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THE AMAZING CITY
* * * * * *
LA FAISANE
_Mais tous ces objets sont pauvres et moroses!_
CHANTECLER
_Moi, je n’en reviens pas du luxe de ces choses!_
LA FAISANE
_Tout est toujours pareil, pourtant!_
CHANTECLER
_Rien n’est pareil,_
_Jamais, sous le soleil, à cause du soleil!_
_Car Elle change tout!_
LA FAISANE
_Elle... Qui?_
CHANTECLER
_La lumière!..._
LA FAISANE
_Alors tout le secret de ton chant?..._
CHANTECLER
_C’est que j’ose_
_Avoir peur que sans moi, l’orient se repose!..._
_Je pense à la lumière et non pas à la gloire._
_Chanter, c’est ma façon de me battre et de croire._
_Et si de tous les chants le mien est le plus fier,_
_C’est que je chante clair, afin qu’il fasse clair._
ROSTAND: Chantecler.
* * * * * *
THE AMAZING CITY
by
JOHN F. MACDONALD
Author of
“Paris of the Parisians”
“Two Towns—One City” etc.
[Illustration]
London
Grant Richards Ltd.
St Martin’S Street
MDCCCCXVIII
Printed in Great Britain by the Riverside Press Limited
Edinburgh
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE 7
I. IN THE STREET 19
II. IN A CELLAR 31
III. IN A MARKET-PLACE 38
IV. BOURGEOISIE 47
1. M. DURAND AT MARIE-LE-BOIS
2. PENSION DE FAMILLE. THE BEAUTIFUL MADEMOISELLE
MARIE, WHO LOVED GAMBETTA
3. PENSION DE FAMILLE. FRENCH AND PIANO LESSONS. LES
SAINTES FILLES, MESDEMOISELLES PÉRIVIER
4. THE AFFAIR OF THE COLLARS
V. ON STRIKE 69
1. WHEN IT WAS DARK IN PARIS
2. BIRDS OF THE STATE AT THE POST OFFICE
3. AFTER THE STORM AT VILLENEUVE-ST-GEORGES
VI. COTTIN & COMPANY 84
VII. THE LATIN QUARTER 92
1. MÈRE CASIMIR
2. GLOOM ON THE RIVE GAUCHE
3. THE DAUGHTER OF THE STUDENTS
VIII. MONSIEUR LE ROUÉ 114
IX. FRENCH LIFE AND THE FRENCH STAGE 122
1. M. PAUL BOURGET, THE REACTIONARY PLAYWRIGHT, AND
M. PATAUD, WHO PUT OUT THE LIGHTS OF PARIS
2. M. ALFRED CAPUS. “NOTRE JEUNESSE” AT THE FRANÇAISE
3. M. BRIEUX, “LA DÉSERTEUSE,” AT THE ODÉON
4. PARIS, M. EDMOND ROSTAND, AND “CHANTECLER”
X. AFTER “CHANTECLER” 187
XI. AU COURS D’ASSISES. PARIS AND MADAME STEINHEIL 192
XII. THE LATE JULES GUÉRIN AND THE DEFENCE OF FORT CHABROL 216
XIII. DEATH OF HENRI ROCHEFORT 235
XIV. ROYAL VISITS TO PARIS 246
XV. AT THE ÉLYSÉE. MESSIEURS LES PRÉSIDENTS 260
1. M. LOUBET AND PAUL DÉROULÈDE
2. M. ARMAND FALLIÈRES. MOROCCO AND THE FLOODS
3. M. RAYMOND POINCARÉ AND THE RECORD OF M. LÉPINE
XVI. MADAME LA PRÉSIDENTE, M. GEORGES CLEMENCEAU AND THE
UNFORTUNATE M. PAMS 296
PREFACE
This selection from the writings of the late John F. Macdonald—between
1907 and 1913—finds, naturally, and without any arbitrary arrangement,
its unity of character, as the middle volume of the book, in three parts,
that it was this author’s ruling desire—rather than his deliberate and
predetermined purpose—to spend many years in writing. The first volume
of this book was _Paris of the Parisians_, the last was the posthumous
volume recently published, under the title of _Two Towns—One City_. In
order to convey a clear idea of the motive and ruling method that give
literary and spiritual unity to this long book in three volumes, which
stands for the accomplished desire of a brief life, let me quote the
author’s own account of this desire given in his Preface to _Paris of the
Parisians_, where, at twenty years of age, he described himself as “a
student of human life, still in his humanities”:
“The purpose of these sketches is not political nor yet didactic. No
charge is laid upon me to teach the French nation its duties, to reprove
it for its follies. Nor yet is it my design to hold up Paris of the
Parisians as an example of naughtiness, nor even of virtue, to English
readers. A student of human life still in my humanities, my purpose is
purely interpretative. I would endeavour to translate into English some
Paris scenes, in such a way as to give a true impression of the movement,
personages, sounds, colours and atmosphere pervaded with joy of living
which belongs to them. These impressions which I have myself received,
and now desire to communicate, are not the result of a general survey
of Paris taken from some lofty summit. I have not looked down upon the
capital of France from the top of the Eiffel Tower; nor yet from the
terrace of the Sacré Cœur; nor yet from the balcony among the _chimères_
of Notre Dame; nor yet from Napoleon’s column on the Place Vendôme; nor
yet from the Revolution’s monument that celebrates the taking of the
Bastille. No doubt from these exalted places the town affords an amazing
spectacle. Domes rise in the distance and steeples. Chimneys smoke;
clouds hurry. Up there the spectator has not only a fine bird’s-eye view
of beautiful Paris: he has a good throne for historical recollections,
for philosophical reveries, for the development of political and
scientific theories also. But for the student of to-day’s life, whose
interest turns less to monuments than to men, there is this drawback—seen
from this point of view the inhabitants of Paris look pigmies. Far below
him they pass and repass: the bourgeois, the bohemian, the boulevardier,
all small, all restless, all active, all so remote that one is not
to be distinguished from the other. Coming down from his tower the
philosopher may explore Paris from the tombs at St Denis to the crypts of
the Panthéon, from the galleries of the Louvre to the shops in the Rue
de Rivoli, from the Opera and Odéon to the Moulin Rouge and sham horrors
of the cabarets of Montmartre—leaving Paris from the Gare du Nord he
may look back at the white city under the blue sky with mingled regret
and satisfaction—regret for the instructive days he has spent with her,
satisfaction in that he knows her every stone; and yet, when some hours
later in mid-Channel the coasts of France grow dim, he may leave behind
him an undiscovered Paris—not monumental Paris, not political Paris, not
Baedeker’s Paris, not profligate Paris, not fashionable cosmopolitan
Paris of the Right Bank, not Bohemian Anglo-American Paris of the Left
Bank, but Paris as she knows herself—Paris of the Parisians.
