CHAPTER I.

JENNY LIND THE ARTIST,

1820–1851.

A MEMOIR OF MADAME JENNY LIND GOLDSCHMIDT, HER ART-LIFE AND DRAMATIC

CAREER: FROM ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS, LETTERS, MS. DIARIES, &c., COLLECTED BY

MR. OTTO GOLDSCHMIDT.

HENRY SCOTT HOLLAND, M.A.,

CANON AND PRECENTOR OF ST. PAUL’S,

AND

W. S. ROCKSTRO,

AUTHOR OF “GENERAL HISTORY OF MUSIC,”

“LIFE OF MENDELSSOHN,”

“LIFE OF HANDEL,”

ETC.

NEW AND ABRIDGED EDITION.

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS.

NEW YORK:

CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS,

743 AND 745, BROADWAY.

LONDON:

PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, Limited,

STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.

=Dedicated=

BY GRACIOUS PERMISSION

TO

=Her Majesty the Queen.=

PREFACE.

The welcome which was given to the Memoir of Jenny Lind in the original

edition of two volumes has encouraged us to offer it in a smaller and

less expensive form. In its first form it was essential that it should

aim at completeness and thoroughness of treatment. It had to omit

nothing that might legitimately be asked for, by those to whom her

memory was dear in Sweden, and in Germany, no less than in England. It

had to satisfy the attention and the interest of musical experts, to

whom her career was a record of artistic perfection. To do this, it

could not but be lengthy, detailed, and somewhat expensive. But, after

all this has been done, there remains a larger English public, to whom

she had become a name rather than a positive memory; who had never heard

her sing: but yet to whom her life could not but appeal with the

irresistible force that belongs to genius whenever it is allied with

simplicity, candour, purity, and courage. To them, her story would speak

home, if only they had the opportunity of reading it.

We have, therefore, ventured on the task of reducing the memoir to one

volume, by vigorous curtailments, and by omission of much technical

matter.[1] We trust that, in this reduced form, it may still convey the

impression of a character which had a touch of unique nobility. Nothing

has been added, except that, in the chapter entitled “Last Words,” an

attempt has been made to fill up the outline of Madame Goldschmidt’s

art-life after her marriage, that it may be felt to have the reality,

and the value, which undoubtedly belonged to it in fact.

H. S. HOLLAND.

W. S. ROCKSTRO.

1893.

CONTENTS.

BOOK I.—ANTICIPATION.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTION _page_ 1

CHAPTER II.

CHILDHOOD.

Birth of Jenny Lind—Her parents—The child entrusted to Carl

Ferndal at Sollentuna—Her love of the country—Return to

Stockholm—Fru Tengmark, her grandmother—First discovery of

her musical gifts—The Fanfare—Jenny at the Widows’ Home—

Mdlle. Lundberg hears her sing—Introduction to Herr

Croelius—Jenny transferred to the School of the Royal

Theatre _page_ 7

CHAPTER III.

PUPILAGE.

The Royal Theatre, Stockholm—Jenny’s life at school—She is

boarded with her mother—Contract with the Directors—The

training of an _Aktris-Elev_—Jenny’s general education—

Difficulties with her mother—Friendship with Mina Fundin—

She takes refuge with Mdlle. Bayard—Her letter to Fru

Fundin _page_ 15

CHAPTER IV.

CAREER.

Jenny’s dramatic power—Her first appearance as “Angela” in

_The Polish Mine_—She acts “Johanna” in _Testamentet_—

Criticism in the _Heimdall_—Extract from the play—“Otto”

in _Johanna de Montfaucon_—“Janette” in the _Pasha of

Suresne_—“Louise” in the _Students of Småland_, etc.—_The

Daily Allehanda_ protests against its performance—Other

_rôles_—She sings at concerts—Herr Berg and his pupil—

Lindblad’s Opera _Frondörerne_—Sacchini’s _Œdipus in

Athens_—She receives a salary from the R. Theatre—Her

appearances in 1837—Hard work—Rise of Meyerbeer—_Robert de

Normandie_—Jenny Lind’s success _page_ 24

CHAPTER V.

DISCOVERY.

The moment of inspiration—“Agatha”—“Julia”—Rise in salary—

“Alice” in _Roberto_—Upsala—Escort home and Students’

song—Country life—Popular enthusiasm—Fru Lind—Louise

Johansson—Jenny Lind’s removal to Herr Lindblad’s—Operatic

successes—Presentation of plate—The judgment of Sweden _page_ 35

CHAPTER VI.

CHARACTER.

Soirée at Stockholm—Moral independence—“A unique

apparition”—Personal appearance of Jenny Lind—A

transparent countenance—A typical Swede—Undertone of

melancholy—Friendship—Influence of Lindblad—Geijer’s songs _page_ 46

CHAPTER VII.

PILGRIMAGE.

Jenny Lind appointed Court Singer—Unsatisfied longings—Offer

from the Royal Theatre—Refusal—Parisian scheme—Provincial

tour accompanied by her father—Charity—Stockholm—“Lucia”—

“Alice”—“Norma”—Overstrain—Salary—Farewell _page_ 58

BOOK II.—ASPIRATION.

CHAPTER I.

IN PARIS, 1841–42.

On the way—Arrival in Paris—First introduction—Nervousness—

Garcia’s first impressions—Jenny Lind’s anguish—Rest—

Linguistic studies—Street cries—End of probation—Garcia’s

lessons—Scales and exercises—What to unlearn—The worst

over—Musical intuition _page_ 65

CHAPTER II.

THE STUDENT.

Home at Mdlle. du Puget’s—Home thoughts—Mdlle. Nissen’s

influence—Madame Persiani—Rachel—Dramatic inspiration—

Despondency—A merciful escape _page_ 73

CHAPTER III.

WITHIN SIGHT OF THE GOAL.

Recovery of voice with enhanced powers—The Artist complete—

Dislike to Parisian artist-life—Reasons for visit to Paris

and return to Stockholm—Longings for home _page_ 80

CHAPTER IV.

THE RETURN.

Offers from Stockholm—Engagement concluded—Lindblad’s

opinion—Interview with Meyerbeer—Private trial at the

Grand Opera—Meyerbeer’s judgment—M. Pillet, Director of

the Grand Opera—The second phase ended _page_ 85

BOOK III.—ACHIEVEMENT.

HOME: AND AFTER?

The Continent passive—Residence at Stockholm—Invitation to

Louise Johansson—Re-appearance as “Norma”—The _messa di

voce_—Stockholm enraptured—New characters—Swedish laws as

to unmarried women—Jenny Lind and her parents—Appointment

of an official guardian—Description of Herr H. M. Munthe—

“The mirror of a noble soul”—National Jubilee—A May-day in

Wärend—The poet Topelius—J. A. Josephson—Success at

Copenhagen—Touching anecdote—New _rôles_—Gluck’s _Armida_—

Opinion of Andersen’s Tales—Proposals from Meyerbeer _page_ 91

BOOK IV.—MASTERY.

CHAPTER I.

IN DRESDEN.

Study of German—Josephson’s welcome—A soirée at Dresden—

Renewed offer at Stockholm—Jenny Lind’s refusal—A

momentous journey _page_ 111

CHAPTER II.

AT THE COURT OF BERLIN.

Predecessors of Jenny Lind—Suspense—Meyerbeer’s attentions—

Courtesy of the Royal Family—Success in Society—Impression

on Lady Westmorland—Transfiguration—Indifference to dress—

First meeting with Mendelssohn _page_ 115

CHAPTER III.

THE DÉBUT AT THE NEW OPERA-HOUSE.

_Das Feldlager in Schlesien_—Fräulein Tuczec—“Vielka”—

“Norma”—Success—Contrasts—Rellstab’s critique—Visit from

Herr Josephson—A Swedish Christmas Eve _page_ 121

CHAPTER IV.

‘DAS FELDLAGER IN SCHLESIEN.’

German studies resumed—Rapid progress—Meyerbeer enchanted—

The public astonished—The critic’s summary—Invitation to

London—At Tieck’s—Serenade and presentation _page_ 129

CHAPTER V.

THE BUNN CONTRACT.

Mr. Bunn’s journey to Berlin—Hears Jenny Lind—Proposals—The

Ambassador’s Box at the Opera—Contract signed—Terms _page_ 134

CHAPTER VI.

HOMAGE TO WEBER.

Weber’s death—His burial—Jenny Lind’s interpretation of

“Euryanthe”—Critique—The apparition of Emma—_La

Sonnambula_—Critique—Sudden indisposition—Letter from

Meyerbeer—Letter to Mr. Bunn—Last appearance—_Norma_—

Critique—_Soirée_ by the brothers Ganz—Court Concerts—

Other Concerts—Farewell—Swedish songs—At Professor

Wichmann’s—Unrest _page_ 138

CHAPTER VII.

AT HOME ONCE MORE.

The homeward journey—Guest performances at Hamburg—Joy of

return—Delight of her people—A welcome—Eighteen

performances—_Die Tochter des Regiments_ for soldiers—A

concert—Country life—Summons to the Court of Prussia _page_ 148

CHAPTER VIII.

IN PRESENCE OF THE QUEEN.

Her Majesty’s reception by the King and Queen of Prussia—

Inauguration of the statue of Beethoven at Bonn—Extract

from Herr Brockhaus’ diary—A sorrow—Jenny Lind sings at

the State Concerts—Mrs. Grote’s account—Meeting with Mr.

and Mrs. Grote at Frankfort—Mrs. Grote offers to intercede

with Mr. Bunn—Jenny’s wish to retire and her reasons—A

London journalist’s opinion of Jenny Lind’s personal

appearance and voice—Proposals for Vienna _page_ 153

CHAPTER IX.

WITH THE DANES.

For Charity—Letter to Madame Birch-Pfeiffer—Impressions of

Copenhagen—The Mind-World of the North—Hans Andersen’s

Verdict—The Bunn Contract _page_ 160

CHAPTER X.

THE RETURN TO BERLIN.

True friends—A brilliant season—“Donna Anna”—_Der

Freischütz_—First production—The _Berlinische Zeitung_

upon Jenny Lind’s impersonation of “Agathe”—The Opera of

Nature—Jenny Lind’s devotion to Art—Self-depreciation—

Artistic position reviewed by Jenny Lind in letter to

Madame Erikson—Desire for retirement _page_ 168

CHAPTER XI.

AT THE GEWANDHAUS.

Letter to Herr Josephson—Jenny Lind’s opinion of

Mendelssohn—Reflex action—The two great Artists at

Leipzig—Great popular excitement—Free list suspended—

Indignation of the Students of the Conservatorium—Rush for

tickets—Miss Dolby—Herr Heinrich Brockhaus’ diary—The

note-book of Herr Edouard Brockhaus—Serenade and

presentation—Mendelssohn returns thanks for Jenny Lind _page_ 176

CHAPTER XII.

‘DIE VESTALIN’ AND ‘DIE HUGENOTTEN.’

“Julia” in _Die Vestalin_—Rellstab’s glowing panegyric—Jenny

Lind’s unerring dramatic instinct—Hans Christian Andersen—

An _al fresco_ toilette—An enthusiastic admirer—Andersen

and Jenny Lind at Weimar—Visit to the Fürstengruft—Verses

by Rollet—Visit to the Mendelssohn family at Leipzig—

Letter from Jenny to Andersen—Meyerbeer’s punctilious

regard for perfection of detail—_Personnel_ of the cast in

_Les Huguenots_—Rellstab’s criticism on Jenny Lind’s

“Valentine” _page_ 184

CHAPTER XIII.

AUF WIEDERSEHEN!

An unfortunate accident—General sympathy—Letter from

Mendelssohn—Three weeks’ imprisonment—Medallion portrait

modelled by Professor Wichmann—Portrait by Magnus—

Re-appearance of Jenny Lind in _Norma_—Benefit recorded by

Rellstab _page_ 192

BOOK V.—PROGRESS.

CHAPTER I.

THE DÉBUT AT VIENNA.

Visit to the Brockhaus family—Mendelssohn’s home-life—

Home-life of Professor Wichmann—Herr Ferdinand David—

Madame Schumann—Mendelssohn as an accompanist—In Vienna—

Madame Birch-Pfeiffer’s delineation of Jenny Lind’s

character—Mendelssohn’s letter to Herr Franz Hauser—The

“Theater an der Wien”—_Norma_—Timidity of Jenny Lind—Herr

Hauser’s reassurance—Success—Press notice of Jenny Lind’s

appearance—Strong party against Jenny Lind—Successful

appearance in _La Sonnambula_—Countless calls before the

curtain—Farther letters from Mendelssohn—Scheme for a

_libretto_ for Mendelssohn by Madame Birch-Pfeiffer—

Difficulties—_Die Ghibellinen in Pisa_—A wreath from the

Empress-Mother—An ovation—Accident to Jenny Lind’s

man-servant _page_ 198

CHAPTER II.

THE LOWER RHINE MUSICAL FESTIVAL.

Mendelssohn engaged on _Elijah_—Hauser’s estimate of Jenny

Lind—The Rhenish Festivals—_St. Paul_ in 1836—The present

festival at Aix-la-Chapelle—Consideration for an invalid

servant—Haydn’s _Creation_—The _Jenny Lind Fest_—

Mendelssohn’s and Geijer’s account of it—Departure from

Aachen—_Elijah_ on the eve of production _page_ 217

CHAPTER III.

THE CONTRACT WITH MR. LUMLEY.

The Drachenfels—Appearances at Hanover—Friendship with the

Royal Family—Second season at Hamburg—Overstrain—A short

holiday—_Elijah_ still unfinished—“Annotations-bok” of

Jenny Lind—Visit to Frankfort—Mrs. Grote and Mr. Lumley—

The Bunn Contract—English influences—Mr. Edward Lewin—Mr.

Lumley’s efforts—Mendelssohn’s introduction of Chorley—

Chorley’s impressions of Jenny Lind—Darmstadt—Lumley’s

trust in Mendelssohn’s influence—Mendelssohn’s letter in

support of Lumley’s endeavours—Engagement with Lumley

signed—Fresh endeavours to obtain a libretto—The Lumley

Contract _page_ 225

BOOK VI.—WORK AND FRIENDS.

CHAPTER I.

SOUTH GERMANY.

In Munich—The Kaulbachs—Letter from Mendelssohn objecting to

the Italian plan—_Concerts particuliers_—The

Birch-Pfeiffer _libretto_—“Susanna” in _Figaro_—Society at

the Kaulbachs—Stuttgart—Letter to Judge Munthe on London

engagement—Carlsruhe—Heidelberg—A Nuremberg medal—Return

to Munich—Haydn’s _Creation_ at Munich _page_ 237

CHAPTER II.

THE RETURN TO VIENNA.

Operas—_Marie, die Tochter des Regiments_—Portrait—The

_Wiener Zeitung_—The Schumanns—Madame Schumann’s Diary—

Concerts—Wilhelmina Neruda—Solicitude of Mendelssohn about

the Bunn Contract _page_ 247

CHAPTER III.

THE SHADOW.

Trio for voice and two flutes in _Vielka_—Fräulein Auguste

von Jaeger’s reminiscences—Radnitzky’s medal—Imperial

Kammersängerin—The Schumanns—Viardot Garcia—Mr. Bunn

adheres to the Contract—Terror of Jenny Lind—Reassurances

of Mendelssohn—Jenny Lind’s offer to Mr. Bunn—Last song at

Vienna _page_ 253

BOOK VII.—SUPREMACY.

CHAPTER I.

MANAGERIAL DIFFICULTIES.

The “_Vieille Garde_” of the Opera—Mr. Lumley in the field—

Lablache—Mr. Lumley’s only hope—Lablache’s estimate of

Jenny Lind—Mr. Lumley’s journey to Vienna—_Elijah_ at

Exeter Hall conducted by Mendelssohn—Mendelssohn’s Visit

to Mrs. Grote—Watching for Jenny Lind—Arrival—Appearance

in Mrs. Grote’s box at Her Majesty’s Theatre—Jenny Lind at

Mrs. Grote’s—Mendelssohn invites her to sing—Jenny Lind’s

nervousness—Second essay—Still diffident about public

appearance—Mrs. Grote’s home-thrust—Jenny Lind convinced—

Appoints rehearsal and chooses “Alice” in _Roberto_ _page_ 259

CHAPTER II.

THE TRIUMPH.

Public excitement—Crowded house—Entrance of Alice—The

_Terzetto_ and Mme. Goldschmidt’s interpretation of it—

Self-effacement—A true artist—The _Times’_ critique _page_ 265

CHAPTER III.

AT CLAIRVILLE.

Seclusion—A household word—A Broadside—Albert Smith’s

sketches—Jenny Lind’s accounts of her London _début_ and

description of her home—Mr. Bunn’s position—Her Italian

successful—Loving greeting to the Imperial city—Jenny

Lind’s large heart—Visiting the sick—Mr. Lumley saved _page_ 270

CHAPTER IV.

‘LA SONNAMBULA,’ ‘LA FIGLIA DEL REGGIMENTO.’

Royal attentions—The Duke of Wellington—A brilliant company—

Jenny Lind escapes—The new “Amina”—_Ah! non credea_—A

stage illusion—Jenny Lind’s thoroughness—Balfe’s tribute—

Lablache’s comment—New departure in _La Figlia_—Inspired

by Jenny Lind—The Priestess of Nature _page_ 277

CHAPTER V.

THE QUEEN’S STATE VISIT TO THE OPERA.

“Norma”—Attitude of the Press—A new reading—Opinions of the

Press—Mons. Roger—Opposing verdicts—Madame Grisi’s opinion _page_ 284

CHAPTER VI.

‘LA TEMPESTA,’ ‘I MASNADIERI.’

The _libretto_ an obstacle—Mendelssohn dissatisfied with

Scribe’s _Tempest_—Verdi—First performance of _I

Masnadieri_ based upon Schiller’s _Die Räuber_ _page_ 287

CHAPTER VII.

‘LE NOZZE DI FIGARO.’

Versatility of Mdlle. Lind’s genius—Mozart’s music—The

comedy of Beaumarchais—Rigorous exactitude of Mdlle. Lind—

An electrical effect—Musical example _page_ 290

CHAPTER VIII.

BY COMMAND OF THE QUEEN.

Royal concerts—Swedish songs—Lablache “_wie ein Vater_”—King

Leopold—Where the English heart was won—An inestimable

privilege _page_ 294

CHAPTER IX.

IN THE PROVINCES.

The summer of 1847—Burnham Beeches—Horse exercise—Wimbledon

Park—Mr. Lumley’s fête at Putney—Tea and supper at

Clairville—Jenny Lind entertaining—Moods—In the provinces—

English tour concluded—Mrs. Grote’s account—Mr. Edward

Lewin—At Norwich—Invitation to the Bishop’s Palace—

Choristers’ privileges—Letter from A. P. Stanley—An

independent witness—Departure from England—On board the

Packet—A last adieu _page_ 298

BOOK VIII.—THE GOAL.

CHAPTER I.

NEW TRIUMPHS AT BERLIN.

Farewell at the Opera-House—At Sans Souci—Royal

Kammersängerin—The King’s letter—Hamburg—Stockholm _page_ 308

CHAPTER II.

HOME AGAIN.

Love of England—Philanthropic plans—Jenny Lind’s published

letter in explanation of these plans—Voice in full

splendour—Operatic performances—Concerts—“Norma” her last

Swedish performance on the stage—The Bunn verdict—Home—

Sympathy between Jenny Lind and Mendelssohn—His death—Fund

for the Theatre School—Engagement to Herr Julius Günther—

Departure—Retrospect _page_ 313

CHAPTER III.

THE RE-APPEARANCE AT HER MAJESTY’S THEATRE.

_La Sonnambula_—Clairville—The fourth of May—Chopin at the

Opera—Chopin’s _Matinées_—Jenny Lind’s enthusiasm for

Chopin’s works—First appearance of Jenny Lind as “Lucia”—

Analysis and critique—Lablache and Jenny Lind in _L’Elisir

d’Amore_—Success of Jenny Lind in _I Puritani_—_Qui la

voce_—The _Cadenza_—Critique—Her Majesty and the Prince

Consort constant auditors—Mr. Lumley’s profits _page_ 324

CHAPTER IV.

THE CONCERT FOR THE BROMPTON HOSPITAL.

Retirement at Clairville—Herr Berg and family—Trusted

friends—Thalberg—Mr. and Mrs. S. C. Hall—The Brompton

Hospital—Mr. Otto Goldschmidt plays at the Concert in its

behalf—Her visit to the Hospital—The “Jenny Lind Gallery”—

Memorial salver—Panegyric by Mr. Disraeli—A long line of

noble deeds inaugurated _page_ 330

CHAPTER V.

‘ELIJAH.’

Letter to Frau von Kaulbach—“In memory of Mendelssohn”—

“_Tournée_ in the Provinces”—_La Figlia_ at Brighton—

Roger’s account of it—Benefit concert for her Orchestra—

Soirée to the band—Address and healths proposed by Jenny

Lind—Return to London—A worthy monument to Mendelssohn—The

Soprano part of _Elijah_ written for Jenny Lind’s voice—

Performance of _Elijah_ at Exeter Hall—_Times’_ critique—

The Mendelssohn Scholarships permanently established _page_ 336

CHAPTER VI.

FOR CHARITY.

Concerts at Manchester—Birmingham—Yule-Tide at Manchester—

Liverpool—Second visit to Norwich—The concerts—The Jenny

Lind Infirmary for Sick Children—Concert for Balfe’s

benefit—Worcester Royal Infirmary—£10,000 for charity—The

_Creation_ at Exeter Hall—_Times’_ critique—Liberality of

Jenny Lind _page_ 342

CHAPTER VII.

THE LAST OPERA.

Doubts and perplexities—“The Grand Classical Concerts”—A

mistake—Reparation—General emotion—Six performances—Her

Majesty and the Prince Consort—“For the last time”—A

delicate memorial _page_ 348

CHAPTER VIII.

THE “METHOD.”

A _soprano drammatico_—Compass—The various registers—Art of

blending—Signor Garcia’s success—Veiled tone of middle

notes—The F♯︎—The _pianissimo_—The natural voice—Diligent

practice—Voice not naturally flexible—The reward of

labour—The shake—The method of breathing—The _messa di

voce_—Articulation—Incessant practice—Two interesting

letters—Singing as a beneficial exercise for the chest—

Summary of eleven years’ operatic work _page_ 355

CHAPTER IX.

FRIENDS IN ENGLAND.

Home of the heart—Of her adoption—The Grotes—Mr. Edward

Lewin—The Bishop of Norwich and Mrs. Stanley—Mary and

Arthur Penrhyn Stanley—“Jenny Lind’s smile”—A letter from

Tasmania—A Swedish Bible—Mrs. Stanley’s report to her

sister—Mme. Salis Schwabe—Baroness and Miss French _page_ 366

BOOK IX.—FRUITION.

CHAPTER I.

WHY DID JENNY LIND LEAVE THE STAGE?

A dramatic genius—The moment of recoil—Reasons—Mrs. Grote’s

views—Tired—The hope of tranquillity—Love of home—Scheme

for endowment of the Theatre School—Second London season—A

crisis—Engagement to Herr Günther broken—A proposal—

Clashing standpoints—Ruin awaits old friends—Mr. Nassau

Senior—A pledge redeemed—Release—To Paris and Mrs. Grote—

“Tired to the very bones” _page_ 376

CHAPTER II.

WANDERINGS AT EASE.

Tale of singing birds—Song from Spontini’s _Vestale_—At the

Swedish Embassy—Death of Catalani—Rest enjoined—A visit to

Mme. Mendelssohn—A grape cure—America on the horizon—Mr.

Goldschmidt’s concert at Hamburg—To Berlin—Royal

invitation to Stockholm—Letter from King Oscar I. _page_ 393

CHAPTER III.

LÜBECK.

An English letter from Jenny Lind—Plan for going to Russia

negatived—American tour—Barnum—His liberality—Destination

of the American earnings—Mr. Benedict and Signor Belletti—

Children’s ball at Lübeck—Mr. Goldschmidt—Hanover—The

Queen of Hanover’s recollections—Excitement at Göttingen—

The Burschenschaft Hannovera—At Berlin—Letter from Prof.

Jüngken—Herr Rellstab’s tribute—Lieder—The last air of

“Susanna”—Hamburg and Mme. Schumann’s diary—Jenny Lind’s

aversion to “Society”—Enthusiasm for Schumann’s songs—Last

“notes” of Jenny Lind “An den Sonnenschein”—Munificence to

the Students’ Union at Lund—A bracelet from the Court of

Berlin—Religious impressions _page_ 402

CHAPTER IV.

HOME ONCE MORE.

With the “Gauthiod”—The _Daily Allehanda_—Fröken von

Stedingk’s record—A bunch of forget-me-nots—Presentation

of medal struck in her honour—Address—Medals, a legacy to

the National Museum, Stockholm—Singing in the St. Clara

Kyrka _page_ 428

CHAPTER V.

DEPARTURE.

Liverpool Philharmonic Society—Two concerts—Jenny Lind at

rehearsal—_Messiah_, her first singing of the Soprano part

in England—Great excitement—Her Swedish heart—The old

folks at home—A hurried departure—A royal progress down

the river—Westward Ho!—American triumphs—Oratorio a

congenial field—Letter to parents—To her guardian Herr

Munthe—Milk soup and a wooden spoon—Death of Fru Lind—

Retrospect of a devoted daughter—Word portrait by Mr.

Parker Willis—Lady beggars—“Good night” _page_ 432

LAST WORDS.

Later Art-life of Madame Goldschmidt—Her death _page_ 448

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

CROELIUS, JENNY LIND’S FIRST SINGING MASTER _page_ 14

FACSIMILE PAGE OF ENGAGEMENT BOOK _To face page_ 228

JENNY LIND IN THE CHARACTER OF “MARIA” IN _La Figlia

del Reggimento_ _To face page_ 248

JENNY LIND IN THE CHARACTER OF “ALICE” IN _Roberto

il Diavolo_ _page_ 267

JENNY LIND IN THE CHARACTER OF “AMINA” IN _La

Sonnambula_ _page_ 279

JENNY LIND IN THE CHARACTER OF “NORMA” _To face page_ 318

MADEMOISELLE LIND, FROM A DAGUERROTYPE BY KILBURN,

AUGUST 1850 _To face page_ 434

WYND’S POINT, MALVERN HILLS, MADAME GOLDSCHMIDT’S

COUNTRY HOME IN WHICH SHE SPENT MUCH OF THE LAST

YEARS OF HER LIFE, AND IN WHICH SHE DIED, NOVEMBER

1887 _page_ 462

JENNY LIND,—THE ARTIST.

BOOK I.

ANTICIPATION.

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTION.

Jenny Lind—the name carries music with it to English ears. The memory is

very tender and fragrant of her who, to our joy, found, for so long, a

home among us. And yet it may well be questioned whether we English have

even yet formed an adequate estimate of her gifts and character.

For what is it which we have in our minds as we recall her name? It is,

first, some tale of the wonderful days when all London went mad over her

singing. We have heard people tell, as their eyes kindle with the old

passionate delight, how she came tripping over the stage in the

_Figlia_, and how the liquid notes came rippling off her lips. We hear

of the hours they waited in the historic crush at the Opera in the

Haymarket; of the feverish energy with which they toiled to catch one

glimpse of her passing. We remember, with a smile, some picture in an

old copy of _Punch_, or the _Illustrated London News_, of scenes in the

opera passages on a Jenny Lind night.

And then we add to this memory of that surpassing triumph, the thought

of one whose purity and simplicity won all hearts to love the girl who,

in the hour of her overwhelming success, remembered others rather than

herself, and poured out her money in charities, and devoted her

marvellous gifts to the relief of poverty and the healing of pain.

That is our English picture, and it is good and pleasant enough; and it

is quite true, so far as it goes. But it is strangely imperfect and

fragmentary. It assumes that her operatic career is to be identified

with the brief passage of those London seasons, and that her fame is a

private possession of our own here in England, where she lived and died.

There prevails no general conception that the English visits were but

the latter episodes of a long dramatic experience—an experience which

had begun, with extraordinary promise, before she had passed out of her

childhood, and which had already won to her the same enthusiasm which

greeted her in England, not only in her own Swedish home and in the

kindred capital, Copenhagen, but in the great musical centres of

Germany—Berlin, the Rhine, Leipzig, Munich, and Vienna.

Nor was it only the enthusiasm of the general public for a most

beautiful voice, which had been already given her; but it was the

authoritative chiefs of the musical art who had signalised in her the

arrival not only of an exquisite singer, but of a supreme and unique

artist. The admiration for Jenny Lind was not a mere popular fever, such

as has now and again followed the steps of some favourite of the opera.

