The Lady of Lyons(莱翁丝女士)

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The Lady of Lyons; Or, Love and Pride.
1
The Lady of Lyons
by Edward Bulwer Lytton
The Lady of Lyons; Or, Love and Pride.
2
To the author of "Ion."
Whose genius and example have alike contributed towards the
regeneration of The National Drama,
This play is inscribed.
The Lady of Lyons; Or, Love and Pride.
3
PREFACE.
An indistinct recollection of the very pretty little tale, called "The
Bellows-Mender," suggested the plot of this Drama. The incidents are,
however, greatly altered from those in the tale, and the characters entirely
re-cast.
Having long had a wish to illustrate certain periods of the French
history, so, in the selection of the date in which the scenes of this play are
laid, I saw that the era of the Republic was that in which the incidents
were rendered most probable, in which the probationary career of the hero
could well be made sufficiently rapid for dramatic effect, and in which the
character of the time itself was depicted by the agencies necessary to the
conduct of the narrative. For during the early years of the first and most
brilliant successes of the French Republic, in the general ferment of
society, and the brief equalization of ranks, Claude's high-placed love; his
ardent feelings, his unsettled principles (the struggle between which makes
the passion of this drama), his ambition, and his career, were phenomena
that characterized the age, and in which the spirit of the nation went along
with the extravagance of the individual.
The play itself was composed with a twofold object. In the first place,
sympathizing with the enterprise of Mr. Macready, as Manager of Covent
Garden, and believing that many of the higher interests of the Drama were
involved in the success or failure of an enterprise equally hazardous and
disinterested, I felt, if I may so presume to express myself, something of
the Brotherhood of Art; and it was only for Mr. Macready to think it
possible that I might serve him in order to induce me to make the attempt.
Secondly, in that attempt I was mainly anxious to see whether or not,
after the comparative failure on the stage of "The Duchess de la Valliere,"
certain critics had truly declared that it was not in my power to attain the
art of dramatic construction and theatrical effect. I felt, indeed, that it was
in this that a writer, accustomed to the narrative class of composition,
would have the most both to learn and unlearn. Accordingly, it was to the
development of the plot and the arrangement of the incidents that I
directed my chief attention;--and I sought to throw whatever belongs to
The Lady of Lyons; Or, Love and Pride.
4
poetry less into the diction and the "felicity of words" than into the
construction of the story, the creation of the characters, and the spirit of
the pervading sentiment.
The authorship of the play was neither avowed nor suspected until the
play had established itself in public favor. The announcement of my name
was the signal for attacks, chiefly political, to which it is now needless to
refer. When a work has outlived for some time the earlier hostilities of
criticism, there comes a new race of critics to which a writer may, for the
most part, calmly trust for a fair consideration, whether of the faults or the
merits of his performance.
The Lady of Lyons; Or, Love and Pride.
5
DRAMATIS PERSONAE.
BEAUSEANT, a rich gentleman of Lyons, in love with, and refused by,
Pauline Deschappelles MR. ELTON.
GLAVIS, his friend, also a rejected suitor to Pauline MR.
MEADOWS.
COLONEL (afterwards General) DAMAS, cousin to Mme.
Deschappelles, and an officer in the French army MR. BARTLEY.
MONSIEUR DESCHAPPELLES, a Lyonnese merchant father to
Pauline MR. STRICKLAND.
GASPAR MR. DIDDEAR.
CLAUDE MELNOTTE MR. MACREADY.
FIRST OFFICER MR. HOWE.
SECOND OFFICER MR. PRITCHARD.
THIRD OFFICER MR. ROBERTS.
Servants, Notary, etc.
MADAME DESCHAPPELLES MRS. W. CLIFFORD.
PAULINE, her daughter MISS HELEN FAUCIT.
THE WIDOW MELNOTTE, mother to Claude MRS. GRIFFITH.
JANET, the innkeeper's daughter MRS. EAST.
MARIAN, maid to Pauline MISS GARRICK.
Scene--Lyons and the neighborhood.
Time--1795-1798
First performed on Thursday, the 15th of February, 1838, at Covent
Garden Theatre.
The Lady of Lyons; Or, Love and Pride.
6
ACT I.
SCENE I.
A room in the house of M. DESCHAPPELLES, at Lyons. PAULINE
reclining on a sofa; MARIAN, her maid, fanning her--Flowers and notes
on a table beside the sofa--MADAME DESCHAPPELLES seated--The
gardens are seen from the open window.
Mme. Deschap. Marian, put that rose a little more to the left.--
[MARIAN alters the position of a rose in PAULINE's hair.]--Ah, so!-- that
improves the hair,--the tournure, the j'e ne sais quoi!-- You are certainly
very handsome, child!--quite my style;--I don't wonder that you make such
a sensation!--Old, young, rich, and poor, do homage to the Beauty of
Lyons!--Ah, we live again in our children,-- especially when they have our
eyes and complexion!
