1855.
Thackeray's family in Paris.--Madame Mohl.--Her husband's encouraging
theory about learning languages.--Mr. Scholey.--His friend, William
Wyld.--An Indian in Europe.--An Italian adventuress.--Important meeting
with an American.--Its consequences.--I go to a French hotel.--People at
the _table d'hôte_.--M. Victor Ouvrard.--His claim on the Emperor.--M.
Gindriez.--His family.--His eldest daughter.
Captain Turnbull knew some English people in the colony at Paris, so he
introduced me to two or three houses, and if my object had been to speak
English instead of French, I might have gone into the Anglo-Parisian
society of that day. One house was interesting to me, that of
Thackeray's mother, Mrs. Carmichael Smith. Her second husband, the
major, was still living, and she was a vigorous and majestic elderly
lady. She talked to me about her son, and his pursuit of art, but I do
not remember that she told me anything that the public has not since
learned from other sources. I soon discovered that she had very decided
views on the subject of religion, and that she looked even upon
Unitarians with reprobation, especially as they might be infidels in
disguise. My own subsequent experience of the world has led me to
perceive that, when infidels wear a cloak, they generally put on a more
useful and fashionable one than that of Unitarianism--they assume the
religion that can best help them to get on in the world. However, I was
not going to argue such a point with a lady who was considerably my
senior, and I was constantly in expectation of being examined about my
own religious views, knowing that it would be impossible for me to give
satisfactory answers. I therefore decided that it would be better to
keep out of Mrs. Carmichael Smith's way, and learned afterwards that she
had a reputation for asserting the faith that was in her, and for
expressing her disapproval of everybody who believed less. For my part,
I confess to a cowardly dread of elderly religious Englishwomen. They
have examined me many a time, and I have never come out of the ordeal
with satisfaction, either to them or to myself.
Thackeray's three daughters were in Paris at that time. I remember Miss
Thackeray quite distinctly. She struck me as a young lady of uncommon
sense and penetration, and it was not at all a surprise to me when she
afterwards became distinguished in literature. Thackeray himself was in
London, so I did not meet him.
I went occasionally in the evening to see that remarkable woman, Madame
Mohl. She was the oddest-looking little figure, with her original
notions about toilette, to which she was by no means indifferent. In the
year 1855 she still considered herself a very young woman, and indeed
was so, relatively to the great age she was destined to attain. After I
had been about six weeks in Paris, her husband gave me the first bit of
really valuable encouragement about speaking French that I had received
from any one.
"Can you follow what is said by others?"
"Yes, easily."
"Very well; then you may be free from all anxiety about speaking--you
will certainly speak in due time."
An eccentric but thoroughly manly and honest Englishman, named Scholey,
was staying at the Hôtel du Louvre at the same time with Captain
Turnbull. He was an old bachelor, and looked upon marriage as a snare;
but I learned afterwards that he had been in love at an earlier period
of his existence, and that the engagement had been broken off by the
friends of the young lady, because Scholey combined the two great
defects of honesty and thinking for himself in religious matters. So
long as people prefer sneaks and hypocrites to straightforward
characters like Scholey, such men are likely to be kept out of polite
society. A dishonest man will profess any opinion that you please, or
that is likely to please you, so long as it will advance his interest.
If, therefore, a lover runs the risk of breaking off a marriage rather
than turn hypocrite, it is clear that his sense of honor has borne a
crucial test.
"I had not loved thee, dear, so much,
Loved I not honor more!"
Scholey spoke French fluently, and, as he lived on the edge of England,
he often crossed over into France. I deeply regret not to have seen much
more of him. One of his acts of kindness, in 1855, was to take me to see
his old friend William Wyld, the painter, with whom I soon became
acquainted, and who is still one of my best and most attached friends.
Wyld lived and worked at that time in the same studio, in the Rue
Blanche, where he is still living and working in this present year
(1887), an octogenarian with the health and faculties of a man of fifty.
There was, in those days, an Indian staying at the Hôtel du Louvre, who
spoke English very well, but not French, so he was working at French
diligently with a master. This Indian was always called "the Prince" in
the hotel, though he was not a prince at all, and never pretended to be
one, but disclaimed the title whenever he had a chance. He lived rather
expensively, but without the least ostentation, and had very quiet
manners. He progressed well with his French studies, but did not stay
long enough to master the language. I was very much interested in him,
as a young man is in all that is strange and a little romantic. He
talked about India with great apparent frankness, saying, that naturally
the Indians desired national independence, but were too much divided
amongst themselves to be likely to attain it in our time. The Mutiny
broke out rather more than a year afterwards, and then I remembered
these conversations.
