FROM MEMORY’S SHRINE
[Illustration: Carmen Sylva]
FROM
MEMORY’S SHRINE
THE REMINISCENCES OF
CARMEN SYLVA
(H. M. QUEEN ELISABETH OF ROUMANIA)
_Translated from the German, by Her Majesty’s desire,
by her former Secretary_
EDITH HOPKIRK
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
[Illustration:_colophon]
PHILADELPHIA & LONDON
J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY
1911
COPYRIGHT, 1911, BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY
Published March, 1911
PRINTED BY J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY
AT THE WASHINGTON SQUARE PRESS
PHILADELPHIA, U. S. A.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
INTRODUCTION 9
I. CLARA SCHUMANN 13
II. GRANDMAMMA 30
III. ERNST MORITZ ARNDT 60
IV. BERNAYS 69
V. TWO OLD RETAINERS 85
VI. FANNY LAVATER 97
VII. BUNSEN 119
VIII. PERTHES 139
IX. A FAITH-HEALER 151
X. MARY BARNES 175
XI. THE FAMILY VALETTE 181
XII. KARL SOHN, THE PORTRAIT-PAINTER 192
XIII. WEIZCHEN 203
XIV. A GROUP OF HUMBLE FRIENDS 217
XV. MY TUTORS 232
XVI. MARIE 243
XVII. MY BROTHER OTTO 251
ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
Carmen Sylva _Frontispiece_
Madame Schumann 16
H. M. King Charles of Roumania 28
Royal Palace at Bucarest 64
A Queen at Her Loom 94
H. M. Queen Elisabeth of Roumania 140
H. M. Queen Elisabeth of Roumania 182
H. M. Queen Elisabeth of Roumania 218
Prince Otto zu Wied 252
FROM
MEMORY’S SHRINE
INTRODUCTION
It has been said by a well-known German novelist of our day in one of
his most recent works that as we approach our fiftieth year our hearts
nearly always resemble a grave-yard, thronged with memories, a far
greater share of our affection belonging by that time to those who are
already at rest beneath the earth than may be claimed by those still
left here to wander with us on its surface. This remark of Rosegger’s is
above all true of such of us as have been accustomed from our earliest
youth to stand mourning beside new-made graves, and see our nearest and
dearest prematurely carried off in Death’s relentless grasp.
It is in this cemetery of mine, sacred to the memory of all whom I have
loved and lost, that I would linger this day, holding commune as is my
wont with my beloved dead; but for once I would not that my pilgrimage
were altogether a solitary one. As in thought I stand before each grave
in turn, gazing with the spirit’s eyes on the dear form so clearly
recognisable under the flowers I have strewn above it, I would fain
retrace for others than myself every line of the features I know so
well, that all you to whom I speak may learn to know and love them
also. Even the best are all too soon forgotten in this busy, restless
world, but it may be that my words, coming from the depths of my heart,
will strike a responsive chord in the hearts of those who read them, and
kindling in their breasts a feeling like my own, will keep alive for a
little space these figures I call back from the shadowy Past. My aim
will be achieved if I can but convey to other souls something of the
impression my own received from the noble and beautiful lives with whom
I have come in contact, and which my pen will now strive with the utmost
fidelity to portray.
