his chat with the _sommelier_. He tells him with some fervor that he is
proud to say that when he was eighteen he dined on a sou’s worth of
bread on the stones of the Place de la Bastille. “Men of that time were
ready to begin at the foot of the ladder,” he continues, puffing at his
cigar, “but nowadays our sons, who see us in comfort, want to obtain
money and luxuries without going through the mill.”
“_Par ici! monsieur_,” says Étienne, and he leads the way up a carved
stairway to the floor above, past little _cabinets particuliers_ whose
cozy interiors are marvels of good taste. Here is one with walls of
rich brocade of the time of Louis XVI. Another is in early French, with
its adaptation of Chinese ornaments. Another is paneled in ebony inlaid
with mother-of-pearl; still another in pale lilac brocade and teakwood.
Each of these private rooms has its serving pantry across a narrow
hallway where the linen and glass and silver are kept spotless, in
readiness at a moment’s notice. A superb private stairway in white
marble and stained glass connects this portion of the restaurant with a
dignified courtyard leading out to a gray little side street. But these
are the little rooms.
[Illustration]
There is, besides, a great banquet hall in medieval Gothic that might
have been carried bodily out of some feudal castle in Touraine with a
carved minstrel gallery, a superb ceiling and rare stained glass. Here
wedding breakfasts and dinners are given with cotillions to follow. And
there are two other salons paneled in rare carving and inlaid woods. At
the bottom of another stairway Étienne directs me across the mosaic
floor of a spacious hall and into a grotto-like cave. Here is another
dining-room. It is resplendent in stalactites with green ferns growing
from walls of moss-grown rocks and a cascade talking to itself and
purling into a green pool.
Music? no, indeed. People who come here have too good a time to need to
be waltzed through the soup or polkaed through the entrée.
It is four o’clock and they are laying the round table in the center of
the grotto with twenty covers. It might be for a state dinner in the
presence of a king, so perfectly is the table appointed and in such
rare taste. A bed of violet orchids forms the center of the table.
I look up and catch sight of the venerable Monsieur Marguery on the
stairway, peering interestedly into the room to watch the laying of the
service. He has suddenly entered through some hidden door—a panel in
the wall which Étienne afterwards shows me. “He is everywhere, as you
see,” said Étienne, quietly.
[Illustration: LE GÉRANT
Drawn by Sancha]
“Ah! it is you, monsieur,” says Monsieur Marguery, cheeringly, as he
approaches. “And have you found this grotto room charming with the pale
orchids and the cool water? You know in summer,” he continues, “it is
quite as cool here as in the Bois”—and he might have added, quite as
beautiful, for this fairy corner needed only the setting of wit and
beauty to make it a paradise.
“And you see, my friend,” he continues, “you have seen only the
upstairs of my restaurant. Come between seven and eight some evening
and I will put you in a corner of my kitchen when it is busiest,” and
he adds, with smiling good humor, “I won’t warn them you are coming.”
I was the guest of the chef in the Marguery kitchen at eight o’clock
one Saturday evening. There were a dozen wedding banquets going on
upstairs, and scores of hidden _dîners particuliers_, while the
restaurant, screened from the kitchen by a swinging door, was filled to
overflowing.
I passed through this door and met my host with the _cordon bleu_, who
looked more like the director of a railroad than a cook. He placed me
in a safe corner connecting the meat room and the kitchen, from which I
could observe and still be out of the way of the rush, for the famous
cuisine was as busy as a stage during a spectacle.
A long counter ran the length of the room, serving as a barrier against
hurrying waiters. Back of this counter lay the culinary plant. Five
great ranges were in full blast.
At one a cloud of steam rose from some entrée, on the second range a
great copper saucepan was suddenly lifted and the fire beneath it sent
up a lurid flare which went slipping up the hooded chimney.
The room was in a state of bedlam with the cries of meat cooks,
vegetable cooks, soup cooks and waiters hurrying for their orders. The
system beneath all this was perfect.
[Illustration: THE VEGETABLE COOK
Drawn by Sancha]
A waiter sprang through the swinging door shouting his order. He never
was forced to repeat it, so alert were the staff of cooks that they
seemed to have been awaiting him.
“_Un Chateaubriand aux pommes!_” cries a garçon.
“_Un Chateaubriand aux pommes!_” corroborates a chief cook.
