Part 2 of Book 3 of Part 4 of the Memoirs of Chateaubriand, Volume 5. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Nicole Lee, the Memoirs of Chateaubriand, Volume 5 by François René des Chateaubriand, translated by Alexander Tixera de Matos, Book 3, Part 2. 21 May. Valdmunchen, where I arrived on Tuesday morning, the 21st of May, is the last Bavarian village on this side of Bohemia. I was congratulating myself on being able promptly to fulfil my mission. I was only fifty leagues from Prague. I plunged into water cold as ice. I made my toilet at a spring, like an ambassador preparing for a triumphal injury. I set out, and half a league from Valdmunchen. Full of confidence, I accosted the Austrian custom-house. A lowered tollgate barred the road. I got down with ear-scent, his red ribbon blazing. A young custom-house officer, armed with a musket, took us to the ground floor of a house into a vaulted room. There, sitting at his desk as though in court, was an old and fat chief of German customs, with red hair, red mustachios, thick eyebrows, sloping over two greenish half-opened eyes, and a smiteful look, a mixture of the Viennese police spy and the Bohemian smuggler. He took our passports without uttering a word. The young official timidly handed me a chair, while the chief before whom he seemed to tremble examined the passports. I did not sit down but went to look at some pistols hanging on the wall, and a carbine leaning against a corner of the room. It reminded me of the musket with which the Arga of the Isthmus of Corinth fired on the Greek peasant. After five minutes' silence, the Austrian barked out two or three words, which my Basilees translated thus. You can't pass. What? I couldn't pass, and why? The explanation began. Your description is not on the passport. My passport is a foreign office passport. Your passport is an old one. It is not a year old. It is legally valid. It has not been endorsed at the Austrian Embassy in Paris. You are mistaken, it has. It has not the blank stamp on it. An omission on the part of the Embassy you can see besides that it has the visa of the other foreign legations. I have just passed through the Kanton of Basel, the Grand Duchy of Barden, the Kingdom of Württemberg, the whole of Bavaria, and I have not been with the smallest difficulty. I had merely to declare my name, and my passport was not even opened. Have you a public character? I have been a minister in France and his most Christian Majesty's ambassador to Berlin, London and Rome. I am known personally to your sovereign and to Prince Metinich. You can't pass. Shall I leave you a security? Will you give me a guard who will be responsible for me? You can't pass. If I send an express to the Bohemian Government? As you please. I lost my patience. I began to wish the custom house officer the devil. As ambassador of a king on his throne, I should not have minded a few hours wasted. But as ambassador of a princess in Irons, I thought myself faithless to misfortune, a traitor to my captive sovereign. The man was writing, the Baselese did not translate my monologue, but there are certain French words which our soldiers have taught Austria, and which she has not forgotten. I said to the interpreter, explain to him that I am going to Prague to offer my devotion to the King of France. The custom house officer, without interrupting his writing, answered, Charles X is not King of France for Austria. I retorted, he is for me. These words flung back to the Cerberus, seemed to make some impression on him. He eyed me up and down. I thought that his long annotation might in the last result be a favourable visa. He scrolled something on Irsan's passport as well, and returned the whole to the interpreter. It appeared that the visa was an explanation of the reasons which did not permit him to allow me to continue my road, so that not only was it impossible for me to go to Prague, but my passport was stamped as bad for the other places to which I might repair. I climbed back into the collage and said to the postillian, Waldmuhn. My return did not surprise the landlord of the inn. He spoke a little French. He told me that a similar thing had happened before. Foreigners had been obliged to stop at Waldmuhn and to send their passports to Munich to be endorsed at the Austrian legation. My host, a very worthy man, was the postmaster of the village, and undertook to forward to the grand berg rave of Bohemian, the letter of which the following is a copy. Waldmuhn, 21 May 1833. Monsieur le Gouverneur. Having the honour to be known personally to His Majesty the Emperor of Austria and to Monsieur le Prince de Metinich, I thought that I could travel in the Austrian state with a passport which, being not yet one year old, was still legally valid and which had been endorsed by the Austrian ambassador in Paris for Switzerland and Italy. As a matter of fact, Monsieur le Comte, I have travelled through Germany and my name has been sufficient to allow me to pass. Only this morning the gentleman at the head of the Austrian custom-hasser Hasselbach did not think himself authorised to be equally accommodating, and this for the reasons set forth in his visa on my passport, and closed, and on that of Monsieur pelorge, my secretary. He has compelled me to my great regret to retrace my steps to Waldmuhn where I await your orders. I venture to hope, Monsieur le Comte, that you will be good enough to remove the little difficulty which stops me by sending me by the express which I have the honour of dispatching to you, the necessary permission to go to Prague and then to Vienna. I am Monsieur le Gouverneur with high regard, your most humble and most obedient servant, Chateaubriand. Pray pardon, Monsieur le Comte, the liberty which I am taking, of enclosing an open note from Monsieur le Duc de Blacca. Some little pride appears in this letter. I was hurt. I was as much humiliated as Cicero when, on his return in triumph from his government of Asia, his friends asked him if he came from Baye or from his house at Tusculum. What? My name, which flew from pole to pole, had not reached the ears of a custom-house officer in the mountains at Hasselbach. A thing which seems all the more cruel, when one thinks of my successors at Basel. In Bavaria I had been addressed as my Lord or your Excellency. A Bavarian officer of Waldmunkens had allowed in the inn that my name required no visa from an Austrian ambassador. Those were great consolations, I admit, but after all, a sad truth remained. The world contained a man who had never heard speak of me. Who knows, however, the Hasselbach customs officer did not know me a little. The police of all countries are so affectionately related. A politician who neither admires nor approves of the treaties of Vienna, a Frenchman who loves the honour and liberty of France, who remains faithful to the fallen part, might well be on the index in Vienna. What a noble revenge to deal with Monsieur de Chateaubriand, as with one of those bag-men so suspicious to the spies. What a sweet satisfaction to treat as a vagabond, whose papers are not in order, an envoy charged to carry traitor-wise to a banished child, with the ideas of his captive mother. The express left Waldmunkens on the twenty-first at eleven o'clock in the morning. I calculated that it could be back on the second day, the twenty-third, between twelve and four, but my imagination was at work. What was to be the fate of my message? If the Governor was a strong man and a man of the world, he would send me the permit. If he was a timid and unintelligent man, he would reply that my request did not come within his powers. He would hasten to refer it to Vienna. This little incident might at the same time please and displease Prince Metinich, and knew how he feared the newspapers. I had seen him of Verona leave the most important business and lock himself up distractedly with Monsieur de Gaines, to draft out an article in reply to the Constitutional and the Débat. How many days would elapse before the Imperial Minister's orders were transmitted? On the other hand, would Monsieur de Blacca be glad to see me at Prague? Would not Monsieur de Dama think that I had come to dethrone him? Would Monsieur Le Cardinal de Latille be quite free from anxiety? Would not the triumvirate turn my mishap to account to have the doors closed against me, instead of open to me? Nothing easier. A word in the Governor's ear, a word of which I should never know. What a state of anxiety would my friends be in Paris? When the adventure was noised abroad, what would not the newspapers make of it? What wild statements were they not indulging? And, if the Grand Burgrave did not think fit to reply to me, if he were away, if no one dared act in his absence, what would become of me without a passport? Where could I be sure of being recognised? At Munich, in Vienna? What postmaster would give me horses? I should be practically a prisoner of Waldmunkern. Those are the cares that pass through my brain. I thought besides of my remoteness from what was dear to me. I have too short a time to live to waste that little. Horace said, Cafe Diem, a council of pleasure at twenty, of reason at my age. Tired of ruminating on every case in my head, I heard the noise of a crowd outside. My inn stood on the village square. I looked through the window and saw a priest carrying the last sacraments to a dying man. What mattered to that dying man, the affairs of kings, of the asservants, and of the world? Everyone left his work and started to follow the priest.  On reaching the sick man's door the priest gave the benediction with the holy viaticum. The bystander's knelt down and made the sign of the cross with lowered heads. The passport to eternity will not be disowned by him who distributes bread and opens the hostel to the traveller. Although I had not been to bed for seven days, I was unable to stay indoors. It was only a little past one. Leaving the village on the Rattuspond side I caught sight of a white chapel on the right, in the middle of a cornfield. I went in that direction. The door was locked through a sloping window once saw an altar with a cross. The date of the erection of that sanctuary, 1830, was inscribed on the architrave. A monarchy was being overthrown in Paris while a chapel was being erected at Valtemuncan. The three banished generations were to come to live in a place of exile within fifty leagues of the new shelter raised to the King Crucified. Millions of events are realised at one in the same time. What is a black man sleeping under a palm tree on the bank of the Niger care for the white man who falls at the same moment under the dagger on the shore of the Tiber? What does he who weeps in Asia care for him who laughs in Europe? What did the mason who built this chapel the Bavarian priest who exalted that Christ in 1830 care for the demolition of Saint-Germain-Loch-sur-voix, the fellow of the crosses in 1830? Events count only for those who suffer through them or benefit by them. They are nothing to those who have not heard of them, who are not touched by them. A certain race of herdsmen in the Abruzzi has witnessed without descending from its mountain the passage of the Carthaginians, the Gauls, the Romans, the Goths, the generations of the Middle Ages and the men of the present age. That race has not mingled with the successive dwellers in the valley, and religion alone has mounted up to it. Returning to the inn I flung myself on two chairs in the hope of sleeping, but in vain the movement of my imagination was stronger than my lassitude. I repeated the contents of my express over and over again. Dinner did not affect the matter. I went to bed amid the lowing of the herds returning from the fields. At ten o'clock a new noise, the watchmen, sang the R. Fifty dogs barked, after which they went to the Eccennals, as though the watchmen had ordered them to be silent. I recognised German discipline. Civilisation has made progress in Germany since my journey to Berlin. The beds are now almost long enough