entirely before that of the drama. There was not one Bohemian with any
literary talent who did not try to write a play--nay, many
plays--tragedies in alexandrines, comedies, or vaudevilles; and when
they were not writing plays they were haunting the theatres as dramatic
critics, selling their articles simply for the sake of a free entry,
unless, like Lucien's immoral set, they added the profits of blackmail.
From the second _cénacle_ to the end of Murger's Bohemia there was no
end so generally pursued as dramatic composition. Bouchardy and
Augustus Mackeat were dramatists, so were Ourliac, Arsène Houssaye, and
Gérard de Nerval; Gautier was a dramatic critic; Murger and Champfleury
failed as vaudevillists; and it is quite likely that Rodolphe's
magnificent drama, "Le Vengeur," had its counterpart in reality. The
"poète échevelé" and the humble _conteur_ alike turned their eyes
continuously towards the stage, besieging luckless managers without
cease. The reason of this was partly, as may be supposed, that a
successful play, then as to-day, gave far quicker and more splendid
pecuniary returns for labour than any other form of literary
composition. A concrete instance of that is the case of Murger himself,
who was set on his legs entirely by the sudden vogue of the dramatized
"Scènes de la Vie de Bohème." But there was another reason at least as
strong, far deeper, and more honourable. The stage, as I have already
pointed out, was the battlefield of the Romantic struggle. "Hernani"
brought home the new truths to the public far more vividly than any
novel or poem could have done; every night they were declaimed before
compelled attention. It is not surprising, then, that the stage played
so great a part in the amusements of Bohemia. It was, with one other,
the chief of their pastimes. For them to listen to "Chatterton," the
"Tour de Nesle," or "Antony" was not only a distraction, it was a
frantic excitement which made their blood seethe almost painfully and
sent geysers of hot eloquence from their lips as they munched the hot
rolls of the Boulangerie Cretaine. These young enthusiasts were not
stinted of good fare. Mademoiselle Mars, Marie Dorval, Rachel and Judith
appeared at the Français during these eighteen years; at the
Folies-Dramatique Frédéric Lemaître created with enormous success the
part of Robert Macaire; while at the Funambules Gaspard Deburau was
winning eternal fame as the incomparable Pierrot. There were a host of
other theatres besides, the Variétés, Porte Saint-Martin, Odéon, not to
mention smaller ones, managed for the most part by men of taste,
supplied with plays by men with some pretension to talent, and
criticized by unsparing critics, from Jules Janin downwards, who knew
what they wanted and did not hesitate to speak when they did not get it.
In the stage Bohemia found not only amusement and inspiration but part
of its livelihood: it lived next door to that special world composed of
actors and actresses. Yet, though Bohemians went to supper with
Mademoiselle Mars, Dumas was very much at home with Marie Dorval, Roger
de Beauvoir played pranks with Bache, and Rodolphe had a love affair
with Mademoiselle Sidonie, the two worlds were definitely separated. In
fact, the life of dramatic artists, whatsoever Bohemian flavouring it
may have, has always had a mysterious taste of its own, incapable of
mixture with any other blend of artistic life, so that, interesting as
it may have been in Paris during these years, its omission from these
pages has been intentional.
