“I play on the same instrument as the Savoyards play, only, you
understand, you can have good and bad instruments; and to have a good
one you must put the price. The one I play on cost me 60 francs in
Paris. There are many more handsome, but none better. This is all that
there is of the best. The man who made it has been dead sixty years. It
is the time that makes the value of it.
“My wife plays on the violin. She is a very good player. I am her
second husband. She is an Italian by birth. She played on the violin
when she was with her first husband. He used to accompany her on the
organ, and that produced a very fine effect.
“The hurdy-gurdy is like the violin--it improves with age. My wife
told me that she once played on a very old violin, and the difference
between that and her own was curious for sound. She was playing, with
her husband accompanying her on the organ, near the château of an old
marquis; and when he heard the sound of the violin he asked them in.
Then he said, ‘Here, try my violin,’ and handed her the old violin. My
wife said that when she touched it with the bow, she cried, ‘Ah, how
fine it is!’ It was the greatest enjoyment she had known for years. You
understand, the good violins all bridge where the bridge is placed, but
the new violins sink there, and the tune is altered by it. They call
the violins that sink ‘consumptive’ ones.
“I am Dijon. The vineyard of Clos Nangent is near to Dijon. You have
heard of that wine. Oh, yes, of course you have! That clos belongs to a
young man of twenty-two, and he could sell it for 2,500,000 francs if
he liked. At Dijon the bottles sell for 7 francs.
“My mother and father did not live happily together. My father died
when I had three years, and then my mother, who had only twenty years
of age, married again, and you know how it often happens, the second
father does not love the first family of his wife. Some Savoyards
passed through our village, and I was sold to them. I was their slave
for ten years. I learnt to play the hurdy-gurdy with them. I used to
accompany an organ. I picked out note for note with the organ. When I
heard an air, too, which I liked, I used to go to my room and follow
the air from my memory upon the instrument. I went to Paris afterwards.
“You see I play on only one string in my hurdy-gurdy. Those which
the Savoyards play have several strings, and that is what makes them
drone. The hurdy-gurdy is the same as the violin in principle. You see
the wheel of wood which I turn with the handle is like its bow, for
it grates on the string, and the keys press on the string like the
fingers, and produce the notes. I used to play on a droning hurdy-gurdy
at first, but one night I went into a café at Paris, and the gentlemen
there cried out, ‘Ah! the noise!’ Then I thought to myself--I had
fifteen years--if I play on one string it will not produce so much
noise as on two. Then I removed one string, and when I went the next
night the gentlemen said, ‘Ah, that is much better!’ and that is why I
play on one string.
“I used to sing in Paris. I learnt all that of new in the style of
romances, and I accompanied myself on my hurdy-gurdy. At Paris I met
my wife. She was a widow then. I told her that I would marry her when
her mourning was over, which lasted nine months. I was not twenty
then. I went about playing at the cafés, and put by money. But when we
went to be married, the priests would not marry us unless we had our
parents’ consents. I did not know whether my mother was dead. I hunted
everywhere. As I could not find out, I lived with my wife the same as
if we had been married. I am married to her now, but my children were
all born before marriage. At last I went to the Catholic priest at
Dover, and told him my life, and that I had four children, and wished
to marry my wife, and he consented to marry us if I would get the
consent of the priest of the place where I had lived last. That was
Calais, and I wrote to the priest there, and he gave his consent, and
now my children are legitimate. By the law of France, a marriage makes
legitimate all the children born by the woman with whom you are united.
My children were present at my marriage, and that produced a very droll
effect. I have always been faithful to my wife, and she to me, though
we were not married.
“When my wife is well, she goes out with me, and plays on the violin.
It produces a very good effect. She plays the seconds. But she has so
much to do at home with the children, that she does not come out with
me much.