“Virtues of which the mere foreign spectator has no notion are to be
found in Paris of the Parisians. And the Parisian does not conceal them
through _mauvaise honte_. Love of Nature, love of children, both absorb
him; how regularly does he hurry into the country to sprawl on the
grass, lunch by a lake, stare at the sunset, the stars and the moon; how
frequently he admires the view from his window, the Jardin du Luxembourg
and the Seine; how invariably he spoils his _gosse_ or another’s _gosse_,
anybody’s _gosse_, infant, boy or girl! He will go to the Luxembourg
merely to watch them. He likes to see them dig and make queer patterns in
the dust. He loves to hear them laugh at _guignol_, and is officiously
careful to see that they are securely strapped on to the wooden horses.
He does not mind their hoops, and does not care a jot if their balls
knock his best hat off. He walks proudly behind Jeanne and Edouard, on
the day of their first Communion, all over Paris; laughing as Jeanne
lifts her snow-white skirt and when Edouard, ætat. 10, salutes a friend;
and he worships Jeanne, and thinks that there is no better son in the
world than Edouard, and he will tell you so candidly and with earnestness
over and over again. ‘Ma fille Jeanne,’ ‘Mon fils Edouard,’ ‘Mes deux
gosses,’ is his favourite way of introducing the joy of his heart and
the light of his home. And then he knows how to live amiably, and how
to amuse himself pleasantly, and how to put poorer people at their
ease, as on fête days. He will go to a State theatre on 14th July (when
the performance is free) and joke with the crowd that waits patiently
before its doors, and never push, and never complain, and never think
of elbowing his way forward at the critical moment to get in. He will
admire the fireworks and illuminations after, and dance at street corners
without ever uttering a word that is rude or making a gesture that is
rough. He will trifle with confetti on Mardi Gras, and throw coloured
rolls of paper on to the boulevard trees. And he will laugh all the time
and joke all the time, and make Jeanne happy and Edouard happy, and be
happy himself, until it is time to abandon the boulevards and go home.
‘La joie de vivre!’ Verily, the Parisian studies, knows and appreciates
it.
“There is something else he appreciates also, and reveres. And here
especially we find that his paternal affection for all children,
his courtesy and good-fellowship with all classes, his sense of
proprietorship and delight and pride in public gardens do not indicate
only a happy and amiable disposition, but spring from a deeper sentiment.
He is sauntering on the boulevards, it may be, with Edouard. The time is
summer—there is sunshine everywhere; the trees are in bloom, the streets
are full of movement and noise, _fiacres_ rattle, tram-horns sound,
camelots cry, gamins whistle. Suddenly there is a temporary lull. A slow
procession passes, a hearse buried in flowers; mourners on foot follow,
the near relatives, bareheaded, walking two by two; after them come, it
may be, a long line of carriages; it may be, one forlorn _fiacre_. It
does not matter. For the Parisian, a rich funeral or a poor one is never
an indifferent spectacle; never simply an unavoidable, disagreeable
interruption of traffic, to be got out of sight, and out of the way of
the busy world as quickly as possible. Here is one of those ordinary
circumstances when the Parisian’s attention to the courtesies of social
life is the outward and visible sign of his self-respecting humanity and
fraternal sympathy. His hat is off, and held off—so is Edouard’s cap, so
are the caps of even younger children, for from the age of four upwards
each _gosse_ knows what is due from him on such an occasion. _Cochers_
are bareheaded, boulevard loafers also; the bourgeois stops stirring his
absinthe to salute; many a woman crosses herself and mutters a prayer.
‘Farewell!’ ‘God bless thee!’ The kind and pious leave-taking of the
Parisian enjoying to-day’s sunshine to the Parisian of yesterday whose
place to-morrow will know him no more, accompanies the procession step by
step on its way to the cemetery of Père Lachaise or Montparnasse....
