THE MAN OF AFFAIRStrusted to him many responsible tasks of a quasi-legal nature,
such as composing memoranda to government offices, writing
brochures on administrative matters and preparing information
for use in litigation.
He entered zealously into this work, for he was fascinated by
the economic vistas that were opened to him by a direct contact
with the life of an industrial centre. Yet he was by no means
always content with his new life. His tasks were heavy, and con
sumed so much time that at first he had very little leisure and
almost no facilities for the studies he had hoped to complete. He
told his parents that he was forced ‘to run around all day,’ while
to Maurice he made a bitter complaint of his intellectual frustra
tion.
‘In Lyons I am like a buried man. For a period I have re
nounced will, desire and passion; imagine what a hard sacrifice it
is for a man as selfish, wilful and fiery as I. But in the face of
necessity I swallow my courage and budge no more than a corpse.
Without books, without solitude, without learned or literate
society, I sink into eternal jesting and loafing. I begin already to
get more familiar with debit and credit; I see closely the effects of
competition, and am plunged in everything that is disgusting and
ignoble in the commerce o f Lyons.’
Lyons itself he detested from the start. A resolute provincial at
heart, he had not yet learnt to tolerate large cities. His periodic
outbursts against Paris illustrate this— and Lyons he found lack
ing even in the redeeming features o f the capital, such as libraries
and intelligent company. He denounced it as a ‘dirty city,’
grumbled about ‘Lyons mud’, and wryly remarked: ‘God grant
that the neglect of my wardrobe which has always been held
against me does not degenerate into filthiness.’
Nor did he find the Lyonnais any more attractive than their
environment. He had taken to wearing spectacles— the thin
steel-rimmed lenses which appear in his portraits— and he com
plained that the results were regrettable. ‘Before, all the women
looked passable; now they seem atrocious to me. A t first I
accused my glasses, but one day when I was in the Museum I
realised that beautirul things actually appeared very beautiful—
more beautiful even than in nature, and that the ugly things were
made more ugly.’ As for the character of his neighbours, he
decided they were a mixture of debauchees and bigots, over whom