Sarrasine

Sarrasine

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Title: Sarrasine
Author: Honore de Balzac
Translator: Clara Bell and others
Release Date: August 23, 2005 [EBook #1826]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
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SARRASINE ***

Produced by Dagny; and John Bickers

Sarrasine
By

Honore de Balzac
Translated by
Clara Bell and others

DEDICATION
To Monsieur Charles Bernard du Grail.

SARRASINE

I was buried in one of those profound reveries to which everybody,
even a frivolous man, is subject in the midst of the most uproarious
festivities. The clock on the Elysee-Bourbon had just struck midnight.
Seated in a window recess and concealed behind the undulating folds of
a curtain of watered silk, I was able to contemplate at my leisure the
garden of the mansion at which I was passing the evening. The trees,
being partly covered with snow, were outlined indistinctly against the
grayish background formed by a cloudy sky, barely whitened by the
moon. Seen through the medium of that strange atmosphere, they bore
a vague resemblance to spectres carelessly enveloped in their shrouds, a
gigantic image of the famous Dance of Death. Then, turning in the
other direction, I could gaze admiringly upon the dance of the living! a
magnificent salon, with walls of silver and gold, with gleaming
chandeliers, and bright with the light of many candles. There the
loveliest, the wealthiest women in Paris, bearers of the proudest titles,
moved hither and thither, fluttered from room to room in swarms,
stately and gorgeous, dazzling with diamonds; flowers on their heads
and breasts, in their hair, scattered over their dresses or lying in
garlands at their feet. Light quiverings of the body, voluptuous
movements, made the laces and gauzes and silks swirl about their
graceful figures. Sparkling glances here and there eclipsed the lights
and the blaze of the diamonds, and fanned the flame of hearts already

burning too brightly. I detected also significant nods of the head for
lovers and repellent attitudes for husbands. The exclamation of the
card-players at every unexpected coup, the jingle of gold, mingled with
music and the murmur of conversation; and to put the finishing touch to
the vertigo of that multitude, intoxicated by all the seductions the world
can offer, a perfume-laden atmosphere and general exaltation acted
upon their over-wrought imaginations. Thus, at my right was the
depressing, silent image of death; at my left the decorous bacchanalia
of life; on the one side nature, cold and gloomy, and in mourning garb;
on the other side, man on pleasure bent. And, standing on the
borderland of those two incongruous pictures, which repeated
thousands of times in diverse ways, make Paris the most entertaining
and most philosophical city in the world, I played a mental
_macedoine_[*], half jesting, half funereal. With my left foot I kept
time to the music, and the other felt as if it were in a tomb. My leg was,
in fact, frozen by one of those draughts which congeal one half of the
body while the other suffers from the intense heat of the salons--a state
of things not unusual at balls.
[*] Macedoine, in the sense in which it is here used, is a game, or rather
a series of games, of cards, each player, when it is his turn to deal,
selecting the game to be played.
"Monsieur de Lanty has not owned this house very long, has he?"
"Oh, yes! It is nearly ten years since the Marechal de Carigliano sold it
to him."
"Ah!"
"These people must have an enormous fortune."
"They surely must."
"What a magnificent party! It is almost insolent in its splendor."
"Do you imagine they are as rich as Monsieur de Nucingen or
Monsieur de Gondreville?"

"Why, don't you know?"
I leaned forward and recognized the two persons who were talking as
members of that inquisitive genus which, in Paris, busies itself
exclusively with the Whys and Hows. _Where does he come from?
Who are they? What's the matter with him? What has she done?_ They
lowered their voices and walked away in order to talk more at their ease
on some retired couch. Never was a more promising mine laid open to
seekers after mysteries. No one knew from what country the Lanty
family came, nor to what source--commerce, extortion, piracy, or
inheritance--they owed a fortune estimated at several millions. All the
members of the family spoke Italian, French, Spanish, English, and
German, with sufficient fluency to lead one to