[Illustration: Bal Masqué à l'Opéra]
The one other amusement--a pure pastime involving no material
profit--which was particularly popular in Bohemia was dancing. In this
respect Bohemia was no exception from the rest of Parisian society, for
in all classes there was an inextinguishable passion for the dance. But
the Bohemian, obeying only his own laws of social propriety, was in a
more favourable position for taking full advantage of all public
opportunities for this exercise and of all the _agréments_ in the way of
casual intercourse with both sexes which it implied. All the year round
there were public balls given in Paris, at which the Bohemian was in his
element, giving rein to his inventive humour, his high spirits, and his
gift of seductive gallantry. During the first few years after 1830, the
golden age of Bohemia, the balls at the Opéra were the most frequented,
especially in the days of the carnival. There masks and dominoes covered
dancers of every rank in society, for even the _femme du monde_ slipped
in unbeknown to her husband. This scene of utmost gaiety and brilliance,
of which Balzac gives a picture at the opening of "Splendeurs et Misères
des Courtisanes," was closely rivalled by the ball at the Variétés, at
which a still more feverish excitement reigned. Or if the Bohemian
preferred to make sure of a _grisette_ as a partner he went to the
Prado, the site of which was opposite the Palais de Justice, where,
under Pilodo, the famous conductor, he could join Louise la Balocheuse,
Angelina l'Anglaise, or Ernestine Confortable in the giddy whirl. The
waltz was recognized at this period, but the quadrille easily held the
place of honour, especially as it lent itself more freely to individual
invention, such as Ourliac's magnificent variation depicting the
grandeur and fall of Napoleon. It was through this licence in the
figures of the quadrille that the _chahut_ and the _cancan_ were
introduced by the rakish set among the _viveurs_ which included Charles
de la Battut, Alton-Shee, Monnier, and the famous Chicard--a
leather-merchant who made a name by his grotesque costumes and wild
dances, the term _chicard_, which degenerated into _chic_, becoming a
general denomination for his imitators. I have not been able to arrive
at the difference between the _chahut_ and the _cancan_, but both were
originally primitive dances indulged in by the lowest classes, quaint,
but in all probability perfectly decent. The rage for extravagance
during the early thirties changed them into formidable pantomimes of
violence, if not always of indecency, which every complete reveller
rendered with his own individual touch. Heine, in the course of one of
his articles in the _Augsburg Gazette_, said of the _cancan_:
"It must be regarded simply as a pantomime of Robert Macairedom.
Anybody who has a general idea of the latter will understand those
indescribable dances, expressions of _persiflage_ in dance, which
not only mock sexual relations, but civic relations too, all, in
fact, that is good and beautiful, every kind of enthusiasm,
patriotism, uprightness, faith, family feeling, heroism, divinity."
Heine's view is rather too Teutonic, for the popularity of the _cancan_
was due to the high spirits of the Romantic enthusiasm, and its degree
of morality or immorality depended upon the individual dancer. Not much
harm can be imagined to have dwelt in the dance-_persiflage_ of the
Impasse du Doyenné, whatever a Chicard or a Milord Arsouille may have
made of it. The feature of public balls, however, was certainly a
Dionysiac exaltation which culminated in the final _galop infernal_, as
it was called, into which Musard particularly infused a special fury. It
was less a dance than a stampede of maniacs, who rushed round the room,
men and women, clutching one another anyhow, wigs flying, tresses
waving, dresses rent from fair shoulders, all shrieking and shouting,
brandishing arms, kicking legs, and stamping heedlessly on those who
were unlucky enough to fall.
[Illustration: The Galop Infernal]
The balls of the Opéra declined in attraction and became dull about
1836, but they were revived with still greater splendour two years
later, when Musard was made conductor and members of the ballet were
drafted in to enliven the company. Such balls, however, became too
much public functions to suit the less splendid Bohemia of a later day,
which found diversion more suited to its pocket and its manners at the
Chaumière or the Closerie des Lilas on the left bank. It was at such
places as these that Rodolphe and Marcel disported themselves, and
Schaunard was arrested for "chorégraphie trop macabre." The Chaumière
was a large garden on the Boulevard Montparnasse, a miniature edition of
Cremorne or Vauxhall, with a primitive shooting gallery, a skittle
alley, and switchback. It was open all day for students to promenade
after lectures and make their addresses to the _grisettes_ working under
the trees. Its dances were very simple affairs; a few lamps and Chinese
lanterns, a small orchestra, a bar for lemonade and _galette_ were all
that the management supplied, the fun, of which they had enough and to
spare, being the dancers' contribution.
The Closerie des Lilas, though less generally popular than the
Chaumière, was more particularly associated with Bohemia than the
latter, for Murger, Vitu, Fauchéry, Théodore de Banville, and one or two
others of that set frequented it regularly, as a French writer[32] says,
"avec quelques comparses sans importance," among whom, no doubt, were
Mimi and Musette. This little dancing-hall began in 1838 as La
Chartreuse, being so called because it was on the site of the old
Carthusian monastery in the Rue d'Enfer. It was in some sort the
trial-ground for those of the fair sex who aspired to become stars of
the Prado and the Chaumière. Privat d'Anglemont has described it in a
rare pamphlet as it was in its early days under its extraordinary
manager, Carnaud. As La Chartreuse it was the most primitive kind of
_guingette_, the dancing-place being a large marquee, into which one
descended by a steep flight of steps. On the left were an orchestra and
_café_, and the only ornaments were nine plaster statues representing
the Muses, which were handily adapted for supporting petroleum lamps on
their arms. "There," says Privat d'Anglemont, "decent dress was not _de
rigueur_; one came as one liked, or rather as one could--the women in
bonnets or, in default of other adornments, covered simply by their
hair, and the men in blouses. It certainly was the most original bar in
Paris. It had a physiognomy of its own, strange, quaint, even a little
burlesque, but it existed. Its population was to be seen nowhere else;
it seemed to exist only at the Chartreuse and for the Chartreuse. Since
this ball disappeared its population has completely vanished."
