Another Study of Woman by Honoré de Balzac;Ellen Marriage
page 43 of 56 (76%)
page 43 of 56 (76%)
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was in a rage his brow was knit and the muscles of the middle of his
forehead set in a delta, or, to be more explicit, in Redgauntlet's horseshoe. This mark was, perhaps, even more terrifying than the magnetic flashes of his blue eyes. His whole frame quivered, and his strength, great as it was in his normal state, became almost unbounded. "He spoke with a strong guttural roll. His voice, at least as powerful as that of Charles Nordier's Oudet, threw an incredible fulness of tone into the syllable or the consonant in which this burr was sounded. Though this faulty pronunciation was at times a grace, when commanding his men, or when he was excited, you cannot imagine, unless you had heard it, what force was expressed by this accent, which at Paris is so common. When the Colonel was quiescent, his blue eyes were angelically sweet, and his smooth brow had a most charming expression. On parade, or with the army of Italy, not a man could compare with him. Indeed, d'Orsay himself, the handsome d'Orsay, was eclipsed by our colonel on the occasion of the last review held by Napoleon before the invasion of Russia. "Everything was in contrasts in this exceptional man. Passion lives on contrast. Hence you need not ask whether he exerted over women the irresistible influences to which our nature yields"--and the general looked at the Princesse de Cadignan--"as vitreous matter is moulded under the pipe of the glass-blower; still, by a singular fatality--an observer might perhaps explain the phenomenon--the Colonel was not a lady-killer, or was indifferent to such successes. "To give you an idea of his violence, I will tell you in a few words what I once saw him do in a paroxysm of fury. We were dragging our guns up a very narrow road, bordered by a somewhat high slope on one |
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