The Corvey Novels Project at the University of Nebraska

— Studies in British Literature of the Romantic Period —

James, G.P.R. The Ancient Regime; A New Novel. First American Reprint. Chapter I. Chapter II. Chapter III. Chapter IV. Robert's Semi - Monthly Magazine for Town and Country. 15 Aug 1841, 605 (8 pages).

James, G.P.R. The Ancient Regime; A New Novel. First American Reprint. Chapter V. Chapter VI. Chapter VII. Chapter VIII. Chapter IX Chapter X. Chapter XI.
G P R JAMES. Robert's Semi - Monthly Magazine for Town and Country. 1 Sep 1841, 634 (23 pages).

James, G.P.R. The Ancient Regime; A New Novel. VOLUME II -- Chapter VI. Chapter VII. Chapter VIII. Chapter IX. Chapter X. Chapter XI. Chapter XII. Chapter XIII. G P R JAMES. Robert's Semi - Monthly Magazine for Town and Country. 1 Oct 1841, 713 (26 pages)

James, G.P.R. The Ancient Regime; A New Novel. Chapter XIV. Chapter XV. Chapter XVI. Chapter XVII. VOLUME III -- Chapter I. Chapter II. Chapter III Chapter IV. Chapter V. Robert's Semi - Monthly Magazine for Town and Country 19 (15 Oct. 1841); 757 (30 pages).

James, G.P.R. The Ancient Regime; A New Novel. Chapter VI. Chapter VII Chapter VIII. Chapter IX. Chapter X. Chapter XI. Chapter XII. Chapter XIII. Chapter XIV Chapter XV. Chapter XVI. Robert's Semi - Monthly Magazine for Town and Country 20 (1 Nov 1841); 801 (37 pages).

"Almost as he (Pierre) spoke (to his wife) there was a knock at the chamber-door, a hand laid upon the latch thereof, and a stranger entered the room. He was dressed in the habit of an abbe, which was, in some degree, clerical, and distinguished from the rest of the world those personages who had taken what are called first vows; which, in fact, bound them to nothing. Those vows were continually renounced at pleasure; and even while they remained in force they did not restrain the person who had taken them from mingling with the full current of worldly things-enjoying all the pleasures, and but too often sharing in all the vices of society. Abbes were prevented, indeed, from marrying till they had formally cast off those vows; but this restriction was of course only an occasion for additional licentiousness; so that it became a common saying, in regard to any one wh had a numerous family, 'He has as many children as an abbe.' The person who entered might be five or six-and-thirty, and was a fine powerful man, though the countenance was somewhat pale and sallow, and the eyes were near together, though fine, while a curl about the lip denoted that there were some bitterness of spirit within, either from disappointment or a frame of mind naturally sarcastic. There is, perhaps, as much of what we may call expression in a man's carriage, and particularly in his step, as there is in his countenance; and the step of the abbe was very peculiar. It was slow and noiseless but firm and fixed. Though his shoulders were not round, his head bent a little forward, and his full dark eyes, when reacting on any object, remained half open, without the slightest wandering or movement. Though keen in themselves, no motion betrayed the secrets of the heart: they seemed full of inquiry, but answered nothing. I mean not by any means to say that his countenance was without expression, for it had much peculiar character of his own; though the expression varied only according to his will, and not according to his emotions. On the present occasion, his lip bore a benign and chastened smile; and though he entered with his broad-brimmed hat on, he removed it immediately as he advanced toward the table. The filigree-worker and his wife both rose, while her husband fixed his eyes with n inquiring and somewhat stern glance upon the stranger, and then suddenly turned and looked for a moment toward the dying embers of their small fire, till he had wiped away all traces of the late emotion from his face. 'I have been inquiring into your situation, my good lady, since I saw you,' said the abbe, 'and from the account which even that hard-hearted old usurer Fiteau gives of you and your husband, I have become interested in you, and wish to know if I can serve you.' The woman hesitated, and Pierre himself turned round and remained silent for a single minute, gazing on the stranger with a curious and somewhat doubtful smile. At length he answered, 'We have much to thank you for already, sir, and it is an easy thing to serve people who are so poor as we are.' 'Not always,' answered the abbe, without a change of countenance; 'each person in this world has his particular views, and I already know that you have yours.' 'How sir?' said the man, again gazing on him eagerly; 'have I ever seen you before?' 'Not that I know of, my good friend,' replied the abbe, with a smile; 'but your question is easily answered. There are but ten men in Paris under the kind, who, if I had offered them half-a-dozen livres, would have refused to take them. Now, some twenty minutes ago, I offered your wife here, when I saw she was in distress, a handful of the change I had just received. She contented herself with half a livre, and when I urged her to take more, she said that her husband would be angry if she did. Now, have I not reason, to say that you have your own peculiar views? But to put all such things aside, tell me if I can serve you, and how?' 'Only, sir, I believe, by ordering some of these trinkets from me,' replied the man, in a tone considerably softened; and he pointed to the basket he was working. The abbe took it up and examined it. 'It is very beautiful,' he said: 'come, I will buy this of you and pay you for it now-though I, alas!' he added, 'have neither wife nor children to please with such gauds. What is the price of it?' 'Nay, sir, I cannot sell you that,' replied the man: 'it is promised to Monsieur Fiteau; but I can soon work you another exactly like it.' 'You can work him another,' replied the abbe, somewhat sharply. 'Why should I wait, who am willing to befriend you, and he not, who will do nothing for you?' ' Because I have promised it to him, sir,' replied the man, simply; 'and I cannot break my word.' 'You are right,' answered the abbe; 'I applaud your honesty, and you shall work me another. What may the price be, my good friend?' 'Nay, sir, I hardly know,' replied the filigree worker. 'Monsieur Fiteau pays me five livres for my labor, and finds the silver; but what he charges I cannot tell.' The stranger took up the basket and examined it with a thoughtful air, murmuring as if to himself, 'The usurer! What may the silver be worth?' 'Some six or seven livres when spun into wire,' replied the man. 'And he gives you five,' rejoined the abbe, 'talking forty for himself. Out upon it! Here, my friend, here are ten livres to begin with, when you bring me the basket done, I will give you twenty more, and then I shall have the trinket at about one-half of the price which this man Fiteau would charge for it.' The filigree-worker suffered the man to put the money down upon the table without taking it up."