“A kind critic of some of these sketches here reproduced from _The
Saturday Review_ has said of them that their tendency is to ‘counteract
the wrong-headed reports of French and English antipathies by which two
sympathetic neighbour-peoples are being estranged and exasperated.’ If
this be true—and to some extent I hope it may be—the result is surely
all the more gratifying because it does not proceed from any deliberate
effort on my part to serve that end, but, as I have said, from my
endeavour to convey to others the impressions I have received. The
immortal Chadband may be said to have established the proposition that
if a householder, having upon his rambles seen an eel, were to return
home and say to the wife of his bosom, ‘Rejoice with me, I have seen an
elephant,’ it would not be truth. It would not be truth were I to say
of the Jeunesse of the Latin Quarter that it is callous and corrupt, or
to deny that beneath the madcap, frolicsome temper of the hour can be
felt the justness of mind and openness to great ideas that will put
a curb on extravagance and give safe guidance by and by. And again of
Paul and Pierre’s little lady friends, Mimi and Musette, mirth-loving,
dance-loving daughters of Mürger—it would not be truth were I to report
them in any sense wicked girls, or to deny that taking them where they
stand their ways of feeling are straight though, no doubt, their way
of life may go a little zigzag. And of Montmartre and her cabarets and
_chansonniers_—it would not be truth were I to say that only madness and
perversion reign in her cabarets, or to deny that true poets and genuine
artists may be found amidst the false and hectic glitter of the ‘Butte.’
And of the man in the street who is neither poet nor student, the average
Parisian of simply everyday life—it would not be truth were I to repeat
the hackneyed phrase that he would overthrow the Republican Government to
reinstate a Monarchy, being a Royalist at heart. True, storms rage about
him; scandals break out beside him; ministries fall; presidents pass—did
these storms and scandals represent Republican principles it might be
said with truth that he paid them little heed. What is true, however, is
that the qualities and principles he takes his stand by do not change or
fall with ministries or pass with presidents: cultivating still the art
of living amiably, rejoicing still over the beauties of his town, and not
merely rejoicing over them, but respecting and protecting them, believing
still, and with reason, in the greatness of his country, he succeeds
where his rulers often fail, not merely in professing, but in practising
the doctrine of liberty, equality, fraternity.”
The point of view from which the author of _Paris of the Parisians_
in 1900 studied French life remained the same down to 1915, when he
died. Nor did he ever change his interpretative methods into didactic
or political ones. But it was inevitable that, as years passed, fresh
knowledge and enlarged experience would come to the student of French
life who, at twenty, sought to convey his impressions as he at that time
received them. His impressions were not altered, nor, as a result of his
increased knowledge of life, did he ever become himself less appreciative
of the special virtues he discovered in the serious, as well as in the
joyous, sides of the French art of living. On his own side, he remained
to the end of his life (as so many of his friends testify) the same
unworldly, joyous being, of profound and tender sympathies, impatient of
all rules and systems save those that derive their authority from human
kindness. But as a result of his inborn power of vision and gifts of
observation and expression, his impressions became more lucid and were
given greater force by the exceptional opportunities he enjoyed. During
his residence in Paris, throughout the years when most of the essays in
criticism contained in this volume were written, he was dramatic critic
of French life and the French stage for _The Fortnightly Review_, and as
Paris correspondent, given more or less a free hand by other leading
periodicals to which he was a contributor; so that he could direct his
attention to the study of many aspects of Parisian life not exclusively
bounded by political interests.
Looking through the list of subjects dealt with in these chapters, it
will be seen that the criticism of French life carried through by John F.
Macdonald (if by “criticism” we understand what Matthew Arnold defined
as “an impartial endeavour to see the thing as in itself it really is”)
covered, from 1907 to 1913, nearly all events in every domain of Parisian
life during this critical period.
In other words, the present volume supplies the evidence which
not only confirms the impressions that he sought to convey to his
fellow-countrymen in _Paris of the Parisians_, but it lends the authority
that belongs to a judgment founded upon a right criticism to the sentence
which I may, in conclusion, quote from his article on the “Paris of
To-day,” originally published in _The Fortnightly Review_, July, 1915,
and reprinted (by the editor’s kind permission) in his posthumous book,
_Two Towns—One City_.
“It has been repeatedly and persistently asserted, in hastily written
articles and books, that the war has created an entirely ‘new’ Paris.
Journalists and novelists have proclaimed themselves astonished at the
‘calm’ and the ‘seriousness’ of the Parisians, and at the ‘composed’
and ‘solemn’ aspect of every street, corner and stone in the city;
and how elaborately, how melodramatically have they expatiated upon
the abolition of absinthe, the closing of night-restaurants, the
disappearance of elegant dresses, the silence of the Apaches, the hush in
the demi-monde, and the increased congregations in the churches!
“‘A new, reformed Paris,’ our critics reiterate. ‘The flippancy has
vanished, the danger of decadence has passed—and in place of extravagance
and hilarity we find economy, earnestness and dignity.’
“Now, with these hastily conceived reflections and criticisms I beg
leave to disagree. It is not a ‘new’ Paris that one beholds to-day, but
precisely the very Paris one would expect to see. No city, at heart, is
more serious, more earnest, more alive to ideas and ideals: no other
capital in the world works so hard, creates so much, feels so deeply,
labours and battles so incessantly and so consistently for the supreme
cause of liberty, justice and humanity. Crises, and shocks, and scandals,
if you like—but what generous reparations, what glorious recoveries!
