Body

Overview

Albin Body is the young man «du pays» of the Spa season of 1874 who dances and walks with Marie's party. The Mon Journal indexes disagree on his nationality: t.3 «Body (Albin), Belge» (with «Body (frère du précédent)»), t.4 and t.6 «Body (Albin), Anglais». The best candidate is Albin Body (Spa, 17 October 1836 – Spa, 18 December 1916), historian and archivist of the town of Spa, author of the Bibliographie spadoise (1875) and Le Théâtre et la musique à Spa (1885) (French Wikipedia, «Albin Body», https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albin_Body). Marie's «M. Body (du pays)» (020.0420) and the dry, bespectacled wit of 020.0474 fit a scholar of the town; confidence 0.75, since Marie never names his occupation.

Relevance to Marie

• 28 June 1874. At Gambart's dinner at Spa: «un M. Body (du pays) et un Anglais dont j'oublie le nom... Wheelwright» (020.0420).
• 30 June 1874. Dances with Marie, Basilévitch and Paul «une contredanse fantaisie» (020.0468) and is one of the four who gather round them (020.0470).
• 1 July 1874. «M. Body, un homme sec, à lunettes, faisant beaucoup d'esprit et en ayant moins» (020.0474); Marie says that a Body is the intimate friend of the other brother of Princess Eristoff (020.0478) and that the princess «veut se divorcer pour épouser un Body» (020.0509, one of the Body brothers); he walks with the princess on 5 July (021.0003).
• 5 July 1874. On the outing he speaks ill of M. de Neufarge (021.0004). On 10 July Body says that Bagatelle is a real bulldog (021.0099).

References in Diary

• First mentioned: 1874-06-28 (020.0420). 27 tagged paragraphs, carnets 020–021.