SIGHTS IN THE BEAUTIFUL CITY.
The Gobelin tapestry.--How and where it is
made.--Pere la-Chaise.--Poor Rachel!--The baby
establishment.--"Now I lay me."--The little
mother.--The old woman who lived in a shoe.--The
American chapel.--Beautiful women and
children.--The last conference-meeting.--"I'm a
proof-reader, I am."
BY no means least among the places of interest in Paris is the
manufactory of the Gobelin tapestry which serves to adorn the walls of
the palace _salons_. O, these long, tiresome _salons_, which must be
visited, though your head is ready to burst with seeing, your feet to
drop off with sliding and slipping over the polished floors. The wicked
_stand_ upon slippery places, and nothing so convinced us of the
demoralizing effect of foreign travel as our growing ability to do the
same. When you have seen one or two, you have seen all. There may be
degrees in gorgeous splendor, but we were filled with all the
appropriate and now-forgotten emotions at sight of the first, and one
cannot be more than full. Many of the old palace apartments are dull and
dingy beyond belief, by no means the marble halls of our dreams; but of
the others let me say something once for all. Under your feet is the
treacherous, bare floor of dark wood, laid in diamonds, squares, &c.;
over your head, exquisite frescoes of gods and goddesses, and all manner
of unearthly and impossible beings enveloped in clouds by the
bale,--usually an apotheosis of some king or queen, or both, and, as a
rule, of the most wicked known at that time. The Medici were especially
glorified and raised above the flesh,--and they had need to be. On every
side pictures in Gobelin tapestry, framed into the walls, often so large
as to cover the entire space from corner to corner, from cornice to
within a few feet of the floor, and in this latter space doors, formed
of a panel sometimes, for the entrance and egress of servants. Imagine,
with all this, the gilt, and stucco, and wood-carving; the flowers, and
arabesques, and entwined initials; the massive chandeliers, with
glittering pendants; the mantels of rare marbles, of porphyry, and
malachite; the cabinets, and tables, and escritoires of marqueterie and
mosaic; the gilded chairs, stiff and stark, richly covered; the bronzes,
vases, and curious clocks: and over all the air of having never been
used from all time, and of continuing to be a bare show to all
eternity,--and you have a faint conception of the _salons_ of half the
palaces.
As for the tapestry, pray don't confound it with the worsted dogs and
Rebekahs-at-the-Well with which we sometimes adorn (?) our homes, since
one would never in any way suggest the other. In these every delicate
line is faithfully reproduced, and the effect exactly that of an oil
painting. After long years the colors fade; and we were startled
sometimes, in the old palaces, to come upon one of these gray shadows
of pictures, out from which, perhaps, a pair of wonderful eyes alone
would seem to shine. In old times the rough walls of the grim prison
palaces were hung with tapestry wrought by the fair fingers of court
ladies, the designs of tournament and battle being rudely sketched by
gay gallants. Many a bright dream was worked into the canvas, I doubt
not, never found upon the pattern; many a sweet word said over the task
that beguiled the dull hours, and kept from mischief idle hands. But in
the reign of Louis XIV. the art of weaving tapestry was brought from
Flanders, and a manufactory established on the outskirts of Paris which
still remains. To visit it a pass is required. Accordingly we addressed
a note of solicitation to some high official, and in due time came a
permit for Madame K. and family; and an ill-assorted family we must have
appeared to the official at the gate. There were the rooms, hung with
specimens of the tapestry, for which we did not care, and then the six
devoted to the weaving; long, low, and narrow they were, with hand-looms
ranged down one side. Through the threads of the warp we could see the
weavers sitting behind their work, each with his box of worsteds and
pattern beside him. The colors were wound upon quills, numbers of which
hung, each by its thread, from the half-completed work. Taking one of
these in one hand, the workman dexterously separated the threads of the
warp with the other, and passed the quill through, pressing down the one
stitch thus formed with its pointed end. You can imagine how slow this
work must be. How tiresome a task it is to delight the eyes of princes!
The making of carpets, which has been recently added, is equally
tiresome. This, too, is hand work, they being woven in some way over a
round stick, and then cut and trimmed with a pair of shears. To make one
requires from five to ten years, and their cost is from six to twenty
thousand dollars. About six hundred weavers are said to be here, though
we saw but a small proportion of that number. They receive only from
three to five hundred dollars a year, with a pension of about half as
much if they are disabled.