[Illustration: La Guinguette]
Everything about the Chartreuse was original, not only the dancers and
the dances but the orchestra, the music, and the manager. Every kind of
"percussion" was added to the usual instruments, the noise of
money-bags, pistol shots, rows of explosive caps, resounding anvils, and
sheets of metal struck to represent the roaring of lions and tigers. All
the music was composed by Carnaud himself, who was conductor, first
violin, _restaurateur_, composer, and advertisement-writer in one. At
every special _fête_ he invented a new quadrille and a new exotic word
to describe it, such as "la fête des vendanges, quadrille
déchirancochicandard," or "l'hôtel des haricots,[33] avec accompaniments
de chaînes et de bruits de clefs, grand quadrille
exhilarandéliranchocnosophe."
Carnaud was succeeded by the famous Bullier, who altered the name to the
Closerie des Lilas and replaced the simple marquee by an Oriental palace
with a garden, Moorish pavilions, billiard tables, swings, and a
pistol-shooting gallery. A decent orchestra was installed and four
admirable waiters. With these improvements the balls, held every Sunday,
Monday, and Thursday, began to attract the _beau monde_ of the Quartier
Latin, and several of the dancers gained the coveted honour of a
_sobriquet_. There were Jeanne la Juive, for instance, Maria les Yeux
Bleus, Joséphine Pochardinette, and the literary Clémentine Pomponnette,
who used to show her admirers a farce she had written "dans les loisirs
que lui laissait l'amour." This transformation took place about 1847,
and it was then that one of the Moorish pavilions was especially
consecrated to Murger's Bohemian set. It is needless to say that the
name of Bullier still remains in the Bal Bullier of to-day.
One other popular ball must be mentioned, the Bal Mabille, which for so
long was one of the sights of Paris. This public ball was instituted by
Mabille, a dancing-master, in the Champs Elysées. The price of entrance
at first was fifty centimes, with an extra fee for each quadrille, and
in 1843 the whole of the dances were included in an initial sum of two
francs. The fame of the Bal Mabille was due first to its polkas, a dance
which became the rage at the time, and secondly to the most celebrated
of polka-dancers, Elise Sergent, known as La Reine Pomaré. Her dancing
was a revelation of fire and passion which won her recognition on the
very first evening of her appearance. Crowds came to see her dance,
articles were devoted to her by the journalists of the day, and Privat
d'Anglemont wrote a sonnet to her. Paris, in fact, went mad about her,
and she had many lovers, among whom, it is said, was Alphonse Karr,
which brings her into some kind of connexion with Bohemia. But Reine
Pomaré and her rival, Céleste Mogador, who also made her _début_ at
Mabille, were too much on the plane of _grandes cocottes_ for any real
relation with the Bohemia of their day. They might have danced for love
at the Impasse du Doyenné, but Schaunard and Marcel had nothing to
offer them to compare with the splendour of the _viveurs_ which was laid
at their feet. Bohemia found its pleasure at less expense and with less
restraint in the company of Mimi and Musette in a Moorish pavilion at
the Closerie des Lilas, where Colline's bad puns found appreciative
listeners and Schaunard's _pas de fascination_ were greeted with
rapturous applause.
