The Confessions Read online

  I had not yet sufficient reasoning power to realize the extent to which appearances were against me, to put myself in my elders’ position. I clung to my own, and all I felt was the cruelty of an appalling punishment for a crime I had not committed. The physical pain was bad enough, but I hardly noticed it; what I felt was indignation, rage, and despair. My cousin was in a more or less similar case; he had been punished for what had only been a mistake but was taken for a premeditated crime, and he, following my example, got into a rage, and so to speak, worked himself up to the same pitch as myself. Lying together in the same bed, we embraced wildly, almost stifling one another; and when our young hearts were somewhat assuaged and we could give voice to our anger, we sat up and shouted a hundred times in unison at the tops of our voices: ‘Carnifex!* carnifex! carnifex!’

  I feel my pulse beat faster once more as I write. I shall always remember that time if I live to be a thousand. That first meeting with violence and injustice has remained so deeply engraved on my heart that any thought which recalls it summons back this first emotion. The feeling was only a personal one in its origins, but it has since assumed such a consistency and has become so divorced from personal interests that my blood boils at the sight or the tale of any injustice, whoever may be the sufferer and wherever it may have taken place, in just the same way as if I were myself its victim. When I read of the cruelties of a fierce tyrant, of the subtle machinations of a rascally priest, I would gladly go and stab the wretch myself, even if it were to cost me my life a hundred times over. I have often run till I dropped, flinging stones at some cock or cow or dog, or any animal that I saw tormenting another because it felt itself the stronger. This is perhaps an innate characteristic in me. Indeed I think it is. But the memory of the first injustice I suffered was so painful, so persistent, and so intricately bound up with it that, however strong my initial bent in that direction, this youthful experience must certainly have powerfully reinforced it.

  There ended the serenity of my childish life. From that moment I never again enjoyed pure happiness, and even to-day I am conscious that memory of childhood’s delights stops short at that point. We stayed some months longer at Bossey. We lived as we are told the first man lived in the earthly paradise, but we no longer enjoyed it; in appearance our situation was unchanged, but in reality it was an entirely different kind of existence. No longer were we young people bound by ties of respect, intimacy, and confidence to our guardians; we no longer looked on them as gods who read our hearts; we were less ashamed of wrongdoing, and more afraid of being caught; we began to be secretive, to rebel, and to lie. All the vices of our years began to corrupt our innocence and to give an ugly turn to our amusements. Even the country no longer had for us those sweet and simple charms that touch the heart; it seemed to our eyes depressing and empty, as if it had been covered by a veil that cloaked its beauties. We gave up tending our little gardens, our herbs and flowers. We no longer went out to scratch the surface of the ground and shout with delight at finding one of the seeds we had sown beginning to sprout. We grew to dislike that life; and they grew to dislike us. So my uncle took us away, and we left M. and Mme Lambercier, with few regrets on either side, each party having grown weary of the other.

  More than thirty years have passed since my departure from Bossey without my once recalling my stay there in any consecutive way or with any pleasure. But now that I have passed my prime and am declining into old age, I find these memories reviving as others fade, and stamping themselves on my mind with a charm and vividness of Outline that grows from day to day. It is as if, feeling my life escaping from me, I were trying to recapture it at its beginnings. The smallest events of that time please me by the mere fact that they are of that time. I remember places and people and moments in all their detail. I can see the man- or maid-servant bustling about the room, a swallow flying in at the window, a fly alighting on my hand while I am saying my lesson. I can see the whole arrangement of the room in which we lived, on the right of which was M. Lambercier’s study, with an engraving of all the popes, a barometer, and a large almanac on the walls. The windows were darkened by raspberry canes, which sometimes grew into the room; for the garden climbed steeply above the back of the house, and overshadowed it I am well aware that the reader does not require information, but I, on the other hand, feel impelled to give it to him. Why should I not relate all the little incidents of that happy time, that still give me a flutter of pleasure to recall – six or seven of them at least.… Or let us strike a bargain. I will let you off five and be content with one, just one, so long as I am allowed to take as long as I like in telling it, in order to prolong my pleasure.

