Rise and Fall of Cesar Birotteau

A stout, chubby-faced fellow of medium height, from head to foot the evident son of a hat-maker, with round features whose shrewdness was hidden under a restrained and subdued manner, suddenly appeared. His face, which was melancholy, like that of a man weary of poverty, lighted up hilariously when he caught sight of the table, and the bottles swathed in significant napkins. At Gaudissart’s shout, his pale-blue eyes sparkled, his big head, hollowed like that of a Kalmuc Tartar, bobbed from right to left, and he bowed to Popinot with a queer manner, which meant neither servility nor respect, but was rather that of a man who feels he is not in his right place and will make no concessions. He was just beginning to find out that he possessed no literary talent whatever; he meant to stay in the profession, however, by living on the brains of others, and getting astride the shoulders of those more able than himself, making his profit there instead of struggling any longer at his own ill-paid work. At the present moment he had drunk to the dregs the humiliation of applications and appeals which constantly failed, and he was now, like people in the higher walks of finance, about to change his tone and become insolent, advisedly. But he needed a small sum in hand on which to start, and Gaudissart gave him a share in the present affair of ushering into the world the oil of Popinot.

“You are to negotiate on his account with the newspapers. But don’t play double; if you do I’ll fight you to the death. Give him his money’s worth.”

Popinot gazed at “the author” which much uneasiness. People who are purely commercial look upon an author with mingled sentiments of fear, compassion, and curiosity. Though Popinot had been well brought up, the habits of his relations, their ideas, and the obfuscating effect of a shop and a counting-room, had lowered his intelligence by bending it to the use and wont of his calling, – a phenomenon which may often be seen if we observe the transformations which take place in a hundred comrades, when ten years supervene between the time when they leave college or a public school, to all intents and purposes alike, and the period when they meet again after contact with the world. Andoche accepted Popinot’s perturbation as a compliment.

“Now then, before dinner, let’s get to the bottom of the prospectus; then we can drink without an afterthought,” said Gaudissart. “After dinner one reads askew; the tongue digests.”

“Monsieur,” said Popinot, “a prospectus is often a fortune.”

“And for plebeians like myself,” said Andoche, “fortune is nothing more than a prospectus.”

“Ha, very good!” cried Gaudissart, “that rogue of a Finot has the wit of the forty Academicians.”

“Of a hundred Academicians,” said Popinot, bewildered by these ideas.

The impatient Gaudissart seized the manuscript and began to read in a loud voice, with much emphasis, “CEPHALIC OIL.”

“I should prefer Oil Cesarienne,” said Popinot.

“My friend,” said Gaudissart, “you don’t know the provincials; there’s a surgical operation called by that name, and they are such stupids that they’ll think your oil is meant to facilitate childbirth. To drag them back from that to hair is beyond even my powers of persuasion.”

“Without wishing to defend my term,” said the author, “I must ask you to observe that ‘Cephalic Oil’ means oil for the head, and sums up your ideas in one word.”

“Well, let us see,” said Popinot impatiently.

Here follows the prospectus; the same which the trade receives, by the thousand, to the present day (another piece justificative): —

GOLD MEDAL

EXPOSITION OF 1819

CEPHALIC OIL

Patents for Invention and Improvements

“No cosmetic can make the hair grow, and no chemical preparation can dye it without peril to the seat of intelligence. Science has recently made known the fact that hair is a dead substance, and that no agent can prevent it from falling off or whitening. To prevent Baldness and Dandruff, it is necessary to protect the bulb from which the hair issues from all deteriorating atmospheric influences, and to maintain the temperature of the head at its right medium. CEPHALIC OIL, based upon principles laid down by the Academy of Sciences, produces this important result, sought by the ancients, – the Greeks, the Romans, and all Northern nations, – to whom the preservation of the hair was peculiarly precious. Certain scientific researches have demonstrated that nobles, formerly distinguished for the length of their hair, used no other remedy than this; their method of preparation, which had been lost in the lapse of ages, has been intelligently re-discovered by A. Popinot, the inventor of CEPHALIC OIL.

“To preserve, rather than provoke a useless and injurious stimulation of the instrument which contains the bulbs, is the mission of CEPHALIC OIL. In short, this oil, which counteracts the exfoliation of pellicular atoms, which exhales a soothing perfume, and arrests, by means of the substances of which it is composed (among them more especially the oil of nuts), the action of the outer air upon the scalp, also prevents influenzas, colds in the head, and other painful cephalic afflictions, by maintaining the normal temperature of the cranium. Consequently, the bulbs, which contain the generating fluids, are neither chilled by cold nor parched by heat. The hair of the head, that magnificent product, priceless alike to man and woman, will be preserved even to advanced age, in all the brilliancy and lustre which bestow their charm upon the heads of infancy, by those who make use of CEPHALIC OIL.

“DIRECTIONS FOR USE are furnished with each bottle, and serve as a wrapper.

“METHOD OF USING CEPHALIC OIL. – It is quite useless to oil the hair; this is not only a vulgar and foolish prejudice, but an untidy habit, for the reason that all cosmetics leave their trace. It suffices to wet a little sponge in the oil, and after parting the hair with the comb, to apply it at the roots in such a manner that the whole skin of the head may be enabled to imbibe it, after the scalp has received a preliminary cleansing with brush and comb.