Instantly a man dodges out of the meat room, a second later the steak
is sizzling over the fire, the vegetable cook stands ready with his
potatoes, a fourth prepares the sauce, a fifth attends to the plates,
and the sixth looks after the garnishing of the dish.
“I am glad you find it interesting,” said my host the chef, as he
joined me for a moment’s rest.
I bowed my compliments.
“And is this the only kitchen for so large an establishment?” I
ventured, in surprise.
“Yes, the only one; we do it all here. It is the organization which
counts, not the space. With these five ranges and this force of men we
are competent to handle as many dinners as come under the roof.”
The chef’s eye seemed everywhere. When the rush was over, his private
coupé would call for him, but at present he was on guard.
I marveled at this man’s memory. What a catalog of sauces, each one
containing scores of ingredients, he must carry in his head! What a
list of dishes, each one prepared in a dozen different ways! I imparted
to him the fact that my culinary skill was limited to boiling an egg,
and he laughed good-humoredly, his intelligent face, with its white
mustache, glowing under his white cap in the glare of a nearby fire.
“Precisely, monsieur, but you see it is the same in every profession;
one must learn the minute parts which tend to make something which in
itself pleases, whether it be through the mind, the pocket, or the
stomach,” and, asking me to excuse him for a moment, he disappeared in
the direction of a cloud of mushroom steam to overlook an entrée.
A cook near me was busy with the final sizzle of a duck _en casserole_.
The man was an artist in the way he stirred his sauce. Even in the very
handling of the burnished copper _batterie_ of saucepans about him.
I fully expected this culinary prestidigitator would produce the lady’s
ring from the duck he had just finished cooking and discover the rabbit
in my overcoat pocket, but the duck was smothered so quickly in a rich
brown sauce, with a dash of this and a pinch of that from the magician,
and finally thrust for a final magic touch over the crackling blaze,
that, before I could guess what might happen next, it was on its way to
some _cabinet particulier_, where a quiet little man with gray hair was
waiting to carve it.
It was he who won the grand prize for his skill in getting sixty slices
from a single duck. He has quite the air of a dignified surgeon who has
been called in consultation.
He carves with a plain knife sharpened upon the back of a plate. The
duck seems to fall apart under his expert touch. He mashes into a paste
the liver and heart, pouring over the whole the red blood gravy.
_Voilà!_ It is done; and, passing the first dish to one of the group of
garçons at his elbow who have been watching him, he bows and leaves the
room. The group of waiters about him are deeply interested in this
object lesson, and it is this willingness to learn which makes in Paris
so many good _garçons de café_.
The famous old Maison Dorée has closed its doors. The business of this
celebrated restaurant had fallen off so seriously that its death was
but a question of days. Paris had deserted it in its old age and dined
elsewhere.
Many of the waiters, who had spent their lifetime beneath its roof,
hoped against hope, and continued to serve the few habitués who
remained faithful to the end.
Occasionally a party of strangers would open the door, and, finding the
restaurant deserted, close it apologetically and go on their way to a
gayer place.
[Illustration: THE MAGICIAN]
In encouraging moments like these the veteran waiters ceremoniously
took their places and the dignified _maître d’hôtel_ advanced to greet
the newcomers bravely, as if the ruin of the old house were not an open
secret. There is something pathetic about the death of an establishment
like the Maison Dorée.
How much gaiety it has seen in its lifetime!
How faithfully it has cheered those who entered its doors!
Here the _vie Parisienne_ that Grévin and Cham drew so inimitably, came
to dine in the old days; the courtezans of Balzac; the belles and beaux
of the Empire.
Just as the Maison Dorée lived in thoroughbred dignity so did it die.
Yesterday morning the shades of the windows were drawn down. The end
had come. A simple card on the door bore the words:
“LE RESTAURANT
EST FERMÉ.”
And one felt like laying a wreath on its threshold.
[Illustration: THE VERSEUR
Drawn by Sancha]
On Saturdays the Café de la Cascade, in the Bois, is taken possession
of by _bourgeois_ wedding parties, with brides in white satin gowns and
grooms and their friends in dress-suits, which they had donned early in
the morning and in which they have sung and cheered, and drunk the
bride’s health and the groom’s health, and that of _les belles soeurs_
and _les petits_ nephews and all the innumerable _enfants_, cousins and
_cousines_, comrades and _amis_ connected by blood, marriage or
friendship with the happy pair.
