Père Lachaise.--Mourning in public.--Defacing the Tomb of
Abelard and Eloïsa.--Baron Munchausen.--Russian
Monument.--Statue of Manuel.
Often as I have visited the enclosure of Père Lachaise, it was with
feelings of renewed curiosity and interest that I yesterday
accompanied thither those of my party who had not yet seen it. I was
well pleased to wander once more through the cypress alleys, now grown
into fine gloomy funereal shades, and once more to feel that wavering
sort of emotion which I always experience there;--one moment being
tempted to smile at the fantastic manner in which affection has been
manifested,--and the next, moved to tears by some touch of tenderness,
that makes itself felt even amidst the vast collection of childish
superstitions with which the place abounds.
This mournful garden is altogether a very solemn and impressive
spectacle. What a world of mortality does one take in at one glance!
It will set one thinking a little, however fresh from the busy
idleness of Paris,--of Paris, that antidote to all serious thought,
that especial paradise for the worshippers of SANS SOUCI.
A profusion of spring flowers are at this season hourly shedding their
blossoms over every little cherished enclosure. There is beauty,
freshness, fragrance on the surface.... It is a fearful contrast!
I do not remember any spot, either in church or churchyard, where the
unequal dignity of the memorials raised above the dust which lies so
very equally beneath them all is shown in a manner to strike the heart
so forcibly as it does at Père Lachaise. Here, a shovelful of weeds
have hardly room to grow; and there rises a costly pile, shadowing its
lowly neighbour. On this side the narrow path, sorrow is wrapped round
and hid from notice by the very poverty that renders it more bitter;
while, on the other, wealth, rank, and pride heap decorations over the
worthless clay, striving vainly to conceal its nothingness. It is an
epitome of the world they have left: remove the marble and disturb the
turf, human nature will be found to wear the same aspect under both.
Many groups in deep mourning were wandering among the tombs; so many
indeed, that when we turned aside from one, with the reverence one
always feels disposed to pay to sorrow, we were sure to encounter
another. This manner of lamenting in public seems so strange to us!
How would it be for a shy English mother, who sobs inwardly and hides
the aching sorrow in her heart's core,--how would she bear to bargain
at the public gate for a pretty garland, then enter amidst an idle
throng, with the toy hanging on her finger, and, before the eyes of
all who choose to look, suspend it over the grave of her lost child?
An Englishwoman surely must lose her reason either before or after
such an act;--if it were not the effect of madness, it would be the
cause of it. Yet such is the effect of habit, or rather of the
different tone of manners and of mind here, that one may daily and
hourly see parents, most devoted to their children during their lives,
and most heart-broken when divided from them by death, perform with
streaming eyes these public lamentations.
It is nevertheless impossible, let the manner of it differ from our
own as much as it may, to look at the freshly-trimmed flowers, the
garlands, and all the pretty tokens of tender care which meet the eye
in every part of this wide-spread mass of mortal nothingness, without
feeling that real love and real sorrow have been at work.
One small enclosure attracted my attention as at once the most
_bizarre_ and the most touching of all. It held the little grassy tomb
of a young child, planted round with choice flowers; and at its head
rose a semicircular recess, containing, together with a crucifix and
other religious emblems, several common playthings, which had
doubtless been the latest joy of the lost darling. His age was stated
to have been three years, and he was mourned as the first and only
child after twelve years of marriage.