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was a novelty; an event。 He lived the life of a sovereign; or; better

still; of a journalist; in fact; he was the perambulating 〃feuilleton〃

of Parisian commerce。



His name was Gaudissart; and his renown; his vogue; the flatteries

showered upon him; were such as to win for him the surname of

Illustrious。 Wherever the fellow went;behind a counter or before a

bar; into a salon or to the top of a stage…coach; up to a garret or to

dine with a banker;every one said; the moment they saw him; 〃Ah!

here comes the illustrious Gaudissart!〃'*' No name was ever so in

keeping with the style; the manners; the countenance; the voice; the

language; of any man。 All things smiled upon our traveller; and the

traveller smiled back in return。 〃Similia similibus;〃he believed in

homoeopathy。 Puns; horse…laugh; monkish face; skin of a friar; true

Rabelaisian exterior; clothing; body; mind; and features; all pulled

together to put a devil…may…care jollity into every inch of his

person。 Free…handed and easy…going; he might be recognized at once as

the favorite of grisettes; the man who jumps lightly to the top of a

stage…coach; gives a hand to the timid lady who fears to step down;

jokes with the postillion about his neckerchief and contrives to sell

him a cap; smiles at the maid and catches her round the waist or by

the heart; gurgles at dinner like a bottle of wine and pretends to

draw the cork by sounding a filip on his distended cheek; plays a tune

with his knife on the champagne glasses without breaking them; and

says to the company; 〃Let me see you do THAT〃; chaffs the timid

traveller; contradicts the knowing one; lords it over a dinner…table

and manages to get the titbits for himself。 A strong fellow;

nevertheless; he can throw aside all this nonsense and mean business

when he flings away the stump of his cigar and says; with a glance at

some town; 〃I'll go and see what those people have got in their

stomachs。〃



'*' 〃Se gaudir;〃 to enjoy; to make fun。 〃Gaudriole;〃 gay discourse;