XII
THE PARIS OF BOHEMIA
_Paris sombre et fumeux,_
_Où déjà, points brillants au front de maison ternes,_
_Luisent comme des yeux des milliers de lanternes;_
_Paris avec ses toits déchiquetés, ses tours_
_Qui ressemblent de loin à des cous de vautours,_
_Et ses clochers aigus à flèche dentelée,_
_Comme un peigne mordant la nue échevelée._
THÉOPHILE GAUTIER
The last chapter was devoted to certain accidental adjuncts of _la vie
de Bohème_ by way of general illustration, though they consisted of
simple amusements common not only to the Parisians of the day but to
civilized society of most epochs. The present chapter, which I have
reserved till the last, might logically have claimed an earlier place,
for its subject, as I have already pointed out, is distinctive of the
society in which Bohemia played an important part. Bohemia, of course,
neither monopolized Paris nor even a portion of it, but the Paris of
Bohemia's florescence and decline was a unique background for these
events, a necessary condition, though temporary in itself, which it
would pass the bounds of human possibility to reconstruct. Interesting
as it is to imagine correctly the dress of the Bohemian and his
mistress, the places where they dined, or the gardens where they danced,
the re-presentation of the city where they lived, so small, so
sensitively vibrant, so congested, so hopelessly out of date, except for
a few new patches, so dirty, so noisy, and so picturesque, ranks far
higher in importance. Yet, though I might have put this chapter first, I
choose to put it last because I cannot hope that it will be appreciated
by any but those who have already some memory of Paris and on whom the
spell of its fascination has, at least, been lightly cast. The general
description of Bohemian life may provide some entertainment to those who
know not Paris; for their sake I have sought not to break the general
interest. My story is now told, and I am free to call those who have
breathed, even for a moment, the quick breeze off the Seine or seen the
sunshine strike through the trees in the Tuileries Gardens, to stay with
me for a last look back upon that city of beauty and adventure which
calls, like the East, to those who love it. To have gained even a
superficial view of modern Paris, to have caught some of her accents and
contrasts--the radiance of the Bois de Boulogne, the vivacity of the
boulevards, the _cafés_ overflowing on to the pavements, the view from
her bridges, the differences between the two banks, the mean alleys
lurking mischievously at the back of splendid thoroughfares, the
broadest omnibuses comically invading the narrowest streets--is to have
formed some general notion with which an earlier Paris can be compared.
And with a reader who has penetrated deeper, whose nostrils yearn for
her indescribably subtle perfume, who knows the different aspects of her
streets from days of diligent tramping, who has seen her river blending
with her sky in a hundred harmonies, who has felt her moods and her
humours, finding like a true lover her blemishes as adorable as her
perfections, who has recognized her past in her present, and who, though
a stranger, has divined in ecstasy the wild throb of her romantic
heart--with him my task is easier still. Such a one will already have
guessed the intoxication of the air which a Roger de Beauvoir delicately
breathed, when Paris, her spirit newly quickened with the exhilaration
of a potent elixir, was yet unspoiled by modern cosmopolitan vulgarity,
and her inner soul shone out, through all her deformities and
incongruities, with a gay and unmasked confidence.
She did not shine before an unseeing generation, for the Parisians of
the Romantic age adored their city, dandies, Bohemians, and _bourgeois_
alike, all passionately conscious of their privileged citizenship,
though they could admit with Maxime du Camp that under Louis Philippe
she was "one of the dirtiest, the most tortuous, and the most unhealthy"
in the world. As they lived in her, so they wrote of her--with pride.
Victor Hugo did her great homage in "Notre Dame de Paris" and "Les
Misérables," Eugène Sue in "Les Mystères de Paris," and Paul de Kock in
all his work, but these achievements appear as slight and partial
sketches beside the wonderful and penetrating picture which Balzac drew
of Paris--at once the background and the protagonist--in his greatest
novels. Balzac, besides giving us a world, gave us a great city. Minute
as were the studies he made of the provinces, they are nothing to the
picture that he drew of the city which he regarded as the brain of the
whole world, the leader of its civilization. He gloated over Paris as a
scientist gloats over an interesting organism that he has first observed
and then skilfully dissected. He had dissected Paris even on the
threshold of his career. In some of his early stories, like a brilliant
young surgeon fresh from his researches, he overweights the matter in
hand with the results of the laboratory. "Ferragus" begins with a long
comparison of the streets of Paris; "La Fille aux Yeux d'Or" with a
marvellous tirade on the restless race for money and pleasure that is
run by all classes, a tirade which, probing as it does all the strata of
society, is an epitome, in some sort, of all his work. Paris, that small
_enceinte_ which was enclosed within what is now the second line of
_boulevards_, still innocent of the reforming hand of Haussmann,
becoming rich, but hardly yet industrial, not yet the pleasure-ground
of all the world, destitute of railways, squalid, ill-kept, nevertheless
was transformed by his wonderful imagination into the type of all great
cities, which will ever remain true. To him she was "le plus délicieux
des monstres," as he says in "Ferragus." "Mais, ô Paris," he cries, "qui
n'a pas admiré tes sombres paysages, tes échappées de lumière, tes
culs-de-sac profonds et silencieux; qui n'a pas entendu tes murmures,
entre minuit et deux heures du matin, ne connaît encore rien de ta vraie
poésie, ni de tes bizarres et larges contrastes. Il est un petit nombre
de gens ... qui dégustent leur Paris.... Pour ceux-là Paris est triste
ou gai, laid ou beau, vivant ou mort; pour eux Paris est une créature;
chaque homme, chaque fraction de maison est un lobe du tissu cellulaire
de cette grande courtisane de laquelle ils connaissent parfaitement la
tête, le cœur et les mœurs fantasques. Aussi ceux-là sont les
amants de Paris...."