I am about, then, to throw open the sanctuary I have so long jealously
guarded from the world--the private chapel within whose niches my
Penates are enshrined. Those to whom I pay a constant tribute of love
and gratitude were either the idols of my early youth or the friends of
riper years. I shall try to show them as they appeared to me on earth,
in every varying aspect, according to season and circumstance, and to
the changes of my own mood and habits of thought during the different
stages of my mental development. To my youthful enthusiasm many of them
became types of perfection, in whom I could discern no human
weakness--to have known them was my pride and happiness. All that was
best in myself I attributed to their influence, and their presence has
never ceased to dwell with me since they have been removed to higher
spheres. They, on whose lips I hung with such rapt attention, drinking
in every word that fell from them, very possibly paid but small heed to
the silent, earnest-eyed child, nor guessed how fondly those lessons of
wisdom and holiness were being treasured up in that little heart. For to
none of us is it ever given to know the precise hour in which our own
soul has spoken most clearly and forcibly to another soul, nor to fathom
the full import of the message with which we are entrusted towards our
brethren. We cast our bread upon the waters of life, not knowing its
destination, and the seed we scatter with a lavish hand is borne in all
directions by the winds to take root it may be in the soil we should
have deemed least fit for culture. Children often observe more keenly
and reflect more thoughtfully than their elders would give them credit
for. We need but look back each of us to our own childhood, in order
rightly to understand how deep and lasting are the impressions then
received, and how they may colour the whole after-current of our lives.
Now, as I recall those days, I feel myself, as it were, suddenly
transported into the midst of an enchanted garden, among whose rare and
luxuriant blossoms I would fain gather together the fairest specimens
for a garland. But they spring up around me in such wild profusion, and
their beauty is so radiant, their colours so rich, their fragrance so
intense, that I am embarrassed in my choice, and only stretch out my
hand timidly and hesitatingly towards them, fearing lest in plucking I
should injure the least of these fairest works of Creation. Well,
indeed, may I feel diffident as to my own skill in selecting and
grouping them aright.
Yet, though the skill be lacking, goodwill and sincerity I may at least
claim to bring with me in full measure to my labour of love. It is no
mixture of Fact and Fiction I would here compile, nothing but the
simple, unadorned Truth, things I have myself seen and heard. Not that I
would have these pages resemble memoirs, in the ordinary sense of the
word, for what are memoirs at the best but a superior sort of
gossip--when they are not, that is to say, simply gossip of a despicable
kind! No mysteries will be here unveiled, no scandalous secrets dragged
to light. I do but propose to draw back the curtain from before the
picture-gallery within whose sacred precincts I have until now allowed
no other footsteps than my own to stray, so that all who will may render
homage with me to the moral and intellectual value of the lives these
portraits strive to commemorate.
CHAPTER I
CLARA SCHUMANN
It is but fitting and natural that I should open with this revered name
the series of my reminiscences, as my childish recollections hardly go
further back than the date of the first time I heard her, when I was
only eight years old, at my very first concert in Bonn. That was so
great an event in my life, and I was so impatient for the evening to
come, that I hardly know how I got through the whole day that preceded
it. Seldom has any day since appeared so interminably long. Still, the
evening did come at last, and I remember accompanying my mother to the
concert-room, into which she was wheeled in her invalid-chair, for,
although still quite young, she had been for many years in ill-health
and unable to walk. But whether I walked by her side, or how I got
there, I no longer know, for I have only a sort of confused recollection
of having been brought there without any effort on my own part, as
though I had been borne thither on wings! My first concert! My heart
still beats loud when I think of it.
It was a big, crowded room we entered. But I did not see the people. I
paid no attention to anybody. I saw nothing but the estrade on which the
piano was placed. Our seats were so far to the right that, small as I
was, I should not have seen the pianist at all had I not obtained my
mother’s permission to establish my diminutive person in the passage
left between the two rows of seats, where I had a full view of the
keyboard. I was all eyes, all ears, quivering from head to foot with
intense nervous expectation. At last Madame Schumann came in, and,
advancing swiftly to the instrument, sat down before it. She was dressed
in black velvet, with a single deep-red rose stuck low behind one ear in
her dark hair, which was very thick and inclined to curl, and which she
wore plainly parted and flat to the head, instead of having it according
to the fashion of those days twisted to stand out on each side of the
face. What struck me at once was something harmonious in her whole
appearance; it always seemed to me afterwards as if her dress must have
been crimson too, to match the rose in her hair. Her hands were small,
firm and plump, the touch full, healthy and vigorous, almost of virile
strength. I carried the rich, clear tones away with me, to ring in my
ears for long afterwards. But that which went straight to my heart, and
haunted me longer still, was the pathetic look in her eyes.