“My age is twenty-five, and I have voyaged for seventeen years. There
are three months since I came in England. I was at Calais and at
Boulogne, and it is there that I had the idea to come to England. Many
persons who counselled us, told us that in England we should gain a
great deal of money. That is why I came. It took three weeks before
I could get the permission to be married, and during that time I
worked at the different towns. I did pretty well at Dover; and after
that I went to Ramsgate, and I did very well there. Yes, I took a
great deal of money on the sands of a morning. I have been married a
month now--for I left Ramsgate to go to be married. At Ramsgate they
understood my playing. Unless I have educated people to play to, I do
not make much success with my instrument. I play before a public-house,
or before a cottage, and they say, ‘That’s all very well;’ but they
do not know that to make a hurdy-gurdy sound like a violin requires
great art and patience. Besides, I play airs from operas, and they do
not know the Italian music. Now if I was alone with my hurdy-gurdy, I
should only gain a few pence; but it is by my children that I do pretty
well.
“We came to London when the season was over in the country, and now
we go everywhere in the town. I cannot speak English; but I have my
address in my pocket, if I lose myself. _Je m’elance dans la ville._
To day I went by a big park, where there is a château of the Queen.
If I lose my way, I show my written address, and they go on speaking
English, and show me the way to go. I don’t understand the English, but
I do the pointed finger; and when I get near home, then I recognise the
quarter.
“My little girl will have six years next February, and the little boy
is only four years and a-half. She is a very clever little girl, and
she notices everything. Before I was married, she heard me speaking to
my wife about when we were to be married; and she’d say, constantly,
‘Ah, papa, when are you going to be married to mamma?’ We had a pudding
on our marriage-day, and she liked it so much that now she very often
says, ‘Oh, papa, I should like a pudding like that I had when you
married mamma.’ That is compromising, but she doesn’t know any better.
“It was my little girl Eugénie who taught her brother Paul to dance. He
liked it very much; but he is young yet, and heavy in his movements;
but she is graceful, and very clever. At Boulogne she was much beloved,
and the English ladies would give her packets of sugar-plums and cakes.
When they dance, they first of all polk together, and then they do
the Varsovienne together, and after that she does the Cachuca and the
Mazurka alone. I first of all taught my girl to do the Polka, for in my
time I liked the dance pretty well. As soon as the girl had learnt it,
she taught her brother. They like dancing above all, when I encourage
them, for I say, ‘Now, my children, dance well; and, above all, dance
gracefully, and then I will buy you some cakes.’ Then, if they take
a fancy to anything, if it is not too dear, I buy it for them, and
that encourages them. Besides, when she says ‘Papa, when shall we go
to France, and see my little brother who is out at nurse?’ then I
say, ‘When we have earned enough money; so you must dance well, and,
above all, gracefully, and when we have taken plenty of money we will
be off.’ That encourages them, for they like to see me take plenty
of money. The little girl accompanies the music on the castanets in
the Cachuca. It is astonishing how well she plays them. I have heard
grown-up artists in the cafés chantants, who don’t play them so well
as she does. It is wonderful in so young a child. You will say she has
learnt my style of playing on the hurdy-gurdy, and my movements; but it
is the same thing, for she is as clever to other music. Sometimes, when
she has danced, ladies come up and kiss her, and even carry her off
into their houses, and I have to wait hours for her. When she sees that
I gain money, she has much more courage. When the little girl has done
dancing with my Paul, then he, when she is dancing alone, takes the
plate and asks for money. He is very laughable, for he can already say,
‘If you please, misses.’ Sometimes the ladies begin to speak to him, he
says, ‘Yes! yes!’ three or four times, and then he runs up to me and
says, ‘Papa, that lady speaks English;’ and then I have to say, ‘No
speak English.’ But he is contented if he hears anybody speak French.
Then he runs up to me, and says, ‘Papa, papa, Monsieur speaks French.’