Pauline [languidly]. Dear mother, you spoil your Pauline!--[Aside.] I
wish I knew who sent me these flowers!
Mme. Deschap. No, child!--If I praise you, it is only to inspire you
with a proper ambition.--You are born to make a great marriage.-- Beauty
is valuable or worthless according as you invest the property to the best
advantage. Marian, go and order the carriage! [Exit MARIAN.
Pauline. Who can it be that sends me, every day, these beautiful
flowers?-- how sweet they are!
Enter Servant.
Servant. Monsieur Beauseant, Madam.
Mme. Deschap. Let him enter. Pauline, this is another offer!-- I know
it is!--Your father should engage an additional clerk to keep the account-
book of your conquests.
Enter BEAUSEANT.
Beau. Ah, ladies how fortunate I am to find you at home!--[Aside.]
How lovely she looks!--It is a great sacrifice I make in marrying into a
family in trade!--they will be eternally grateful!--[Aloud.] Madam, you
will permit me a word with your charming daughter.--[Approaches
The Lady of Lyons; Or, Love and Pride.
7
PAULINE, who rises disdainfully.]--Mademoiselle, I have ventured to
wait upon you, in a hope that you must long since have divined. Last night,
when you outshone all the beauty of Lyons, you completed your conquest
over me! You know that my fortune is not exceeded by any estate in the
province,--you know that, but for the Revolution, which has defrauded me
of my titles, I should be noble. May I, then, trust that you will not reject
my alliance? I offer you my hand and heart.
Pauline [aside.] He has the air of a man who confers a favor!--[Aloud.]
Sir, you are very condescending--I thank you humbly; but, being duly
sensible of my own demerits, you must allow me to decline the honor you
propose. [Curtsies, and turns away.
Beau. Decline! Impossible!--you are not serious!--Madam, suffer me
to appeal to you. I am a suitor for your daughter's hand-- the settlements
shall be worthy of her beauty and my station. May I wait on M.
Deschappelles?
Mme. Deschap. M. Deschappelles never interferes in the domestic
arrangements,--you are very obliging. If you were still a marquis, or if my
daughter were intended to marry a commoner,--why, perhaps, we might
give you the preference.
Beau. A commoner!--we are all commoners in France now.
Mme. Deschap. In France, yes; but there is a nobility still left in the
other countries in Europe. We are quite aware of your good qualities, and
don't doubt that you will find some lady more suitable to your pretensions.
We shall be always happy to see you as an acquaintance, M. Beauseant!--
My dear child, the carriage will be here presently.
Beau. Say no more, madam!--say no more!--[Aside.] Refused! and by
a merchant's daughter!--refused! It will be all over Lyons before sunset!-- I
will go and bury myself in my chateau, study philosophy, and turn
woman-hater. Refused! they ought to be sent to a madhouse!-- Ladies, I
have the honor to wish you a very good morning. [Exit.
Mme. Deschap. How forward these men are!--I think, child, we kept
up our dignity. Any girl, however inexperienced, knows how to accept an
offer, but it requires a vast deal of address to refuse one with proper
condescension and disdain. I used to practise it at school with the dancing-
The Lady of Lyons; Or, Love and Pride.
8
master.
Enter DAMAS.
Damas. Good morning, cousin Deschappelles.--Well, Pauline, are you
recovered from last night's ball?--So many triumphs must be very
fatiguing. Even M. Glavis sighed most piteously when you departed; but
that might be the effect of the supper.
Pauline. M. Glavis, indeed!
Mme. Deschap. M. Glavis?--as if my daughter would think of M.
Glavis!
Damas. Hey-day!--why not?--His father left him a very pretty fortune,
and his birth is higher than yours, cousin Deschappelles. But perhaps you
are looking to M. Beauseant,--his father was a marquis before the
Revolution.
Pauline. M. Beauseant!--Cousin, you delight in tormenting me!
Mme. Deschap. Don't mind him, Pauline!--Cousin Damas, you have
no susceptibility of feeling,--there is a certain indelicacy in all your ideas.-
-M. Beauseant knows already that he is no match for my daughter!
Damas. Pooh! pooh! one would think you intended your daughter to
marry a prince!
Mme. Deschap. Well, and if I did?--what then?--Many a foreign
prince--
Damas [interrupting her]. Foreign prince!--foreign fiddlestick!-- you
ought to be ashamed of such nonsense at your time of life.
Mme. Deschap. My time of life!--That is an expression never applied
to any lady till she is sixty-nine and three-quarters;-- and only then by the
clergyman of the parish.