"It was about five o'clock in the morning when he finished it; and just as he was putting the last concluding touch to the work, the rolling sound of rapid wheels rushing into the court-yard of the house, whose highest and most miserable story the artisan tenanted, told that some gay votary of pleasure and fashion was returning, probably from scenes of vice as well as dissipation, at the hour when the children of industry and want were rising from their hard couch, to begin the heavy passing of a day of toil. It was common in those times for many of the best and most splendid mansions in Paris to be divided among all the classes of society, though the arrangement of the tenants, indeed, was very different from that which existed in the social world. Lowest of all, we are told, except the rats and bottles that occupied the cellars, generally lived the proprietor of the house. He might be some avaricious or some decayed nobleman, whose health, purse, or inclination, rendered him unwilling to climb even a single flight of stairs. Then came the gay, the luxurious, the fashionable, the man of the court and of society; inhabiting the wide and lofty rooms of the first-floor. The entresol above gave accommodation to the smart young secretary of some public office, some foreign baron, or some of the numerous counts and princes that swarm in German and Italian courts. The second floor received the respectable merchant, or banker, who had his offices and business in another part of the city; the widow lady, possessing affluence, but not riches; and all that numerous class, by no means the least happy or the least estimable, who are known by the name of very respectable persons. Above that, again, on the third, came the highest grade of men of letters, the academician, the celebrated professor, the philosopher in vogue, the great artist. On the fourth-for there was a fourth, ay, reader, and a fifth, and sixth also-were people still at ease, and possessing all the necessaries of life; but possessing them, not only with the slight inconvenience of daily climbing up long flights of stairs, but often with the serious anxiety of providing for children, for whom fortune had assigned no fund but the labor of a parent. Above these, again came the poor artist, struggling forward with zeal and industry to make his merit known. The deep-thinking man of science, the result of whose investigations made or saved the fortune of thousands, without giving him a sous; the moralist, the teacher, the man of letters, who distained to pander to the bad taste of a licentious public, or to employ the arts of the quack to gain fame, or wealth, or honors. Above these, again, was want, and misery, and destitution, the never-ceasing toil of all the various artists and artisans, the production of whose hands ornamented the palace, the church, and the saloon; such men, in short, as our filigree-worker, who were brought too closely in contact with the dwellings of wealth, luxury, and vice, not to feel an additional pang, amid all the miseries of their own station, and to murmur at that social arrangement which allotted to them the whole of the dark side of life, and gave to beings often less worthy all that was bright and sunshiny. The vices of the higher class of the Parisian people, their intemperance, their debauchery, their infidelity, their contemptible frivolity, were all indulged, enacted and displayed, under the very same roofs where dwelt misery, penury, and labor: and yet they wondered that there came a revolution! Oh I would but man remember that he is but a steward of all that he possesses; that his wealth, his honors, his talents, his genius, his influence, and all merely lent to him by the one great Possessor, not alone for his individual benefit, but for the benefit of the whole; would he but remember this, such terrible accounts of the stewardship would not be taken as are often demanded on this earth by agents that seem little likely to be instructed with such a commission; and the after-reckoning, too, might be looked for in peace, knowing that it is to be rendered to a mild and merciful Lord. The filigree-worker cast himself down upon his bed, saying with a smile, 'Others have come home to sleep, why should I not rest also?' But though he did take a few hours' repose, he was up and away long before the fevered gamester, whose wheels he had heard, entertained any thought of stirring from his restless couch. The part of the world, however, toward which Pierre Morin now bent his steps, was all busy and stirring with a multitude of people, some animated alone by the hope of gaining that honest daily bread which in those days was with very great difficulty acquired by the lower orders of the Parisian people; but many others, instigated by the dark spirit of that most degrading of all demons, Mammon, to rob the rich of their wealth, and the poor of their labor. Not far from the great church of Notre dame, somewhat behind it, but still a little to the right of that building, is a narrow street which has suffered little variation, except inasmuch as the shops, with which it was filled at the time I speak of, are now very much fewer in number than they then were, and are almost entirely devoted to the sale of such ornaments and utensils as are generally appropriated to the church. Sacramental caps and salvers, crosses of all kinds, even the pastoral crook of the bishop and the pix itself, are still there displayed; but at the period of my story, every article worked in gold or silver was there to be found; and multitudes of trinkets of all kinds were ranged in the shop-windows, all along a street, every house of which was then the property of a goldsmith or a jeweler. At the corner of this street, in the best and largest shop that it contained, where one might just catch a view of solemn Notre Dame, rising blue and airy over the neighboring houses, might be seen daily old Gaultier Fiteau, the famous jeweler, goldsmith, and money-changer."

