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"I could not understand her. One minute she would cling round my neck and kiss me; another, when I wished in turn to caress her, she would repulse me. "'But as I intend, Atala, to become a Christian, what is there to prevent us marrying? I said, again and again. "And every time I asked this question she burst into tears and would not answer.
In the crisis of Chateaubriand's picturesque and passionate tale of the American wilderness, no one can escape the thrilling, haunting sound of the bell from the Jesuit chapel, as it tolls in the night and storm that were fatal to the happiness of Atala. One scarcely need say that the romance of missions has never faded from the American mind.
He realized, as the genius of Châteaubriand realized at almost the same moment, the artistic richness of the material which lay to hand in the silent forest vastnesses, with their unfamiliar life of man and beast, and their possibilities of mystery enough to satisfy the most craving. He was not the equal of the author of 'The Natchez' and 'Atala'; but he had a fresh and daring mind.
"But when once you are united to a man as you are," the Baroness put in, "virtue requires you to remain faithful to him." "Till he dies," said Atala, with a knowing flash. "I shall not have to wait long. If you only knew how Daddy Vyder coughs and blows. Poof, poof," and she imitated the old man.
Ever since the days of Cartier the French had known that savages inhabited the banks of the St Lawrence, but Champlain is the pioneer in that great body of literature on the North American Indian, which thenceforth continued without interruption in France to the René and Atala of Chateaubriand. Above all other subjects, the Indians are Champlain's chief theme.
If we except Châteaubriand, who was more loved than loving, Benjamin Constant stands last on the list of Madame Récamier's conquests; for, after the author of "Atala" and of the "Genius of Christianity" crossed her path, we hear of no more flirtations, no more despairing lovers.
Ask her if she was married without the sacrament of marriage!" Atala looked at the Italian. "How is she any better than I am?" she asked. "I am prettier than she is." "Yes, but I am an honest woman," said the wife, "and you may be called by a bad name." "How can you expect God to protect you if you trample every law, human and divine, under foot?" said the Baroness.
He forgot little Atala Judici, for excesses of profligacy had reduced him to the volatility of feeling that is characteristic of childhood. But the happiness of the family was dashed by the change that had come over him. He had been still hale when he had gone away from his home; he had come back almost a hundred, broken, bent, and his expression even debased.
Indeed, this effect-seeking writer, with all his genius, seemed less fitted than any one to express the natural and spontaneous. His Atala, who charms us so at the first reading, deals in studied emotions.
I never look at that shop near the Chinese baths, with its tapestry hangings of Florida jessamine, and filled with magnolias, without seeing the forest glades of the New World, described by the author of Atala, opening themselves out before me. Then, when this study of things and this discourse of reason begin to tire you, look around you! What contrasts of figures and faces you see in the crowd!
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