Stifling cabarets, lurid restaurants, rouge, and patchouli, and startling
deshabille, if you please; but all those dissipations were provided
for the particular pleasure and well-filled purses of Messieurs les
Étrangers—at least twenty foreigners to one Frenchman on the hectic hill
of Montmartre; and what a babel of English and American voices _chez_
Maxim, until five or six in the morning, when the average Parisian was
peacefully enjoying his last hour’s sleep! The statues and monuments
of Paris, the free Sorbonne University, the quays of the Seine with
their bookstalls, the incomparable Comédie Française, the stately French
Academy, the Luxembourg Gardens, the Panthéon (with its noble motto:
‘Aux Grands Hommes, la Patrie Reconnaissante’), the Arc de Triomphe,
Notre-Dame; do these (and innumerable other) illustrious institutions,
so cherished by the Parisians, appear compatible with ‘flippancy,’
‘incoherency’ and ‘the danger of decadence’? And the profound, ardent
patriotism of the Parisians—how else could it have manifested itself
save in the noble, supreme spectacle of courage, determination and
self-sacrifice which we are witnessing to-day? No; it is not a ‘new’
Paris, but the very Paris one expected to see; hushed but proud; stricken
yet self-confident; wounded, even stabbed to the heart after eleven
months of war—but heroic, indomitable”—the Amazing City—the worthy
capital of, as Mr Kipling says,
“the Land beloved by every soul that loves and serves its kind.”
Before closing my preface to this Selection from the sketches, essays
and criticisms of Paris life, under its picturesque, popular, literary
and social aspects that represents John F. Macdonald’s interpretation
of the spirit of the “Amazing City,” between 1907 and 1914, I have to
acknowledge the kindness of the several Editors, to whom these different
articles were originally addressed; and who have allowed me to reprint
them in the present volume. _The Roué_, _In a Cellar_, and _The Affair
of the Collars_, appeared originally in _The Morning Post_. The three
articles, _On Strike_, the two pictures of the historical _Pension de
Famille in the Rue des Poitevins_ (haunted by the memory of Gambetta),
and of the other _Pension de Famille in the Shadow of St Sulpice_,
saddened by the memory of the pathetic story of the gentle and pious
old maids who died broken-hearted, as victims of the Rochette swindle,
appeared in _The Morning Leader_, in the days before its association with
_The Daily News_. The series of short sketches of French Presidents and
Leading Statesmen, and Personalities, who have helped to make, and are
still living influences in, French politics, were contributed, later, to
_The Daily News and Morning Leader_. I have to thank the Editor of _The
Contemporary Review_ for consenting to the reprinting of the articles
upon _Henri Rochefort_ and _Royal Visits to Paris_; and the Editor of
_The Fortnightly Review_ for allowing me to reproduce from the series of
articles on _French Life and the French Stage_, which appeared in this
_Review_ during several years, three special criticisms, illustrative of
the typical French national “virtue,”—a fundamental understanding of the
essential duty of man to be an intelligent and kindly human being—applied
to the correction and sweetening of faulty rules of “Bohemian” morality
and bourgeois respectability; and lending high ideals to what is
generally described as the “realistic” spirit of the modern French drama.
The articles descriptive of life in the Latin Quarter appeared originally
in _The Saturday Review_.
FREDERIKA MACDONALD.
_February 1918._
I
IN THE STREET
In my almost daily perambulations through the brilliant, through the
drab, and through the ambiguous quarters of Paris, I constantly come upon
street scenes that bring me inquisitively to a standstill. Not that they
are particularly novel or startling. Indeed, to the Parisian they are
such banal, everyday spectacles that he passes them by without so much as
a glance. But for me, familiar though I am with the physiognomy of the
Amazing City, these street scenes, amusing or pathetic, sentimental or
grim, possess an indefinable, a never-failing charm.
For instance, I dote on a certain ragged, weather-beaten old fellow who
is always and always to be discovered, on a boulevard bench, under a dim
gas-lamp, at the precise hour of eleven. Across his knees—unfolded—a
newspaper. And spread forth on the newspaper, scores and scores of
cigarette ends and cigar stumps, which have been industriously amassed in
the streets, and on the terraces of cafés, during the day. Every night,
on this same boulevard bench, at the same hour of eleven, the old fellow
counteth up his spoil.
“Fifty-five, fifty-six, fifty-seven,” he mutters.
“Eh bien, le vieux, how are affairs?” asks a policeman. But the old
fellow, bent in half over the newspaper, hears him not. When—O joy!—he
comes upon a particularly fine bit of cigar, he holds it up to the
gas-lamp, measures it closely with his eye, then packs it carefully away
in his waistcoat pocket. But when—O gloom!—he has a long run of bad luck
in the way of wretched, almost tobaccoless cigarette ends, he breaks out
into guttural expressions of indignation and disgust.
The night wears on. Up go the shutters of the little wine-shop opposite.
Rarely a passer-by. Scarcely a sound.
“One hundred and two. One hundred and three. One hundred and four,”
counts the weather-beaten old fellow under the gas-lamp.
Then, the street singers of Paris, with harmonium, violin and a bundle
of tender, sentimental songs. Four of them, as a rule; four men in
jerseys, scarlet waistbands and blue corduroy trousers. They, too, come
out particularly at night and establish themselves under a gas-lamp. And
all around them stand charming, bareheaded girls from the neighbouring
_blanchisseries_ and milliners’ shops; and the adorers of those
maidens—young, amorous MM. Georges, Ernest and Henri—from the grocer’s,
the butcher’s, the printer’s; and workmen and charwomen and concierges;
and probably a cabman or two, and most likely a soldier, a lamp-lighter,
a policeman.
“_Love is Always in Season_, the latest and greatest of valse-songs,
created by the incomparable Mayol,” announces the vocalist. A chord from
the harmonium and violin, and the singer, in a not unmelodious voice,
proceeds to assure us that “though the snow may fall, or the skies may
frown, or the seas may roar, Love, sweet love, is Always in Season.”
