DELACROIX Eugène (1798-1863).

L.A.S. "EDx", Sunday 25 [June 1843, to Charles SOULIER]; 3 pages in-8. He is in the middle of the packages: "I am going to spend a few days with my brother in Vichy, not to take the waters (me of course) but to keep him company. I find that sooner than going to Bordeaux. I have a great apprehension of finding there the very opposite of the rest I need. Since I made up my mind to go there, I know I don't know how many more or less annoying people I must meet there and who will turn that place into a Paris street for me, where one would be more crowded than in Paris itself. Finally, God is great. - The continuous storms are killing me [...] If the summer goes on like this, there will be no health, no painting, and I also hear that there will be no wheat, no oats or anything". He met an old friend of Soulier's, M. de Bourcet, in a salon: "How strange this world is. Here is a being that I saw only once in the rue de Grenelle, some 20 years ago. What has he done since then, what have we done ourselves, why are we still here, why are others no longer here? Inexplicable life, an abyss of sadness and boredom when you look over the edge. We have to stand still in our corner like passengers in their cabins and not even look into the depths of the abyss that surrounds us. You see, dear, that even while talking to you, I, who should only be happy in caring for you, find a way to think about the ugliness of life. But it's a devil of a storm, and I'm packing to leave, which is as bad for me as anything else. The only thing missing is the stagecoach to complete my martyrdom"... Correspondance générale (t. II, p. 140).