Remarkable People.--Distinguished People.--Metaphysical Lady.
Last night we passed our _soirée_ at the house of a lady who had been
introduced to me with this recommendation:--"You will be certain of
meeting at Madame de V----'s many REMARKABLE PEOPLE."
This is, I think, exactly the sort of introduction which would in any
city give the most piquant interest to a new acquaintance; but it does
so particularly at Paris; for this attractive capital draws its
collection of remarkable people from a greater variety of nations,
classes, and creeds, than any other.
Nevertheless, this term "remarkable people" must not be taken too
confidently to mean individuals so distinguished that all men would
desire to gaze upon them; the phrase varying in its value and its
meaning according to the feelings, faculties, and station of the
speaker.
Everybody has got his or her own "remarkable people" to introduce to
you; and I have begun to find out, among the houses that are open to
me, what species of "remarkable people" I am likely to meet at each.
When Madame A---- whispers to me as I enter her drawing-room--"Ah!
vous voilà! c'est bon; j'aurais été bien fâchée si vous m'aviez
manquée; il y a ici, ce soir, une personne bien remarquable, qu'il
faut absolument vous présenter,"--I am quite sure that I shall see
some one who has been a marshal, or a duke, or a general, or a
physician, or an actor, or an artist, to Napoleon.
But if it were Madame B---- who said the same thing, I should be
equally certain that it must be a comfortable-looking doctrinaire, who
was, had been, or was about to be in place, and who had made his voice
heard on the winning side.
Madame C----, on the contrary, would not deign to bestow such an
epithet on any one whose views and occupations were so earthward. It
could only be some philosopher, pale with the labour of reconciling
paradoxes or discovering a new element.
My charming, quiet, graceful, gentle Madame D---- could use it only
when speaking of an ex-chancellor, or chamberlain, or friend, or
faithful servant of the exiled dynasty.
As for the tall dark-browed Madame E----, with her thin lips and
sinister smile, though she professes to hold a _salon_ where talent of
every party is welcome, she never cares much, I am very sure, for any
remarkableness that is not connected with the great and immortal
mischief of some revolution. She is not quite old enough to have had
anything to do with the first; but I have no doubt that she was very
busy during the last, and I am positive that she will never know peace
by night or day till another can be got up. If her hopes fail on this
point, she will die of atrophy; for nothing affords her nourishment
but what is mixed up with rebellion against constituted authority.
I know that she dislikes me; and I suspect I owe the honour of being
admitted to appear in her presence solely to her determination that I
should hear everything that she thinks it would be disagreeable for me
to listen to. I believe she fancies that I do not like to meet
Americans; but she is as much mistaken in this as in most other of her
speculations.
I really never saw or heard of any fanaticism equal to that, with
which this lady worships destruction. That whatever is, is wrong, is
the rule by which her judgment is guided in all things. It is enough
for her that a law on any point is established, to render the thing
legalised detestable; and were the republic about which she raves, and
of which she knows as much as her lap-dog, to be established
throughout France to-morrow, I am quite persuaded that we should have
her embroidering a regal robe for the most legitimate king she could
find, before next Monday.
Madame F----'s _remarkables_ are almost all of them foreigners of the
philosophic revolutionary class; any gentry that are not particularly
well off at home, and who would rather prefer being remarkable and
remarked a few hundred miles from their own country than in it.
Madame G----'s are chiefly musical personages. "Croyez-moi, madame,"
she says, "il n'y a que lui pour toucher le piano.... Vous n'avez pas
encore entendu Mademoiselle Z----.... Quelle voix superbe!... Elle
fera, j'en suis sûre, une fortune immense à Londres."
Madame H----'s acquaintance are not so "remarkable" for anything
peculiar in each or any of them, as for being in all things exactly
opposed to each other. She likes to have her parties described as "Les
soirées antithestiques de Madame H----," and has a peculiar sort of
pleasure in seeing people sitting side by side on her hearth-rug, who
would be very likely to salute each other with a pistol-shot were they
to meet elsewhere. It is rather a singular device for arranging a
sociable party; but her _soirées_ are very delightful _soirées_, for
all that.
Madame J----'s friends are not "remarkable;" they are "distinguished."
It is quite extraordinary what a number of distinguished individuals I
have met at her house.
But I must not go through the whole alphabet, lest I should tire you.
So let me return to the point from whence I set out, and take you
with me to Madame de V----'s _soirée_. A large party is almost always
a sort of lottery, and your good or bad fortune depends on the
accidental vicinity of pleasant or unpleasant neighbours.
I cannot consider myself to have gained a prize last night; and
Fortune, if she means to make things even, must place me to-night next
the most agreeable person in Paris. I really think that should the
same evil chance that beset me yesterday pursue me for a week, I
should leave the country to escape from it. I will describe to you the
manner of my torment as well as I can, but must fail, I think, to give
you an adequate idea of it.
A lady I had never seen before walked across the room to me last night
soon after I entered it, and making prisoner of Madame de V---- in the
way, was presented to me in due form. I was placed on a sofa by an old
gentleman with whom we have formed a great friendship, and for whose
conversation I have a particular liking: he had just seated himself
beside me, when my new acquaintance dislodged him by saying, as she
attempted to squeeze herself in between us, "Pardon, monsieur; ne vous
dérangez pas! ... mais si madame voulait bien me permettre" ... and
before she could finish her speech, my old acquaintance was far away
and my new one close beside me.
