which his picture had been placed. In passing through the
Faubourg St. Honoré, he stopped in the midst of a group which
seemed to be watching with curious interest a sign that was
being placed over a shop. This sign was neither more nor less
than Marcel’s picture, which had been sold by Médicis to a
grocer. Only, ‘The Passage of the Red Sea’ had undergone one
more change, and bore a new name. A steamboat had been added,
and it was now called ‘The Harbor of Marseilles.’ The curious
onlookers, when they saw the picture, burst out in a flattering
ovation; and Marcel returned home in ecstasy over the triumph,
murmuring—‘The voice of the people is the voice of God.’”
What part the synoptic charger was now called on to fill, unfortunately
we cannot say.
The third member of our quartet is Gustave Colline, student of
“hyperphysical philosophy,” and inveterate perpetrator of alarming puns.
He too is a composite character, the principal ingredients of his
make-up being furnished by two of Murger’s old associates—Jean Walton
and Trapadoux, both of whom were men of immense and curious erudition
and many eccentricities. Colline himself, of a somewhat more steady way
of life than his companions, gains a fairly regular income by teaching
mathematics, botany, Arabic, and various other subjects, as occasion
demands, and spends the greater part of it in the accumulation of
second-hand books. “What he did with all these volumes,” remarks the
historian, “so numerous that the life of a man would never have sufficed
to read them, no one knew—he least of all.” But still he goes on adding
tome to tome, and when he chances to return to his lodgings at night
without bringing a new specimen to his store, he feels that, like the
good Titus, he has wasted his day. Thus his strange, shapeless mouth,
pouting lips, double chin, shaggy light hair, and threadbare,
hazel-colored overcoat, are well known upon the quays and wherever
ancient volumes are exposed for sale. His tastes are catholic in the
extreme; for he will buy anything and everything that is to be bought,
provided only it is rare, out of the way, and for all practical purposes
useless. Some idea of the range and versatility of his interests may be
given by reference to a single episode in his history. When, in company
with Marcel, Rodolphe gave that famous Christmas entertainment, whereof
the record is to be found in its proper place in the annals of Bohemia,
he insisted on borrowing for the occasion the philosopher’s famous
swallowtail coat. Now, this coat, as the chronicler justly suggests,
deserves a word or two. By courtesy it was held to be black by
candle-light, though it was really of a decided blue. It was also cut
upon a wild and startling plan, very short in the waist and exceedingly
long in the tails. But its most astonishing features were the
pockets—“positive gulfs, in which Colline was accustomed to lodge some
thirty of the volumes which he everlastingly carried about with him;
which caused his friends to say that during the times when the libraries
were closed scientists and men of letters could always seek information
in the skirts of Colline’s coat—a library always open to readers.” Well,
on this particular day, strange to relate, the great swallowtail
apparently harbored only a quarto volume of Bayle, a treatise in three
volumes on the hyperphysical faculties, a volume of Condillac, two of
Swedenborg, and Pope’s “Essay on Man.” “Hullo!” exclaimed Rodolphe, when
the philosopher had turned out this odd collection and allowed the other
to don the imposing habit; “the left pocket still feels very heavy;
there is still something in it.”—“Ah!” replied Colline, “that is true; I
forgot to empty the foreign language pocket.” Whereupon he drew out two
Arabic grammars, a Malay dictionary, and “The Perfect Stock-Breeder” in
Chinese—his favorite reading.[29] Nor was this quite all. Later on, in
looking for his handkerchief, Rodolphe came accidentally upon a small
Tartar volume, overlooked in the department of foreign literature.
Footnote 29:
This famous volume appears in an “édition princeps,” with “notes in
modern Syriac,” in the very amusing story, “Son Excellence Gustave
Colline,” which really forms an episode of the “Scènes de la Vie de
Bohème,” though it is published in the collection of miscellanies
entitled “Dona Sirène.”
-----
For the rest, Colline is a very agreeable companion, pleasant of manner,
and courteous of bearing; and his conversation is amusingly spiced with
quaint technical expressions and the most outrageous puns. Unlike his
three companions, who are in perpetual bondage to love, he passes on,
for the most part, in bachelor meditation, fancy free, as becomes a
philosopher of the “hyperphysical school.” Once in a while, we find him
flirting a little with the _bonne amie_ of one of his friends, and we
recall a single occasion on which, according to his own statement, he
had an appointment of a romantic character. We read also, in the most
incidental way, of his devotion to a waistcoat-maker, whom he keeps day
and night copying the manuscripts of his philosophical works. But at
these, as at all other times, the lady of his affections remains
“invisible and anonymous.” In general, it may be said that he shows
himself markedly superior to the human weakness which does so much to
disturb the byways of Bohemia no less than the highways of the outer
world.