  If I were not concerned for yours, I might choose the tale of Mlle Lambercier’s unfortunate tumble at the end of the field, which caused her to display her full back view to the King of Sardinia as he passed. But the incident of the walnut tree on the terrace pleases me better. For I took part in it, whereas I was only a spectator of Mlle Lambercier’s tumble; and I assure you that I did not find the least cause for laughter in an accident which, though comical in itself, filled me with alarm on behalf of one whom I loved as a mother, or perhaps even more dearly.

  Outside the gate into the courtyard, on the left as you came in, was a terrace on which we often sat of an afternoon, although it was fully exposed to the sun. In order to provide some shade, however, M. Lambercier had a walnut tree planted there. Its planting was carried out with all solemnity; we two boarders were its godparents, and whilst the hole was being filled we each held the tree with one hand, singing triumphal songs. Now for its watering a kind of trench was left all round it, and every day my cousin and I eagerly watched the watering ceremony, which confirmed us in our natural belief that it was a finer thing to plant a tree on a terrace than a flag in the breech. We resolved, therefore, to win that glory for ourselves and share it with no one.

  For that purpose we went and cut a slip from a young willow, and planted it on the terrace some eight or ten feet from the sacred walnut. Nor did we omit to dig a trench round our tree, but the difficulty was to obtain the wherewithal to fill it. For our water was brought from a considerable distance, and we children were not allowed to run out and fetch it. Nevertheless our willow could not thrive without it, and for some days we resorted to every sort of device for getting it, to such good effect that it budded beneath our eyes, putting out little leaves whose growth we measured hour by hour, in the firm belief that, though it was not a foot high, it would not be long before it cast us a shade.

  Now our tree was our sole preoccupation, and we went about in a sort of fever, incapable of applying ourselves to our lessons or to anything else. Our elders, therefore, unable to make out the cause of the trouble, kept us more confined than ever; and the fatal moment drew near when our water would give out. We were desperate at the thought of watching our tree parch to death. Finally invention’s mother, necessity, suggested a way of keeping it alive and saving ourselves from death by despair. Our plan was to make an underground tunnel which would secretly bring to the willow some of the water which was given to the walnut tree. Feverishly we undertook our enterprise, but at first it did not succeed; the runnel filled up with dirt, and everything went wrong. But nothing deterred us: ‘Labor omnia vincit improbus.’ We dug away more earth and deepened our trench to give the water a flow; and we cut some boxes into little narrow boards, putting some of them flat at the bottom and propping others at angles at each side to make a triangular channel for our stream. Where it flowed in we planted thin sticks at intervals to form a grating or trap that would hold up the fine earth and stones, and keep the channel free for the water. Then we carefully covered our work, treading the soil well down, and on the day when it was completed waited in an ecstasy of alternate hope and fear for watering time. After centuries of delay the hour came round at last, and M. Lambercier emerged, as usual, to witness the ceremony, throughout which we both stood behind him, to hide our tree. For, most fortunately, he had his back to i
t.

  A few seconds after the first bucket was poured in we saw a trickle of water flow into our trench. At this sight our caution deserted us, and we set up such shouts of joy that M. Lambercier turned round; which was a pity since he had just been observing with delight how good the soil was around his tree and how greedily it absorbed the water. Shocked, however, to see it providing for two trenches, he also set up a shout. Then, taking a closer look, he discovered our trick and sent straight for a mattock, which quickly knocked a few of our boards flying. ‘An aqueduct! an aqueduct! he cried, and rained down his merciless blows on every side. Each one of them pierced us to the heart. In a moment the boards, the runnel, the trench, and the willow were all destroyed, and the earth all round was ploughed up. But, in the course of all this frightful business, the only words uttered were his cries of ‘An aqueduct! an aqueduct!’ as he knocked everything to pieces.