Its peculiar force lay in this—that it held enthralled the highest and

best minds in Europe. It was the men of genius who recognised in her

something akin to themselves. In her native land it had been those who

dominated in the musical and literary world who were drawn to sing, and

write, and talk of her—Geijer, historian and poet; Lindblad, the

“Schubert of Sweden”; Bishop Thomander, Fredrika Bremer, Topelius. At

Copenhagen it is the chief artists and poets, and writers and sculptors

of the day who are profoundly sensitive to her influence—Jensen, Hans

Andersen, Thorwaldsen, Melbye, Œhlenschläger. In Berlin it is Meyerbeer,

who can talk of nothing else but this marvellous Swedish girl. In London

it is Moscheles, who writes, “What shall I say of Jenny Lind? It is

impossible to find words adequate to describe the impression she has

produced. This is no short-lived fit of public enthusiasm. So much

modesty and so much greatness united are seldom, if ever, to be met

with.” It is Thalberg, Taubert, Schumann, who welcome her into the elect

company of the masters, “who know.” It is Tieck and Kaulbach at Berlin,

it is Grillparzer at Vienna, who are her friends and her hosts. And,

finally, it is Mendelssohn himself, who, as will be seen in the letters

that follow, is fascinated by her personality, and feels all his gifts

roused in him to compose something worthy of her, and is eager and on

fire to put out all his power in an opera which she may sing, and bends

before her judgment as to his own place and career, and delights to

share with her the deepest motives and convictions with which he sets to

work at the _Elijah_. Does not our picture of the Haymarket crush rather

fade into insignificance as a standard of Jenny Lind’s position as an

artist when we recall the high notes of the soprano in the _Elijah_,

giving out the cry of Seraphim to Seraphim, “Holy, holy, holy, Lord God

of Sabaoth,” and remember that it was with her image before him that

Mendelssohn wrote that music—that it was to catch the peculiar beauty

which he loved in her voice that the high F sharps ring out so

appealingly in the “Hear ye, Israel?” And have we at all realised that

she was one of whom he could say, “She is as great an artist as ever

lived; and the greatest I have known”?[2]

The question that we have put was one which her visible presence would

at once suggest. Surely those who first saw her in much later life must

have instinctively felt a jar between the popular ideal and the

realisation; not that she was less than their expectation, but that she

was so much more than the general report tended to convey. They had come

to be introduced to her, murmuring perhaps to themselves some air from

the _Sonnambula_, or the _Figlia_, with which her early fame was

associated; but the air was forgotten when they found themselves in her

presence; that strong and solemn face, with its deep lines and grey

pathetic eyes, with its grave dignity, with its serious exultation—what

had this face in common with an opera of Donizetti? Charm, animation,

lightness, grace—these, no doubt, she had at command, and she could brim

over with gaiety and humour; but not in these lay the impression she

produced—not here was the dominant note struck. Rather one felt oneself

to be facing a character of emphatic force and vigorous outlines—a

character that it was difficult to imagine curbed within the

conventional artificialities of the Italian drama. It had far more of

the impressive pose of a powerful tragedienne. Even the name of “Jenny

Lind” seemed to be inadequate to the occasion. It is a name which

English lips caress with affection, having in it the sense and sound of

some homely and endearing diminutive. But here, one felt, was something

more than affectionate diminutives could express; something more than a

delicious singer; something more, even, than the pure and simple and

beneficent woman. All this there certainly was, but with it and above it

was that which startles and quells and even alarms—something of a rare

and majestic type, which broke through the ordinary layers which encrust

and imprison our average human life; a character solitary and distinct,

dowered with strange intensity, retaining its free original spontaneity,

drawing ever on its own resources, independent and somewhat contemptuous

of those external tests and standards by which the mass of men guide

their hesitating judgments. Susceptible, indeed, she was, as an artist

must be, to outside influence and atmosphere, but her individuality had

not succumbed, or lost its sharp and unique distinction under this

liability to sensitive impression; it had never yielded to the grinding

years. It retained, obviously and undeniably, the rarity and the

grandeur of genius; and all who had eyes to see knew, at a glance, that

here before them was a pilgrim-soul, aloof and uplifted,

“One of the small transfigured band,

Whom the world cannot tame.”

It is to justify this high estimate of her powers and gifts that this

book is written. It starts from the level of Mendelssohn’s judgment of

her. If, indeed, she was the greatest musical artist that he had ever

known, it is well worth while to ask whence her capacities took their

rise, what was their artistic development, what are the special notes

and features which were most characteristic of her genius. The book

proposes to respond to such questions as these; and, with this end in

view, after lightly tracing the records of her birth and early infancy,

it offers a sketch of her dramatic career from the year 1829–30, when

she first passed within the doors of the theatre, to the year 1850–51,

when, after having bade farewell to the stage for ever, she signalised

her new position by her triumphant passage to the New World beyond the

Atlantic. Within those full twenty years she was a Child of the Drama in

an intimate and peculiar sense. Within that time she won the experience,

under the pressure of which the gifts with which she was endowed

received their impress, and moved forward to their perfection. By the

close of those years she had gained everything that gave its unique

character to her artistic genius; for, not only had she proved her

complete mastery over all the manifold opportunities and material of the

operatic stage, but she had already, in earlier days, by her singing of

selections from the _Creation_, and the _Seasons_, and more especially

by her marvellous rendering of the soprano part in the _Elijah_, in

London, on behalf of the Mendelssohn Scholarships, on December 15th,

1848, attested her supremacy in that domain of art which was so

singularly congenial both to her special capacities and to her spirited

temper, and through which she was, in after years, to carry such a high

message to her hearers—the domain of sacred Oratorio.

Those twenty years, then, contain the secret of her growth as an artist.

The years that followed, besides the splendid opportunities which they

brought her of exercising the powers which were already matured, added,

also, to this, much which matured and deepened the woman’s inward

history—added the good gifts which she herself had, by hard necessity,

most pitifully lacked in her early days—the gifts of tender domestic

love, of watchful devotion—the background of warmth and confidence which

belongs to home, and husband, and children. All this would, for herself,

measured by her own balances, be of priceless worth in the estimation of

her life, and for those who knew and loved her, it would be of

inexhaustible interest. But it is the _artistic_ life, alone, of an

artist, over which the world has a positive and undeniable claim. An

artist is, in a sense, public property; his or her art makes direct

appeal to public judgment; it offers itself as a public endowment to the

world at large. Its development, its movements, its story, are public

facts. And it is due to mankind, when it gives to an artist a generous

and unstinted welcome, that it should know the peculiar growth and

training, the advantages and the perplexities, the hindrances and the

helps, through which that gift, which was at last so triumphant, won its

slow way forward out of darkness into light. Such a story may not be

without profit, if it aids men to understand how better to cherish and

foster those germs of genius which are to be found scattered in such

strange freedom, amid conditions which seem least calculated to rear

them in hardihood and grace. And, certainly, the tale of Jenny Lind may

well be told for the sake of bearing splendid witness, to all those who

feel themselves stirred by some inherent native power, of the

unconquerable force with which a pure and strong individuality, if it be

true to the inner light and loyal to the outward call, can dominate

circumstances, however harsh and rude, and can, with a single eye on the

far goal of artistic perfection, and upheld by faith in God, move

straight to its aim with an unswerving and irresistible security,

shaping its passage, amid pitfalls and snares, over this perilous earth

with a motion as free and sure and faithful as a star that passes, in

unhindered obedience, over the steady face of heaven.

Nor will it be without significant interest that those twenty years

begin with her earliest attachment to the Royal Theatre in her own home

city of Stockholm, and end with her tribute-gifts, made out of her

wonderful winnings, as thank-offerings to that theatre and home to which

her heart had so often and so tenderly turned. The years of her main

artistic growth are those in which, whatever her successes elsewhere,

Swedish influences dominated her life. It was from the Swedish stage

that she derived all her dramatic training. It was Swedish literature,

Swedish literary men, who first made her sensitive to the high motives

that were at work within her. It was in their company, under their

encouragement, that she learned the truth and power of her own spiritual

promptings. It was to carry back to her beloved Stockholm the rich

fruits of her Parisian discipline that she toiled in exile. And even

though, as an artist could not but do, she felt her spirit expand when

she found herself taken into the full sweep of the musical forces at a

great centre like Berlin, still her Swedish heart beat true to the old

home-country, and it was out of her innermost self that she bent

herself, as soon as the currents of her public triumph carried her far

abroad, to the sweet task of securing for Sweden, out of the gains that

Europe and America poured into her lap, records and pledges of her

faithful remembrance of the needs and necessities of her own people, and

her fatherland.

CHAPTER II.

CHILDHOOD.

“A Child of the Drama”—so we have named her—and not without reason; for

it was within the shelter of the Royal Theatre at Stockholm that she

first found the comfortable warmth of a steady and a tender home, in

which her child-heart, with its intense affections, could freely and

candidly expand. She was hardly ten years old when she came under the

guardianship of the Royal Theatre; and throughout those nine early

years, she was a forlorn little pilgrim, often passed about through the

hands of strangers, and pitifully deprived of that deep security which a

fixed and stable home-life inbreeds in us through its traditional

sanctities and immemorial kindnesses.

Her birth, which took place in the parish of St. Clara, in Stockholm, on

October 6th, 1820, found both her parents somewhat under difficulties.

Her father, Niclas Jonas Lind, son of a lace-manufacturer, seems to have

been able to do little or nothing towards providing a home for mother

and child. He was very young, only twenty-two years old; he had, through

lack of energy, failed to continue his father’s business, and at this

time, kept the ledgers at a private merchant’s house; in virtue of which

office he is entered as “Accountant” in the church register at the

baptism of his little daughter, who was christened, on the day after her

birth, with the name “Johanna Maria.”

Such a post would, no doubt, bring him in but little; and perhaps he was

not very likely to make the most of what he got. For he was

good-naturedly weak; much given to music of a free and convivial kind,

such as was widely popular in Sweden at that day. Mr. Lind had a good

voice, and took an eager part in these musical festivities. Such a life,

it will be easily understood, does not tend to foster steadiness or

thrift; and he was perfectly unable to provide mother and child with

either lodging or board, though he probably contributed to it in some

slender way. All the practical management had to be left to the energy

and determination of the mother, who was, at the time, making her own

way through the world under conditions which were not favourable to a

baby’s entry on the scene.

She was, herself, of very respectable burgher-stock. Her maiden name had

been Anna Maria Fellborg; but she had been first married, in 1810, at

the age of eighteen, to a Captain Rådberg. Her marriage had proved very

unhappy, owing to the bad character of the husband; and after about

eighteen months she obtained a divorce from him in the High

Ecclesiastical Court, the Court assigning to her, in decisive

recognition of her husband’s misconduct, the custody of a little

daughter who had been born to them, called Amelia Maria Constantia,

together with aliment to the amount of half Rådberg’s income, whatever

that might be. She was thus thrown upon her own unaided exertions; but

she was a woman of great force of character, well-educated for her

circumstances, resolute not to be beaten. She got along, in one way or

another, chiefly by means of education; and in 1820, at Jenny’s birth,

was keeping a day-school for girls, one or two of whom she also boarded;

it was one of these little boarders, nine years older than Jenny, who

became afterwards so helpful to her as companion and friend—Louise

Johansson, whose name will frequently recur in the course of our story.

A baby would be, no doubt, a most tiresome inconvenience in the

management of such a household; and so her mother seems to have placed

the child, at once, under the care of Carl Ferndal, who was organist and

parish clerk of the church at Ed-Sollentuna, some fifteen English miles

out of Stockholm. She was tended by this man and his wife for about

three years, her mother visiting her, it seems, at intervals, and

spending with her the summer of 1821. Owing to some dispute with the

clerk, she took Jenny back in 1824, probably in the early part of the

year, to Stockholm; but it is possible to believe that those early years

in Sollentuna were not without some influence on the child’s character,

for they seem to have woke up in her, from the very start, that innate

and instinctive sense of the country which was so noticeable in her. The

instinct itself is, indeed, native to the Swedes, for whom “the country”

is a passion; and this national characteristic held, in her, a

deep-rooted dominion. Somehow, one felt, in her company, as if she had

come out of the country. She was in close touch with all that belongs to

a simple peasantry. She knew the tones of its songs; and the rhythm of

its dances; its simplicity, its charm, its pathos—all were hers.

Something of its native depth and dignity seemed to have passed into

her. She ever felt herself at home in the country; she breathed there

freely; she revelled in its wild flowers, in contrast with cultivated

garden-flowers for which she had little love. She had an intense delight

in the songs of wild-birds, with whose ways and habits she had intimate

acquaintance. She enjoyed, especially, the expanse of wide waters. She

delighted to be at large; she hated crowds, and the pressure of a city,

and the unresting stir of society. She did not desire the constant

company of many fellow-creatures; the town-instincts did not draw her.

Her need of music might bring her to live there where she could best

satisfy it; but her heart was, naturally, away in country-scenes, where

men were not too thick and near; and where God seems closer; and where

the soul can feed its own high thoughts, somewhat aloof and alone,

unfretted by man’s insistent noise. Yet, after these first four years,

she was brought up altogether in a city, winning the sight of the

country only in her holidays. Something, surely, sank down very deep

into the tiny baby, as she toddled in and out of the clerk’s house, in

the village of Sollentuna—something, which made her at home, ever, amid

trees and fields—and something which was still strong in her to the end,

linking the first days in the Swedish village to those last hours when

she waited for her death, hid in the English home, where she had made

for herself a refuge of peace, amid the sweet solitude of the Malvern

hills.

Back, however, to Stockholm, she was then quickly brought; and there, in

her home, she, most likely, found a new arrival in the person of Fru

Tengmark, her grandmother on her mother’s side, now in her second

widowhood, who had, hitherto, lived with one of her daughters, Fru

Perman, at Östersund, in the north of Sweden, but who had now come to

press her claim for admittance into a certain Home for the Widows of

Stockholm burghers, an established and endowed institution of some

importance in Stockholm. Already, in 1822, the old lady had put in her

plea that she was unable, at an age which made employment impossible, to

save herself, by her own efforts, from need; but it was not until 19th

August, 1824, that rooms were finally allotted to her. Jenny, therefore,

it would appear, found her at her mother’s house; and she seems to have

received from Fru Tengmark a more kindly and appreciative treatment than

it was in her mother’s nature to bestow upon her. She always spoke of

her grandmother with strong admiration and affection. Above all, she

took in from her a profound impression of religion; and it was to her

that, in after years, she was accustomed to trace back those spiritual

influences which became the very soul of her life.

[Illustration: Vintage printed sheet music in treble clef showing

several lines of a melody with quarter and eighth notes on aged paper.]

It was the grandmother who was the first to detect the musical gifts of

the child; and this detection left a profound impression on the child

herself, as if she, too, then first made a discovery of what was in her

through the surprise which she found herself producing in others. The

story formed her earliest distinct memory. Coming up from the country to

the town, she was struck by the music of the military bugles that daily

past through the street; and one day when she fancied herself alone in

the house she crept to the piano on which her half-sister used to

practise her music, and, with one finger, strummed out for herself the

fanfare which she had caught from the soldiers. But the grandmother was

at hand, and, hearing the music, called out the name of the half-sister,

whom she supposed it to be; and little Jenny, in terror at being found

out, hid under the square piano; she was so small that she fitted in

perfectly; and the grandmother, getting no answer to her calls, came in

to look, and presently discovered her, and dragged her out, and was

astonished, and said, “Child, was that you?” and Jenny, in tears at her

crime, confessed; but the grandmother looked at her deeply, and in

silence; and when the mother came back she told her, and said: “Mark my

words, that child will bring you help.” And, after that, the neighbours

used to be called in to hear her play. As she told the story in later

years, she would reproduce most vividly the frightened look of the child

creeping away to hide; and the significant look of the wonder-struck

grandmother as she took in that it was indeed the tiny creature of three

years old who had played the tune. She never forgot the historic

“fanfare”; and, as the earliest signal of her after-career, it is given

in the form in which she herself committed it to the memory of her

daughter.

At this day-school Jenny continued with her mother, for three or four

years; but, at last, the only boarder, Louise Johansson, was taken away,

and her mother found herself hard pressed for funds. She determined to

go out as governess; and, perhaps with this intention, answered an

advertisement stating that a certain childless couple were anxious to

have a child to take care of. It turned out that this couple lived in

the very same Widows’ Home, in which Fru Tengmark had rooms, the man

being the Guardian or Steward of the Home—a thoroughly comfortable and

respectable position, by right of which he occupied the Lodge at the

gate. This all seemed to fall in admirably, as Jenny would have the

companionship of her favourite relation. So thither she was sent,

probably in the year 1828; and her mother retired from Stockholm and

took a place as governess, in Linköping, carrying with her her daughter

Amalia Rådberg to help her in her educational work.

For a year and more she lived in the Widows’ Home, but there is nothing

recorded of her life there until we come to the famous incident which

brought about her removal, and which fixed, for ever, the lines of her

future career. It came about in this fashion. “As a child I sang with

every step I took, and with every jump my feet made.” So she herself

records in her letter to the editor of the ‘Swedish Biographical

Lexicon,’ written in 1865;[3] and, apparently one of the forms which the

perpetual song took was addressed to a cat, “with a blue ribbon round

its neck,” of which she was very fond. The rest of the story shall be

given in her own words as they were taken down by her eldest son, to

whom she told it at Cannes in the spring of 1887:—Her favourite seat

with her cat was in the window of the Steward’s rooms, which look out on

the lively street leading up to the Church of St. Jacob’s, and there she

sat and sang to it; and the people passing in the street used to hear,

and wonder; and amongst others the maid of a Mdlle. Lundberg, a dancer

at the Royal Opera House; and the maid told her mistress that she had

never heard such beautiful singing as this little girl sang to her cat.

Mdlle. Lundberg thereupon found out who she was, and sent to ask her

mother, who seems to have been in Stockholm at the time, to bring her to

sing to her. And, when she heard her sing, she said, “The child is a

genius; you must have her educated for the stage.” But Jenny’s mother,

as well as her grandmother, had an old-fashioned prejudice against the

stage; and she would not hear of this. “Then you must, at any rate, have

her taught singing,” said Mdlle. Lundberg; and the mother was persuaded,

in this way, to accept a letter of introduction to Herr Croelius, the

Court Secretary and Singing-master, at the Royal Theatre. Off with the

letter they started; but, as they went up the broad steps of the Opera

House, the mother was again troubled by her doubts and repugnance. She,

no doubt, had all the inherited dislike of the burgher families to the

dramatic life. But little Jenny eagerly urged her to go on; and they

entered the room where Croelius sat. And the child sang him something

out of an opera composed by Winter. Croelius was moved to tears and said

that he must take her in to Count Puke, the head of the Royal Theatre,

and tell him what a treasure he had found. And they went at once; and

Comte Puke’s first question was, “How old is she?” and Croelius

answered, “Nine years old.” “Nine!” exclaimed the Count; “but this is

not a _crèche_! It is the King’s Theatre!” And he would not look at her,

she being, moreover, at that time what she herself (in her letter to the

‘Biographical Lexicon’) calls “a small, ugly, broad-nosed, shy, gauche,

under-grown girl!” “Well,” said Croelius, “if the Count will not hear

her, then I will teach her gratuitously myself, and she will one day

astonish you!” Then Count Puke consented to hear her sing; and, when she

sang, he too was moved to tears; and, from that moment, she was

accepted; and was taken, and taught to sing, and educated, and brought

up at the Government expense.

So she told the crucial event in her life in her own graphic manner.

Those stairs were to become familiar enough to the little feet which

then first felt them. Up that broad flight she stepped on to the

platform on which, for twenty years to come, she was to live out her

life, and win her unexampled victories. As she pulled at her mother’s

unwilling hand that day, she took the step which determined her whole

destiny.

For, radical as her mother’s dislike might be to the stage, yet fate, on

the one hand, was too strong for her, and, on the other, she was pressed

sorely by her straitened means. Croelius and Count Puke were not going

to let their new-found treasure slip through their hands. They made an

immediate offer to relieve the mother of all direct responsibility for

her child’s maintenance and education; they proposed to adopt her into

the School of Pupils, which was attached to the Royal Theatre, looking

to repay the expenses, which they risked, through the after-success

which they anticipated. It was a generous proposal; it came at a moment

of pressure when it was almost impossible to refuse the opportunity of

relief; and the mother yielded. To her it still seemed an act by which,

in her own words, used afterwards to the Directors of the theatre, she

was “sacrificing her own child to the stage.” But circumstances were

unfortunate, and she could not but agree. So Jenny passed over from the

Widows’ Home to become a little nursling of the Drama; and the world

owes a debt of genuine gratitude to the Directors of the Theatre Royal

for so quick and bold a recognition of the wonderful gift which lay hid

in that tiny body. Rare, indeed, in the annals of art is it that the

official authorities are so swift in their appreciation of strange and

exceptional genius or so ready to make a venture on its behalf. And the

chief honour, in a deed most honourable to all concerned, must lie with

Herr Croelius. It was his insight that saw what there was in the “shy,

gauche, and ugly, under-grown girl;” it was his courage that laid

compulsion on the natural unwillingness of Count Puke. “The person,” she

herself wrote in the letter we have already quoted to the editor of the

‘Biographical Lexicon,’ “whom alone I have to thank for the first

discernment of my gift of song was the Court Secretary Croelius,

Singing-master at the Theatre Royal. He told me all that which in later

years came to pass.” His kindly features, quaint and dignified, are

recorded in the accompanying sketch, on which she herself, long

afterwards, wrote her witness to the goodness of him who was “the first

to discern her gifts,” and whose insight and courage determined her

career.

[Illustration: Black-and-white engraved profile portrait of a

19th-century man facing left, with handwritten inscription reading

‘Croelius, my first dear old singing master’ and a note referencing a

performance at the Royal Theatre of Stockholm, 1829.]

So closes her early childhood. Hitherto she has sung as Nature bade her,

singing to herself, singing to her cat, singing “at every step and jump

which she made with her baby feet.” Something, indeed, she may have

caught from her mother, who was qualified to teach music, and from her

half-sister and the day-pupils who used to practise on the piano on

which Jenny made her first famous experiment; and she would have heard

her father, who used to come in the evening and sing, while her mother

played the guitar, when the little one lay probably in bed. And, even at

Sollentuna, she would have listened, in baby-wonder, to Ferndal as he

played his organ in the church. But her young life had been, as we have

seen, strangely wandering, chequered, and untutored, and nearly

everything she had must have come from her own instinctive spontaneity.

She was now to pass at this tiny age into a school devoted to the drama,

under the definite training and discipline of skilled masters in music.

The little foundling of Nature was henceforward to become the child of

Art.

CHAPTER III.

PUPILAGE.

The Royal Theatre, at Stockholm, into which Jenny Lind passed in the

September of 1830, was to be, for the next ten years, the scene and

centre of her life. In it she found a nursery for her child-talent; a

school to direct her entire development; a playground in which she

tasted the delights of companionship; a home, which watched over her

with fatherly interest and authority; a stage on which she was greeted

with unstinted appreciation. It became, for this spell of years, the

pivot of all her efforts, the focus of all her associations and hopes,

the environment within which all her gifts opened and discovered

themselves.

The theatre was subsidised from the Royal Civil List, and was directed

and controlled by the office of the Lord Chamberlain. Its chief officer

was a Royal Director (Intendant), under whom, among other officials, was

the Chief of the Singing Department. The first office was occupied, at

the time of Jenny’s entry, by Count Puke; while the second was filled by

Herr Croelius, who was dignified with the title of Court Secretary. The

official finances came under the supervision of Herr Forsberg, an

official in the War Office, who was charged with the honorary

superintendence of the Theatre-School. He took an almost fatherly

interest in Jenny Lind; and she retained an intimate and affectionate

friendship with his family, until her death.

The theatre stands in the heart of Stockholm, close to the Norrbro

(North Bridge), overlooking the wide basin of the Norrström: it is a

large, handsome building, facing the street known as the Gustaf Adolf’s

Torg, with its basement and double stories, on the second of which, in

fine and airy rooms, was housed the School of Girls attached to the

theatre, into which Jenny was now introduced, herself the very youngest

of all, as we may gather from Count Puke’s complaint that Croelius was

treating the theatre as if “it were a _crèche_.”

The “Directors of the Royal Theatre,” as its authorities were called,

were in the habit of boarding out the pupils at some certified home, or

homes, in the town, under the charge of some lady with whom the theatre

made terms for food, lodging, and educational supervision. And, here, we

come to a rather curious arrangement, which might, if it had been

happily carried out, have combined, most fortunately, Jenny’s new

conditions with her natural home-relations. Her mother had moved back to

Stockholm just before Jenny’s entry at the theatre: she had taken, in

the spring of 1830, a flat in No. 4 Quarteret Hammaren, in the

Jakobsbergsgata. Had she taken it for the very purpose of boarding the

pupils of the theatre? It is impossible to say: but, certainly, this

parish of St. Jacob is close at hand; and, very soon after her return,

she appears to have been intrusted by the Directors with some of their

boarders; and, among them, probably, her own little daughter. Indeed,

this is made almost certain by the fact that Jenny’s very earliest

recollection of the Theatre-School, as she often told her daughter, was

her running to the school, to keep herself warm, in the cold winter

mornings, dressed in the vivid smart colours, which her mother and

half-sister loved, and which she so hated that she used to pull the

bright feathers out of her bonnet as soon as she was out of sight of

home. At last, in 1833, the affair took shape in a legal contract, drawn

up between the “Directors” and Jenny’s mother. The conditions of the

bond are most precise. They begin by stating that they have, already,

since April, 1832, been paying for[4] “Jenny Lind’s board and

education,” and that, through the progress she has made since then, they

have “formed the best hopes of her usefulness for the theatrical

profession,” and that they “desire to attach this young talent, by more

definite conditions, to the Royal Theatre.” They wish, therefore, to

close a contract with her mother, with the terms of which, as they

carefully insert, “Jenny Lind has declared herself satisfied.” The child

is to be received in the capacity of “actress-pupil at the Royal

Theatre”; and cannot, without the consent of the Directors, be released

from her engagement until she have, through her after-efforts, “made

restitution for the care and expense bestowed on her education.”

“During her growing years, and until she is competent to be allotted a

fixed salary, she is to receive, at the expense of the theatre, food,

clothes, and lodging, together with free tuition in singing, elocution,

dancing, and such other branches of instruction as belong to the

education of a cultivated woman, and are requisite for the theatrical

profession.” The carrying out of this instruction is then committed to

her mother, who engages to teach her “the Piano, Religion, French,

History, Geography, Writing, Arithmetic, and Drawing.” She is also to

see to all matters of “food, fire, furniture, and clothing, bedding and

washing”; and to have for her a tender mother’s care.

For these purposes she will receive from the Directors 250 Riksdaler

Banco (_i.e._ 20 guineas), while Jenny herself will be given two

Riksdaler Banco every month for pocket-money, out of which she is to pay

(poor child!) for her own needles and tape as well as for silk and

cotton towards the mending of her clothes; this will leave not very much

over for Jenny’s private purposes; but on the other hand she is to be

allowed the use of a pianoforte belonging to the Royal Theatre; and

moreover, after the 1st July, 1835, she will actually be supplied with a

chest of drawers, as well as bedstead and bedclothes, at the special

cost of the Royal Theatre. Her mother is to see to it that the little

pupil carefully observes the hours for lessons, rehearsals, and

representations. The Royal Directors are to judge when the tiny creature

will become competent to enter as actress with a salary from the Civil

List, after which a new contract will be made, by which she will be

pledged to remain for ten years in the service of the Royal Theatre for

such a salary as the Directors, having proper regard to her talent and

usefulness at the time, shall decide to grant her; but, in case “the

aktris-elev Lind, contrary to the good hopes entertained on her behalf,

were for one reason or another to prove of no use to the Royal Theatre,

or, again, if she were to fail in that obedience she owes to the Royal

Directors, it shall have full right to discharge her from the theatre

after three months’ notice, in which case the contract is to lapse.”

So runs the deed, signed, on behalf of the Directors, by P.

Westerstrand, who had succeeded Count Puke as Intendant, and by Carl D.

Forsberg, of the War Office; and, below their signatures, Jenny’s mother

declares herself to be satisfied with the proposed conditions.

The bond is impressive, first in requiring the “full education of a

cultivated woman.” There, in that phrase, is a distinct ideal. It

implies that the drama is no narrow, specialised function of a mere

expert; but is an affair in which the entire mind and character of the

artist are concerned, so that the theatre itself may well spend its

money in securing, not only the technical and professional training, but

also that the pupil shall have the intelligence developed and

fertilised, so that it be level with the average culture of the time.

And then, again, the completeness of the more professional instruction

is well worth notice. Elocution, dancing, the piano—all are necessary to

perfect the dramatic singing. The memory of this completeness in her

early theatrical education left an indelible impression on Jenny Lind.

She felt that she owed to it so much that contributed to, and enriched,

the full effect of her musical gift; and especially she valued her

trained skill in expressive and beautiful motion, gained in the dancing

school at the Theatre Royal. She moved exquisitely. Her perfect walk,

her dignity of pose, her striking uprightness of attitude, were

characteristic of her to the very last; and no one can fail to recall

how she stood, before, and while, she sang. Her grace, her lightness of

movement were all the more noticeable from the rather angular thinness

of her natural figure; and there can be no doubt that they threw into

her acting a charm which was positively entrancing.

To what degree the full education of a cultivated woman was actually

attained in her case, it would be hard to exactly define. A great

musical gift like hers carries culture with it; and, then, she had, all

her after-life, revelled in the society of the most cultivated men in

Europe. So that it is difficult, from knowledge of her in later days, to

say how much she had gained out of the formal instructions given her in

childhood. But, naturally, these can only have been of an elementary and

superficial type.