Music, painting, and philosophy are thus well represented in the
Bohemian _cénacle_, and in Rodolphe, the last of the group, the sister
art of poetry finds a worthy exponent. Rodolphe is the real hero of the
book, and is indeed an approximately faithful sketch of the author
himself. In the fancy-poet of the Latin Quarter, the man who, in the
very cut of his clothes, manners, appearance, conversation, “confessed
his association with the Muses,” many of Murger’s well-known traits of
character and personal idiosyncrasies are frankly reproduced. We have a
brief but sufficiently detailed description of him when he makes his
first appearance in the Café Momus, and there can be no doubt as to the
artist’s model from which the study is made. He is presented as “a young
man whose face was almost lost in an enormous thicket of many-colored
beard. But, as a set-off against this abundance of hair on the chin, a
precocious baldness had dismantled his forehead, which looked like a
knee, and the nakedness of which a few stray hairs that one might have
counted vainly endeavored to cover. He wore a black coat, tonsured at
the elbows, and with practical ventilators under the armpits, which
could be seen whenever he raised his arm too high. His trousers might
once have been black, but his shoes, which had never been new, seemed to
have several times made the tour of the world on the feet of the
Wandering Jew.” In all this—in the precocious baldness and parti-colored
beard especially—we have the historian of Bohemia himself. We do not,
therefore, wonder that the character of Rodolphe should stand out from
among the other figures of the “Scenes,” by reason of a certain
autobiographic distinctness of outline and color, nor that he should
prevail upon us by a kind of personal charm which his companions rarely
possess.
To follow Rodolphe’s various adventures and enterprises back to their
originals in Murger’s life, would be an interesting task, but it is one
that cannot be attempted here; and for the time being we must keep to
the poet in the book. Like his friends Schaunard and Marcel, this young
man has pinned his faith to one ambitious work, a drama called the “The
Avenger,” which has already gone the round of all the theatres of Paris,
and of which in the course of a couple of years, he has accumulated a
dozen or so huge manuscript copies, weighing collectively something like
fifteen pounds. “The Avenger” was ultimately produced, and ran for five
successive nights, after large portions of these carefully wrought
versions had been used up in the humble service of lighting the fire.
But this does not come till towards the end of the story; and during the
days when we know him best, Rodolphe, awaiting his dramatic triumph, is
willing enough to turn his literary talents to account in less dignified
ways. The main sources of his income appear to be “The Scarf of Iris,” a
fashion-journal, and “The Castor,” a paper devoted to the interests of
the hat-trade, both of which he edits, and in which he publishes from
time to time his opinions on tragedy and kindred subjects. It is to the
columns of the latter periodical, by-the-by, that Gustave Colline
contributes a discussion on “The Philosophy of Hats, and Other Things in
General”—how much to the amusement and instruction of its readers we are
unfortunately not told. Probably the financial advantages of these two
undertakings are of a rather slight and unsubstantial character; at any
rate, the editor-in-chief shows himself at all times ready to supplement
his official emoluments whensoever occasion offers. Witness his most
famous piece of hack-work, the composition of “The Perfect Chimney
Constructor.” Rodolphe, who has been sadly down on his luck for a
time—fluctuating between going to bed without supper and supping without
going to bed—happens accidentally to run across his Uncle Monetti, a
stove-maker and physician of smoky chimneys, whom he has not seen for an
age. Now, Monsieur Monetti is an enthusiast in his art, and has
conceived the idea of drawing up for the benefit of future generations,
a manual of chimney-construction, in which his own numerous patents
shall be given adequate presentation. Finding his nephew fallen upon
evil days, he intrusts him with this literary enterprise, promising him
a remuneration of three hundred francs, and rashly giving him outright
fifty francs on account. Of course, Rodolphe incontinently disappears,
and only turns up again when the money has disappeared also. Uncle
Monetti then resorts to drastic measures. He locks the volatile young
gentleman in a small room, six stories up, with stoves and ovens for his
company, and takes away his clothes, leaving in their stead a ridiculous
Turkish dressing-gown. In this attic solitude the unfortunate young poet
is fain to wax eloquent over ventilators, till he is rescued in the most
romantic way by a certain Mademoiselle Sidonia, as the reader will find
recorded at length in its proper place in the Bohemian chronicles.