for a man of ordinary stature, but the top sheet is still sewn to the blanket and the bottom sheet, which is too narrow, turns by twisting and curling up in such a way as to make you very uncomfortable. And since I am in the country of Auguste Lafontaine, I will imitate his genius. I want to inform the latest posterity of what existed in my time in the room of my inn at Waldmogen. No, then, grandner views, that that room was like an Italian room, with bare whitewashed walls, without any woodwork or hangings, a white-coloured band or skirting at the bottom, a ceiling with a circle of three fillets, a cornice painted with blue roses, with a garland of chocolate-coloured laurel leaves, and above the cornice on the wall, foliage painted in red on an American green ground. Here and there, little French and English engravings in frames, two windows with white cotton curtains, between the windows a looking glass. In the middle of the room a table for at least twelve people, covered with an oil cloth with a raised ground, stamped with roses and different flowers. Six chairs upholstered in red totten, a chest of drawers, three bedsteads round the room, in a corner near the door a stove in black-glazed earthenware, of which the sides show the Bavarian arms and relief. It is topped with a receiver shaped like a gothic crown. The door is furnished with a complicated iron mechanism capable of closing the gates of a jail, and baffling the picklocks of thieves or lovers. I describe for the benefit of travellers the excellent room in which I am writing this inventory, which competes with the Mises. I recommend it to future Legitimus, who may be stopped by the red-headed wild goat of Hasselbach. This page of my memoirs will give pleasure to the modern literary school. After counting by the light of the night lamp, the astragals of the ceiling, and looking at the engravings of the young Milanese, the beautiful Greeks, the young French woman, the young Russian, the late king of Bavaria, the late queen of Bavaria, who is like a lady whom I know, and whose name I cannot possibly remember, I snatched a few minutes' sleep. I rose from bed at seven o'clock on the twenty-second. A bath took away the rest of my fatigue, and I was interested only in my village, like Captain Cook discovering an island in the Pacific Ocean. Balmungin is built on the slope of a hill. It is not unlike a dilapidated village in the Papal States. A few house fronts painted in fresco. An archway at either end of the main street. No ostensible shops. A dry well in the square. A frightful pavement of large flags. Mixed with small pebbles. Of the kind which one no longer sees, except in the neighbourhood of Campo-Corhante. The people whose appearance is rustic wear no special dress. The women go with their heads bare or wrapped in a handkerchief in the man of the Paris milkmaids. Their skirts are short. They walk with bare legs and feet, as do the children. The men are dressed, some like the men of the people in our towns, some like our old peasants. Heaven be praised, they have only hats. And the filthy, cotton caps of our burgesses are unknown to them. Every day, which most, there's a performance at Balmungin, and I used to assist at it in the front row. At six o'clock in the morning, an old shepherd tall and lean goes through the village, stopping at different places. He blows a straight horn six feet long, which one would take at a distance for a speaking trumpet or a sheet-hook. He first produces three metallic and rather harmonious notes from it. Then he sounds the quick tune of a sort of gallop-poor arounds de Vache, imitating the lowing of oxen and the grunting of pigs. The fanfare ends with a long, rising falsetto note. Suddenly, from every gate, debush cows, heifers, calves, bulls. Bellowing, they flood the village square. They climb up or descend all the circumjacent streets, and, forming into columns, take their custom row to the pastureage. Follows the prancing squadron of swine, which look like wild boars and grunt. Their sheep and lambs, disposed as a rear-guard, form the third part of the concert, with their bleating. The geese compares the reserve. In a quarter an hour, all are out of sight. At seven o'clock in the evening, the horn is heard again. It is the herds returning. The order of the march has changed. On the vanguard, with the same music as before, a few detach their scouts, run at haphazard, or stop at every corner. The sheep defile. The cows, with their sons, daughters, and husbands, bring up the rear. The geese waddle on the flanks. All these animals reach their own homes again. None mistakes, it's gate. But there are cossacks that go marauding. Mad-caps have played about and refused to go in. Young bulls have persisted in remaining with a mate, which does not belong to their manger. Then come the women and children with their little switches. They compel the stragglers to rejoin the main body, and the rebellious recruits to submit to the rules. I delighted in this performance, just as formerly Henry IV at Shoney, used to be amused by the cowkeeper called Tullamond, who collected his herds to the sound of the trumpet. Many years ago, staying at the Chateau de Fervac in Normandy at Madame de Cristine's, I occupied the bedroom of Henry IV. My bed was enormous. The Bernese had slept in it with some floret to other. I gained royalism there, for I did not have it by nature. Mates filled with water surround the castle. The view from my window spread over meadow's edge by the little river Fervac. In those meadows I perceived one morning an elegant sow of extraordinary whiteness. It looked as though it might be the mother of Prince Macassar. It lay at the foot of a willow, on the cool grass in the dew. A young bore pig gathered a little fine serrat moss with its ivory tusks, and came to lay it on the sleeper. It repeated this operation so many times that the white wild star was entirely hidden. One saw only its black feet stick out from under the downy verger in which it was buried. Be this told to the glory of an ill-famed beast of which I should blush to have spoken at too great length. If Homer had not sung it, I perceived. In fact, that this part of my memoirs is nothing less than an odyssey. Balmunkan is Ithaca. The shepherd is a faithful humeyous with his swine. I am the son of Lea, he is returning after wandering on land and sea. I should perhaps have done better to intoxicate myself with the nectar of Ivantes, to eat the flower of the moly plant, to linger in the land of the lotus eaters, to remain with Zeus, or to obey the song of the siren, saying, approach, come to us. 22nd May, 1833 If I were twenty years old I should seek some adventures of Balmunkan as a means of shortening the hours. But at my age we have no silk ladders left to save in our memory. And we no longer scale walls except with the shadows. Formerly I was very intimate with my body. I used to advise it to live wisely in order to show itself quite lively and quite jolly in forty years' time. It laughed at the sermons of my soul persisted in making merry. I would not have given two doids as called a well-preserved man. Out upon you it used to say, What have I to gain by being niggardly with my spring in order to enjoy life's days when there will be none left to care to share them with me? And it steeped itself over hidden years in happiness. I am obliged, therefore, to accept it as it now is. I took it for walk on the 22nd to the southeast of the village. We followed through the marshes a little water-current which put some works in motion. I had to manufacture linen at Waldmuchen. Breaths of linen were unrolled on the fields. Young girls whose business it was to damp them ran barefoot on the white strips, preceded by the water that spurted from their watering-pots. Just as gardeners would water a border of flowers. Along the stream I thought of my friends. I was touched by their memory. Then I asked what they must be saying of me in Paris. Has he arrived? Has he seen the royal family? Will he come back soon? And I was deliberating as to whether I would not send ear-scent to fetch some fresh butter and brown bread in order to eat quess at the edge of a spring under a tuft of alder shoots. My life was no more ambitious than that. Why has fortune fastened the skirt of my doublet to reveal with the hem of the mantle of our kings? Returning to the village I passed near the church.  One of these shows St. Peter and Vincula with a pull-box for the prisoners. I dropped in a few croitzers in memory of the Pelico's prison and of my own cell at the prefecture of police. The other sanctuaries showed the scene in the garden of olives. A scene so touching and so sublime that it is not destroyed even here by the grotesqueness of the figures. I hurried through my dinner and hastened to the evening prayer for which I heard them ringing. As I turned the corner of the narrow street in which the church stands opened out over some distant hills. A little light still lingered on the horizon and that dying light came from the side of France. A profound feeling gripped my heart when shall my pilgrimage be over? I passed through Germanic territory very miserably when I was returning from the army of the princes. Very triumphantly when as ambassador of Louis XVIII I was going to Berlin. After so many and such different years I was penetrating stealthily into the depths of that same Germany to seek the king of France, Spanish de Nieux. I entered the church, it was quite dark not even a lighted lamp. Through the blackness I recognized the sanctuaries standing in a gothic recess only through its thicker gloom. The walls, the altars, the pillars seemed to me laden with ornaments and pictures veiled in crepe. The nave was occupied by close parallel benches. An old woman was reciting aloud in German the Our Father of the Rosary. Women young and old whom I could not see replied with a hail-marys. The old woman spoke her words well her voice was clear her accent grave empathetic. She was two benches away from me her head bent slightly in the dusk each time she uttered the word Christo in some prayer which she added to the Our Father. The rosary was followed by the litany of the Blessed Virgin the aura pro-novus chanted in German by the invisible worshipers sounded in my ear like a repetition of the word hope. Espérance, espérance, espérance. We left the church promiscuously I went to sleep with hope. It was long since I had clasped her in my arms but she does not grow older and one always loves her despite her infidelities. According to Tasters the Germans believed the knight to be older than the day knocks to create the envidator yet I reckon young knights in sempitonal days. The Perts tell us also that sleep is the brother of death. I do not know but old age is certainly its nearest relation. 