" 'Tell me,' said the sweet voice of Annette, 'of what complexion and appearance was the gentleman who gave you the letter, and called himself, as you say, the Count de Castleneau?' 'He is a tall, good-looking person, Mademoiselle,' replied the courier; 'not quite so long and so lean as Monsieur here, but somewhat paler in the face, with a bluish sort of beard, like the Turkish gentleman they talk about, and as grave and quiet as the same gentleman after he had cut off his last wife's head.' The description, though somewhat caricatured, was not to be mistaken, and the baron went on: 'How long have you been in his service?' 'At the present moment,' replied the man, 'I have been in his service just four days and five hours; that is to say, five hours before I set out from Paris, and four days upon the journey.' 'In fact, no time at all,' said the baron; 'but merely hired to bring the letter down to this place.' 'Something like it, but not quite,' answered the man: 'the count did want a courier, and sent for the first he could find; but he hired me to bring the letter, and go back with the young lady, after which I am to be established courier in ordinary.' Neither the baron nor Annette had any means of judging whether the man's story was or was not true; and, moreover, when they came to ask themselves what reasonable cause there existed either for doubting the truth of the courier's tale, or for suspecting the letter not to be genuine, they found it difficult to assign any, and both were forced to admit that the style being slightly constrained was by no means sufficient to warrant the supposition that the count had not written that epistle. These thoughts were passing in the mind of both at the same moment; and the only farther questions which were put to the man were, 'When did you quit Paris? and what is your name, my good friend?' 'On Monday, and my name is Pierre Jean,' replied the man, adding nothing farther. 'That is your Christian name,' said the baron; 'what is your surname?' 'Pierre Jean,' replied the man, 'my only name is Pierre Jean-that is the name my godfathers and godmothers gave me at my baptism; and I should be sorry to throw it off because it is a little worn out about the knees. Pierre Jean is the name I have been known by all my life, and the only name I answer to; nor do I see any reason why a man who has never in life had more than two shirts should go about the world with the ostentatious frippery of three names upon his back.' 'But what was your father's name?' demanded the baron, after thinking a moment. 'Lord bless you, sir!' replied the man, 'I never had a father-I am a great deal too poor to indulge in the luxury of ancestors. My mother's name I have forgotten, though she lived till I was some six years old; but as to a father, Heaven defend me! I never had such a thing that I know of; if I had, I might have been burdened with an inheritance, and brothers and sisters, and all sorts of things of that kind.' The baron smiled; for there was a drollery about the man's very impudence which was difficult to be resisted; and, after asking Annette whether she had any more questions to put, he told the courier that he might retire and finish his meal. * * *

