Bohemians of the Latin Quarter | Page 7

he is! A
culpable excess of zeal! The luminary is wrong; I shall have to make a
complaint to the longitude-office. However, I must begin to be a little
anxious. Today is the day after yesterday, certainly; and since yesterday
was the seventh, unless old Saturn goes backward, it must be the eighth
of April today. And if I may believe this paper," continued Schaunard,
going to read an official notice-to-quit posted on the wall, "today,
therefore, at twelve precisely, I ought to have evacuated the premises,
and paid into the hands of my landlord, Monsieur Bernard, the sum of

seventy-five francs for three quarters' rent due, which he demands of
me in very bad handwriting. I had hoped--as I always do--that
Providence would take the responsibility of discharging this debt, but it
seems it hasn't had time. Well, I have six hours before me yet. By
making good use of them, perhaps--to work! to work!"
He was preparing to put on an overcoat, originally of a long-haired,
woolly fabric, but now completely bald from age, when suddenly, as if
bitten by a tarantula, he began to execute around the room a polka of
his own composition, which at the public balls had often caused him to
be honoured with the particular attention of the police.
"By Jove!" he exclaimed, "it is surprising how the morning air gives
one ideas! It strikes me that I am on the scent of my air; Let's see." And,
half-dressed as he was, Schaunard seated himself at his piano. After
having waked the sleeping instrument by a terrific hurly-burly of notes,
he began, talking to himself all the while, to hunt over the keys for the
tune he had long been seeking.
"Do, sol, mi, do la, si, do re. Bah! it's as false as Judas, that re!" and he
struck violently on the doubtful note. "We must represent adroitly the
grief of a young person picking to pieces a white daisy over a blue lake.
There's an idea that's not in its infancy! However, since it is fashion,
and you couldn't find a music publisher who would dare to publish a
ballad without a blue lake in it, we must go with the fashion. Do, sol,
mi, do, la, si, do, re! That's not so bad; it gives a fair idea of a daisy,
especially to people well up in botany. La, si, do, re. Confound that re!
Now to make the blue lake intelligible. We should have something
moist, azure, moonlight--for the moon comes in too; here it is; don't
let's forget the swan. Fa, mi, la, sol," continued Schaunard, rattling over
the keys. "Lastly, an adieu of the young girl, who determines to throw
herself into the blue lake, to rejoin her beloved who is buried under the
snow. The catastrophe is not very perspicuous, but decidedly
interesting. We must have something tender, melancholy. It's coming,
it's coming! Here are a dozen bars crying like Magdalens, enough to
split one's heart--Brr, brr!" and Schaunard shivered in his spangled
petticoat, "if it could only split one's wood! There's a beam in my

alcove which bothers me a good deal when I have company at dinner. I
should like to make a fire with it--la, la, re, mi--for I feel my inspiration
coming to me through the medium of a cold in the head. So much the
worse, but it can't be helped. Let us continue to drown our young girl;"
and while his fingers assailed the trembling keys, Schaunard, with
sparkling eyes and straining ears, gave chase to the melody which, like
an impalpable sylph, hovered amid the sonorous mist which the
vibrations of the instrument seemed to let loose in the room.
"Now let us see," he continued, "how my music will fit into my poet's
words;" and he hummed, in voice the reverse of agreeable, this
fragment of verse of the patent comic-opera sort:
"The fair and youthful maiden, As she flung her mantle by, Threw a
glance with sorrow laden Up to the starry sky And in the azure waters
Of the silver-waved lake."
"How is that?" he exclaimed, in transports of just indignation; "the
azure waters of a silver lake! I didn't see that. This poet is an idiot. I'll
bet he never saw a lake, or silver either. A stupid ballad too, in every
way; the length of the lines cramps the music. For the future I shall
compose my verses myself; and without waiting, since I feel in the
humour, I shall manufacture some couplets to adapt my melody to."
So saying, and taking his head between his hands, he assumed the
grave attitude of a man who is having relations with the Muses. After a
few minutes of this sacred intercourse, he had produced one of those