Let it be remembered that this good deed on your part is due to your heart and will.May it protect you during your life,and make you blest in the life which is to come!"While at Nimes,the two poet-artisans met--Reboul the baker and Jasmin the barber.Reboul,who attended the music-recitation,went up to Jasmin and cordially embraced him,amidst the enthusiastic cheers of three thousand people.
Jasmin afterwards visited Reboul at his bakery,where they had a pleasant interview with respect to the patois of Provence and Gascony.At the same time it must be observed that Reboul did not write in patois,but in classical French.
Reboul had published a volume of poems which attracted the notice and praise of Lamartine and Alexandre Dumas.Perhaps the finest poem in the volume is entitled The Angel and Child.
Reboul had lost his wife and child;he sorrowed greatly at their death,and this poem was the result.The idea is simple and beautiful.An angel,noticing a lovely child in its cradle,and deeming it too pure for earth,bears its spirit away to Heaven.The poem has been admirably translated by Longfellow.
Dumas,in 'Pictures of Travel in the South of France,'relates an interview with the baker-poet of Nimes.
"What made you a poet?"asked Dumas.
"It was sorrow,"replied Reboul--"the loss of a beloved wife and child.I was in great grief;I sought solitude,and,finding no one who could understand me,poured forth my grief to the Almighty.""Yes,"said Dumas,"I now comprehend your feelings.It is thus that true poets become illustrious.How many men of talent only want a great misfortune to become men of genius!You have told me in a word the secret of your life;I know it now as well as you do."And yet Jasmin,the contemporary of Reboul,had written all his poetry without a sorrow,and amidst praise and joyfulness.
Chateaubriand,when in the South of France,called upon Reboul.
The baker met him at the door.
"Are you M.Reboul?"inquired the author of 'The Martyrs.'
"Which,sir--the baker or the poet?"
"The poet,of course."
"Then the poet cannot be seen until mid-day.At present the baker is working at the oven."Chateaubriand accordingly retired,but returned at the time appointed,and had a long and interesting conversation with Reboul.
While at Montpellier Jasmin received two letters from Madame Lafarge,then in prison.The circumstances connected with her case were much discussed in the journals of the time.She had married at seventeen a M.Lafarge,and found after her marriage that he had deceived her as to his property.Ill-feeling arose between the unhappy pair,and eventually she was tried for poisoning her husband.She was condemned with extenuating circumstances,and imprisoned at Montpellier in 1839.
She declared that she was innocent of the crime imputed to her,and Jasmin's faith in the virtue of womanhood led him to believe her.
Her letters to Jasmin were touching.
"Many pens,"she said,"have celebrated your genius;let mine touch your heart!Oh,yes,sir,you are good,noble,and generous!I preserve every word of yours as a dear consolation;I guard each of your promises as a holy hope.Voltaire has saved Calas.Sing for me,sir,and I will bless your memory to the day of my death.I am innocent!For eight long years I have suffered;and I am still suffering from the stain upon my honour.
I grieve for a sight of the sun,but I still love life.Sing for me."She again wrote to Jasmin,endeavouring to excite his interest by her appreciation of his poems.
"The spirit of your work,"she said,"vibrates through me in every form.What a pearl of eulogy is Maltro!What a great work is L'Abuglo!In the first of these poems you reach the sublime of love without touching a single chord of passion.What purity,and at the same time what ease and tenderness!It is not only the fever of the heart;it is life itself,its religion,its virtue.This poor lnnuocento does not live to love;she loves to live.Her love diffuses itself like a perfume--like the scent of a flower.In writing Maltro your muse becomes virgin and Christian;and to dictate L'Abuglo is a crown of flowers,violets mingled with roses,like Tibullus,Anacreon,and Horace."And again:"Poet,be happy;sing in the language of your mother,of your infancy,of your loves,your sorrows.The Gascon songs,revived by you,can never be forgotten.Poet,be happy!The language which you love,France will learn to admire and read,and your brother-poets will learn to imitate you.Spirit speaks to spirit;genius speaks to the heart.Sing,poet,sing!
Envy jeers in vain;your Muse is French;better still,it is Christian,and the laurel at the end of your course has two crowns--one for the forehead of the poet and the other for the heart of the man.Grand actions bring glory;good deeds bring happiness."Although Jasmin wrote an interesting letter to Madame Lafarge,he did not venture to sing or recite for her relief from prison.
She died before him,in 1852.
Footnotes for Chapter XIV.
[1]We adopt the translation of Miss Costello.