Leaning a little forward, bending as it were over the keys, as if to be
alone with her own music and the better to hear herself, apparently
utterly oblivious of the rest of the world, the player kept her
magnificent, melancholy eyes persistently cast down. But I could see
those wonderful eyes, and her sadness impressed me so much that it
almost spoilt my pleasure in the music, for I was wondering all the time
how it could be that anyone who played so divinely could all the same
look so unutterably sad. I did not then know her unhappy story; I had
not heard how her husband had gone out of his mind, leaving her
penniless, with a large family to provide for, and that it was, indeed,
to provide her children’s daily bread that she thus played in public. It
did not occur to me that anyone could be poor who wore a velvet dress.
Besides it was impossible to my childish mind to conceive that any
artist could be poor. On the contrary, I looked upon them all as being
fabulously rich, as having all the treasures of the universe at their
disposal. Those beliefs were natural to my age, for in childhood Romance
is Reality, and Reality a very poor sort of Romance! Have we not been
all of us the heroes of our own fairy-tales?--either Aladdin or Robinson
Crusoe, and more often Crusoe on his island than Aladdin in the magic
cave, since at that time of life the riches of this world appeal very
feebly to our imagination.
But for the pathetic expression of a pair of dreamy eyes my mind was
sufficiently receptive, sorrow and heartache being already only too
familiar to me. My mother, as I have mentioned, was at that time an
invalid, my younger brother had been a sufferer from his birth, and my
father was slowly dying of consumption. The daily spectacle of pain and
illness may well open a child’s eyes to the expression of suffering in
other human faces. But as I was always a very reserved child, accustomed
to keep all puzzling problems to myself and brood over them in silence,
I asked no questions, and consequently learnt nothing about my new idol
nor even suspected the existence of a domestic tragedy. Schumann’s
works were at that time a sealed book for me, with the exception of a
few simple pieces, intended for children. And children’s pieces were not
what I cared about. I only wanted Beethoven!
After that I did not see her again for many years--till I was grown up,
a girl of twenty, in St. Petersburg. I was just recovering from an
illness, and it was whilst I was still so weak that I could hardly
stand, that I had the sudden news of my dear father’s death. The blow
was such an overwhelming one, I felt at first as if everything in life
were over for me, and that I should never take pleasure in anything
again. And just then Mme. Schumann arrived with her daughter Marie. The
Grand Duchess Hélène, in whom so many artists had found a true friend
and enlightened patroness, hastened to place rooms in her palace at the
disposal of the celebrated pianist. So mother and daughter, to my
unspeakable joy and consolation, took up their abode with us for seven
weeks, and were lodged in the suite of apartments just above my own.
Whenever she was going to practice, Mme. Schumann would send word to me,
and then I would manage to drag myself upstairs, and let myself be
propped up by cushions in a corner of the room, where I could listen
undisturbed. It was as if I were being slowly awakened from a deathlike
trance, and being brought back to an interest in life again by the
strains of that exquisite music. Better still, my aunt very soon
arranged for me to take some piano-lessons of this great artist, and
these mark quite an epoch in my life. They were certainly quite
exceptional
[Illustration: By kind permission of Messrs. Breitkopf & Hartel, 54
Great Marlborough Street, London, W.