General applause. Cries of “C’est chic, ça” from the charming, bareheaded
girls. Sighs and sentimental glances from their faithful adorers.
“Buy _Love is Always in Season_. Only two sous, only two sous! The
Greatest, the most Exquisite valse-song of the day,” cries the vocalist,
holding up copies of the song. “Buy it at once, and we will sing it all
together.”
At least twenty copies are sold. “Attention,” cries the vocalist. And
then, under the gas-lamp, what a spectacle and what song! Everyone sings;
yes, even this huge, apoplectic cabman: “Though the snow may fall....”
Everyone sings: the soldier, the workmen, the decrepit old charwomen:
“Though the skies may frown....” Everyone sings: the very policeman’s
lips are moving. And how the charming, bareheaded girls sing and sing;
and how amorously, how passionately do their adorers raise their voices:
“Though the seas may roar.... What matter, what matter!... Since love,
sweet love, is always in season!”
Of course children, with their lively, irresponsible games, provide
delightful street scenes. No piano-organs, alas! to which they may dance.
We have but three or four piano-organs in Paris, and these play only in
elegant quarters, for the pleasure of portly, solemn butlers. However,
the children hold theatrical performances on the pavement, which, if
animated and dramatic, are scarcely convincing; indeed they must be
pronounced bewildering, chaotic. René, aged six, proclaims himself
Napoleon; Jeanne, his sister, declares herself Sarah Bernhardt; André
strangely states that he is an Aeroplane; others most incoherently become
a Horse, the President of the Republic, Aunt Berthe, a Steamer on the
Seine, the Dog at the neighbouring chemist’s, and (this, a favourite,
amazing rôle) the Eiffel Tower! Then, when the parts have been duly
selected, after no end of wrangling, then, the play! Much extraordinary
dialogue between Napoleon and the divine Sarah; more between the
Eiffel Tower and the President of the Republic; still more between the
Aeroplane, the Seine Steamer and Aunt Berthe. And then dancing and
singing and skipping and——
Well, at once the most irresponsible and irresistible street scene in
Paris. Or, at least, second only in irresponsibility to the fêtes of
Mardi Gras and Mi-Carême.
Year after year, the cynic is to be heard declaring that confetti
has “gone out” and that no one really rejoices at carnival time; but
year after year, when Mardi Gras and Mi-Carême come round, confetti
flies swiftly and thickly and gaily in Paris, and only a rare, elegant
boulevardier, or some dull, heavy bourgeois remains indifferent to the
excitement of the scene.
Confetti, in fact, everywhere! Already at nine o’clock this
morning—blithe morning of Mardi Gras—it has got on to my staircase, and
from thence into the dining-room and on to the breakfast-table. Suddenly,
confetti in my coffee. A moment later, confetti on the butter. And when I
unfold the newspapers, a shower of confetti.
“It is extraordinary,” I murmur to the servant.
“Most certainly, confetti is extraordinary,” she assents. “It goes
where it pleases; it does what it likes; it respects nobody and
nothing—impossible to stop it.”
“And only nine o’clock in the morning,” I remark, removing a new speck of
confetti from the butter.
“At seven o’clock, when I went to Mass, it had got into the church,”
relates my servant. “It was also in the sacristy when I went to see M. le
Curé. Truly, it is the most astonishing thing in the world; and yet it is
only a little bit of coloured paper.”
As time wears on the tradesmen’s assistants bring more confetti into the
house. Somehow or other it enters my boots, and finds a resting-place
in my pockets. At luncheon, lots of confetti. At dinner, pink, green,
yellow, orange and purple confetti with every course. And when at eight
o’clock I set forth to view the rejoicings on the Grands Boulevards, my
servant, leaning over the banisters, impudently pelts me with confetti.
A cold night and occasionally a shower—but the boulevards are thronged
with I don’t know how many thousands of Parisians. Here, there and
everywhere electrical advertising signs dance and blink dizzily. Each
café is brilliantly illuminated. More pale, fierce light from the street
lamps. And, heavens! what a din of voices, and whistles, and musical
instruments!
“Who is without confetti? Who is without confetti?” shout scores of
men, women and children, holding up long, bulky paper bags, supposed to
contain two pounds of the bright-coloured stuff. And the bags sell and
sell. And the little rounds of paper fly and fly. And down they fall in
their hundreds of thousands on to the ground, making it a soft, agreeable
carpet of confetti.
Of course, no traffic. In the midst of the crowd groups of policemen; and
the policemen are pelted, and the policemen must shake confetti out of
eyes, and beards, and ears, and moustaches. However, they are amiable;
and, indeed, everyone is good-tempered. No rudeness and no roughness.
Here is Edouard, aged eight, in the crowd—dressed as a soldier, with
a wooden gun and a paper helmet. There is Yvonne, aged seven, in the
throng—all in white, with a wand tied at the top with a huge creamy
bow. And Edouard and Yvonne are perfectly safe. And that old married
couple—plainly from the provinces—are entirely safe. And——
A splash of confetti in my face. Then, a deluge of confetti over my hat.
And I am pleased, and I am flattered; for my assailant is an English
girl, with blue eyes, and gold hair, and an incomparable complexion.
Despite the cold, every seat and every table on the terraces of the cafés
are occupied. Past the terraces surges the crowd, casting confetti at the
glasses of beer, coffee and liqueurs, which the consumers have carefully
covered over with saucers. But, always unconquerable, the confetti enters
the glasses; and thus one drinketh benedictine _à la_ confetti, and
chartreuse _à la_ confetti, and——
“Who wants a nose? Who wants a nose?” shouts a hawker, holding up a
collection of long, vivid red noses. And the red noses are bought; and
so, too, are false beards and moustaches, and artificial eyebrows, and
huge cardboard ears.
