In the time of Mathurin Regnier, this cabaret was called the Pot-aux-Roses, and as the rebus was then in fashion, it had for its sign-board, a post (poteau) painted rose-color.
In the last century, the worthy Natoire, one of the fantastic masters nowadays despised by the stiff school, having got drunk many times in this wine-shop at the very table where Regnier had drunk his fill, had painted, by way of gratitude, a bunch of Corinth grapes on the pink post. The keeper of the cabaret, in his joy, had changed his device and had caused to be placed in gilt letters beneath the bunch these words:
“At the Bunch of Corinth Grapes” (“Au Raisin de Corinthe”).
Hence the name of Corinthe.
Nothing is more natural to drunken men than ellipses.
The ellipsis is the zig-zag of the phrase.
Corinthe gradually dethroned the Pot-aux-Roses.
The last proprietor of the dynasty, Father Hucheloup, no longer acquainted even with the tradition, had the post painted blue.
A room on the ground floor, where the bar was situated, one on the first floor containing a billiard-table, a wooden spiral staircase piercing the ceiling, wine on the tables, smoke on the walls, candles in broad daylight,—this was the style of this cabaret.
A staircase with a trap-door in the lower room led to the cellar.
On the second floor were the lodgings of the Hucheloup family.
They were reached by a staircase which was a ladder rather than a staircase, and had for their entrance only a private door in the large room on the first floor.
Under the roof, in two mansard attics, were the nests for the servants.
The kitchen shared the ground floor with the tap-room.
Father Hucheloup had, possibly, been born a chemist, but the fact is that he was a cook; people did not confine themselves to drinking alone in his wine-shop, they also ate there.
Hucheloup had invented a capital thing which could be eaten nowhere but in his house, stuffed carps, which he called carpes au gras.
These were eaten by the light of a tallow candle or of a lamp of the time of Louis XVI., on tables to which were nailed waxed cloths in lieu of table-cloths.
People came thither from a distance.
Hucheloup, one fine morning, had seen fit to notify passers-by of this “specialty”; he had dipped a brush in a pot of black paint, and as he was an orthographer on his own account, as well as a cook after his own fashion, he had improvised on his wall this remarkable inscription:—
CARPES HO GRAS.
One winter, the rain-storms and the showers had taken a fancy to obliterate the S which terminated the first word, and the G which began the third; this is what remained:—
CARPE HO RAS.
Time and rain assisting, a humble gastronomical announcement had become a profound piece of advice.
In this way it came about, that though he knew no French, Father Hucheloup understood Latin, that he had evoked philosophy from his kitchen, and that, desirous simply of effacing Lent, he had equalled Horace.
And the striking thing about it was, that that also meant:
“Enter my wine-shop.”
Nothing of all this is in existence now.
The Mondetour labyrinth was disembowelled and widely opened in 1847, and probably no longer exists at the present moment.
The Rue de la Chanvrerie and Corinthe have disappeared beneath the pavement of the Rue Rambuteau.
As we have already said, Corinthe was the meeting-place if not the rallying-point, of Courfeyrac and his friends.
It was Grantaire who had discovered Corinthe.
He had entered it on account of the Carpe horas, and had returned thither on account of the Carpes au gras.
There they drank, there they ate, there they shouted; they did not pay much, they paid badly, they did not pay at all, but they were always welcome.
Father Hucheloup was a jovial host.
Hucheloup, that amiable man, as was just said, was a wine-shop-keeper with a moustache; an amusing variety.
He always had an ill-tempered air, seemed to wish to intimidate his customers, grumbled at the people who entered his establishment, and had rather the mien of seeking a quarrel with them than of serving them with soup.
And yet, we insist upon the word, people were always welcome there.
This oddity had attracted customers to his shop, and brought him young men, who said to each other:
“Come hear Father Hucheloup growl.”
He had been a fencing-master.
All of a sudden, he would burst out laughing.
A big voice, a good fellow.
He had a comic foundation under a tragic exterior, he asked nothing better than to frighten you, very much like those snuff-boxes which are in the shape of a pistol. The detonation makes one sneeze.
Mother Hucheloup, his wife, was a bearded and a very homely creature.
About 1830, Father Hucheloup died.
With him disappeared the secret of stuffed carps.
His inconsolable widow continued to keep the wine-shop.
But the cooking deteriorated, and became execrable; the wine, which had always been bad, became fearfully bad.
Nevertheless, Courfeyrac and his friends continued to go to Corinthe,—out of pity, as Bossuet said.
The Widow Hucheloup was breathless and misshapen and given to rustic recollections.