MADAME SCHUMANN]
lessons in every way, altogether unlike everything else of that nature,
for at first I was almost too feeble to hold my fingers on the keys. But
my dear professor soon found something for me, to which my strength was
just equal--Schumann’s delicious “Scenes of Childhood”--and from these
we went on little by little to higher flights. But it was not alone for
the progress in my music that these hours were of inestimable value; I
look back to them as having left their mark on the whole course of my
life ever since, for I was roused from my own lethargy and despondency
by learning the trials through which my new friend had passed. This
noble-minded woman could, indeed, have hit upon no better lesson in
fortitude than that which was contained in the simple story of her own
youth, as calmly and unaffectedly she told her young companion of the
catastrophe which had wrecked her life. It was, indeed, a revelation to
me, this glimpse into the workings of another soul, whose sufferings I
had never even suspected. The simple words in which the tale was told
wrung my heart more than any studied eloquence could have done, and I
blushed to think that I had dared to wrap myself up in my own sorrow, as
if I were the only sufferer in the world. I learnt from her how much
another had borne silently, uncomplainingly, and I understood how duty
may often call upon us to take up our burden and resume the daily
struggle before our wounds are yet healed, instead of giving ourselves
up to the luxury of grief. I will try, as far as I can, to give Clara
Schumann’s story in her own words, as she told it to me, in the long
conversations we held in those unforgettable hours. She spoke of her
childhood, for her troubles began early; her parents were separated, and
the little girl never knew a really happy home. In spite of the slight
deafness, with which she was troubled from her earliest years, her
father insisted on having her trained as a musician, and she was
prepared to make her appearance in public when she was only twelve years
old. “It was all very hard,” she related, “for I adored my mother, whom
I hardly ever saw. I remember my father once taking me to Berlin to pay
her a visit, and the way in which he flung the door open, with the
words: ‘Here, madam, I have brought your daughter to see you!’ Yes,
those were hard circumstances for me, and the more so, as he had married
again, and my stepmother was anything but kindly disposed towards me.”
There was a pause, and her expression changed as she went on to tell of
her love-idyl and early marriage. This was a dreamy look in her eyes,
and an arch smile on her lips that made her face quite young again,
while she spoke of those bygone days of short-lived happiness.
“It was when I was only fourteen,” she said, “that Robert Schumann first
became a visitor at our house. He was then just eighteen years of age,
and very soon we two young people had fallen in love, and even become
secretly engaged. Secretly, I need hardly say, so frightened was I of my
father, who, for his part, had constantly announced that he had his own
quite fixed plans for my future.”
Again she paused, and seemed for a moment plunged in memories of the
past. I did not disturb her with questions, but waited for her to go on
with her narrative, and it was with merriment once more rippling over
her face that she related some of the more amusing scenes in the drama.
“Four years later it had come to open war between my affianced husband
and my father, and I remember having to appear between them in the court
of law, in which the struggle for my person was being decided. Schumann
proved to the entire satisfaction of the court that he was of age, and
perfectly well able to support a wife, whilst my father, having no just
ground for his refusal, simply loaded him with insult. The decision was
accordingly given in our favour, and we were legally authorised to
become man and wife. At this my father’s rage literally knew no bounds.
Had he not often sworn that his daughter should never marry a beggarly
musician, that he would hardly consider a prince good enough for her! So
he turned me out of the house, refusing even to let me take my own few
possessions with me, my stepmother going so far as to tear off my finger
a little ring I always wore, as it had been my mother’s, but which she
now gave to her own daughter. Thus was I cast out of my father’s house,
and from the moment the door closed behind me I never saw his face
again, nor ever heard a word more from him. It was as if I were really
dead to him henceforth. But I did not grieve. It was by my husband’s
side that I wandered forth, happy for the first time in my life, in the
consciousness of our mutual affection.
