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Updated: May 28, 2025
When Goriot appeared for the first time in this condition, an exclamation of astonishment broke from his hostess at the color of his hair a dingy olive gray. He had grown sadder day by day under the influence of some hidden trouble; among all the faces round the table, his was the most woe-begone. There was no longer any doubt.
Not content with the constant interpolation of side remarks and comments, queries of a politely ironical nature to the reader, in the regular approved fashion of English novels, Gogol added after the tenth chapter a defiant epilogue, in which he explained his reasons for dealing with fact rather than with fancy, of ordinary people rather than with heroes, of commonplace events rather than with melodrama; and then suddenly he tried to jar the reader out of his self-satisfaction, like Balzac in "Pere Goriot."
Sometimes it was held that he was one of those petty gamblers who nightly play for small stakes until they win a few francs. A theory that he was a detective in the employ of the Home Office found favor at one time, but Vautrin urged that "Goriot was not sharp enough for one of that sort."
"I felt sure myself that he loved you," murmured Father Goriot, while Eugene lay back bewildered on the sofa, utterly unable to speak a word or to reason out how and why the magic wand had been waved to bring about this final transformation scene. "But you must see your rooms," said Mme. de Nucingen.
Vauquer said half banteringly to him, "So those daughters of yours don't come to see you any more, eh?" meaning to imply her doubts as to his paternity; but Father Goriot shrank as if his hostess had touched him with a sword-point. "They come sometimes," he said in a tremulous voice. "Aha! you still see them sometimes?" cried the students. "Bravo, Father Goriot!"
In her comfortable chambers at the Waldorf, Carrie was reading at this time "Pere Goriot," which Ames had recommended to her. It was so strong, and Ames's mere recommendation had so aroused her interest, that she caught nearly the full sympathetic significance of it. For the first time, it was being borne in upon her how silly and worthless had been her earlier reading, as a whole.
"In your own house?" asked Mme. de Restaud, looking at her sister. "What does it matter where they were?" asked Goriot. "The money is spent now." "I see how it is," said the Countess. "Rooms for M. de Rastignac. Poor Delphine, take warning by me!" "M. de Rastignac is incapable of ruining the woman he loves, dear." "Thanks! Delphine.
The boy who, in the future, was to awaken actual physical disgust in his readers by his description of the stuffy and dingy boarding-house dining-room in "Le Pere Goriot," was crushed and stupefied by his surroundings, and would sit for hours with his head on his hand, not attempting to learn, but gazing dreamily at the clouds, or at the foliage of the trees in the court below.
With the faculty for severe logic sedulously cultivated by elderly women during long evenings of gossip till they can always find an hypothesis to fit all circumstances, she was wont to reason thus: "If Father Goriot had daughters of his own as rich as those ladies who came here seemed to be, he would not be lodging in my house, on the third floor, at forty-five francs a month; and he would not go about dressed like a poor man."
Eugene sat dumb with amazement in the presence of this inexhaustible love; he gazed at Goriot, and his face betrayed the artless admiration which shapes the beliefs of youth. "I will be worthy of all this," he cried. "Oh! my Eugene, that is nobly said," and Mme. de Nucingen kissed the law student on the forehead. "He gave up Mlle. Taillefer and her millions for you," said Father Goriot.
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