23 May 1833 On the morning of the 23rd heaven mingled some sweetness with my pains. Baptiste told me that the most eminent man of the place the brewer had three daughters and owned my works set out in a row among his beer jugs. When I went out this gentleman and two of his daughters watched me go by. What was the third young lady doing? In former days a letter had come to me from Peru written with her own hand by a lady a cousin of the son who admired a taller. But we know no Waldmünchen under the very nose of the wolf of Hasselbach was a thousand times more glorious. It was true that this occurred in Bavaria at a league from Austria the curse of my renown. Do you know what would have happened if my trip to Bohemia had been taken out of my own head alone? But why should I have wanted to go to Bohemia for myself alone? Once I had been stopped at the frontier I should have gone back to Paris. There was a man who contemplated a voyage to Peking one of his friends met him at the Pont Royal in Paris. Why I thought you were in China? I have come back. Those Chinaman put difficulties in my way at Canton so I left them in the lurch. While Baptiste was telling me of my triumphs the passing bell of a funeral called me to my window. The priest went by preceded by the cross many women crowded after the men in cloaks, the women in black gowns and mob caps. The corpse taken up at the third door from mine was carried to the graveyard. Half an hour later the procession girls returned minus the procession. Two young women held their handkerchiefs to their eyes. One of the two uttered loud cries they were mourning their father. There was a man who had received the viaticum on the day of my arrival. If my memoirs reached Valde Munchen when I myself have no more the family in mourning today will find the date of its sorrow past. Perhaps as he lay on his bed the dying man heard the noise of my carriage it is the only noise of me that he will have heard upon earth. After the crowd had dispersed I took the road which I had seen the funeral take in the direction of the winter sunrise. I found first a fish pond in the stagnant water beside which a stream flowed rapidly like life beside the tomb. Crosses on the other side of a rising ground showed me the position of the cemetery. I crossed a sunk road and made my way through a gap in the wall into the consecrated ground. Clay furrows represented the bodies under the soil. Here and there stood crosses. They marked outlets through which the travelers had entered the new world. Even as beacons at the mouth of a river indicate the passage is open to ships. A pearl old man was digging the grave of a child. Alone, perspiring and bareheaded he did not sing. He did not jest like the clowns in Hamlet. Further away was another grave near which one saw a stool, a lever and a rope for the descent into eternity. I went straight up to this grave which seemed to say here is a fine opportunity. At the bottom of the hole lay the reason coffin covered with a few shovel-falls of white dust while awaiting the rest.  The dead took care of their shroud. Far from his country the Christian has it always in his power suddenly to waft himself there. He has but to visit man's last resting place around the churches. The cemetery is the family field and religion, the universal motherland. It was noon when I returned. By every calculation the express could not be back before three o'clock. Nevertheless every stamping of horses made me run to the window. As the hour approached I grew convinced that the permit would not come. To destroy the time I asked for my bill. I sent myself to reckon up the chickens I had eaten. A greater than I did not disdain this trouble. Henry Tudor, seventh of the name in whom ended the Wars of the Roses red and white, even as I am going to unite the white and the trickler-cockades. Henry the seventh initialed one after the other pages of a little account book which I have seen. To a woman for three apples, twelve pence. For discovering three hairs, six shillings, eight pence. To Master Bernard the blind hurt a hundred shillings. This was better than Homer. To a little man at Sharsbury, twenty shillings. We have many little men today, but they cost more than twenty shillings. At three o'clock the hour at which the express might be back I went with ear-scent along the road to Hasselbach. It was a windy day. I was tuned with clouds that passed across the sun, casting their shadows over the fields and fir-groves. We were preceded by a herd of cattle from the village which raised as it went, the noble dust of the army of the Grand Duke of Curroquia, to which the night of the Mancha so valiantly gave battle. A cavalry rose at the top of one of the ascents of the road. From there one discerned a long ribbon of the highway. Seated in a ravine I questioned ear-scent. Seaside no one coming. Some village cart seen from afar made our hearts beat. As they approached they proved to be empty, like everything that bears dreams. I had to return home and dine very sadly. Applying offered after the shipwreck, the diligence was to pass at six o'clock. Might it not bring the governor's reply? Six o'clock struck, no diligence. At a quarter-past six Baptiste entered the room. The ordinary post from Prague has just arrived. There is nothing for Monsieur. The last ray of hope was extinguished. Scarcely had Baptiste left my room when shorts appeared, waving a big letter with a big seal in the air, and shouting, Here is de Bermid! I threw myself upon the dispatch. I tore open the envelope. It contained, together with the letter from the governor, the permit and a note from Monsieur de Blacca. Here is Monsieur Le Conte de Trotec's letter. Prague, 23rd May, 1833 Monsieur Le Visconde I much regret that, at your entrance into Bohemia, you should have met with difficulties and a delay in your journey. But in view of the very severe orders prevailing on our frontiers, regarding all the travelers who come from France, orders which you yourself must think very natural in the circumstances, I cannot but approve of the conduct of the head of the customs at Hasselbach. In spite of the quite European celebrity of your name, you must be so good as to excuse this official, who has not the honour to know you personally, if he had doubts as to the identity of your person, the more so as your passport was endorsed only for Lombardy and not for all the Austrian states. As to your plan for travelling to Vienna, I am writing about it today to Prince Metinich, and will hasten to communicate his reply to you immediately after your arrival in Prague. I have the honour to send you herewith the reply of Monsieur Le De Blacca, and I beg you to be good enough to accept the assurance of the high regard with which I have the honour to be, etc. the Kondichotek. This reply was polite and proper. The government could not abandon the inferior authority which had after all done its duty. I had myself in Paris foreseen the cabling of which my old passport might become the cause. As for Vienna, I had referred to it with a political object. In order to set Monsieur Le Kondichotek's mind at rest and show him that I was not trying to avoid the Prince de Metinich. At eight o'clock in the evening on Thursday the twenty-third of May I drove off. Who would believe it? I had a wild motion with a sort of regret. I had already grown used to my hosts. My hosts had grown accustomed to me. I knew all the faces of the windows and doors. When I walked out they used to welcome me with a kindly air. Then I came up to witness the departure of Michael Ash as dilapidated as was the monarchy of Hugh Cappett. The men took off their hats. The women gave me a little nod of congratulation. My adventure was the subject of the village gossip. Everyone took my part. The Bavarians and the Austrians detest one another. The first were proud at having allowed me to pass. I had often noticed standing on the threshold of her cottage a young Waldmuthan girl with a face like a virgin in her first manner. Her father, with the presence civil bearing, used to take off his broad-room felt hat to the ground to me and give me a greeting in German which I returned cordially in French. Standing behind him his daughter used to blush as she looked at me over the old man's shoulder. I caught sight of my virgin again but she was alone. I wave goodbye to her with my hand. She remained motionless. She seemed astonished. I tried to imagine I know what vague regrets in her thought. I left her like a wildflower which one has seen in a ditch by the roadside and which has centered one's way. I passed the flocks of Eumeas. He uncovered his head grown grey in the service of the sheep. He had finished his day's work. He was returning to sleep with his youths while Ulysses went to continue his wanderings. I had said to myself before receiving the permit, if I get it I shall crush my persecutor. On arriving at Hasselbach it happened to me as to George Donder that my cursed good nature was too much for me. I had no heart for the triumph. Like a real paltrune I cowered in a corner of the carriage and short showed the order from the governor. I should have suffered too much from the customs officer's confusion. He on his side did not appear and did not even have my trunk searched. Peace be with him. Let him pardon me for the insults which I addressed to him but which, owing to a remnant of spite, I will not erase from my memoirs. As one leaves Bavaria on that side a vast black forest of pine trees serves as a porch to Bohemia. Miss Hubbard in the valleys, the light was fading and the sky towards the west was the colour of peach blossoms. The horizons fell till they almost touched the earth. Light is lacking at that latitude and with light life. All is dim when she pale. Winter seems to charge summer to keep the whore frost for it until its speedy return. A small piece of the moon which on faintly pleased me all was not lost since I found a face that I knew. It seemed to say to me, what are you there? Do you remember how I saw you in other forests? Do you remember the pretty things you used to say to me when you were young? Really, you used to talk very nicely about me. Why are you so silent now? Where are you going alone and so late? Will you never end recommencing your career? Oh moon, you are right.  You used to light my steps at the time when I wandered with my phantom of love. Today my head is silvered like your face. And you are surprised to find me solitary. And you scorn me. It has spent whole nights wrapped in your veils. Dare you deny our meetings on the lawns and by the seaside? How often have you looked upon my eyes by the sea? How often have you looked upon my eyes passionately fixed on yours? Ungrateful and mocking planet. You ask me where I am going so late. It is hard to be reproached for the continuation of my journeys. Ah, if I travel as much as you. I do not grow young again as you do. You, who return monthly into the brilliant circle of your cradle. I reckon no new moons. My abatement has no limit other than my complete disappearance and when I go out I do not know my torches. You do yours. I travelled all night. I passed through Tainett, Stanker and Stab. In the morning of the twenty-fourth I went on to Pilsen, the beautiful barrack, Homeric style. The town is stamped with that air of melancholy which prevails in this country. Had Pilsen, Volnstein hoped to seize a scepter. I too was inquest or a crown, but not for myself. The country is cut and slashed with heights called Bohemian mountains, papps whose tip is marked by pine trees and whose swelling outlined by the green of the harvests. The villages are scarce. A few fortresses, hungering for prisoners, roost on the rocks like old vultures. Between sedits and barren, the mountains on the right become bold. One goes through a village, the roads are spacious, the posts well equipped. There is a monarchy that imitates old France. Johann the Blind and the Philippe of Valois are the ambassadors of George under Louis-Ars. By what forest paths did they pass? Of what use are the modern roads of Germany? They will remain deserted for there is no history, art, nor climate to call foreigners to their lonely causeways. For purposes of commerce it is unnecessary that the public thoroughfares should be so wide and so costly to keep in repair. The richest trade in the world, that of India and Persia, is conducted on the backs of mules, asses and horses by narrow paths hardly traced over the mountain chains or sandy zones. The present high roads in unfrequented countries will serve only for war, as vomitries for the use of the new barbarians who, issuing from the north with the immense bustle of firearms will come to flood regions favoured by intellect and the sun. In 1748 a road to the level marked on the walls of the post house. After boroughn, gorgeous twist round a few hills and spread out at the entrance to an upland. From this upland the road plunges into a valley with vague lines, the lap of which is occupied by a hamlet. There commences a long ascent which leads to Duschnick, the posting station and the last stage. Soon descending towards an opposite eminence at the top of which stands a cross, one discerns Prague on both banks of the Moldau. It is in that town that the sons of St. Louis are ending a life of exile, that the air of the house is beginning a life of prescription while his mother languishes in a fortress on the soil from which he has been driven. Frenchmen you have sent the daughter of Louis Sez and Marie Antoinette, her to whom your father's opened the gates of the temple, to Prague. You have not cared to keep among you that unique monument of greatness and virtue.  