In connection with one extraordinary episode in Rodolphe’s career—his
sudden receipt of five hundred francs in hard cash—we have an excellent
opportunity of studying some of the mysteries of Bohemian finance. He
and Marcel, who was then his fellow-lodger, regarded this colossal sum
as practically inexhaustible; they were not a little surprised,
therefore, to find, before a fortnight had gone by, that it had vanished
into air, as though by magic. The strictest frugality had presided over
all their expenditures, and the question was, where in the world the
money could have gone to. Into this problem the two economists forthwith
made inquisition, analyzing their accounts, and carefully weighing them
item by item. This is about the way in which the audit was conducted:—
“March 19.—Received five hundred francs. Paid, one Turkish pipe,
twenty-five francs; dinner, fifteen francs; miscellaneous expenses,
forty francs,” Marcel read out.
“What in the world are these miscellaneous expenses?” asked Rodolphe.
“You know well enough,” said the other. “It was the evening when we
didn’t come home till morning. At any rate, that saved us fuel and
candles.”
There is nothing like rigid economy, as we see.
“March 20.—Breakfast, one franc, fifty centimes; tobacco, twenty
centimes; dinner, two francs; an opera glass”—needed by Rodolphe, who,
as editor of the “Scarf of Iris,” had to write a notice of an art
exhibition; and so on, and so on. As the account continued,
“miscellaneous expenses” reappeared with ever-increasing frequency;
indeed, the two financiers had in the end to admit that this “vague and
perfidious title,” as Rodolphe called it, had proved a delusion and a
snare.
* * * * *
Such, then, are the four principal characters with whose doings and
misdoings the “Scenes of Bohemian Life” are mainly occupied. A word only
about the women of the book.
It is while he is in their company, I suppose, more than at any other
time, that the Anglo-Saxon reader feels how far the pathways of Bohemia
lie outside the boundaries of respectable society. Louise, the fickle
bird of passage; Musette, vagabond and careless; Mimi, charming,
heartless, ill-fated; Phémie, beneath whose delicate exterior was
concealed a veritable volcano of passion;—yes, the face of the moralist
will certainly harden as he dwells on the giddy vagrancy of their lives,
and the hopeless tragedy in which the music and the laughter inevitably
find their earthly close. About this matter I shall try to say something
presently. For the moment I want only to point out that, though the
women of Murger’s book are drawn from known or conjectured originals,
the portraiture does not seem to be nearly as close as it is throughout
in the case of the men. This does not mean only that each girl in the
“Scenes” is a more or less blurred compound of various famous figures of
the old Latin Quarter; it means, also—and this is, of course, far more
important,—that the characters have undergone much transfiguration. The
magic and grace by which, amid all their personal shortcomings and
delinquencies, these heedless adventurers of the studio and the café are
actually marked, are largely, it is to be feared, the results of
Murger’s own idealizing imagination and delicately poetic touch.
There is an important point, suggested by the present part of our
subject, which demands a moment’s attention. The principle indicated in
the well-known lines of Lafontaine—
“Deux coqs vivaient en paix: une poule survint,
Et voilà la guerre allumée!”—
is generally held to be one of universal applicability. But the life of
our Bohemian brotherhood for once gives it the lie direct. Never, even
in the most trying seasons of love and jealousy, did the ties slacken
which bound the four companions—Colline, the great philosopher; Marcel,
the great painter; Schaunard, the great musician; and Rodolphe, the
great poet—as they called one another. Rodolphe and Mimi might lead a
cat-and-dog life; Marcel might quarrel with Musette, and make it up only
to quarrel again; Schaunard might see fit to address some of his telling
observations to the person of the melancholy Phémie; but artist and
poet, philosopher and painter, rubbed on together in peace; and if the
truth must be told, smoked many a pipe in company over the grave of
their dead passions. Truly the domestic side of their life left much to
be desired. At one time they all occupied the same house, and then the
unfortunate neighbors lived, as it were, on a volcano. Six months went
by; things grew daily more and more intolerable; and then the final
breaking-up of the establishment came about. “But,” adds Murger—and the
remark exhibits clearly the kind of understanding which existed among
the strangely-assorted friends—“in this association, despite the three
young and pretty women who formed part of it, no sign of discord
appeared among the men. They frequently gave way to the most absurd
caprices of their mistresses; but not one of them would have hesitated a
moment between the woman and the friend.”
