Volume I Part 9 (1/2)
But not only were the sisters of Beaumarchais living on hope and love, the elder Caron himself was entertaining the same guests as is proved by the following letter written by his son from Madrid.
?Monsieur and very dear father:--
?I am not surprised at your attachment for Madame Henry; she is cheerfulness itself, and has one of the best hearts that I know. I could wish you might have been happy enough to inspire a more lively return of affection. She would make you happy and you would certainly render agreeable this union founded upon reciprocal affection and an esteem which has lasted twenty-five years. If I were you, I know very well how I should go about it, and if I were she, I know also very well how I should reply; but I am neither the one nor the other and it is not for me to clear up this affair of yours, I have enough of my own.?
To which the elder Caron replied, September 19th, 1764, ?We supped yesterday with my dear and good friend who laughed heartily when she saw the article in your letter, imagining as she very well could, the way in which you would go about this affair if you were in my place, so that as she says, she only embraces you with all her heart, because you are nine hundred miles away.?
But though the amiable Madame Henry was quite ready to laugh at the article in the son?s letter she does not appear to have been in any hurry to change the relations.h.i.+p which had so long existed between herself and the elder Caron, for shortly before his return from Madrid we find Beaumarchais writing in relation to the same matter: ?A man ought not to be alone. One must hold to something in this life, and the society of your sons and daughters can only be sacrificed to another much sweeter, but which you do not seem on the point of acquiring. I precede my arrival by a picture of what should be, so that you may have time to determine what you ought to do before my return, which will be soon. What happiness for me, if on reaching there I could on the same day see a.s.sured the felicity of my father and my sister.?
Unfortunately for us, Beaumarchais returned from Spain in May, 1765, so that the correspondence ceased and with it, our means of following in detail the lives of those in whom we have begun to take so warm an interest. The ?felicity? of the father we know, however, to have been consummated, for on January 15, 1766, he was united in marriage with the woman of his choice, Madame Henry, she being then sixty years of age and he sixty-eight. After two years of happy married life, Madame Caron died and we find her husband again returning to the rue Cond? to live with his dearly loved son.
In the meantime, Mademoiselle de Boisgarnier had taken the advice of her brother, and we cannot for a moment doubt that she acted wisely; for her lover, Janot de Miron, seems to have been a man of exceptionally fine character. Referring to the letter already quoted in which Beaumarchais pleads with his sister for her friend, M. de Lom?nie says, ?In reading this eulogy of poor Miron, where his moral qualities are exalted rather to the detriment of his brilliant ones, we have need to remember that Beaumarchais previously had declared his friend was not wanting in external accomplishments; and truly he was not. Miron, judging from his letters was rather pedantic, but in no way stupid. The taste for poetry and art, which reigned in the Caron family was no stranger to him. After several years of torment, he succeeded in touching that disdainful little heart and thus his constancy was rewarded. Mademoiselle de Boisgarnier, suitably endowed by her brother, married in 1767 M. de Miron, whom the influence of Beaumarchais later succeeded in having appointed _Secr?taire des Commandements du Prince de Conti_.
In all these matters it will be seen that Beaumarchais did not set himself up to be dictator in his family but was actuated solely by the desire to see consummated the dearest wish of those about him. Pauline he accepted as a settled fact of his existence, treating her as though he were her brother rather than her lover. His taste led him naturally to women more mature in years and experience, and he was far less sentimental than Pauline.
We shall see presently, as we come to treat of Beaumarchais as an author, that though through flashes of inspiration he may at times attain the heights of the heroic, yet he has in reality small sympathy with it, either in life or literature. At no time, do we find him possessed of one of those absorbing pa.s.sions which devour all lesser ones and which alone make sacrifice, not only necessary but easy; sacrifice is always distasteful to him. He has an intense desire to be happy and to have all about him happy. We must not expect, in this wise to find him a hero.
Beaumarchais is pre-eminently a modern man, and it is no accident that he should have been an instrument to aid in laying the foundations of that modern nation, which more than any other, has brought case and comfort within the reach of every cla.s.s and condition of men.
CHAPTER V
_?Les serments Des amants Sont l?gers comme les vents, Leur air enchanteur, Leur douceur Sont des pi?ges trompeurs Cach?s sous des fleurs.?_
_S?guedille de Beaumarchais_
New study of Beaumarchais by Lintilhac--Beaumarchais?s Return from Madrid--The Lover of Julie Carries off Pauline--the _R?glement de compte_ which Terminated this Romantic Chapter of the Life of Beaumarchais.