    rather free。Littre。



When buckled down to his work he became the slyest and cleverest of

diplomats。 All things to all men; he knew how to accost a banker like

a capitalist; a magistrate like a functionary; a royalist with pious

and monarchical sentiments; a bourgeois as one of themselves。 In

short; wherever he was he was just what he ought to be; he left

Gaudissart at the door when he went in; and picked him up when he came

out。



Until 1830 the illustrious Gaudissart was faithful to the article

Paris。 In his close relation to the caprices of humanity; the varied

paths of commerce had enabled him to observe the windings of the heart

of man。 He had learned the secret of persuasive eloquence; the knack

of loosening the tightest purse…strings; the art of rousing desire in

the souls of husbands; wives; children; and servants; and what is

more; he knew how to satisfy it。 No one had greater faculty than he

for inveigling a merchant by the charms of a bargain; and disappearing

at the instant when desire had reached its crisis。 Full of gratitude

to the hat…making trade; he always declared that it was his efforts in

behalf of the exterior of the human head which had enabled him to

understand its interior: he had capped and crowned so many people; he

was always flinging himself at their heads; etc。 His jokes about hats

and heads were irrepressible; though perhaps not dazzling。



Nevertheless; after August and October; 1830; he abandoned the hat

trade and the article Paris; and tore himself from things mechanical

and visible to mount into the higher spheres of Parisian speculation。

〃He forsook;〃 to use his own words; 〃matter for mind; manufactured

products for the infinitely purer elaborations of human intelligence。〃

This requires some explanation。



The general upset of 1830 brought to birth; as everybody knows; a

number of old ideas which clever speculators tried to pass off in new

bodies。 After 1830 ideas became property。 A writer; too wise to

publish his writings; once remarked that 〃more ideas are stolen than

pocket…handkerchiefs。〃 Perhaps in course of time we may have an

Exchange for thought; in fact; even now ideas; good or bad; have their

consols; are bought up; imported; exported; sold; and quoted like

stocks。 If ideas are not on hand ready for sale; speculators try to

pass off words in their stead; and actually live upon them as a bird

lives on the seeds of his millet。 Pray do not laugh; a word is worth

quite as much as an idea in a land where the ticket on a sack is of

more importance than the contents。 Have we not seen libraries working

off the word 〃picturesque〃 when literature would have cut the throat

of the word 〃fantastic〃? Fiscal genius has guessed the proper tax on

intellect; it has accurately estimated the profits of advertising; it

has registered a prospectus of the quantity and exact value of the

property; weighing its thought at the intellectual Stamp Office in the

Rue de la Paix。



Having become an article of commerce; intellect and all its products

must naturally obey the laws which bind other manufacturing interests。

Thus it often happens that ideas; conceived in their cups by certain

apparently idle Parisians;who nevertheless fight many a moral battle

over their champagne and their pheasants;are handed down at their

birth from the brain to the commercial travellers who are employed to

spread them discreetly; 〃urbi et orbi;〃 through Paris and the

provinces; seasoned with the fried pork of advertisement and

prospectus; by means of which they catch in their rat…trap the

departmental rodent commonly called subscriber; sometimes stockholder;

occasionally corresponding member or patron; but invariably fool。



〃I am a fool!〃 many a poor country proprietor has said when; caught by

the prospect of being the first to launch a new idea; he finds that he

has; in point of fact; launched his thousand or twelve hundred francs

into a gulf。



〃Subscribers are fools who never can be brought to understand that to

go ahead in the intellectual world they must start with more money

than they need for the tour of Europe;〃 say the speculators。



Consequently there is endless warfare between the recalcitrant public

which refuses to pay the Parisian imposts and the tax…gatherer who;

living by his receipt of custom; lards the public with new ideas;

turns it on the spit of lively projects; roasts it with prospectuses

(basting all the while with flattery); and finally gobbles it up with

some toothsome sauce in which it is caught and intoxicated like a fly

with a black…lead。 Moreover; since 1830 what honors and emoluments

have been scattered throughout France to stimulate the zeal and self…

love of the 〃progressive and intelligent masses〃! Titles; medals;

diplomas; a sort of legion of honor invented for the army of martyrs;

have followed each other with marvellous rapidity。 Speculators in the

manufactured products of the intellect have developed a spice; a

ginger; all their own。 From this have come premiums; forestalled

dividends; and that conscription of noted names which is levied

without the knowledge of the unfortunate writers who bear them; and

who thus find themselves actual co…operators in more enterprises than

there are days in the year; for the law; we may remark; takes no

account of the theft of a patronymic。 Worse than all is the rape of

ideas which these caterers for the public mind; like the slave…

merchants of Asia; tear from the paternal brain before they are well

matured; and drag half…clothed before the eyes of their blockhead of a

sultan; their Shahabaham; their terrible public; which; if they don't

amuse it; will cut off their heads by curtailing the ingots and

emptying their pockets。



This madness of our epoch reacted upon the illustrious Gaudissart; and

here follows the history of how it happened。 A life…insurance company

having been told of his irresistible eloquence offered him an unheard…

of commission; which he graciously accepted。 The bargain concluded and

the treaty signed; our traveller was put in training; or we might say

weaned; by the secretary…general of the enterprise; who freed his mind

of its swaddling…clothes; showed him the dark holes of the business;

taught him its dialect; took the mechanism apart bit by bit; dissected

for his instruction the particular public he was expected to gull;

crammed him with phrases; fed him with impromptu replies; provisioned

him with unanswerable arguments; and; so to speak; sharpened the file

of the tongue which was about to operate upon the life of France。



The puppet amply rewarded the pains bestowed upon him。 The heads of

the company boasted of the illustrious Gaudissart; showed him such

attention and proclaimed the great talents of this perambulating

prospectus so loudly in the sphere of exalted banking and commercial

diplomacy; that the financial managers of two newspapers (celebrated

at t

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