CHAPTER IV--THE BACK ROOM OF THE CAFÉ MUSAIN

  One of the conversations among the young men, at which Marius waspresent and in which he sometimes joined, was a veritable shock to hismind.

  This took place in the back room of the Café Musain. Nearly all theFriends of the A B C had convened that evening. The argand lamp wassolemnly lighted. They talked of one thing and another, without passionand with noise. With the exception of Enjolras and Marius, who heldtheir peace, all were haranguing rather at hap-hazard. Conversationsbetween comrades sometimes are subject to these peaceable tumults. Itwas a game and an uproar as much as a conversation. They tossed wordsto each other and caught them up in turn. They were chattering in allquarters.

  No woman was admitted to this back room, except Louison, the dish-washerof the café, who passed through it from time to time, to go to herwashing in the "lavatory."

  Grantaire, thoroughly drunk, was deafening the corner of which he hadtaken possession, reasoning and contradicting at the top of his lungs,and shouting:--

  "I am thirsty. Mortals, I am dreaming: that the tun of Heidelberg has anattack of apoplexy, and that I am one of the dozen leeches which willbe applied to it. I want a drink. I desire to forget life. Life is ahideous invention of I know not whom. It lasts no time at all, and isworth nothing. One breaks one's neck in living. Life is a theatre set inwhich there are but few practicable entrances. Happiness is an antiquereliquary painted on one side only. Ecclesiastes says: 'All is vanity.'I agree with that good man, who never existed, perhaps. Zero not wishingto go stark naked, clothed himself in vanity. O vanity! The patching upof everything with big words! a kitchen is a laboratory, a dancer is aprofessor, an acrobat is a gymnast, a boxer is a pugilist, an apothecaryis a chemist, a wigmaker is an artist, a hodman is an architect, ajockey is a sportsman, a wood-louse is a pterigybranche. Vanity has aright and a wrong side; the right side is stupid, it is the negro withhis glass beads; the wrong side is foolish, it is the philosopher withhis rags. I weep over the one and I laugh over the other. What arecalled honors and dignities, and even dignity and honor, are generallyof pinchbeck. Kings make playthings of human pride. Caligula made ahorse a consul; Charles II. made a knight of a sirloin. Wrap yourselfup now, then, between Consul Incitatus and Baronet Roastbeef. As forthe intrinsic value of people, it is no longer respectable in the least.Listen to the panegyric which neighbor makes of neighbor. White on whiteis ferocious; if the lily could speak, what a setting down it would givethe dove! A bigoted woman prating of a devout woman is more venomousthan the asp and the cobra. It is a shame that I am ignorant, otherwiseI would quote to you a mass of things; but I know nothing. For instance,I have always been witty; when I was a pupil of Gros, instead ofdaubing wretched little pictures, I passed my time in pilfering apples;_rapin_24 is the masculine of _rapine_. So much for myself; as forthe rest of you, you are worth no more than I am. I scoff at yourperfections, excellencies, and qualities. Every good quality tendstowards a defect; economy borders on avarice, the generous man is nextdoor to the prodigal, the brave man rubs elbows with the braggart; hewho says very pious says a trifle bigoted; there are just as many vicesin virtue as there are holes in Diogenes' cloak. Whom do you admire, theslain or the slayer, Cæsar or Brutus? Generally men are in favor of theslayer. Long live Brutus, he has slain! There lies the virtue. Virtue,granted, but madness also. There are queer spots on those great men.The Brutus who killed Cæsar was in love with the statue of a little boy.This statue was from the hand of the Greek sculptor Strongylion,who also carved that figure of an Amazon known as the Beautiful Leg,Eucnemos, which Nero carried with him in his travels. This Strongylionleft but two statues which placed Nero and Brutus in accord. Brutus wasin love with the one, Nero with the other. All history is nothing butwearisome repetition. One century is the plagiarist of the other. Thebattle of Marengo copies the battle of Pydna; the Tolbiac of Clovis andthe Austerlitz of Napoleon are as like each other as two drops of water.I don't attach much importance to victory. Nothing is so stupid as toconquer; true glory lies in convincing. But try to prove something! Ifyou are content with success, what mediocrity, and with conquering, whatwretchedness! Alas, vanity and cowardice everywhere. Everything obeyssuccess, even grammar. _Si volet usus_, says Horace. Therefore I disdainthe human race. Shall we descend to the party at all? Do you wish meto begin admiring the peoples? What people, if you please? Shall it beGreece? The Athenians, those Parisians of days gone by, slew Phocion,as we might say Coligny, and fawned upon tyrants to such an extent thatAnacephorus said of Pisistratus: "His urine attracts the bees." The mostprominent man in Greece for fifty years was that grammarian Philetas,who was so small and so thin that he was obliged to load his shoes withlead in order not to be blown away by the wind. There stood on the greatsquare in Corinth a statue carved by Silanion and catalogued by Pliny;this statue represented Episthates. What did Episthates do? He inventeda trip. That sums up Greece and glory. Let us pass on to others. Shall Iadmire England? Shall I admire France? France? Why? Because of Paris?I have just told you my opinion of Athens. England? Why? Because ofLondon? I hate Carthage. And then, London, the metropolis of luxury, isthe headquarters of wretchedness. There are a hundred deaths a year ofhunger in the parish of Charing-Cross alone. Such is Albion. I add,as the climax, that I have seen an Englishwoman dancing in a wreath ofroses and blue spectacles. A fig then for England! If I do not admireJohn Bull, shall I admire Brother Jonathan? I have but little taste forthat slave-holding brother. Take away _Time is money_, what remains ofEngland? Take away _Cotton is king_, what remains of America? Germanyis the lymph, Italy is the bile. Shall we go into ecstasies over Russia?Voltaire admired it. He also admired China. I admit that Russia has itsbeauties, among others, a stout despotism; but I pity the despots.Their health is delicate. A decapitated Alexis, a poignarded Peter,a strangled Paul, another Paul crushed flat with kicks, divers Ivansstrangled, with their throats cut, numerous Nicholases and Basilspoisoned, all this indicates that the palace of the Emperors of Russiais in a condition of flagrant insalubrity. All civilized peoples offerthis detail to the admiration of the thinker; war; now, war, civilizedwar, exhausts and sums up all the forms of ruffianism, from thebrigandage of the Trabuceros in the gorges of Mont Jaxa to the maraudingof the Comanche Indians in the Doubtful Pass. 'Bah!' you will say tome, 'but Europe is certainly better than Asia?' I admit that Asia is afarce; but I do not precisely see what you find to laugh at in the GrandLama, you peoples of the west, who have mingled with your fashions andyour elegances all the complicated filth of majesty, from the dirtychemise of Queen Isabella to the chamber-chair of the Dauphin. Gentlemenof the human race, I tell you, not a bit of it! It is at Brussels thatthe most beer is consumed, at Stockholm the most brandy, at Madrid themost chocolate, at Amsterdam the most gin, at London the most wine, atConstantinople the most coffee, at Paris the most absinthe; there areall the useful notions. Paris carries the day, in short. In Paris,even the rag-pickers are sybarites; Diogenes would have loved to be arag-picker of the Place Maubert better than to be a philosopher at thePiræus. Learn this in addition; the wineshops of the ragpickers arecalled _bibines_; the most celebrated are the _Saucepan_ and _TheSlaughter-House_. Hence, tea-gardens, goguettes, caboulots, bouibuis,mastroquets, bastringues, manezingues, bibines of the rag-pickers,caravanseries of the caliphs, I certify to you, I am a voluptuary, I eatat Richard's at forty sous a head, I must have Persian carpets to rollnaked Cleopatra in! Where is Cleopatra? Ah! So it is you, Louison. Goodday."

