Part I: 1850- 1922 The old world Baptiste and Victoria; Auguste and Yvonne
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- The 17th century Teilhacs
- Jacques Teilhac (1782-1843)
- Pierre Vergnes (1805-1892)
- Charles Vergnes (1829-1898)
- Victoria Vergnes
| Pierre VERGNES 1842 1865
DENOYER de SEGONZAC 1866 1870 At that time, the central part of Carennac already had the same beautiful buildings as now, perhaps in not such a good state as they were already old. The first cadastre, compiled in 1807 uncannily shows our house, with its external stone staircase, exactly the same size as in 1990, with the carreyrou in the same place. Neither have any of the neighbouring houses changed much: the presbytère, the Gaucher and Maud houses were exactly, in external shape, as they are now. Our house stood on the main path into the big village, which counted about 1000 inhabitants. The current street leading from the entrance of the village to the Palissade did not exist, neither did the straight avenue to Gramat. The bottom of the garden was effectively the end of the village, after which there were only fields and swampy grounds not fit for passage all the year round (no Girac house, no Hotel des Touristes). To leave Carennac eastwards, especially in wet weather, you had to cross the hill by what is now the road to the cemetery and Magnagues. I have established by written evidence that ancestors of ours inhabited the house right from that time, as I will explain. Genealogical research has now become quite easy, with innumerable registry records available on line. Many aficionados have already scrutinised these old documents and uploaded short summaries that can be searched and matched. That is how I have been able to confirm, and expand, family memories collected since I was a boy. For the much older Carennac ancestors, and especially the Teilhac, I invite interested descendants to take a look at the genealogical dossier, which can be accessed online. In this memoir, I will only mention the people on whom we have some personal information. The 17th century Teilhacs Because of its rather prestigious position, the Teilhac name is the one which has been best researched in our ancestry by genealogists, and counts our most remote ancestor, Jean Teilhac, born in Carennac in 1585 (12 generations up from myself, 400 years before Sarah and Isabelle) and married to Fanie de Verdié. There is still a little uncertainty about the genealogical line, with discrepancies between the trees of different researchers. I have used the one vetted by the majority, and will continue the investigation. The Teilhac had a coat of arms authorized by the king: "de sable à une clé d'argent" and the claim "Teilhac: consuls de Carennac". As far as I have currently established, the consuls were the closest thing to the current maire, i.e. the top municipal official. Nothing is known about these generations except that they occupied what would now be called middle class positions in the Ancient Régime, owning land and public offices but without belonging to one of the two privileged orders (clergy and aristocracy). Pierre Teilhac (1743-1796) He is the first for whom I have found the indication "Avocat au Parlement" in the registry records, along with the mention "bourgeois" (before the Revolution), and "propriétaire" afterwards. But these offices ("charges") Both his sons, Jean Pierre (b. 1780) and Jacques were prominent citizens in the village. Jacques Teilhac (1782-1843) With Jacques Teilhac, the great-grandfather of my great-grand-mother Victoria, we are starting to know a little about their lives. He was only a child during the Revolution, but must have been marked by the events as told to him by his parents, who would have had difficult times as moderately influential families. One of his uncles (Antoine, b. 1750) was the last “prieur” of Carennac, who lived to be dispossessed of his prieuré, which comprised the small castle (logis du doyen), the church and the cloister, which were officially appropriated by the commune.29 He had had a particularly nasty time, having been deported as "prêtre réfractaire" to the "pontons de Rochefort"30 but he survived an died a few years after returning to the village. Jacques was married in 1805 to Antoinette Carbonnières and had three children: - Frédéric (born 8/7/1806, see parish record), married to Jeanne Batut, about whom there is not much information; - Marie Rose (born 5/6/1808), married to our ancestor Pierre Vergnes (from La Saule) called "le grand-père", through whom we are related to Jacques, - Fantine, married to Cyril Charlat, a highly colourful widower nicknamed "jambe de bois" as he had been lamed during the Napoleonic wars, and who is the ancestress of the Ayroles and other Carennac cousins. This Charlat was one of the first owners of the auberge in front of the castle, where his descendants Chaleix still live31. Antoinette is currently the only case in this story of a widow remarrying. At 34, widowed from Antoine Vernet, with whom she had had at least one daughter (Françoise Julie), she married Jacques Teilhac, who was 12 years younger. Her daughter Julie went on to marry Pierre Moureau in 1820, the son of the very first maire of Carennac. Just after the Revolution, Jacques (termed "du Coustal", after the street where our house stands) was a member to the conseil municipal. The maire was Pierre Joseph Valrivière and the deputy Jean Louis Geniès. In 1841, according to the census, Jacques, already a widower, lived in the prettily named Rue des Carrières étroites (we need to determine where that street was) with his son Frédéric, daughter in law and grandson (also Frédéric). The census is extremely useful because it certifies, among all children whom we know from the registries that they were born, which actually lived to adulthood and in which household in the village at certain dates. The census also records some picturesque street-names which may have not been in general use at the time, unless the greater population made them necessary. However, the names of the streets evolved quite significantly between 1836 and 1886, and are no longer in use as the population has now declined so much that the postman can remember everybody. Jacques was not the most distinguished member of the Teilhac clan. It was his older brother Jean Pierre, born two years before, who was appointed juge de paix, lived in the big (now Gaucher) house, and was maire of Carennac from 1825 to 1840. As maire, he was succeeded by his son Antoine (after a one year inter-regnum by a Geniès from Magnagues). A few years earlier, in 1833, perhaps feeling old and weak, Jacques had organised his succession by dividing his property between his three children, and binding by contract his eldest son, Frédéric, to support him in his old age. He was to die seven years later, in 1841, aged 59. This was a typical way of proceeding in those days, as there were no old age pensions. F. Pressouyre's book on Teyssieu studies this type of contract at length. In what gives us an insight about what it meant to be somewhat rich at the time, this document lists the assets of Jacques, and their value is indicated. As this document is rather complex, I must give a summary of its content: Une vigne avec pigeonnier au [mot illisible]. de Loubreyrie, commune de Carennac, d’une surface de 2ha 21a ou 80 journaux, ancienne mesure de Beaulieu, partagée entre Frédéric et Marie Rose, Frédéric obtenant le pigeonnier Les dettes passives du donateur seront partagées entre Frédéric et Fantine. La Dame Vergnes ne sera pas tenue d’y contribuer, sa donation particulière se trouve la 1ere faite par le Sieur Jacques et elle a déclaré s’en tenir à cette donation. Fantine doit payer deux mille francs : - 1237 frs au curé Laplagne de Carennac, avec intérêt 25 frs - 200frs au Sieur Valrivière cadet de Carennac - 143 frs à Frédéric en déduction d’une plus forte somme qui lui est due par Teilhac, le donateur, - 200 frs à Lescure deSoult - 200 frs à Jeanne Lestrade de Puybrun Frédéric sera tenu de loger, nourrir, soigner, entretenir son père, de pourvoir amplement à tous ses besoins tant de santé que maladie. Suit la liste très détaillée des meubles, objets, outils, etc, avec les prix. Enregistré à Martel, par devant Guillaume Solignac le 19 octobre 1933 (Document de la famille Ayroles, transcrit en résumé par Hélène Bouyssonie). In the main Teilhac house (now divided between Gaucher and Ayroles) next to ours, in 1836, the following three generations are living together: - Antoine, already a widower at 36, propriétaire, - his mother Victoire Trassy, 68 - two unmarried aunts, Victoire Teilhac (75) and Marie-Anne Teilhac (67), - a little Victoria, 6, Antoine's daughter, The household comprised also three domestic servants. Pierre Vergnes (1805-1892) Among our distant ancestors, Pierre Vergnes is perhaps the most worthy of our attention, both as the first certified owner of our house (1836 census), then because of his distinguished local political career. Pierre Vergnes (Victoria's grandfather), born in la Saule, commune de Bétaille in 1805, came from a landowning farming family that had not moved from La Saule for at least one hundred years, each generation keeping the farm going or increasing its land, and transmitting it to the next. Without breaking the pattern, Pierre made a more interesting life for himself by marrying into the Teilhac family in 1829, in Carennac, the village just above the farm. This must have helped him to reach the position of maire of Carennac. In 1841, an election was called for the triennial partial renewal of the conseil municipal, in which only the main borough of the commune ("chef-lieu" according to the minutes) voted. Antoine Eloi Teilhac, son of Jean Pierre, juge de paix) was elected maire, assisted by Fabien Audubert as adjoint. A Valrivière (Antoine Eusèbe) was also elected councillor, while Jacques Teilhac who was feeling old probably did not seek re-election. It seems the policies of the commune took a turn at that time, judging by two changes introduced immediately: - the instituteur's salary was doubled, but he had to teach all the children from "poor families" for free, instead of a stated number in the previous years (15). More affluent families paid 1 franc for children learning to read, 2 F for those learning to read and write; - the commune flatly refused to repair the church's roof, claiming that the "conseil de fabrique" of the parish, which is composed of "marguilliers" in charge of the upkeep of the building, was refusing to open its accounts and registers for inspection by the elected officials. In the minutes, we can read that the repairs of the roof were supported by Valrivière, who lived just next door, and who even threatened to sue the commune. Pierre Vergne did not have to wait long to be appointed maire by the Préfet of the Lot, which happened the next year, 1842, after the early death of the incumbent. Being the husband of Marie Rose, daughter of Jacques Teilhac, he may have inherited the political clients of his in-laws, or on the contrary sought support elsewhere, among the plebs. I like to think of him as an Carennac equivalent of Cicero, who joined forces with the patricians to become consul, in this case at his modest local level. He must have been a remarkable man, who though an outsider from the Bétaille plain, held the position of maire of Carennac from 1842 to 1865, making him the longest-serving elected official since the position was created. When we know how wily these villagers still are, this is no mean feat. He was succeeded by the a scion of the Dunoyer de Segonzac a minor aristocratic family also a permanent fixture in the village. His education must have been very poor, and he made up this lack with innate intelligence and social skills. During his tenure, Pierre Vergnes faced difficult times, during and after the Revolution of 1848. The events in the Lot centred on the bigger towns, such as Cahors and Figeac, with minor disturbances elsewhere, as evidenced by this account listing the "victims" of the authorities.32 
He seems to have chosen the right side, as he kept his position as maire at the end of the events. This attracted great animosity from the most ardent republicans, if we are believed two small items of information found at the National Library. - in 1851 he was listed as one of the signatories of the lists of enemies of the Republic, along with hundreds of other names, starting with Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte and Morny, minister of the interior33. After the names of all the members of the Emperor's household, ministers and préfets, in the section devoted to the Lot département, the names for Carennac were: "Dunoyer, propriétaire à Carennac, vrai type de l'immoralité la plus grossière, méprisé de tous les honnêtes gens, flatteur du pouvoir qui règne et déserteur de ce même pouvoir qui tombe, enfin dénonciateur éhonté des démocrates et souteneur de toute improbité (…) Vergnes, fils d'un condamné pour vol, maire de Carennac par ordonnance du préfet, -- et Teilhac, juge de paix du même canton, tous les deux du même acabit, personnages à qui les faux témoignages ne coûtaient pas s'il s'agissait de nuire aux démocrates ou d'attirer une condamnation sur les partisans de la démocratie." - An arrêté by the Préfet du Lot34 gives a list of suspects to be arrested, among which our ancestor is not present, having found favour with the regime: Arrêté du commandant supérieur de l'état de siège dans le département du Lot: "Considérant les nommés (follows a list of about 30 men) (…) Valrivière aîné, membre du conseil général, à Carennac (…) contre lesquels des mandats d'arrêt ont été lancés comme prévenus d'avoir participé aux actes insurrectionnels et aux désordres qui se sont produits sur plusieurs points du département, sont en fuite." It seems that Pierre Vergnes sided with the "republicans" but desisted from any armed resistance, later to rally the Empire. Valrivière may have been condemned as a royalist. The last picture of Pierre Vergnes is given by his grand-daughter Esther in his later years, when he was over 80, as a tyrannical but perhaps senile pater familias. It seems that as a self-made man, who had enhanced his social and economic situation in difficult times, he did not welcome signs of modernism such as the disenfranchisement of the peasants, who now dared ask for decent wages. There may have been good reasons for Pierre to become grumpy in his dotage. The difficulties described by Esther would be enough to rile any saint. With the onset of the industrial revolution in that region, farm labourers were rare as the young men were emigrating to the cities in search of more profitable occupation offered by the newly created industries. The relations between landlords and tenants must have become more conflictual, the rents coming to look illegitimate or excessive, after all there had been a revolution to abolish privilege. In her letters, Esther described a landlord who did not want to pay his labourers, perhaps because he could no longer afford the going rates, with the consequence that the crops were not brought in, and left to rot standing. The arrival of the railway in the 1880s would have accelerated the process. At least, that is the situation that emerges from Esther's letters to her married sister. Of more direct interest to us, Pierre Vergnes is listed in the 1836 census as living with his wife Rose Teilhac and his three children (Charles, Frédéric and Justine) in our very own house, in what was called “Rue du Coustal”. This word means hill, and referred to the steep climb that separated the village from the hill outside the town going east, where the Dordogne ran at the bottom of a cliff, making it difficult to leave town towards Saint Céré. This address is confirmed by the fact that the listing proceeds street by street, and the next-door neighbours are the priest Jean Antoine Laplagne and his servant Marguerite Vaux, in the Presbytère, and the Teilhac family (who lived in what was later known as the “logis Teilhac”, and is now the "maison Gaucher".) It is probably then that the newly-wed Vergnes couple moved in after their marriage in 1829. The house may have been part of Rose’s dowry, and her father Jacques may have been domiciled there as early as 1814. It is difficult to imagine a landowning family like the Vergne from the Bétaille plain, who had built up their estate from generations of savings, wasting money on buying a town house when they would have been keen to purchase more agricultural land. During his tenure as mayor, he lived in the village, with his father (also Pierre) back on the farm with brother Basile. Early into his occupancy of the house, Pierre must have started a major renovation of the house, as attested by two facts: - the solidly consistent build of three of the four external walls, nearly homogeneous, especially the back part. The quality of the hewn stone is similar to the one used in other houses dated 1840 in the village; on the 1807 map, the building is represented as divided into three separate dwellings, which had to be merged at some time since; the structure of he house, best visible in the cellar, shows these different strata, merged into a single building around 1840. - the lintel over the main entrance bears a partly rubbed out date which could be read as 1840, a period when it became customary to carve a date on houses. It is also a time known to have been one of widespread renovation to existing buildings. - I recently found a carved stone in the cellar, so well preserved that it looks new, bearing the same 1820 date. How this loose stone happened to be there is a mystery.
- the house and “its two gardens” is listed among the assets to be divided between his heirs in 1892, a fact confirmed in the purchase act of the house in 1903, where the origin of property is always recorded; it is touching that the numbering of the cadastre plots had not changed since the Revolution, so it is easy to identify the two gardens: the first is the plot in front of the house (N°1781) and the second is the one just next to the Presbytère; - in 1886, when at her wits end about how to deal with her grandfather then over 80, Esther Vergnes invited her sister and brother in law (the newly wed Bouyssonie couple) to take up residence there (she calls it “là-haut”) to start a farm, while supervising the management of La Saule. She also mentions that the tenants of the house are called Laroque, the name that crops up in 1903 when Baptiste needs to evict the tenants of the house he has just bought.
From the account of his daughter Esther, Charles must have lived nearly all his life under the thumb of his father, the great man who died only six years before him. He was unfortunate to lose his wife in 1879 (she was aged only 43) and then his mother Marie Rose Teilhac in 1884. The two widowers living under the same roof must not have been nice company for the young ladies of the house. During his stewardship, it seems the farm suffered from regular flooding by the Dordogne which perhaps got worse over time and endangered the profitability of the concern by adding to the natural uncertainty of agricultural production the risk of losing entire crops and livestock. Charles must have been a competent manager to overcome these difficulties, as we see him rounding off the family estate by purchasing at least three extra plots of land: - a meadow at La Prade, close to the Carennac bridge: 3,800 m², bought in 1862 for 1,830 francs; - a field called Pré Navau, just next to the camping site: 3,600 m² bought for 2,500 francs in 1872; - a vineyard with the strange name of Les Xinxarlines.
Teulières was quite common as a family name, making it difficult to trace which of the branches was so successful, but it is sure that the Teulières took a quicker start than the Vergnes on the social ladder, perhaps because they understood more quickly that there was no future in farming. The fact that Bétaille was already a slightly bigger town, connected with the rest of the world by railway from the 1880s, may have contributed. The Teulières were also allied with the prominent families in Bétaille, among which the notaire Bouygues, or a friendly maire, Mr Force. Charles and Marguerite had two daughters, Victoria, born in 1860 and Esther, born three years later. With very different characters, their lives took diverging paths, until property issues finally created a final rift between them. Again we have a tale of the rat de ville/rat des champs, but with lady-rats. Victoria Vergnes Victoria was born on the ancestral farm at La Saule in 1860, and it would be tempting to think she was named after the Queen of England, in what must be the first sign of anglophilia among our ancestors. But this is not so, the name was given in homage to several aunts or grandmothers named Victoire born since the Revolution. The ending in a may not be English, but a new fashion for local, Occitan-sounding names. At that time the farm was sufficiently profitable, or well managed by her grandfather, to fund an expensive education in a religious boarding school in Albi. Her studies were conventional, according to the notion of the time, and she became an accomplished young lady at ease in any salon, thanks to their musical and drawing talents. Victoria actually took a diploma in domestic science, but probably never worked as a teacher. Such a course would be the customary education for a young lady aspiring to make a good marriage, according to our friend Anne Verdet, rather than the preparation for a career as a teacher. She had a visiting card of her own, which seems quite genteel for the time and place, indicating Bétaille as her commune of residence, but no address of course (such as “La Saule”) in keeping with convention. She was married from La Saule aged 25. Victoria's first daughter, Yvonne, my grandmother, was born in Meaux two years after the marriage, so Victoria would have been quite busy first moving to the new post, setting up house and then preparing for the birth. According to her relatives, Victoria was a model housewife, an excellent cook and seamstress whose qualities were recognised by the extensive parentage. The Carennac house contains many examples of her needlework and there is an impressive collection of recipes cut out from newspapers, or equally talented ladies of the towns where she lived. Cooking may have been something of an obsession, or perhaps just finding new meals to satisfy a demanding husband. In those days, the French took food even more seriously than nowadays. She was probably the most devout catholic of the family, more so than her husband, and certainly more than her daughters, who had received many (noxious) modern influences with the evolution of mentalities. Two very pretty stocky books, in which she inscribed her name and the date (both are dated 15 May 1887, just after her marriage) have been preserved: - Nouvelle Année Eucharistique, Librairie Catholique, 1873, in excellent condition in spite of its storage for 70 years in the attic ; - Recueil de Prières de Mme de Fenouil, Limoges, 1846: considering the older date of publication, and the poorer general state of the tome, she may have had this book for some years before, perhaps even since childhood. Also very venerable, a Paroissien Romain belonging to Esther Vergnes, perhaps dated 1850, with an inscription and even her initials engraved on the binding. It is just possible that this volume may have been given to Yvonne at some later stage, as she was Esther’s goddaughter. From her childhood, she may have preserved two even more ancient school books, which perhaps indicated that these were her main centres of cultural interest:
- Petite histoire sainte, par Félix Ansart (1876), inscribed by both Victoria (« Mlle Victoria Vergnes, pensionnaire au couvent St Joseph à Albi, 16 Octobre 1876) and also her sister Esther a few years later. This is most probably the textbook used in school. Though she was pious like most people of her time, she never used the word ‘God’ in her letters, contrary to those of some other characters in this story. Her faith must have been of the quiet, personal devotion type, with no attempt to rule other people’ lives in the name of religion.
The second Vergne miss was born at La Saule in 1863, three years after Victoria, and named after Sylvie Teulières, an aunt on her mother's side. She was given the same education as her older sister, at the St Joseph school in Albi. From her numerous letters to Victoria, written in the most beautiful handwriting, emerges a somewhat direct but self-centred personality. The 1896 letters depicting a Cold Comfort atmosphere at La Saule and the grandfather's tyranny are quite entertaining: Il faut que je me cache pour tout faire ; pour t’écrire cette lettre je me soustrais à ses regards. Oh ! ma chère Victoria, que cette tyrannie me pèse, qu’elle est lourde, ne pouvoir pas seulement t’écrire sans être poursuivie ! Tous ces longs jours d’avril maintenant, il se trouve partout, au bout de l’escalier, dans la cour, dans l’aire, il me poursuit à pas de loup dans les chambres, je ne sais où me mettre, où aller, toute seule toute la journée, traînant mon angoisse d’un endroit à l’autre. Personne n’ose venir, jusqu’au facteur qui ne sait comment s’y prendre pour me donner les lettres. C’est pourtant tout-à-fait vrai tout ce que je te dis-là, ce n’est d’ailleurs que la continuation du martyre de ces vacances que tu endurais si péniblement quand le pauvre Baptiste vint te rejoindre. En vérité, on fait des romans où on élève des héroïnes très-haut, et qui n’endurent pas ce que nous souffrons ou avons souffert. Notre histoire servirait de matière à faire un de très-entraînant. Il faudrait y mettre une fin, car pour ma part, je ne me sens pas capable de tenir plus longtemps. What is more astonishing is the neglect of the farm which would have surely led to great difficulties, unless Esther was exaggerating: Il faut que je te dise ce qu’ils me disent du domaine et dans quels état ils le laissent. Ils ne veulent que lever la récolte de blé, et puis le laisser tout-à-fait. Ils ne veulent pas faucher, n’y rien toucher autrement ; et ils le feront ! je le vois pour tout de bon ! Il y a encore tout le fourrage dans la grange, une bonne partie des pommes de terre, les haricots et toute la paille des haricots qui ne sont pas encore tout à fait finis de battre. Le grand-père ne s’en occupe pas du tout, afin de pouvoir dire qu’il n’a rien pris quand on lui en demandera compte. C’est Papa Charles qui a vendu les pommes de terre, mais il ne garde rien, car le grand père lui fait tout acheter pour la maison et payer les impôts de suite qu’il lui vient quelque argent. Oh ! que je souffre de vous dire ces choses, çà vous fera mal à l’un et à l’autre, mais moi qui le vois sous les yeux et qui l’endure, ça me torture cruellement uni à tout le reste. Qu’y faire ? Seule, je n’y puis rien ! Esther felt bound to stay on the farm instead of visiting her sister in Meaux, because, she said, as soon as she would have left, one of the scheming female neighbours would have moved in, bringing disgrace on the family and diverting the inheritance. In the 1896 census, the farm was still profitable enough for the Vergne household to have three domestic servants, including a Marie Brousse, nicknamed Miette, who was a favourite of Esther. Esther may have been relieved when she got married shortly afterwards, in 1888 to Jean Bourgès (dit Baptiste), having apparently avoided unsuitable parties chosen by her father and grandfather for purely business reasons. The Bourgès couple were to spend the rest of their lives on the farm. They never had any children, and the farm underwent severe flooding in the winters, reported in detail, with the dates, by Esther to her sister. It seemed that the whole estate was going to be engulfed by the water ("Un barrage contre le Pacifique" style). After the disagreement about the compensation36 owed to her sister for having received the main asset in the division of their inheritance (the farm), Victoria and Esther did not sustain much communication, and nothing more is heard of the Bourgès after 1913. We know about the disagreement from letters from the notaire, (and Hélène mentioned it to me several times) so it is possible that the sisters were no longer on speaking terms.
