My Twenty-Five Days
I had just taken possession of my room in the hotel, a narrow den betweentwo papered partitions, through which I could hear every sound made by myneighbors; and I was beginning to arrange my clothes and linen in thewardrobe with a long mirror, when I opened the drawer which is in thispiece of furniture. I immediately noticed a roll of paper. Havingopened it, I spread it out before me, and read this title:My Twenty-five Days.It was the diary of a guest at the watering place, of the last occupantof my room, and had been forgotten at the moment of departure.These notes may be of some interest to sensible and healthy persons whonever leave their own homes. It is for their benefit that I transcribethem without altering a letter."CHATEL-GUYON, July 15th."At the first glance it is not lively, this country. However, I am goingto spend twenty-five days here, to have my liver and stomach treated, andto get thin. The twenty-five days of any one taking the baths are verylike the twenty-eight days of the reserves; they are all devoted tofatigue duty, severe fatigue duty. To-day I have done nothing as yet;I have been getting settled. I have made the acquaintance of thelocality and of the doctor. Chatel-Guyon consists of a stream in whichflows yellow water, in the midst of several hillocks on which are acasino, some houses, and some stone crosses. On the bank of the stream,at the end of the valley, may be seen a square building surrounded by alittle garden; this is the bathing establishment. Sad people wanderaround this building--the invalids. A great silence reigns in the walksshaded by trees, for this is not a pleasure resort, but a true healthresort; one takes care of one's health as a business, and one gets well,so it seems."Those who know affirm, even, that the mineral springs perform truemiracles here. However, no votive offering is hung around the cashier'soffice."From time to time a gentleman or a lady comes over to a kiosk with aslate roof, which shelters a woman of smiling and gentle aspect, and aspring boiling in a basin of cement: Not a word is exchanged between theinvalid and the female custodian of the healing water. She hands thenewcomer a little glass in which air bubbles sparkle in the transparentliquid. The guest drinks and goes off with a grave step to resume hisinterrupted walk beneath the trees."No noise in the little park, no breath of air in the leaves; no voicepasses through this silence. One ought to write at the entrance to thisdistrict: 'No one laughs here; they take care of their health.'"The people who chat resemble mutes who merely open their mouths tosimulate sounds, so afraid are they that their voices might escape."In the hotel, the same silence. It is a big hotel, where you dinesolemnly with people of good position, who have nothing to say to eachother. Their manners bespeak good breeding, and their faces reflect theconviction of a superiority of which it might be difficult for some togive actual proofs."At two o'clock I made my way up to the Casino, a little wooden butperched on a hillock, which one reaches by a goat path. But the viewfrom that height is admirable. Chatel-Guyon is situated in a very narrowvalley, exactly between the, plain and the mountain. I perceive, at theleft, the first great billows of the mountains of Auvergne, covered withwoods, and here and there big gray patches, hard masses of lava, for weare at the foot of the extinct volcanoes. At the right, through thenarrow cut of the valley, I discover a plain, infinite as the sea,steeped in a bluish fog which lets one only dimly discern the villages,the towns, the yellow fields of ripe grain, and the green squares ofmeadowland shaded with apple trees. It is the Limagne, an immense level,always enveloped in a light veil of vapor."The night has come. And now, after having dined alone, I write theselines beside my open window. I hear, over there, in front of me, thelittle orchestra of the Casino, which plays airs just as a foolish birdmight sing all alone in the desert."A dog barks at intervals. This great calm does one good. Goodnight."July 16th.--Nothing new. I have taken a bath and then a shower bath.I have swallowed three glasses of water, and I have walked along thepaths in the park, a quarter of an hour between each glass, then half anhour after the last. I have begun my twenty-five days."July 17th.--Remarked two mysterious, pretty women who are taking theirbaths and their meals after every one else has finished."July 18th.--Nothing new."July 19th.--Saw the two pretty women again. They have style and alittle indescribable air which I like very much."July 20th.--Long walk in a charming wooded valley, as far as theHermitage of Sans-Souci. This country is delightful, although sad; butso calm; so sweet, so green. One meets along the mountain roads longwagons loaded with hay, drawn by two cows at a slow pace or held back bythem in going down the slopes with a great effort of their heads, whichare yoked together. A man with a big black hat on his head is drivingthem with a slender stick, tipping them on the side or on the forehead;and often with a simple gesture, an energetic and serious gesture, hesuddenly halts them when the excessive load precipitates their journeydown the too rugged descents."The air is good to inhale in these valleys. And, if it is very warm,the dust bears with it a light odor of vanilla and of the stable, for somany cows pass over these routes that they leave reminders everywhere.And this odor is a perfume, when it would be a stench if it came fromother animals."July 21st.