From the Gobelins we drove across the Seine again, and out to Pere
la-Chaise, where stood once the house of the confessor of Louis XIV.,
from whom the cemetery takes its name, the Jesuit priest through whose
influence the edict of Nantes was revoked. A kind of ghastly imitation
of life it all seemed--the narrow houses on either side of the paved
streets, that were not houses at all, hung with dead flowers and
corpse-like wreaths, stained an unnatural hue. We peered through the
bars of the locked gate opening into the Jews' quarter, trying to
distinguish the tomb where lie the ashes of a life that blazed, and
burned itself out. Poor Rachel! Through the solemn streets, among the
quiet dwellings of the noiseless city, whence comes no sound of joy or
grief, where they need no candle, neither light of the sun, we walked a
while, then plucked a leaf or two, and came away.
One day, when the sun lay hot upon the white streets of the beautiful
city, we searched among the shops of the crooked Faubourg St. Honore for
a number forgotten now, and the Creche, where the working mothers may
leave their children during the day. In another and more quiet street
we found it. We pulled the bell before a massive gateway; the wide doors
opened upon a smiling portress, who led the way across the paved court
to the house, where she pointed up some stairs, and left us to mount and
turn until it was no longer possible, until a confusion of doors barred
our way, when we rapped upon one. Another was opened, and we found
ourselves among the babies. There were, perhaps, twenty in all, the
larger children being in the school-room below; but even twenty
toddling, rolling babies, looking so very like the same image done in
putty over and over again, appears an alarming and unlimited number when
taken in a body. They rolled beneath our feet, they clung to our skirts,
they peeped out, finger in mouth, from behind the doors, they kicked
pink toes up from the swinging cradles, and in fact, like the clansmen
of Rhoderic Dhu, appeared in a most startling manner from the most
unexpected places. Plump little things they were, encased in shells of
blue-checked aprons, from the outer one of which they were
surreptitiously slipped upon our entrance to disclose a fresher one
beneath. How long this process could have continued with a similar happy
result, we did not inquire. Every head was tied up in a tight little
night-cap, giving them the appearance of so many little bag puddings.
Every face was a marvel of health and contentment, with one kicking,
screaming exception upon the floor. "Eengleesh," explained the Sister of
Charity who seemed to have them in charge, giving a sweeping wipe to the
eyes, nose, and mouth, gradually liquidizing, of this one, and trying in
vain to pacify a nature that seemed peaceless. Who was its mother, or
how the little stranger chanced to be here, we did not learn. On either
side of the long, narrow room hung the white-curtained cradles, each
with its pretty, pink quilt. At one end was an altar, most modest in its
appointments, consisting of hardly more than a crucifix and a vase of
flowers upon the mantel. As we entered the room, the sister stood before
it with a circle of white caps and blue checked aprons around her, a
circle of little clasped hands, of upturned eyes and lisping lips,
repeating what might have been, "Now I lay me," for anything we knew.
Our entrance brought wandering eyes and thoughts.
At the opposite end of the room, a wide, long window swung open,
revealing a pleasant garden down below, all green and blossoming, with
an image of the Virgin half hid among the vines. Cool, and fresh, and
green it seemed after the glare of the hot streets, a pleasant picture
for the baby eyes. Out from this window the little feet could trot upon
the guarded roof of a piazza. A little chair, a broken doll, and
limbless horse here were familiar objects to the eyes of the mothers in
our party, and when two children seized upon one block with a
determination which threatened a breach of the peace, we were convinced
that even baby nature was the same the world over. Supper time came, and
the children were gathered together in a small room, before the drollest
little table imaginable--a kind of elongated doughnut, raised a foot
from the floor, with a circular seat around it. All the little outer
shells of blue check were slipped on, all the little fat bodies lifted
over and set into their places, to roll off, or about, at will. A grace
was said, to us, I think, since all the little eyes turned towards us,
and a plate of oatmeal porridge put before each one. Some ate with a
relish, and a painful search over the face with a spoon for the open,
waiting mouth; some leaned back to stare at the company; and others
persisted in dipping into the dish of their next neighbor. One little
thing, hardly more than a year old, drew down the corners of her mouth
in a portentous manner, when the motherly one beside her, of the
advanced age of three years, perhaps, rapped on the table with her
spoon, and patted the doleful little face, smiling all the while, until
she actually drew out smiles in return. The dear little mother! An
attendant with a homely face, creased into all manner of good-natured
lines, resolved herself into the old woman who lived in a shoe, holding
two babies and the porridge dish in her lap, balancing one upon the end
of the low bench beside her, while two or three more stood at her knee,
clinging to her apron. It was like a nest of open-mouthed birdlings.
Blessings on the babies, and those, whether of our faith or not, who
teach and care for them, we thought, as we came away. "Inasmuch as ye
have done it unto one of the least of these, ye did it unto me," said
the Master.
