself to hope: to hope!

Can I, then, wish to live?

My past life has been a series of misfortunes, my present life is full of excitements and disturbances: peace of mind has fled from me for ever.

My death would be a momentary sorrow to a few, a boon to others, and the greatest of boons to myself.

"This 21st of Floréal, 10 May, is the anniversary of the death of my mother and brother: Je péris la dernière et la plus misérable[554]!

[Sidenote: Illness of madame de Beaumont.

] "Oh, why have I not the courage to die?

This illness, which I was almost weak enough to dread, has subsided, and perhaps I am condemned still to live long; it seems to me, nevertheless, that I would gladly die: Mes jours ne valent pas qu'il m'en coûte un soupir[555].

"None has more cause than I to complain of nature: by refusing me everything, it has given me the sense of all I lack.

At every moment I feel the weight of the complete mediocrity to which I am condemned.

I know that self-content and happiness are often the price of this mediocrity of which I complain so bitterly; but by not adding to it the gift of illusion, nature, in my case, has turned it into a torture.

I am like a fallen creature who cannot forget what he has lost, and who has not the force to recover it.

That absolute lack of illusion, and hence of enthusiasm, is the cause of my unhappiness in a thousand ways.

I judge myself as a stranger might do, and I see my friends as they are.

My only value lies in an extreme kindness of heart, which is not active enough to command appreciation, nor to be of any real use, and which loses all its charm owing to the impatience of my character: my suffering from the misfortunes of others is greater than my power to relieve them.

Nevertheless, I owe to it the few real joys that have occurred in my life; I owe to it especially my ignorance of envy, the common attribute of conscious mediocrity."

"MONT DORE.

"I had intended to enter into a few details concerning myself, but _ennui_ causes the pen to drop from my fingers.

"All the bitterness and painfulness of my position would change to happiness if I were sure that I had but a few months to live.

"Even if I had the strength myself to end my sorrows in the only possible way, I should not exert it: it would be defeating my own intention, showing the measure of my suffering, and leaving too grievous a wound in the heart which I have deemed worthy to sustain me in my trials.

"I 'beseech myself in tears' to take a step which is as rigorous as it is inevitable.

Charlotte Corday says that 'every act of self-sacrifice bestows more pleasure in the execution than it has cost pain in the conception;' but her death was near at hand, and I may still live long.

What will become of me?

Where can I hide?

What tomb shall I choose?

How can I shut out hope?

What power can block up the door?

"To go away in silence, to court oblivion, to bury myself for ever, that is the duty laid upon me which I hope to have the courage to fulfill.

If the cup is too bitter, once I am forgotten, nothing can compel me to empty it to the dregs, and who knows but my life may, after all, not be so long as I fear.

"If I had decided upon the place of my retirement, I believe I should be more calm; but the difficulty of the moment adds to the difficulties that arise from my weakness, and it requires something supernatural to act against one's self with vigour, to treat one's self as harshly as a violent and cruel enemy could do."

"ROME, 28 _October.

_ "During the past ten months I have never ceased to suffer.

During the last six, all the symptoms of consumption, and some in the last degree: I lack only the illusions, and maybe I have some!"

M.

Joubert, alarmed at this desire for death which was torturing Madame de Beaumont, addressed these words to her in his _Pensées_: "Love life and respect it, if not for its own sake, at least for that of your friends.

In whatever state your own may be, I shall always prefer to know that you are occupied in spinning it out rather than in tearing it to pieces."

At the same time my sister was writing to Madame de Beaumont.

I have the correspondence, which death placed in my hands.

The poetry of the ancients pictures one of the Nereids as a flower floating on the deep;

Lucile was that flower.

In comparing her letters with the fragments just quoted, one is struck by the similarity of heart-heaviness expressed in the different language of those unhappy angels.

When I think that I have lived in the company of such minds as those, I am surprised at my own insignificance.

My eyes never light without bitter grief upon those pages written by two superlative women, who vanished from this earth at a short distance one from the other.

"LASCARDAIS, 30 _July.

