THE PORTRAIT GALLERY
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the passions of his grandson, putting his hands on
his
head and
saying: "Your grandfather knows how to soothe those great cares";
nothing, save that his sons, many times a year, should seek
his
advice
on delicate questions; nothing, finally, save to feel calm, appeased,
infinitely wise. The hand of the old gentleman scarcely weighed on
the curls of
his
grandson: it was almost a benediction. What could
he be thinking of? Of his honorable past, which conferred the right
to pronounce on everything, to have the last word on everything.
I had not gone far enough the other day: Experience was much more
than a defense against death; it was a right: the right of old men.
General Aubry, hung over the arch, with his great sabre, was
a leader. A leader too, President Hebert, refined and cultivated, a
friend of Impetraz. His face was long and symmetrical with an end–
less chin, punctuated, exactly under his lip, by an imperial; he stuck
out
his
jaw a little, with the amused air of someone making a
distinguo,
of setting in motion an objection of principle, like a faint
belch. He was dreaming, he was holding a goose-feather quill: he
too, you can bet, was taking his relaxation, and it was by composing
verses. But he had the eagle eye of the leaders.
And the soldiers? I was in the center of the hall, the target of
all those grave eyes. I was neither grandfather, nor father, nor even
a husband. I did not vote, I paid, if at all, a few taxes: I could
boast neither the rights of one who contributes, nor of an elector,
nor even the humble right to honorableness which twenty years of
obedience confer upon an employee. My existence began seriously
to amaze me. Was I not simply a presence?
"Ah," I said to myself suddenly, "I am the soldier!" That made
me smile, bearing no grudge.
A plump gentleman of about fifty politely returned me a fine
smile. Renaudas had painted
him
with love, he had no stroke too
tender for the little ears, plump and carved, above all for the hands,
long, nervous, with loose fingers: in truth the hands of an intellectual
or an artist. His face was unknown to me: I must have passed the
canvas often without noticing it. I approached and read "Remy Par–
rottin, born in Bouville in 1849, professor at the School of Medicine
in Paris."
Parrottin: Dr. Wakefield had spoken to me of him: "Once in
my lifetime I met a great man. He was Remy Parrottin. I took his
course the winter of 1904 (you know I spent two years in Paris
studying obstetrics) . He made me understand what a leader is. He
had the stuff, I swear. He electrified us, he led us to the end of the