Nevertheless, the list of general studies named by the Directors was not

merely nominal; pains were taken; the instruction was given. Religion,

in spite of the hostile proximity of French on the one side, and of the

piano on the other, was carefully attended to; and her Confirmation

certificate, given her on May 10th, 1836, witnesses, by the hand of the

rector of St. Jacob’s parish, Herr Abraham Pettersson, that she passed

the public examination in the Christian doctrine of salvation “_with

distinction_.”

For French, she went, probably, to the classes of M. Terrade, teacher to

the Royal Theatre; the instruction was slight, but a certain degree of

conversational French was in free use in Stockholm at the time, and

would be habitual round about the theatre. Still, before her visit to

Paris in 1841, she thought it necessary to take special lessons; and she

had, when there, as we shall see, to grind at the grammar; so that her

early knowledge must have been quite unscientific.

As to the piano, she, certainly, gained, at some time in her early life,

a complete mastery over it, which stood her in good stead, and afforded

her great enjoyment in later years. It was true that she had injured her

left hand, when young, while striking fire with a flint on tinder, which

to a certain extent crippled its full use; and, besides, she feared to

fatigue and contract the vocal organs by serious practice on the piano.

But, in spite of this, she handled it freely, and finely; she delighted

to improvise on it, which she did with a touch of genuine genius; and

part of the peculiar charm of her northern songs, as she sang them, came

to them from her delicious playing of the accompaniment. There seems to

be no doubt that, from quite early days, and more especially at about

the age of sixteen, she could use it with easy familiarity; for, while

still at this school, she used to “coach” the other girls through the

musical parts of the plays, beating them out, herself, on the piano.

She had an eager and intense appreciation of her native literature; but,

no doubt, this would be largely due to the influence of the Stockholm

literary world, into which she was heartily welcomed at the time of her

first triumphs.

A specimen of her drawing still remains—some painted flowers, done in

the exact and formal manner of the day, but bearing sufficient witness

to her having had the regular lessons; and those, probably, from her

mother, who has left designs of the same type.

One accomplishment must be mentioned with special honour, her sewing.

She worked magnificently. “Madame’s stitches never come out,” is the

later testimony from her maid to her powers. And she loved to do a piece

of work, designing it herself, and achieving it, with the thoroughness

of an expert.

German, which, afterwards, she loved, and pronounced beautifully, she

did not begin until after her twenty-fourth year.

English was only slowly won, after her English visits. Her usual speech

in this country at that time was French.

So much for her general education and accomplishments; but we have been

anticipating the course of our story, to which we now return.

The little girl, then, started in the spring of 1833, with what might

well seem good hopes. Her career had taken a definite shape; she was

provided for, if nothing went wrong, for years to come; she was to

receive a regular education; and a future position was assured to her.

In the meantime she was to be housed, and cared for, by her own mother,

in the happy companionship of other girls.

Mdlle. Bayard, the lady superintendent of the school, was a person much

respected; and the pupils were sure of enjoying care and attention from

her. Jenny seems to have been exceedingly happy both with her, and with

the other girls; but, alas! her trouble came from where we might least

expect it—from her mother. Was it that her strong and resolute nature

had been warped by early disappointment?—that the early marriage with

Captain Rådberg at eighteen, with its rapid disillusion, had left

serious damage behind it on temper, and character? Certainly, the world

had gone hard with her. She had had to fight her way along for herself,

under the burden of straitened circumstances. And she was somewhat

proud, and stubborn, and self-willed. She, probably, fretted at the

sense of being below the conditions which her burgher blood might expect

and justify. From passages in her letters, we shall see, that she was

quick to resent a slight, and hard to pacify. Altogether, from her

recorded words and expressions, we can feel that she was one for whom

things would not run smoothly. She was apt to show herself

cross-grained, violent, harsh; and this not only to others, but also to

her child.

Before going on to tell the pitiful story of this early harshness, it

may be well to remember that the daughter’s memory of her mother was not

all dismal and unkind. Their characters had, probably, many elements in

common; her mother’s force, her mother’s haughty persistence reappeared,

to some extent, in Jenny Lind. She, too, was not apt to take life too

easily. And, again, she warmly recognised all that she owed, at this

early time, to her mother’s talents, and resolution, and effort. There

was, below all the divergence, a strong tie of underlying attachment.

The actual intercourse was, indeed, unhappy; it was marred by cruelty,

and narrowness, and suspicion, which left a life-long shadow on the

child. But it was not without something in it, which would, under

brighter circumstances, open out into the tenderness and gentleness

which belong to the name of mother, when once the early hardships were

passed.

But it is these bad days of which we have now to speak. It appears that

the pupils found the treatment they received from her too stern and

hard; and they were soon removed to rooms at the top of the theatre

itself; and placed under the charge of Mdlle. Bayard. Here they fared

excellently; and were extremely happy. Jenny, who remained at her

mother’s, used to visit them there; and it was now that she struck up

her intimate friendship with one of the pupils, Mina Fundin, who became

her favourite playmate, and with whom she kept up, for life, an

affectionate relationship. This lady is still alive, residing in

Stockholm. It would seem that the contrast between the lonely severity

of the home and the lively society of the theatre-rooms was too much for

Jenny; and, at last, after some bout of harsh treatment, on the 30th of

October, 1834, she took matters into her own hands, and ran off to

Mdlle. Bayard. The Directors saw the merit of the proceeding, and

allowed her to remain there. But her mother was not a person to

acquiesce in such an arrangement, and the result was a long dispute with

the theatre for the recovery of the child. It can serve no good purpose,

now, to follow the track of this unhappy wrangle. It is enough to say

that the mother was not content, until she had applied the pressure of

the law against the Directors; that, at first, she only rested her

appeal on the bond with the theatre, and that, when this failed, in

January, 1835, she set to work with a more determined effort. Mr. Lind,

who had, hitherto, kept in the background, was called to the front to

take part in the struggle; and, together, they combined to make good

their full parental claims over their child. Such a claim, once formally

established, and put in force, was, necessarily, irresistible; and the

theatre was obliged to surrender Jenny, by a final judgment of the Royal

Upper Town-Court, on the 23rd of June, 1836; and was, also, directed to

recognise the existing contract of 1833 as still standing, and to pay,

therefore, to the parents the stipulated sum for Jenny’s keep, which was

owing from January 1st, 1835, to April 1st, 1836, together with lawyer’s

fee, etc. There the quarrel ended; on June 6th the theatre notified to

the parents that Jenny would return to their house on July 1st, to be

boarded at the old terms; and both Mr. Lind, and his wife, countersigned

the notice.

It is pleasant to think that, in spite of these most uncomfortable

proceedings, the little creature over whose person home and theatre were

fighting so strenuously was spending a most happy time at Mdlle.

Bayard’s; and it is delightful to read the brimming letter which she

wrote, in the very thick of the wrangle, in August 1835—the very first

word that we actually possess from her pen. It is written from

Skytteholm, a place lying on one of the inland lakes which, in Sweden,

are called by the pleasant name of “Sweet-Waters,” where the pupils were

taken for their summer holidays. It is addressed to the mother of her

little playfellow, Mina Fundin—the Mina mentioned in the letter, who has

made such desperate resolutions from which she is only saved by the

state of her nerves and the motherliness of the “sensible old woman.”

With Mina’s mother, Jenny is evidently on the brightest and most

affectionate terms. Here is the letter:—

“Skytteholm, 5 Aug., 1835.

“MY DEAR LITTLE AUNTY,

“Pardon me for taking the liberty to write to you—but—I really

don’t know what to write about! Yes, I know! I hope that my little

Aunty and Lotta are quite well;—_we_ are flourishing, all of us!

“Ah! thank God! soon we return to town; I long dreadfully, for now

there is no more fun down here. You must not feel uneasy, Aunty, about

Mina going to drown herself, for she has not yet done so, because she

is too nervous even to go near the water—Oh, yes!—_occasionally_ she

does run the risk of it, but _I_ will look after her—_I_, who am a

sensible, old woman.

“We eat fruit in such quantities that sometimes we are not able to

walk, but we can’t get so very much, for the simple reason that there

are so few ripe ones; we only eat currants, and those are most

wholesome, aren’t they?

“Adieu, kind little Aunty! Do not mind my having written so badly, I

shall write better another time. I venture to enclose myself in

Aunty’s friendship.

“Yours truly obliged,

“JENNY LIND.”

“Oh! how beautifully written!”

The applause of the last phrase refers to the signature, which is

written with a vigorous flourish. The tone of the letter is delicious,—

simple, gay, and tender. They must have been bright days out of which

such words came; and it must be confessed, we fear, that some of the

brightness was probably left behind her, on the day when she returned to

her own mother’s house on the 1st of July. The nature of the return, to

begin with, was not likely to be very auspicious; and, then, there was

the partial loss of her merry companions. However, we hear of nothing to

show that things did not go smoothly.

And, in the meantime, too, success is coming, and continually growing,

to enliven, and enhearten the days. Whatever the struggle, and trouble,

that her life brought in it, certainly of one grief, which is apt to

darken the days of young artists, she was absolutely free. She was never

troubled by a lack of recognition. From her earliest childhood, her

gifts were felt to be surpassing; and this feeling never flagged. From

the beginning of her dramatic career to its close, it is one unbroken

triumph; and she had this singular good fortune of finding her way to

the exercise of her gifts, before a sympathetic public, as soon as she

had them to exercise. We shall see, in the next chapter, the way in

which this happened, and the direction which her success took. We shall

see that this risk on her behalf, which the Theatre Royal ran, and to

which we have ventured to give cordial praise, was one which justified

itself, by practical results, almost as soon as it had been run. The

theatre had hardly sown before it found itself reaping. The child, whom

Count Puke thought more of an age for a _crèche_ than a Royal Theatre,

was already, before she was in her teens, bringing grist to the Royal

mill.

CHAPTER IV.

CAREER.

We have seen that it was the child’s _musical_ talent that, first,

evoked the wonder of her neighbours. The stupor of the grandmother at

the baby’s fanfare on the piano; the amazement of the passers-by at the

song which was being confided to the ears of the patient and

appreciative cat; the tears that started to the eyes of Croelius—these

are the earliest signals of her marvellous gifts. But we, now, have to

recognise a new characteristic, which was almost more phenomenal than

her singing. Indeed, it may well be doubted whether, during her first

ten years at the Royal Theatre, it did not surpass her voice in

witnessing to the presence in her of a unique genius. This was her

_dramatic_ power. Precocious and extraordinary as her child-voice had

been, both in versatility and in tenderness, yet her early woman’s voice

did not, at first, exhibit or develop its after-gifts of high sonority.

It was still thin, and veiled. Rather, at that time, the secret of her

success lay in that intense and irresistible identification of herself,

voice and all, with her part, which is the highest proof of dramatic

genius.

In later years, those, who heard her sing in opera, would often say,

that if she had not been the greatest singer in the world, she would

have been the greatest actress. And we shall see the evidence for the

truth of this anticipation, if we glance over the early records of her

performance at the theatre; and we shall, also, understand through what

years of actual experience it was that she had obtained that thorough

mastery over all the detail and method of the stage, which made her

acting so consummate.

The long list of her performances, kept in the records of the Royal

Theatre, reveal to us that already, in the very first year of her

admittance to the school, as a little child of ten years old, she made

her appearance on the boards, on November 29th, 1830, in a play called

_The Polish Mine_, described as a “Drama, with Dance”; and in which she

played the part of “Angela.” “Angela” is a little girl of seven, who has

been carried off to a wild castle in the hills by a tyrant lord, to

amuse and cheer her mother, whom he had seized and shut up as his

prisoner. The child is to amuse the company at a grand fête in the

castle, and contrives, in an improvised dance, to convey to her mother

comfort and affection. But, on recognising her father disguised among

the guests, in pursuit of his wife, a cry of surprise escapes her; the

father is detected, and all three, father, mother, and child, are thrown

into prison in the Mine. There little Angela succeeds in getting hold of

the warder’s key while he is speaking with her mother, and in opening

the barrier without being discovered. The father and mother are thus

enabled to meet, and to fly, with their child, from the Polish Mine;

after a series of exciting adventures, they make good their escape; all

is made right. It is a part full of occasions for the brilliant little

dancer, whose ingenuity and skill are the key to the plot. The play was

repeated five times in the December, and twice more in the January

following. On March 18th, 1831, she made her first appearance in the

play that is noticed in the newspaper quoted below; it was called

‘_Testamentet_, a Drama,’ in which her part was that of “Johanna.” She

appeared, in this character, for the third time on April 14th, 1832, and

on the 4th April, 1832, we have the following notice of her appearance

in a periodical for literature and art, called _Heimdall_. The paper

begins by an apology for not having, long ago, put on record the wonder

that had already for some time been aroused. “We take this opportunity,”

it writes, “of performing a long-neglected duty—that of calling

attention to a young pupil of the theatre, Jenny Lind, only ten or

eleven years of age, who has several times appeared in the play

_Testamentet_ which preceded _Fidelio_. She shows, in her acting, a

quick perception, a fire and feeling, far beyond her years, which seem

to denote an uncommon disposition for the theatre.”

This play, _The Will_, is a charming piece by Kotzebue; and the part

taken by Jenny is one which would give delicious opportunities to her

arch and winning grace. It is impossible, as one reads the part, not to

picture her every look and gesture, so admirably is it suited to

qualities in her which were vividly present to the very last. We venture

to extract a scene from it. The plot turns on an old Colonel wounded in

the wars, who has been carried, unknown to himself, to the house of a

daughter whom he had utterly cast off for a marriage of which he

disapproved. He is full of gratitude for the care with which he has been

nursed. His heart is stirred with a longing for home: he is longing to

leave his fortune to his kind nurses; but the daughter, who has

recognised him, keeps ever out of sight; and he only sees her two

children, Henriette and Johanna. Henriette, the eldest, having been told

by her mother who this old man is, has been singing him a song which he

had loved in long-past days, “O sweet, and holy Nature!” He has broken

down under the strain of bitter memories: and he has to beg her to cease

singing, and to send him her little sister, for “the gracious child

knows so well how to charm away all bitterness.” After a sad monologue,

bewailing the loneliness in which he is drawing near to that last hour,

when there will be no one ever to say over him, “Here lies a brave man

in peace!” Johanna (Jenny) comes springing into the room, saying:—

“Good morning, dear old Colonel!—‘Mister Colonel,’ I ought to have

said! My mother scolds me, if I don’t!”

“COL. Good morning, little Jacky! Come, and be merry with me! Do some

of those funny tricks, that you are so fond of! And call me ‘Colonel,’

plain and simple, please!—Or, what do you think of calling me ‘Papa’?

“JOH. Papa? Oh! that I could never do! My papa is in the picture

upstairs, and he is so beautiful, and young, and kindly——

“COL. Well, I own I am not young and beautiful: but kindly!—_that_ I

am, indeed! Don’t you believe it?

“JOH. Oh yes! very often you are!

“COL. You must remember how ill I was: sick people cannot be very kind

to others: but now, you shall always find me bright and good, right

until I go away.

“JOH. What? Must you go away from us?

“COL. Certainly: in a few days.

“JOH. Are you in earnest?

“COL. I am, indeed.

“JOH. Oh! don’t go away from us! We all love you so dearly!

“COL. Do you love me?

“JOH. Oh! yes! At first, you know, I was very frightened of you; but

now—not a bit!

“COL. And how did you get over your fright?

“JOH. Why, because when you are as kind as you were, no one could help

being fond of you. And when you are dull, and cross, then I just take

myself off.

“COL. Ah! then, to-day, my Jacky will not take herself off, will she?

“JOH. Yes, I will, if you ever again call me ‘Jacky’! that is a

_dreadful_ name!

“COL. Why dreadful?

“JOH. I don’t know. But there are such _lovely_ names in the books

which my sister reads; and specially nice English names, like Liddy,

and Betty, and Arabella! Oh! if only they had asked _me_ before I was

baptized, I would have chosen the very loveliest of them all!

“COL. It was, really, a great shame that they did not ask you.

“JOH. My mother says, that she only had two names to give to her

daughters, because my grandfather had but two names, John, and Henry!

“COL. John Henry! Why, those are _my_ names, too!

“JOH. Once I cried over the stupid name, Jacky. But, then, my mother

began to cry, too, and she said: ‘Dearest child, you bear a name which

reminds me of a noble man!’ Now, I don’t know at all why I should

remind her of him. But then mother began to cry; so, you see, since

then, I don’t take any notice of it!

“COL. Well, let me try and teach you why you have the name. I am too

old, you say, to be your father, so will you try to think that I am

your dear old grandfather, John Henry?

“JOH. Yes! All right! But then, you know, you must never go away!

“COL. Or will you come with me, when I go?

“JOH. Away from mother? Oh! what a horrid thing to do!

“COL. Well, but, some day, you will have to leave her, when you go to

be married.

“JOH. Ah! yes! when I am married! I say! have you got a son?

“COL. Why?

“JOH. Why, because, if he is nice, I would marry him, and, then, we

might all stop together.

“COL. No, Jacky! I have no son—no child at all!

“JOH. Poor old man!

“COL. (_sighing_). Yes, indeed!

“JOH. It’s a shame! A horrible shame! I should have been so glad to

have married your son!

“COL. Why so glad?

“JOH. Why, because you are rich; and, then, I should be rich; and I

could help my sister!

“COL. What is there that she needs?

“JOH. I’ll tell you. Only, you must promise never to betray me!

“COL. I promise faithfully.

“JOH. Well, you know, she loves the head-ranger, and the head-ranger

loves her; and my mother says that it is all right: she often says,

‘It would be the joy of my old age!’ But he has nothing, and we have

nothing: so nothing can be done.

“COL. Dear me! Is that how it stands?

“JOH. Ah! if only I could manage that mother should be able to say to

me ‘You are the joy of my old age!’ That would be lovely! I declare

that if only I could do that, I would not mind calling all my own

children, ‘Jacky!’

“COL. Listen to me, dear child! I have an idea. If it was in your

power to make your sister rich enough to marry the head-ranger, would

you not do it?

“JOH. Of course I should!

“COL. Well, then, you _can_ do it.

“JOH. You are only laughing at me?

“COL. No! I promise you! Come away with me; be my little daughter; and

I will give your mother enough money to buy this joy for her old age!

“JOH. Oh! that’s very hard! Where shall we have to go?

“COL. Far, far away from here.

“JOH. Oh dear! and shall I never see my mother again?

“COL. Oh yes! I shall let you have a beautiful carriage with four

beautiful horses, and you will jump into it, and cry ‘Coachman, drive

me quick to mamma!’

“JOH. Will you really give me that?

“COL. I promise it.

“JOH. And I shall, then, bring joy to my mother’s old age!

“COL. Yes, you alone! of your own self!

“JOH. Come along, you dear old Colonel; I will be your daughter.

“COL. Away we’ll go, my Jacky! Only wait a minute! I must go and

arrange things. (_Goes out._)

“JOH. (_alone_). Oh! How happy mother will be! and my dear sister! and

the head-ranger! And it shall be a splendid wedding! and we will have

the musicians to play! Oh yes! we must have musicians! My old man must

not refuse me that, or else I won’t go with him! Oh dear! I wish I was

not going! I shall cry so; and the others will cry too; for they all

love me!—Ah! but then just think what it will be when I come back in

the beautiful carriage with four horses; and say ‘Coachman, drive me

home!’ and away we go, over stock and stone, until we draw up here at

our own house, prr! prr; and mother will put out her head at the

window; and cry ‘Jacky is come! Jacky is come!’”

Such was the delightful part played by the tiny little girl of ten years

old. Every word in it would suit her—the merry quickness of the child,

the sudden turns from gaiety to tears, and back again to gaiety, the

mysterious confidences, the prattling innocence, the brimming affection.

No wonder that the _Heimdall_ was fascinated.

In the year preceding this notice, 1831, she had played, for three

nights, in what is called by the serious name of “an historic drama”—

_Johanna de Montfaucon_, in which she took the part of “Otto”; and,

besides this, had appeared five times as “Jeannette,” in a “Comedy, with

Dance,” called the _Pasha of Suresne_. During the following year, 1833,

she appeared in twenty-two performances—her new characters being

“Louise” in a bagatelle in one act, called _The Students of Småland_,

and “Georgette,” in a drama of five acts, called _Thirty Years of a

Gambler’s Life_, which ran for ten nights during November and December;

and was constantly repeated in 1834. This early brilliancy was

apparently at its very height in 1834—when, on June 24th of that year, a

paper, _The Daily Allehanda_, seems quite bewildered by the child’s

extraordinary power. “In the play known in its French form as _La fausse

Agnès_” (so it writes) “there is a child’s part which is rendered with

an almost incomprehensible, a really unnatural cleverness by Jenny

Lind.” This cleverness must indeed have been almost incomprehensible:

for it leads the critic to indulge in an anxious complaint that the

little girl’s “temperament seems readily to lean to everything that is

not of a serious character.” So absolutely had she disguised herself by

the freedom with which she had thrown herself into her part! All that

deep impressive seriousness, which was the innermost note of her being,

had absolutely vanished out of sight; and the paper feared for her

light-headed frivolity! Yet, in calling, as it does, upon Jenny’s

instructors and guardians to see to it that the danger be averted, and

that “her happy natural gifts, high-spirited as they are, should be

carefully and judiciously dealt with,” the _Daily Allehanda_ was giving

proof of a tender and noble solicitude for the good guidance of the

child. And it did more. For it goes on to complain of the immoral

character of this play, in which she was allowed to appear; it speaks

strongly of the deep ethical corruption of the society which it

portrayed, and of the responsibility incurred by those who permitted a

child to put out her powers in a part so full of “coquetry, boldness,

and heartlessness.” It does honour to the Press of Stockholm that it

should have made this protest. As we read it, we shudder at the terrible

perils which were swarming round the child. Here was a case in which her

very innocence of evil, at that tender age, allowed her to revel in the

fun and the audacity of such a character, without any of the checks

which a knowledge of the villainy in it would have suggested to her pure

mind. Her very innocence is used to encourage her to abandon herself to

the fling and swing of the scandalous play. So perilous was her path!

Yet along it she moves, untainted and unhurt, in the security of the

pure in heart, with such sure feet as those with which, on Raphael’s

canvas, St. Margaret passes, without an effort or a fear, in maiden

gentleness, over the writhing Dragon and through the gate of Hell.

She appeared, altogether, twenty-two times in 1834, and twenty-six times

in 1835—the principal new character being “Pierrette,” in a drama from

the French in three acts, called _The Foster-Son_, which ran for

thirteen nights in the course of the year; and “Leonora” in a

vaudeville, with music by Berwald, called _The New Garrison_.

In several of these plays, there seems to have been music and dancing;

possibly, too, some singing from Jenny. At any rate, she sang publicly

at some concerts in the theatre, during these years; taking part in a

duet from _La Straniera_ with her master Herr Berg, on November 24th,

1832; and in a trio, on November 28th, 1835. And long before this there

appear to have been performances given, in private rooms, by Herr Berg,

in which to exhibit her phenomenal talent, the news of which spread

abroad: for, in the _Heimdall_, the periodical from which we have

already quoted a description of her acting, there is the following

record given, in its number for April 24th, 1832:—

“Her (_i.e._ Jenny’s) remarkable musical gift, and its precocious

development, have made quite a sensation in the circle in which she

has appeared, guided by her master, Herr Berg. Her memory is as

perfect as it is sure; her receptive powers as quick as they are

profound. Every one is, thus, both astonished, and moved, by her

singing. She can stand a trial, in the most difficult _solfeggi_ and

the most intricate phrases, without being bewildered; and whatever

turn the ‘improvisation’ of her master may take, she follows his

indications with the liveliest attention, as if they were her own.

Nothing can be more interesting than to listen to Herr Berg with this

little pupil by his side; and one is tempted to believe in a magnetic

‘rapport’ between them, so entirely do both seem to be one soul and

one heart.

“If this young genius does not ripen too prematurely, there is every

reason for expecting to find in her—although alas! not until the

distant future—an operatic artist of high rank.”

This is a fascinating little glimpse of the child of twelve, absorbed in

her teacher, miraculously interpreting and reproducing his mind. Her

innate originality of character did not at all stand in the way of her

rapid assimilation as a pupil. Her musical genius carried her into the

very heart of what was set before it, with extraordinary rapidity of

insight. We shall find many instances of this. And, here, it leads us to

dwell, for a few moments, on the name of this, her early master.

Berg had succeeded Croelius, as Head of the School of Singing, within a

year, or so, after her entry at the theatre. Already, in April, ’32, he

had made the child entirely his own, in the manner described in the

periodical. Croelius had the merit of first believing in her; but it is

Berg, who is to be credited with her entire training for the Swedish

stage. He, evidently, took the most intense and devoted interest in her

from the very first; and she became the intimate friend of his home. He

was a clever and cultivated musician, confident, sanguine, and eager;

well considered in Stockholm society. Her own feelings towards her first

teacher cannot be better expressed than in the words which she wrote,

long afterwards, to her guardian, Judge Munthe, in November, 1849. “Herr

Berg arrived so unexpectedly! I was delighted to see him! Oh! God! those

memories of childhood! At this unexpected meeting with him, remembrances

of all kinds from my early years arose in my soul! We all, indeed, have

our shortcomings, that is certain—therefore, let us cover them over!

Herr Berg is one of my nearest friends; and gratitude is a feeling that

I love, and desire to cultivate.... And old friend Berg is interwoven

with the history of my whole life.”

Such, then, was her master; alert, talkative, confident, with a

quick-eyed face, not unlike Schubert in type; too pressing, perhaps, in

his zeal for his pupil, to estimate the overstrain on her powers—an

overstrain, forced on, no doubt, by theatrical necessities behind him,

but constantly noticed and feared by the Press of the day.

In 1836, there is no record of Jenny Lind appearing at any concert; but

her dramatic engagements continue, and some of them, with music and

singing. And, especially is to be noted her first attempt in an opera,

during the month of February, when she played “Georgette,” for four

nights, in a “grand opera,” by Lindblad, called _Frondörerne_.

Apart from this, the year was not specially signalised; she made rather

fewer appearances, only eighteen during the year, her new parts being

“Emilie” in a comedy with song from the German, called _The New

Blue-Beard_—and “Carolina” in a big drama in five acts of Kotzebue’s,

called _The Unknown Son_; and just at the close of December, she took

the part of a girl in Sacchini’s opera _Œdipus in Athens_.

The 1st of January, 1837, marks a new departure. According to the

contract of 1833, with the mother, the Directors were to decide at what

date Jenny Lind should be given a fixed salary, as actress at the Royal

Theatre. Hitherto the money paid her by the Directors has been simply an

arrangement for her keep; she has performed, on their behalf, under this

arrangement one hundred and eleven times, besides her appearances at

concerts. It is now considered time to give her a fixed and salaried

position, after which she is still bound, by the original contract, to

be in the service of the Directors for ten years, if they require it of

her. Her salary is fixed at 700 R. D. Banco; about £60 a year.[5] And,

certainly, she was to do a lot of work, in the course of the year, in

discharge of her obligations under the bond. She appeared ninety-two

times on the boards; in twelve new characters. Four of the pieces were

produced for the first time in Stockholm. The parts varied greatly in

character: “Betty,” in a drama, with music, chorus and dancing, called

_Jenny Mortimer_; “Zoe,” in a comedy of that name, by Scribe; and

“Marie,” in another of his comedies called _Adèle de Sénanges_;

“Justine,” in a verse-comedy of five acts, from the French, called _The

Jealous Wife_; “Louise,” in a burlesque comedy, with song, by Nicolo

Isouard, called the _The Ludicrous Encounter_; “Rosa,” in a two-act

comedy by the Princess Amelia of Saxony, called _The Bride of the

Capital_; “Erik,” a boy’s part in a drama, with music and dancing,

called _The Fisherman_; “Laura,” in _The Sentinel_, a comic opera by

Rifaut; “Fanny,” in _Marie de Sivry_, a drama in three acts. Here was a

great deal of bright and light business; and besides this, there was

work of a more serious kind: “Emma,” in a three-act tragedy in verse, by

Delavigne, called _The Sons of King Edward_; “Clara,” in _The Bride of

the Tomb_, an historical drama in five acts, which ran for eight nights

on end; “Dafne,” in Victor Hugo’s _Angelo Malipieri_; and “Fräulein

Neubrunn,” in _The Death of Wallenstein_. Two performances were given of

Mozart’s _Zauberflöte_, in which she sang as “Second Genius.”

Evidently, she had a wide range of characters; and she must have

accumulated a mass of dramatic experience. It will be noticed that this

is all in her sixteenth and seventeenth years; and this disposes of a

familiar rumour that, at that period, her voice entirely failed, and

that she had to lie by. There was no positive pause in her work. The

year 1836 was, no doubt, one in which she did least; but, then, it was

the very year in which she first used her voice in a grand opera. The

year 1837 was, as we see, a time of growing, and incessant work, and is

the first year of her _official_ engagement. The rumour arose from her

own pronounced opinion that it is a time at which a girl’s voice

absolutely requires rest; to which opinion she had been brought by her

bitter experience of the damage done to her own vocal organs by the

absence of this needful relaxation. She ought to have had the repose for

quiet and orderly growth, which all need, and which she was not allowed.

