Is it in "The Parisians" that the soldier carries a bouquet on his
musket, and it is said that Paris, though starving, must have flowers?
These sweet spring days, when vast crowds of people are wandering about
amusing themselves, and children are making daisy chains in the parks,
and men pass along the streets with great branches of lilac blossoms or
masses of rosebuds, which are sold at every corner, and skies are blue,
and the lovely sunshine everywhere is falling upon happy-looking faces,
you feel like blessing not only the spring-time, but beautiful Paris and
the temperament of the French. "St. Denis caught a sunbeam flying, and
he tied it with a bright knot of ribbons, and he flashed it on the earth
as the people of France; only, alas, he made two mistakes,--he gave it
no ballast, and he dyed the ribbons blood-red." You think of the want of
ballast and the blood-red tinge when you look at the ruined Tuileries,
and see every now and then other traces of the Commune. In our
dining-room is a great mirror with a hole in its centre and long seams
running to its corners. Madame keeps it as a memento of those terrible
times, and of her anxiety and terror when balls were coming in her doors
and windows, and she would not on any account have it removed. But,
after all, it is the flying sunbeams of the present that most impress
you. They are more vivid, being actually before your eyes, than scenes
of riot and madness, which you can only imagine. The life about you is
altogether so fascinating, so cheering. You catch the spirit that seems
to animate the people. Where all is so sunny and gay why should you
grieve? Have you little troubles? Leave them behind and go out into the
sweet sunshine, and they will grow so insignificant you will be ashamed
to remember how you were brooding over them; and then, if they are
really great, they will pass; everything passes. Only take to-day to
your heart the loveliness that is waiting for you, for indeed there is
something in it that makes you not only happy for the time, but brave
and hopeful for the future. All of which is the little sermon that Paris
preaches to us all day long. Perhaps we didn't come to Paris for sermons
especially, but after all it is often the unexpected ones that are the
best.
How shall I tell what we have seen and heard here? One day we visited
the Pantheon, and, having seen what there was to see below, we went up
to the dome, which affords a magnificent view of all Paris and the
surrounding country. A party of school-girls ascended the long, narrow,
winding flights at the same time, and they were entirely absorbed in
counting the stairs. The one in advance clearly proclaimed the number;
the others verified her account. The interest was intense. Occasionally
we would come to a platform where at first it would seem that there was
nothing more to conquer. Breathless, panting, flushed, the young girls
would look searchingly around, then, with a shriek of delight, would
plunge into a dark corner and open a door, from which another
crazy-looking stairway led up to other heights. Their chaperon, who
looked as if she might be the principal of a school, gave up in despair
before we were half-way up, and, seating herself to await their return,
cast amused, kindly glances after the retreating forms of the undaunted
girls. I take pleasure in stating the important and interesting fact
that the number of steps from the ground to the "Lanterne" above the
dome of the Pantheon is five hundred and twenty, and you can't possibly
go higher unless you should choose to ascend a rope which is used when
on grand occasions they illuminate the dome and burn a brilliant light
on the very tiptop. So said a little abbe who looked like a mere boy,
and who courteously told us many interesting things as we stood there, a
group of strangers scanning one another with mild curiosity,--two
well-bred Belgian boys with the abbe, some ultra-fashionable dames, a
party of Englishmen of course, and ourselves. The school-girls
fortunately went down without seeing the rope. Had they observed it, and
known that it was possible by any means whatever to go higher than they
had gone, they would have been miserable, unless indeed their aspiring
spirit had led them in some way to ascend it.
With the paintings and sculpture at the Louvre and the Luxembourg we
have spent several happy days, only wishing the days might be months.
Don't expect me to tell you what delighted us most, or how great
pictures seemed which we had before seen only in engravings or
photographs. They burst gloriously all at once upon our ignorant eyes,
and we wanted to sit days and days before one picture that held us
entranced, and yet our time was so limited we had to pass on and on
regretfully. Of course some one was there to whisper in our ears, "O,
this is nothing! You must go to Italy." Certainly we must go to Italy,
but the thought of the beauty awaiting there could not detract from that
which was around us. Before some of the paintings we felt like standing
afar off and worshipping. There were Madonnas with insipid faces which
we did not appreciate. There were other pictures which we coldly
admired; they were wonderful, but we did not want to own them,--did not
love them. Among those which we longed to seize and carry away is the
"Cupid and Psyche" of Gerard, in which Psyche receiving the first kiss
of love is an exquisitely innocent, fair-haired little maiden, not so
very unlike the friend to whom we would like to send it.
There are always curious people in the galleries. Sit down and rest a
minute and something funny is sure to happen.
