Jean Christophe: In Paris

Jean Christophe: In Paris, by
Romain Rolland

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Title: Jean Christophe: In Paris The Market-Place, Antoinette, The
House
Author: Romain Rolland

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CHRISTOPHE: IN PARIS ***

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JEAN-CHRISTOPHE
In Paris
The Market-Place, Antoinette, The House
by Romain Rolland
Translated by Gilbert Cannan

CONTENTS
THE MARKET-PLACE
ANTOINETTE
THE HOUSE

THE MARKET-PLACE

I
Disorder in order. Untidy officials offhanded in manner. Travelers
protesting against the rules and regulations, to which they submitted all
the same. Christophe was in France. After having satisfied the curiosity
of the customs, he took his seat again in the train for Paris. Night was
over the fields that were soaked with the rain. The hard lights of the
stations accentuated the sadness of the interminable plain buried in
darkness. The trains, more and more numerous, that passed, rent the air
with their shrieking whistles, which broke upon the torpor of the
sleeping passengers. The train was nearing Paris.
Christophe was ready to get out an hour before they ran in; he had
jammed his hat down on his head; he had buttoned his coat up to his
neck for fear of the robbers, with whom he had been told Paris was
infested; twenty times he had got up and sat down; twenty times he had
moved his bag from the rack to the seat, from the seat to the rack, to the
exasperation of his fellow-passengers, against whom he knocked, every
time with his usual clumsiness.
Just as they were about to run into the station the train suddenly
stopped in the darkness. Christophe flattened his nose against the
window and tried vainly to look out. He turned towards his
fellow-travelers, hoping to find a friendly glance which would
encourage him to ask where they were. But they were all asleep or
pretending to be so: they were bored and scowling: not one of them
made any attempt to discover why they had stopped. Christophe was
surprised by their indifference: these stiff, somnolent creatures were so
utterly unlike the French of his imagination! At last he sat down,
discouraged, on his bag, rocking with every jolt of the train, and in his
turn he was just dozing off when he was roused by the noise of the
doors being opened.... Paris!... His fellow-travelers were already getting
out.
Jostling and jostled, he walked towards the exit of the station, refusing
the porter who offered to carry his bag. With a peasant's suspiciousness

he thought every one was going to rob him. He lifted his precious bag
on to his shoulder and walked straight ahead, indifferent to the curses
of the people as he forced his way through them. At last he found
himself in the greasy streets of Paris.
He was too much taken up with the business in hand, the finding of
lodgings, and too weary of the whirl of carriages into which he was
swept, to think of looking at anything. The first thing was to look for a
room. There was no lack of hotels: the station was surrounded with
them on all sides: their names were flaring in gas letters. Christophe
wanted to find a less dazzling place than any of these: none of them
seemed to him to be humble enough for his purse. At last in a side
street he saw a dirty inn with a cheap eating-house on the ground floor.
It was called Hôtel de la Civilisation. A fat man in his shirt-sleeves was
sitting smoking at a table: he hurried forward as he saw Christophe
enter. He could not understand a word of his jargon: but at the first
glance