--Excursion to the valley of the Enval. It is a narrow gorgeinclosed by superb rocks at the very foot of the mountain. A streamflows amid the heaped-up boulders."As I reached the bottom of this ravine I heard women's voices, and Isoon perceived the two mysterious ladies of my hotel, who were chatting,seated on a stone."The occasion appeared to me a good one, and I introduced myself withouthesitation. My overtures were received without embarrassment. We walkedback together to the hotel. And we talked about Paris. They knew, itseemed, many people whom I knew, too. Who can they be?"I shall see them to-morrow. There is nothing more amusing than suchmeetings as this."July 22d.--Day passed almost entirely with the two unknown ladies. Theyare very pretty, by Jove!--one a brunette and the other a blonde. Theysay they are widows. H'm?"I offered to accompany them to Royat tomorrow, and they accepted myoffer."Chatel-Guyon is less sad than I thought on my arrival."July 23d.--Day spent at Royat. Royat is a little patch of hotels at thebottom of a valley, at the gate of Clermont-Ferrand. A great many peoplethere. A large park full of life. Superb view of the Puyde-Dome, seenat the end of a perspective of valleys."My fair companions are very popular, which is flattering to me. The manwho escorts a pretty woman always believes himself crowned with anaureole; with much more reason, the man who is accompanied by one on eachside of him. Nothing is so pleasant as to dine in a fashionablerestaurant with a female companion at whom everybody stares, and there isnothing better calculated to exalt a man in the estimation of hisneighbors."To go to the Bois, in a trap drawn by a sorry nag, or to go out into theboulevard escorted by a plain woman, are the two most humiliating thingsthat could happen to a sensitive heart that values the opinion of others.Of all luxuries, woman is the rarest and the most distinguished; she isthe one that costs most and which we desire most; she is, therefore theone that we should seek by preference to exhibit to the jealous eyes ofthe world."To exhibit to the world a pretty woman leaning on your arm is to excite,all at once, every kind of jealousy. It is as much as to say: 'Lookhere! I am rich, since I possess this rare and costly object; I havetaste, since I have known how to discover this pearl; perhaps, even, I amloved by her, unless I am deceived by her, which would still prove thatothers also consider her charming."But, what a disgrace it is to walk about town with an ugly woman!"And how many humiliating things this gives people to understand!"In the first place, they assume she must be your wife, for how could itbe supposed that you would have an unattractive sweetheart? A true womanmay be ungraceful; but then, her ugliness implies a thousand disagreeablethings for you. One supposes you must be a notary or a magistrate, asthese two professions have a monopoly of grotesque and well-doweredspouses. Now, is this not distressing to a man? And then, it seems toproclaim to the public that you have the odious courage, and are evenunder a legal obligation, to caress that ridiculous face and that ill-shaped body, and that you will, without doubt, be shameless enough tomake a mother of this by no means desirable being--which is the veryheight of the ridiculous."July 24th.--I never leave the side of the two unknown widows, whom I ambeginning to know quite well. This country is delightful and our hotelis excellent. Good season. The treatment is doing me an immense amountof good."July 25th.--Drive in a landau to the lake of Tazenat. An exquisite andunexpected jaunt decided on at luncheon. We started immediately onrising from table. After a long journey through the mountains wesuddenly perceived an admirable little lake, quite round, very blue,clear as glass, and situated at the bottom of an extinct crater. Oneside of this immense basin is barren, the other is wooded. In the midstof the trees is a small house where sleeps a good-natured, intellectualman, a sage who passes his days in this Virgilian region. He opens hisdwelling for us. An idea comes into my head. I exclaim:"'Supposing we bathe?'"'Yes,' they said, 'but costumes.'"'Bah! we are in the wilderness.'"And we did bathe! "If I were a poet, how I would describe thisunforgettable vision of those lissome young forms in the transparency ofthe water! The high, sloping sides shut in the lake, motionless,gleaming and round, as a silver coin; the sun pours into it a flood ofwarm light; and along the rocks the fair forms move in the almostinvisible water in which the swimmers seemed suspended. On the sand atthe bottom of the lake one could see their shadows as they moved along."July 26th.