Enter Servant.
Servant. Madame, the carriage is at the door. [Exit.
Mme. Deschap. Come, child, put on your bonnet--you really have a
very thorough-bred air--not at all like your poor father.--[Fondly]. Ah, you
little coquette! when a young lady is always making mischief, it is a sure
sign that she takes after her mother!
Pauline. Good day, cousin Damas--and a better humor to you.--[Going
back to the table and taking the flowers]. Who could have sent me these
The Lady of Lyons; Or, Love and Pride.
9
flowers? [Exeunt PAULINE and MADAME DESCHAPPELLES. Damas.
That would be an excellent girl if her head had not been turned. I fear she
is now become incorrigible! Zounds, what a lucky fellow I am to be still a
bachelor! They may talk of the devotion of the sex-- but the most faithful
attachment in life is that of a woman in love-- with herself. [Exit.
SCENE II.
The exterior of a small Village Inn--sign, the Golden Lion--A few
leagues from Lyons, which is seen at a distance.
Beau. [behind the scenes.] Yes, you may bait the horses; we shall rest
here an hour.
Enter BEAUSEANT and GLAVIS.
Gla. Really, my dear Beauseant, consider that I have promised to
spend a day or two with you at your chateau, that I am quite at your mercy
for my entertainment,--and yet you are as silent and as gloomy as a mute
at a funeral, or an Englishman at a party of pleasure.
Beau. Bear with me!--the fact is that I am miserable.
Gla. You--the richest and gayest bachelor in Lyons?
Beau. It is because I am a bachelor that I am miserable.--Thou
knowest Pauline--the only daughter of the rich merchant, Mons.
Deschappelles?
Gla. Know her?--who does not?--as pretty as Venus, and as proud as
Juno.
Beau. Her taste is worse than her pride.--[Drawing himself up.] Know,
Glavis, she has actually refused me!
Gla. [aside]. So she has me!--very consoling! In all cases of heart-ache,
the application of another man's disappointment draws out the pain and
allays the irritation.--[Aloud.] Refused you! and wherefore?
Beau. I know not, unless it be because the Revolution swept away my
father's title of Marquis,--and she will not marry a commoner. Now, as we
have no noblemen left in France,--as we are all citizens and equals, she
can only hope that, in spite of the war, some English Milord or German
Count will risk his life, by coming to Lyons, that this fille du Roturier may
condescend to accept him. Refused me, and with scorn!--By Heaven, I'll
The Lady of Lyons; Or, Love and Pride.
10
not submit to it tamely:-- I'm in a perfect fever of mortification and rage.--
Refuse me, indeed! Gla. Be comforted, my dear fellow,--I will tell you a
secret. For the same reason she refused ME!
Beau. You!--that's a very different matter! But give me your hand,
Glavis,--we'll think of some plan to humble her. Mille diables! I should
like to see her married to a strolling player!
Enter Landlord and his Daughter from the Inn.
Land. Your servant, citizen Beauseant,--servant, Sir. Perhaps you will
take dinner before you proceed to your chateau; our larder is most
plentifully supplied.
Beau. I have no appetite.
Gla. Nor I. Still it is bad travelling on an empty stomach. What have
you got? [Takes and looks over the bill of fare.]
[Shout without.] "Long live the Prince!--Long live the Prince!"
Beau. The Prince!--what Prince is that? I thought we had no princes
left in France.
Land. Ha, ha! the lads always call him Prince. He has just won the
prize in the shooting-match, and they are taking him home in triumph.
Beau. Him! and who's Mr. Him?
Land. Who should he be but the pride of the village, Claude
Melnotte?--Of course you have heard of Claude Melnotte?
Gla. [giving back the bill of fare.] Never had that honor. Soup--ragout
of hare--roast chicken, and, in short, all you have!
Beau. The son of old Alelnotte, the gardener?
Land. Exactly so--a wonderful young man.
Beau. How, wonderful?--Are his cabbages better than other people's
Land. Nay, he don't garden any more; his father left him well off. He's
only a genus.
Gla. A what?
Land. A genus!--a man who can do everything in life except anything
that's useful--that's a genus.
Beau. You raise my curiosity;--proceed.
Land. Well, then, about four years ago, old Melnotte died, and left his
son well to do in the world. We then all observed that a great change came
摘要：

TheLadyofLyons;Or,LoveandPride.1TheLadyofLyonsbyEdwardBulwerLyttonTheLadyofLyons;Or,LoveandPride.2Totheauthorof"Ion."WhosegeniusandexamplehavealikecontributedtowardstheregenerationofTheNationalDrama,Thisplayisinscribed.TheLadyofLyons;Or,LoveandPride.3PREFACE.Anindistinctrecollectionoftheveryprettyli...

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