O young lad, whom I was the first to proclaim king, what am I to say to you? How shall I dare to appear in your presence I who am not banished, I who am free to return to France, free to return my last breath to the air which fired my breast when I breathed for the first time, I whose burns may rest in their native land. Captive of Blay, I am going to see your son. End of Book 3 Part 2 Part 1 of Book 4 of the Memoirs of Chateaubriand Volume 5 This is a Libyvox recording. All Libyvox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit Libyvox.org Recording by Nicole Lee The Memoirs of Chateaubriand Volume 5 by François-René de Chateaubriand Translated by Alexandre-Texer de Matos Book 4 Part 1 I entered Prague on the 24th of May at 7 o'clock in the evening and alighted at the bath-hotel in the old town built on the left bank of the Moldau. I wrote a note to M. Dut de Blacca to inform him of my arrival and receive the following reply. If you are not too tired, M. Le Vicant, the King will be charmed to receive you this evening at a quarter to ten. But if you wish to rest, his Majesty would see you with great pleasure tomorrow morning at half-past eleven. Pray except my sincere compliments. Friday, 24th May, 7 o'clock. Blacca d'Ope I did not feel that I ought to avail myself of the alternative offered to me. I set out at half-past nine, a man belonging to the inn in French, led the way for me. I climbed up silent, gloomy streets without street lamps to the foot of the tall hill which is crowned by the immense castle of the King's sub-behemia. The building outlined its black mass against the sky, no light issued from its windows. There was there something akin to the solitude, the sight and the grandeur of the Vatican or of the Temple of Jerusalem seen from the valley of Jehoshvat. No one heard nothing but the sound of my footsteps and my guides. I was obliged to stop at intervals on the landings of the steps that had formed the roadway, so steep was the incline. As I climbed I discovered the town below me, the links of history, the fate of men, the destruction of empires, the designs of providence presented themselves to my recollection. I identified themselves with the memory of my own destiny. When we had reached the platform on which Franshin is built, we passed through an infantry post whose guard room was near the outer wicked gate. Through this wicked gate we entered a square courtyard surrounded by uniform and deserted buildings. On the ground floor on the right we threaded a long corridor lighted at wide intervals by glass lanterns hung on the wall on either side, as in a convent or barracks. At the end of the corridor was a staircase at whose foot two centuries marched up and down. As I climbed the second flight I met Monsieur de Blacca who was coming down. I entered the apartments of Charles the Tenth with him. There two more grenadiers were standing sentry. This foreign guard, those white uniforms at the door of the King of France made a painful impression on me. The idea of a prison came to me rather than a palace. We passed through three pitch-dark and almost unfurnished rooms. I felt as though I were wondering once more through the terrible monastery of the Escoriale. Monsieur de Blacca left me in the third room to inform the King with the same etiquette as at the Tuileries. He came back to fetch me, showed me his Majesty's closet and withdrew. Charles the Tenth came up to me, held out his hand to me cordially and said, Good evening, good evening, Monsieur de Chateaubriand. Well, I am delighted to see you. I expected you. You are not to have come this evening, for you must be very tired. Don't stand, let us sit down. How is your wife? Side note at Rajshin. Nothing breaks once so much as simplicity of speech in the high positions of society and the great catastrophes of life.  I found a difficulty in stifling the sound of my sobs with my handkerchief. All things which I had resolved to say, all the vain and relentless philosophy with which I intended to arm my conversation failed me. Should I become the pedagogue of misfortune? Should I dare to demonstrate with my King, my white-haired King, my King outlawed, exiled, ready to lay his mortal remains on foreign soil? My old sovereign again took my hand on seeing the trouble of that relentless enemy, that opponent of the ordinances of July. He made me sit beside a little wooden table on which stood two candles. He sat down by the same table, leaning his good ear towards me to hear me better, thus surprising me of his ears, which came to mingle their common misfortunes with the extraordinary calamities of his life. It was impossible for me to recover my voice at the sight in the residence of the emperors of Austria, of the sixty-eighth King of France, bent under the weight of those rains and of seventy-six years of those years twenty-four had been spent in exile, five on a tottering throne, the monarch was ending his last days in a last exile, with the grandson whose father had been assassinated and whose mother was a prisoner. Charles X to break the silence addressed a few questions to me. Thereupon I briefly explained the object of my journey. I said that I was the bearer of a letter from Madame la Duchesse de Berri, addressed to Madame la Dauphine, in which the prisoner of play confided the care for children to the prisoner of the temple as to one practised in misfortune. I added that I also had a letter for the children. The King replied, Do not give it to them. They know only a part of what has happened to their mother. You must hand me that letter. However, we will talk of all that at two o'clock tomorrow. Go to bed now. You shall see my son and the children at eleven o'clock, and you will dine with us. The King rose, wished me good night, and retired. I went out. I joined Monsieur de Blacca in the entrance room. The guide was waiting for me on the staircase. I returned to my inn, descending the streets on the slippery pavements in a shorter time as I had taken long to climb them. Prague, 25th May, 1833 The next day, the 25th of May, I received a visit from Monsieur Laconte de Cosset, staying at my inn. He told me of the disagreements at the castle relative to the education of the Dut de Bordeaux. At half-past ten I went up to Frantz-Chin. The Dut de Guiche took me in to Monsieur le Dauphin. I found him grown old and thin. He was dressed in a shabby blue coat buttoned up to the chin. It was too wide for him, and looked as though it had been bought at a rag-fare. The poor prince excited a great pity in me. Monsieur le Dauphin has personal courage. His obedience to Charles XI prevented him from proving himself at Saint-Cloud, a rambouille what he proved himself at Chiclana. His baffle-ness has increased in consequence. He finds it difficult to bear the sight of a new face. He often says to the Dut de Guiche, Why are you here? I have no need of anyone. There's no mouse-holes small enough to hide me. He has said also repeatedly, Don't talk about me. Don't trouble me. I am nobody. I don't want to be anybody. I have twenty thousand francs a year. It is more than I need. I have to think only of saving my soul in making a good end. Again he has said, If my nephew had need of me I would serve him with my sword. But I sign my abdication against my own feeling. Out of obedience to my father I shall not renew it. I shall sign nothing more. My father has never uttered a lie. He reads much. He has considerable attainments, even in languages. His correspondence with Mr. de Bilel during the Spanish war has its value. And his correspondence with Madame la Dauphine, which was intercepted and inserted in the monitor makes one love him. His poverty is incorruptible. His religion is profound. His filial piety rises to the height of virtue. But an unconquerable shyness is the actual use of his faculties. To put him at his ease, I avoided entering upon politics with him and only inquired after his father's help. This is a subject on which he is inexhaustible. The difference in climate between Edinburgh and Prague, the king's prolonged attacks of gout, the waters of templates which the king was going to take, the good which they would do him. There you have the purport of our conversation. Monsieur de Dauphine watches over Charles X as over a child. He kisses his hand when he goes up to him, asks how he has slipped, picks up his pocket handkerchief, speaks loud so as to make himself heard by him, prevents him from eating what might disagree with him, makes him put on or leave off and overgo according to the state of the weather, takes him out walking and brings him back again. I was careful to speak to him of nothing else. Of the days of July, of the fall of an empire, of the future of the monarchy, not a word. It is eleven o'clock, he said.  We shall meet again at dinner. I was taken to the apartment of the governor. The door was open. I saw the Baron de Dama with his pupil, Madame de Gonto with Mamazelle, Monsieur Barhant, Monsieur Lavilat, and a few other devoted servants. All were standing. The young prince, scared, looked at me sideways, looked at his governor as though to ask him what he was to do. How to act in this danger was though hard to speak to me. Mamazelle smiled with a half smile and a timid and independent air. She seemed to be paying attention to her brother's movements and gestures. Madame de Gonto looked proud of the education which she had given her pupils. After bowing to the two children I went up to the orphan and said, Will Henry V allow me to lay the homage of my respect at his feet? When he has ascended his throne perhaps he will remember that I had the honour to say to his illustrious mother, Madame, your son is my king. So I was the first to proclaim Henry V king of France, and a French jury by acquitting me allowed my proclamation to stand good. God save the king. The child, Florida, hearing himself greeted as king, hearing me speak of his mother, of whom no one spoke to him now, recoiled and took refuge between the Baron de Damme's knees, uttering a few emphatic but almost whispered words. Monsieur le Baron. My words seemed to surprise the king.  