5

ΙΟ

Le Commissaire. Oui! mais je ne prétends pas, moi, les avoir faites pour rien.

Harpagon. (Montrant maître Jacques.) Pour votre payement, voilà un homme que je vous donne à pendre.

Maître Jacques. Hélas! comment faut-il donc faire ? On me donne des coups de bâton pour dire vrai, et on me veut pendre pour mentir.

Anselme. Seigneur Harpagon, il faut lui pardonner cette imposture.

Harpagon. Vous payerez donc le commissaire?

Anselme. Soit. Allons vite faire part de notre joie à

votre mère.

Harpagon. Et moi, voir ma chère cassette.

NOTES

N.B.-The figures refer to the page and the line; thus 23. 16. means page 23, line 16.

The letters (D), (B) refer to the editions of Despois (cf. Bibliography),

and of Braunholtz (Pitt Press); and the letters (C), (H), to the grammar of Clark and Murray (pub. Dent) and to Haase, Syntaxe française du dix-septième siècle, Paris (Picard).

2. I. Harpagon: in one of his plays Plautus uses the word harpagones to indicate 'stingy people,' and the Italian author of the Emilia, used by Molière as a source for L'Étourdi, names a miser 'Arpago.'

In the inventory made of Molière's effects after his death the costume he used for this part is described as follows: Un manteau, chausses et pourpoint de satin noir garni de dentelle ronde de soie noire, chapeau, perruque, souliers.' The whole was valued at 20 livres (D. p. 35).

2. 7. Frosine (= Euphrosine): Molière has taken a stock character and has altered it to make her a professional match-maker.

2. 8. Maître Simon: just as the London Livery Companies and the Cutlers Company in Hallamshire (Sheffield) have their masters or wardens, their watchers and searchers, so the Paris guilds had their 'maîtres' and their 'gardes.' These French guilds nominated 'courtiers' (brokers) to negotiate business between their members and outsiders.

The title maître followed by a christian name, is given to a man holding a position of authority in an inferior rank; here applied to the foreman broker and the chief servant (Maître Jacques). Cf. chef used to indicate the head-cook in a large establishment.

2. 12. Brindavoine and La Merluche-Oatstalk and Stockfishare names fittingly applied to Harpagon's lean men-servants.

2. 14. Le Commissaire: a minor executive law-officer, whose business it would be to take evidence in cases of misdemeanours. Such was the venality of the law that it is natural to find him claiming payment for taking the depositions of Harpagon and Maître Jacques (87. 33).

2. 15. The scene represents a room in the house of Harpagon with a garden beyond. Much has been written on the importance of the stage effects and machinery at the disposal of Molière's company for the setting of the play. It seems improbable, however, that the setting used for L'Avare is anything more than what would be the appearance of the house of a wealthy bourgeois. Dr. Lister, to whom frequent reference has been made, states that there were in Paris in his time seven hundred houses with porte cochère, stable and coach-house; and he also remarks on the fashion for gardens and greenhouses leading off the living rooms.

3. 4. du regret the construction is not quite clear. From the vous repentez-vous of the next line it seems probable that the preposition de is here used to signify the cause (thence, out of regret')-a very common use in seventeenth-century French—now expressed by another preposition or by some other turn of phrase.

3. 5. fait heureux: French of the seventeenth century is not fixed about the use of faire and rendre with a double accusative. In modern French rendre goes with an adjective and faire with a noun, and this distinction was in process of being drawn as is shown by 5. 21, 25. 23, 31. 10 and by 7. 10; but faire was, and still is, used when it means 'to represent,' 'to make appear' as in 36. 14 (C. 337), 39. 9.

3. 6. engagement: a written promise of marriage to which Dame Claude had been witness (cf. 79. 33, 80. 13).

3. 6. où the use of où is common in seventeenth-century French where we should now require a preposition and a relative; here où would be replaced by auxquels (cf. C. 194, H. 38).

3. II. succès: here in its etymological sense of 'issue.' Cf. the use of 'success' in Shakespeare.

3. 13. dans : modern French would have to turn this phrase

differently, and would say: parce que vous avez des bontés . . . (cf. below, 59. 1).