No wonder that by midnight, after such a day of continuous festivity,
the poor bride is wild-eyed, flushed, exhausted and demoralized! For
this _bourgeois_ wedding had started at ten A. M. with the civil
ceremony at the City Hall, the civil wedding being the only one legally
recognized in France. From the hall the party proceeded to the church,
where most brides insist on going after the civil ceremony. Here occurs
another long function, including an address by the priest or minister.
Then the bridesmaids, accompanied by the men of honor, _garçons
d’honneur_, of which there are three classes, make two collections
among the assemblage: one for the poor and the other for the church.
This procession is headed by a gorgeously dressed major-domo, “Le
Suisse,” who pounds the floor with his heavy baton as he strides
solemnly through the aisles warning everyone to get their donations
ready. The collections referred to are made either in a butterfly net,
which discreetly hides the sous from view, or in purses made to match
the gowns of the bridesmaids and carried ostensibly open for the
expected louis.
There are several classes of weddings, just as there are several
classes of funerals, their magnificence progressing in proportion to
the money paid. You can be married at the little altar or the big one,
enter under a spangled canopy at the front door or by an unadorned
modest side one.
Now comes another ordeal for the bride; having gone to the sacristy
after the ceremony, she is obliged to shake hands with everyone present
and be kissed on both cheeks by cousins, friends or even acquaintances.
Then the procession of carriages drives up, each being given its
precedence in line. They are filled and start off for the wedding
breakfast at the restaurant. This means a well-to-do wedding; many
couples can afford only one huge stage which alternately serves in
going to and from the races, while others go on foot, often six or
seven arm-in-arm romping through the streets, singing or stopping at
some little _buvette_ for a glass of wine. The poor bride walks on and
on, holding her satin train. She is half exhausted, but is expected to
be bright and gay. Poor victim, the day has only begun for her!
After the wedding breakfast at the restaurant, trains are taken to some
nearby country place like St. Cloud, or carriages to the Café de la
Cascade. Here occurs the indispensable dinner, a feast of uproarious
_camaraderie_, where dishes succeed dishes, and where each one is
expected to be rollicking and witty and sing his song. In accordance
with an old custom, to the first man of honor is allotted the privilege
of trying to steal the garter of the bride.
The dance which follows this dinner lasts until morning, and lucky are
the bride and groom if they can escape by midnight.
But mild indeed are these _bourgeois_ weddings of the city compared
with those of the well-to-do peasants! These include festivities which
last three days, most of which time is spent at table, where beef is
followed by veal, veal by mutton, mutton by rabbit, rabbit by chicken,
and chicken by pork, and so on through the list of viands. This
continuous feast is only made possible by consuming from time to time a
stiff glass of applejack.
“_Vive la mariée!_” cry a dozen overjoyous ones in front of a café at
St. Cloud as my _voiture_ tries to pass. My _cocher_ grins and cracks
his whip. The best man, a soldier, the groom and a dozen others, noisy
with the sound wine of Touraine, link arms in front of my rawboned
steed, yelling:
“You cannot pass, monsieur, unless you cry _Vive la mariée!_”
“_Vive la mariée!_” I cry, loudly as I can, in my ineradicable accent.
There is a welcoming shout from the wedding party. The bride throws me
a kiss. The little cousins and _cousines_ and the _beau-frère_ and
_belle-mère_ wave their handkerchiefs in acknowledgment, a dozen
tumblers of red wine are offered to me, and as many are thrust at the
fat _cocher_ who is now waving his glazed hat in the air with
enthusiasm.
“_Vive la République! Vive la mariée! Vive la France!_” come from a
score of throats as I am allowed to proceed. As we rattle up a crooked
street, the din of the festivity grows fainter and fainter in the
distance, now I hear faintly the indistinct blare of the band playing
below for the dance, and now and then a cheer, stronger than the
others, floats up from the far-away café: “_Vive la mariée!_”
Dining in the open air is brought to its perfection in the Bois de
Boulogne.
The Chalet du Touring Club, at the entrance of the Bois, is a popular
rendezvous for the bicycling Mimis and the Faustines, and their
admirers. At the _apéritif_ hour in the afternoon, this cosmopolitan
café under the trees is crowded with a mixed assemblage. It is an
excellent place in which to breakfast well and at a moderate price.