Then, what costumes in the crowd! Of course, any number of pierrots and
clowns, who gesticulate and grimace; and ladies in dominoes, and men
in heavy scarlet mantles and black masks. Over there, an Arab; here, a
Greek soldier in the Albanian kilt—the picturesque “fustanella.” And
confetti—red, blue, yellow, green, white, orange, purple—sprinkled over,
and clinging to, all these different costumes, and flying above them and
all around them, a fantastic spectacle!
Confetti, again, in the fur coats of chauffeurs; a whirl of it—bright
yellow—around three colossal negroes from darkest Africa; and a fierce
battle of it, waged by an admiring Parisian against two fascinating young
ladies from New York. Darkest Africa grins, displaying glistening white
teeth. New York utters shrill little cries. And Motordom—represented
by the three chauffeurs—imitates the many savage sounds emitted by
60-horse-power machines.
“Your health!” cries a clown, plunging a handful of confetti into a glass
which, for only a second or two, has remained uncovered.
“Vive la Vie! Vive la Vie!” shout a procession of students from the Latin
Quarter.
“Who is without Confetti? Who wants a nose? Who desires a moustache?”
yell the hawkers.
And now, rain. Down it comes, finely, steadily, soddening the carpet of
confetti, spotting the fantastic costumes, scattering the crowd. Edouard
(in his paper helmet) and Yvonne (with her wand) are hurried along
homewards—much against their will—by their parents; the hawkers disappear
with the remaining paper bags; the dizzy advertising signs give a last
blink and go out; the policemen congregate beneath the street lamps and
in doorways—the carnival is over.
However, memories remain, and these memories are—confetti.
It has flown, but it has not gone. Every hour of every day, for many a
week, it will turn up in one’s home, in one’s clothing, at one’s meals...
still bold, vivid, ungovernable, unconquerable....
And now, after colour and gaiety—ambiguity, gloom. Away to remote,
neglected corners of Paris; to the _terrain vague_—the waste ground—of
the Amazing City, which, this particular afternoon, lies steeped in a
damp fog, and strewn with sodden newspapers and broken bottles, and pots
and pans without handles, hats without brims, and battered old shoes. On
the waste, prowling about amidst the wreckage, a gaunt, vagabond cat.
Gathering together odds and ends, the aged, bent _chiffonnière_—a hag
of a woman, half demented, with fingers like claws, that go scraping
and digging about in the refuse. Then three ragged children—skeletons
almost—also interested in the rubbish, who are savagely snarled at by
the _chiffonnière_ when they approach her preserves. Fog, damp and
puddles. Mounds of overturned earth, subsidences, crevices. A rusty
engine lying disabled on its side. Quantities of coarse, savage thistles.
Gloom unrelieved. The _chiffonnière_ and the ragged children becoming
more and more ghostly and ghastly in the half-light. The kind of scene
depicted so tragically by the great-hearted Steinlen, and sung of so
despairingly by the humane poet, Rictus. Sung of, too, by lesser poets
than the author of the _Soliloque d’un Pauvre_. For _terrain vague_ is
a favourite theme with the _chansonniers_ of Montmartre, and in their
songs they are fond of describing how they have passed from comfortable,
bourgeois neighbourhoods on to “waste ground.” The bourgeois was dozing
in his chair; Madame la Bourgeoise was knitting a hideous woollen shawl;
Mademoiselles the three daughters were respectively tinkling away at the
piano, pasting picture cards into an album, absorbing a sickly novel.
As a heartrending, an overwhelming contrast, behold—after the snugness
of the bourgeoisie—the wretchedness, the _misère noire_ of the human
phantoms poking about on the waste ground!
“Would that I had a bourgeois here on this _terrain vague_; a bourgeois
I might terrify and harrow!” declaim the realistic _chansonniers_
of the Montmartre cabarets. “‘Bourgeois,’ I would cry, ‘what do you
see? Bourgeois, look well, look again, look always. Bourgeois, do you
understand? It is well, wretched, cowardly Bourgeois—you tremble!’”
No less attracted by _terrain vague_ are the frail, wistful poets of
Paris, the poets (as they have been so admirably denominated) of “mists
and half-moons, dead leaves and lost illusions.” On to the waste they
bring Pierrot, their favourite, eternal hero. Midnight has long struck.
A half-moon casts silvery shafts on to the wreckage—and on to Pierrot,
who, as he stands there forlornly amidst the debris, proceeds to disclose
the secret: “Pourquoi sont pâles les Pierrots....” Only the cheeks of the
vulgar are rosy; for the vulgar cannot feel. But the artist is stung day
after day by ironies, cruelties, bitter awakenings—and so is frail, and
so is pale. How he suffers, how tragically is he disillusioned! There was
a blonde... but she was capricious. There was a brune... but she, too,
was fickle. There was a rousse, an auburn-haired goddess... but alas!
she also was false. And Pierrot sobs. And Pierrot goes on his knees to
the half-moon. And Pierrot prays. And suddenly a radiant figure appears
on the waste ground, and a sweet, melodious voice murmurs: “Why sigh
for the blonde? Why grieve for the brune? Why weep for the rousse? Am I
not enough?” And Pierrot, looking up with his pale, tear-stained face,
beholds his Muse, smiling down upon him—
“Sur ce terrain va—aa—gue.”