Before 1837 quite closed, a noticeable event took place, full of

prophetic meaning to our heroine. A new name is becoming important in

the operatic world,—the name of Meyerbeer; his fame stands high in

Berlin and Paris; and the Royal Theatre is anxious to test the prospects

of his popularity in Stockholm. So a concert is arranged, in which a

part of the fourth act of _Robert de Normandie_ should be tentatively

given. Oddly enough the part of the opera selected for the experiment

was one that is not generally given when the work is performed as a

whole. It is the scene in which, after a chorus of women, the Princess

Isabella recognises the face of the girl, Alice, as she enters; and

learns from her what she bears to Roberto from his mother. Four

performances of this excerpt were given in the course of that December;

and Jenny Lind was chosen to sing the short passage in which “Alice”

appears. There is a melodious phrase, twice repeated, in the recitative,

and a pathetic cadence at its close. The tradition still lives of the

instantaneous effect produced by her on those who heard it. It was a

short flight; she just felt her wings; she was to hear much more of

Meyerbeer, and of “Alice.” For the moment all is still again. It is but

a passing trial. We must wait a little longer.

CHAPTER V.

DISCOVERY.

Yet it is to be but a very little longer; for we now come to the year

which was, to her, the epoch, the turning-point of her career. It had

opened with an immense run, for twenty-two nights, all through January

and February, of a French melodrama in two acts, _The American Monkey_,

in which she played “Hyacinthe.” Then followed three performances of the

serious tragedy, in verse, _The Sons of King Edward_. And then, on the

night of March 7th, came the moment of moments. “I got up, that morning,

one creature:” she herself often said; “I went to bed another creature.

I had found my power!” And, all through her life, she kept the 7th of

March with a religious solemnity; she would ask to have herself

remembered on it with prayers; she treated it as a second birthday. And

rightly; for, on that day, she woke to herself; she became artistically

alive; she felt the inspiration, and won the sway, which she now knew it

was given her to have and to hold.

She achieved this in the character of “Agatha” in Weber’s _Freischütz_.

She used often to tell how, in studying this part in preparation for her

_début_, with Madame Erikson, one of the chief leaders and teachers in

the school, of whom she was very fond, and who did much for her, she,

one day when they two were alone, was seized with a desire to satisfy

her teacher, and put her whole soul and power into her portrayal of the

character—only to be met with dead silence. “Am I, then, so incapable

and so stupid?” she thought, till she saw the tears trickling down her

teacher’s face; and all Madame Erikson could say was, “My child, I have

nothing to teach you; do as Nature tells you!”

The day of her _début_ was an agony; but, with her first note, she felt

all fear and nervousness disappear. She had discovered herself; and,

certainly, the discovery was absolute. The experience of that night was

final. “She had found her power.” That is her own record of what

happened on that evening. She who was perfectly accustomed to a public

audience, and to the applause of a public audience, still felt that all

this success had never shown her the real potency which it was in her to

wield. Still, for her, that 7th of March was a disclosure, a revelation,

a new thing. It was not so much a better edition of that which had

preceded it. It was a step out into a new world of dominion. She knew,

at last, where it was that she stood; and what she was to do on the

earth. She learned something of her mission. For, to her religious mind,

the discovery of a gift was the discovery of a mission. She saw the

responsibility with which she was charged, through the mere possession

of such a power over men. The singer, with the gift from God—that is

what she became on that night. “She went to bed a new creature.”

The memory of that eventful moment remained permanently recorded in the

shape of two silver candlesticks, presented to her by the Directors of

the Royal Theatre, “in remembrance of March the 7th,” so the inscription

ran. It was the first of the many tributes that were made her in her

life; and it had, as such, a peculiar value which no after-gift could

exceed. She held those silver candlesticks in special affection; and

left them, at her death, to her daughter.

The _Freischütz_ was given nine times in the course of 1838; but, for

most of the year, she returned to her old parts which she had already

played, appearing in melodrama, comedy, and burlesque. In all, she had

made, for her salary of £60, seventy-three appearances.

In 1839, her success bore its fruit in a rise of the salary to 900 R. D.

Banco. She appeared, in the course of the year, only fifty-three times;

but, perhaps, this is to be explained, by the growing importance of her

operatic parts, and the gradual dropping of the light comedy characters

in which she had figured hitherto. She sang the part of “Laura” in an

opera called _Le Château de Montenero_, by Dalayrac. She repeated

“Agatha” four times. She appeared in a character which she greatly

enjoyed, and in after years frequently repeated—that of “Julia” in

Spontini’s _Vestale_.

But the event of the year was her appearance in her traditional part of

“Alice” in _Roberto_, by which she was destined to win her most

memorable triumphs. It was a character in which her splendid dramatic

power fused itself with her gifts of voice, so as to leave an indelible

impression of force and of beauty on the imagination of those who saw

and heard. It was a part which drew on her own vivid personality, with

its intensity of faith, with its horror of sin, with its passionate and

chivalrous purity.

She opened, in this part, on May 10th and, evidently, with overwhelming

effect; for she has to play it for twenty-three times before the year is

out, and to repeat it for twenty-three more, in the following year. It

is on “Alice” that the interest is concentrated, in Stockholm

drawing-rooms, when Jenny Lind’s name is announced as a guest. She will

have to sing the part sixty times on those same boards before she has

done, between the 10th of May on which she first sang it, and the 30th

of December, 1843, when she will give her last performance of it in the

Royal Theatre.

Bournonville, a distinguished composer of operatic ballets, in

Copenhagen, of whom we shall hear more later on, writes in his

‘Theatrical Life’ of this performance:—

“She was only eighteen when I first heard her, but had already so

eminent a talent, that her performance of ‘Alice’ could be compared to

the best I had seen and heard in Paris. Although her voice had not yet

reached the high development it afterwards attained, it already

possessed, even then, the same sympathy, the same electric power,

which now makes it so irresistible. She was worshipped.”

The year 1839 was marked by several appearances at concerts in the Royal

Theatre; and on May 12th, she gave her first great concert on her own

behalf. At this, she sang a recitative with aria, from _Anna Bolena_,

and in a duet by Mercadante: besides giving a scena from the second act

of the _Freischütz_.

Not only at Stockholm did she sing. We find her at Upsala on the 19th

June, giving a concert in her own name, in connection with the great

Whitsuntide festivities, of which that university town is, annually, the

scene. Here, for the first time, she had the fascinating triumph of an

escort home, accompanied by the Students’ Song. And here, too, is the

first note of danger given, as to the strain that is being put on her

voice. Evidently, her inner genius is already beating against the bars

of her technical skill. In her “strivings after perfection” she is

attempting more than her present knowledge and training enable her to

express. She “surpasses the limits” which, according to the paper,

“Nature has set”; though, indeed, it was not “Nature,” but the lack of

knowledge, which had set the limits. It is just about this time, in May,

1840, that the famous Swedish historian Geijer, who was a most

sympathetic admirer, notices “a certain inequality in her acting” in the

part of “Lucia.” Something there was, which was, as yet, missing to her

full development. Here is the interesting extract from the

_Correspondenten_, a journal of politics and literature, in which the

tone of warning or alarm is so gracefully struck.

“We could hardly name any musical treat, given in Upsala, which has

met with a more general appreciation than Fröken Jenny Lind’s concert,

last Sunday.... The modest bearing which is so noticeable in this

gifted singer contributes, in no mean measure, to enhance the

enthusiastic reception, with which she will always be greeted by an

impartial public. But she herself, and those who, in one way or

another, are disposing of her talents, ought to bear in mind that an

artist’s strivings after perfection can, in the case of a delicate

physique, easily become a devouring fire. May we err in our

conjecture, but there seems to be some foundation for the fear that

this enchanting voice not rarely surpasses the limits which Nature

itself has suggested. From here Fröken Lind, according to report, went

to Gothenburg, having, however, promised to visit us again, later on.”

At Gothenburg, Jenny Lind had a most delightful rest for the summer. She

stayed there all July, singing indeed at a concert now and again, but

without any serious work, and in hearty enjoyment of the delicious

open-air country-life which was so near her heart. Her mother is with

her, and writes to Mr. Lind on July 12th, 1839, a vivid account of the

pleasant days, in which we can feel how the public excitement is working

round Jenny, who “receives many visits every day from all possible

artists and amateurs.”

“In my last letter I gave you an account of our pleasant journey, etc.

We have now settled down temporarily at the sweetest little spot,

called ‘Gubbero,’ belonging to the Russian Consul Lang, whose chief

property is separated only by a garden from our lodgings which consist

of three furnished rooms with ante-room. Our Jenny recruits herself

daily, now in the haystacks, now on the sea or in the swing, in

perfect tranquillity, while the town people are said to be longing for

her concert and greatly wondering when it will come off. Once or twice

she has been singing in rather good circles, the divine air of

‘Isabelle’ from _Robert le Diable_. Nearly everybody was crying—one

lady actually went into hysterics from sheer rapture; this has got

abroad already. Yes, _mon petit vieux_, she captivates all, all! It is

a great happiness to be a mother under such conditions. She sends

fondest love to her papa, wishing from all her heart to meet you in

quite good health. About the 20th, Jenny will give her first concert—

everyone says she ought to raise the usual price.”

The last touch is as eminently characteristic of Fru Lind as it is

unlike her daughter. We find the same note again in an amusing bit of

disappointed complaint with which she closes a most pretty account of a

surprise which they had had, earlier in the year—an account which we

insert here, not only as a graphic story of the way in which Jenny was

responding to the buzz of popular enthusiasm which already began to

besiege her, but also, as illustrating what Fru Lind here notices, of

Jenny’s power to draw tears of joy, by her singing. Ever in her voice

rang the sympathetic vibration, at which tears flow. As it had been at

her earliest interview with old Croelius at nine years old, so it is now

with this old Baron, when she is all but nineteen.

“Do you know,” writes the mother from Stockholm, on the evening of

Feb. 22, 1839, “the other day we had a curious visit, a certain Baron

de G——, an old _gentilhomme_, who had travelled all the way from his

country-seat, with the hope of seeing and hearing Jenny in the

_Freischütz_, but he was disappointed, through a change of

performance, owing to Almlöf’s indisposition. Randel[6] (whose patron

this man is) undertook to forward, in the most delicate way, his

request to me and to our Jenny, that he might call upon us and be

allowed to hear, ever so little, the voice of the adored one, so

highly spoken of in his own part of the country. Jenny agreed, and so

they came—Randel, Baron de G——, and his son. Little Jenny was liberal,

the noble aspect of the old man prepossessed her in his favour, she

sang both her grand airs. The old man was delighted, and this was

clearly visible, because he could not keep back his tears. Our little

home looked particularly neat, and chocolate was served, and they

parted with us, quite charmed. But probably it ends there! For who

rewards talent in our country; even when people are ever so rich?” And

“what,” she asks in this same letter, “has this good, this

incomparable Jenny for her increased labour? Not even the advantage of

providing for her indispensable wants, without incurring debt! But I

say, like you, ‘Come day, comes counsel’; we shall see.”

These characteristic passages, which we have quoted to illustrate the

stir of fame that is moving about the daughter, will well serve to

explain a domestic crisis which we are now approaching—a crisis which

had, for its issue, an event that told deeply upon Jenny Lind’s artistic

development. For, indeed, as we read them, we cannot but be conscious

that this mother, proud as she is of her wonderful child, and delighting

in the glow of her success, yet lets drop expressions which reveal the

gulfs that gape between the two temperaments. Every one who reads can

understand why it was that, in spite of the pleasant and affectionate

intercourse of these summer holidays at Gothenburg, there was something

which would make mother and child impossible companions for one another.

This practical and determined mind which was bent on acquiring the just

profits that were due from a public that talked so enthusiastically

about “our incomparable Jenny”—how it must have offended the primary

instincts of the artist herself! How was it conceivable that she should

tolerate this insistent voice in her ear, suggesting always how easy it

would be to raise the price of the tickets; while she was, on the other

hand, shaping steadily, into clearer vision, her recognition of her gift

as a charge from God, to be used in His service, for the help of

mankind? There might be much affection, at heart, between the pair, but

companionship, there could not be. They had antagonistic consciences:

and neither of them had a nature that easily yields. This very letter

from which we have been quoting contains a most characteristic instance

of the temper of which we are speaking—a temper which was bound to fill

a house with the noise of clash and quarrel, such as would be misery to

one who needed in her home shelter, softness, refuge, ease, and peace.

Here is the story:—

“I must tell you” (she writes) “that I have just returned from the

theatre with rather a long face to find that no seat is accorded to

Jenny’s mother, although there still were empty seats, and, besides,

the performance had already begun. M——, with his insinuating smile,

asked me to wait on the chance of there being room after the second

piece had begun. But I answered, ‘As no place is accorded me, I shall

go without altogether,’ and so I left. Z—— is always overbearing and

rude. This is the gratitude we get for our leniency with these people.

Jenny, on hearing of this misadventure, went straight up to Z——, and

gave him to understand her annoyance at my not having a seat. His

answer, that there could not be room for everybody’s mother, was just

like him; but Jenny’s remark on this took him a little down; a

messenger was despatched to offer me a seat on the first tier; but, to

Jenny’s surprise, mother was gone—and best so!”

This episode is amusing enough; and, moreover, no one who knew the

daughter can resist the recognition of qualities in her which vividly

recall the mother in this most characteristic scene. Certainly they bore

likeness to one another. But, then, this would only make matters worse.

We cannot be surprised if such an atmosphere became intolerable, and if

explosions occurred.

So it was that, towards the end of 1839, Jenny took the decisive step

which, finally, separated her from actual home-life. It came about with

a certain touch of humour. She had, some time before this, pressed her

old friend, Louise Johansson, now engaged in a _Magasin de Modes_, to

take a spare room, which was to be let in the Linds’ house. This secured

her a companionship which she greatly valued, and, through which, things

were tolerable. After a year Fru Lind proposed to raise her terms: and,

when Mdlle. Louise could not agree to this, she lost her temper, and

declared that both Jenny and she were welcome to leave her roof.

This was told to a well-to-do relation, Mdlle. Apollonia Lindskog, known

to Jenny as “Tante Lona,” living with a sister of Mr. Lind’s father, Fru

Strömberg, who, having adopted Mr. Lind at his father’s death, was

called by Jenny “Grandmother.” These two ladies agreed to receive the

exiles: but how were they to manage the transfer? In this way. Jenny

packed all her clothes into a large wash-basket on the plea that they

were to go to the dressmaker. She, then, invited her parents to a

performance of _Roberto_, in which she played “Alice”: during which time

Louise put up her things, and sent them off to Mdlle. Lindskog. Next

morning, at breakfast, Louise announced that she wished to leave her

present lodgings. Fru Lind, with much heat, broke out into her old

phrase, and declared that if so, she might take Jenny with her. Jenny,

then, took her at her word; and left the house, going, first, to Herr

Berg, and, then, joining Louise at Mdlle. Lindskog’s. Her parents

appeared there, to claim her: but found themselves unable to force a

girl of nineteen from the house of so near a relation. Yet Jenny, in

fear that they might yet succeed, on a Sunday shortly after, left the

house, escorted by her maid Annette, and turned her steps towards the

Bonde Palace, close to the theatre, overlooking the Norrström, in which

lived the famous musician, Adolf Frederik Lindblad, the chief of Swedish

songwriters, her warm admirer, and friend. Into his family she was

received: she found in Madame Lindblad a second mother: and from Herr

Lindblad himself, and from the society into which he brought her, she

inhaled an influence which affected her entire development, artistic,

intellectual, and moral. Of this, we shall have more to say in the

following chapter. In his house she remained until her final departure

for Paris in July, 1841. Back to rooms in that house she came on her

return to Stockholm in 1842. There was her home. There she could rest at

peace. There she found the sympathy, the understanding, the inspiration,

which her nature ardently needed. Though in some points endowed with a

“Finnish” stubbornness, she was, in others, singularly self-distrustful,

uncertain, easily unnerved. She greatly needed an atmosphere of

affection to give her confidence and security. She was passionately

domestic; she must have the assurance of love about her, to save her

from the miseries of suspicion and of distrust, into which her lofty

idealism was very apt to lapse. It was not that she did not have

affection for her parents: on the contrary, she held them very deep in

her heart. But it was impossible for them to enter into her motives and

aims.

So it happened: and Jenny, now, could at last bring together her life

into a single whole. Her daily surroundings were no longer in collision

with her artistic inspiration. Rather, they aided, fed, succoured it.

Her spirit breathed an air that was congenial and bracing: her heart

found warmth and nourishment in the cherishing kindliness of a family.

The year must have been a happy one. It was full of success. It opened

with a brilliant continuation of her “Alice,” in January, to be repeated

in April, and all through November. She sang, again, in her former parts

of “Agatha,” “Euryanthe,” “Pamina,” “Julia” (the _Vestale_), and

“Marie,” in Herold’s operatic drama of that name. All is now opera: not

a single one of her old comedy parts does she play. She adds to her

score two important characters—“Donna Anna,” in _Don Juan_; and “Lucia,”

in _Lucia di Lammermoor_. This last part, one of her famous _rôles_, had

a furore. She introduced it into Stockholm on May 16th, and played it

for twenty-eight nights in the year. It was after her thirteenth

performance of “Lucia,” that, on June 19th, 1840, a number of the

actors, together with members of the orchestra and chorus, gathered

before her dressing-room and serenaded her; and, on her return home, she

was presented with a silver tea and coffee service, which was ever

highly valued by her, and was left, by specific direction in her will,

to her eldest son. The donors appeared in gala costume, among them being

his Excellency Count J. G. de la Gardie, Count Carl de Geer, Count Carl

Axel Löwenhjelm, Count Gustaf Trolle Bonde, etc., etc. Lindblad’s eldest

daughter, now Mme. Lotten von Feilitzen, remembers well how Jenny Lind

had to go to the window, after receiving the present, to wave her

handkerchief to the crowd that had collected below in the street.

Altogether, she made sixty-nine appearances.

Two special events may be finally noticed. First, she goes again, at

Whitsuntide, to Upsala; and we have a letter of Geijer, written at the

time, which speaks of the intense interest of Lindblad in his charge.

“Lindblad, who in the general enchantment is particularly enchanted

with Mdlle. Lind, was also here and staying with us. He left this

morning, upon which Upsala may be likened to a barrel from which the

bottom has been taken out, so that the contents run away.”

And our old paper, the _Correspondenten_, has some graceful words which

we cannot but insert, for, besides the warm and intelligent enthusiasm

of its praise, it uses the symbol of the nightingale, which became

afterwards her familiar patronymic.

“But, in addition to Nature’s beautiful singing-birds, there came,

flying thither on Whitsun eve, a nobler nightingale, the famous Jenny

Lind, whose arrival many a one has heartily looked forward to. For,

indeed, she has been the object of a homage such as, in its truest

form, can be given only in a city of culture and of youth. True, it is

in the first place a great, an extraordinary talent one admires in

her; but how infinitely is the value of this artistic power increased

by the unpretending, modest, charming manner, in which it presents

itself to an enraptured listener! With her all seems Nature, simple

and glorious, so as to make one forget what great influence Art has

also exercised on her development. It is by this harmonious

combination of a noble nature and art, that Fröken Jenny Lind in every

respect stands out as of exceptional and unalloyed worth.”

So goes the judgment of Sweden. It embodies exactly the constant

impression which, year after year, in far lands abroad, she is to

create. Somehow or other, wherever she is to go, and whatever her

triumphs in Denmark, Germany, England, and America, no one can succeed

in recording his experience without arriving at this very identical

conclusion of the Upsala periodical. Always he finds himself saying,

that “great and extraordinary as is the talent which one admires in her,

how infinitely is the value of this artistic power increased by the

modest and charming manner in which it offers itself to the enraptured

listener!” That is it. That is what everyone feels, and what everyone

tries to say. It is this especial interest of her singing to which we

propose to devote the following chapter. Here we pause for a moment in

our narrative of her early dramatic career, and take note of where we

stand. We have followed her from the lowest rung of the ladder—a tiny

mite in the theatre-school, performing its first miraculous feats—to the

high platform on to which she has passed, in secure possession of

unqualified supremacy on her native stage. Nothing has interrupted or

broken this sure progress. It has been a steady upward movement towards

its final bewildering triumph. As a child, she had fascinated by her

acting; as a singer, her very first _début_ had been to her an immediate

and unmistakable revelation of her supreme powers. Her nation have

greeted her with acclamation. Their enthusiasm for her voice can only be

outdone by their enthusiasm for herself. So it is, as we look back along

the road she has travelled. Her troubles have all been domestic. As an

artist, her career has been unchecked and unclouded. She might well

think that she had, at twenty, already touched the summit. All the world

about her was ready to assure her that it was so. How little she herself

thought so, we shall soon see.

But, before doing so, we are bound to stop and review the personal

character, which had developed under these conditions. What type of

person was the Jenny Lind of whom all Sweden was now talking?

CHAPTER VI.

CHARACTER.

There are artists, in whom their art is so predominant, that, like a

despotism, it concentrates all efforts and capacities upon itself. The

man is absorbed within his main interest. Through it alone does he find

energetic vent. In it he verifies the attributes of genius: he gives

evidence of something in him which is surpassingly excellent: but,

outside its ring-fence, in all the other departments of life and

character, he shows himself as ordinary, and unremarkable as the rest of

us. His artistic genius does not flow over, and animate, his other

sensibilities, and gifts: it abides in itself: and seems, even, to drain

originality out of all rival channels; so that we might think the man

commonplace, and dull, until we saw him transfigured and illuminated in

the exercise of his own peculiar talent. This is a perfectly possible

type of genius: and, because it exists, men are loud in asserting the

proverbial disappointment often felt at meeting, in society, some one

who has been, through his gift, the inspiration of their lives. In the

ordinary affairs with which all are concerned, this glorious hero, this

poet, this musician, with whose fame the world is ringing, shows no

particular power, has no especial facility, may, indeed, prove himself

inferior in judgment and in insight to many a man who prides himself on

making no claim to be a genius. More especially, in the field of

executive art, involving curious and special facilities of organization,

we may expect to come across such surprises as this.

All the more noticeable then is it, that, in the case of Jenny Lind, the

surprise is all the other way. There is a universal consent, in all who

record her influence, that what they experienced was the effect of a

character whose genius penetrated every corner of her being, so that her

unique gift of song appeared but as an incidental illustration of the

originality which was everywhere in her. Even those who felt her singing

most profoundly, felt ever as she sang, that she was more than her

singing: while those whose lack of musical perception made them

impervious to her special talent, experienced as much as any the full

fascination of her personality. This impression of her belongs to her

early, as well as to her after, years; and it cannot be better given

than in an expressive phrase, used long after our present date, indeed,

but which vividly and exactly embodies what was already so

characteristic of her. “After all, I would rather hear Jenny talk, than

sing, wonderful as that is,” writes Mrs. Stanley, the wife of the Bishop

of Norwich, to her sister, Mrs. Augustus Hare, in September, 1847, after

a rapturous account of what her singing had been. Surely, a most

striking remark to make. The phrase exactly embodies the feeling that

Jenny Lind was, not less, but more, than her Art. What men saw, and

found in her was, not that a common piece of the stuff of human nature

had been caught up, by the artistic inspiration, into some unspeakable

heaven, and been transfigured by some sudden and strange glory which

carried the human spirit beyond itself. No! rather they felt that here

was a character of supreme value, of unique excellence, which had

contrived to find its way down into the world’s scenery, through the

particular channel provided for it by song. Music gave it its chief

opportunity for discovering itself to men; but it itself stood above the

Art which it used as its finest medium of communication. Hence the

intensity of spiritual interest, which greeted her singing. Men seemed

to themselves not so much to be listening to a voice, as to be catching

sight, through the door which music opened, of a high and pure soul,

moving down to them, through the pathway of song, out of some far

untainted home of purity and joy. It was this soul which they greeted

with such amazement, such warmth; it was its felt presence which made

the tears start, always, to their eyes as they listened. It was Jenny

Lind herself, who, by means of her wonderful gift, was the revelation to

them of the heights which it was still open to men to attain.

And, because this was so, we desire, both in the present chapter, and in

chapters to come, to dwell, especially, on the _social_ impression

produced by her, wherever she went. This book, it is true, is a memoir

of Jenny Lind as the artist. But as she was one of those whose art

reveals a character behind it, out of which its own excellence is drawn;

so it would be impossible to represent the effect of Jenny Lind, as an

artist, without making it continually clear what it was which Mrs.

Stanley meant when she said in 1847, “After all, I would rather hear

Jenny talk than sing,” or, as she wrote again in the same year: “Her

singing is the least part of her charm; she has the simplicity of

genius.”

We shall have frequent occasion, as our story proceeds, to call

attention to this significant characteristic; as, for instance, to note

that wherever she goes, over the cities of Europe, she is, somehow,

always found to be staying in the house of someone who is of special,

and even European, reputation. Men of this high stamp seem, always, to

foregather with her; she has the entry; she finds her home with them.

And, again, in her own city of Stockholm, where the circumstances of her

life, with which we are familiar, might be expected to stand somewhat in

her way, and where there was, necessarily, so much, in her bringing up,

which would make it difficult for her to break down social barriers,

nothing is more remarkable than her complete acceptance, before she has

passed her girlhood, not only into those circles where details of birth

and position are supposed to be of vital importance, but what is far

more, into those high literary intimacies where nothing but character

counts.

Let us give illustrations of this. Here is a most graceful and brilliant

picture of a soirée in Stockholm in 1839, which we cannot but give as a

whole. It is perfectly trustworthy, being the record of a lady, still

living, in whose old home the scene took place. Evidently, as all who

read it must feel, the impression of that marked evening stamped itself

upon the girl’s brain, so that every detail stood out sharp and clear,

when, in 1887, nearly fifty years later, she wrote out the sketch. Here

is the account:—

“It is a cold winter’s evening in the year 1839. In the house of 11

Regeringsgatan chandeliers and lustres are gradually being lit. Along

the street is stopping a row of closed carriages, which, each in its

turn, drive up to the entrance. Footmen in livery open the

carriage-doors and smart women, followed by men in uniform, get out

cautiously and disappear through the porch of the faintly illuminated

passage.

“In the first _salon_, where various musical instruments are seen,

they are received by the host, Baron L——, an elderly man, with noble

features, shaded by silver-grey hair, of dignified deportment, and an

air of kindliness and refinement about him generally. Passing through

a smaller ante-chamber, the guests now proceed to the great,

half-round _salon_, where the hostess is awaiting them. She is a tiny

little lady, about thirty, youthful in her movements, with expressive

eyes and a smile of great fun as well as of courtesy, round her lips.”

After describing the arrival of the guests, the account goes on.

“All of a sudden, the whispering becomes louder, changing tone

altogether, while every head is directed towards the ante-chamber.

“On the threshold stands the host and by his side, shaking hands with

him, a young girl, with an abundance of curls round the pale cheeks; a

gown in simple style softly clings round the maiden figure, and there

is a dreamy, half-absent, and fascinating look in the deep-set eyes.

“The hum is increasing still more when the old nobleman leads the

visitor into the midst of his guests; but he has not time to pronounce

her name, it is already on everybody’s lips, and is now flying round

the room with a subdued sound: _Jenny Lind! Jenny Lind!_

“The beauties of the season are forgotten, and, what is more, they

forget all about themselves.

“A singular liveliness is breathing through the hitherto rather formal

company. The hostess attracts both young and old to her animated

conversation with the honoured guest; and every one is gratified who

catches a word or a look from this Jenny Lind who, for the last few

weeks, has, as ‘Alice’ in _Robert le Diable_ and ‘Agatha’ in the

_Freischütz_, captivated and enchanted both themselves and the whole

Stockholm public.

“Somewhat monosyllabic, at the start, amongst all these strangers, the

guest begins, by-and-by, to shake off her reserve. She smiles an

incredulous smile when one of _la jeunesse dorée_ compares her to ‘la

divine Malibran,’ and laughs openly at some old general’s grotesque

flattery. To a sentimental inquiry as to what heavenly thoughts had

filled her mind when, the preceding evening, she had, as ‘Alice,’

embraced the cross, she answered, a little hesitatingly: ‘I believe I

was thinking of my old bonnet.’ But, wherever she encounters genuine

and deeper understanding in the compliments uttered, her answers are

sympathetic, almost humble.

“How the gay party went on, and how Jenny Lind sang the ‘Lieder’ of

Geijer and Lindblad as they never were, nor ever more will be sung—we

must here only glance at. And further how the host and hostess were

obliged to check the too eager wishes of their friends to hear more

and ever more—in order to show that the object of the invitation had

been the personal acquaintance of the charming artist, not only the

enjoyment of her song, lovely though it be. That Jenny Lind was

satisfied with her evening, and, in this _milieu_, found several of

her most enthusiastic and faithful admirers, is quite certain. And, as

she was the first operatic singer received in the best society of the

capital, in which she became a dear and honoured guest, it has seemed

of some interest to preserve a few details of her appearance in this

domain.