"The Prince" had some precious and curious things with him, which he
showed me; but his extreme dislike to attracting attention made him
dress quite plainly at all times, especially when he went out, which was
usually in a small brougham. Now and then an English official, from
India, or some military officer, would call upon him, and sometimes they
spoke Arabic or Hindostanee.
There was a lady at the hotel who has always remained in my memory as
one of the most extraordinary human beings I ever met. She was an
Italian, good-looking, yet neither pretty nor handsome, and, above all,
intelligent-looking. She dressed with studiously quiet taste, and used
to dine at the _table d'hôte_ with the rest of us. Besides her native
Italian, she spoke French and English with surprising perfection, and
her manners were so modest, so unexceptionable in every way, that no one
not in the secret would or could have suspected her real business, which
was to secure a succession of temporary husbands in the most respectable
manner, and without leaving the hotel. Her linguistic accomplishments
gave her a wide field of choice, and representatives of various nations
succeeded each other at irregular but never very long intervals. As I
shall be dead when this is published, perhaps it may be as well to say
that I was not one of the series. The reader may believe this when he
remembers that I was very economical for the time being, in consequence
of the loss on my book of poems. After a while my French teacher
informed me that "the Prince" had been caught by the fair Italian, who
established herself quietly somewhere in his suite of rooms. People did
not think this very wrong in a Mahometan, but after his departure from
Paris I happened to be studying some old Italian religious pictures in
the Louvre, and suddenly became aware that the same lady was looking at
a Perugino near me. This time she was with the Prince's successor,--a
most respectable English gentleman, and so far as absolute correctness
of outward appearance went, there was not a more presentable couple in
the galleries. It is my opinion that she succeeded more by her good
manners and quiet way of dressing than by anything else. She must have
been a real lady, who had fallen into that way of life in consequence of
a reverse of fortune.
After a while I came to the conclusion that I was too much with English
people at the Hôtel du Louvre, and an incident occurred which altered
the whole course of my future life, and is the reason why I am now
writing this book in France. I had been up late one night at the Opera,
and the next morning rose an hour later than usual. An American came
into the breakfast-room of the hotel and found me taking my chocolate.
Had I risen only half-an-hour earlier, I should have got through that
cup of chocolate and been already out in the streets before the American
came down. To have missed him would have been never to know my wife,
never even to see her face, as the reader will perceive in the sequel,
and the consequences of not marrying her would have been incalculable.
One of them is certain in my own mind. The modest degree of literary
reputation that makes this autobiography acceptable from a publisher's
point of view has been won slowly and arduously. It has been the result
of long and steadfast labor, and there is no merely personal motive that
would have ever made me persevere. Consequently, the existence of this
volume, and any meaning that now belongs to the name on its title page,
are due to my getting up late that morning in the Hôtel du Louvre.
The American and I being alone in the breakfast-room, and shamefully
late, were drawn together by the sympathy created by an identical
situation, and began to talk. He gave some reasons for being in Paris,
and I gave mine, which was to learn French. We then agreed that to get
accustomed to the use of a foreign language the first thing was to
surround ourselves with it entirely, and that this could not be done in
a cosmopolitan place like the Hôtel du Louvre.
"I have a French friend," the American said, "who could give you the
address of some purely French hotel where you would not hear a syllable
of English."
After breakfast he kindly took me to see this friend, who was a merchant
sitting in a pretty and tidy counting-house all in green and new oak.
The merchant spoke English (he had lived in America) and said, "I know
exactly what you want,--a quiet little French hotel in the Champs
Élysées where you can have clean rooms and a well-kept _table d'hôte_."
He wrote me the address on a card, and I went to look at the place.
The hotel, which exists no longer, was in the Avenue Montaigne. It
suited my tastes precisely, being extremely quiet, as it looked upon a
retired garden, and the rooms were perfectly clean. There was only one
story above the ground-floor, and here I took a bedroom and sitting-room
looking upon the garden. The house was kept by a widow who had very good
manners, and was, in her own person, a pleasant example of the
cleanliness that characterized the house. I learned afterwards (not from
herself) that she had been a lady reduced to poor circumstances by the
loss of her husband, and that her relations being determined that she
should do something for her living, had advanced some money on condition
that she set up an establishment. Having no experience in hotel-keeping,
she soon dissipated the little capital and lived afterwards on a
pittance in the strictest retirement.