_ "I was so much charmed, madame, at last to receive a letter from you that I did not allow myself the time to have the pleasure of reading it through at once: I interrupted its perusal to go and tell all the inmates of this house that I had heard from you, without considering that my gladness is of but little importance here, and that hardly anyone even knows that I am in correspondence with you.

Seeing that I was surrounded by indifferent faces, I went back to my room, and determined to be glad by myself.

I sat down to finish reading your letter, and, although I have read it over many times, in truth, madame, I do not know the whole contents.

The joy which I constantly feel at the sight of this so long desired letter interferes with the attention which I ought to give to it.

[Sidenote: Letters from Lucile.

] "And so you are going away, madame?

Do not, once you have reached Mont-Dore, forget your health; give it all your care, I entreat you, with all the fervour and affection of my heart.

My brother has written to me that he hopes to see you in Italy.

Fate and nature alike are pleased to distinguish him from me in a very favourable manner.

But at least I will not yield to my brother the happiness of loving you: that I will share with him all my life.

Alas, madame, how oppressed and downcast is my heart!

You cannot know the good your letters do me, the contempt with which they inspire me for my ills!

The idea that you think of me, that you are interested in me, exalts my courage extraordinarily.

Write to me therefore, madame, so that I may cherish an idea so essential to me.

"I have not yet seen M. Chênedollé; I long greatly for his arrival.

I shall be able to tell him of you and of M. Joubert: that will be a great pleasure to me.

Allow me, madame, once more to urge you to think of your health, the bad condition of which incessantly afflicts me and occupies my thoughts.

How can you not love yourself?

You are so lovable and so dear to all: have the justice, then, to do much for yourself.

"LUCILE."

"2 _September.

_ "What you tell me, madame, of your health alarms and saddens me; however, I reassure myself by thinking of your youth and remembering that, although you are very delicate, you are full of life.

"I am disconsolate at your being in a country which you do not like.

I would wish to see you surrounded with objects calculated to distract and to cheer you.

I hope that, when your health recovers, you will become reconciled to Auvergne: there is no spot incapable of presenting some beauty to such eyes as yours.

I am now living at Rennes: my loneliness suits me fairly well.

I change my residence frequently, madame, as you see; it looks much as though I were out of place on the earth: in reality, it is long since I first began to look upon myself as one of its superfluous products.

I believe, madame, that I spoke to you of my sorrows and perturbations.

At present, all that is over, and I enjoy an inward peace of which none has it any longer in his power to rob me.

In spite of my age, having, through circumstances and taste, almost constantly led a solitary life, I knew nothing whatever, madame, of the world: I have at last made that disagreeable acquaintance.

Fortunately, reflection came to my aid.

I asked myself in what way that world could be so formidable and where lay the worth of a world which can never, in evil and good alike, be aught but an object of pity.

Is it not true, madame, that man's judgment is as shallow as the rest of his being, as changeable and of an incredulity as great as its ignorance?

All these reasons, good or bad, have enabled me to fling behind me with ease the fantastic garment in which I had arrayed myself.

I found myself full of sincerity and strength; I am no longer capable of being troubled.

I am working with all my might to recover possession of my life, to obtain entire control of it.

"You must also, madame, believe that I am not too much to be pitied, since my brother, the best part of myself, is agreeably placed, and since I have eyes left with which to admire the marvels of nature, God for my support, and for an asylum a heart full of peace and gentle memories.

If you have the kindness, madame, to continue to write to me, that will be a great added happiness to me."

* Mystery of style, a mystery everywhere perceptible, nowhere present;

the revelation of a painfully privileged nature; the ingenuousness of a girl whom one might imagine to be in her first youth; and the humble simplicity of a genius unaware of its own power, all breathe out of these letters, a large number of which I have suppressed.

Did Madame de Sévigné write to Madame de Grignan with a more grateful affection than Madame de Caud to Madame de Beaumont?

"Her tenderness might well pretend to keep pace with her own."

My sister loved my friend with all the passion of the tomb, for she felt that she was going to die.