“In the memory of the writer of this paper, Jenny Lind stands out a

unique apparition, like no one else, simple, unpretending, but

dignified—penetrated by a sort of sacred responsibility for her

mission—the mission of Art in its lofty purity—which she felt that God

had confided to her.”

The last touches of this graphic record will serve to justify our

insistence on this social aspect of Jenny Lind’s life; and to redeem our

motives from the suspicion of any unworthy interest in these formalities

of society. For it is just through this lofty sense of artistic mission

that she took her place amid her fellows. As at Stockholm, so

everywhere, it is this, her spiritual sense of responsibility, which

gave her social distinction, and carried her, in dignified ease, through

these surroundings. It was this, which secured her that aspect of

independence, of detachment, which is so vital, if an artist is to

preserve moral dignity, in face of a “society” which is too apt to

flatter itself that it is doing a favour to those to whom it kindly

permits an entry, and which is encouraged in this self-flattery, if the

artist is obviously grateful for the attention. Nobody could see Mdlle.

Lind for two seconds, and suspect her of any such flattery. She moved

about “like an apparition”: like one “with a mission”: charged with a

serious responsibility. That is her social character: that is her note,

her charm, as this paper beautifully records: and this made all touch of

over-deference to external position absolutely impossible to her. No one

could mistake that free independence: that moral “detachment.” Indeed,

criticism on her social qualities would turn on the very opposite defect

to that at which we have been hinting. It might be said that this

spiritual aloofness gave a sense of haughtiness to her manner in public,

and with those who were not intimate. There was a “hold-off” look—a

drawing away, a critical survey of a new-comer, which made many an

introduction to her, in after years, a moment of supreme agony to those

who had, perhaps, dreamed of that happiness for hours and days before,

but who, now that it had come, and that she was looking them over with a

cold and lofty gaze, could only pray that the earth might yawn and

swallow them up, before things had gone any further. It was a severe

ordeal: and, unquestionably, no worldly rank or position would have the

slightest effect in modifying its severity.

Again, this spiritual attitude of one “charged with a mission,” made

“Society” most distasteful to her. She hated its frivolous distractions,

its social pettiness, its wearisome routine. She liked “intimates.” And

“Society,” therefore, in admitting her, never felt that it had done her

a great kindness, or that she hung on its favours. Rather, it knew that

something was there in her, which made all social distinctions become

very small matters indeed. For the standards, which her presence forced

to the front, were not “social,” but moral and spiritual: and it was

impossible to have intercourse with her, without becoming conscious of

this: and, tried by those standards, it was she who brought the honour,

not society which conferred it.

In this temper of moral independence, she passed up, out of the

struggles and clouds of her childhood, into the full sunlight of

success, with absolute ease, without a shadow of encumbering

consciousness, without a breath of worldliness ever crossing her spirit.

She retained, without even an effort, all her inherent and native

simplicity, her freshness, her undaunted sincerity. Never did she

slacken, for a moment, her demand that the worth of men should be

estimated, wholly and utterly, according to their moral value. Never,

for one instant, did the mists of conventionalism dim her vision, or

confuse her insight. She had one set of balances; and one only. She

never even seems to have been tempted to exchange them. Swept up, in the

sudden rush of an overwhelming success, out of obscurity into the

company and the friendship of princes and kings, this girl, in her

simple-hearted virginity, kept a conscience as true and fine as steel.

Failings of another type might be laid to her charge. She could be hasty

and hard, sometimes, in her judgments. She was liable to misunderstand

people. She had vehement impulses, and equally vehement reactions, which

were apt to gain for her, from those who knew her little, the character

of capricious fitfulness. She could magnify slight lapses into great

sins. A certain spiritual haughtiness there was in her; a certain

suspicion of the motives on which she, by bitter experience, learned

that men too often act. All this might be said. But one thing it was for

ever impossible, even for an enemy, to imagine: that Jenny Lind ever

condescended to lower the steady standards by which she tested all human

worth, high or low, rich or poor. Thus it was that she secured, as we

shall hear, “a homage” from the best society in Stockholm, which was

quite peculiar in its type. “Homage!” that is the very word to express

what it was that was given her. One feels it, in the delightful refusal

of the lady of the house, in the sketch just given, to ask her to sing

again, lest she should seem to have been invited for her singing, and

not for her personal qualities. It was this complete acceptance of her,

in her own independent character, which worked a real and lasting change

in the social respect given to actors and actresses in Stockholm, by

which the difficulties that had stood hitherto in their way disappeared.

And this absolute sincerity of character which won her this homage as a

girl of nineteen, remained so entirely untouched to the last, that every

gesture and every look, recorded in that graceful portrait of her

behaviour on her earliest _début_, is familiar to those who only knew

her in the latter years of her English life. That is the very lady whom

they knew: every phrase recalls her. They can see her, as she stands

there, at the entry of the _salon_, when the old nobleman is receiving

her: rather monosyllabic, at first; and, then as she shakes off her

reserve, responding, to any genuine speech, with a sympathy that is

“almost humble.” They can feel her as she bends and smiles

incredulously, at the pretty compliments paid her by the young men: they

can positively hear her laugh as the old generals come up to fumble out

their “grotesque flattery”: they can catch the very ring of her voice,

and the very look in her arch eyes, as she puts off the inquiries as to

the nature of her secret thoughts when clasping the cross in the scene

from _Roberto_, with the mock-serious confession that “she was thinking

of her old bonnet!” “A unique apparition, like no one else; simple,

unpretending, dignified!” How much the words recall! How many a similar

scene was embodied in them! To the very last hour of her life, they

would have been the only possible description of her. Surely, a singular

force of sincerity lay in her, which could make that early picture of

her so speak to those who saw and loved her forty years after, as if it

were alive with her very presence and instinct with her very tones!

And here, as we speak of her social effect, it is necessary to touch

upon her personal appearance. Yet how useless it seems! No words can be

used which will not convey a wrong or exaggerated impression to those

who never saw her: and to those who have seen and known her, no words

are necessary. Her features were strong, and homely: of a usual Swedish

type, we believe: very pliable, and expressive, especially about the

nose and the mouth; and it was this expressive pliability, which allowed

such strange and delicious transformation to pass over her face, as it

changed from repose to action. At the start, you would pronounce it

plain; but, then, it lent itself to express, in a peculiar degree, the

winning simplicity and freshness of girlhood. It was full of animation,

and into it, moreover, there ever passed the singular grace of her

“pose” and her movements. It was a face which it was delightful to

watch. It could express everything with a graphic intensity that made

one laugh from pure joy. It could brim over with fun: it had an

irresistible archness, when she was amused: it was capable of an almost

awful solemnity: and it could, when she was suspicious and on her guard,

become absolutely stony. A transparent countenance, indeed, on which

every emotion revealed itself with unqualified spontaneity. It was the

ever-changing mirror of her soul, and therefore became charged with

interest: a speaking face, which could captivate by its overflowing

vitality, until it became delightful to observe, and to remember, for

its own sake; and this illumination from within, combined as it was,

with the buoyant movements which filled her whole body, gave her, both

off and on the stage, whenever she was animated, that positive charm,

that personal fascination, which is associated, generally, with beauty.

She was five feet three to four inches in height: but she held her head

so erect and had trained herself so carefully in standing and walking

that she appeared to be taller.

All the portraits taken of her, take notice of the fine mould of her

arms, and especially, of their characteristic position, in repose, with

her hands clasped on her lap. In the Stockholm days, she wore her hair

in bunches of curls at each side of the forehead, as is the case in

Södermark’s portrait of her, painted in 1843, which she had in her own

possession. About the year 1844, she seems to have adopted for herself,

that wavy droop of the hair, laid down low about her ears, which became

so familiar and noticeable a mark of her appearance, that it alone

sufficed to make a likeness resemble her.

The main elements of her character, as of her type of countenance, were

radically national. She was a downright and typical Swede. She was fond

of dwelling on the artistic capacities of her people, to whom she owed

her own quick sensibilities, her alert and receptive imagination, her

vivacity of temperament. She believed them to have all the artist’s

possibilities in them, with all the attendant perils. And, in view of

these perils to which all such gifted natures must be liable, it is

remarkable that she should have included within this national groundwork

of her character, a profound moral stability, a depth of seriousness,

such as would be rare in any race; and, moreover, with this she had a

persistence, a stubbornness, which, among Scandinavian races, is

traditionally attributed to the Finn. And if she had the vivacity of her

people, she inherited also from it the strong, passionate feelings, and

affections, which make the home-relationships, in Sweden, so rooted and

so deep; and, also, that undertone of melancholy, into which such

artistic sensitiveness is prone to react,—an undertone, which seems to

creep, like the sighing of a wounded spirit, out of the black heart of

Swedish pine-woods, and to hover over the wide surfaces of her inland

waters. Such notes of pathos underlie the songs of her people: and she

was a true Swede when she wrote of herself, “When I am alone, you have

no idea how different I am—so happy, yet so melancholy that tears are

rolling down my cheeks unceasingly.”

This personal impression, which we have faintly suggested, told, as we

have said, not only upon the higher social circles of Stockholm, but

also upon the literary and cultured society, where, again, she formed

affectionate intimacies with the few, and the best.

Of those two names must yet be mentioned, which embody a special

interest in her life.

First, A. F. Lindblad, the famous song-writer. We have seen into what

close contact they had been drawn. In his house she found a refuge, and

a home, through which she was brought into constant contact with the

higher culture of the Swedish capital. Lindblad was born in 1801, and

studied music in Berlin, under Zelter: and also in Paris, between

1825–27, after which he returned to Stockholm and lived there until

1864, when he moved to near Linköping. His renown rests, chiefly, on his

songs.

“They are eminently national, and full of grace and originality,

tinged, with the melancholy which is characteristic of Swedish music.

In short songs, in which extreme simplicity is of the essence of their

charm, his success has been most conspicuous.”[7]

There can be no doubt that Jenny Lind’s intimacy with Lindblad had an

immense influence on her musical development. Besides the vital effect

of his personality, she heard at his house all the best instrumental

music of the great composers then flourishing: it was there that she was

first introduced to the music of Mendelssohn,—especially to the _Songs

without Words_, which had, just at that time, taken Europe by storm. She

wrote herself, in 1882, after having read, a biography of Lindblad, by

Professor Nyblom:—

“I have to thank him (Lindblad) for that fine comprehension of art

which was implanted by his idealistic, pure, and unsensual nature into

me, his ready pupil. Subsequently Christianity stepped in, to satisfy

the moral needs, and to teach me to look well into my own soul. Thus

it became to me, both as an artist and as a woman, a higher

chastener.”

So she described her spiritual progress, looking back to the influence

of Lindblad as anticipatory of that yet deeper hold of the meaning of

Art which was given her under the later dominance of the full Christian

ideal. Not only did she repay, in counterinfluence, all the attention

that Lindblad concentrated upon her, but also, she by her singing,

carried the fame of his songs all over Europe. And still, in long after

years, in England, in hours of lonely quiet, or at times when she was

depressed and needed comfort, she would sit at the piano and “croon”

over to herself those songs of Lindblad’s, which had in them so many

memories—memories that had passed into her very being, of far days in

the old country, when those sounds, so saturated with the inspiration of

her home, were first in her ears, and she was tasting the spring

sweetness of her fresh young powers.

And, secondly, we must mention the great name of Erik Gustaf Geijer, a

man at the very summit of Swedish literature. Born in 1783, he became

Professor of History at the University of Upsala in 1816, where his

lectures had unexampled popularity. In spite of the offer of a

bishopric, Professor he still remained, planning the great history of

Sweden, of which his introduction was a masterpiece of skill and

knowledge: and producing various historical works. He was much occupied

with political and economical speculations; and for thirty years

continued to be one of the chiefs of the Swedish literary world. He died

on April 23, 1847. Besides his historical and political work, he had a

real talent for music; and published a volume of songs, of which

Lindblad wrote a famous account.[8] Through music, he crossed the path

of Jenny Lind; and in her he took a most warm interest.

“Jenny and I have become very good friends,” he writes in January,

1840. “I call her ‘Thou,’ and she calls me ‘Uncle.’ She is a simple

attractive being. Lindblad and Madame Lindblad both stand to her in

almost fatherly and motherly relation, which becomes both parties very

well. All the same, I am afraid she is a kind of ‘comet’ which may

interfere with their domestic peace, for comets have tails; and their

house is besieged by Jenny’s admirers, who now may be said to consist

of the whole public.”

Again, in March, he writes: “Jenny Lind sang two of my songs, _i.e._

‘_The Drawing-Room or the Wood_,’ and ‘_Spring, will it come?_’ It was

quite excellent. I went behind the curtain to thank her, and

accompanied her home to her door. I do not think lightly of the good

graces in which I believe myself to stand with her.”

For her he wrote songs, both words and music; and it is in one of these

songs that we discover the record both of his estimation of her

character, and also of the profound effect which such an estimate,

coming from such a man, had upon her to whom it was addressed. And,

indeed, we cannot wonder at this effect: for the author of the song is

not afraid to acknowledge, in this fresh young girl, the signs and omens

of that supreme genius, which is the highest born of Heaven, and which,

yet, because it is highest, is also as a “consuming flame,” to which the

devoted and sacrificial Will must yield itself, as a victim, offered on

an altar. The deep and serious import of such momentous words, addressed

to her by the highest intellectual authority of her native land, and

ranking her, the young opera-singer from the Theatre School, with that

rare band of spiritual heroes whose lives are as a torch lit by divine

fire, must have been as a revelation; and the traces of this remain on a

copy of these verses, in her own handwriting, found among her papers,

across the bottom of which she has written, “On these words I was

launched into the open sea.” To her they marked the date at which she

felt herself a public, an historic, character. For her they contained

the secret of her mission, of her expectations, of her future. She was

to move out into the open day of her fame, not to win a reputation, not

to enjoy, not to taste triumph, not to satisfy her own craving for

expression, not to find a world of honour, and wealth, and ease. Nay!

She was to be clad about with prophetic solemnity. She was to yield

herself to the stern necessities of genius: she was to consume, in

giving: the steps up which she was ever to be passing were to be the

steps of an altar: and she was the sacrifice. Such were the words that

were behind her when she found herself “launched into the open sea.”[9]

We give them in a free and rough translation:—

“Oh! if from yon Eternal Fire,

Which slays the souls that it sets free—

Consuming them, as they aspire—

One burning spark have fallen on thee!

“Fear not! Though upward still it haste,

That living fire, that tongue of flame!

_Thy_ days it turns to bitter waste;

But ah! from heaven—from heaven it came!”

CHAPTER VII.

PILGRIMAGE.

The sign of the sacrifice was already upon her, in the year 1840. On the

surface, she had everything which could satisfy her. She had become the

idol of the National Drama. She had been made Member of the Royal

Swedish Academy of Music in 1840, and had received the high official

recognition by being appointed Court-singer on the 13th of January,

1840, by His Majesty Carl Johan. This was an honour which her mother had

already been anticipating, from the summer of 1839, and had rejoiced

over the fact that it included a salary. “It is a great mark of

distinction,” she writes to her husband; “and a great joy for us!” She

had the best social “world” at her feet. She enjoyed the delightful

companionship of some of the most cultivated men and women in Sweden.

Her position at the Royal Theatre was assured her. The Directors were,

at the very moment, proposing to her a fresh and advanced contract.

Indeed, we shall see that their zeal outran their discretion and their

proper consideration for her; for they were but too anxious to use her

gifts at the risk of over-straining them. Her popularity was at its

height; she was pursued with enthusiasm. The musical authorities of

Stockholm had no more to teach her; they were content to praise her as

the perfect exponent of their art.

And, yet, what was it that worked within the girl’s heart, and told her

that all this was as nothing—told her that, far from having reached the

end, she was not even at the beginning—told her that her art had secrets

yet to unfold to her, and that this adulation which encompassed her was

but a prophecy of what she ought to become hereafter? As she bowed in

courteous acknowledgment of the loud plaudits of an enthusiastic

theatre, she heard, above all the genial tumult, this “still, small

voice” within, which said to her, “Yes! you may some day live to deserve

that kindly, that encouraging applause; but to-day you know that, by

rights, it is not yours. It is given you, in spite of yourself. But you

have that in you which may, indeed, deserve to receive that which is

generously offered you, in anticipation, to-day. Far away, over the sea,

the secret is kept which will unlock the shut doors, and will set free

your true self. There it is that Art will disclose the mystery, which is

now felt but not perceived—the mystery that moves veiled behind the

glory of to-day’s success.” It was the inspiration of genius which spoke

to her. She had but her own soul to trust to. She had no ideal, no

articulate standard given her, by which to test herself; yet she knew

her lack—she felt what she was missing. And, in so feeling, she knew,

also, that, to discover the ideal, to win that which was lacking, all

her present triumph must be surrendered—must be thrown to the winds. The

voice within must be obeyed at all costs; out over the sea, far from

home and its happy honours, she must seek, alone and undirected, the

meaning of the mysterious summons. Surely the pressure of the prophetic

words was upon her—

“Fear not, though upward still it haste,

That living fire, that tongue of flame!

_Thy_ days it turns to bitter waste;

But ah! from heaven—from heaven it came!”

So it was that she took her own resolution. We give it in her own

remarkable words. They were written in answer to the new proposals made

by the Directors, who, on the 15th of December, 1840, “wishing,” as they

said, “most particularly to attach to the Swedish stage a talent so

eminent as the Court-singer Fröken Jenny Lind, make her the highest

offer of which their regulations afford them the power.” This highest

offer was, it is true, not extravagant; it ensured her £150 a year; it

provided her with all her costumes out of theatrical funds; it allowed

her one “benefit” every year; and special “extra service money for the

parts in which she appears.” It offered her the months of July and

August for study abroad; and promised to try to extend this interval.

The engagement was to last for the full period permitted, _i.e._ three

years.

To this Fröken Lind sent the following answer:—

“_To the Directors of the Royal Theatre._

“In reply to the letter from the Directors of the Royal Theatre, dated

15th December last year, I have the honour to state as follows: The

musical and dramatic capabilities which, from my earliest years, I

have felt myself to possess, have, thanks to the cultivation received

at home, though hitherto insufficient, still been able to attract some

attention to my dawning talent; but it is not with half-developed

natural gifts, however happy, that an artist can keep his ground; and,

greatly as I prize the appreciation I have been fortunate enough

already to win, I feel I ought to consider it not so much a homage to

the artist I was and am, as an encouragement to what I might become.

“With this conviction, and in order to attain the artistic perfection

open to me, I have thought it a duty to do what I can, and not to draw

back before any sacrifice, either of youth, health, comfort, or

labour, not to speak of the modest sum I have managed to save, in the

hope of reaching what may, perhaps, prove an unattainable aim. In

consequence, I have decided on a journey to, and a sojourn at, some

place abroad, which, through furnishing the finest models in art,

would prove to me of the greatest profit.

“It is, then, chiefly this journey which constitutes the real obstacle

to my immediately accepting, in its entirety, the kind offer of the

Directors of the Royal Theatre; for it defers, for another year, the

possibility of my re-engagement. I am in hopes, however, that the

Royal Directors will not disapprove of my resolution, all the more as

it aims solely at perfecting myself in my art; while all sacrifices,

inseparable from a similar undertaking, will fall on myself alone.

Trusting that the Royal Directors will accord to these reasons due

consideration, and, in accordance with the request made in their kind

letter, I beg leave to submit my counter-proposals.

“On returning to my native country, next year, I undertake to serve at

the Royal Theatre for the two following years at the salary proposed

by the Royal Directors in the above-mentioned letter of the 15th

December last, but with the following modifications: that my

engagement, for each year, may not exceed eight months, viz., from 1st

October unto the following 31st May, so that a leave of the four

months, June, July, August and September may be accorded to me.

“Furthermore, I must, rather as a humble petition, than as a condition

for my return to the service of the Royal Theatre, express my wish to

be free this year from next 31st May, since in the beginning of June

an opportunity offers for me to start on my intended journey in

company with a family without whose protection I should not venture to

undertake it. I hope the Royal Directors will, kindly, give due weight

to this invaluable advantage, and, in view of its importance to me,

excuse my earnest request.

“JENNY LIND.

“Stockholm, 9 February, 1841.”

A notable document, this. Had she any counsel to aid her in its

production? Did Berg, did Lindblad advise the step? We have no record of

such advice from them. Both, indeed, seem to have agreed to the step,

and to favour its carrying out; for Berg is found with her at the start

in Paris; and it is only out of her own delicate affection for her

former master that she delays her beginning with the next one. Moreover,

she owns to having consulted him as to what was to be done when it

became clear to him as to her, that he had no more to teach her.

Lindblad, also, visits her in Paris, and interests himself in her final

fortunes there. But, still, there is no sign of their being the prime

movers. No evidence exists of her seeking other counsel than her own

heart in making the final decision.

Yet two influences there were that told strongly upon her at the time,

and urged her forward. The first was theoretical and ideal: it was that

of Geijer. He was clear that she belonged to mankind, rather than to

Sweden, and he pressed upon her the necessity of widening her range of

knowledge and skill. She, herself, attributed the momentum that drove

her afield to Geijer’s insistence. “He kicked me out ... into the great

world,” she would say, with humorous vigour. The second influence was

direct, and practical. It was the example of Belletti, the celebrated

barytone, then singing with her at the Royal Theatre. He showed her,

vividly, what scientific singing in the great Italian manner really

meant; and he would be able, if consulted as to where such style could

be gained, to say at once,—“At Paris, under Garcia.”

The decision, then, from which she is not to draw back, even at “the

sacrifice of youth, health, comfort, and of her modest savings,” appears

to be largely the issue of her own insight, and deliberation. Later on,

in Paris, she speaks as if it were her own “artistic conscience” whose

dictates she had obeyed. Certainly, it was left to her own courage and

resolution to find the funds by which to carry it out. And it was, for

this end, that she had already in the summer of 1840 set out on a

provincial round of concerts, accompanied by her father; in which she,

probably, wore out what remained of her voice after the hard work of the

theatrical season, but, in compensation, won triumphant successes and

accumulated supplies that would carry her through a year’s training at

Paris, whither she was determined to go and discover the true secret of

song.

We have a letter from her written, in the middle of this tour, towards

the early part of July, to her friend Louise Johansson, from Malmö, at

the extreme south of Sweden, whence she could actually see Copenhagen,

in which she records how things have gone in the series of towns through

which she has passed. “The journey has gone off well enough, thank God!

That is to say, the roads were so bad that the wheels, now and then,

sank a foot deep into the mud, and it was very horrid sitting about in

the atrocious weather; but as soon as I arrive in a town, and see the

exceeding great kindness and friendliness the people have for me, then I

feel it wicked to grumble. You cannot think to what an extent they all

vie with each other in serving me. It is quite astonishing!”

The letter closes with a commission which shows how very early in life

her characteristic charities had begun:—

“My dear Louisa, would you be kind enough to render me the service of

going to Clara Vestra, Kyrkogata 13 or 25. I am not sure which of

these numbers is the right one, but after you have crossed the Clara

churchyard, and when you arrive at the gate on the Vestragatan, turn

to the left, then it is the first door on the right-hand side, on the

ground floor. Ask for Bruhn, the painter, a poor sick man ill in bed

these last fourteen years; I forgot to bring him his monthly

allowance, before coming away; will you be good enough to give him, on

my behalf, 8 r. d. banco, and to tell him this is for the months of

July and August. Greet him much from me, as also his wife, and pardon

your friend who troubles you in this way.

“JENNY.”

A note is here struck, which is to sound on through her life. It

expresses one of the most vital instincts of her nature—an instinct

which roots itself deep down in her artistic impulses—this instinct

which bids her dedicate her gift to the cause of the poor, and the

unhappy. That in her which made her an artist, made her also charitable.

It was the sense of possessing a gift which prompts the giving. That

which had flowed in, must flow out. She was responsible for her great

possession; she held it in trust; she must put it out to use. It was no

mere liberality of disposition; it was no mere genial beneficence; it

was an obligation, binding, and urgent; a joyful duty; a holy privilege

which it would be a sin to neglect. Everything in her which made her

recognise the powers lodged in her to be a divine endowment, made her,

by a like impulse, recognise her duty to give away what she gained. No

one will understand her, who does not see how closely her charity was

interwoven with her art; and how it was that, in after days, in deciding

the question of marriage, she made it the prime necessity that her

husband should leave her free in her charities. It is because it was so

interwoven, that it seemed to her to be no work of merit; it was done by

a plain law of right; it was spontaneous, natural, inevitable. So it is

that already, at twenty, in the flush of youth and personal success, her

nature is at work with instinctive security; she has found out the poor

sick painter; and, quite modestly apologising for the trouble, just as

if she were giving a commission to buy something at a shop, she begs her

friend to see to it that he gets what he had the right to look for from

her.

Back to Stockholm she got in August, where she was singing in _Lucia di

Lammermoor_, on August 19th; and all through the autumn, and spring, she

is hard at work, fulfilling her bond to the Directors, though, owing to

her concert-tour, she had had no holiday whatever. No wonder, that her

voice was left fatigued and strained after such unintermittent work,

with all the weariness of incessant journeys, and the anxieties that

beset new appearances in unfamiliar rooms. It was in this effort to

raise funds by which to reach Paris, that she ran so near to doing

irreparable damage to her vocal powers. Twenty-three times does she

perform in _Lucia_, between August 19th, when she returned, and June

19th, when she closed her engagement. Fourteen times did she give

“Alice,” in _Roberto_; and nine times she repeated her former _rôle_ of

“Agatha” in the _Freischütz_. And, besides these, there were incidental

appearances; in the _Zauberflöte_ as “Pamina”; in _The Swiss Family_ as

“Emmelina”; and, seven times, as “Alaida” in Bellini’s _Straniera_. And,

moreover, there were concerts at the theatre, in which she sang, on

August 27th, and October 17th, and November 14th, and on January 11th

and 20th. And, finally, for the closing nights in May and June, came her

first seven performances of _Norma_. At the last of the concerts, she

had sung, as her piece, a duet from _Norma_, with Mme. Gelhaar, her old

playmate in the school. And, on May 19th, the full opera was produced,

in which her own people recognised, and greeted, one of her most

brilliant and impressive impersonations.

With _Norma_ she ended, on June 19th; it was her 447th appearance on the

boards of the Royal Theatre, since, as a tiny child of ten, she played

“Angela” in _The Polish Mine_, on November 29th, 1830. The Directors

had, indeed, been justified by the venture they made with the little

creature, whom they sent on the stage to dance and sing before she had

been many months at the school. She had well repaid them. For her

sixty-nine performances in the year 1840, she is only receiving, besides

the regulation play money, 1100 r. d. banco—about £95 a year. Her voice

is fatigued, and worn; she has done more work than she could rightly

afford. But her spirit is not looking back, but ahead. She is not

calculating her present gains; but is all on fire with the great hope,

that is astir within her, at the bidding of which she will wander out, a

pilgrim of Art, seeking the better country, sure that there is a vision

to be seen, a victory to be won, to which as yet she has not even come

nigh.

She has found her opportunity; and has made her resolution. Some good,

kind friends, M. and Madame von Koch, in whose house she found constant

friendship and affection, have arranged for her journey, and have lent

her a maid, as a companion. A safe road is thus laid open for her to

Paris. So, on June 21st, she gave, in the Ladugårdslands Church, a final

concert on her own behalf, singing an aria from _Anna Bolena_, and

another from _Norma_; winding up with a ‘Lyrical Farewell,’ written and

composed, for the occasion, by Lindblad; and, in July, she leaves the

Lindblads’ house, and enters on the pilgrimage which was to mean so

much. Home has been gracious to her; she loves her country which has

loved her so freely; her one desire is to return to Stockholm, worthy of

the enthusiasm which it has poured about her. But home cannot tell her

the great secret. Somewhere else it lies, far off; she must seek it, and

find it, even though, on its behalf, she sacrifice “youth, health,

comfort, labour, and savings.”

BOOK II.

ASPIRATION.

CHAPTER I.

IN PARIS.

On Thursday, the first of July, 1841, Mdlle. Lind embarked, on the

steamship _Gauthiod_, for Lübeck; attended by a trusty female companion,

recommended to her by Madame von Koch.

“The dear little girl,” wrote Madame Lindblad, “was almost crushed. I

never thought that it would cost her so much. On the last night she

never slept, but wrote letters the whole night through, coming

occasionally into our rooms to have a good cry. On the first of July she

left, at 11 o’clock, A.M.”

After a few days of rest and enjoyment, she proceeded with her companion

to Hâvre by the steamboat; and thence, by diligence, to Paris.

To a nature so sensitive, the change from the natural simplicity of

domestic life in Sweden, to the restless activity of the French capital,

with its crowded streets, its ceaseless craving for pleasure and

excitement, its passion for amusement, its caprices of fashion, and

above all, its splendid theatres, its art-collections, and priceless

opportunities for mental cultivation and improvement—to such a nature,

all this, so new, so unexpected, and, in many respects, so strangely

incomprehensible, must have been fraught with an all-absorbing interest.

And we must not forget, that the Paris of fifty years ago was a city,

very different from, and, in many respects, very much more interesting

than, that in which it delights us to spend our holidays to-day—an older

Paris, as different from the Paris of to-day, as the Hamburg of to-day

is, from the Hamburg that suffered in the conflagration of 1842.

