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Updated: June 10, 2025
There are days when I could swear that she loved me. Her character, formerly so irritable, is entirely changed; she is gentleness itself." But he could not conquer his aversion; it was stronger than his own will. These unavailing regrets, and the disappointments and sorrow that preyed upon him, undoubtedly aggravated the bitterness and severity of Martial's policy.
The harmless plays on words, sudden surprises, and neat turns of expression, which had satisfied the Greek and earlier Latin epigrammatists, were by no means stimulating enough for the blase taste of Martial's day. The age cried for point, and with point Martial supplies it to the full extent of its demand.
And if Martial followed his wife into the Poivriere, Jean had so arranged matters that the duke would at first suppose that she had been led there by charity. "But he will not go in," thought Lacheneur, whose heart throbbed wildly with sinister joy as he held Martial's horse. "Monsieur le Duc is too fine for that." And Martial did not go in.
This poor M. de Courtornieu had been so entirely crushed by Martial's revelation that he no longer made any effort to oppose him. "And this terrible letter?" he groaned. "Marie-Anne Lacheneur gave it to Abbe Midon, who came to me and said: 'Either the baron will escape, or this letter will be taken to the Duc de Richelieu. I voted for the baron's escape, I assure you.
Blanche was dead poisoned, like Marie-Anne; but she had procured a drug whose effect was instantaneous; and extended upon her couch, clad in her wonted apparel, her hands folded upon her breast, she seemed only asleep. A tear glittered in Martial's eye. "Poor, unhappy woman!" he murmured; "may God forgive you as I forgive you you whose crime has been so frightfully expiated here below!"
Of course it is true that many of Martial's lyrics would be thought disgusting in any well-regulated convict establishment. His gallantry is rarely "honourable." Scaliger used to burn a copy of Martial, once a year, on the altar of Catullus, who himself was far from prudish. But Martial, somehow, kept his heart undepraved, and his taste in books was excellent.
The younger Pliny, who speaks of him with a slightly supercilious approval, repaid with a more substantial gratification a poem comparing him to Cicero. Martial's gift for occasional verse just enabled him to live up three pair of stairs in the city; in later years, when he had an income from booksellers as well as from private patrons, he could afford a tiny country house among the Sabine hills.
While awaiting Martial in the vestibule of the chateau, he armed himself against the scorn and sneers which he would probably receive from this haughty nobleman whom he had come to insult. But Martial's kindly greeting had disconcerted him a little. But he was reassured when he saw the terrible effect produced upon the marquis by the insulting letter. "We have cut him to the quick," he thought.
He drew a copy of Kant from his blouse, but in his confusion several other volumes dropped from his bosom on the ground. The Baronet picked them up. "Ah!" said the Philosopher, "what's this? Cicero's De Senectute, at your age, too? Martial's Epigrams, Caesar's Commentaries. What! a classical scholar?" "E pluribus Unum. Nux vomica. Nil desperandum. Nihil fit!" said the Boy, enthusiastically.
Martial's thoughts were busy as he trotted along about a hundred yards behind the vehicle. "She is in a terrible hurry," he said to himself. "This, however, is scarcely the quarter for a lover's rendezvous." The carriage had passed the Place d'Italie. It entered the Rue du Chateau-des-Rentiers and soon paused before a tract of unoccupied ground.
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