MARCASTo Monseigneur le Comte Guillaume de Wurtemberg, in token of the author’s respectful gratitudeI NEVER saw anyone, even among the remarkable men of our time, whose appearance was more striking than this man’s; studying his physiognomy inspired, first, a sense of melancholy and, ultimately, a nearly painful sensation. There was a kind of harmony between the person and the name. That “Z.” preceding “Marcas,” which always appeared on letters addressed to him and which he never failed to include in his own signature, that last letter of the alphabet brought to mind some sense of fatality.MARCAS! Say it over to yourself, that two-syllable name: Don’t you hear some sinister meaning to it? Don’t you feel as if the man who bears it must be destined for martyrdom? However strange and wild, still the name does have the right to go down to posterity: It is properly constructed, it is easy to pronounce, it has that brevity desirable in famous names.Is it not as gentle as it is bizarre?
