VI. DEATH OF THE FATHER

214. moxas: A moxa (from the Japanese mokusa ) is a preparation of mugwort herb (Artemisia moxa), or an inflammable substance such as a roll of cotton, used in the practice of moxibustion, whereby the substance is burned and applied to the skin. An ancient Chinese medical practice, it is used to stimulate circulation and energy, particularly in the case of debilitated or geriatric patients; it was popular in France in the nineteenth century.

215. Money buys everything, even daughters: The echoes of King Lear in the novel are perhaps most audible in these closing passages. Here, the tragic realization Goriot shares with Lear is that purchased affections are only as shallow and short lived as the money that bought them. Fool (II.4):

Money can buy the words that flatter a father’s vanity, but not the honest filial love the words stand in for, where loyalty and devotion are given unbidden and freely. Where Delphine and Anastasie display the selfishness of a Regan or Goneril, perhaps Victorine Taillefer shows a Cordelia-like loyalty to her father. It is known that performances of King Lear and other Shakespeare plays were held in Paris in 1827–28, and caught the attention of contemporaries such as Alexandre Dumas, Alfred de Vigny, Victor Hugo and Hector Berlioz.

216. the country: In French, la patrie, which has overtones of ‘fatherland’, resonating with the novel’s theme of paternity.

217. viaticum: The Eucharist, or, in other religious traditions, voyage provisions, given to the dying, to help them on their journey as they depart this world. Sometimes this takes the form of a coin, the obolus that pays Charon for passage across the river Acheron in Greek mythology, for example. But money has lost all meaning for Goriot – all he wants is a kiss. (In French, the word is also used to denote comfort or sustenance.)

218. Pluck them out!: Another echo of Lear. Gloucester, betrayed by his bastard son Edmund, is blinded when Goneril orders Cornwall to ‘Pluck out his eyes’ (III.7).

219. Their children will avenge me: Lear, cursing Goneril (I.4):

220. a third-class funeral: In France, undertakers divided funerals into nine classes according to their expense. A third-class funeral was moderately expensive.

221. holy-water sprinkler: At a Roman Catholic funeral, the coffin is sprinkled with holy water by a priest, and by the mourners, as a symbol of purification. No one has yet performed this ritual for Goriot.

222. Libera … De profundis: The Libera Nos (prayer) and the De Profundis (Psalm 129) are both part of the Mass for the dead, here tacked on to the daily Vespers service.

223. Père Lachaise: See note 199 on the location and origins of this cemetery. Balzac himself was buried here on his death in 1850, not far from the spot where Rastignac stands and watches Goriot’s coffin being lowered into the ground. His was a third-class funeral, like Goriot’s. However, Balzac’s was attended by a vast crowd of friends, writers and admirers, who listened and mourned as Victor Hugo pronounced his funeral oration, calling Balzac a member of ‘the powerful race of revolutionary writers’ (Robb, Balzac, p. 412).

224. Saché: Balzac began writing Old Man Goriot in September 1834, at the Château de Saché in Touraine, where he stayed as the guest of Jean de Margonne and his wife. He completed it on 26 January 1835. It was first published in the Revue de Paris in four instalments, between December 1834 and February 1835. See Introduction, pp. xv–xviii.