It was to this older Paris that Mdlle. Lind repaired, in the summer of

the year 1841, in the hope of perfecting herself in the technicalities

of the Art she so dearly loved—that Art of Singing, of whose mysteries

she knew so little, and longed to know so much; and the details of which

she found it so impossible to acquire satisfactorily in Stockholm.

For her advancement in Dramatic Art, she trusted to herself alone. No

one could teach her to act, and she sought no teacher, for her method

was part of herself; she needed no help for this. But her need of a

competent _Maestro di Canto_ was a very pressing one, indeed; and she

had long been convinced that one, and one only, could teach her what she

so much desired to know. But it will be readily understood that the

assistance and hearty co-operation of such a master as she needed were

not to be had for the mere asking; and some little time elapsed before

her desire was accomplished.

On first reaching Paris, she found a comfortable home with a family

named Ruffiaques, who kept a boarding-house, in a street near the Rue

Neuve des Augustins.

Here, she was visited by Madame Berg, the wife of her former

singing-master, who was then staying in Paris, with her little invalid

son, Albert; and, also, by Herr Blumm, a Swedish gentleman of kindliest

disposition and infinite _bonhomie_, who held the appointment of

_Chancelier_ to the Swedish Legation, in the Rue d’Anjou, and to whom

she was indebted for innumerable acts of courtesy and kindness, during

the period of her residence in Paris.

On leaving Sweden, she had brought with her letters of introduction from

Queen Desideria,[10] to her relative, the Duchesse de Dalmatie (Madame

la Maréchale Soult); and, soon after her arrival in Paris, she was

invited by this lady to an afternoon reception. It was understood that

she would be asked to sing: and, by invitation of the Duchesse, Signor

Manuel Garcia, the brother of Madame Malibran and Madame Viardot, and

the most renowned _Maestro di Canto_ in Europe, came to hear her.

She sang some Swedish songs, accompanying herself on the pianoforte;

but, either through nervousness, or fatigue, she does not appear to have

done herself justice, and her singing seems to have produced no very

favourable effect upon the assembled guests. Her voice was worn, not

only from over-exertion, but from want of that careful management which

can only be acquired by long training under a thoroughly competent

master. Such training she had never had. She had formed her own ideal of

the difficult _rôles_ that had been entrusted to her at the Royal

Theatre in Stockholm, and had tried to reach that ideal by the only

means she knew of—means, very pernicious indeed. The result was, that

the voice had been very cruelly injured. The mischief had been seriously

aggravated by the fatigue consequent upon her long and arduous

provincial tour; and the effect was a chronic hoarseness, painful enough

to produce marked symptoms of deterioration upon the fresh young voice,

which had never been taught either the method of production, or the

cultivation of style necessary for the development of its natural charm.

Signor Garcia was not slow to perceive all this; and he afterwards told

a lady, who questioned him upon the subject, that Mdlle. Lind was, at

that time, altogether wanting in the qualities needed for presentation

before a highly-cultivated audience.

Soon after this, Mdlle. Lind called, by appointment, upon Signor Garcia,

who then occupied a pleasant _deuxième étage_, in a large block of

houses in the Square d’Orléans, near the Rue Saint Lazare. As, on this

occasion, she formally requested the great _Maestro_ to receive her as a

pupil, he felt it his duty to examine her voice more carefully than he

had been able to do at Madame Soult’s afternoon party; and, after making

her sing through the usual scales, and forming his own opinion of the

power and compass of the vocal registers, he asked her to sing the

well-known scena from _Lucia di Lammermoor_—“_Perche non ho_.” In this,

unhappily, she broke completely down—in all probability, through

nervousness, for she had appeared in the part of “Lucia,” at the

Stockholm Theatre, no less than thirty-nine times only the year before,

and the music must, therefore, have been more than familiar to her.

However, let the cause have been what it might, the failure was

complete; and, upon the strength of it, the Maestro pronounced his

terrible verdict—“It would be useless to teach you, Mademoiselle; you

have no voice left”—“_Mademoiselle, vous n’avez plus de voix_.”[11]

The effect of this sentence of hopeless condemnation upon an

organisation so highly strung as that of Mdlle. Lind may be easily

conceived. But her courage was equal to the occasion, though she told

Mendelssohn, years afterwards, that the anguish of that moment exceeded

all that she had ever suffered in her whole life. Yet, her faith in her

own powers never wavered for an instant. There was a fire within her

that no amount of discouragement could ever quench.

Instead, therefore, of accepting his verdict as a final one, she asked,

with tears in her eyes, what she was to do. Her trust in the _Maestro’s_

judgment was no less firm than that which she felt in the reality of her

own vocation. In the full conviction that, if she could only persuade

him to advise her, his counsel would prove invaluable, she did not

hesitate to make the attempt; and the result fully justified the

soundness of her conclusions. Moved by her evident distress, he

recommended her to give her voice six weeks of perfect rest; to abstain,

during the whole of that time, from singing even so much as one single

note; and to speak as little as possible. And, upon condition that she

strictly carried out these injunctions, he gave her permission to come

to him again, when the period of probation was ended, in order that he

might then see whether anything could be done for her.

To any really earnest aspirant, six weeks of enforced idleness would

have been a martyrdom. For Mdlle. Lind, such a period of inaction was

simply impossible. Disobedience to the _Maestro’s_ orders was, of

course, out of the question. But, if she was forbidden to sing, or to

speak, she was, at least, permitted to read, and write. Never doubting,

for a moment, of her ultimate success, she knew that she would, one day,

have to sing in Italian, and possibly, also, in French. She therefore

spent the six weary weeks in the diligent study of those languages; and

there are actually in existence, at this moment, no less than sixty-one

large foolscap pages, in her own handwriting, closely filled with

exercises in Italian grammar, and twenty-three similar pages in French,

the greater part of which appear to have been completed during this

trying period; not mere scattered memoranda, but systematic work,

genders of nouns, conjugations of irregular verbs, long lists of

exceptions, and other like matters, such as would have been executed by

an industrious student on the eve of a severe critical examination.

But, the time was a weary one, nevertheless. Her nerves were excited to

the last degree of tension, and never did she forget the exasperating

effect of the cries which, day after day, reached her, from the street,

as the long dull hours dragged on. Two of these she imitated, sometimes,

when speaking of her Paris life, in the presence of her daughter, who

thus noted down the “words and music.”

[Illustration:

Haricots, haricots verts!

Ah! le vitrier!

]

The first of these street-melodies speaks for itself. The second is the

cry of a wandering glazier; and may still be heard, in the poorer

streets of Paris, sung by men who carry panes of glass on their backs,

to mend broken windows.

Intense indeed must have been the relief, when the time of probation

expired, at last. Once more, Mdlle. Lind sought an interview with the

master; and, this time, her hopes were crowned with success. Signor

Garcia found the voice so far re-established, by rest, that he was able

to give good hope of its complete restoration, provided that the faulty

method of production which had so nearly resulted in its destruction was

abandoned; and, with the view of attaining this important end, he agreed

to give her two lessons, regularly, every week—an arrangement which set

all her anxieties at rest, and for which she was deeply grateful, to the

end of her life.[12]

The delight of the artist, at being once more permitted to sing, may be

readily imagined. Though discouraged, sometimes, by the immense amount

she had to learn—and, with still greater difficulty, to unlearn—she

never lost heart; and so rapidly did the vocal organs recover from the

exhaustion from which they had been suffering, that, before long, she

was able to practise her scales and exercises for many hours daily.

The lessons appear to have begun about the twenty-fifth, or twenty-sixth

of August; and to have been continued, twice a week, from that period,

until the month of July, 1842.

Mdlle. Lind thus describes her first introduction to the new system, in

a letter to her friend, Fröken Marie Ruckman:—

“Paris, Sept. 10, 1841.

“I have already had five lessons from Signor Garcia, the brother of

Madame Malibran. I have to begin again, from the beginning; to sing

scales, up and down, slowly, and with great care; then, to practise

the shake—awfully slowly; and, to try to get rid of the hoarseness, if

possible. Moreover, he is very particular about the breathing. I trust

I have made a happy choice. Anyhow, he is the best master; and,

expensive enough—twenty francs for an hour. But, what does that

signify, if only he can teach me to sing? Mdlle. Nissen has been his

pupil, now, for two years, and has made immense progress.”

A fortnight later, she writes to Madame Lindblad:—

“I am well satisfied with my singing-master. With regard to my weak

points, especially, he is excellent. I think it very fortunate for me

that there exists a Garcia. And I believe him, also, to be a very good

man. If he takes but little notice of us, apart from his lessons—

well!—that cannot be helped; but I am very much pleased, nay!

enchanted with him as a teacher.”[13]

And, again, to Herr Expeditionschef Forsberg:—

“Paris, February 1, 1842.

“Garcia’s method is the best, of our time; and the one which all here

are striving to follow.”

And, it is pleasant to know that the _Maestro_ was equally well pleased

with his pupil, who, in a still later letter, writes:—

“Paris, March 7, 1842.

“You know, to-day, four years ago, I made my _début_ in _Der

Freischütz_.—No! five years ago, I mean. No! it is four, I think.—

Well! yes! I do not know.—Anyhow, it was on the 7th of March.[14]

“My singing is getting on quite satisfactorily, now. I rejoice

heartily in my voice; it is clear, and sonorous, with more firmness,

and much greater agility. A great, great deal still remains to be

done; but the worst is over. Garcia is satisfied with me.”

The teaching she now received was, evidently, the exact thing Mdlle.

Lind needed. Of the management of the breath, the production of the

voice, the blending of its registers, and other technical details upon

which the most perfect of singers depends, in great measure, for

success, she knew nothing—and, but for Signor Garcia, in all probability

never would have known anything. But, of that which concerned the higher

life of her art, neither Signor Garcia nor any one else could teach her

anything at all. She evidently felt this, herself; for, long years

afterwards, she wrote:—

“The greater part of what I can do in my Art, I have myself acquired,

by incredible labour, in spite of astonishing difficulties. By Garcia

alone have I been taught some few important things. God had so plainly

written within me what I had to study; my ideal was, and is, so high,

that I could find no mortal who could in the least degree satisfy my

demands. Therefore I sing after no one’s method—only, as far as I am

able, after that of the birds; for, their Master was the only one who

came up to my demands for truth, clearness, and expression.”[15]

But, though thus dependent upon her own natural genius for the high

qualities which placed her above the greatest of her contemporaries in

everything which concerned her loftiest aspirations in the realm of Art,

she was none the less grateful to Signor Garcia for the “few important

things” which gave her her first practical insight into the _technique_

of singing—an insight, without which, as she herself felt, she would

never have been able to bring her own great artistic ideal to

perfection.

CHAPTER II.

THE STUDENT.

For some few weeks after her first interview with Signor Garcia, and her

subsequent entrance upon a course of regular study under his guidance,

Mdlle. Lind continued to reside with Madame Ruffiaques. But she soon

awoke to the conviction that a boarding-house was scarcely a fitting

place for continuous and undisturbed study; and—a still more serious

consideration—she found that the terms for board and lodging were too

high for her slender means. It was really necessary that she should go

to a cheaper and a more convenient home; but the removal was not

effected without tears on either side. Madame Ruffiaques cried bitterly

when she left, saying that they had all “hoped for a longer stay on her

part,” and “could scarcely have believed such dignity of conduct

possible in a young person coming alone to Paris.” But it was

indispensable that the step should be taken. Towards the close of

October, therefore, she removed to the house of Mdlle. du Puget; a lady,

who, though not a Swede by birth, had been educated in Sweden, was

thoroughly Swedish in all her thoughts and habits, and had familiarised

the French with the literature of Sweden by her excellent translations

of many well-known Swedish works.

Though a pleasant, and, in many ways, a sympathetic companion, Mdlle. du

Puget was not free from certain amusing peculiarities which Mdlle. Lind

occasionally described with genuine good humour. In a letter to Madame

Lindblad, dated, “Paris, November 26, 1841,” she narrates an amusing

little episode:—

“You must know that I am beginning to be an ape—a fact of which I was

not aware until yesterday. I was singing to Mdlle. du Puget, and she

seemed a little bit surprised when, just once or twice, I displayed

all my powers—_you_ know what I mean—and she looked at me as if she

had not given me credit for this. (Mdlle. du Puget—you must know—is a

person who has heard all the great artists, and is herself musical.)

First, I sang ‘in Persiani’s style,’ and then ‘in Grisi’s’; and she

was kind enough to say it was excellently _imitated_—‘could not, in

fact, be better.’ The compliment was rather hard to digest. I was so

ashamed, that, for a long while, I could not look up. But, after a

considerable pause, I asked, ‘Do you really think so?’—with a feeling

of pride which my look—even the look of my back—must surely have

reflected. God help me! I am so proud that I cannot bear people to

tell me I ‘imitate.’ I loathe the very word to such an extent that I

cannot conceive what its inventor was thinking of! It seems to me,

that to take what is another’s, and use it for one’s self, and then to

make believe that it is one’s own, is positively to steal. But, I

seize so quickly the impression of what is good, or bad, that I should

not feel surprised if I have caught something from the Italian Opera,

which I have already visited pretty frequently. But be this as it may,

the reminiscences I am carrying away from the Italian Opera here are

much better than those connected with Stockholm and the school and

style that prevail there.”

But Mdlle. Lind was not deprived of the companionship of critics better

able than Mdlle. du Puget to appreciate her talents at their true value.

Her most intimate friend, at this period, was Mdlle. Henrietta

Nissen,[16] who was also a pupil of Garcia, and a great favourite with

the master. The two talented young vocalists frequently sang together;

and, before long, a feeling of generous rivalry sprang up between them,

which must have been of infinite advantage to both. Mdlle. Lind thus

describes her young friend in a letter to Madame Lindblad:—

“Paris, August 19, 1841.

“Yesterday I went to see Mdlle. Nissen, to whom I go pretty often; and

we sang to one another. She has a beautiful voice. Still, I think I

agree with what Adolf once said—‘it is getting a little thin in the

upper notes.’ But, notwithstanding this, it is a splendid voice. In

future we are going to have music together at Herr Blumm’s.”

The meetings at Herr Blumm’s became an institution. A month later, she

writes:—

“Paris, September 19, 1841.

“I am just expecting Philippe[17]—not King Philippe!—who is going to

take me to Herr Blumm’s, where Mdlle. Nissen is waiting for us, with

an old relative of hers; and we four are going somewhere into the

country for the day. She is a very sweet girl. I am really glad to

have made her acquaintance. The divine song draws us to each other.”

But there were other bonds of sympathy between them, besides those

cemented by their mutual love for “the divine song.” When Christmas drew

near, Mdlle. Lind’s heart was torn by yearnings for home. As the time

approached she wrote to Madame Lindblad:—

_“Paris, December 9, 1841._

“Do you know what I am doing, besides writing to you? I am munching

away—at what?—just guess!—at a bit of genuine Swedish

_Knäckebröd_,[18] which Herr Blumm has brought me.... Ah! think of me,

when you go to the _Julotta_,[19] for it is the most glorious thing

your poor Jenny knows of.”

And again:—

“Paris, December 16, 1841.

“Ah! who? who will light the Christmas Tree for my mother? No one; no

one! She has no child who can bring her the least pleasure. If you

knew how she is ever before me! how constantly she is in my thoughts!

how she gives me courage to work! how I love her, as I never loved her

before!”

And, in the midst of this cruel burst of home-sickness, good

Mademoiselle du Puget bethought her of an expedient, of which we hear in

another letter, written four days after Christmas:—

“Paris, December 29, 1841.

“Christmas Eve passed off better than I expected; for Mademoiselle du

Puget went to fetch the dear sweet Nissen, and, all of a sudden, as I

was standing in my room alone, she came creeping in to me. We sang

duets together—but my thoughts strayed homewards.”

It is beautiful, as the time progresses, to mark the utter absence of

jealousy which characterised this rare artistic friendship between two

young students, each of whom had a reputation to ensure, and a name to

render famous.

On April 3, 1812, she writes:—

“Do you know that Nissen is just upon the point of concluding an

engagement for three years at the Italian Opera? For the first year,

she is offered four thousand riksdaler banco;[20] and, when the three

years are over, she will, no doubt, be able to command from sixty to

seventy thousand riksdaler banco[21] per annum. Ah, yes! God help her!

She is a nice good girl. Yet, notwithstanding all this, I am contented

with my own lot, and would not change with any one, though my

prospects for the future are poor, and dark.”

And again on May 1:—

“I am not depressed on Mademoiselle Nissen’s account. Ah, no! Besides,

how foolish it would be not to stand aside for a merit greater than my

own—and this I do. Thank God! I feel no jealousy, and—shall I tell

you?—it is true that I can never get her voice; but I am quite

satisfied with my own. And, furthermore, I shall be able, in time, to

learn all that she knows; but she can never learn what I know. Do you

understand? She is a nice girl; and, with all my heart, I wish her

every happiness. Her stay here is of great advantage to me, for she

spurs me on.”

In truth, every brilliant manifestation of real talent served only to

spur Mademoiselle Lind on to still greater exertions on her own account.

She was a constant attendant at the Italian Opera; and recorded her

impressions of the principal performers with the most perfect frankness.

In one letter she writes:—

“Oh! if you could have heard Madame Persiani sing in _La Sonnambula_,

yesterday! Oh! oh! it was beautiful!”

Of Grisi, though she admired her greatly as an actress, she spoke less

enthusiastically; and, especially, of her shake, which, she said, was

not good. Indeed, this particular grace was then but very little

cultivated in the Italian School, from an idea—entirely fallacious—that

its frequent practice was deleterious to the voice.

But Mademoiselle Lind’s observations were not confined to the Italian

Opera, or to singing alone. She was a great admirer of Mademoiselle

Rachel; and studied her performances with peculiar interest. In one of

her letters she writes:—

“Paris, October 24, 1841.

“There is a remarkable dearth of good actresses here. Mademoiselle

Rachel is the only one—after her, Grisi.”

And again:—

“Paris, November 20, 1841.

“Shall I tell you my thoughts? The difference between Mademoiselle

Rachel and myself is, that she can be splendid when angry, but she is

unsuited for tenderness. I am desperately ugly, and nasty too, when in

anger; but I think I do better in tender parts. Of course, I do not

compare myself with Rachel. Certainly not. She is immeasurably greater

than I. Poor me!”

It is evident from this, that, while striving, with all her might, to

master the technical difficulties of singing under the guidance of

Signor Garcia, Mademoiselle Lind never, for a moment, forgot the

importance of the dramatic element. Her correspondence teems with

observations which show how constantly her thoughts were dwelling upon

this important point. In one more than ordinarily interesting letter,

she writes:—

“Paris, October 24, 1841.

“I am longing for home. I am longing for my theatre. I have never said

this before, in any of my letters. I know I am contradicting myself,

but I rejoice over it. Oh! to pour out my feelings in a beautiful

part! This is, and ever will be, my continual aim; and, until I stand

there again, I shall not know myself as I really am. Life on the stage

has in it something so fascinating, that I think, having once tasted

it, one can never feel truly happy away from it, especially when one

has given oneself wholly up to it, with life and soul, as I have done.

This has been my joy, my pride, my glory! True, it is a great thing to

be free from all the worries connected with it; but, when I return

home, I know not what people could have to reproach me with. Then the

die will be cast; and I shall not change very much for the better

after that, I suppose—and, consequently, things will be different.”

Later on she writes:—

“Paris, March 7, 1842.

“Sometimes I act by myself; and it seems to me that I have gained more

feeling, more _verve_, more truth in my rendering; at least, I feel,

now, better than I used to do, what life really is. It is just

possible that I may not act as well as before; but I do not think so.

Nobody acts as I act. What do you say to such language as this? But,

you will not misunderstand me.”

But there were moments of doubt, bordering sometimes almost upon

despondency. On one occasion she says:—

“Paris, May 30, 1842.

“Then Garcia pretends to believe that I shall never more act in tragic

parts![22] What do you think of that? I leave him to say what he

pleases. In the meantime, may God preserve me from being altogether

bewildered! I do not think there is any danger. I acted ‘_Norma_,’

this morning, and it was not much worse than at Stockholm.”

In the midst of these alternations of hope and anxiety, the studies were

interrupted, for a moment, by a sudden shock—a merciful escape from an

accident of the most frightful possible character.

On the 8th of May, the Baroness Schwerin accompanied Mademoiselle Lind

on an excursion to Versailles.

Herr Blumm was anxious that the party should return to Paris by a train

which would give them an opportunity of passing through some very

beautiful scenery on their way home. But, that very morning, the Préfet

de Police offered the Baroness a box at one of the theatres. In order to

render this available, the plans were changed at the last moment; and it

was not until after their return, that the little party of friends

learned that the train by which they intended to travel had been wrecked

by the bursting of the boiler, and that, of the four hundred persons who

were injured by the explosion, one hundred were either scalded to death,

or cut to pieces, in a manner too horrible for description.

Mademoiselle Lind’s account of the occurrence shows that it affected her

very deeply indeed. But her nature was not of the weak type which is

rendered unfit for exertion by a sudden fear, however great may have

been its effect at the moment; and her subsequent letters show that

after the first burst of thankfulness was over, she was at work again as

heartily as ever. She had come to Paris to work; and she left undone

nothing which could tend to perfect her in the art to which every energy

of her life was devoted.

CHAPTER III.

WITHIN SIGHT OF THE GOAL.

Mdlle. Lind’s course of study, under Signor Garcia, lasted ten months,

from the 26th or 27th of August, 1841, to the end of June, 1842—by which

time she had learned all that it was possible for any master to teach

her.

The result for which she had so ardently longed, so patiently waited, so

perseveringly laboured, was attained at last. Her voice, no longer

suffering from the effect of the cruel fatigue, and the inordinate

amount of over-exertion which had so lately endangered, not merely its

well-being, but its very existence, had now far more than recovered its

pristine vigour—it had acquired a rich depth of tone, a sympathetic

sweetness, a birdlike charm in the silvery clearness of its upper

register, which at once impressed the listener with the feeling that he

had never before heard anything in the least degree resembling it.

No human organ is perfect. It is quite possible that other voices may

have possessed qualities which this did not; for voices of exceptional

beauty are nearly always characterised by an individuality of expression

which forms by no means the least potent of their attractions. But, the

listener never stopped to analyse the qualities of Mdlle. Lind’s voice,

the marked individuality of which set analysis at defiance. By turns,

full, sympathetic, tender, sad, or brilliant, it adapted itself so

perfectly to the artistic conception of the song it was interpreting,

that singer, voice, and song, were one.

With such rare power at command, Mdlle. Lind was able, without effort,

to give expression to every phase of the conception which she had

originally formed by the exercise of innate genius alone. Her acting, as

we have seen, in former chapters, had grown up with her from her

infancy, and formed part of her inmost being. She had found no one in

Paris capable of teaching her anything that could improve that, though

she thought it necessary to take lessons in deportment. The rest she had

studied for herself, though she had naturally gained experience by

observation of others. With fearless modesty, she had measured her own

powers against those of Mdlle. Rachel, and dared to tell herself what

she believed to be the truth, with regard to their comparative merits.

She had acted the part of _Norma_ to herself, and calmly passed judgment

upon her own performance. That she was satisfied with it we cannot

doubt; for she had studied the difficult character of her heroine to

such good purpose, that she had reconciled all its apparent

incongruities, and elevated it into a consistent whole, dramatic and

musical, breathing poetry and romance from beginning to end, yet, as

true to nature as she was herself, and no longer fettered by the fatal

technical weakness which had so long stood between her ideal and its

perfect realisation. There was no weakness now. The Artist was complete.

And now arose the crucial question—should the finished Artist make her

_début_ in Paris?—or, should she return, at once, to Sweden, and

reappear, in all the glory of her newly-acquired powers, in her beloved

Stockholm?

There were arguments to be brought forward on both sides. The problem

was no new one. It had frequently been discussed; but her own feeling on

the subject was very strong indeed. She could not reconcile herself to

Paris. From the very first, she had suspected the hollowness of its

social organisation. As early as the 10th of September, 1841, she had

written to her friend, Fröken Marie Ruckman:—

“MY BEST FRIEND,—

“There might be much to say about Paris, but I put it off until I am

better able to judge. This much, however, I will say at once, that, if

good is sometimes to be found, an immeasurable amount of evil is to be

found also. But, I believe it to be an excellent school for any one

with discernment enough to separate the rubbish from that which is

worth preserving—though this is no easy task. To my mind, the worst

feature of Paris is, its dreadful selfishness, its greed for money.

There is nothing to which the people will not submit, for the sake of

gain. Applause, here, is not always given to talent; but, often

enough, to vice—to any obscure person who can afford to pay for it.

Ugh! It is too dreadful to see the _claqueurs_ sitting at the theatre,

night after night, deciding the fate of those who are compelled to

appear—a terrible manifestation of original sin!”

To Madame Lindblad, some six weeks later, she writes:—

“Paris, October 24, 1841.

“All idea of appearing here in public has vanished. To begin with—I

myself never relied upon it; but people said so many silly things

about ‘just one performance,’ that, at last, I began to feel as if I

were in duty bound to try. But, monstrous and unconquerable

difficulties are in the way. In any case, I want to go home again.

But, if I can arrange to sing at a concert, before leaving, I will do

so; in order that I may not return home without having at least done

something.”

Three months later, in a letter dated February the 1st, 1842, and

addressed to Herr Expeditionschef Forsberg (who controlled the Dramatic

School attached to the R. Theatre at Stockholm at the time at which

Jenny was numbered among its pupils), we find her dwelling touchingly on

her desire to consecrate her talents to her native country.

“I came hither,” she says, “because I felt my talent too

insignificant. I knew, indeed, that it was not really so. But, having

no one to consult but my dear Herr Berg—who was, miserable at his

inability to help me through with my incessant work—I resolved simply

to break off, and to take two years’ leave of absence.

“I am working on, now; have made progress; and—need I say it—if they

want to hear me again, in my Sweden, with what joy will I not hasten

thither! I have only made these sacrifices, in order that I may become

worthy of the public; and, if I do not succeed, I shall, at all

events, have satisfied my artist’s conscience.

“Therefore, Herr Expeditionschef, if I can only learn to sing, I shall

certainly return, in a year and a half; but, not if I meet with

coldness, or am regarded as altogether unnecessary. I am almost afraid

of that. I do not wish to stand in the way of any one. Rather than

that, I would settle down here to give singing-lessons; for Garcia’s

method is the best of our time, and every one, here, is striving to

follow it. But, in any case, I shall come home, in order that people

may hear what progress I have made—if I really have made any. Will

they accept me, and give me a suitable engagement? If so, I shall

remain. If not, I shall go abroad again.”

When the time for arriving at a decision began to draw near, she wrote

to Madame Lindblad:—

“Paris, April 3, 1842.

“I dare not tell you how I long for home! I dare not tell you how far

from happy I feel, here! but, there is one thing in your letter that

really frightens me. You say, that, if I come back, without having

previously appeared in public, here, they will say that I was not fit

for it, however well I may sing. Ho! ho! what will happen, then? It

might, perhaps, be better for me to engage myself somewhere as

nursery-maid; for it is a very difficult thing to appear, here, in

public. On the stage it would be out of the question. It could only be

in the concert-room: and there I am at my weakest point, and shall

always remain so. What is wanted here is—‘admirers.’ Were I inclined

to receive them, all would be smooth sailing. But there I say—STOP!

“To sing, without a name, is difficult; for, here, everything depends

upon the accessories. It matters not how little talent there may be.

My position is, indeed, a hard one! If only I belonged to a country

having more self-confidence when passing judgment on its own artists,

then, all would be well. But, the misfortune is, that they never

believe in themselves. However, I have never said that I should appear

in public, though others have.”

A week later she wrote to her father:—

“Paris, April 10, 1842.

“GODE PAPPA!—

“So many thanks for your last letter. I see, from it, that you and

Mamma are well. It gives me no slight comfort to know this; and I

should be even better satisfied, if I were also to learn that you

prosper in your country home.

“As yet, my dear Pappa, I have not grown particularly stout; but, what

I shall be, when I grow old, I cannot tell. However, I trust the Lord

will save me from being obliged to sing on the stage, until my life’s

end; and then, I shall rest tranquil.

“Apropos of the Opera! I wonder when I shall next be allowed to show

myself ‘on the boards,’ as the term is. I clearly see—yes, I do see,

Pappa—that I am born to stand on them. God grant that I may always

stand ‘on firm feet,’ as Gelhaar said.[23] In one respect, Pappa knows

that I do. In the other, I am in God’s hands. Think only, if, when I

come home, I find no engagement!

“Yes, yes. ‘Comes time, comes counsel.’ Perhaps I may have to sit on

the Djurgårds Common, with a little money-box in front of me, to

gather in small contributions, and sing while the day lasts—for, says

the proverb, ‘There is no day so long that it has not its evening’—

and, after that, I go to my Father’s bosom, to awake in a better land.

And this is surely the highest aim. It does not matter how one gets

there, so that one only does get there, somehow, and, ‘he that

humbleth himself shall be exalted,’ says the Scripture.—But, be this

as it may!