The Pavillon Chinois, with its picturesque pagoda-like roof, is
frequented by a richer class.
During the season, between five and seven, all of smart Paris may be
seen at the Pavillon d’Armenonville. At this hour the tables in the
garden are filled with pretty women in chic toilettes, accompanied by
faultlessly dressed gentlemen whose bank accounts have managed thus far
to survive.
By six, the scene resembles a garden party. There is a mixture of
nature and artifice, of exquisite toilettes, of gay flowers blooming in
beds under the shadows of sturdy trees up in whose branches the birds
flutter and sing. One’s ears are filled with babble of voices and the
soft laughter of those whose life for the moment is happy. The sun has
sunk in an opalescent haze, its rays reflect upon the glass of the
pavilion and the edge of the tiny kiosks whence come the chatter and
laughter of some jolly _partie carrée_ still at table over a late
_déjeuner_. Above the hum drones the rhythm of the Tziganes; their
violins cry in some plaintive gipsy song. Now the strings rush into the
most seductive of Viennese waltzes, melting away, to begin afresh in
some mad Hungarian czardas.
Smart turnouts and little private victorias with tinkling bells are
constantly arriving and departing. Now there is a sound of prancing
hoofs and the clink of harness at the entrance of the garden, and in
rumbles a break perfectly driven by a well-groomed gentleman posed in
faultless style on the box seat. By his side sits a Parisienne of
Parisiennes—from the glossy undulations of her black hair to the tips
of her tiny patent leather boots, both of which are now occupied in
daintily descending the steps of the break. She is a famous beauty who
sings at one of the _cafés concerts_, quite young, with pretty white
teeth and an olive skin.
[Illustration: ENTRANCE OF THE CAFÉ DE MADRID]
[Illustration: THE GARDEN OF THE CAFÉ DE MADRID]
Her companion leaves his turnout to the care of his grooms, and the
break with its shining red wheels rumbles away in the direction of the
carriage shed. The charming brunette is radiant from the drive; they
have been nearly to Poissy and back. She will now have a _gaufrette_
and a _coupe de fruits au champagne_, and the gentleman who drove so
cleverly a cigarette and a long brandy and soda. This dainty Parisienne
insists on preparing this “_drôle de boisson anglaise_” herself, and,
with a rippling laugh, puts in the ice and the brandy and then the
soda, and, as a final touch, in a spirit of deviltry, adds a cherry
from her own _coupe_, for which archness she is scolded by her
companion, to whom she blows a kiss in return.
[Illustration: A RESTAURANT ON THE CHAMPS-ÉLYSÉES]
At eight, the Pavillon d’Armenonville will be brilliant with a throng
of diners—men in spotless shirt-fronts and women in toilets of lace
and jewels—and crisp notes of the Bank of France will change hands for
rich food and sparkling wine. The season for these delightful retreats
of the Bois being short, the rents for them are exorbitant, and so the
_monde_ must pay the fiddler accordingly.
At the end of the Bois is the Chalet du Cycle, another restaurant with
a superb garden flaming in flowers, and dotted with cozy thatched
kiosks like the huts of some jungle village and dotted with tables
shaded by huge red umbrellas. Here at the _apéritif_ hour the crowd
comes _en bicyclette_ and automobile, and at night the hurrying waiters
serve parties dining cozily in the glow of shaded candles. The Chalet
du Cycle is a charming place in which to breakfast some sunny morning
with the Seine gliding close by under the trees.
Another segment of fairy-land, even more exquisite in its _mise en
scène_, is the Café de Madrid. Here a low, rambling, half-timbered
house forms a courtyard which is as brilliant at night with the _haut
monde_ at dinner. Here, too, as at Armenonville, the carriages,
entering under a gateway smothered in trailing vines, drive in past the
tables. Everywhere about you there are flowers—banks of geraniums and
fragrant roses. When you have dined, you can turn your armchair and
watch the beauty about you and the victorias coming and going.
It is characteristic for Parisians to sit for hours over dinner. The
Café de Madrid at night resembles closely a garden party given at the
château of some private estate. It is the absence of the feeling of
publicity that makes it so charming.
And after all this restful luxury there is the cool Bois to drive in,
through forest alleys with the smell of the fresh woods all about and
the sparkle of stars overhead.