“The ten years that followed were years of happiness indeed, of such
happiness as it is rarely given to mortals to know on earth. I lived for
my husband alone, entirely wrapt up in him. I watched every change in
his countenance, I studied his every mood, and had so thoroughly
identified myself with him that my own brain was on the verge of
becoming affected too, when his began to give way. I did not understand
at first that there was anything the matter with him, and continued to
take pride as ever in following and participating in every phase through
which his mind passed. But that mind was darkening, although I knew it
not. His fits of melancholy grew more frequent and of longer duration,
as though a baleful shadow had fallen across his soul. One night he
suddenly awakened me, begging me to get up, to leave him, to stay no
longer in the room. Astonished and alarmed, but accustomed to obey his
lightest wish in all things, I complied with the strange request. Next
day he told me that it was his fears for me, for my safety, which had
induced him to send me from him. ‘I feared lest I should hurt you!’ he
groaned. For he felt that he was gradually losing all control over his
own actions, that something outside himself was continually urging him
to violence against those whom he loved best in the world. Musical
phantasies mixed themselves with the rest. Thus he was for ever
imagining that he heard sounds, sometimes just one note of music
perpetually repeated, and then again the tones would be modulated, and
vary, and combine and weave themselves into melody! And these snatches
of melody he still noted down. But worse was at hand, for the day soon
came, the terrible day, which put an end to all my earthly happiness,
and after which it was no longer possible to conceal the truth from
myself and others. My dear, unfortunate husband had managed to steal out
of the house unperceived, and had attempted to drown himself in the
Rhine! He was saved, but I was not allowed to see him again. It was said
that it would be dangerous for him, for both of us. But he sent me a
most touching message, begging me to forgive him the pain which he knew
he must have caused me, and explaining how it was that he could not have
acted otherwise--he felt that it was the only means of saving us both
much trouble and sorrow. It almost broke my heart to hear this.
“Indeed, at first I could do nothing but sit and cry my eyes out at the
immensity of the misfortune which had come upon me. I was alone in the
world, with my helpless little ones, for he who had been our protection
and support was himself now the most helpless of all. But it was the
very immensity of my misfortune which roused me out of the apathy into
which I had fallen, as I realised the necessity of an effort on my part
for all these weak and helpless ones, who now depended solely on me. To
my father I did not dare to appeal, and even now, in my dire distress,
he gave no sign, sent me no word of kindness. But other friends took
active steps to help me, and with their assistance, thanks to the sums
they collected for me, I was able to put my affairs in order, and start
giving concerts to support my family. So things went on for the next
three years; I travelled about, playing in all the principal towns in
Europe, and my husband remained under the care of a doctor in Bonn. All
this time I never once saw him, although I was always entreating to be
allowed to do so.
“Then one day, just as I was about to give a concert in London, I
suddenly received a letter, informing me that my husband had only a few
days more to live, that I must hurry back if I wished to be in time to
see him once more! And like this I had to let myself be taken to the
concert-room, and like this I played! People have since told me that I
never played so well in my whole life. Of that I know nothing. I went
through my work mechanically, feeling half dazed, neither knowing nor
caring what or how I played, and not a note of the music reaching my own
ears. At the end the whole room seemed to spin round before my eyes, but
I made my way out somehow, and in a very few minutes was already on my
way to Bonn.
“When I arrived I was at first refused entrance to the room. But my mind
was fully made up. I was determined that no power on earth should now
keep us longer apart. I simply said: ‘If he is really dying, then my
presence can harm him no longer, and I insist upon being admitted!’ So
they let me in. But it was a terrible shock to see him, so changed that
at first I should hardly have known him. Only his eyes, those dear,
loving eyes, were still the same, and as they fixed themselves on me I
had the happiness of seeing the full light of recognition come back to
them. ‘Ah! my own!’ he exclaimed, stretching out his arms toward me. He
was frightfully weak, having of late refused all nourishment, under the
delusion that the attendants wished to poison him. I could, however,
prevail on him to take a little food when I brought it to him, and his
eyes never left me, following my every movement. In the midst of my
sorrow I yet felt a contentment at my heart that I had not known during
these last years, whilst I was separated from him. I might almost say I
was happy once more, just in being with him, and in feeling that his
affection was unchanged. But it could not last long--his strength was
ebbing fast--soon came the last parting, and then all was over, and I
was really alone in the wide world, with my poor, fatherless children!”