"The orders of the king were duly obeyed. Notice was given to Pierre Morin to set free all the persons who had been taken at the chateau of Michy; and, summoning them one by one to his presence at his own bureau, he gave them a careful admonition as to a discreet use of any secrets that they possessed, and in regard to their future conduct in their various avocations. Pierre Jean was the last whom he thought fit to speak with, but not even the Chatelet had been able to diminish, by a shade, the brazen impudence of Pierre Jean. 'My dear friend and counsellor,' he replied to the warnings of Pierre Morin, 'it is all no use; I could not be an honest man if I would; nature is against me; I was born to roguery as my inheritance; and I do declare that I have often tried very hard to behave like an honest man without being able. Why, in this very business I was put in here for, I vow, that twenty times, when I looked at the girl, and she said a kind word to me, I was tempted to give her a hint of the whole matter; but then Satan himself, or some of his imps, always whispered in my ear in the most insinuating tone possible, 'Two hundred louis, and all expenses paid.' 'It was not possible to resist that, you know.' 'Hardly, indeed,' replied Pierre Morin; 'especially as I suppose, my good friend, you expected protection even if you were caught.' 'No, no, no!' replied Pierre Jean: 'do not do justice to my prudence at the expense of my wit; I never expected protection at all. If it had been a shopkeeper or a poor man, that had employed me, I might have expected something of the kind; but the higher the person the less the security. No, no, no! Solomon, or some of those great people wrote, 'Put not your faith in the princes;' and he who said so knew more of his own race than most people do of their kidney.' 'Well, Master Pierre Jean,' replied Morin, 'all I have to tell you is this, if I catch you at any such tricks again, especially with regard to this same lady, I shall deal with you in a different way from what I have done at present; for instead of arresting you for a minor offence, I shall have you apprehended for that business on the other side of the Seine, where robbery and an attempt to murder were in question; then we should see you swinging in the Greve to a certainty, you know.' 'No, no, you would not do that,' replied Pierre Jean; 'I know you better, Monsieur Morin, "And why not I' replied Pierre Morin. 'You are deceiving yourself altogether. I will do it, as I live.' 'No, no,' answered the man; 'but I will tell you why not. First you know that I never wanted to murder the man, or tried to murder him; and next, because you would never have a hand in hanging one of the oldest friends and acquaintances you have in the world.' 'Friends and acquaintances!' said Pierre Morin, gazing at the man steadfastly; what do you mean, sir?-take care what you say.' 'Ay, ay,' replied Pierre Jean: 'twenty years does make a difference, and fortune changes favors; but I knew you well enough when I was a shop-boy to old Fiteau the goldsmith. Ay, and I could tell you something more about that business if I liked-something that might astonish you to hear.' Whatever might be the feelings of Pierre Morin-whether he had or had not previously recognised Fiteau's cidevant shop-boy-cannot be told, but he had by this time learned to conceal all emotions, and not the slightest trace of any such thing as surprise could be detected on his countenance. 'I wonder, Master Pierre Jean,' he said, 'that you, who have been so long trading among the sharp people of Paris, do not know that there is nothing at all takes place which we are not aware of here. For yourself, I will give you your own history, in two minutes, if you like to hear it. Here,' he cried aloud to one of the clerks within, 'give me folio 500, letter P.J.' As soon as the huge volume was brought to him, he turned to the words Pierre Jean, and that worthy beheld two or three long columns filled with his own good acts and deeds. 