Parisians in the Country | Page 8

or political horizons. Don't I know their dodges?
I'm up to all the tricks of all the trades. Do you know why? Because I
was born with a caul; my mother has got it, but I'll give it to you. You'll
see! I shall soon be in the government."
"You!"
"Why shouldn't I be the Baron Gaudissart, peer of France? Haven't they
twice elected Monsieur Popinot as deputy from the fourth
arrondissement? He dines with Louis Phillippe. There's Finot; he is
going to be, they say, a member of the Council. Suppose they send me

as ambassador to London? I tell you I'd nonplus those English! No man
ever got the better of Gaudissart, the illustrious Gaudissart, and nobody
ever will. Yes, I say it! no one ever outwitted me, and no one can--in
any walk of life, politics or impolitics, here or elsewhere. But, for the
time being, I must give myself wholly to the capitalists; to the 'Globe,'
the 'Movement,' the 'Children,' and my article Paris."
"You will be brought up with a round turn, you and your newspapers.
I'll bet you won't get further than Poitiers before the police will nab
you."
"What will you bet?"
"A shawl."
"Done! If I lose that shawl I'll go back to the article Paris and the hat
business. But as for getting the better of Gaudissart--never! never!"
And the illustrious traveller threw himself into position before Jenny,
looked at her proudly, one hand in his waistcoat, his head at
three-quarter profile,--an attitude truly Napoleonic.
"Oh, how funny you are! what have you been eating to-night?"
Gaudissart was thirty-eight years of age, of medium height, stout and
fat like men who roll about continually in stage-coaches, with a face as
round as a pumpkin, ruddy cheeks, and regular features of the type
which sculptors of all lands adopt as a model for statues of Abundance,
Law, Force, Commerce, and the like. His protuberant stomach swelled
forth in the shape of a pear; his legs were small, but active and vigorous.
He caught Jenny up in his arms like a baby and kissed her.
"Hold your tongue, young woman!" he said. "What do you know about
Saint-Simonism, antagonism, Fourierism, criticism, heroic enterprise,
or woman's freedom? I'll tell you what they are,--ten francs for each
subscription, Madame Gaudissart."
"On my word of honor, you are going crazy, Gaudissart."

"More and more crazy about YOU," he replied, flinging his hat upon
the sofa.
The next morning Gaudissart, having breakfasted gloriously with Jenny,
departed on horseback to work up the chief towns of the district to
which he was assigned by the various enterprises in whose interests he
was now about to exercise his great talents. After spending forty-five
days in beating up the country between Paris and Blois, he remained
two weeks at the latter place to write up his correspondence and make
short visits to the various market towns of the department. The night
before he left Blois for Tours he indited a letter to Mademoiselle Jenny
Courand. As the conciseness and charm of this epistle cannot be
equalled by any narration of ours, and as, moreover, it proves the
legitimacy of the tie which united these two individuals, we produce it
here:--
"My dear Jenny,--You will lose your wager. Like Napoleon, Gaudissart
the illustrious has his star, but NOT his Waterloo. I triumph
everywhere. Life insurance has done well. Between Paris and Blois I
lodged two millions. But as I get to the centre of France heads become
infinitely harder and millions correspondingly scarce. The article Paris
keeps up its own little jog-trot. It is a ring on the finger. With all my
well-known cunning I spit these shop-keepers like larks. I got off one
hundred and sixty-two Ternaux shawls at Orleans. I am sure I don't
know what they will do with them, unless they return them to the backs
of the sheep.
"As to the article journal--the devil! that's a horse of another color.
Holy saints! how one has to warble before you can teach these
bumpkins a new tune. I have only made sixty-two 'Movements': exactly
a hundred less for the whole trip than the shawls in one town. Those
republican rogues! they won't subscribe. They talk, they talk; they share
your opinions, and presently you are all agreed that every existing thing
must be overturned. You feel sure your man is going to subscribe. Not
a bit of it! If he owns three feet of ground, enough to grow ten cabbages,
or a few trees to slice into toothpicks, the fellow begins to talk of
consolidated property, taxes, revenues, indemnities,--a whole lot of

stuff, and I have wasted my time and breath on patriotism. It's a bad
business! Candidly, the 'Movement' does not move. I have written to
the directors and