  It may be supposed that the incident had unpleasant consequences for the young architects. But not so. That was all. M. Lambercier did not utter a word of reproach, did not look sternly upon us, and never mentioned the matter at all, though we heard his full-throated laugh ring out shortly afterwards from his sister’s room. You could hear M. Lambercier’s laugh from afar. What was even more surprising, however, was that when the first shock was over, we were not very distressed ourselves. We planted another tree in another place, and often reminded one another of the first one’s unhappy fate, by significantly repeating ‘An aqueduct! an aqueduct!’ Before that time I had had occasional bouts of conceit and fancied myself an Aristides or a Brutus; but this was my first well-defined attack of vanity. To have built an aqueduct with our own hands and set a cutting to compete with a large tree seemed to me the very height of glory, the meaning of which I understood better at ten than did Caesar at thirty.

  The memory of that incident so stuck in my mind – or was so forcibly recalled to it – that one of my dearest plans, on revisiting Geneva in 1754, was to go back to Bossey, and see the memorials of my youth, chief among them that well-loved walnut tree, which by that time would have been a third of a century old. But I was so besieged by people, so little my own master, that I could not find a moment in which to please myself. It is unlikely that I shall ever have this opportunity again. But though I have lost all hope of ever seeing it now, I still long to do so, and were I ever to return to that dear village and find my walnut tree still alive, I should most probably water it with my tears.

  On my return to Geneva I stayed for two or three years with my uncle, waiting for them to decide what should be done with me. He intended his own son for an engineer, and so made him learn drawing and taught him the elements of Euclid. I shared these lessons with him, and got a taste for them, especially for the drawing. In the meantime they were discussing whether to make me a watchmaker, a lawyer, or a minister. My preference was for the ministry, for I fancied myself as a preacher. But the little income from my mother’s property had to be divided between my brother and myself, and was not enough for me to study on. Since I was too young, however, for a decision to be really urgent, I remained provisionally at my uncle’s more or less wasting my time, but paying all the same – as was only right – quite a little for my board.

  My uncle, like my father, was a pleasure lover, but had not learnt, like him, enough self-mastery to do his duty. So he paid very little attention to us. My aunt was a religious woman, of a rather pietistical turn, who preferred singing her psalms to looking after our education. So we were allowed almost complete freedom, which we never abused. We were sufficient company for one another, and almost inseparable. So we were not tempted to mix with the riff-raff of our own age, and did not pick up any of those loose habits that idleness might have led us into. But I am wrong to speak of us as idle; never in our lives were we less so, and the lucky thing was that all the crazes that attracted us, one after another, kept us together, busily occupied at home, and not tempted even to go out in the road. We constructed cages, pipes, kites, drums, and model houses, toy guns and bows, and blunted my poor old grandfather’s tools, imitating him in his craft of watchmaking. But our especial preference was for scribbling on paper, drawing, colour washing, painting, and generally wasting the materials. An Italian showman came to Geneva, a man by the name of Gamba-Corta, and we went to see him once, but refused to go again. He gave a marionette show, and we made marionettes; his marionettes acted a kind of comedy, and we made up comedies for ours. Then, producing our voices from deep in our throats in unskilful imitation of Mr Punch, we performed these charming comedies, which our unfortunate relatives were patient enough to sit through. But one day Uncle Bernard read us a very fine sermon in his serious style, and we then began to make up sermons. These details are not very interesting, I admit, but they serve to show that our early education was on the right lines. For though we were almost our own masters at a very early age, we were scarcely ever tempted to misuse our time. So little were we in need of companions, indeed, that we even neglected opportunities for finding them. When we went for walks we watched the children’s games without envy, from a distance, and did not so much as think of joining in. Our own friendship so filled our hearts that we had only to be together and the simplest pleasures were delightful.