The governor replied, Monsignor has taught what loyal subjects like yourself, Monsieur le Viscont, he did not finish his sentence. Monsieur de Damme hastened to state that the momentful study had arrived. He invited me at four o'clock. I went to pay visit to Madame la Duchesse de Guiche, who lived at some distance in another part of the castle. It took nearly ten minutes to go to her through corridor after corridor. When I was in London I had given a little fetch in honour of Madame de Guiche, then in all the brilliancy of her youth and followed by a host of adorers. In Prague I found her changed, but the expression of her face pleased me more. Her head was dressed in a way that suited her. Her hair, plaited in little tresses like that of an odourlisk or a sabine-medal, was festooned in winglets on either side of her forehead. The Duchesse de de Guiche represented in Prague beauty chained to adversity. Madame de Guiche had heard of what I had said to the Deux de Bordeaux. She told me that they wanted to send away Monsieur Barond, that there was a talk of calling in some Jesuits, that Monsieur de Damme had postponed but not abandoned his plans. This existed, compared to the Deux de Blacar, the Baron de Damme and the Cardinal de Latille. This triumvirate tended to take possession of the coming reign by isolating the young king and bringing him up in principles and under men, antipathetic to France. The remainder of the inhabitants of the castle caballed against the triumvirate. The children themselves headed the opposition. The opposition harbour had different shades. The Gonto party was not quite the same as the Guiche party. Madame de Bué, a deserter from the Berry party, took sides for the Abbe Molligny. Madame la Dauphine, placed at the head of the impartials, was not exactly favourable to the young France party, represented by Monsieur Barond. But, as she spoiled the Deux de Bordeaux, she often leaned towards his side and stood by him against his governor. Madame de Gué, devoted body and soul to the triumvirate, had no credit with the Dauphinès, other than that which she enjoyed thanks to her presence and importunity. After paying my respects to Madame de Guiche, I went to Madame de Gonto's. She was expecting me with the Princess Louise. Mamazelle somewhat recalls her father. She is fair-haired, her blue eyes have a shrewd expression. She is short for her age and is not so full-grown as her portraits represent her. Her whole person is a mixture of the child, the young girl and the young princess. She looks up, lowers her eyes, smiles with an artless cockatry mingled with art. One does not know of one ought to tell her fairy stories, make her a declaration or talk to her with respect as to a queen. The Princess Louise adds to the agreeable accomplishments a good deal of information. She speaks English and is beginning to know German well. She even has a little foreign accent and exile is already marking itself in her language. Madame de Gonto presented me to my little king's sister. Innocent fugitives, there were like two gazelles hiding among ruins. Mamazelle Vachon, the under-governess, an excellent and distinguished spinster, arrived. We sat down and Madame de Gonto said to me, We can speak, Mamazelle knows all. She deplores with us what we see. Mamazelle said to me at once, Oh Henry was very silly this morning. He was frightened. Grandpa Pa said to us, Guess whom you will see tomorrow. It's one of the powers of the earth. Well, it's the emperor. No, said Grandpa Pa. We tried again. We could not guess. He said, It's a vicon de Chateaubriand. I hid myself on the forehead for not guessing. The Princess struck a forehead, blushing like a rose, smiling bitterly through her moist and gentle eyes.  She continued, You did not hear what Henry said when you asked him to remember you. He said, Oh yes always. But he said it so low. He was afraid of you and afraid of his governor. I was making signs to him. Did you see? You'll be more pleased this evening. He will speak. Wait! This solicitude of the young Princess on her brother's behalf was charming. I was almost committing a crime of les majestés. Mamazelle remarked it, and this gave her a bearing of conquest that was captivating in its grace. I put her mind at rest as to the impression which Henry had made upon me. I was very glad, she said, Mamazelle, before Monsieur de Nama. Will she soon have left prison? My readers know that I had a letter from Madame la Duchesse de Berri for the children. I did not tell them of it because they did not know of the details subsequent to the captivity. The King had asked me for this letter. I considered that I was not at liberty to give it to him, and that I ought to take it to Madame la Dauphine, to whom I was sent, and who was then taking the waters at Carlsbad. Madame de Gonto repeated what Monsieur de Cossay and Madame de Guiche had already told me. Mamazelle groaned with childish seriousness. Her governess having spoken of Monsieur Baron's discharge and the probable arrival of a Jesuit, the Princess Louise crossed her hands and said with a sigh, that would be very unpopular. I could not help laughing. Mamazelle began to laugh also, still blushing. A few moments remained before my audience of the King. I got into my collage and went to call in the grand burg grave, Count Chotec. He lived in a country house, half a league from the town, on the side of the castle. I found him at home and thanked him for his letter. He invited me to dinner for Monday, the twenty-seventh of May. On returning to the castle at two o'clock, I was introduced to the King's presence, as on the preceding day, by Monsieur de Blacar. Charles X received me with his customary kindness and with that elegant ease of manner, which the years render more perceptible in him. He made me sit again at the little table. Here is a detailed account of our conversation. Sire, Madame Nadeau-Chesterberry commanded me to come to see you, and to hand a letter to Madame Nadeau-Fien. I do not know what the letter contains, although it is open. It is written in invisible ink, as is the letter for the children. But in my two letters of credence, one intended to be shown, the other of a confidential character, Mary Caroline explains to me what is in her mind. During her captivity she commits her children, as I told Your Majesty yesterday, to the special protection of Madame Nadeau-Fien. Madame Nadeau-Chesterberry charges me besides to report to her on the education of Henry V, whom they here call the Duke de Bordeaux. Lastly, Madame Nadeau-Chesterberry declares that she has contracted a secret marriage with Count Hector Lucchese Pali, a member of an illustrious family. These secret marriages are princesses for which there are many precedents. Do not deprive them of their rights. Madame Nadeau-Chesterberry asks to preserve her rank as a French princess, the regency, and the guardianship. When she is free she proposes to come to Prague to embrace her children and lay her respects at Your Majesty's feet. The King answered with severity. I made the best reply that I could, out of a recrimination. I beg Your Majesty to pardon me, but it seems to me that you have been prejudiced. Monsieur de Blaccais, no doubt an enemy of my august client. Charles X interrupted me. No, but she has treated him badly, because he prevented her from committing follies, from embarking on mad enterprises. It is not given to everybody, I said, to commit follies of that kind. Henry IV fought like Madame Nadeau-Chesterberry, and like her, he was not always sufficiently strong. Sire, I continued, you do not wish Madame de Berry to be a princess of France. She will be so in spite of you. The whole world will always call her de Chesterberry, the heroic mother of Henry V. Her dauntless courage and her sufferings overtower everything. You cannot, like the duit d'Orléans, wish to brand at one blow the children and the mother. Is it so difficult for you, then, to forgive a woman's glory? Well, Monsieur Lombasta said the King with good-natured emphasis. Let Madame de Chesterberry go to Palermo. Let her there live with Monsieur Lecais, as husband and wife, of the world.  She shall come to embrace them. I felt that I had pushed them out of far enough. The principal points were three fourths obtained, the preservation of the title, and the admission to Prague at a more or less distant period. Feeling sure of completing my task with Madame la Dauphine, I changed the conversation. Obstinate minds jibber persistency. I passed to the princess education in the interest of the future. On this subject I was not clearly understood. Religion has made a solitary of Charles X. His ideas are cloistered. I slipped in a few words on the capacity of Monsieur Baron and the want of capacity of Monsieur Tadama. The King said, Monsieur Baron is a man of attainments, but he takes too much upon himself. He was chosen to teach the duit de Bordeaux the exact sciences, but he teaches everything, history, geography, Latin. I have sent for the Arbe McCarthy to share Monsieur Baron's labours. He will be here soon. These words made me shudder for the new tutor could evidently be only a Jesuit, replacing a Jesuit. The fact that in the present state of society in France the mere idea of attaching a disciple of Loyola to the person of Henry V had entered into the head of Charles X was enough to make one despair when he had recovered from my astonishment, I asked. Is not the King afraid of the effect upon public opinion of a tutor taken from the ranks of a famous but columnated society? The King exclaimed, Pooh, are they still at the Jesuits? I spoke to the King of the elections and the desire of the Royalists to know his wishes, the King replied. I cannot say to a man take an oath against your conscience. Those who think that they ought to take it are doubtless acting with good intentions. I have no prejudice, my dear friend, against men. Their past lives matter little when they are sincerely anxious to serve France and the legitimacy. The Republicans wrote to me in Edinburgh. I accepted as concerns them personally all that they asked of me but they wanted to impose conditions of government upon me. I rejected them. I will never yield on matters of principle. I want to leave my grandson even though mine was. Are the French happier and freer today than they were with me? Do they pay less taxes? What a milk cow, Francis! If I had allowed myself to do a quarter of the things that Monsieur le Duc d'Orléans has done, what outcries, what curses? They plotted against me. They have owned it. I wanted to defend myself. The King stopped as though embarrassed by the number of his thoughts and by the fear of saying something that might hurt me. All this was well and good. But what did Charles X understand by principles? Had he accounted for the cause of the real or imaginary conspiracies hatched against his government? After a moment of silence he resumed, How are your friends the Bertards? They have no reason to complain of me as you know. They are very severe upon a banished man who has done them no harm at least as far as I know. But my dear fellow, I bear no one ill will. Let everybody behave as he thinks right. This sweetness of temperament, this Christian meekness on the part of an expelled and slandered king brought tears to my eyes. I tried to say a few words about Louis Philippe. I said the King, Monsieur le Duc d'Orléans, he judged, What do you expect? Men are like that. Not a bitter word, not a reproach, not a complaint could escape from the mouth of the thrice banished old man. And yet French hands had cut off his brother's head and pierced his son's heart. To such an extent have those hands been mindful and implacable towards him. I praised the King with all my heart and in a voice broken with emotion. I asked him if it was not part of his intention to put a stop to all that secret correspondence to dismiss all those commissaries who for forty years have been deceiving the legitimacy. The King assured me that he was resolved to put an end to that impotent mischief. He had already, he said, named a few serious persons, including myself, to compose a sort of council in France, competent to keep him informed of the truth. Monsieur de Blacca would explain all that. I begged Charles X to assemble his servants in Hermé. He referred me to Monsieur de Blacca. I called the King's attention to the time of the majority of Henry V. I spoke to him of a declaration as a necessary thing to be made. The King, who inwardly would have nothing to say to this declaration, invited me to draft the model for him. I replied respectfully but firmly that I would never formulate a declaration at the foot of which my name should not appear below the King's. My reason was that I did not wish to have put to my account the eventual changes introduced into any deed by Prince Metinich and Monsieur de Blacca. I pointed out to the King that he was too far from Paris. That one would have time to make two or three revolutions before he was informed of it in Prague. The King replied that the Emperor had left him free to choose his place of residence in all the Austrian states. The Kingdom of Lombardy accepted. But, added his Majesty, the towns in Austria that one can live in are all at more or less the same distance from France. In Prague I am lodged for nothing and my position obliges me to make that calculation. A noble calculation for a Prince who had for five years enjoyed a civil list of twenty millions without counting the royal residences. For a Prince who had left to France the colony of Algiers and the ancient patrimony of the Bourbons valued at twenty-five to thirty millions per annum. Sire, your loyal subjects have often thought that your royal indigents might have some needs. They are ready to club together each according to his means in order to make you independent of foreigners. I believe my dear Chateaubriand said the King laughing that you are not much richer than myself. How have you paid for your journey? I said, Sire, it would have been impossible for me to come to you if Madame La Duchesse de Berri had not instructed her banker, Monsieur Joke, to pay me six thousand francs. That's very little, exclaimed the King. Do you want any more? No, Sire, I ought even by careful management to be able to return something to the poor prisoner. But I am not good at bargaining. You were a magnificent lord in Rome. I always conscientiously squandered what the King gave me. I did not have two sews left.  