Lucile had hardly ever left the neighbourhood of the Rochers[556]; but she was the daughter of her century and the Sévigné of solitude.

* A letter from M. Ballanche, dated 30 Fructidor, informed me of the arrival of Madame de Beaumont, who had come from Mont Dore on her way to Italy.

He told me that I need not fear the misfortune which I dreaded, and that the health of the sufferer seemed to be improving.

On reaching Milan, Madame de Beaumont met M. Bertin, who had been called there on business: he had the kindness to take charge of the poor traveller and to escort her to Florence, where I had gone to meet her.

I was shocked at the sight of her.

She had but sufficient strength left to smile.

After a few days' rest, we left for Rome, travelling at a foot-pace, in order to avoid the jolting.

Madame de Beaumont received assiduous attentions everywhere: a charm interested you in this lovable woman, so suffering and so forlorn.

The very maids at the inns gave way to this sweet commiseration.

[Sidenote: Mournful days.

] My feelings may be easily guessed: we have all accompanied friends to the grave, but they were mute, and no remnant of inexplicable hope came to render your sorrow more keen.

I no longer saw the fine landscape through which we passed.

I had taken the Perugian road: what was Italy to me?

I still thought her climate too severe, and, if the wind blew ever so little, its breezes seemed storms to me.

At Terni, Madame de Beaumont spoke of going to see the cascade; she made an effort to lean on my arm, and sat down again, saying: "We must leave the waters to flow without us."

I had hired for her in Rome a lonely house near the Piazza d'Espagna, at the foot of the Monte Pincio[557]; it had a little garden with orange-trees growing against the walls, and a court-yard in which stood a fig-tree.

There I set down my dying charge.

I had had much difficulty in procuring this retreat, for there is a prejudice in Rome against diseases of the chest, which are considered as infectious.

At that period of the revival of social order, all that had belonged to the old monarchy was sought after.

The Pope sent to inquire after the daughter of M. de Montmorin; Cardinal Consalvi and the members of the Sacred College followed His Holiness' example; Cardinal Fesch himself showed Madame de Beaumont, to the day of her death, marks of deference and respect which I should not have expected of him.

I had written to M. Joubert of the anxiety with which I was torn before Madame de Beaumont's arrival: "Our friend writes to me from Mont Dore," I said, "letters that shatter my soul: she says that she feels 'that there is no more oil in the lamp;' she speaks of 'the last throbs of her heart.'

Why was she left alone on this journey?

Why did you not write to her?

What will become of us if we lose her?

Who will console us for her?

We realize the value of our friends only at the moment when we are threatened with their loss.

We are even mad enough, when all is well, to think that we can leave them with impunity.

Heaven punishes us; it snatches them from us, and we are appalled at the solitude which they leave around us.

Forgive me, my dear Joubert: to-day I feel as though my heart were twenty years old; this Italy has made me young again; I love all that is dear to me with the same vehemence as in my early years.

Sorrow is my element: I am myself again only when I am unhappy.

My friends at present are of so rare a sort that the mere dread of seeing them taken from me freezes my blood.

Bear with my lamentations: I am sure you are as unhappy as I. Write to me, and write also to that other Breton unfortunate."

At first, Madame de Beaumont felt a little relieved.

The sufferer herself began again to believe in her life.

I had the satisfaction of thinking that at least Madame de Beaumont would not leave me again: I expected to take her to Naples in the spring, and from there to send in my resignation to the Minister for Foreign Affairs.

M.

d'Agincourt[558], that true philosopher, came to see the light bird of passage, which had stopped at Rome before proceeding to the unknown land; M. Boquet, already the oldest of our painters, called.

These relays of hope kept up the sufferer, and lulled her with an illusion which at the bottom of her soul she no longer retained.

Letters, cruel to read, expressing hopes and fears, reached me from every side.

On the 4th of October, Lucile wrote to me from Rennes: * [Sidenote: Letters from Lucile.

] "I commenced a letter for you the other day; I have just made a useless search for it; in it I spoke to you of Madame de Beaumont, and complained of her silence towards me.