“My little girl has embroidered trowsers and petticoats. You won’t
believe it, but I worked all that. The ends of the trowsers, the
trimmings to her petticoats, her collars and sleeves, all I have
worked. I do it at night, when we get home. The evenings are long and
I do a little, and at the end of the week it becomes much. If I had to
buy that it would cost too much. It was my wife who taught me to do it.
She said the children must be well dressed, and we have no money to buy
these things. Then she taught me: at first it seemed droll to me, and
I was ashamed, but then I thought, I do it for my living and not for
my pleasure, it is for my business; and now I am accustomed to do it.
You would fancy, too, that the children are cold, going about in the
streets dressed as they are, but they have flannel round the body, and
then the jumping warms them. They would tell me directly if they were
cold. I always ask them.
“The day I was married a very singular circumstance happened. I had
bought my wife a new dress, and she, poor thing, sat up all night to
make it. All night! It cost me five shillings, the stuff did. I had a
very bad coat, and she kept saying, ‘I shall be gay, but you, my poor
friend, how will you look?’ My coat was very old. I said, ‘I shall do
as I am;’ but it made her sad that I had no coat to appear in style
at our marriage. Our landlord offered to lend me his coat, but he was
twice as stout as I am, and I looked worse than in my own coat. Just
as we were going to start for the church, a man came to the house with
a coat to sell--the same I have on now. The landlord sent him to me.
It is nearly new, and had not been on more than three or four times.
He asked 12_s._, and I offered 8_s._; at last he took 9_s._ My wife,
who is very religious, said, ‘It is the good God who sent that man, to
reward us for always trying to get married.’
“Since I have been here, my affairs have gone on pretty well. I have
taken some days 5_s._, others 6_s._, and even 8_s._; but then some days
rain has fallen, and on others it has been wet under foot, and I have
only taken 4_s._ My general sum is 5_s._ 6_d._ the day, or 6_s._ Every
night when I get home I give my wife what I have taken, and I say,
‘Here, my girl, is 3_s._ for to-morrow’s food,’ and then we put the
remainder on one side to save up. We pay 5_s._ a-week for our room, and
that is dear, for we are there very bad! very bad! for we sleep almost
on the boards. It is lonely for her to be by herself in the day, but
she is near her confinement, and she cannot go out.
“It makes me laugh, when I think of our first coming to this country.
She only wore linen caps, but I was obliged to buy her a bonnet. It
was a very good straw one, and cost 1_s._ It made her laugh to see
everybody wearing a bonnet.
“When I first got to London, I did not know where to go to get
lodgings. I speak Italian very well, for my wife taught me. I spoke to
an Italian at Ramsgate, and he told me to go to Woolwich, and there I
found an Italian lodging-house. There the landlord gave me a letter to
a friend in London, and I went and paid 2_s._ 6_d._ in advance, and
took the room, and when we went there to live I gave another 2_s._
6_d._, so as to pay the 5_s._ in advance. It seems strange to us to
have to pay rent in advance--but it is a custom.
“It costs me something to clothe my children. My girl has six different
skirts, all of silk, of different colours, grey, blue, red, and yellow.
They last the year. The artificial flowers on her head are arranged
by her mamma. The boots cost the most money. She has a pair every
month. Here they are 3_s._, but in France they are dearer. It is about
the same for the little boy; only as he does not work so much as his
sister, he is not dressed in so distinguished a style. He is clean, but
not so elegant, for we give the best to the girl.
“My children are very good at home. Their mother adores them, and lets
them do as they like. They are very good, indeed.
“On Sunday, they are dressed like other children. In the morning we go
to mass, and then we go and walk a little, and see London. I have, as
yet, made no friends in London. I know no French people. I have met
some, but they don’t speak to me. We confine ourselves to our family.
“When I am in the streets with good houses in them, and see anybody
looking at the windows, then if I see them listening, I play pieces
from the operas on my hurdy-gurdy. I do this between the dances.
Those who go to the opera and frequent the theatres, like to hear
distinguished music.”