--Some persons seem to look with shocked and disapproving eyesat my rapid intimacy with the two fair widows. There are some people,then, who imagine that life consists in being bored. Everything thatappears to be amusing becomes immediately a breach of good breeding ormorality. For them duty has inflexible and mortally tedious rules."I would draw their attention, with all respect, to the fact that duty isnot the same for Mormons, Arabs Zulus, Turks, Englishmen, and Frenchmen,and that there are very virtuous people among all these nations."I will cite a single example. As regards women, duty begins in Englandat nine years of age; in France at fifteen. As for me, I take a littleof each people's notion of duty, and of the whole I make a resultcomparable to the morality of good King Solomon."July 27th.--Good news. I have lost 620 grams in weight. Excellent,this water of Chatel-Guyon! I am taking the widows to dine at Riom. Asad town whose anagram constitutes it an objectionable neighbor tohealing springs: Riom, Mori."July 28th.--Hello, how's this! My two widows have been visited by twogentlemen who came to look for them. Two widowers, without doubt. Theyare leaving this evening. They have written to me on fancy notepaper."July 29th.--Alone! Long excursion on foot to the extinct crater ofNachere. Splendid view."July 30th.--Nothing. I am taking the treatment."July 31st.--Ditto. Ditto. This pretty country is full of pollutedstreams. I am drawing the notice of the municipality to the abominablesewer which poisons the road in front of the hotel. All the kitchenrefuse of the establishment is thrown into it. This is a good way tobreed cholera."August 1st.--Nothing. The treatment."August 2d.--Admirable walk to Chateauneuf, a place of sojourn forrheumatic patients, where everybody is lame. Nothing can be queerer thanthis population of cripples!"August 3d.--Nothing. The treatment."August 4th.--Ditto. Ditto."August 5th.--Ditto. Ditto."August 6th.--Despair! I have just weighed myself. I have gained 310grams. But then?"August 7th.--Drove sixty-six kilometres in a carriage on the mountain.I will not mention the name of the country through respect for its women."This excursion had been pointed out to me as a beautiful one, and onethat was rarely made. After four hours on the road, I arrived at arather pretty village on the banks of a river in the midst of anadmirable wood of walnut trees. I had not yet seen a forest of walnuttrees of such dimensions in Auvergne. It constitutes, moreover, all thewealth of the district, for it is planted on the village common. Thiscommon was formerly only a hillside covered with brushwood. Theauthorities had tried in vain to get it cultivated. There was scarcelyenough pasture on it to feed a few sheep."To-day it is a superb wood, thanks to the women, and it has a curiousname: it is called the Sins of the Cure."Now I must say that the women of the mountain districts have thereputation of being light, lighter than in the plain. A bachelor whomeets them owes them at least a kiss; and if he does not take more he isonly a blockhead. If we consider this fairly, this way of looking at thematter is the only one that is logical and reasonable. As woman, whethershe be of the town or the country, has her natural mission to please man,man should always show her that she pleases him. If he abstains fromevery sort of demonstration, this means that he considers her ugly; it isalmost an insult to her. If I were a woman, I would not receive, asecond time, a man who failed to show me respect at our first meeting,for I would consider that he had failed in appreciation of my beauty, mycharm, and my feminine qualities."So the bachelors of the village X often proved to the women of thedistrict that they found them to their taste, and, as the cure was unableto prevent these demonstrations, as gallant as they were natural, heresolved to utilize them for the benefit of the general prosperity. Sohe imposed as a penance on every woman who had gone wrong that she shouldplant a walnut tree on the common. And every night lanterns were seenmoving about like will-o'-the-wisps on the hillock, for the erring onesscarcely like to perform their penance in broad daylight."In two years there was no longer any room on the lands belonging to thevillage, and to-day they calculate that there are more than threethousand trees around the belfry which rings out the services amid theirfoliage. These are the Sins of the Cure."Since we have been seeking for so many ways of rewooding France, theAdministration of Forests might surely enter into some arrangement withthe clergy to employ a method so simple as that employed by this humblecure."August 7th.--Treatment."August 8th.--I am packing up my trunks and saying good-by to thecharming little district so calm and silent, to the green mountain, tothe quiet valleys, to the deserted Casino, from which you can see, almostveiled by its light, bluish mist, the immense plain of the Limagne."I shall leave to-morrow."Here the manuscript stopped. I will add nothing to it, my impressions ofthe country not having been exactly the same as those of my predecessor.For I did not find the two widows!
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