  Thus did Grantaire, more than intoxicated, launch into speech, catchingat the dish-washer in her passage, from his corner in the back room ofthe Café Musain.

  Bossuet, extending his hand towards him, tried to impose silence on him,and Grantaire began again worse than ever:--

  "Aigle de Meaux, down with your paws. You produce on me no effect withyour gesture of Hippocrates refusing Artaxerxes' bric-à-brac. I excuseyou from the task of soothing me. Moreover, I am sad. What do you wishme to say to you? Man is evil, man is deformed; the butterfly is asuccess, man is a failure. God made a mistake with that animal. Acrowd offers a choice of ugliness. The first comer is a wretch,_Femme_--woman--rhymes with _infâme_,--infamous. Yes, I have the spleen,complicated with melancholy, with homesickness, plus hypochondria, andI am vexed and I rage, and I yawn, and I am bored, and I am tired todeath, and I am stupid! Let God go to the devil!"

  "Silence then, capital R!" resumed Bossuet, who was discussing a pointof law behind the scenes, and who was plunged more than waist high in aphrase of judicial slang, of which this is the conclusion:--

  "--And as for me, although I am hardly a legist, and at the most, anamateur attorney, I maintain this: that, in accordance with the termsof the customs of Normandy, at Saint-Michel, and for each year, anequivalent must be paid to the profit of the lord of the manor, savingthe rights of others, and by all and several, the proprietors as wellas those seized with inheritance, and that, for all emphyteuses, leases,freeholds, contracts of domain, mortgages--"

  "Echo, plaintive nymph," hummed Grantaire.

  Near Grantaire, an almost silent table, a sheet of paper, an inkstandand a pen between two glasses of brandy, announced that a vaudeville wasbeing sketched out.

  This great affair was being discussed in a low voice, and the two headsat work touched each other: "Let us begin by finding names. When one hasthe names, one finds the subject."

  "That is true. Dictate. I will write."

  "Monsieur Dorimon."

  "An independent gentleman?"

  "Of course."

  "His daughter, Célestine."

  "--tine. What next?"

  "Colonel Sainval."

