Bouvard and Pecuchet Part 45

Foureau, in order to make the experiment himself, would fain have seized the lancet, but the doctor having refused, he vigorously pinched the invalid.

The captain tickled her nostrils with a feather; the tax-collector plunged a pin under her skin.

"Let her alone now," said Vaucorbeil; "it is nothing astonis.h.i.+ng, after all. Simply a hysterical female! The devil will have his pains for nothing."

"That one there," said Pecuchet, pointing towards Victoire, the scrofulous woman, "is a physician. She recognises diseases, and indicates the remedies."

Langlois burned to consult her about his catarrh; but Coulon, more courageous, asked her for something for his rheumatism.

Pecuchet placed his right hand in Victoire's left, and, with her lids closed uninterruptedly, her cheeks a little red, her lips quivering, the somnambulist, after some rambling utterances, ordered _valum bec.u.m_.

She had a.s.sisted in an apothecary's shop at Bayeux. Vaucorbeil drew the inference that what she wanted to say was _alb.u.m Graec.u.m_ a term which is to be found in pharmacy.

Then they accosted Pere Lemoine, who, according to Bouvard, could see objects through opaque bodies. He was an ex-schoolmaster, who had sunk into debauchery. White hairs were scattered about his face, and, with his back against the tree and his palms open, he was sleeping in the broad sunlight in a majestic fas.h.i.+on.

The physician drew over his eyes a double neckcloth; and Bouvard, extending a newspaper towards him, said imperiously:

"Read!"

He lowered his brow, moved the muscles of his face, then threw back his head, and ended by spelling out:

"Cons-ti-tu-tion-al."

But with skill the m.u.f.fler could be slipped off!

These denials by the physician roused Pecuchet's indignation. He even ventured to pretend that La Barbee could describe what was actually taking place in his own house.

"May be so," returned the doctor.

Then, taking out his watch:

"What is my wife occupying herself with?"

For a long time La Barbee hesitated; then with a sullen air:

"Hey! what? I am there! She is sewing ribbons on a straw hat."

Vaucorbeil s.n.a.t.c.hed a leaf from his note-book and wrote a few lines on it, which Marescot's clerk hastened to deliver.

The _seance_ was over. The patients went away.

Bouvard and Pecuchet, on the whole, had not succeeded. Was this due to the temperature, or to the smell of tobacco, or to the Abbe Jeufroy's umbrella, which had a lining of copper, a metal unfavourable to the emission of the fluid?

Vaucorbeil shrugged his shoulders. However, he could not deny the honesty of MM. Deleuze, Bertrand, Morin, Jules Cloquet. Now these masters lay down that somnambulists have predicted events, and submitted without pain to cruel operations.

The abbe related stories more astonis.h.i.+ng. A missionary had seen Brahmins rus.h.i.+ng, heads down, through a street; the Grand Lama of Thibet rips open his bowels in order to deliver oracles.

"Are you joking?" said the physician.

"By no means."

"Come, now, what tomfoolery that is!"

And the question being dropped, each of them furnished an anecdote.

"As for me," said the grocer, "I had a dog who was always sick when the month began on a Friday."

"We were fourteen children," observed the justice of the peace. "I was born on the 14th, my marriage took place on the 14th, and my saint's-day falls on the 14th. Explain this to me."

Beljambe had often reckoned in a dream the number of travellers he would have next day at his inn; and Pet.i.t told about the supper of Cazotte.

The cure then made this reflection:

"Why do we not see into it quite easily?"

"The demons--is that what you say?" asked Vaucorbeil.

Instead of again opening his lips, the abbe nodded his head.

Marescot spoke of the Pythia of Delphi.

"Beyond all question, miasmas."

"Oh! miasmas now!"

"As for me, I admit the existence of a fluid," remarked Bouvard.

"Nervoso-siderial," added Pecuchet.

"But prove it, show it, this fluid of yours! Besides, fluids are out of fas.h.i.+on. Listen to me."

Vaucorbeil moved further up to get into the shade. The others followed him.

"If you say to a child, 'I am a wolf; I am going to eat you,' he imagines that you are a wolf, and he is frightened. Therefore, this is a vision conjured up by words. In the same way the somnambulist accepts any fancies that you desire him to accept. He recollects instead of imagining, and has merely sensations when he believes that he is thinking. In this manner it is possible for crimes to be suggested, and virtuous people may see themselves ferocious beasts, and involuntarily become cannibals."

Glances were cast towards Bouvard and Pecuchet. Their scientific pursuits were fraught with dangers to society.

Marescot's clerk reappeared in the garden flouris.h.i.+ng a letter from Madame Vaucorbeil.

The doctor tore it open, turned pale, and finally read these words:

"_I am sewing ribbons on a straw hat._"

Amazement prevented them from bursting into a laugh.

"A mere coincidence, deuce take it! It proves nothing."

And as the two magnetisers wore looks of triumph, he turned round at the door to say to them: