Note 205 — BOOK VII[145]
Alexander Teixeira de Mattos translation
Major H. D. Delloye had been dismissed the service in 1830 and had turned publisher. He very rightly published only royalist works. In 1836, when Chateaubriand was in the greatest difficulties for money, he was able to arrange a combination of a satisfactory character for the interests and intentions of the illustrious writer. The company formed by M. Delloye guaranteed M. and Madame de Chateaubriand a respectable annuity, supplied them with the sums required for their immediate necessities, and postponed to a remote date the publication of the Mémoires d'Outre-tombe, the Congrès de Vérone and other works to which the author might be disposed to devote his leisure.
On the 30th of June 1836, Chateaubriand addressed the following letter to his honourable publisher:
"To Monsieur H. D. Delloye, retired lieutenant-colonel, Knight of the Royal Order of St. Louis and of the Legion of Honour.
"Paris, 30 June 1836.
"And so, monsieur, our business is fairly started: so soon as I had finished the Milton, I resumed work on the Memoirs and I have begun to have that portion copied which I am to deliver to you in the early months of the coming year. I congratulate myself, monsieur, on having met a gallant and loyal officer of the Royal Guard who has brought to a conclusion a piece of business which, but for him, might never have been finished. It is, therefore, to you, monsieur, that I shall owe the repose of my life and, what is more important to me, that of Madame de Chateaubriand. With God's help, the rest will go of itself and I hope that neither you nor, when the time comes, the Shareholders, will have reason to regret becoming the owners of my Memoirs.
"Believe, monsieur, I beg, in my sincere devotion and accept the assurance of my most distinguished consideration.
"Chateaubriand."—B.