  "Sainval is stale. I should say Valsin."

  Beside the vaudeville aspirants, another group, which was also takingadvantage of the uproar to talk low, was discussing a duel. An oldfellow of thirty was counselling a young one of eighteen, and explainingto him what sort of an adversary he had to deal with.

  "The deuce! Look out for yourself. He is a fine swordsman. His play isneat. He has the attack, no wasted feints, wrist, dash, lightning, ajust parade, mathematical parries, _bigre!_ and he is left-handed."

  In the angle opposite Grantaire, Joly and Bahorel were playing dominoes,and talking of love.

  "You are in luck, that you are," Joly was saying. "You have a mistresswho is always laughing."

  "That is a fault of hers," returned Bahorel. "One's mistress does wrongto laugh. That encourages one to deceive her. To see her gay removesyour remorse; if you see her sad, your conscience pricks you."

  "Ingrate! a woman who laughs is such a good thing! And you neverquarrel!"

  "That is because of the treaty which we have made. On forming our littleHoly Alliance we assigned ourselves each our frontier, which we nevercross. What is situated on the side of winter belongs to Vaud, on theside of the wind to Gex. Hence the peace."

  "Peace is happiness digesting."

  "And you, Jolllly, where do you stand in your entanglement withMamselle--you know whom I mean?"

  "She sulks at me with cruel patience."

  "Yet you are a lover to soften the heart with gauntness."

  "Alas!"

  "In your place, I would let her alone."

  "That is easy enough to say."

  "And to do. Is not her name Musichetta?"

  "Yes. Ah! my poor Bahorel, she is a superb girl, very literary, withtiny feet, little hands, she dresses well, and is white and dimpled,with the eyes of a fortune-teller. I am wild over her."

  "My dear fellow, then in order to please her, you must be elegant,and produce effects with your knees. Buy a good pair of trousers ofdouble-milled cloth at Staub's. That will assist."

  "At what price?" shouted Grantaire.

  The third corner was delivered up to a poetical discussion. Paganmythology was giving battle to Christian mythology. The question wasabout Olympus, whose part was taken by Jean Prouvaire, out of pureromanticism.

  Jean Prouvaire was timid only in repose. Once excited, he burst forth,a sort of mirth accentuated his enthusiasm, and he was at once bothlaughing and lyric.

  "Let us not insult the gods," said he. "The gods may not have takentheir departure. Jupiter does not impress me as dead. The gods aredreams, you say. Well, even in nature, such as it is to-day, after theflight of these dreams, we still find all the grand old pagan myths.Such and such a mountain with the profile of a citadel, like theVignemale, for example, is still to me the headdress of Cybele; it hasnot been proved to me that Pan does not come at night to breathe intothe hollow trunks of the willows, stopping up the holes in turn with hisfingers, and I have always believed that Io had something to do with thecascade of Pissevache."

  In the last corner, they were talking politics. The Charter which hadbeen granted was getting roughly handled. Combeferre was upholding itweakly. Courfeyrac was energetically making a breach in it. On the tablelay an unfortunate copy of the famous Touquet Charter. Courfeyrac hadseized it, and was brandishing it, mingling with his arguments therattling of this sheet of paper.

  "In the first place, I won't have any kings; if it were only from aneconomical point of view, I don't want any; a king is a parasite. Onedoes not have kings gratis. Listen to this: the dearness of kings. Atthe death of François I., the national debt of France amounted to anincome of thirty thousand livres; at the death of Louis XIV. it was twomilliards, six hundred millions, at twenty-eight livres the mark, whichwas equivalent in 1760, according to Desmarets, to four milliards, fivehundred millions, which would to-day be equivalent to twelve milliards.In the second place, and no offence to Combeferre, a charter granted isbut a poor expedient of civilization. To save the transition, to softenthe passage, to deaden the shock, to cause the nation to pass insensiblyfrom the monarchy to democracy by the practice of constitutionalfictions,--what detestable reasons all those are! No! no! let us neverenlighten the people with false daylight. Principles dwindle and palein your constitutional cellar. No illegitimacy, no compromise, no grantfrom the king to the people. In all such grants there is an Article 14.By the side of the hand which gives there is the claw which snatchesback. I refuse your charter point-blank. A charter is a mask; the lielurks beneath it. A people which accepts a charter abdicates. The law isonly the law when entire. No! no charter!"

  It was winter; a couple of fagots were crackling in the fireplace. Thiswas tempting, and Courfeyrac could not resist. He crumpled the poorTouquet Charter in his fist, and flung it in the fire. The paperflashed up. Combeferre watched the masterpiece of Louis XVIII. burnphilosophically, and contented himself with saying:--

  "The charter metamorphosed into flame."

  And sarcasms, sallies, jests, that French thing which is called_entrain_, and that English thing which is called humor, good and badtaste, good and bad reasons, all the wild pyrotechnics of dialogue,mounting together and crossing from all points of the room, produced asort of merry bombardment over their heads.