Dear, what a sad, strange life I have led for some months!

And the words of the prophet are constantly recurring to my mind: 'He will crown thee with tribulation, he will toss thee like a ball[559].'

But let us leave my troubles and speak of your anxieties.

I cannot persuade myself that they are justified.

I always see Madame de Beaumont full of life and youth, and almost incorporeal; my heart can feel no foreboding where she is concerned.

Heaven, which knows our feelings for her, will doubtless preserve her for us.

Dear, we shall not lose her; I seem to have an inward sense that that is certain.

I sincerely hope that, when you receive this letter, your anxiety will have disappeared.

Tell her from me of all the real and tender interest I take in her; tell her that to me her memory is one of the most beautiful things in this world.

Keep your promise and do not fail to let me have news of her as often as possible.

Alas, what a long time will elapse before I receive a reply to this letter!

How cruel a thing is distance!

What makes you speak of your return to France?

You are trying to humour me, you are deceiving me.

Amid all my troubles there arises one sweet thought, that of your friendship, the thought that I exist in your memory in the shape in which it has pleased God to fashion me.

Dear, I see no other safe shelter for me upon earth but your heart;

I am a stranger and unknown to all the rest.

Adieu, my poor brother.

Shall I see you again?

This idea does not present itself to my mind very distinctly.

If you see me again, I fear you will find me quite out of my senses.

Adieu, you to whom I owe so much!

Adieu, unmixed felicity!

O memories of my happy days, can you not now lighten a little my sad hours?

"I am not one of those who exhaust all their sorrow at the moment of separation; each day adds to the grief which I feel at your absence and, if you were to stay in Rome a hundred years, you would not come to the end of that grief.

In order to delude myself as to absence, not a day passes but I read some pages of your work: I make every effort to imagine that I hear you speak.

My love for you is very natural: ever since our childhood you have been my protector and my friend; you have never cost me a tear, never made a friend but he has become mine.

My kind brother, Heaven, which is pleased to make sport of all my other felicities, wills that I should find my happiness wholly in you, that I should trust myself to your heart.

Give me news soon of Madame de Beaumont.

Address your letters to me at Mademoiselle Lamotte's, although I do not know how long I shall be able to remain there.

Since our last separation, I have always, where my house is concerned, been like a quicksand that gives way beneath my feet: assuredly to anyone who does not know me I must appear incomprehensible; nevertheless I vary only in form, for inwardly I remain constantly the same."

The song of the swan preparing to die was conveyed by me to the dying swan: I was the echo of that last ineffable music!

* [Sidenote: And Madame de Krüdener.

] Another letter, very different from the above, but written by a woman who has played an extraordinary part, Madame de Krüdener[560], shows the empire which Madame de Beaumont, with no strength of beauty, fame, power, or wealth, exercised over people's minds: "PARIS, 24 _November_ 1803. "I learnt two days ago from M. Michaud[561], who has returned from Lyons, that Madame de Beaumont was in Rome and that she was very, very ill: that is what he told me.

I was deeply grieved by this; I had a nervous shock, and I thought a great deal of this charming woman, whom I had not known long, but whom I loved truly.

How often have I wished for her happiness!

How often have I hoped that she might cross the Alps and find beneath the sky of Italy the sweet and profound emotions which I myself have there experienced!

Alas, can she have reached that delightful country only to know pain and to be exposed to dangers which I dread!

I cannot tell you how this idea grieves me.

Forgive me if I have been so much absorbed by this that I have not yet spoken to you of yourself, my dear Chateaubriand; you must know my sincere attachment for you, and to show you the genuine interest which I take in Madame de Beaumont is to touch you more than I should have done by writing of yourself.

I have that sad spectacle before my eyes; I have the secret of sorrow, and my soul is always torn at the sight of those souls to which nature gives the power of suffering more than others.

I had hoped that Madame de Beaumont would enjoy the privilege which she had received, of being happier; I had hoped that she would recover some little health with the sun of Italy and the happiness of having you by her side.