“The oil is sold in bottles bearing the signature of the inventor, to prevent counterfeits. Price, THREE FRANCS. A. POPINOT, Rue des Cinq-Diamants, quartier des Lombards, Paris.

“It is requested that all letters be prepaid.

“N.B. The house of A. Popinot supplies all oils and essences appertaining to druggists: lavender, oil of almonds, sweet and bitter, orange oil, cocoa-nut oil, castor oil, and others.”

“My dear friend,” said the illustrious Gaudissart to Finot, “it is admirably written. Thunder and lightning! we are in the upper regions of science. We shirk nothing; we go straight to the point. That’s useful literature; I congratulate you.”

“A noble prospectus!” cried Popinot, enthusiastically.

“A prospectus which slays Macassar at the first word,” continued Gaudissart, rising with a magisterial air to deliver the following speech, which he divided by gestures and pauses in his most parliamentary manner.

“No – hair – can be made – to grow! Hair cannot be dyed without – danger! Ha! ha! success is there. Modern science is in union with the customs of the ancients. We can deal with young and old alike. We can say to the old man, ‘Ha, monsieur! the ancients, the Greeks and Romans, knew a thing or two, and were not so stupid as some would have us believe’; and we can say to the young man, ‘My dear boy, here’s another discovery due to progress and the lights of science. We advance; what may we not obtain from steam and telegraphy, and other things! This oil is based on the scientific treatise of Monsieur Vauquelin!’ Suppose we print an extract from Monsieur Vauquelin’s report to the Academy of Sciences, confirming our statement, hein? Famous! Come, Finot, sit down; attack the viands! Soak up the champagne! let us drink to the success of my young friend, here present!”

“I felt,” said the author modestly, “that the epoch of flimsy and frivolous prospectuses had gone by; we are entering upon an era of science; we need an academical tone, – a tone of authority, which imposes upon the public.”

“We’ll boil that oil; my feet itch, and my tongue too. I’ve got commissions from all the rival hair people; none of them give more than thirty per cent discount; we must manage forty on every hundred remitted, and I’ll answer for a hundred thousand bottles in six months. I’ll attack apothecaries, grocers, perfumers! Give ‘em forty per cent, and they’ll bamboozle the public.”

The three young fellows devoured their dinner like lions, and drank like lords to the future success of Cephalic Oil.

“The oil is getting into my head,” said Finot.

Gaudissart poured out a series of jokes and puns upon hats and heads, and hair and hair-oil, etc. In the midst of Homeric laughter a knock resounded, and was heard, in spite of an uproar of toasts and reciprocal congratulations.

“It is my uncle!” cried Popinot. “He has actually come to see me.”

“An uncle!” said Finot, “and we haven’t got a glass!”

“The uncle of my friend Popinot is a judge,” said Gaudissart to Finot, “and he is not to be hoaxed; he saved my life. Ha! when one gets to the pass where I was, under the scaffold —Qou-ick, and good-by to your hair,” – imitating the fatal knife with voice and gesture. “One recollects gratefully the virtuous magistrate who saved the gutter where the champagne flows down. Recollect? – I’d recollect him dead-drunk! You don’t know what it is, Finot, unless you have stood in need of Monsieur Popinot. Huzza! we ought to fire a salute – from six pounders, too!”

The virtuous magistrate was now asking for his nephew at the door. Recognizing his voice, Anselme went down, candlestick in hand, to light him up.

“I wish you good evening, gentlemen,” said the judge.

The illustrious Gaudissart bowed profoundly. Finot examined the magistrate with a tipsy eye, and thought him a bit of a blockhead.

“You have not much luxury here,” said the judge, gravely, looking round the room. “Well, my son, if we wish to be something great, we must begin by being nothing.”

“What profound wisdom!” said Gaudissart to Finot.

“Text for an article,” said the journalist.

“Ah! you here, monsieur?” said the judge, recognizing the commercial traveller; “and what are you doing now?”

“Monsieur, I am contributing to the best of my small ability to the success of your dear nephew. We have just been studying a prospectus for his oil; you see before you the author of that prospectus, which seems to us the finest essay in the literature of wigs.” The judge looked at Finot. “Monsieur,” said Gaudissart, “is Monsieur Andoche Finot, a young man distinguished in literature, who does high-class politics and the little theatres in the government newspapers, – I may say a statesman on the high-road to becoming an author.”

Finot pulled Gaudissart by the coat-tails.

“Well, well, my sons,” said the judge, to whom these words explained the aspect of the table, where there stilled remained the tokens of a very excusable feast. “Anselme,” said the old gentleman to his nephew, “dress yourself, and come with me to Monsieur Birotteau’s, where I have a visit to pay. You shall sign the deed of partnership, which I have carefully examined. As you mean to have the manufactory for your oil on the grounds in the Faubourg du Temple, I think you had better take a formal lease of them. Monsieur Birotteau might have others in partnership with him, and it is better to settle everything legally at once; then there can be no discussion. These walls seem to me very damp, my dear boy; take up the straw matting near your bed.”

“Permit me, monsieur,” said Gaudissart, with an ingratiating air, “to explain to you that we have just pasted up the paper ourselves, and that’s the – reason why – the walls – are not – dry.”

“Economy? quite right,” said the judge.

“Look here,” said Gaudissart in Finot’s ear, “my friend Popinot is a virtuous young man; he is going with his uncle; let’s you and I go and finish the evening with our cousins.”