* * * * *
Amid all the uncertainties and anxieties, the follies and the vices of
their daily life, these brother Bohemians are possessed of a very keen
and genuine enthusiasm for art, and of a sturdy faith in themselves and
their own high calling. This is one good aspect of their character;
another and complementary aspect, upon which Murger lays much stress, is
their complete freedom from stiff-necked virtuosity and dilettante
affectations. There are Bohemians who chatter only of “art for art’s
sake,” who hold with inflexible obstinacy and stoical pride to the
narrow path they have marked out for themselves, who scorn to descend,
upon any pretext, for any purpose whatsoever, to the plane of common
affairs. But Murger takes pains to make it clear that Rodolphe and his
friends do not belong to this unfortunate class—the “Buveurs d’Eau,” as
they are called, the first tenet of whose creed is that no one of their
number, on penalty of expulsion from the society, shall accept any work
outside pure art itself.[30] Rodolphe, as we know, is working hard upon
his great tragedy; Marcel, upon his “Passage of the Red Sea”; Schaunard,
upon his symbolic symphony; Colline, upon his system of “Hyperphysical
Philosophy”: but there are no cant phrases of art-worship everlastingly
upon their lips, and they are ready enough to turn their energies, when
opportunity offers, into more remunerative, if less ambitious,
undertakings. We have seen something already of the practical means,
sometimes adopted by them, of putting a figure before the cipher, which
unfortunately, as a rule, constitutes their entire available capital. If
further evidence be demanded, we need only refer to the occasions when
Rodolphe versifies an epitaph for an inconsolable widow and turns off a
rhyming advertisement for a dentist, and when Marcel paints eight
grenadiers at six francs apiece—likenesses guaranteed for a year, like a
watch.
Footnote 30:
See “Les Derniers Buveurs d’Eau,” in “Dona Sirène”; “Les Buveurs
d’Eau”; “Scènes de la Vie de Jeunesse”; and the “Scènes de la Vie de
Bohème,” preface, and the story of “Le Manchon de Francine.”
-----
* * * * *
Of the “Scenes of Bohemian Life” as a whole, it would be hopeless to
endeavor to give any general idea within the limits of a rapid sketch.
It is little to say that from cover to cover of this wonderful book
there is not a dull or indifferent page—not a page that does not teem
with quaint description, brilliant bits of characterization, vivid
pictures of manners and life. Of the range and opulence of its humor
some hint has perhaps been given, though the merest hint only, in the
personal delineations attempted above. Mirth-compelling the “Scenes”
certainly are, and we feel in their case, as we cannot always feel with
the masterpieces of the French comic genius, that the laughter they
provoke is generous, hearty, wholesome—laughter without taint of
cynicism or spite. But the humor of the volume, rich and racy as it is,
and the ebullient wit that glitters and flashes in its dialogues and
incidental touches of comment and criticism, are not by any means the
only qualities that deserve attention. Murger was a true humorist, and,
like all true humorists, he had the keenest realization of the pathos
and tragedy of life, the most delicate apprehension of “the sense of
tears in mortal things.” Though it can hardly be said of the “Scenes of
Bohemian Life,” as it has been rightly said of the great body of the
author’s work, that the dominant note is one of poignant melancholy, the
minor chords are heavy and frequent enough to tone down the exuberant
gayety of the volume, and to cause the final impression left by it to be
rather sombre than exhilarating. Murger saw much of the reckless and
irresponsible life of the Latin Quarter on its grotesque side, and he
has given this side extraordinary prominence in this particular book,
reserving many of the harsher features, which from personal contact he
knew equally well, for the “Scenes de la Vie de Jeunesse” and the
“Buveurs d’Eau.” But the reader who follows to their close the chapters
we have here more especially been considering—and who can put them down
unfinished?—will find that their brilliancy of light and color are
thrown up against a very dark background, and that the shadows gather
and deepen about us as the story runs its course. At length, the wild
music ceases altogether; the mad laughter is silenced; and the book is
laid by, not with a burst of final merriment, but with a gulp and a
pang. _Ah, comme nous avons ri!_ Yes, the struggles, the privations, the
absurdities of Bohemia are comical enough; but life is stern, even in
this Land of Romance; there is death in it, and many a heartbreak; and
if we escape the suffering of failure, we must accept the inevitable
disillusion of success. Life, too, is fleeting; the golden sands slip
through our fingers as we try to clutch them. _Eheu fugaces!_ It is the
old-world burden that we must needs end with—“La jeunesse n’a qu’un
temps!”
No—“ce n’est pas gai tous les jours, la Bohème.” For my own part, I know
not whither one could turn to find pages of purer tenderness and pathos
than those in which Murger has written of Francine’s muff and of the
death of poor little Mimi. And yet, there is no effort, no melodramatic
striving after effect. The lips quiver, the eyes grow dim as we read;
but so admirably is the art concealed, so perfect is the reserve under
which it is all done, that it is only when we come to turn back over the
chapters for the express purpose of analyzing them, that we begin to
realize the author’s exquisite perception and tact, and the genius with
which he carries his meaning straight home to our hearts. Poor Francine!
Poor Mimi! These fragile slips of womanhood from the dingy old Latin
Quarter are filled with the life that the poet alone can give. We meet
them once in a few pages of print; and their hungry eyes and poor, worn
faces linger with us forever.
* * * * *