Who will ever tell the history of this famous playground of rich and
poor? How many of its silent trees have sheltered and kept secret the
romances of the world! How much honor has been risked for the sake of
cruel, triumphant women whose hearts were tender in proportion to their
needs! And how many real loves have sought it as a refuge!
If all this is sad, turn back in your drive towards the sparkling
lights of the city, to Paris who is now wearing all her jewels. Some of
her strings of diamonds are glittering through the vista of black trees
ahead—or are these only the footlights of the great stage whereon so
many comedies, so many tragedies, and so many light farces, have been
played?
[Illustration]
Chapter Three
SOME “RISQUÉ” CURTAINS WITH SERIOUS LININGS
[Illustration]
Snug in the corner of an ancient alley called the Cité d’Antin is the
“Théâtre de la Robinière.” Its official address is “3 (bis) Rue La
Fayette,” that is, you are requested to enter there and, following your
nose around the corner, grope your way in the obscurity over the
cobbles and make a second turn to the right. At last a green lantern
over the doorway glimmers ahead of you. It is the Robinière now
installed in what was once the Théâtre Mondain.
The Robinière once existed on the first platform of the Tour Eiffel;
since then its proprietor, Monsieur François Robin, has moved it to its
permanent address, all of which speaks well for its success. It is
filled nightly with Parisians of the vicinity.
Much of the success of this tiny theater is due to the indefatigable
effort of its director, Monsieur Robin, who literally passes his life
in his playhouse, assisted in its management by his wife. These two,
without help, without even a secretary, run the theater, often working
from early morning until long past midnight, writing their own posters,
watching the rehearsals of their excellent small company (in which
Madame plays), attending to press notices, receiving authors and
artists, and, in short, making a success of this old “Salle d’Antin”
where all its preceding owners met with ruin.
There is nothing elaborate about this stuffy little bandbox of a
theater. Its narrow auditorium is plain, dingy and old-fashioned. A
piano serves for the orchestra, but the comedies are clever and the
acting excellent—two things which Parisians demand first of all.
The Robinière is but one of a number of miniature theaters in Paris
beginning at eight-thirty or nine o’clock, and producing each night
four short realistic comedies, often with some clever _chansonnier_
singing his creations during the _entr’actes_. No two of these theaters
are alike, and in all of them there is good acting; even in the
smallest of these so-called _bouis-bouis_ you will find the actors to
be men and women who have worked patiently through the National
Conservatoire studying their art under the best masters.
Fortunately in France the woman who has become suddenly notorious
through her divorce or the latest scandal is not snapped up by
theatrical managers as a star before the ink is dry on the Sunday
papers detailing her disgrace. In Paris there are music hall _revues_
to receive these meteors when they fall and where they may parade their
beauty and their clothes, or their lack of them, with the rest of the
_demi-mondaines_.
During the intervals between the plays at the Robinière a single aged
“_garçon de café_” takes the orders for the refreshments in the cold,
stuffy little “_fumoir_,” while behind the bar one of the leading
ladies of the comedy graciously assists him by opening the bottled beer
and attending to the drinks, very much as a good-natured woman would
help by cutting the cake at a children’s party.
When the bell rings for the curtain Madame hurries out of her apron and
back to her part in “Les Deux Jarretières,” a farce so replete with
amusing complications that the small audience is kept in a continual
titter of good humor. In the comedy following, entitled “Le Sofa de
Monsieur Dupré,” the story is even more simple. A respectable widow,
Madame Dupré, living alone in her old age, is attended by her maid
Pauline, whom she has come to regard as an indispensable companion.
Pauline makes the old lady comfortable in her favorite chair, tucks
under her feet her foot-warmer, and, leaving her mistress, goes out to
post a letter.
In the interval which elapses before her return a neighbor calls and
kindly informs Madame Dupré that the indispensable Pauline has been the
mistress of Madame Dupré’s revered husband. When Pauline returns,
Madame, in her indignation, turns her out of the house. The foot-warmer
grows cold, the fire in the grate goes out, a thousand little comforts
have not been attended to, and the old lady decides to send for Pauline
and forgive her, preferring that her few remaining years should pass in
peace and comfort.
Quite different is the Théâtre de la Bodinière, founded by Monsieur
Bodin, the former secretary of the historic Comédie Française. The
Bodinière is devoted to interpreting the work of young authors by
celebrated artists. It is a theater where respectable _jeunes filles_
may be taken in safety. The plays are as harmless as the Rollo books.