"See this chaw-ming thing of Murillo," says a florid youth of nineteen
or twenty, with very tight gloves, an elaborate necktie, and, alas! an
unquestionably American air, as he marshals a timid-looking group,--his
mother and sisters, perhaps. "Quite well done, now, isn't it?" And on he
went. If he knew a Perugino from a Vandyck his countenance did him great
injustice. Then another party comes along,--conscientious, ponderous,
English,--and halts with precision. One of them reads, in a loud voice,
from a book--"Titian--Portrait--462"--and they stare blankly at the
picture before them, which happens to be not a Titian at all, but a
"Meadow Scene, with Cows," by Cuyp, or a great battle-piece of Salvator
Rosa. When they discover their mistake and recover from their
astonishment, they pass on in search of the missing Titian. We smiled at
this, but, as the pictures are not hung according to the order given in
catalogues, we knew very well that it was our good fortune, and not our
merit or our wisdom, that kept us from similar mistakes. What might we
not have done had we not been so beautifully guarded against all
blundering by our escort, a French gentleman of rare culture,--both an
amateur painter and sculptor,--and an intimate friend of some of the
most distinguished French artists! With him for a companion we felt
superior to all catalogues and treatises upon art. We have had the
pleasure, too, of visiting his private museum and studio, where are
strange relics collected in a life of unusual travel and adventure. He
is a retired colonel of the French army, and when in service has lived
in Egypt, Turkey, Persia, Greece, and now his little room, which we
climbed six flights of stairs to reach, is crowded with mementos of his
wanderings. I despair of conveying any idea of what he has hung upon his
walls. It would almost be easier to tell what he has not. Persian
pictures, stone emblems, fans, rosaries, swords, mosaics, pistols, queer
chains and pipes, as well as some very valuable paintings,--a Vandyck,
an Andrea del Sarto, a number of the modern French school, presented to
him by the artists. Was it not a privilege to have such a guide when we
visited the Paris lions? He took us to the Musee de Cluny, among other
exceedingly interesting places, where we saw hosts of
antiquities,--beautifully carved mantels, magnificent fireplaces, "big
enough to roast a whole ox" (and they really use them, winters, too--the
noble great logs were all ready to be lighted), rare old windows of
stained glass, rich robes of high church dignitaries, porcelain,
jewelled crowns of Gothic kings, old lace and tapestries, and carved
wood that it did one's heart good to see. Girls with tied-back dresses,
and hats fairly crushed by the weight of the masses of flowers with
which French milliners persist in loading us this spring, did look so
painfully modern in those mediaeval rooms! We began to feel as if we
were walking about in one of the Waverley novels, and fully expected to
meet Ivanhoe clad in complete armor on the stone staircase that leads
down from the chapel.
There were many things over which we found it impossible to be
enthusiastic,--the jawbone of Moliere, for example, in a glass case. It
probably looks like less distinguished jawbones, but if his whole
skeleton had been there I fear we should have been no more impressed.
Chessmen of rock crystal and gold we coveted, and we liked the room in
which are the great, ponderous, gilded state coaches of some century
long ago, with their whips, harnesses, and comical postilion boots.
There is a little sleigh or sledge there, said to have been Marie
Antoinette's,--a small gold dragon, whose wing flies open to admit the
one person whom the tiny equipage can seat. It looked as if it must have
been pushed by some one behind. Fancy a gold dragon with fiery-red eyes
and a wide-open red mouth coming towards you over the snow!
This whole building is full of interest from its age and historical
associations. It was built in the fifteenth century, has been in the
hands of comedians, of a sisterhood; Marat held his horrible meetings
here; Mary of England lived here after the death of her husband, Louis
XII., and you can still see the chamber of the "White Queen," with its
ivory cabinets, vases, and queer old musical instruments. Visitors are
requested not to touch anything, but we couldn't resist the temptation
of striking just one chord on a spinet. Such a cracked voice the poor
thing had! It sounded so dead and ghostlike and dreary, we hurried away
as fast as we could. Don't be alarmed, and think I am going to write up
all the history of the place. I haven't the least idea of doing such a
thing; only this I can tell you,--the Hotel de Cluny affords an
excellent opportunity to test your knowledge of history; and if you ever
stand where we did, and send your thoughts wandering among past ages,
may your dates be more satisfactory than were ours!
The ruins of an old Roman palace, of which only a portion of the baths
remain, adjoin the museum. There is a great room, sixty feet long, all
of stone, and very high, which was used for the cold baths. The other
baths are all gone, but if you imagine hot and warm and tepid ones as
large as the cold, it certainly gives you a profound admiration for the
magnitude of the ancient bath system. If Julian the Apostate, who built
the palace, they say, could see us as we go peering curiously about,
asking what this and that mean, and the names of stone things that were
probably as common in his day as sewing-machines are now, wouldn't he
laugh? We looked over the shoulder of a painter who was making a
delightful little picture of a part of the ruins, the stone pavement and
staircase, then a beautiful arch through which we could look into the
open air, and see the warm sunshine, the great lilac-bushes, and a tall
old ivy-covered wall beyond. The contrast between the cold gray interior
and the bright outer world was very effective.
Strange old place where Caesars have lived, and through which early
kings of France and fierce Normans have swept, plundering and ruining,
and where, to-day, by the fragments of the massive ivy-covered walls and
under the trees in the pleasant park, happy little children play, and
nurses chatter, and life is strong, and fresh and warm, even while we
are thinking of the dead past!