She began the conversation by some very obliging assurances of her
wish to make my acquaintance. "I want to discuss with you," said she.
I bowed, but trembled inwardly, for I do not like discussions,
especially with "remarkable" ladies. "Yes," she continued, "I want to
discuss with you many topics of vital interest to us all--topics on
which I believe we now think differently, but on which I feel quite
sure that we should agree, would you but listen to me."
I smiled and bowed, and muttered something civil, and looked as much
pleased as I possibly could,--and recollected, too, how large Paris
was, and how easy it would be to turn my back upon conviction, if I
found that I could not face it agreeably. But, to say truth, there was
something in the eye and manner of my new friend that rather alarmed
me. She is rather pretty, nevertheless; but her bright eyes are never
still for an instant, and she is one of those who aid the power of
speech by that of touch, to which she has incessant recourse. Had she
been a man, she would have seized all her friends by the button: but
as it is, she can only lay her fingers with emphasis upon your arm, or
grasp a handful of your sleeve, when she sees reason to fear that your
attention wanders.
"You are a legitimatist! ... quel dommage! Ah! you smile. But did you
know the incalculable injury done to the intellect by putting chains
upon it!... My studies, observe, are confined almost wholly to one
subject,--the philosophy of the human mind. Metaphysics have been the
great object of my life from a very early age." (I should think she
was now about seven or eight-and-twenty.) "Yet sometimes I have the
weakness to turn aside from this noble pursuit to look upon the
troubled current of human affairs that is rolling past me. I do not
pretend to enter deeply into politics--I have no time for it; but I
see enough to make me shrink from despotism and legitimacy. Believe
me, it cramps the mind; and be assured that a constant succession of
political changes keeps the faculties of a nation on the _qui vive_,
and, abstractedly considered as a mental operation, must be
incalculably more beneficial than the half-dormant state which takes
place after any long continuance in one position, let it be what it
may."
She uttered all this with such wonderful rapidity, that it would have
been quite impossible for me to have made any observation upon it as
she went along, if I had been ever so much inclined to do so. But I
soon found that this was not expected of me.
"'Twas hers to speak, and mine to hear;"
and I made up my mind to listen as patiently as I could till I should
find a convenient opportunity for changing my place.
At different times, and in different climes, I have heretofore
listened to a good deal of nonsense, certainly; but I assure you I
never did nor ever can expect again to hear such a profusion of wild
absurdity as this lady uttered. Yet I am told that she has in many
circles the reputation of being a woman of genius. It would be but a
vain attempt did I endeavour to go on remembering and translating all
she said; but some of her speeches really deserve recording.
After she had run her tilt against authority, she broke off,
exclaiming--
"Mais, après tout,--what does it signify?... When you have once
devoted yourself to the study of the soul, all these little
distinctions do appear so trifling!... I have given myself wholly to
the study of the soul; and my life passes in a series of experiments,
which, if I do not wear myself out here," putting her hand to her
forehead, "will, I think, eventually lead me to something important."
As she paused for a moment, I thought I ought to say something, and
therefore asked her of what nature were the experiments of which she
spoke. To which she replied--
"Principally in comparative anatomy. None but an experimentalist could
ever imagine what extraordinary results arise from this best and
surest mode of investigation. A mouse, for instance.... Ah, madame!
would you believe it possible that the formation of a mouse could
throw light upon the theory of the noblest feeling that warms the
heart of man--even upon valour? It is true, I assure you: such are the
triumphs of science. By watching the pulsations of that _chétif_
animal," she continued, eagerly laying hold of my wrist, "we have
obtained an immense insight into the most interesting phenomena of the
passion of fear."
At this moment my old gentleman came back to me, but evidently without
any expectation of being able to resume his seat. It was only, I
believe, to see how I got on with my metaphysical neighbour. There was
an infinite deal of humour in the glance he gave me as he said, "Eh
bien, Madame Trollope, est-ce que Madame ---- vous a donné l'ambition
de la suivre dans ses sublimes études?"
"I fear it would prove beyond my strength," I replied. Upon which
Madame ---- started off anew in praise of _her_ science--"the only
science worthy the name; the science...."
Here my old friend stole off again, covered by an approaching tray of
ices; and I soon after did the same; for I had been busily engaged all
day, and I was weary,--so weary that I dreaded dropping to sleep at
the very instant that Madame ---- was exerting herself to awaken me to
a higher state of intelligence.
I have not, however, told you one tenth part of the marvellous
absurdities she poured forth; yet I suspect I have told you enough. I
have never before met anything so pre-eminently ridiculous as this:
but upon my saying so to my old friend as I passed him near the door,
he assured me that he knew another lady, whose mania was education,
and whose doctrines and manner of explaining them were decidedly more
absurd than Madame ----'s philosophy of the soul.
"Be not alarmed, however; I shall not bestow her upon you, for I
intend most carefully to keep out of her way. Do you know of any
English ladies thus devoted to the study of the soul?"... I am
sincerely happy to say that I do not.