  By dint of always being together we became noticeable, especially since, my cousin being so tall and I so short, we made a curiously assorted pair. His long, thin shape and his little face like a wrinkled apple, his soft expression and slovenly gait, incited the children to make fun of him. In their country dialect they gave him the nickname of Barnâ Bredanna* and as soon as we came out we heard Barnâ Bredanna shouted all around us. He could bear this more patiently than I. I got angry, and wanted to fight, which was just what the little devils wanted. I fought, and was beaten. My poor cousin did his best to back me up; but he was not strong and one punch sent him over. Then I lost my temper, but although I caught plenty of blows on my head and shoulders it was not me they were after but Barnâ Bredanna. However I had made things so much worse by my headstrong temper that we dared not go out except when they were in class, through fear of being booed and followed by the schoolchildren.

  So already I was a righter of wrongs. To be a proper knight-errant I only needed a lady; I acquired two. Every now and then I used to go and see my father at Nyon, a little village in the Vaudois where he had settled. He was very well liked, and his popularity extended to me. During the little time I spent with him everyone competed to entertain me. A certain Mme de Vulson, in particular, smothered me with kisses and, to complete my happiness, her daughter adopted me as her young man. It is obvious what purpose a young man of eleven serves for a girl of twenty-two. Such artful maidens know how to make use of little men as covers for their affairs with their elders, or to tempt real lovers by making an attractive show with unreal ones. But I did not see any disparity between us and took the matter seriously. I gave myself to her with all my heart, or rather with all my head, for my love, desperate though it was, was almost entirely of the imagination. Nevertheless I indulged in emotional scenes, agitations, and furies which were quite ridiculous.

  I know two very distinct sorts of love, both real but with practically nothing in common except that they are alike extremely violent and different in every way from a mere friendly affection. The whole course of my life has been divided between these two quite separate emotions, and I have even experienced them both simultaneously. For instance, at the time I am speaking of, whilst so publicly and tyrannically monopolizing Mlle de Vulson that I could not bear any man to come near her, I was having very short but very passionate encounters with a little Mlle Goton, who was so kind as to play the schoolmistress to me – and that was all. But that all meant everything. It seemed the height of bliss. For, suspecting already the key to the mystery although I could only make childish use of it, I compensated myself, behind Mlle de Vulson’s back, for the use she put me to as a mask for her other amours. But, to my great mortification, my secret was discovered – or rat
her less well kept by my little schoolmistress than by me – and very soon we were separated.

  She was indeed a strange little person, was Mlle Goton. She was not beautiful, but her face was not easy to forget. I can remember it yet, rather vividly at times for an old fool. Her eyes, especially, but her figure and her manner too, were out of keeping with her years. She had a proud, rather overbearing way with her which very well suited her schoolmistress’s role, and indeed had given us the first idea for it. But the oddest thing about her was a mixture of boldness and modesty difficult to imagine. She took the greatest liberties with me, but never allowed me to take any with her; she treated me exactly like a child, which makes me imagine that she had either ceased to be one herself, or that she was so childish, on the other hand, that she only saw the danger she was exposing herself to as a game.

  I gave myself over entirely, as you might say, to both these young ladies, so completely in fact that when I was with either of them I never thought of the other. But, on the other hand, there was no similarity between the emotions each of them roused in me. I could have spent my whole life with Mlle de Vulson without a thought of leaving her; but when I met her my pleasure was a calm one, never bordering on passion. I liked her best in fine company; her sense of humour, her sharp tongue, my jealousies even, attached me to her and made her interesting. I swelled with pride when she preferred me to grown-up rivals, whom’ she appeared to slight. I was in a torment, but I loved my torment. Applause, encouragement, and laughter excited me and raised my spirits. I indulged in bursts of anger and sallies of wit. In company I was beside myself with love for her; alone with her, I should have been constrained and cold, perhaps bored. All the same I was tenderly concerned for her, I suffered when she was ill, I would have sacrificed my health to restore hers – and I knew very well from experience the difference between sickness and health. When I was away from her I thought of her and missed her; when we were together her kisses warmed my heart, but did not rouse my senses. I was on terms of easy familiarity with her, for I asked no more of her in imagination than she gave me in fact. All the same I could not have borne to see her give as much to others. I loved her as a brother, but with a lover’s jealousy.