Ah, reassure me, speak to me; tell her that I love her sincerely, that I pray for her!

Has she had my letter written in reply to hers to Clermont?

Address your answer to Michaud: I ask you only for one word, for I know, my dear Chateaubriand, how sensitive you are, and how you suffer.

I thought she was better; I did not write to her; I was overwhelmed with business; but I thought of the happiness she would find in seeing you again, and I imagined how it would be.

Tell me something of your own health; believe in my friendship, in the interest which I have vowed to you for ever, and do not forget me.

"B. KRÜDENER."

The improvement which the air of Rome had produced in Madame de Beaumont did not last: true, the indications of an immediate dissolution disappeared; but it seems that the last moment always lingers as it were to deceive us.

Two or three times, I had tried the effect of a drive with the patient; I strove to divert her thoughts by pointing out the country and the sky to her: she no longer cared for anything.

One day I took her to the Coliseum: it was one of those October days that are to be seen only in Rome.

She contrived to alight, and went and sat upon a stone facing one of the altars placed in the circle.

She raised her eyes and turned them slowly around those porticoes which had themselves so many years been dead, and which had seen so many die; the ruins were adorned with briers and columbines saffroned by autumn and bathed in light.

The dying woman next lowered her eyes, which had left the sun, stage by stage, till they came to the arena; she fixed them upon the altar cross, and said: "Let us go; I am cold."

I took her home again; she went to bed and rose no more.

I was in correspondence with the Comte de La Luzerne[562]; I sent him from Rome, by each mail, the bulletin of his sister-in-law's health.

He had taken my brother with him when Louis XVI.

charged him with a diplomatic mission to London: André Chénier was a member of this embassy.

The doctors, whom I called together again after the experiment of the drive, declared to me that nothing but a miracle could save Madame de Beaumont.

She was impressed with the idea that she would not outlive All Souls' Day, the 2nd of November; then she remembered that one of her kinsmen, I do not know which, had died on the 4th of November.

I

told her that her imagination was troubled; that she would come to see the falsity of her alarms; she replied, to console me: "Ah, yes, I shall go farther!"

She noticed a few tears which I was trying to conceal from her; she held out her hand to me, and said: "You are a child; were you not prepared for it?"

On the eve of her death, Thursday the 3rd of November, she seemed more composed.

She spoke to me of the disposal of her property, and said, speaking of her will, "that all was settled, but that all had to be done, and that she would have liked to have had only two hours in which to see to it."

In the evening, the doctor told me that he felt obliged to warn the sufferer that the time had come for her to think of setting her conscience in order: I broke down for a minute; I was staggered by the fear of hastening the few moments which Madame de Beaumont had still to live by the formal preparations for death.

I railed at the doctor, and then entreated him to wait at least till the next day.

I passed a cruel night, with this secret locked in my bosom.

The patient did not permit me to spend it in her room.

I remained outside, trembling at every sound I heard: when the door was half opened, I perceived the feeble gleam of an expiring night-light.

[Sidenote: The last scene.

] On Friday the 4th of November, I entered, followed by the doctor.

Madame de Beaumont observed my agitation, and said: "Why do you look like that?

I have had a good night."

The doctor thereupon intentionally told me aloud that he wished to speak to me in the next room.

I went out: when I returned, I no longer knew if I lived.

Madame de Beaumont asked me what the doctor wanted.

I

flung myself at her bedside and burst into tears.

She lay for a moment without speaking, looked at me, and said in a firm voice, as though she wished to give me strength: "I did not think that it was quite so near; well, the time has come to say good-bye.

Send for the Abbé de Bonnevie."

The Abbé de Bonnevie, having obtained powers, went to Madame de Beaumont.

She told him that she had always had a deep religious feeling at heart, but that the extraordinary misfortunes which had befallen her during the Revolution had led her for some time to doubt the justice of Providence; that she was ready to admit her errors and to recommend herself to the eternal mercy; that she hoped, however, that the ills which she had suffered in this world would shorten her time of expiation in the next.