Among the numerous studies of the life of Beaumarchais which the admirable and scholarly work of M. de Lom?nie stimulated into being, none takes a higher place than that of Eug?ne Lintilhac. Fired into enthusiasm by the work of Lom?nie, and having as he has said, his curiosity rather stimulated than satisfied thereby, he demanded of the descendants of Beaumarchais leave to examine for himself the entire ma.s.s of ma.n.u.script which had served as the foundation of that great work. He was also actuated, as he tells us, by the sentiment so forcibly expressed by Gudin, ?I soon found that I could not love him moderately when I came to know him in his home,? and it was this sentiment which made him desire to refute from direct evidence some unsympathetic writings which had appeared, writings in which the character of Beaumarchais is inverted and all his great and disinterested actions viewed from the standpoint of whatever was ordinary about him, or whatever could be tortured into appearing so, thus making everything seem petty and contemptible, as when a telescope is reversed and all its power directed towards diminis.h.i.+ng the objects upon which it is turned.
Many of the letters which we have already quoted were first published by him, and we shall have occasion, more than once to have recourse to his volume. In the family correspondence M. Lintilhac found several fragments of letters written by friends and especially by one M. de la Chataignerie, a man at that time well advanced in years, but devoted to the interests of his friend and who had been left with a certain oversight of the family.
He wrote: ?The dear sister, who though slightly indisposed, conserves her reason, at least so far as essentials go, begs you to bring everything that you find which is good in all the places where you pa.s.s, even the hams of Bayonne. Time presses because the little dog of a Boisgarnier drives me to despair, and beats me--it is true that I deserve no better.
Adieu, adieu--deliver me from my guardians.h.i.+p!?
And M. Lintilhac continues: ?Nevertheless the care does not rest altogether on him, the main part falls on Julie--who keeps the purse, which is no small matter, for we find that, by the 17th of November she already had given out from 7000 to 8000 francs. We must believe that they were well expended because she no doubt followed the programme traced for her by her brother. ?I recommend to you economy as the mother of comfort,?
and he adds without joking, ?modesty as the amiable companion of great success.? He wishes that the family, ?think of him a little in his absence.? ?Men are vain,? he adds, ?they like to be flattered.??
Beaumarchais, just before leaving Spain, wrote: ?So I am putting my whole mind on my business, my Father, while my misfortune causes me to lose 2000 _?cus_ of income from the provisions of France which dissolve especially to ruin me, the King of Spain and the Ministers cast their eyes on me to be at the head of those in Spain, as my old Du Verney is of those in France. There is talk of joining to this the furnis.h.i.+ng in general of all the grain needed for Spain as well as the fabrication of saltpetre and powder, so that I may find myself suddenly at the head of a company for providing provisions, subsistencies, munitions and agricultural products.
?Keep this for the family and see that my prospects, honest as they are, are known only by their success.?
And Julie replied in her tenderest vein, ?My Beaumarchais, my amiable genius, I have seen your letters, your projects, your work and nothing surprises me, not even your philosophizing over our sad news. When any one appreciates you as I do, one has the right to count upon astonis.h.i.+ng things. a.s.suredly we will keep the secret; but when do you return? My heart rebels at your long absence.?
M. Lintilhac continues: ?We know his grand projects did not receive the aid and sanction of the ministry, but they were dismissed with flattering compliments for him. All his plans, however, had not proved abortive as has so often been said, because on returning to France he writes to his father from Bordeaux, April 2nd, 1765, ?I am now at Bordeaux, I don?t know whether I shall leave to-morrow or the next day. My Spanish business requires certain information which I can obtain only here, or in some other seaport.
??I received a letter from Durand at Madrid very satisfactory in regard to the obliging regrets of the honest people of Madrid as well as for the affairs to which I have there attached him. I am absolutely alone, my valet de chambre stayed at Bayonne with a groom and three beautiful horses, which at Paris ought to pay the price of their journey as well as my own.??
No record has come down to us of the meeting of Beaumarchais and his family after their long separation, but now that we know them all so intimately it is not difficult to reconstruct the scene, the venerable father pressing his son to his bosom, the tears of tenderness welling to his eyes, the sisters rus.h.i.+ng to embrace him, the friends and domestics even, eager to clasp his hand, and all radiant with the thought of having him in their midst. Then this outburst of affection over, what gaiety and mirth follow, and all that human expansiveness which comes so spontaneously from the heart!
But though the family tie remained as strong as ever, a decided change had come already into the situation between him and Pauline. Nevertheless, matters were smoothed over and the marriage was definitely decided upon.