Farther away—away, this time, to one of the environs of Paris, and down
there, by the river-side, the annual fête. Not an empty corner, not a
vacant space; nothing but booths, “side-shows,” shooting-galleries,
roundabouts, caravans—“all the fun of the fair.” Confusion, exhilaration,
and a hundred different, frenzied sounds. All this babel lasts a week;
but at the end of the week, departure and gloom. Gone the caravans and
their picturesque inmates. Gone the “distractions.” There stood the
shooting-gallery, with its targets, grotesque dummies and strings of
clay pipes. One fired twice for a penny. If successful, one was rewarded
with paper flowers, or a shocking cigar, or (in exceptional cases) a
strident alarm clock; if a bad marksman, one was consoled with a slice of
hard, gritty ginger-bread. Farther on revolved the roundabout. One rode
a rickety steed, with only one stirrup. One turned to the accompaniment
of a husky, exhausted old organ. What appalling liberties it took with
the _Valse Bleue_! Next, one visited the palmist, inspected a seedy lion,
stared at optical illusions, shook hands with a dwarf, bought sticks of
nougat, rode again on the round about, returned to——
But all over now, and nothing but memories and souvenirs about: broken
clay pipes, splinters of bottles and wood, shavings, scraps of cloth,
hand-bills and rusty, bent nails, the eternal old battered hat, the
equally inevitable old boot, and a hoof or two from the rickety horses
that revolved to the haunting tune of the _Valse Bleue_.
The usual mounds of refuse. Also, the turf damaged with ruts, and burnt
away in places by the fair people’s fires. The annual fête over, not a
soul but myself loiters on this portion of the Seine river-bank. Only
gloom and desolation. Nothing but waste. Again, _terrain vague_.
II
IN A CELLAR
Bright things and sombre things, tarnished things and threadbare things,
frail things, fast-fading things; things and things, and all of them old
things.... The past in this cellar; in every nook and corner of it—the
past. Come here through a hole in the wall of a narrow, cobbled Paris
street—come down a number of crooked stone steps—I now look curiously
about me, and wonder what to do next. No one challenges me: the cellar
appears to be uninhabited. Yet above its crude, primitive entrance, on a
weather-beaten board, I discern the name—Veuve Mollard.
An autumnal mist filled the street outside; and the mist, pouring through
the hole in the wall, has invaded the cellar and made it chilly and
ghostly. It is a rambling, chaotic place—suggestive of three or four
cellars having been thrown into one; for it twists and it turns, and
it bulges and recedes, and it slopes and ascends; and the grimy brick
ceiling—lofty enough at the entrance—suddenly dips towards the middle,
and almost precipitates itself to the ground at the far end. Here and
there an unshaded lamp, of the kitchen description, burns dimly. On
a stool I perceive a workbox, crowded with sewing materials—but not
a sign, not a sound of “Widow” Mollard. I cough loudly. I advance
farther into the cellar. And, as I advance, I pass bright things and
sombre things, tarnished things and threadbare things, frail things,
fast-fading——
“Monsieur?”
An apparition, a spectre! There, in the background, appears a tall, gaunt
woman, with a pale, wrinkled face, large, luminous dark eyes and tumbled
white hair. In the dim light from the lamps Veuve Mollard looks a hundred
years old. There she stands, old and alone, in a rambling old cellar,
amidst old, discarded things.
“Monsieur?”
A deep, even a sepulchral voice—and then from myself an explanation. I
should like to examine the old things—all of them, not knowing myself
what I want. I have a fancy for old things; like to wonder over them;
like, O most respectfully, to handle them. No; unnecessary to turn up
the lamps; they give, just as they are, the very light for old things.
“Faîtes donc, faîtes donc,” assents the deep voice. Retiring to a corner,
Widow Mollard seats herself on a stool and proceeds to darn a rent in a
faded yellow velvet curtain.
Silence in the cellar. Shadows, ambiguities, and the mist from the street.
Against the walls, boards have been laid on the floor; and heaped on the
boards are tapestries, draperies, all kinds of stuffs. Then, tables,
wooden trays, and flat, open receptacles of wicker-work. Also pegs, for
gowns. Again, battered, lidless boxes of odds and ends. Thus, _embarras
de choix_: which of the old things shall I examine first? At last I
decide on the tapestries. They are of all shapes and sizes, but most
of them have been severed, are but parts—no head to this horse, no top
to the lance of this knight, and of that saint only the half. Next, a
circular piece of tapestry representing what might be a throne—but faded,
faded; and the figure on the throne as shadowy as a phantom. Gobelins?
Veuve Mollard no doubt knows: but I prefer to pursue my researches
alone, unaided; and then the gaunt widow is darning and darning away at
the yellow velvet curtain.... Whose velvet curtain? Where has it hung,
what fine window has it screened? Once, evidently, a rich, magnificent
yellow; now faded, crumpled, damaged. A curtain from the Faubourg St
Germain? from a ruined château? even from the palaces of Versailles or
Fontainebleau? Again I glance at Widow Mollard. Old, old. Her fingers
tremble, and a long lock of white hair has fallen over one pale, wrinkled
cheek.
Out of this tray a snuff-box, enamelled, oval-shaped and delicate. A
Watteau peasant girl on the lid—but the pretty, pink-cheeked girl, fast
fading. Whose snuff-box? Then a shoe buckle. Whose massive, old-fashioned
silver buckle? And of whom this miniature: blue eyes, sensitive mouth,
delicate eyebrows and powdered hair? Then, a tiny Sèvres tea-cup; a
gilt key; a chased silver book-clasp; a string of coral; an ornament of
amethysts; bits of embroidery; stray pieces of velvet and silk; lace,
satins, furs, and spangled and soft and transparent stuffs. Whose finery?