She made a sign to me to withdraw, and remained alone with her confessor.

I saw him come back an hour later, wiping his eyes, and saying that he had never heard more beautiful language, nor seen such heroism.

The parish priest was sent for to administer the sacraments.

I returned to Madame de Beaumont.

When she saw me, she asked: "Well, are you pleased with me?"

She spoke feelingly of what she deigned to call "my kindness" to her: ah, if I had at that moment been able to buy back a single one of her days by the sacrifice of all my own, how gladly would I have done so!

Madame de Beaumont's other friends, who were not present at this sight, had at all events but once to weep for her: whereas I stood at the head of the bed of pain in which man hears his last hour strike, and each smile of the patient restored me to life and made me lose it again as it died away.

One lamentable thought distracted me: I noticed that Madame de Beaumont had not until her last breath suspected the real attachment which I bore for her; she did not cease to show her surprise, and she seemed to die disconsolate and charmed.

She had believed herself a burden to me, and had wished to go to set me free.

The priest arrived at eleven o'clock: the room filled with that indifferent crowd of idlers which cannot be prevented from running after the priest in Rome.

Madame de Beaumont faced the formidable solemnity without the least sign of fear.

We fell upon our knees, and the patient received Communion and Extreme Unction at once.

When all had retired, she made me sit on the edge of her bed and spoke to me for half an hour of my affairs and of my plans with the greatest elevation of mind and the most touching friendship; she urged me, above all, to live with Madame de Chateaubriand and M. Joubert: but was M. Joubert himself to live?

She asked me to open the window, as she felt oppressed.

A sun-ray came and lit up her bed: this seemed to cheer her.

She then reminded me of plans for retiring to the country which we had sometimes discussed, and she began to cry.

Between two and three in the afternoon, Madame de Beaumont asked to be changed to another bed by Madame Saint-Germain[563], an old Spanish lady's-maid, who waited on her with the affection worthy of so kind a mistress: the doctor forbade this, fearing lest Madame de Beaumont might die during the moving.

She then told me that she felt the agony approach.

Suddenly she flung back her blanket, held out her hand to me, pressed mine convulsively; her eyes wandered.

With her one free hand she made signs to some one whom she saw standing at the foot of her bed; then, bringing the hand back to her breast, she said: "It is there!"

[Sidenote: Death of madame de Beaumont.

] Dismayed, I asked her if she knew me: a faint smile broke through her delirium; she gave me a little nod of the head: her speech already was no longer of this world.

The convulsions lasted only a few minutes.

We supported her in our arms, the doctor, the nurse, and myself: one of my hands lay upon her heart, which could be felt against her wasted frame;

it beat swiftly, like a clock winding off its broken chain.

Oh, moment of fear and horror, I felt it stop!

We let down upon her pillow the woman who had found rest; her head drooped.

Some locks of her uncurled hair fell over her forehead; her eyes were closed, night had set in for ever.

The doctor held a mirror and a light to the stranger's mouth: the mirror was not dimmed with the breath of life and the light remained unmoved.

All was ended.

* Generally those who weep are able to indulge their tears in peace;

there are others to take upon themselves to attend to the last cares of religion: as representing for France the Cardinal Minister, then absent, and as the sole friend of M. de Montmorin's daughter and responsible to her family, I was obliged to superintend everything; I had to fix the place of burial, to look after the depth and width of the grave, to order the winding-sheet and to give the carpenter the dimensions of the coffin.

Two monks watched by the coffin, which was to be carried to San Luigi dei Francesi.

One of these fathers was from Auvergne and a native of Montmorin itself.

Madame de Beaumont had expressed the wish to be buried in a piece of cloth which her brother Auguste[564], the only one to escape the scaffold, had sent her from the Mauritius.

This cloth was not in Rome; only a piece of it was found, which she always carried with her.

Madame Saint-Germain fastened this strip around the body with a cornelian containing some of M. de Montmorin's hair.