'Ay,' continued Pierre Morin, as he read over the first part, 'I see what you tell me is true, though I never looked to that part of your story before. You were shop-boy to old Fiteau at the time he was murdered, and were strongly suspected, I find, of having purloined some of the articles you were sent out to deliver.' 'Upon my honor,' cried Pierre Jean, 'I never stole a thing for three years after that.' 'That is to your credit,' replied Pierre Morin; 'you caught the vice in the army, I suppose; for there I find you were drummed out of the 10th regiment; and then again you were confined for three months for swindling; and then charged with robbing the royal courier, for which Corvant was hanged; and then ---' 'Ah, Monsieur Morin,-Monsieur Morin,' cried Pierre Jean, 'stop, in pity's name! I see there is no biography like that of the police-office.' Pierre Morin smiled, and, pointing to the end of the voluminous article headed 'Pierre Jean,' he shewed him a long line of small crosses made in red ink, and asked, 'Do you understand what that means, my good friend?' 'No, sir,' replied Pierre Jean, who by this time was very much inclined to call him Monseigneur; 'pray what may be the interpretation thereof?' 'One, two, three, four, five, six, seven,' said Pierre Morin, counting the crosses; 'that means hangable upon seven counts! But come, come, Master Pierre Jean, don't be down-hearted, there are one or two others that have got more crosses than you have. Why, the fellow I had executed on Wednesday week had ten, and you may escape yet, if you choose to make yourself serviceable, keep yourself quiet, and above all things, hold your tongue when you are not told to speak.' 'Oh!' cried Pierre Jean, 'I will be as silent as the grave: my tongue shall never carry me to the gallows, if I can help it.' 'No,' replied Pierre Morin, 'but you must always tell me what I want to know.' 'Oh, I am ever at your honor's feet,' replied Pierre Jean. 'Well then,' continued Monsieur Morin, 'be so good as to tell me now what it was you said would surprise me?' 'I don't think now,' replied Pierre Jean, 'that anything would surprise you; but what I meant was, that on the night when Fiteau was murdered, I saw three men instead of two coming down the street. Two of them were those who were broke on the wheel; but there was a third, who is still living, for I saw him not many days ago.' Still Pierre Morin showed no sign of astonishment. 'Did you speak to him?' he demanded. 'Oh! Not I,' answered Pierre Jean: 'he is a great man now-a-days, and was going into the court when I saw him.' 'You were wise,' repeated the commissary, 'and will be still wiser, if you hold your tongue about the matter to every one.' 'Oh, that I will,' answered Pierre Jean; 'I never thought of mentioning it-one hawk does not kill another, you know; but I did think that I might make use of the secret some time, for I was just then going down to Castelneau; and I fancied if I were caught, and they tried to punish me, I would stop them by threatening to tell what I knew.' 'You would only have got yourself hanged,' replied Pierre Morin, 'and done him no harm.' 'Ay! how so?' demanded Pierre Jean, with some surprise. 'Because,' replied Pierre Morin, 'when a scoundrel accuses a gentleman, he must either prove him accusation or prove his honesty; now I take it, Master Pierre Jean, that you could neither do the one nor the other. There was no word but your own for the matter, and you know well what your word is worth in any court throughout France. Be a wise man, Monsieur Pierre Jean, and do not meddle with hot pitch without a long spoon.'"

"It is always a sad and terrible task-where there is any human feeling left in the heart-that of examining the papers and letters of those who are gone. The records of fruitless affections, of disappointed hopes, of tenderness perhaps misplaced, perhaps turned by the will of fate to scourge the heart that felt it, are there all before our eyes. Side by side, at one view, and in one instant, we have before us the history of a human life, and its sad and awful moral-we have there the picture of every bright enjoyment, of every warm domestic blessing; while, written by the hand of death beneath them, is the terrible truth, 'These are all past away for ever, and so will it soon be with thee likewise!'"