First, two soldiers advanced: a sergeant, browned by the sun of Africa, and a young conscript, having still the odor of the fields about him, his arms embarrassed by a cloak three times too large for him. The sergeant gave a skeptical laugh. The conscript remained bent for a long while, singularly flattered by having a sweetheart.
Then came a fat man in a white vest, with a red and bloated face, who gazed tranquilly without a grimace either of joy or displeasure, as if he thought it altogether natural that he should be loved by some one.
He was followed by three schoolboys, youths from fifteen to sixteen years old, with brazen mien, pushing each other to make people think that they had the honor to be intoxicated. All three of them swore that they saw their aunts in the Mirror of Love.
Thus, brothers, the curious followed each other before the mirror, and I cannot now recall the different expressions of countenance which struck me then. Oh! oh! vision of the well-beloved! what rude truths you spoke to those wide open eyes! They were the true Mirrors of Love, mirrors in which woman’s grace was reflected in a dubious light, where luxury spread out into folly.
The girls, on the other side of the rope, amused themselves in a most genuine fashion. I read only intense curiosity upon their faces, I did not see the indication of the least wicked thought. They came, turn by turn, to throw an astonished glance upon the mirror and retired, some a trifle thoughtful, others laughing like so many fools.
To speak the truth, I know not what business I had there. If I were a woman, provided I was pretty, I would never entertain the foolish idea of putting myself out to go see the man who loved me. The days when my heart should weep at being alone, if those days were days of spring and golden sunlight, I would go into a flowery path that each passerby might gaze at and adore me. In the evening, I would return rich with love.
The curious girls before me were not all equally pretty. The handsome ones derided the science of the magician; for a long time past they had had no need of him. The ugly ones, on the contrary, had never found themselves at such a fête as this. There came one of these, with thin hair and large mouth, who could not tear herself away from the magic mirror; she kept upon her lips the joyous and heartrending smile of a poor wretch satisfying her hunger after a long fast.
I asked myself what fine ideas had been awakened in these foolish heads. This was not an easy problem to solve. All of them had, without doubt, seen in their dreams princes cast themselves at their feet; all of them desired to become better acquainted with the lovers whom they remembered so confusedly on awaking. There were, certainly, many deceptions; princes are becoming rare, and the eyes of our souls, which open at night upon a better world, are eyes much more accommodating than those we employ during the day. There were also great delights: the dream was realized; the lover had the handsome moustache and the black hair seen in the vision.
Thus each one, in a few seconds, lived a life of love, innocent romances, swift as hope, which one guessed from the blushes on the cheeks and the quivers of the corsages.
After all, these girls were, perhaps, fools, and I was a fool myself to have seen so many things where there was, doubtless, nothing whatever visible. Nevertheless, I completely reassured myself by studying them. I noticed that both men and women seemed in general thoroughly satisfied with the apparition. The magician, certainly, had never been malicious enough to give the least displeasure to these good folks who had paid him two sous.
I approached, brothers; I applied, without too much emotion, my right eye to the Mirror of Love. I perceived, between two huge red curtains, a woman leaning against the back of an armchair. She was brilliantly illuminated by lamps which I could not see, and stood out in relief against a piece of painted canvas, stretched across the end of the booth; this canvas, cut in places, must formerly have represented a fine grove of blue trees I Brothers, I saw neither Marie nor Laurence. She who loved me, according to the magician’s glass, wore, like a well-bred vision, a long white robe slightly fastened at the waist, flowing upon the floor like a cloud. She had across her forehead a wide veil, also white, held in place by a crown of hawthorn flowers. Thus clad, the dear angel was all whiteness, all innocence.
She leaned coquettishly against the back of the armchair, turning towards me large, caressing blue eyes. She seemed to me superb beneath the veil: she had flaxen tresses which were lost amid the muslin, a frank and pure forehead, delicate lips, dimples which were nests for kisses. At the first glance, brothers, I took her for a saint; at the second, I saw she had the air of a good girl and was not in the least conceited.
She lifted three fingers to her lips, and sent me a kiss, with a courtesy which did not in the least suggest the realm of shadows. Observing that she was not disposed to fly away, I fixed her features in my memory and retired from the mirror.
As I was quitting the booth, I saw my acquaintance, the friend of the people, enter. This grave moralist, who seemed to shun me, hastened to set the bad example of culpable curiosity. His long spine, bent in a semicircle, shook with emotion; then, being unable to get nearer, he kissed the magic glass.
I descended the three plank steps of the platform; I found myself again in the crowd, decided to seek the girl who loved me now that I knew her smile.
The lamps smoked, the tumult was increasing, the people pushed along with such reckless haste that they nearly overturned the booths. The fête was at that hour of ideal joy in which, in order to be happy, one risks being suffocated.
On straightening myself up, I had before me a horizon of linen caps and silk hats. I advanced, pushing the men, cautiously getting around the great skirts of the women. Perhaps the girl who loved me was wrapped in that pink cloak; perhaps her head was beneath that tulle hood ornamented with mauve ribbons; perhaps she wore that delicious straw hat with an ostrich feather in it. Alas! the owner of the cloak was sixty; the hood, which concealed an abominably ugly face, leaned lovingly upon the shoulder of a sapper; she who wore the hat was laughing heartily, opening widely the most beautiful eyes in the world — but I did not recognize those beautiful eyes.
Brothers, above crowds hover I know not what anguish and what sorrow, as if the multitude had sent up a breath of terror and pity. Never do I find myself amid a great assemblage of people without experiencing a vague uneasiness. It seems to me that some frightful misfortune menaces these assembled men, that a single flash of lightning will suffice, amid the excitement of their gestures and voices, to strike them with motionlessness, with eternal silence.
Little by little, I decreased my pace, looking at this joy which wounded me. At the foot of a tree, in the full yellow light of the lamps, an old beggar was standing, his body stiffened, horribly twisted by paralysis. He lifted towards the passersby his pale face, winking his eyes in a lamentable fashion the better to excite pity. He gave to his limbs sudden quivers of fever which shook him like a withered branch. The young girls, fresh and blushing, passed laughingly before this hideous spectacle.
Further away, at the door of an inn, two workmen were fighting. In the struggle, the glasses had been overturned, and to see the wine flowing over the pavement one might have thought it blood from great wounds.
The laughter seemed to me to be changed into sobs, the lights became a vast conflagration, the crowd whirled as if stricken with terror. I walked on, with a feeling of horrible sadness at my heart, staring at the faces of the young girls but never finding the person who loved me.
I saw a man standing before one of the posts which bore the lamps, considering it with a profoundly absorbed air. From his disturbed looks, I thought he was seeking the solution of some grave problem. This man was the friend of the people.
Having turned his head, he noticed me.
“Monsieur,” said he to me, “the oil employed in fêtes like this costs twenty sous a litre.