The French ecclesiastics were invited; the Princesse Borghèse lent the funeral car of her family; Cardinal Fesch had left orders, in case of an accident but too clearly foreseen, to send his livery and his carriages.

On Saturday the 5th of November, at seven o'clock in the evening, by the gleam of torch-light and amidst a large crowd, Madame de Beaumont passed along the road where we have all to pass.

On Sunday the 6th of November, the burial mass was celebrated.

The funeral would have been less French in Paris than it was in Rome.

That religious architecture which displays in its ornaments the arms and inscriptions of our ancient country; those tombs on which are inscribed the names of some of the most historic families of our annals; that church, under the protection of a great saint, a great king and a great man: all this did not console misfortune, but honoured it.

I had wished that the last scion of a once exalted race should at least find some support in my humble attachment, and that friendship should not fail it as fortune had done.

The people of Rome, accustomed to strangers, accept them as brothers and sisters.

Madame de Beaumont left a pious memory behind her on that soil so hospitable to the dead; she is still remembered: I have seen Leo XII.

[565] pray at her tomb[566].

In 1828[567], I visited the monument of her who was the soul of a vanishing society; the sound of my footsteps around this silent monument, in a lonely church, was a warning to me: "I shall always love thee," says the Greek epitaph; "but thou, among the dead, drink not, I pray thee, of the cup which would cause thee to forget thy former friends[568]."

If the calamities of a private life were to be measured by the scale of public events, those calamities would hardly deserve a word in a writer's Memoirs.

Who has not lost a friend?

Who has not seen him die?

Who could not recall a similar scene of mourning?

The comment is just, yet no one has ever corrected himself of telling his own adventures: sailors on board the ship that carries them have a family on shore of whom they think and of whom they talk with one another.

Every man has within himself a world apart, foreign to the laws and to the general destinies of the ages.

It is, moreover, a mistake to believe that revolutions, famous accidents, resounding catastrophes are the only records of our nature: we all labour singly at the chain of our common history, and all these separate existences together compose man's universe in the eyes of God.

[Sidenote: Letters of sympathy.

] To collect regrets around the ashes of Madame de Beaumont is but to lay upon her tomb the wreaths intended for her: M. DE CHÊNEDOLLÉ TO CHATEAUBRIAND.

"You can have no doubt, my dear', unhappy friend, of the great part which I take in your affliction.

My grief is not so great as yours, because that is impossible; but I am very deeply afflicted by this loss, which darkens yet further this existence which for so long has been nothing but suffering to me.

It is thus that all that is good, lovable and sensitive vanishes from the face of the earth.

My poor friend, hasten back to France; come and seek consolation with your old friend.

You know how well I love you: come.

"I was excessively anxious about you: it was more than three months since I had heard from you, and three of my letters have remained unanswered.

Have you received them?

Madame de Caud suddenly ceased writing to me two months ago.

This hurt me mortally, and yet I cannot think that I have done anything to offend her.

But, whatever she may do, she can never take from me the fond and respectful friendship which I have vowed to her for life.

Fontanes and Joubert also no longer write to me; so that all whom I loved seem to have combined to forget me at once.

Do not you forget me, O my good friend: leave me one heart upon which I can rely in this vale of tears!

Farewell, I embrace you weeping.

Be sure, my good friend, that I feel your loss as it should be felt.

"23 _November_ 1803." M. DE FONTANES TO CHATEAUBRIAND.

"I share all your regrets, my dear friend: I feel the painfulness of your position.

To die so young, and after outliving all her family!

But, at any rate, that interesting and unhappy woman did not lack the help and the remembrance of friendship.

Her memory will live in hearts worthy of her.

I have forwarded to M. de La Luzerne the touching account intended for him.

Old Saint-Germain, your friend's servant, has taken it with him.

That faithful attendant made me shed tears when talking of his mistress.

I told him that he had a legacy of ten thousand francs; but he did not give it a single thought.

If it were possible to talk of money matters under such mournful circumstances, I would say that it would have been very natural to have given you at least the use of a fortune which will have to pass to distant and almost unknown collaterals[569].

I approve of your conduct;