Although I said nothing of our church-going in London, I cannot pass
over our American chapel in Paris, with its carved, umbrella-like
canopy, shading the good Dr. R., who did so much socially, as well as
spiritually, for Americans there. Here came many whose names are well
known; among them our minister to France, an elderly gentleman of
unpretending dress and manner, with a kindly, care-worn face. And here
gathered also a company of beautiful women and children, proving the
truth of all that has been said of our countrywomen. A blending of all
types were they, as our people are a blending of all nationalities, each
more lovely than the other, and all making up a picture well worth
seeing. I wish I might say as much for the opposite sex. One gentleman,
who wore a red rose always in his button-hole, and turned his back upon
the minister to stare at the women, had a handsome though _blase_ face,
and more than one head above the pews would have been marked anywhere;
but the women and children bore away the palm. The delicate, sensitive
faces which characterize American women, whether the effect of climate,
manner of life, or of the nerves for which we are so celebrated, are
found nowhere else, I am sure.
Besides the Sabbath services a weekly prayer-meeting was held here. They
were singing some sweet familiar hymn as we entered one evening and took
our place among the pilgrims and strangers like ourselves. It was the
last gathering for the winter. Some were off for home, some for a summer
of travel; only a few, with the pastor, were to remain. One followed
another in words of retrospection, and regret at parting, until a pall
settled over the little company--until even we, who had never been there
before, wiped our eyes because of the general dolefulness. A hush and
universal mistiness pervaded the air of the dimly-lighted house; the
assembly seemed about to pass out of existence, Niobe-like. Then up rose
Dr. R., the pastor. I wondered what he could say to add to the gloom;
something like this, perhaps: "Dear people, everybody is off; let us
shut up the church, lock the door, and throw away the key. Receive the
benediction." But no; I wish you might feel the thrill that went through
the little company as his words fell from his lips. I wish I dared
attempt to repeat them. "And now to you who go," he said, at last, "who
take with you something of our hearts, be sure our prayers will follow
you. Keep us in memory; but, above all, keep in memory your church vows.
Make yourselves known as Christians among Christians. And when you have
reached home--the home to which our thoughts have so often turned
together--let this be a lesson. When summer comes and you leave the city
for the country, for the mountains, for the sea-side, take your religion
with you. Search out some struggling little church with a discouraged
pastor,--you'll not look far or long to find such a one,--and work for
that, as you have worked for us. And one thing more; send your friends
who are coming abroad to us. Send us the Christians, for we need them,
and by all means send us those who are not Christians; they may need us;
and the Lord bless you, and keep you in all your goings, and give you
peace."
Then the people gathered in knots for last words--for hand-clasps and
good-byes. Now a spirit of peace and good will having fallen upon us
with the pastor's benediction, we gazed wistfully upon the strangers in
the hope of finding one familiar face; but there was none; so we came
sorrowfully down the aisle. The door was almost reached when a sharp,
twanging voice behind us began, "I'm sent out by X. & Y., book
publishers." "O," said I to the friend at my side, "I believe I will
speak to that man. I know Mr. X., and I do so want to speak to
somebody." How he accomplished the introduction I cannot tell, but in a
moment my hand was grasped by that of a stout little man, with bushy
hair and twinkling eyes. "Know Mr. X.? Mr. Q. X.?" he began. To tell the
truth I had not that honor, my acquaintance having been with his
brother; but there was no time to explain, and retreat was equally
impossible; so I replied that my father knew him well; then thinking
that something more was necessary to explain the sudden and intense
interest manifested in his behalf, added, desperately, "indeed,
intimately." To this he paid no manner of attention,--I doubt if he
heard it,--but rattled on: "Fine man, Mr. X., Mr. Q. X. Know Mr. Y.?
Fine man, Mr. Y.; been abroad a year; I'm goin' out to meet him, I am.
He's in Switzerland, Mr. Y. is; been abroad a year. I'm a proof-reader,
I am. I s'pose you know what a proof-reader is." "Yes," I succeeded in
inserting while he took breath, remembering some amateur attempts of my
own in that direction. He began anew: "I'm sent out by X. & Y.; expect
to find Mr. Y. in Switzerland; fine man--" Will he never stop, I
thought, beginning a backward retreat from the pew down the aisle, with
all the while ringing in my ears, "I'm a proof-reader, I am," &c. "Don't
laugh, pray don't," I said to the friends waiting at the door. "It's
dreadful--is it not?" What became of him we never knew, but in all
probability the sexton removed him--still vocal--to the sidewalk that
night; where, since we do not know for how long a time he was wound up,
he may be iterating and reiterating to this day the interesting fact of
his occupation, with the eulogy upon Messrs. X. & Y.