“I was obliged to act as I did; otherwise, the whole thing would have

remained at a standstill with me. Perhaps I have not yet been quite

forgotten—though I have some doubt about it: and, in that case, and if

I have also made some progress, people may perhaps find pleasure in

listening to me, when I come back again. I wish for nothing better

than this.

“_Adieu, lille Fader._ Write, if occasion offers, to your

“AFFECTIONATE DAUGHTER.”

A letter addressed, on the same day, to Madame Lindblad, announces still

greater indecision with regard to the future:—

“Paris, April 10, 1842.

“I am really anxious to see how a life, begun like mine, will end. Oh!

what emptiness beyond description there is around me! An unwonted

amount of courage is necessary, for prolonging my stay here for

another year. But I need this, for several reasons. This journey has

altogether changed me. The foundation of the building was tolerably

safe, and needed no pulling down. But, the superstructure!—this has

crumbled away, through not having been better put together.”

The spirit which pervades these letters is unmistakable; and clearly

shows Mdlle. Lind’s own feeling, with regard to the critical question,

on the settlement of which her artistic destiny seemed now mainly to

depend.

But, she was not, and could not possibly be, the only, or even the best

judge, of what was best for her. From the very nature of the case, she

was placed very much at the mercy of others, who, moved by feelings of

friendship, or self-interest, as the case might be, took an active part

in the discussion; and it was mainly through their intervention that the

question was solved with the results which we propose to describe in our

next chapter.

CHAPTER IV.

THE RETURN.

On the 24th of May, 1842, while Mdlle. Lind was still tortured by doubts

as to the best course to follow, in this difficult crisis, the Directors

of the Royal Theatre at Stockholm sent her the offer of a definite and

official engagement—or rather re-engagement—at the Opera-House in which

her early triumphs had been achieved. It must be confessed, that the

terms proposed by the _Direktion_ were more in accordance with her

former _status_ at the Royal Theatre, than with that which was the just

due of the great artist she had now become. The engagement was to last

either one, or two years; from the 1st of July, 1842, to the same date,

in 1843, or 1844—the longest period for which an engagement was legally

possible. The salary was fixed at 1800 _Riksdaler Banco, per annum_—

equal to about £150, in English money; with the privilege of an extra

“benefit”; and “extra service-money, according to the regulations of the

Royal Theatre,” for each appearance; the necessary “silk costumes and

bridal gowns” being provided at the expense of the management. In return

for these emoluments, Mdlle. Lind was engaged to submit, in all things,

to the regulations laid down for the direction of the Royal Theatre, in

the year 1839; but she was permitted to extend her stay abroad, until

September, 1842, without diminution of salary, as a compensation for the

expenses connected with her home journey.

To this not very tempting offer, she replied, as follows:—

“Paris, June 6, 1842.

“I have had the honour to receive the Royal Direction’s flattering

offer of an engagement, for one or two years, from the 1st of July,

1842, at the Royal Theatre of Stockholm, and hasten to submit my

humble answer.

“Although the period which I intended to devote to my studies abroad

does not terminate until next year, and, therefore, an earlier return

home will either interrupt those studies, or entail redoubled efforts

for the accomplishment of the course on which I have entered, I feel

not disinclined to accept the offer of the Royal Direction, for two

years; but, well remembering the rather too heavy service to which I

had to submit in former times, at the Royal Theatre, and from the evil

consequences of which I am still suffering, I am compelled to attach

the following conditions to my engagement, viz.:—

“(i.) That while enjoying the salary, benefices, and other advantages

proposed by the Royal Direction, I shall not be obliged to appear in

more than fifty representations during the season.

“(ii.) That an extra fee of 66 _Rdr._, 32 _sk._, _Banco_,[24] may be

granted to me for each representation over and above the said fifty,

during the season.

“(iii.) That the representations be so arranged, as not to compel my

appearance more than twice during the week.

“(iv.) That leave of absence be granted to me, from the 15th of June,

to the 1st of October, in each year.

“I trust that the Royal Direction will appreciate the fairness of the

above-named conditions, and will consider them as pardonable

forethought with regard to my health and future, which are

particularly uncertain, and difficult to ensure, by a dramatic artist,

in Sweden.”

On the same day, she thus confided her difficulties to Madame Lindblad:—

“Paris, June 6, 1842.

“I have been offered an engagement at the theatre in Stockholm, and

this has somewhat altered things. There is much to be said for, but

much also against it. It seems to me that my demands are not

exaggerated, when I propose to appear fifty times during the season,

for 1800 _Rdr. Banco_ in the form of salary, with extra money, etc.;

while, for other evenings, beyond that number, they will have to give

me, each time, 66 _Rdr._, 32 _sk._, _Banco_—the same as to Belletti. I

shall not do it for less; so, if they do not agree to this—well and

good!

“So, it may happen that I come home in the autumn. What do you say to

that? I rather long for home; and this offer, on the part of the

Direction, will furnish a good opportunity for closing the mouths of

those who might feel inclined to say something about my incapacity for

another theatre.”

Herr Lindblad, who was in Paris, at this time, wrote to his wife:—

“Paris, June 1, 1842.

“Jenny has had an offer, from the Direction of the Royal Opera, to

come home; and she seems inclined to accept it. If so, she will

return, in the autumn.”

This seems to imply that Herr Lindblad took no unfavourable view of the

arrangement; yet, when the engagement was finally concluded, he wrote to

Madame Lindblad:—

“Paris, July 4, 1842.

“Jenny has engaged herself at too small a salary. This she regrets,

now, but it cannot be helped. Her love for Sweden, and the kind letter

from the Director of the Opera, have dimmed her vision.”

And again:—

“Paris, Friday, July 15, 1842.

“I conducted Meyerbeer to Jenny, when she sang for him airs from

_Roberto_, _Norma_, and several of my songs. He thought much of her

voice, and wishes to take her to the Grand Opera-House, in order to

hear how it would sound on the stage there; for he believes that its

carrying power would grow in the large room.”

And again:—

“Paris, July 18, 1842.

“So it is, however, that, had Meyerbeer arrived here before Jenny

accepted the engagement at Stockholm, she would probably not—unless

tempted by home-sickness—have returned so soon to Sweden; for

Meyerbeer was not against engaging her for Paris or Berlin. Not a soul

has here done the least towards making her known. She has been living

as in a convent.

“Still, she is not sorry to return home; for, the greatest stage

reputations are here won only through sacrificing honour and

reputation. While the world is resounding with their praise, every

_salon_ is closed to them; and this, even in easy-going Paris. Such

homage as Jenny met with in Sweden, no foreign artist ever received.

This, she feels; and it is for this vivifying atmosphere that she is

longing.”

As may well be supposed, Meyerbeer’s influence was no unimportant factor

in the arrangements which concerned the future. He had come to Paris on

business connected with the production of _Le Prophète_; had there heard

of Mdlle. Lind—probably, from Herr Lindblad; and—as we gather from that

gentleman’s letter of the 15th of July—had already heard her sing, in

private. But he seems to have entertained doubts as to whether her voice

was powerful enough to fill the _salle_ of the Grand Opera; and, in

order to satisfy himself on this point, he wished to hear her sing on

the stage of the theatre itself. Whether or not, Signor Garcia felt any

doubts upon the subject, we do not know. On the 13th of June, Herr

Lindblad had written:—

“On Saturday last, I met Garcia, and spoke to him about Jenny. He has

found out that she has much _esprit_, and feeling; but considers her

voice still somewhat _fatiguée_.”

But, whatever Signor Garcia may have felt, it is quite certain that

Meyerbeer was determined to carry his point; and, that he made the

necessary arrangements with M. Leon Pillet, then the Director of the

Grand Opera, for the gratification of his wish; for, on the 22nd of

July, he wrote (in German) to Herr Lindblad:—

“HONOURED SIR,—

“I was unable to answer your kind letter, yesterday, as I found it

impossible to speak to the Director of the Opera. But I have since

seen him, and have arranged that, to-morrow, Saturday, at two o’clock

in the afternoon, precisely, a well-tuned pianoforte, and an

accompanist, shall be in readiness, on the stage of the Opera, to

accompany Mdlle. Lind in her songs.

“I have told the Director, that Mdlle. Lind wishes to bring with her

six or eight persons with whom she is acquainted; and orders have been

given to the porter to admit them. The entrance, however, will not be

from the Rue Lepelletier, as in the evening; but, in the Rue

Grangebatelière, No. 3, through the great gateway, on the left hand of

the court.

“Begging you, honoured sir, to make my compliments to Mdlle. Lind, and

in the hope of seeing you again to-morrow, at the Opera, at two

o’clock,

“Yours most sincerely,

“MEYERBEER.”

Of the proceedings which took place at this probationary meeting, no

detailed account has been preserved. M. Castil-Blaze tells us, that the

pieces sung were, the three grand scenes from _Der Freischütz_, _Robert

le Diable_, and _Norma_; but, as we shall presently see, his account of

the occurrence is so glaringly incorrect, in other respects, that it is

not safe to accept any part of it. Herr Lindblad, however, has described

his impressions; briefly enough, it is true, but, in language which may

be accepted as thoroughly trustworthy. His account of the effect

produced is thus recorded:—

“Paris, July 25, 1842.

“Nothing worth mentioning happened, in the course of last week, except

that Jenny appeared at the Grand Opera, here; but, without the lights,

and with no other listeners than Meyerbeer, the Hiertas, Herr Blumm,

Branting, the Director of the Opera, and myself. It was in order to

hear how her voice would tell, in the immense _salle_. Jenny was

unusually nervous; and, you know, she never does herself justice until

she is in full action on the stage. But, notwithstanding this, she

sang well; though it seemed pale in comparison with what she can do.

Meyerbeer said the prettiest things: ‘_Une voix chaste et pure, pleine

de grâce et de virginalité_,’ etc., etc. Yesterday, I breakfasted with

him; and, in the presence of Berlioz, and some other Frenchmen, he

spoke of her with an enthusiasm so great, that I almost felt inclined

to question its sincerity—for, Jenny had not sung nearly so well as

she is capable of doing.

“In the meantime, she is coming home, for which she longs with her

whole heart. May the Swedes receive her well, now, and not soon get

tired of her! Otherwise, we shall take her to Berlin, and get her an

engagement there, in accordance with Meyerbeer’s wish. He maintains

that she ought to appear there.”

This proves, clearly enough, that after hearing the effect of Mdlle.

Lind’s voice, in the _salle_ of the Grand Opera, Meyerbeer was of

opinion that Berlin would offer a better field for the exercise of her

talents than Paris; and subsequent events proved that his judgment was

perfectly correct. Neither the style, nor the tastes of the singer,

would have found a congenial home on the stage of the Grand Opera. There

was, in all probability, no difference of opinion between any of the

parties concerned, on this point; and, for the moment, this probationary

performance passed off, without any practical result. But, in after

years, the circumstance was brought before the public, in a distorted

form which entirely changed its import, by giving a glaringly false

account of the circumstances under which the trial took place.

It was said, that “Mdlle. Lind had vowed a profound artistic dislike to

France, in remembrance of the check which she had there experienced, and

for which she retained a lively resentment;” that “she constantly

refused the engagements offered to her from Paris, because she had been

heard there, without success, at the beginning of her career, by the

Direction of the Opera;” that she had even “made a _début_ at this

theatre;” that “this _début_ had not been a happy one;” and that it was

this “that provoked her resentment.”

These false reports were publicly contradicted in November, 1887, by M.

Arthur Pougin, who, in an article communicated to ‘_Le Ménestrel_,’

related the circumstances, precisely as they are here recorded.

Moreover, the letters of Meyerbeer and Lindblad prove the statements

complained of to have been without a shadow of foundation. Mademoiselle

Lind was not in Paris in 1840. Never having sung before a Parisian

audience, she could have had no possible cause for resentment against

it; and, at no period of her life did she ever entertain so unworthy a

feeling. Indeed, when the trial performance took place, in 1842, she was

not open to an engagement, either in Paris, or elsewhere; for the

contract with the “Direction” of the Royal Theatre at Stockholm had

already been signed and ratified. The die was cast.

“Paris, July 25, 1842.

“Jenny is now returning home,” wrote Herr Lindblad, “and longing for

it, with her whole heart. She will accompany the Hiertas. There is a

question of returning by way of England, and staying there until the

11th of August, when the steamer leaves for Stockholm. If this is

possible, we might all be back by the 14th of August, or the 15th, at

the latest.”

And it was possible. The journey to Paris, with its hopes and fears, its

long hours of diligent study, its cruel alternations of confidence and

despondency, dominated by a firm and righteous determination to achieve

success in spite of every obstacle, at the cost of every sacrifice of

personal ease and comfort that the nature of the case might demand—the

eventful journey to Paris, so carefully planned, and so bravely brought

to its conclusion, had accomplished all, and more, far more than ever

was expected from it. And the second phase of the great Art-life was at

an end.

BOOK III.

ACHIEVEMENT.

CHAPTER I.

HOME: AND AFTER?

“Land of my birth! Oh, that I could one day show how dear thou art to

me!” That had been the deep desire of Jenny Lind, as she toiled in

Paris. And, indeed, it had seemed as if the Fates were set on fulfilling

her desire. She was, after all, to return to her familiar boards—to put

herself under the old yoke. That great Italian Opera, with its famous

heroines of song, was to remain a vision of what was doing in the big

world outside. She was not to enter, as yet, on that magnificent scene.

Enough for her to carry out her bond with that theatre which had been

her nursery and her home, in her beloved Stockholm, at the humble salary

of 1800 r. d. banco, _i.e._ £150 a year. Very happily, so far as we can

see, she set to work; though inwardly conscious of the immense increase

of knowledge and power which had become hers since she had begun again

with Garcia “at the beginning of the beginning,” and had learnt what

“Art” meant. She arrived in August, 1842, and rented rooms for herself

and Annette, her maid, on the upper floor of the same Bonde Palace,

where the Lindblads still lived. With them she had the delight of

feeling at home, and all the comfort of domestic affection; but, in the

following year, she found it well to establish herself in an independent

position, and she took rooms in another house, whither she invited her

old friend, Louise Johansson, to come, and be her companion.

On October 10th she opened, at the theatre, with a performance of

_Norma_—the very opera in which she had closed her appearances on June

19th, 1841. It must have been a direct challenge to the critical world

of Stockholm, to recognise the change that had intervened between the

two performances. What that change was, we learn from an estimate which

has been kindly supplied us by a most competent and judicious critic,

himself a musician, who sang with her often, both before and after her

visit to Paris. We give his own words:—

“When, during the years 1838, 1839, and 1840, Jenny Lind enraptured

her audience, at Stockholm, by her interpretation of the parts of

‘Agathe,’ ‘Paulina,’ ‘Alice,’ ‘Norma,’ or ‘Lucia,’ she succeeded in

doing so solely through her innate capacity for investing her

performances, both musically and dramatically, with truthfulness,

warmth, and poetry.

“The voice, and its technical development, were not, however, in

sufficiently harmonious relation with her intentions.

“In proof of this, it was noticed that the Artist was not always able

to control sustained notes in the upper register—such, for instance,

as the A flat, above the stave, in Agathe’s cavatina, ‘_Und ob die

Wolke_’—without perceptible difficulty; and, that she frequently found

it necessary to simplify the _fioritura_ and _cadenze_, which abound

in florid parts like those of ‘Norma’ and ‘Lucia.’

“Nay!—there were not wanting some, who, though they had heard her in

parts no more trying than that of Emilia, in Weigl’s _Swiss Family_—a

_rôle_, which, in many respects, she rendered delightfully—went so far

as to doubt the possibility of training the veiled and weak-toned

voice in a wider sense.

“Yet, in spite of this, Jenny Lind, when resuming her sphere of action

at the Stockholm Theatre, proved to have not only acquired a soprano

voice of great sonority and compass, capable of adapting itself with

ease to every shade of expression, but to have gained, also, a

technical command over it, great enough to be regarded as unique in

the history of the musical world. Her _messa di voce_[25] stood alone—

unrivalled by any other singer.

“In like manner, in her shake, her scales, her _legato_ and _staccato_

passages, she evoked astonishment and admiration no less from

competent judges than from the general public: and the more so since

it was evident that, in the exercise of her wise discrimination, the

songstress made use of these ornaments, only in so far as they were in

perfect harmony with the inner meaning of the music.

“The incredibly rapid development of Jenny Lind’s voice and

_technique_ caused many people to question the value of the

instruction she had originally received. Such doubts must, however, be

dismissed as unjustifiable. The true reason why Jenny Lind’s singing,

before she went abroad, could not be said to flow in the track which

leads to perfection, is undoubtedly to be found in the fact that she

was a so-called _Theaterelev_—a pupil educated at the expense of the

Directors of the Theatre itself—and, as such, was unable to escape

from the necessity of appearing in public before her preparatory

education was completed—a proceeding no less disastrous to the pupil

than contrary to the good sense of the teacher.”

Such, then, was the transformation that had come over her rendering of

_Norma_. No wonder that Stockholm was wild with enthusiasm.

She sang in seven performances of _Norma_, and in six of _Lucia_,

besides giving some scenes from Rossini’s _Semiramide_, and in January,

1843, repeated her favourite “Alice” three or four times.

She took up several new characters—“Amazili,” in Spontini’s _Ferdinand

Cortez_, the second act of which was given eight times during the

spring; “Valentine,” in the _Huguenots_; “Minette,” in _La Gazza Ladra_;

“La Contessa,” in Mozart’s _Nozze di Figaro_; above all, “Amina,” in the

_Sonnambula_—one of her representations which was to become so famous in

after years, and which she sang for the first time on March 1st, 1843.

Altogether, before the nine months of the year’s engagement were out,

she had made, between October 10th, 1842, and June 21st, 1843, one

hundred and six appearances in thirteen different parts.

But, besides her normal work, those nine months were chiefly memorable

for two main incidents, one, personal and domestic; the other, national

and dramatic.

The personal event formed the last crisis in her home-relations. These

relations were still strained; for we must remember that she has never

gone back on that first decision to leave her parents’ home, which

landed her in the Lindblads’ household. She is still living apart from

them; and this is all the more marked, now that she is independent of

the Lindblads, and living in her own hired rooms, with the sole

companionship of the faithful Louise. A woman, by Swedish law, at that

time, was bound to be under guardianship until she married. Yet it must

have been as difficult as ever for her to remain under the guardianship

of parents, who cared, indeed, for her, and valued her highly, but who,

yet, could not possibly enter into her motives and aims, which were

beyond the range both of the easy-going conscience of her father, and of

the embittered temperament of her mother. We have only to recall her

deep and peculiar sense of the obligation she was under, to devote her

art and its rewards to the service of God and man, to see how tough a

difficulty this desire would prove to Herr Lind, who had never taken

life very seriously, and to Fru Lind, who had fought her own way along,

with sturdy resolution, under the ugly burden of poverty, and who had

seen no good cause to be over-tender towards a world which had dealt

hardly enough with her.

In view, then, of this radical difficulty, Jenny Lind took a step,

which, with characteristic generosity, put an end to the long and

tangled story. Out of her earnings, scanty though they were, she managed

to secure a little home in the country, in which she established her

father and mother. And, then, she won their consent to transfer a

guardianship, which they could not well exercise at a distance, to an

official guardian, duly appointed by law, to whom they would hand over

all parental responsibilities. This they did; and the transference was a

marked moment in her life. Not only did she thereby put a total end to

all the domestic troubles which had so darkened her young days; not only

did she set free her natural affection for her mother, by releasing it

from all the aggravation of jarring wills; but also she did something

towards securing for herself what she, always, most sorely needed—

needed, indeed, with all the innermost necessities of her being—a strong

and steady personal influence at the back of her life, to calm her

agitations, to control her uncertainties, to abide constant throughout

her reactions, to correct her self-mistrust, to dissipate her

suspicions, to fix her emotions, to anchor her conscience. She had all

the fervour and the lapses, the starts and the recoils, of a dramatic

genius; and, firm and high as was her moral ideal, its very force

brought it into confused collision with the bewilderment of

circumstances, and it was as liable to perplex and distress her, as to

cheer and impel. Some one ought to be near at hand from whom she could

receive the profound assurance that “all was well”—that her belief in

goodness had not played her false. This is what her home had sadly

omitted to give her: and for this loss nothing could now compensate. But

it was, at least, a profound relief, under such a strain, to have

obtained a guardian whose presence abode with her, from then to his

death in 1880, as a permanent pledge of all that was wise, and kindly,

and excellent, and of good report. Herr Henric M. Munthe, Judge of the

Court of Second Instance, the guardian chosen, was a man of high

character and distinguished position; she could confide in his judgment

with absolute confidence, while she could also rely on his appreciation

of her art, as he was himself a cultivated musician, and took his part

in the best amateur quartette in Stockholm. His portrait suggests a

benignant and benevolent “Thackeray”—a face full of fatherly interest

and mild good humour, yet with the discreet wisdom of one who knows the

Law. And, indeed, with the shrewdness of a councillor, he combined true

sympathy with all that was most deeply implanted in her heart. She wrote

to him constantly and freely; and she found in him one who could

understand her, even in those respects in which a legal trustee is most

apt to fail. For it was he who directed and managed for her, so long as

his guardianship lasted, those abundant charities which she showered

upon her native Stockholm. About these she could pour out her mind to

him, sure of intimate comprehension. And his open recognition of her

ideas in all this is evidenced by the fact that he stored up her letters

to him, and left them at his death inscribed with this description—“The

mirror of a noble soul”; though, according to her own words to his son,

these letters were almost entirely occupied with the distribution of her

charitable gifts. She declares this, in a letter written, in June, 1880,

to Carl H. Munthe, the son of the Judge, after she had learned from him

of the existence of these letters, on the father’s death in April, 1880.

Her letter throws so much light on her character that the main portion

of it is printed here.

This letter to Carl Munthe has an interest, also, that belongs to the

present memoir, for it will be noticed that she here mentions her

intention of writing an autobiography; and, above all, of recording her

artistic experience. Though this purpose was utterly abandoned (or,

rather, was never put in action), yet her words lend a sanction to the

effort made in this volume to give some record of her career as an

artist. In her last years, she was prone to justify her abandonment of

the autobiography by indignant remonstrances at the hopeless failure of

the public to understand Carlyle’s ‘Reminiscences.’ Her experience of

the cruel stupidity with which a mighty character like his could be

maltreated and misinterpreted, made her put the thought utterly away.

“If they could so treat him, who was so great, what respect would they

pay me?” she said. “No! let the waves of oblivion pass over my poor

little life!”

But we must go back to our letter: here it is:—

_Extract of a Letter from Fru Jenny Lind-Goldschmidt to Hofrättsrådet

Carl Munthe._

“1 Moreton Gardens, June 15th, 1880.

“The letters from me, left in your charge, my dear brothers and my

sister Emma, can contain only dispositions for distribution of

pensions and purses to different people. What good would there be in

exhibiting these letters to the curiosity of the public long after

that the writer thereof is decayed and forgotten? To me, the most

acceptable course would be the burning of those letters after you all

are gone. There is nothing I have shunned more, during my life, than

praise for the assistance I have been fortunate enough, through the

grace of God, to render to my fellow-men as far as lay in me, and it

can never be a merit to give of that which has been given to us. These

are my views—and, if I am not much mistaken about you, brother Carl,

you will say I am right.

“Moreover, I intend to write an autobiography. My life—especially as

an artist—has furnished material for a biography in such abundance,

that I almost look upon it as a duty to produce something of the kind,

before leaving a world where I had been called upon to take so active

a part. That in such a biography, written by myself, my beloved

guardian should take his well-deserved place, is only natural; that

the help he gave me with the distribution of my little bounties in my

fatherland, was of the greatest importance for those who received

them, is a fact nobody can dispute, and, consequently, his part in

this page of my life must be clear and unmistakable. Alas! in my

letters to him, he does not by any means occupy the place to which he

is entitled, consequently they would be only interpreted to my

advantage; and still, had he remonstrated against my urgent

commissions—which he was much too noble and much too discreet ever to

do—I should most probably have listened to his objections.”

Such was the kind and fatherly guardianship which she won for herself,

under a legal sanction obtained from His Majesty’s Lower Town Court on

the 30th of January, 1843, under the chairmanship of the Sous-Préfet,

Chamberlain, and Knight of the Order of the Royal North Star, M.

Kuylenstjierna, when the following request was presented:—

“Having decided to leave Stockholm for good, and consequently being

unable to bestow due attention to the guardianship of my dear

daughter, the Court-singer, Jenny Lind, I hereby beg that I may be

relieved from this duty, and that Herr H. M. Munthe, Judge of the High

Court, may be appointed in my place to the guardianship.”

This is signed by N. J. Lind; and, after that Herr Munthe has formally

signified his consent, the Royal Court agrees to the request, and Judge

H. M. Munthe “is herewith appointed guardian of the Court-singer, Jenny

Lind, in accordance with regulations provided by the law.”

So happily closes a long and chequered chapter of domestic history. The

parents contentedly enjoy the fruits of their daughter’s generosity.

Their discomforts and their anxieties are over. They seem to have been

very fond of one another; and henceforward the days began of quiet and

kindly peace in which the natural affections found free way.

The second great event of that spring was the National Jubilee, to

celebrate the twenty-fifth year of the reign of King Carl Johan. The

Royal Family of the Bernadottes, in spite of their abrupt introduction

into the country, have succeeded in attracting about them the national

associations; and the Jubilee was to be celebrated by appeals to

everything that was native, and popular, and Swedish. The Royal Theatre

set itself to the task by the production of a “Divertissement

National,”—a medley of national scenes, with words and dances by

Böttiger, Tegner’s son-in-law, and himself a poet; and with music by

Berwald, the conductor at the Theatre Royal. In this, Jenny Lind sang,

in the character of a peasant girl from Wermland. This piece ran for

twenty-seven nights, all through February, and March, into April; and it

was followed, in May, by another _Pièce d’ Occasion_, of the same type,

with national melodies and dances, called _A May Day in Wärend_—full of

Swedish customs, and melodies, and dresses; in which she sang the part

of “Märtha,” the heroine, riding in, at one part, on horseback on to the

stage, and singing as she rode. This ran for fifteen nights before June

was over. She was capitally supported by the barytone, Belletti, in the

character of an itinerant Italian. We can imagine how her Swedish blood

would tingle, as she threw herself, with her whole heart, into the

delight of rendering the native peasant life which was so dear to her,

and which she so instinctively interpreted. She would pour her soul out

in melodies which touched the very fibres of her being, as they spoke to

her of the sounds and sights which make Sweden what it is to Swedish

hearts. She must have felt that the opportunity was indeed come to put

out all the new powers, which she had gained abroad, to prove to her own

people how dear they were to her.

We find that, from this time on, the Court began to take delight in

showing her both favour and friendship; and especially kind to her was

the Queen, Desideria, wife of Bernadotte. We are allowed to use the

interesting notes from the diary of a lady-in-waiting on Queen

Desideria, which belong to this and the following years. This lady,

Fröken Marie von Stedingk, had, in quite early days, predicted a great

future for Jenny Lind, when she heard of her wonderful dramatic gifts,

as a child of eleven or twelve. And, now, after the return from Paris,

it was “her greatest treat” to witness the fulfilment of her prophecy,

and to hear “Our nightingale, the charming Jenny Lind,” both in the

_Divertissement National_, and in her great parts, “_Norma_,” “_La

Sonnambula_,” etc. She had, also, “often the advantage of hearing her,

through the winter, in private houses, where one and all treated her

with distinction. Her behaviour and her reputation are faultless; her

manners pleasant and modest. Without being pretty, she has an expression

of purity and genius, which, combined with her youth and her charming

figure, is exceedingly prepossessing.” We shall hear more of this diary

in the years 1844 and 1845.

So the first year of the home engagement ended—prosperous, happy,

secure. But, after all, was it to be possible that this great gift of

hers should be left to be the private possession and prize of her

Swedish home? Could it be so hid? Was no rumour to creep about of this

strange singing ’mid the northern seas? Was the “Nightingale” caught,

and caged for ever?

It could not be; and we have, now, to follow her first flights outside

the home-limits, and to watch her, as she discovers that her voice has

that in it which can overleap all the barriers set up between people and

people, and can speak to the souls of those whose tongue is unknown to

her, and whose eyes have never seen the woods and waters of Sweden.

There was a little experiment first, in Finland, in the summer of 1843,

which met with overwhelming response. A graceful and pathetic record of

the visit is given us in the verses of the aged poet of Finland,

Topelius, written for a festival in 1888, on the news of Jenny Lind’s

death. The old poet is carried back to recall the days when he first

heard her sing so long ago; and we venture to give, in a free

translation, a few of the opening verses, which describe, with delicate

accuracy, the effect she then made on all—the effect of one, who, using

all the subtlest resources given her by skill and training, still spoke

straight home, from soul to soul, with the natural direct ease with

which a bird sings its heart out, in sheer simplicity and joy:—

“I saw thee once, so young and fair,

In thy sweet spring-tide, long ago;

A myrtle wreath was in thy hair,

And, at thy breast, a rose did blow.

· · · · ·

“Poor was thy purse, yet gold thy gift;

All music’s golden boons were thine:

And yet, through all the wealth of Art,

It was thy _soul_ which sang to mine!