When I took my rooms the small hotel seemed modestly prosperous. There
were about a dozen people at the _table d'hôte_, but they did not all
stay in the house. We had an officer in the army who had brought his
young provincial wife to Paris, a beautiful but remarkably unintelligent
person, and there were other people who might be taken as fair specimens
of the better French _bourgeoisie_. The most interesting person in the
hotel was an old white-headed gentleman whose name I may give, Victor
Ouvrard, a nephew of the famous Ouvrard who had been a great contractor
for military clothes and accoutrements under Napoleon I. Victor Ouvrard
was living on a pension given by a wealthy relation, and doing what he
could to push a hopeless claim on Napoleon III. for several millions of
francs due by the first Emperor to his uncle. I know nothing about the
great contractor except the curious fact that he remained in prison for
a long time rather than give up a large sum of money to the Government,
saying that by the mere sacrifice of his liberty he was earning a
handsome income. The nephew was what we call a gentleman, a model of
good manners and delicate sentiments. He would have made an excellent
character for a novelist, with his constantly expressed regret that he
had not a speciality.
"Si j'avais une spécialité!" he would say, as he tapped his snuff-box
and looked up wistfully to the ceiling--"si j'avais seulement une
spécialité!" He felt himself humiliated by the necessity for accepting
his little pension, and still entertained a chimerical hope that if the
Emperor did not restore the millions that were due, he might at least
bestow upon him enough for independence in his last years. There had
been some slight indications of a favorable turn in the Emperor's mind,
but they came to nothing. Meanwhile M. Victor Ouvrard lived on with
strict economy, brushing his old coats till they were threadbare, and
never allowing himself a vehicle in the streets of Paris. He was an
excellent walker, and we explored a great part of the town together on
foot. He kindly took patience with my imperfect French, and often gently
corrected me. The long conversations I had with M. Ouvrard on all sorts
of subjects, in addition to my daily lessons from masters, got me
forward with surprising rapidity. I observed a strict rule of abstinence
from English, never calling on any English people, with the single
exception of Mr. Wyld, the painter, nor reading any English books. When
M. Ouvrard was not with me in the streets of Paris, I got up
conversations with anybody who would talk to me, merely to get practice,
and in my own room I wrote French every day. Besides this, for physical
exercise, I became a pupil in a gymnasium, and worked there regularly.
One thing seemed strange in the way they treated us. When we were as hot
as possible with exercise, at the moment of leaving off and changing our
dress, men came to the dressing-rooms to sponge us with ice-cold water.
They said it did nothing but good, and certainly I never felt any bad
effects from the practice.
The ice-cold water reminds me of a ridiculous incident that occurred in
the garden of the Tuileries. M. Ouvrard and I were walking together in
the direction of the palace, when we saw a Frenchman going towards it
with his eyes fixed on the edifice. He was so entirely absorbed by his
architectural studies that he did not notice the basin just in front of
him. The stone lip of the basin projects a little on the land side, so
that if you catch your foot in it no recovery is possible. This he did,
and was thrown violently full length upon the thin ice, which offered
little resistance to his weight. The basin is not more than a yard deep,
so he got out and made his way along the Rue de Rivoli, his clothes
streaming on the causeway. Some spectators laughed, and others smiled,
but M. Ouvrard remained perfectly grave, saying that he could not
understand how people could be so unfeeling as to laugh at a misfortune,
for the man would probably take cold. Perhaps the reader thinks he had
no sense of humor. Yes, he had; he was very facetious and a hearty
laugher, but his delicacy of feeling was so refined that he could not
laugh at an accident that seemed to call rather for his sympathy.
A French gentleman who was staying at the hotel had a friend who came
occasionally to see him, and this friend was an amiable and interesting
talker. He had at the same time much natural politeness, and seeing that
I wanted to practise conversation he indulged me by patiently listening
to my bad French, and giving me his own remarkably pure and masterly
French in return. His name, I learned, was Gindriez, and he was living
in Paris by the tolerance of the Emperor. He had been Prefect of the
Doubs under the second Republic, and had resigned his prefecture as soon
as the orders emanating from the executive Government betrayed the
intention of establishing the Empire. As a member of the National
Assembly he had voted against the Bonapartists, and was one of the few
representatives who were concerting measures against Napoleon when he
forestalled them by striking first. After the _coup d'état_ M. Gindriez
fled to Belgium, but returned to Paris for family reasons, and was
permitted to remain on condition that he did not actively set himself in
opposition to the Empire. M. Gindriez looked upon his own political
career as ended, though he could have made it prosperous enough, and
even brilliant, by serving the power of the day. A more flexible
instrument had been put into his prefecture, a new legislative body had
been elected to give a false appearance of parliamentary government, and
an autocratic system had been established which M. Gindriez believed
destined to a prolonged duration, though he felt sure that it could not
last forever. Subsequent events have proved the correctness of his
judgment. The Empire outlasted the lifetime of M. Gindriez, but it did
not establish itself permanently.
It was a peculiarity of mine in early life (which I never thought about
at the time, but which has become evident in the course of this
autobiography) to prefer the society of elderly men. In London I had
liked to be with Mackay, Robinson the engraver, and Leslie, all
gray-headed men, and in Paris I soon acquired a strong liking for M.