That was all we knew, until I stopped at the farm (February 2017) and spoke to the sister of the current owner. After Esther's death, Baptiste Bourgès was an old widower and asked a cousin of his named Truel to look after him in his dotage, and in compensation handed over the farm. Current owners are descendants of the beneficiaries. I thus have confirmation that there was no disappearance of the fairly nice 'maison de maître' La Saule, which is the big farmhouse in front of the aquatic parc of the same name. My informant, Mme Lescot, had heard about Mlle Bouyssonie from her grand-mother. Baptiste and Victoria: a successful mediated marriage
Nor would the search for an eligible spouse be left to the last moment. After all, parents could foresee many years ahead when the issue would arise. Strange as it may seem now, the young women themselves were very involved in the process of finding a husband. There is an excellent description of the frame of mind of a dutiful Christian young lady at the approach of marriage to an unattractive husband chosen by her bourgeois parents37. A fairly brief (three month) courtship by correspondence, the principle of which had been approved by Mr Vergnes, is known to us by the letters piously preserved by Hélène. It is rather stilted, but in impeccable French, and not devoid of feeling. Here are the first sentences of Baptiste’s first missive: “J’ai l’honneur de vous informer qu’un de mes intéressés vient de me parler de vous pour des choses bien importantes. Chose à laquelle on ne saurait trop réfléchir. D’après les renseignements qu’il me donne, je serais très-heureux d’entrer en correspondance avec vous. »38 He must have drafted that opening many times before hitting on this embarrassed and rather formal wording. Let us also take a look at Victoria’s first sentences in her reply, more confident and direct: « J’ai hâte de répondre à votre demande. Vos avances ont été favorablement accueillies comme vous pouviez vous y attendre car on a dû vous dire où se bornent mes vues. »39 Both parties agree that a good character is more precious than a fortune, and from there things proceed smoothly. The affianced display remarkable common sense and forms of address are carefully graduated to show their growing closeness. Victoria does seem slightly more refined in her style than Baptiste, who makes up with a manly display of sentiment. It is a pleasure to read the matter-of-fact approach to the most important decision of their lives. What is striking is how well matched the couple were from a social and educational point of view, thanks to the foresight of their relatives and the realism of each side’s expectations. At that time Baptiste was a junior employee, with little expectation of inheritance as he came from a numerous family. He had to seek authorization from his administration to get married. It is quite possible that the Vergnes family were happy to embrace a prospect of one of their daughters leaving the farming community, even if it was only to take up with a poor low-grade fonctionnaire. In that they would have shown a degree of foresight about the future evolution of French society where the security of lifelong employment was going to become such a bonus. Victoria herself, who had received a fine education, was probably keen to escape the isolation of the Saule domain and the narrow-mindedness, as she may have seen it, of her entourage, to see a little more of the world. The description that her sister Esther would give a few years later of the atmosphere on the family farm must have been an added incentive to consider marriage as a route to independence. The young couple corresponded for more than two months before they actually met, and then the wedding came just afterwards. Baptiste and Victoria were married in Bétaille on 23 December 1885 after a contract had been signed at the notary. Victoria was granted a dowry of 3,000 francs, an advance on her future inheritance, which must have been more than one year of Baptiste’s salary. She had good inheritance possibilities, being the eldest daughter of an affluent landlord, contrary to Baptiste who had no property at all and little prospects but his salary and retirement plan. The contract may have been thought necessary to protect Victoria’s inheritance. I recommend a very funny satirical book by Hippolyte Taine40, with a title reminding us of Sterne, written in those very same years about Paris mores. There was already a current of thought to condemn these petit-bourgeois