“Yea! sang, as no one else has sung,

So subtly skilled, so simply good!

So brilliant! yet as pure, and true

As birds that warble in the wood!”

So it went well in Finland.

But yet another step outward was to be made that summer—a step into a

country, near enough to be familiar, yet remote enough to be almost

foreign. Once before, she had just looked in at Copenhagen, in the

middle of her provincial tour, in 1840; and, now, she visited it again.

It was in connection, again, with a provincial tour which she made; and

of which we have some happy records in the life of the musician, Jakob

Axel Josephson.

This name is so closely linked with these years of Jenny Lind’s life,

that we must pause upon it before going on with our story. Josephson was

a Swedish composer—born in 1818, and died in 1880—whose songs have

become widely famous in Sweden. The event of his life was a tour through

Germany and Italy, for the study of Art; it was this which brought him

under the full sway of classical culture in music; and it was with this

tour, as we shall see, that Jenny Lind was so personally and deeply

concerned. He returned from it in 1847, and was appointed Musical

Director of Upsala University in 1849. He devoted himself with

indefatigable perseverance to producing the great works of the great

masters, especially the oratorios of Handel, Haydn, and Mendelssohn.

Through these efforts, as well as through his lectures on the ‘History

of Music,’ given at Upsala, he has done much to kindle and to purify, by

the power of music, the minds of the present generation in Sweden.

Now, in 1843, Josephson was just at the critical point in his musical

education; he was longing to get abroad; he had no sufficient funds.

Here was a situation which Jenny Lind would thoroughly understand; for

it had been her own. We shall soon see how she dealt with it. They met,

in the August of this year, at this town, Linköping, whither Josephson

had gone, on the occasion of an annual concert, to be given under the

direction of Concert-Master Randel, in aid of the fund for the widows

and orphans. It was a most pleasant surprise, as he tells us in his

Diary,[26] to meet with a number of old acquaintances and friends, and

among others Jenny Lind and Günther, who had come to give a concert of

their own, and joined in this preliminary entertainment. Crowds were

present from all parts of the country, partly owing to the presence of

some of the royalties; and the heat and the crush in the church, where

the concert was given, were intolerable, and he did not enjoy it so much

as he expected—“even Jenny Lind was less successful than usual.” This

was on the 18th August; but, at her own concert, in the evening of the

following day, she was in excellent voice, and he was enraptured; “she

sang in a manner unsurpassed. What brilliancy of delivery, side by side

with that grandeur which is so characteristic of her! What energy and

pathos, even in the very _fioriture_! What classical finish in her

cadenzas!” In the evening she was serenaded. And on the following day,

at the concert given by her and Herr Günther, he heard her sing, in

costume, a scena from the _Freischütz_. “She is incomparable!” is his

verdict. “The beautiful gentle calm during the first part of the scene;

her fine attitudes, full of feeling, when listening for the horns; her

rapture and glowing prayer at the supposed victory of her beloved—all

this is so glorious, so true, so enchanting, that in reality, nothing

can be said, while the full heart feels all the more from the lack of

words.” She sang one of Josephson’s own songs, at this concert, “Believe

not in Joy!” After this musical feast at Linköping, the friends

separated. Josephson and Günther went on a tour of their own, giving

musical soirées, while Jenny Lind took the opportunity of a run across

to Copenhagen. Before the three meet again, we must see what happened to

her there. She had intended only to make a visit; but there was in

Copenhagen, an eager and enthusiastic friend who was not to be denied.

This was Mr. A. A. Bournonville, of whom we have already spoken as being

delighted with Jenny Lind’s operatic singing as far back as 1839, when

he was indignant at the pittance at which she was rendering such

magnificent service to the Royal Theatre. He was eminent, both at

Copenhagen and at Stockholm, as a composer, and master of ballets; he

was made knight of the Danebrog in Denmark, and of the Wasa in Sweden;

he was greatly respected and beloved, and it was at his house that Jenny

Lind usually stayed, on her visits to Copenhagen. He urgently pleaded

that she should give them “her incomparable Alice” in _Roberto_; and

suggested that she should sing her part in Swedish, while the rest sang

in Danish, as the languages were so nearly akin.

“All the theatre showed the greatest goodwill,” he writes in his

memoir of his theatrical life; “but the one obstacle was the fear of

Jenny Lind herself; she dreaded a foreign stage. And when she saw Fru

Heiberg act in the _Son of the Desert_ she felt such enthusiasm for

her, and, at the same time, such depression for herself, that she

begged me, with tears of anguish, to spare her the pain of exhibiting

her own insignificant person and talent, on a stage which had, at its

disposal, the genius and the beauty of Fru Heiberg. In addition to

this, my counter-arguments excited her to such a degree that she began

to reproach me for having laid a trap for her. This both frightened

and wounded me; and I promised to cancel all. But now the ‘woman’ came

to the front; for as I began to doubt, she waxed firm.”

An admirable episode, as amusing as it is natural! So long as it is only

her _own_ doubt, it is only due to nervousness, however real its

anguish; but if another doubt her powers, it constitutes an attack, a

challenge; and “the artist,” as well as “the woman,” is up in arms to

repel it. Bournonville seems to have seen how to reap the advantage of

this mode of argument with her; he must have deepened his doubts to the

point which secured complete conviction in her. For, certainly, he

obtained her consent. She sang; and the success was tremendous, was

overpowering. “Jenny Lind gained in Denmark a second Fatherland,” writes

Bournonville. And, after deploring the slackness which failed to secure

her services for the Danish Opera, he speaks, significantly enough, of

the impression which the event made on her—of the discovery which she

made for herself. “The ice was broken. Jenny Lind discovered that she

could get her living out of Sweden; and also she learned that the

Artist, in reality, should not settle down on the native-soil, but, like

the bird of passage, should go there only in search of rest.” The words

are those of the theatrical master, who has made the drama his world.

They are singularly unlike what she would have used, at any time. But

they may describe, in his language, an effect which did take place

within her secret self. She must have experienced a sense that the doors

were being flung open, and that she might pass out through them, if she

would. There was a world, she now knew for certain, out and away beyond

the range of home, where she would find that her powers would tell, her

gifts be welcomed, her genius be met with the warmth of sympathy. This

must have, indeed, been something like a revelation, to one who, as we

have just seen in the scene with Bournonville, was terribly susceptible

to self-mistrust. There can be no doubt that Copenhagen marked an

eventful hour in her destiny.

She only sang twice in the theatre, on September 10th and 13th: and in

one concert, in the large hall of the Hôtel d’Angleterre, on September

16th. The opera, on each occasion, was _Roberto_. The following words

from a History of Danish Dramatic Art, by Th. Overskou, form an

admirable comment:—

“It was said about Jenny Lind, that in her everything is combined to

make the perfect dramatic singer; a clear, full, sonorous voice of

large compass; an easy and charming method of singing, which she never

overburdens with inappropriate ornament; a style, in the highest

degree expressive and enchanting: and an extraordinary dramatic

talent. Added to this, there lies diffused throughout the whole

personality of this admirable artist, a peculiar charm, a naturalism

rare on the stage, which makes an immediate appeal to the goodwill of

the audience. And, after all, this eulogy, however detailed and true,

can only give but an imperfect account of the gifts by which, without

dazzling through beauty, she fascinates all by her appearance, her

singing, and her speech; for her power derives its origin and its life

from a loveliness altogether characteristic and individual, such as it

is impossible to describe, and which banishes all disturbing

influences, and collects all her rare and precious advantages, so as

to create an irresistible impression of grace and purity of soul.”

Nor was it only the possibility of a wider public, which opened upon her

at Copenhagen. She also found that here, as at Stockholm, she won, in a

peculiar manner, the admiration and the friendship of eminent men, such

as the artists Jensen and Melbye, the poet Œhlenschläger, and, above

all, of Hans Andersen, who was absolutely fascinated, and who for a long

time after, paid her a devotion, which had in it all that delightful

mingling of simplicity and childishness, which was so characteristic of

him. In his ‘Story of my Life,’ he tells in beautiful words how he was

called in by Bournonville, to take part in the work of persuading her to

sing:—

“Except in Sweden,” she said, “I have never appeared in public. In my

own country all are so kind and gentle towards me; and if I were to

appear in Copenhagen, and be hissed! I cannot risk it!” “When she

appeared in _Alice_,” he writes, “it was like a new revelation in the

domain of Art. The fresh young voice went direct to the hearts of all.

Here was truth and nature. Everything had clearness and meaning. In

her concerts, Jenny Lind sang her Swedish songs. There was a peculiar,

and seductive charm about them: all recollection of the concert-room

vanished: the popular melodies exerted their spell, sung as they were

by a pure voice with the immortal accent of genius. All Copenhagen was

in raptures. Jenny Lind was the first artist to whom the students

offered a serenade: the torches flashed round the hospitable villa,

where the song was sung. She expressed her thanks by a few more of the

Swedish songs, and I then saw her hurry into the darkest corner, and

weep out her emotion. ‘Yes, yes,’ she said, ‘I will exert myself; I

will strive; I shall be more efficient than I am now, when I come to

Copenhagen again!’”

This is the remarkable note of her character—so natural, yet so rare—

that every triumph, instead of satisfying her with her skill, spurs her

to further efforts to be more worthy of its joy. Hans Andersen goes on:—

“On the stage, she was the great artist, towering above all around

her; at home, in her chamber, she was a gentle young girl, with the

simple touch and piety of a child.... The spectator laughs and weeps,

as she acts: the sight does him good: he feels a better man for it: he

feels that there is something divine in Art. One feels, at her

appearance on the stage, that the holy draught is poured from a pure

vessel.”

We will close this visit to Copenhagen with the graceful and touching

words in which Mr. Bournonville has clothed an incident which seemed to

him to embody the secret of Jenny Lind’s significance at that time. In

translating the words from their congenial French, we must, we fear,

strip them of half their charm: but here they are:—

“Again and again have the delights of Nature, the glory of Art, the

enthusiasm for the true and the beautiful, inspired in me some

attempts at verse. How, then, is it that, to-day, the sweet singing of

Jenny Lind has left my lyre mute? How is it that I fail to find even

an echo within me which might pass on into the distance the sound of

that music which laid open to my soul a world as yet unknown? Alas! To

paint in words the tones of a voice steeped in all the uttermost

tenderness of the human heart, is as vain as to seek shadows in the

darkness! Moreover, the sound of my voice would be lost in the

thunders of a people’s praise. The little flower that alone I could

offer to the artist, in the midst of her triumphs, would be crushed

under the feet of the crowds that press round her. No! Rather let me

treasure up the memory of her gifts, and of her story within my home,

and let me leave, as a legacy to those that come after, one trait of

her life, which will serve to bring her honour in the day when the

loud applause will have died away, and when the poets will be singing

the praises of other, and newer names.

“I had a friend who enjoyed all the privileges of happy comfort, of

public esteem, of cultivated taste, of the affection of his family, of

the love of his fair, young wife. A cruel sickness brought him down to

the very edge of the grave; but by God’s mercy, he was saved. He was

lying, still weak and faint, in his bed, when the thrill of excitement

which Jenny Lind had kindled in Copenhagen, reached even to his

sick-room; and bitter were the regrets of the young wife, at the sick

man’s loss of that which would have been to him such a delight. Jenny

heard of her desire, and offered, at once, to sing to the invalid: and

so, in the very heart of her triumphs, when the Court and the Town

were anxiously craving to know whether they could yet keep her one day

more, she found time to charm, with her heavenly voice, the hearts of

the two young people. It was on a Sunday, the 16th of September, 1843,

at the hour when all the churches were filled with the praises of God,

that Jenny, without any strangers to observe her, without any public

notice, did this act of charity; and the tears of gratitude which

flowed from the eyes of Mozart and Mathilde Waage Petersen were the

waters in which they christened her with the name of ‘Angel.’ The

emotion and the pleasure of the visit served to help the recovery of

my friend.

“May God ever bless Jenny Lind!

“May she receive the reward of her charity, if, one day, she be wed!

“And if God grant her children, may it be given them to know of this,

their mother’s act.”

This kindness of hers was not forgotten, we shall find, when she

returned to Copenhagen about two years later; for on the back of the

picture then presented to her—a picture of white roses by Jensen—appear

the names of this happy little couple, Mozart and Mathilde.

So ended the first flight outside the house, the first brief act of

achievement beyond her native stage. She crossed back to Sweden, to

continue her series of concerts; and on reaching Westerwik, about the

25th of September, by the steamer “Scandia,” she found herself once

again in company with Günther and Josephson, who had lingered on in the

town, after a successful musical soirée. The friends joined together at

the hotel in the evening. “I greatly rejoiced,” writes Josephson, “to

meet her again after the brilliant triumphs she has achieved at

Copenhagen.”

“Her genial modesty had lost nothing through her success. Her nature

wins more and more harmony; and in consequence there is more

equanimity in her disposition and in her friendliness, than before she

went abroad.”

Josephson was just parting with Günther, at the close of their tour; so,

while Günther went straight home to Stockholm, Josephson decided to tack

himself on to Jenny Lind and her companion, now on their way to give a

concert at Norrköping, where he might be able to help. So, on the 28th,

he started after her in a light cart, caught up her carriage at Vida,

and, after that, took his seat alternately on his own trap or on the box

of her carriage, while she read aloud to him some of Hans Andersen’s

poems from a book presented to her by Hans himself. At the country inn

they improvised a rough dinner, which they enriched with the music of an

old barrel-organ, by chance discovered on the premises. They arrived at

Norrköping that night; and spent the next day in arrangements and

rehearsals, while, in the evening, Jenny was serenaded by singers from

Upsala.

On the 30th of September she gave her concert, singing airs from

_Figaro_, _Norma_, _Roberto_, and _Niobe_. At supper that evening at

General Cronhjelm’s she was again serenaded, and next morning was off to

Stockholm.

She returned, for another year’s work, at her old salary; in the course

of which, between October 4, 1843, and July 5, 1844, she made sixty-six

appearances, in sixteen different characters, six of them being wholly

new. She reached her sixtieth performance of “Alice”; her forty-ninth of

“Lucia”; her thirty-sixth of “Agatha”; her twenty-sixth of _Norma_; her

eighteenth of the _Sonnambula_. The jubilee play, _A May Day in Wärend_,

ran on to within a few days of the national mourning for the King Carl

Johan, whose death closed the theatre from March 4 to May 2. Among her

new parts was Gluck’s _Armida_, of which she wrote a characteristic note

to Judge Munthe, on February 17, 1844:—

“I send you some seats for my ‘benefit’ on the 19th in Gluck’s

_Armida_. I trust that you will greatly enjoy the music. Both the

music, and the piece, are so grand, that my smallness will be shown

out, thereby, in its true light. But I am so thrilled by the sublime

spirit of the music that I am only too ready to risk my own

personality.”

During the opening of this year, 1844, she was, in concert with Günther,

interesting herself greatly in the fortunes of Josephson. Günther had

begun to scheme on behalf of his tour abroad, during their trip together

in the autumn; and had already in November written to him about a

proposal to give a concert to raise funds for this, in Stockholm. “Jenny

Lind,” he had then reported, “knows all; and has besides received an

anonymous letter from Upsala on the matter.” On the 12th of January,

1844, Josephson received, with rejoicing, a kind letter from Jenny Lind,

confirming the news of the concert which she and Günther were to give

for his benefit.[27] On the 6th of March, he spent the morning arranging

with them the details; but, towards the close of April, the concert, to

his great joy, was shifted from Stockholm to Upsala, and was fixed for

Whit Monday. It succeeded beyond all expectations. “All have come

forward in the most generous, spontaneous manner, and the result has, by

God’s grace, turned out for the best. My journey is now guaranteed.” So

he writes on the 30th of May: “If hitherto I have belonged to Art

privately, I am now challenged to work more generally for the holy

cause. This gift from my friends ought to bring with it a blessing on my

way, for their sympathy has had the largest share in bringing it about.

I am all round besieged with kindness. How remain faithful and

grateful!”[28] So loyally and generously had she worked to fulfil the

dream of another, who shared in her own profound aspiration after the

highest ideal, and was beset by the same obstacles. For two long years,

Josephson had been yearning for this opportunity, and now it was given

him. It was a good work, which proved well rewarded.

As to the Season, it must have passed much as usual. She wrote to Hans

Andersen, at the time of the national mourning:—

“Stockholm, 19th March, 1844.

“MY GOOD BROTHER,

“Mr. Bournonville mentioned in his last letter to me that you have

been shedding tears because of my silence. This, naturally, I take to

be nonsense, but as my conscience does reproach me in regard to you,

my good brother, I hasten to recall myself to your memory, and to ask

my friend and brother not to be angry with me, but rather to furnish

me soon with a proof that I have not forfeited my right to his

friendship and goodwill. A thousand, thousand thanks for the pretty

tales! I find them divinely beautiful to such a degree as to believe

them to be the grandest and loveliest that ever flowed from your pen.

I hardly know to which of them I should concede the palm, but, upon

reflection, I think _The Ugly Duckling_ the prettiest.—Oh, what a

glorious gift to be able to clothe in words one’s most lofty thoughts;

by means of a scrap of paper to make men see so clearly how the

noblest often lie most hidden and covered over by wretchedness and

rags, until the hour of transformation strikes and shows the figure in

a divine light! Thanks, from all my heart, thanks for all this—as

touching as it is instructive. I long now very much for the moment

when I shall be allowed to tell my good brother by word of mouth how

proud I am of this friendship, and with the help of my _Lieder_ to

express—if even in a trifling degree—my gratitude! only that you, my

brother, are surely better fit than any one to comprehend our Swedish

proverb: ‘Every bird sings according to his beak.’

“This country is now in mourning—peace to those who are gone! After

all, one is happiest when once well out of the way. Our theatre is now

closed for about seven or eight weeks, and this is not pleasant, but

meanwhile, we are busy, studying new things. I must tell you, my good

brother, that I have here quite a cosy little home; cheerful, sunny

rooms, a nightingale and a greenfinch:—the latter, however, is greatly

superior as an artist to his celebrated colleague, for, while the

first remains on his bar grumpy and moody, the other jumps about in

his cage, looking so joyous and good-natured, as if, to begin with, he

was not in the least jealous, but, instead of that, supposes himself

created merely for the purpose of cheering his silent friend! And then

he sings a song, so high, so deep, so charming and so sonorous, that I

sit down beside him and, within, lift up my voice in a mute song of

praise to Him whose ‘strength is made perfect in weakness.’ Ah! it is

divine to feel really good. My dear friend! I do feel so happy now. It

seems to me I have come from a stormy sea into a peaceful cottage.

Many struggles have calmed down, many thoughts have become clearer,

many a star is gleaming forth again, and I bend my knee before the

Throne of Grace and exclaim: ‘Thy will be done.’ Farewell! God bless

and protect my brother is the sincere wish of his affectionate sister

“JENNY.”

This peace in the “cosy little home” is to be quickly broken up. A

flight abroad is now to be taken, which will carry her further afield

than Finland, or Copenhagen. It is no less a place than Berlin that has

begun to take note of this wonderful singing, and is preparing to

capture it for its own service and joy. Meyerbeer is there, engaged in

bringing out a work, which is to celebrate all the glories of the

Prussian kingdom: and he is anxious to secure all the talent open to

him. He had heard her sing, as we know, in Paris, and had felt, then,

that Berlin was her proper sphere: and, now, his memory and his zeal are

kindled anew by the enthusiasm of an artist of no mean ability, who

arrived at Berlin from Stockholm, with a fervent admiration for what he

had seen and heard there. This artist was M. Paul Taglioni, a brother of

the famous _danseuse_, a descendant, on the mother’s side, of the

Swedish tragedian Karsten, and well known both in Paris and Berlin, not

only as a graceful dancer, but, also, as a skilful composer of ballets,

and a judicious and competent critic. It was to his report that Madame

Goldschmidt always attributed Meyerbeer’s marked anxiety to engage her

at Berlin in order that she might take the principal part in the new

opera—_Das Feldlager in Schlesien_—which he was composing for the

opening of the new Royal Opera-House in the Prussian capital.

The records of the proposals made by Meyerbeer are lost; but, some time

in that summer, they reached sufficient definiteness to induce her to

determine on a visit to Dresden in July, in order that she might work up

her German to the level demanded by an appearance, on such an historic

occasion, in the Opera-House at Berlin. Off to Dresden she resolutely

went, as soon as her season was over, ending, as it did, on July 5, with

eight performances of the _Turco in Italia_—an almost forgotten opera of

Rossini’s—in which she played the part of Fiorilla. Mdlle. von Stedingk

tells us how she stole off to the theatre, _incognita_, owing to the

Court being still in mourning, and heard her in this Opera, in which, as

she says, “she made even the unpleasant part of Fiorilla graceful and

womanly. But I prefer _Norma_, which is her greatest triumph.”

Her enthusiasm breaks out in the record of a tea-party which she gave

“in honour of Jenny Lind, previous to her departure for Germany; Carl

and Charlotte[29] were the other guests. It was to me an indescribable

enjoyment, when she sat down at my piano, and sang to us. From that

moment, my little room became dearer to me, and more harmonious than

ever.”

“The Queen Dowager was extremely kind to Jenny, at the farewell

audience, presenting her with portrait medals of herself and the late

King, and with a watch, which, she said, is ‘To remind you not to forget

the time of your return to us.’”

Thus the time came for the new venture. She had thought herself escaped

“into a peaceful cottage from out of a stormy sea.” So she had written

to Hans Andersen in March. But a greater voyage into a wider sea is now

before her. The wind is up: the sails are set: she must go. The first

note that she sings in Berlin will have sealed her fate. There will be

no withdrawal possible for her after that. Out into the deeper floods

the strong currents will sweep her. The great European world, its

peoples, its kings, its musicians, its heroes, will close in round her;—

will claim her with irresistible insistence. Her returns to Stockholm—

her “beloved Stockholm”—will become rarer, and rarer: at last, she will

come back only to enrich it with endowments, and to bid it “Good-bye!”

BOOK IV.

MASTERY.

CHAPTER I.

IN DRESDEN.

And now, for the second time, we find Mdlle. Lind leaving home and

friends, and departing to seek new fortunes in a country utterly unknown

to her.

The opportunity was a splendid one, and might well have tempted any

aspiring artist—but, it needed careful preparation.

It had never been Mdlle. Lind’s wont to trust to genius alone for

results which, she well knew, could be attained only by the union of

genius with conscientious industry. As a cultivated musician, a singer,

an actress, she had nothing more to learn. She did not even need

experience; for, after forming her method in Paris, she had already had

ample opportunity for testing its excellence in practical connection

with the stage. But in order to ensure her success at Berlin it was

necessary that she should add to these high qualifications an intimate

acquaintance with the pronunciation, at least, of the German language,

if not, indeed, a thorough mastery of its grammatical construction; and,

far from attempting to evade the difficulty, she adopted the best

possible expedient for overcoming it. She determined to set apart a

sufficient time for quiet and regular study, not in Berlin, but in

Dresden; where she would not only be able to obtain without difficulty

the best possible instruction, but could also usefully supplement it by

attending the performances at one of the best Opera-Houses in Germany.

And here, too, Meyerbeer had arranged to meet her, for the purpose of

consultation with regard to the principal part in the important work—

_Das Feldlager in Schlesien_—which he was preparing for the re-opening

of the Grand Opera-House in Berlin.

To Dresden, then, she repaired, accompanied by her aunt, Fröken

Apollonia Lindskog—familiarly known by her relatives as Tante Lona—

arriving there on the 25th of July, 1844, three weeks only after her

last performance in Stockholm.

By the luckiest of chances she was welcomed at the very moment of her

arrival in the Saxon capital by her trusty and valued friend, Herr Jakob

Axel Josephson, who was then, through her generous assistance,

prosecuting his studies in Germany, and who, while accidentally crossing

the Alte Brücke, (the grand old bridge over the Elbe,) passed a crowd of

carriages conveying passengers into the town from the terminus of the

Leipzig Railway, and, peeping into one of these, saw Mdlle. Lind with

Tante Lona sitting by her side.

“I hailed the driver immediately,” he writes, in his Diary. “The

carriage stopped; I paid my respects to the travellers; arranged to

call on them, later in the day, at their hotel, and left them to

continue their journey.”[30]

After paying his visit, and finding her “happy and contented,” he

resumes:—

“It was, in fact, to Jenny that I was indebted for the means of coming

here myself. I had therefore a great deal to say to her; but, between

old friends there is no need of many words.”

The evening was pleasantly spent in a walk on the Brühl’sche Terrasse by

moonlight, followed by a friendly supper at the hotel; and, after

devoting the next morning to an exhaustive exploration of the town in

search of private apartments for the ladies, a pianoforte for Mdlle.

Lind, and another for Herr Josephson, the three friends walked together,

at six o’clock, to the fine old Opera-House,[31] to hear Wagner’s

_Rienzi_, which had been produced there, with great success, in 1842,

and had furnished the first stepping-stone to its composer’s subsequent

reputation.

It will naturally be understood that, having visited Dresden for

purposes of study only, Mdlle. Lind lived a life of comparative

seclusion. She was furnished, however, as a matter of course, with

letters of introduction to the Swedish Consul, Herr Karl Kaskel—a

personal friend of Meyerbeer—and Herr Josephson’s sympathetic pen has

furnished us with an account of her appearance at an evening party

given, during the last week in July, at the country-house of that

gentleman’s father.

“The evening began, as usual, with conversation,” he writes, in his

Diary, “for the Saxon ladies are entertaining hostesses. But, after a

little time, they begged Jenny Lind to sing; and, sitting down to the

piano, she began with Berg’s _Fjerran i skog_. Scarcely had she ended

it before a cry of satisfaction rang through the room. She repeated

the song, followed it up with _Tro ei glädjen_, sang _Fjerran i skog_

for the third time, and finished with the Romance from Winter’s _Das

unterbrochene Opferfest_. As, later on, she sang the Aria from

Pacini’s _Niobe_ in her grand style, and adorned it with her most

beautiful _fioritura_, the general delight burst forth into loud

applause, and all remained throughout the rest of the evening simply

enchanted; for God knows how long a time had elapsed since any one had

heard anything like it.

“For us Swedes the meeting was a truly brilliant inauguration of

Jenny’s entrance into Germany, and an especially joyful one, though

only in so small a house; and we remarked with pleasure how anxious

the good Germans were to hear her in public, whether on the Stage or

in the Concert-room.”

Apart from the sensation she created on this occasion, Mdlle. Lind

lived, in company with Fröken Apollonia, in strictest privacy, during

the whole of the time she remained in Dresden. She had indeed but little

time permitted to her, even for consultation with Meyerbeer or for the

purpose of study; for on the 28th of August—one month and three days

only after her arrival at the terminus of the Leipzig Railway—she was

recalled to Stockholm, to assist, in her character of “Court Singer,” at

the festivities which graced the coronation of King Oscar I.

Queen Desideria’s watch[32] had already marked the hour for the

wanderer’s return, though on this occasion it was to be represented by a

very brief visit.

The Court was now out of mourning, and all Stockholm in festal attire to

do honour to the approaching ceremony. Unfortunately, Fröken Marie von

Stedingk, being in close attendance on the Queen Dowager, was prevented

by the imperious demands of Court etiquette from attending the

performances at the Royal Theatre, and her Diary therefore furnishes us

with no account of Mdlle. Lind’s appearances. But we know, from the

archives of the theatre, that they were ten in number—viz., three of _La

Sonnambula_; three of _Norma_; one of Gluck’s _Armida_; and three

introducing single acts of _Der Freischütz_, _Norma_, _Lucia di

Lammermoor_, and _Anna Bolena_.

So well prepared were the Swedes to appreciate their talented

countrywoman at her true value that they could not endure the idea of

losing her. In the hope of preventing her from singing in Germany, Count

Hamilton, the then Director of the Royal Theatre, offered her an

engagement as principal singer, for eight years, at an annual salary of

five thousand dollars,[33] which was to be continued to her after the

termination of the contract as a pension for life. To this offer she

felt very much inclined to agree, though her best friends tried hard to

make her see that, by so doing, she would deprive the rest of Europe of

all participation in the advantages derivable from her exceptional

talent. For a long time her resolution remained immovable. But one day a

trusted friend bethought himself of a curious method of persuasion,

which could only have occurred to one who understood her nature

thoroughly. After leaving her, as he feared on the point of signing the

dangerous contract, he encountered in the street a certain Consul

General who prided himself upon an intimate knowledge of everything

connected with music. To this gentleman he narrated the circumstance,

with many expressions of regret as to the turn affairs were taking. But

to his great surprise the Consul General took the opposite view,

maintaining that, notwithstanding her successes at home, the artist

herself must have known that her powers were unequal to the attainment

of a similar result in a more extended sphere. Well knowing the effect

which this absurd misrepresentation of the true state of the case could

not fail to produce upon Jenny’s mind, her friend lost no time in making

her acquainted with it; and then and there he had the satisfaction of

seeing her tear up the fatal contract and thus put an end to the

discussion for ever.

Retreat was now impossible, and as soon as practicable after the last

performance of _Norma_, on the 9th of October 1844, she took leave of

her friends and started on her trying journey, rendered all the more

painful by those fears for the unknown future which her constitutional

diffidence forbade her to shake off.