You refused it. No, Sire, because you have more unfortunate servants than myself. You helped me out of my difficulty for the twenty thousand francs of debts that remained over from my Roman embassy after the ten thousand which I borrowed from your great friend, Monsieur Lafite. I owed them to you, said the King. It did not even amount to what he sacrificed in salary when sending in your resignation as ambassador, which, by the way, hurt me not a little. However there may be, Sire, whether it was due to me or not, Your Majesty, by coming to my assistance, did me a service at the time, and I will pay you back your money when I can. But not at present. For I am as poor as a rat. My house and the read-on fare is not paid for. I am poor, while waiting for the lodging which I have already visited for Your Majesty's sake. When I pass through a town I first inquire if there is an arms-house. If there is, I sleep peacefully. Bored in lodging, who asks for more? Oh, it won't end like that. How much would you want Chateaubriand to be rich? Sire, you would be wasting your time. If you gave me four millions this morning I should not have a fathering tonight. The King shook my shoulder with his hand. Capital!  Faith, I don't know. For I have no taste and no expenses. It's incomprehensible. I am such a fool that when I went to the Foreign Office I would not take the twenty-five thousand francs allowed for the expenses of installation and that, when leaving, I scorned to perlain the secret service money. You are talking to me of my fortune to avoid talking to me of your own. That is true, said the King. Here is my confession in my turn. By spending my capital in equal portions from year to year I have calculated that at my age I can live till my last day without needing anybody. If I found myself in distress I should prefer, as you suggest, to apply to Frenchmen rather than foreigners. They have offered to raise loans for me, among others, one of thirty millions which would have been subscribed in Holland. But I knew that that loan quoted on the principal exchanges in Europe would send down the French funds. This prevented me from adopting that plan. Nothing that would affect the public fortune in France could suit me. A sentiment worthy of a King. In this conversation the reader will have remarked the generous character, the gentle manners and the good sense of Charles X. It would have been a curious sight for a philosopher to see the subject and the King questioning each other as to their fortunes and their confidences as to their poverty inside a castle borrowed from the sovereigns of Bohemia. Prague, twenty-fifth and twenty-sixth May, 1833 At the end of this conference I attended Henry's riding lesson. He rode two horses, the first without stirrups, the horse being led, the second with stirrups, performing vaults without his holding the reins, with a stick passed between his back and arms.  Monsieur O'Heggertie, the elder and the teaching-equery, shouted, What's that leg doing? It's like a stick. Let your leg go. Good! Awful! What's the matter with you today? And so on. The lesson over, the young page King pulled up on horseback in the middle of the riding school, took off his cap suddenly to salute me in the gallery, where I was standing with a bar under Dama and some French people, and sprang from his horse as nimbly and gracefully, as the little Jean de Saint-Hubert. Henry's slender, agile, well built, he is fair, he has blue eyes with a trait in the left eye which reminds one of his mother's look. His movements are sudden. He accosts you, frankly, he is curious and asks questions. He has none of the pedantry which the newspapers ascribe to him.  I complimented him on his good appearance on horseback. You've seen nothing, he said.  He's as vicious as a demon. He kicks, he throws me. I get up again, we jump the gate. The other day he hit himself. He's got a leg as thick as that. Isn't the last horse I was riding a pretty one? But I was not in form. Henry a present detests the bar under Dama, whose appearance, character and ideas are repellent to him. He frequently loses his temper with him. In consequence of these rages the prince must need to be punished.  Next comes an Abbe Molligny who confesses the rebel and tries to frighten him out of his wits. The obstinate one will not listen and refuses to eat. Then Madame La Dauphine decides in favour of Henry who eats and laughs at the barren. The education proceeds in this vicious circle. What Masila Duda Bordeaux ought to have is a light hand which would lead him without making him feel the bit a governor who should be his friend rather than his master. If the family of St. Louis were like that of the Stewards, a kind of private family expelled by a revolution confined within an island the destiny of the Bourbons would in a short time be foreign to the new generations. Our old royal power is more than that. It represents the old royalty. The political, moral and religious past of the people is born of that power and grouped around it. The fate of a house so closely intertwined with the social order that was so nearly allied to the social order that is can never be indifferent to mankind. But destined though that house be to live the condition of the individuals composing it with whom a hostile fate had not made a truce would be deplorable. In perpetual misfortune those individuals would march forgotten and find along the glorious memory of their family. There is nothing sadder than the existence of fallen kings. Their days are no more than a tissue of realities and fictions remaining sovereigns by their own firesides among their people and their memories. They have no soon across the threshold of their house and they find the ironical truth at their door. James II or Edward VII Charles X or Louis XIX behind closed doors become closed doors James Edward Charles or Louis without numerals like the labourers their neighbours. They suffer the two full drawbacks of court life and private life. The flatterers, the favourites, the intrigues the ambitions of the one the affronts, the distress the gossiping of the other. It is a continual masquerade of menials and ministers changing clothes the moods sours in this situation hopes weaken, regrets increase one recalls the past one recriminates one exchanges reproaches which are the more bitter in as much as the utterance ceases to become fine within the good taste of a high origin and the proprieties of a superior fortune one becomes vulgar through vulgar sufferings the cares of a lost throne degenerate into domestic worries Popes, Clement XIV and Pius VI were never able to restore peace in the pretenders household those discrowned aliens remain in the supervision in the middle of the world repelled by the princes as infected with adversity suspected by the peoples as smitten with power I went to dress, I had been informed that I might keep on my frock and my boots but misfortune is too high in station to be approached with familiarity I reached the castle at a quarter to six the dinner was laid in one of the entrance rooms I found the cardinal de la Thiel in the drawing room since he had dined with me in Rome at the Embassy Palace at the time of the meeting of the conclave after the death of Leo XII what a change of destiny for me and for the world between those two dates he was still the hedge-priest with the plump belly, the pointed nose the pale face just as I had seen him in the chamber of piers with an ivory paper knife in his hand people asserted that he had no influence and that he was put in a corner and received more kicks than half-pence perhaps but there are different sorts of credit the cardinal says none the less sure because it is secret he derives his credit from the long years spent beside the king and from his priestly character the abbey de la Thiel has been an intimate confidant the remembrance of Madame de Polastron hangs about the confessor surplus the charm of the last human frailties and the sweetness of the first religious sentiments are prolonged as memories in the old monarch's heart they arrived in succession M. de Blacar M. et de Dama the parent's brother M. O'Heggertie the Elder M. Madame de Cossay at six o'clock precisely the king appeared followed by his son we hurried in to dinner the king put me on his right he had M. le Dauphin on his left M. de Blacar sat down opposite the king between the cardinal and M. de Cossay the other guests were placed at random the children dined with their grandfather on Sunday's only this is to deprive oneself of the only happiness that remains in exile family life and intimacy it was a fish dinner and none too good at that the king extolled to me the merits of a fish from the Moldau which possessed none at all four or five foot men in black roamed like lay brothers about the refectory there was no house steward everyone helped himself and offered to help others from the dish before him the king ate well asked to be served and himself served what he was asked for he was in a good humour the fear which he had had of me was passed the conversation turned within a circle of common places on the Bohemian climate the health of M. le Dauphin my journey the witch Sunday's ceremonies which were to take place tomorrow not a word of politics M. le Dauphin after sitting with his nose deep in his plate would sometimes emerge from his silence and addressing the cardinal de Latille said Prince of the church the Gospel of this morning was according to St. Matthew was it not no more senior according to St. Mark what, St. Mark a great dispute followed between St. Mark and St. Matthew and the cardinal was beaten dinner lasted nearly an hour the king rose and we followed him to the drawing room the newspapers lay on a table we all sat down and began to read then and there as if in a café the children came in the duke de Bordeaux escorted by his governor M. le Moselle by her governess they ran up to kiss their grandfather and then rushed to me we ensconced ourselves in the embrasure of a window overlooking the town and commanding a splendid view I renewed my compliments on the writing lesson M. le Moselle hastened to tell me again what her brother had already told me that I had seen nothing that one could not form an opinion while the black horse was lame M. le Gonto came to sit near us M. le Dameur a little further away giving an ear in an amusing state of anxiety as though I were going to eat his pupil or drop a few words on the liberty of the press or the glory of M. le Duchesse de Berry I would have laughed at the fears with which I inspired him if I had been able to laugh at a poor man after M. le Paulineur suddenly Henry said to me have you ever seen a constrictor a boa constrictor Monsignor means they are not either in Egypt or at Tunis the only places in Africa at which I have touched but I have seen many snakes in America oh yes said the princess Louise the rattlesnake in the genu de christianism I bowed to thank M. le Moselle but you have seen plenty of other snakes ask