Gastronomy of the Eye
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| Parisian City Strollers and Covered Passages |
Two well-dressed young fellows—slim of body and with arms as round as those of a pavier's daughter, with boots of the very latest fashion—met one day on the boulevard, at the end of the Passage des Panoramas.
“Why, it's you!”
“Yes, my friend. Don't I take after myself?”
And they made merry together, more or less humorously, their wit on a level with the witticism which opened the conversation.
When they had looked one another over with the care and curiosity with which a detective tries to recognise a man from a description of him, and had satisfied themselves respectively as to the freshness of their gloves, as to their waistcoats, and the elegance of their neckties, when they were practically certain in their minds that neither had met with any misfortune, they linked arms; and if they left the Théatre des Variétés behind, they did not reach Frascati without having put a sharp question, which, freely translated, is: ‘With whom are you taking up just now?’ It is the general rule that she is always a charming woman.
Where is the foot-soldier of Paris upon whose ear these words, out of the thousands uttered by the passersby, have not fallen, like bullets on the day of battle? Where is the man who has not seized one of those innumerable words, frozen in the air, of which Rabelais speaks? But most men walk about Paris as they eat and as they live, without thinking. There are but few musicians clever enough to recognise the key of those few scattered notes, few practised readers of faces who can tell from what passion they proceed. To wander through Paris! Truly a delightful, an adorable existence! Strolling is a science, a feast of the eye. Walking is vegetating; strolling is life. A pretty woman who has long been gazed at with burning eyes will be far more worthy of claiming a reward than the cook who asked the Limousin for twenty sous, with his nose all swollen from sniffing up tasty smells. To stroll is to enjoy oneself, to catch flashes of wit, to admire grand pictures of misery, love, joy, graceful or grotesque portraits; to look into the depths of thousands of lives. If you are young, it means a life full of desires, fully realised; if old, it is to live the life of the young over again, to enjoy their passions afresh…
The Physiology of Marriage
(trans. London, MCMIV)
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