3. 20. amour: this word is to-day generally masculine in the singular, as it is 4. 18, 7. 29.

3. 21. ce in the seventeenth century we often find ce before a noun followed by an infinitive and de, where modern French requires the definite article (H. 21).

4. 6. découvrent: cf. the biblical use of 'discover.'

:

4. 8. à both de and à had many uses in seventeenth-century French which must now be turned by more precise prepositions (C. 232, H. 121).

4. II. assassinez: figurative for 'to kill,' a fashionable term of the time (cf. p. xxxix and 82. 6).

4. 19. en: the position of the pronoun governed by the infinitive is in seventeenth-century French generally before the finite verb (cf. 5. 18, 20. 29, 20. 33, 22. 8, 22. 20, 24. 1, but 21. 3).

4. 19. retranche: 'I restrict my regrets to dread of the blame.' 4. 25. aux choses dans les choses (cf. above 4. 8). This use of à instead of dans is specially frequent before abstract ideas (cf. H. 121 B).

4. 29. étonnant: this word has a very forceful sense in the seventeenth century. Cf. the biblical use of 'astonied.'

4. 30. générosité: this word and généreux imply high-mindedness and hence 'bravery.' Similar uses occur in English. But in modern French as in modern English the word is most commonly used to mean 'liberality.'

5. 2. patrie: we learn from 83. 10 that Valère was born in Naples. 5. 4. domestique: cf. 82. 9. Valère is acting as steward in Harpagon's house. The term domestique had a very wide application in the seventeenth century; thus all the gentlemen of the household of Louis XIV. were his domestiques. In a woodcut, in the 1682 edition, Valère is shown wearing a gentleman's dress and a sword. That Valère is conscious of his good birth is shown from 80. 22 and Scenes iv. and v. of Act V.

6. I. donner dans: cf. 15. 19; 'fall in with,' a fashionable turn of the epoch, cf. p. xxxix.

6. 2. encenser: before this verb, and applaudir, modern French would require the repetition of de.

6. 8. souffre.. au métier: we should rather say dans le métier. 6. 13. tâcher à: with à this verb is comparatively rare in modern French; the construction with de is also found in our text, e.g. 17. 26,

73. 2.

6. 16. et modern French would rather use a stronger conjunction, e.g. mais or car.

6. 19. de... part de votre côté.

8. 10. bonne femme='aged'; turn in English by a dear old mother.'

8. 12. amitié: often in the seventeenth century in the sense of 'affection.'

8. 14. d'un air: this construction is now obsolete. The superlative can only be used qualifying a noun accompanied by the definite article.

8. 17. toute: in Old French tout in its adverbial sense is treated as an adjective agreeing in number and gender with the word qualified. A survival of this is still shown in the modern rule that before a feminine adjective beginning with a consonant or h aspirate tout is variable. In the seventeenth century the present confusing rule is not yet absolute; toute being often found, as here, before an adjective beginning with a vowel.

8. 20. j'en vois: a proleptic-anticipatory use of en; 'I see many things in what you tell me.' Some editors take it in the sense of: 'I see a lot of her in . .' (B. 134).

8. 22. aimez: we should expect to find this verb in the subjunctive, but as this is a statement of fact a seventeenth-century author will prefer the indicative, and a modern author might do so too. (H. 79.) 8. 24. accommodées : this word signified 'well off.'

8. 30. déplaisir : this word has a stronger sense than ‘displeasure.' Cf. 58. 6, 59. 19 where the meaning is 'grief, trouble.'

8. 30. ce m'est: instead of c'est pour moi (cf. 30. 24, 38. 4, 38. 21, 52. 15). In the seventeenth century c'est with a noun is often used with the pronoun in the dative case instead of the disjunctive preceded by a preposition.

8. 31. je sois: the subjunctive was found very commonly with verbs of declaring used affirmatively (C. 337, iv.) (H. 80, ii.).

9. 4. sécheresse: here used in the sense of 'penury'; the modern French être à sec is the equivalent of our 'hard up.'