Perhaps a débutante’s, a débutante of years ago—now old, like the things.
Graceful, charming débutante of the past! Behold her dressing—or rather
being dressed—for her first, her very first ball, amidst what excitement,
what confusion! Her mother on her knees, the maids also on their knees,
putting the last touches; and the débutante turned round and round,
and exhorted to keep still, and told to walk a little, and ordered to
return, and commanded to remain “there,” and not to move, not to move!
Radiant, irresistible débutante of long ago. At once dignified and shy,
now flushed and now pale when in the ballroom she made her first bow to
the world, received her first compliments, achieved her first triumphs,
and experienced, no doubt, her first emotions, her first illusions, her
first doubts. Here in this cellar, in the half-light and the mist from
the street, here lies her first ball-dress; and here too, perhaps, are
the shoes in which she danced her first official waltz, her first real
_cotillon_—a pair of small satin shoes which repose on the top of a heap
of other frail shoes.
Long, narrow shoes, tiny ridiculous shoes—some of them with loose,
dangling rosettes, others showing a bare place where the rosette or
a jewel had once been fastened. High heels, and the soles scarcely
thicker than a sheet of paper. Sometimes a rent in the satin, and the
maker’s name stamped in dim gilt letters. Shoes, no doubt, that long
ago stepped daring quadrilles at the _bal masqué_ of the Opera; the
shoes of Mademoiselle Liane de Luneville, a former blonde and brilliant
courtesan; and next to them remnants from Mademoiselle de Luneville’s
wardrobe. A white satin dress, sewn with artificial pearls, dismembered
silken sleeves, spangled stuffs, daring gauzes, and other extravagances
and audacities. Courtesan finery. Sold, no doubt, in the twilight of the
_demi-mondaine’s_ career; or seized roughly by the bailiffs when not a
shadow of the beauty or glory of Mademoiselle de Luneville remained.
Now does a moth fly out of a piece of tapestry I have shaken. Now do
I behold a black cat, with lurid yellow eyes, perched motionless upon
a pile of draperies in a corner. Now do I perceive gigantic cobwebs
overhead. Thus, some life—but life of an eerie nature—in the cellar.
“Je ne vous dérange pas, Madame?”
“Faîtes donc, faîtes donc,” replies the deep, sepulchral voice of Veuve
Mollard.
A cracked water-colour landscape signed, ever so faintly, “R. E. F.”
Disposed of, perhaps, for a five-franc piece; and to-day the painter
either dead, or a shabby, lonely, struggling old fellow? or a rich and
distinguished “master”? A sword—used in a duel? A small silver mug—from a
god-father? Pink, white and black dominoes: they should have been placed
amongst the courtesan’s finery. The _bâton_ of a _chef d’orchestre_,
silver-mounted, of ebony. A bunch of tarnished seals; chipped vases
and liqueur glasses; a cracked, frameless mirror; a collection of old
legal and medical books; a heap of dusty, fantastic draperies of the
kind used extensively by the students of the Latin Quarter. Deceptive
draperies that once turned a bed into a divan, discreet draperies that
hid the scars on the walls—the draperies of Paul and Pierre, of Gaston
and René, sons of Henri Mürger, genuine, veritable Bohemians, who, if
they lived recklessly and irresponsibly, were nevertheless full of
generous impulses, imagination, ideals, but who to-day are become stout,
bourgeois, double-chinned inhabitants of such dreary provincial towns as
Abbeville and Arras.
Thus the past in this cellar; in every nook and corner of this rambling,
chaotic cellar, the past. Changes and changes—but not one change for
the better. All around me evidence of somebody’s indifference and
faithlessness to old possessions. On all sides, symbols of somebody’s
downfall and ruin.
“Je vous remercie, Madame.”
“C’est moi qui vous remercie, Monsieur.”
On my way out—on the crooked stone staircase leading upwards to the hole
in the wall—I look back.
And down there, in the dim light from the lamps, the gaunt, white-haired
woman darns away at the faded velvet curtain. Down there, from its
throne of draperies, the black cat watches the widow with lurid yellow
eyes. Down there in vague disorder—in an atmosphere of shadows and
ambiguities, of moth, cobweb and mist—down there, lie bright things and
sombre things, tarnished things and threadbare things, frail things,
fast-fading things; things and things, and all of them old, discarded,
forgotten things.
III
IN A MARKET-PLACE
The market!... We holiday-keepers in Moret-sur-Loing have been
looking forward to it, imagining it, scanning the spot where it is
held, recalling other French market-places, ever since we first bowed
before the amiable _patron_ and _patronne_ of our hotel. Our immediate
inquiry was when is the market. “Tell us,” we cried, “when we, like the
villagers, may go forth in our newest clothes, in high spirits, as though
to some fine ceremony, to view fruits and vegetables, gigots and _rôtis_
if we like, stalls of chiffons and trinkets, patent medicines, soaps,
scents and——”
“A week hence, mon pauvre Monsieur,” interrupted the _patronne_. “The
market takes place on Tuesdays only: as it is Tuesday night, you have
just missed it.”
“Then,” we replied, “the week will be empty, sombre; the week will be a
year, a century; but for you, Madame, and your admirable hotel, the week
would be intolerable.” And the _patronne_ bowed and smiled; we bowed and
smiled, “comme dans le monde,” in fact, “en mondains.” Never was there
sweeter smiling, better bowing, in Moret....