Henry are they very vicious some of them Monsignor are exceedingly dangerous others have no venom and one makes them dance the two children came close up to me with delight keeping their full beautiful eyes fixed on mine and then there's the glass snake I said he's splendid to look at and does you know harm he's as transparent and brittle as glass you break him as soon as you touch him can't the pieces come together again asked the prince no no dear M. Moselle answered for me he went to the faults of Niagara Henry resumed they roar terribly don't they can you go down in a boat Monsignor one American amused himself by sending a great barge down another American they say himself jumped into the cataract he was not destroyed the first time he tried again and was killed at the second attempt the two children lifted up their hands and said oh Madame de Gonto joined in the conversation Monsieur de Chateaubriand has been to Egypt and Jerusalem Monsignor clapped her hands and came still closer to me Monsieur de Chateaubriand she said do tell my brother about the pyramids and our Lord Sepulchre I told the mysterious best I could of the pyramids the Holy Sepulchre the Jordan the Holy Land the children were marvellously attentive Monsignor took a pretty face in her two hands with her elbows almost resting on my knees and Henry perched on a high armchair swung his legs to and fro after that fine talk about serpents, cataracts, pyramids and the Holy Sepulchre Monsignor said will you put me a question in history how in history yes ask me about a year the least important year in the whole history of France except the 17th and 18th centuries which we have not yet begun oh I exclaim Henry I prefer famous year ask me something about a famous year he was not so sure of his facts as his sister I began by obeying the princess and said well then will Monsignor tell me what happened who was reigning in France in 1001 and the brother and sister began to try Henry pulling at his forelock Monsignor shading her face with her two hands a familiar trick with her as though she were playing at Highland Seek and then she suddenly revealed her smiling mouth, her limpid look she was the first to say Robert was reigning Gregory the Fifth was Pope Basil the Second, Emperor of the East and Otto the Third Emperor of the West cried Henry hurrying so as not to remain behind his sister and had a vermin the second in Spain Monsignor interrupting him said Ethel Redd in England no no said her brother it was Edmund Ironside Monsignor was right Henry was a few years out in favour of Ironside who had fascinated him but it was none the less prodigious and my famous year asked Henry in a half of X-Tone that's true Monsignor what happened in the year 1593 Pooh exclaimed the young prince the abjuration of Henry the Fourth and Monsignor turned red at not having been able to answer first eight o'clock struck the bar in the dama's voice cut short our conversation just as when the hammer of the clock striking ten used to arrest my father's steps in the great hall at Kamburg dear children the old crusader has told you his adventures in Palestine but not by the fireside in the castle of Queen Blanche to find you he came knocking with his Palmer staff and his dusty sandals at the foreigners icy threshold Blondel has sung in vain at the foot of the tar of the dukes of Austria his voice could not open the road to the motherland for you young outlaws the traveler to distant lands has concealed a part of his story from you he has not told you that a poet and prophet he dragged through the forests of Florida and on the mountains of Judea as much despair sadness and passion as you have hope gladness and innocence that there was a day when like Julia he threw his blood at heaven blood of which God in his mercy has preserved a few drops for him and redeemed those which he gave up to the God of curses the prince taken away by his governor invited me to his history lesson fixed for next Monday at eleven o'clock in the morning Madame de Gonto withdrew with Mamazelle then began a scene of another kind the future royalty in the person of a child had just drawn me into its games and now the past royalty in the person of an old man made me assist at its diversions a rub of wist invited by two candles in the corner of a dark room began between the king and the doffin and the dut de blacca and the cardinal de la tille I was the only onlooker with a hegety the inquiry through the windows whose shutters were not closed the twilight came to mingle its palo with that of the candles the monarchy was dying out between those two expiring lights profound silence reigned but for the shuffling of the cards and a few exclamations from the king who was angry cards were renewed after the latins in order to solace the adversity of Charles the Sixth but there's no ogie nor lahir nowadays to give his name under Charles the Tenth to those distractions of misfortune when the cards were over the king wished me good night I went through the deserted and gloomy rooms through which I had passed on the previous evening the same stairs the same courtyards, the same guards and descending the slave of the hill I returned to my inn after losing my way in the streets and the dark Charles the Tenth remained shut up in the black mass which I had just left nothing can equal the sadness of his forlorness and of his years Prague, 27th May, 1833 I had great need of my bed but the barren cappelle nearly arrived from Holland was lodged in a room next to mine and came hurrying to me when the torrent falls from on high the abyss which it hollows out and in which it is swallowed up fixes one's gaze and leaves one dumb but I have neither patience nor pity to waste on the ministers whose feeble hands let the crowness and Louis fall into the whirlpool as though the waves would carry it back those of his ministers who claim to overpose the ordinances are the most guilty those who say that they were the most moderate are the least innocent if they saw so clearly why did they not resign they did not want to abandon the king Monsieur Le Dauphin cheated them as cowards a poor evasion they were unable to tear themselves from their portfolios whatever they may say there is nothing else at the bottom of that immense catastrophe and what a fine composure after the event one is scribbling about the history of England after bringing the history of France to so pretty a plight the other laments the life and death of the Duke de Reichstadt after sending the Duke de Bordeaux to Prague I knew Monsieur Capel it is only fair to remember that he had remained poor his pretensions did not exceed his value he would very readily have said with Lucien if you come to listen to me in the hope of smelling amber and hearing the song of the swan I call the gods to witness that I have never spoken of myself in terms so magnificent at the present day modesty is a rare quality and the only wrong that Monsieur Capel did was to allow himself to be appointed a minister I received a visit from Monsieur Le Baron de Damar the virtues of that brave officer had flown to his head a religious congestion was puzzling his brain there are some associations which are fatal the Duke de Rivière when dying recommended Monsieur de Damar as governor to the Duke de Bordeaux the France de Polignac was a member of that set and capacity is a form of free masonry which has its lodges in every country that secret society has obliets of which it opens the plugs and in which it causes states to disappear the domestic condition came so naturally to the court that Monsieur de Damar was choosing Monsieur Laviette would never grant him any title other than that of first groom of the bed chamber to Monsignor le Duke de Bordeaux I took a liking at first sight to this great mustachioed soldier whose business it was like a faithful dog to bark around his sheep he belonged to those loyal grenade throwers whom the terrible Marichal de Monteluc used to esteem saying they have no back shop in them Monsieur Laviette will be dismissed because of his sincerity not because of his bluntness one can put up with Baron bluntness often adulation in camp imparts an air of independence to flattery but with the brave old soldier of whom I am speaking it was all frankness he would have taken off his mustachios with honour to himself if he had borrowed 30,000 piastres on them like Chora de Castro his crabbed face was only the expression of liberty he merely informed one by his appearance that he was ready before taking the field with the army the Florentines used to warn the enemy of the intention by the sound of the bell Martinena Prague 27th May 1833 I had intended to hear mass at the cathedral within the castle precincts but being detained by visitors I had time only to go to what was formally the Jesuit church they were singing to an organ accompaniment a woman near me had a voice which made me look round at her at the communion she covered her face with her two hands and did not approach the holy table alas I have already explored many churches in the four quarters of the globe without being able to lay aside even at the tomb of the saviour the rough hair cloth of my thoughts I have depicted Abenhamet wandering in the Christian mosque at Kordoba he caught a glimpse at the foot of a pillar of a motionless figure which he took at first sight for a statue on a tombstone the original of that night of whom Abenhamet caught sight was a religious whom I had met in the church of the Escorial who knows however the storms deep down in that contemplative soul or what entreaty ascended towards the holy and innocent pontiff I had been admiring in the unfrequented sacristy of the Escorial one of Muiyo's most beautiful virgins I was with a woman it was she who first showed me the monk deaf to the sound of the passions that passed through the formidable silence of the sanctuary around him after Mass in Prague I sent for a collage I took the road laid out along the old fortifications by which carriages drive up to the castle they were busy marking out gardens on the ramparts the euphony of a forest will take the place here of the noise of the battle of Prague the whole will be very handsome in forty years or so God grant that Henry V may not stay here long enough to enjoy the shade of relief as yet unborn having to dine at the governor's tomorrow I thought that he would be polite to call a madame la Conteste a Chotec I should have thought her amiable and pretty even if she had not quoted passages from writings to me from memory I went to Madame de Grice's evening where I met General Skrtznecky and his wife he told me the story of the Polish insurrection and the battle of Ostrilenka when I rose to go the general asked me to permit him to press my venerable hand and to embrace the patriarch of the liberty of the press his wife wished to embrace in me the author the Genie du Christianism the monarchy accepted with all its heart the fraternal kiss of the republic I felt an honest man's satisfaction I was glad to rouse noble sympathies on different scores in two foreign hearts to be pressed in turn to the breast of husband and wife through liberty and religion on Monday the twenty seventh in the morning the opposition came to tell me that I could not see the young prince Monsieur de Dama had tired his pupil by dragging him from church to church to the stations of the Jubilee this weariness served as a pretext for a holiday and was made to justify a trip to the country they wanted to hide the child from me I spent the morning in visiting the town at five o'clock I went to dine at Count Chotex the house belonging to Count Chotex was built by his father who was also Grand Burgrave of Bohemia and presents externally the form of a Gothic chapel nothing is original nowadays everything is copied the drawing room gives a view over the gardens they slope down into a valley the light is always dull the soil grayish as in those many cornered recesses of the mountains of the north where gaunt nature wears the hair shirt the