There are a happy few to whom it would be enough to say that the Paris
of Bohemia was the Paris of Balzac--such devotees, I mean, as have
thought it worth while to pay attention to that accurate topography in
which Balzac took so great a pride, following it in a contemporary map
so that, in their walks about the modern city, streets and houses
incessantly recall his characters and his scenes. But life is short for
such agreeable exercises, so this chapter must inadequately proceed. I
have already touched on the social implications of Louis Philippe's
Paris, its smallness and its diminutive population, and my present aim
is simply to present more fully its external aspect, which changed so
quickly after 1848. The rapidity of the change may well be judged by a
passage in Théophile Gautier's article[34] on Paul de Kock, published in
1870. No apology is necessary for transcribing it:
"Those [he says] who were born after the Revolution of February 24,
1848, or a little before, cannot imagine what the Paris was like in
which the heroes and heroines of Paul de Kock move; it resembled
Paris of to-day so little that I sometimes ask myself, on seeing
these broad streets, these great boulevards, these vast squares,
these interminable lines of monumental houses, these splendid
quarters which have replaced the market-gardens, if it is really
the city in which I passed my childhood. Paris, which is on the way
to become the metropolis of the world, was then only the capital of
France. One met French people, even Parisians, in its streets. No
doubt foreigners came there, as always, to find pleasure and
instruction; but the means of transport were difficult, the ideal
of rapidity did not rise above the classic mail-coach, and the
locomotive, even in the form of a chimera, was not yet taking shape
in the mists of the future. The physiognomy of the population had
not therefore sensibly changed.
"The provinces stayed at home much more than now, only coming to
Paris on urgent business. One could hear French spoken on that
boulevard which was then called the Boulevard de Gand and which is
now called the Boulevard des Italiens. One frequently saw a type
which is becoming rare and which, for me, is the pure Parisian
type--white skin, pink cheeks, brown hair, light grey eyes, a
well-shaped figure of moderate stature, and, in the women, a
delicate plumpness hiding small bones. Olive complexions and black
hair were rare; the South had not yet invaded us with its
passionately pale tints and its furious gesticulations. The general
aspect of faces was therefore rosy and smiling, with an air of
health and good humour. Complexions now considered _distingués_
would at that time have caused suspicions of illness.
"The city was relatively very small, or at least its activity was
restricted within certain limits that were seldom passed. The
plaster elephant in which Gavroche found shelter raised its
enormous silhouette on the Place de la Bastille, and seemed to
forbid passers-by to go any further. The Champs Elysées, as soon as
night fell, became more dangerous than the plain of Marathon; the
most adventurous stopped at the Place de la Concorde. The quarter
of Notre Dame de Lorette only included vague plots of ground or
wooden fences. The church was not built, and one could see from the
boulevard the Butte Montmartre, with its windmills and its
semaphore waving its arms on the top of the old tower. The Faubourg
Saint-Germain went early to bed, and its solitude was but rarely
disturbed by a tumult of students over a play at the Odéon.
Journeys from one quarter to another were less frequent; omnibuses
did not exist, and there were sensible differences of feature,
costume, and accent between a native of the Rue du Temple and an
inhabitant of the Rue Montmartre."