Ouvrard, M. Gindriez, and Mr. Wyld. They were kind and open, and had
experience, therefore they were interesting; my uncles in Lancashire
had, no doubt, been kind in their own way, that is, in welcoming me to
their houses, but they were both excessively reserved. Being at that
time deeply interested in France, I was delighted to find a man like M.
Gindriez who could give me endless information. His chief interest in
life lay in French politics; art and literature being for him subjects
of secondary concern, but by no means of indifference, and the plain
truth is that he had a better and clearer conception of art than I
myself had in those days, or for long afterwards. There was also for me
a personal magnetism in M. Gindriez, which it was not easy to account
for then, but which is now quite intelligible to me. He had in the
utmost strength and purity the genuine heroic nature. I came to
understand this in after years, and believe that it impressed me from
the first. It is unnecessary to say more about this remarkable character
in this place, because the reader will hear much of him afterwards. It
is enough to say that I was attracted by his powers of conversation and
his evident tenderness of heart.
When we had become better acquainted, M. Gindriez invited me to spend an
evening at his house after dinner, and I went. He was living at that
time on a boulevard outside the first wall, which has since been
demolished. His _appartement_ was simply furnished, and not strikingly
different in any way from the usual dwellings of the Parisian middle
class. I had now been absent for some weeks from anything like a home,
and after living in hotels it was pleasant to find myself at a domestic
fireside. M. Gindriez had several children. The eldest was a girl of
sixteen, extremely modest and retiring, as a well-bred _jeune fille_
generally is in France, and there was another daughter, very pretty and
engaging, but scarcely more than a child; there were also two boys, the
eldest a very taciturn, studious lad, who was at that time at the
well-known college of Sainte Barbe. Their mother had been a woman of
remarkable beauty, and still retained enough of it to attract the eye of
a painter. She had also at times a certain unconscious grace and dignity
of pose that the great old Italian masters valued more than it is valued
now. M. Gindriez himself had a refined face, but my interest in him was
due almost entirely to the charm and ease of his conversation.
In writing an autobiography one ought to give impressions as they were
received at the time, and not as they may have been modified afterwards.
I am still quite able to recall the impression made upon me by the
eldest daughter in the beginning of 1856. I did not think her so pretty
as her sister, though she had a healthy complexion, with bright eyes and
remarkably beautiful teeth, whilst her slight figure was graceful and
well formed; but I well remember being pleased and interested by the
little glimpses I could get of her mind and character. It was a new sort
of character to me, and even in the tones of her voice there was
something that indicated a rare union of strength and tenderness. The
tenderness, of course, was not for me, a foreign temporary guest in
those days, but I found it out by the girl's way of speaking to her
father. I perceived, too, under an exterior of cheerfulness, rising at
times to gayety, a nature that was really serious, as if saddened by a
too early experience of trouble.
The truth was, that in consequence of her father's checkered career,
this girl of sixteen had passed through a much greater variety of
experience than most women have known at thirty. Her mother, too, had
for some time suffered almost continuously from ill-health, so that the
eldest daughter had been really the active mistress of the house. Her
courage and resolution had been put to the test in various ways that I
knew nothing about then, but the effects of an uncommon experience were
that deepening of the young nature which made it especially interesting
to me. Afterwards I discovered that Eugénie Gindriez had read more and
thought more than other girls of her age. This might have been almost an
evil in a quiet life, but hers had not been a quiet life.
We soon became friends in spite of the French conventional idea that a
girl should not open her lips, but it did not occur to me that we were
likely ever to be anything more than friends. Had the idea occurred,
the obstacle of a difference in nationality would have seemed to me
absolutely insuperable. I thought of marriage at that time as a
possibility, but not of an international marriage. In fact, the
difficulties attending upon an international marriage are so
considerable, and the subsequent practical inconvenience so troublesome,
that only an ardently passionate and imprudent nature could overlook
them.
I, for my part, left Paris without being aware that Mademoiselle
Gindriez had anything to do with my future destiny; but she, with a
woman's perspicacity, knew better. She thought it at least probable, if
not certain, that I should return after long years; she waited
patiently, and when at last I did return there was no need to tell on
what errand.
An incident occurred that might have been a partial revelation to me and
a clear one to her. Before my departure from Paris, M. Ouvrard said to
me that he had been told I was engaged to "une Française."
"What is her name?"--he mentioned another young lady. Now to this day I
remember that when he spoke of a French marriage as a possibility for me
I at once saw, mentally, a portrait of Eugénie Gindriez. However, as a
French marriage was _not_ a possibility, I thought no more of the
matter.