table was laid under the trees in the pleasure ground we dined without our hats my head which so many storms have insulted my hair was sensitive to the breath of the wind while I strove to keep my mind on my dinner I could not help watching the birds and clouds that flew over the banquet passengers embarked on the breezes and having secret relations with my destinies travellers the objects of my envy whose aerial course my eyes cannot follow without a sort of emotion I was moored home with those parasites wandering in the sky then with the guests seated near me on the earth happy those anchorites who had a raven for dap of her I cannot speak to your Prague society because I met her only at that dinner there was a woman present who was very much in the fashion in Vienna and very witty I was told she seemed to me an acrimonious and foolish person although she still had a certain youthfulness like those trees which keep in summer the dried clusters of the flower which they have borne in spring I know therefore of the manners of this country only those of the 16th century was told by Bason Pierre he loved Anna Esther at 18 years of age and six months of widow he spent five days and six nights in disguise and hidden in a room with his mistress he played tennis in Schradtschinn with Wallenstein being neither Wallenstein nor Bason Pierre I laid claim to neither empire nor love the modern esters asked for a cirrus who are able disguised though they be to get rid of their dominoes at night one does not lay aside the mask of the years Prague 27th May 1833 after the dinner soba at seven o'clock I waited on the king I then met the same persons as before excepting Monsieur le Duc de Bordeaux who were said to be ailing from his stations on the Sunday the king was half reclining on a sofa and Mamazelle sitting on a chair right up against the knees of Charles X who were stroking his grand-aughter's arm and telling her stories the young princess listened attentively when I appeared she looked at me with a smile of a reasonable person who should say I must do something to amuse my grand-papa shadow beyond exclaimed the king I did not see you yesterday Sire I was told too late that your Majesty had done me the honour to name me for your dinner party also it was with Sunday a day on which I am not allowed to see your Majesty how is that asked the king Sire it was on with Sunday nine years ago that when I came to pay my court to you they forbade me your door Charles X seemed touched they won't drive you away from the castle of Prague no Sire for I do not see those good servants here who showed me out on the day of prosperity the whist plane began and the day came to an end after the rubber I returned the Duc de Blakas visit the king he said has told me that we were to have a talk I replied that as the king had not thought it expedient to summon his council before which I could have set forth my ideas regarding the future of France and the majority of the Duc de Bordeaux I had nothing more to say His Majesty has no council rejoin the Duc de Blakas with a tremulous laugh and a self-satisfied look in his eyes he has no one but me absolutely no one the Grand Master of the Wardrobe has the highest opinion of himself a French complaint to hear him speak he does everything he's equal to everything he married the Duchess de Berri he does what he pleases with the kings he leads Metonic by the nose he has Nussel Road on his thumb he reigns in Italy he has carved his name on an obelisk in Rome he has the keys of the conclaves in his pocket the three last popes owe the elevation to him he knows public opinion so well he measures his ambition so well by his strength that when accompanying Madame la Duchesse de Berri he had himself given a diploma appointing him Head of the Council of Regency Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and that is how those poor people understand France and the times nevertheless, Monsieur de Blakas is the most intelligent and the most moderate of the band in conversation he is reasonable he always agrees with you is that what you think it is just what I was saying yesterday we have absolutely the same ideas he bemoans his slavery he is tired of business he would like to live in an unknown corner of the earth to die there in peace far from the world as to his influence with Charles the Tenth don't speak of it, Tim they think that he sways Charles the Tenth they are wrong he can do nothing with the king the king refuses a thing in the morning at night he grants the same thing nobody knows why he has changed his mind and so on when Monsieur de Blakas tells you these tales he is telling the truth because he never thought the king but he is not sincere because he inspires Charles the Tenth any of those wishes which are in accordance without princess inclinations for the rest Monsieur de Blakas possesses courage and honour he is not without generosity he is devoted and faithful by rubbing himself against the high and acquiring wealth he has called the ways of both he is very well born he comes of a poor but ancient house known in perjury and arms his stiff and formal manners his assurance, his strictness in matters of etiquette preserve for his masters and air of nobility which one loses too easily in misfortune at least in the museum in Prague the inflexibility of a suit of armour holds erect a body which would fall without it Monsieur de Blakas does not lack a certain energy he dispatches ordinary affairs quickly he is orderly and methodical a fairly enlightened connoisseur in some branches of archaeology a lover of the arts without imagination and in icy libertine he does not grow excited even over his passions his coolness would be a statesman like quality if his coolness were other than his confidence in his genius and his genius betrays him one feels in him the abortive great lord even as one feels it in his fellow countrymen la valette du dépenant either there will or there will not be a restoration if there is a restoration Monsieur de Blakas will come back with places and honours if there is no restoration the fortune of the grand master of the wardrobe is almost all invested out of France Charles X and Louis XIX will be dead he Monsieur de Blakas will be very old his children will remain the companions of the exiled prince illustrious foreigners at foreign courts praise god for all things thus the revolution which exalted and ruined Bonaparte will have enriched Monsieur de Blakas that makes amends Monsieur de Blakas with his long impassive colourless face is the monarchy's undertaker in ordinary he buried it at Hartwell he buried it at Ghent he buried it again in Edinburgh and he will bury it again in Prague or elsewhere always attending to the remains of the high and mighty defunct like those peasants on the coasts who pick up the wreckage which the sea casts up on its shores End of book 4 part 1


Being born, raised, and currently living in California, people ask me all the time if I'm able to surf. Unfortunately, no. I don't know how to surf. But the waves that are crashing ashore here on Earth are not the only ones in the universe, and they may be very mysterious. This is your space pod for November 6, 2015. You may have heard of these kinds of waves before. They're called gravitational waves, and they manipulate the universe in an ever-so-subtle way. No, they're not Matthew McConaughey stuck behind your bookcase, and no, they are not a new idea. Their inception begins nearly a century ago. Gravitational waves were predicted by Albert Einstein, thanks to his theory of general relativity, which we'll cover in a space pod later this month. Gravitational waves theoretically transport energy in the form of gravitational radiation, and there's a very straightforward result from the expected passing of one, an oscillation of particles as they follow the ripple of spacetime from the gravitational wave. The effects on the observable space in which this occurs would be negligible, if any at all. These oscillations would be extremely small. We're talking an order of magnitude smaller than the individual subatomic particles that make up atoms, like a proton. Even though they may be waves in spacetime itself, they still hold the same properties like actual waves do, such as amplitude, frequency, wavelength, and speed. There's a few things that we predict should generate gravitational radiation.  One of the big problems with gravitational waves is detecting them. You have to design systems that can pick up on those small oscillations and tell whether it's a gravitational wave or a truck five miles away on the freeway near your detector. Let's take a look by figuring out the gravitational radiation generated from the interaction of the Earth orbiting the Sun. When the numbers are crunched, our interaction of Earth orbiting the Sun generates a wave with an amplitude of about 10 to the negative 26th. This means that waves affect particles by oscillating them by one part in 10 to the 26th power. This is, as you can imagine, staggeringly small. In fact, it's beyond the theoretical limits of just about any potential gravitational wave detector that we could build. As you can gather from this, the first gravitational waves that we would expect to find would be from the most energetic events in the universe, like ultra-massive supernovae, or really big black holes spiraling in on each other, or even the most energetic event in the universe itself, the Big Bang. In fact, in early 2014, a team from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics found exactly that, the gravitational waves of the Big Bang, once and for all proving cosmic inflation and resulting in our first detection of gravitational waves. Then the process of peer review began.  Doggonnet didn't think about that. Turns out that they didn't find gravitational waves or cosmic inflation, just dust in our own galaxy. Earlier this year in January, the team officially retracted their results. But that's okay. We have several gravitational wave detectors in operation right now. By far the most sensitive of them happens to be the most well-known, the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory, LIGO. LIGO doesn't use telescopes in order to see gravitational waves, but it does use light. Firing a laser in a vacuum chamber that extends down four kilometers in two different directions. That laser beam travels the distance 75 times before returning to a recombination spot together. A gravitational wave would stretch one of those arms before the other, meaning one laser beam would take longer than expected to return to the recombination spot, thus detecting a passing wave. Over that distance, LIGO should be able to detect gravitational waves as small as 10 to the 18th power, one part per 10 to the 18th, which is about the size of the largest gravitational waves we'd expect to experience here on Earth. To give you an idea of how big one part per 10 to the 18th power is, it's roughly one thousandth the diameter of a proton. During its years of operation, it didn't detect a wave, but the expectation at that level of resolution was maybe one wave every few decades. Although over the past few years LIGO wasn't operating because it's being upgraded to what they're now calling advanced LIGO. Advanced LIGO operates with four times the resolution and a sensitivity 10 times greater. The expectation is that advanced LIGO, once up and fully running, should be able to detect tens of gravitational waves annually, but we'll have to await the initial data as its first run is just now starting up. Thanks for watching This Space Pod, I'm Jared Head. What do you think about gravitational waves and the ways to detect them? Well tell us below in the comments and don't forget to like and subscribe to us on social media. We also do have a Patreon campaign where if you've got a little extra, go ahead and hand it over to us and we'll bring the universe and its infinite mysteries to everyone who may want to view. So until the next Space Pod, keep exploring.