mediated marriages. Here is how Taine, our distinguished anglophile, presents a couple on their wedding day: "Ils se sont vus pour la première fois il y a six semaines; ils se sont acceptés après trois entrevues. Aujourd'hui, piano, tapage, et verres d'eau sucrée à la groseille; et voilà deux corps et deux âmes accouplés pour toute la vie" (p. 5). In a chapter resembling Swift's "Modest Proposal", on a different theme, he suggests setting up an official network of marriage bureaus, to help couples form according to mutual liking instead of by their parent's scheming. "Dans les autres pays, en Allemagne, en Amérique, les jeunes gens choisissent par eux-mêmes; on les laisse se promener et se connaître; chacun est l'arbitre et l'ouvrier de sa propre vie; ici les parents ont tout le fardeau" (p 163). It is very difficult for us to form a reasonable opinion on such a topic, as we cannot really understand the constraints bearing on young people of that period; perhaps what was already old-fashioned in Paris was still the normal, and legitimate way of match making in the provinces. In any case, the marriage was successful in spite of the formality of its planning. Baptiste’s career in the indirect tax administration We saw earlier on how Baptiste had entered the administration in 1885 on one of its lowest ranks, as a compensation or favour to ex-servicemen with a good record. But any job security and further advancement was dependent on being successful at a concours. The young couple were living in Meaux at the time, but on minimal wages. It seems that they entertained the idea of coming "home" and settling in Carennac, to assist "Papa Charles" running the family estate, and work the Carennac property. Je crois, ma bonne sœur, que tu as une bonne idée quand tu me dis de venir l’exploiter vous-mêmes, car puisque les affaires là-bas vont si mal pour vous autres, et aussi ici pour tous, il n’y a que ce moyen. Ils seraient contents eux car ils disent très souvent que Baptiste vienne, qu’il le travaille, il trouvera tout là, écris-le lui, que nous ne voulons pas nous en occuper, que nous ne voulons pas payer les domestiques pour avoir de la perte, et que nous ne pouvons pas atteindre partout. Quant à moi, je n’ai pas besoin de vous dire si je serais contente, je reviendrais de la mort à la vie. Nous vivrions en commun quoiqu’il ne paraisse rien, et d’ailleurs vous ne trouveriez pas tout vide à votre arrivée. Baptiste, avec son sage et habile gouvernement, aurait bientôt tiré parti de toutes ces choses qu’il trouverait là-haut41. Peu à peu, Papa se déchargerait sur lui de gouverner beaucoup d’autres choses et une fois que vous lui auriez payé le 1er dîner ( ?) ce serait l’homme le plus facile ; tu le sais bien, toi d’ailleurs . Enfin, je me doute qu’il en serait ainsi. Quant au grand père, vous n’auriez pas à vivre avec lui après tout, quoiqu’il dise, qu’est-ce que ça pourrait vous faire, d’ailleurs, il serait peut-être plus content qu’on ne croit, une fois qu’il verrait Baptiste à l’œuvre. Et plus tard quand viendra le moment du partage Baptiste saurait à quoi s’en tenir, que de malheurs, de désordres, de pertes irréparables cela éviterait si vous veniez ! These plans did not pan out, as Baptiste did not have to wait long, and was admitted two years later, at the 1887 concours, which seems to have been very selective, with Baptiste running against about 10 other candidates, if we go by what Esther understood from a letter by Victoria at the time.42 Esther’s letter expresses her pleasure at this turning point for her sister, while revealing some ambiguity of feelings. The letter is too long to be quoted in full, but here is an excerpt: Et puis, puisqu’il y a de plus beaux appointements, c’est bien toujours mieux que la place du Gouvernement. Ensuite, tu habites la ville, où tu vas te distraire infiniment mieux qu’à Charny. Je suis très-contente que tout aille bien, je t’assure, ma bonne sœur, car je n’ai pas de satisfaction quand je sais que quelque chose vous dérange. Tu ne saurais te figurer comme cela aide à me procurer un peu de bonheur quand je sais que Baptiste et toi vous êtes heureux. Ta nouvelle habitation te plaît-elle toujours ? Cela doit être bien agréable de rester au 1er, et puis avec tant de mouvement sous les fenêtres ça ne doit pas être triste. (...) Raconte-moi tes promenades, cela me distraira un peu. (...) Demain nous devons aller à Glanes, j’aurai des nouvelles de tous les parents de là-haut »
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