She broke down completely on these last words, and for some minutes we
sat together in perfect silence, my tears flowing in sympathy, for I was
deeply moved at witnessing her grief. Her story was made the more
touching by the simplicity with which it was told; this went to my heart
more surely than the most studied eloquence. And it was ever the one
theme--always of _him_ she spoke! She came back constantly to this one
period of life, as if all the rest--everything that had taken place
since--did not count at all. Evidently her own life had come to an end
for her when her husband died. If she lived on at all it was simply in
the idea of contributing to raise a monument to his fame. She was
really quivering with indignation when she related how on one occasion,
after one of her recitals, a lady had actually asked her if her husband
had not also been a pianist? But my contemptuous exclamation, “Oh, the
poor thing!” made her smile in spite of herself. I remember, too, how I
could never satisfy her with my rendering of the little piece called
“Happiness enough.” She was always entreating me to put more fullness
and softness into it, to make it overflow, so to say, with happiness.
And in the depths of her eyes I read the triumphant certitude that this
music told the happiness that had once been hers, and that to none other
would it ever be given to express it as she could. Ah! those were
precious hours, indeed, which I passed with her, and the lessons were
something much more to me than mere music-lessons, for even greater and
nobler than the _artist_ was the _woman_ I learnt to know in them.
In the month of May we went to Moscow, and it was there I heard
Schumann’s Variations for two pianos played by Mme. Schumann and Nicolas
Rubinstein. The latter was an admirable pianist, gifted with great
delicacy and depth of feeling, and if without the fiery, almost
demoniacal, inspiration that distinguished his brother’s playing, this
for the duet on two pianos was rather an advantage than otherwise.
After that several years passed before I saw Mme. Schumann again, and
then it being announced that she would appear at a concert in Cologne
with Stockhausen, my mother and I went over for it. We went early in the
day, so as to be in time for the last rehearsal, but at this we had the
disappointment of not hearing Mme. Schumann, for she had met with a
slight accident, which obliged her to rest till the evening, and her
place at the piano was taken by Brahms. In spite of her absence, it was
all the same a most interesting rehearsal. I had the pleasure of hearing
Brahms play and Stockhausen sing, and enjoyed everything immensely. I
could not help noticing, however, that my mother’s thoughts were
entirely elsewhere, and it annoyed me that she should let anything
distract her attention from the glorious music. Nor did we stay quite to
the end, much to my disappointment, but drove off to the Flora-garden,
and lunched there. And as we sat there, I could not help noticing that
we seemed to attract the attention of a little group of gentlemen,
strangers, as I thought them, who were walking up and down, and one of
whom at last seated himself at a little table quite close to ours,
looking at me so hard, that I slightly turned away from him. But when we
rose to leave, they all three came up to us, and we recognised Herr von
Werner, whose acquaintance we had made at Prince Hohenzollern’s whilst
his two companions were none other than the young Prince of Roumania,
and the latter’s representative in Paris, the last mentioned being the
gentleman who had just been observing me so closely. But I was sincerely
glad to meet the young Prince again, for I had seen much of him in
Berlin some years before, and was full of admiration for the adventurous
spirit and strong sense of duty in which he had entered on his task in
his new country. So I welcomed with pleasure the opportunity of talking
to him again, and walked on ahead with him, discussing all sorts of
things, my mother following with the two other gentlemen. We wandered
from the “Flora” to the Zoological Gardens, and after a long hunt for
the monkey house, found the little creatures already installed in their
winter quarters. I remember holding out my hand to one of them, rather
to the horror of the Prince, who protested against seeing my finger
clasped in the rough little brown paw. But the time had passed so
quickly, and I found my companion’s conversation so interesting,--(he
said afterwards that I told him his political views were quite
Machiavellian!)--two hours had gone by before we got into the carriage
again, and as we drove away, I exclaimed:--“There is somebody with whom
one can enjoy talking! He is really a charming young man!” My mother
said nothing at all. We stopped at Mme. Schumann’s, for I was determined
to have a little talk with her before the evening,--merely to see her at
the concert would not have satisfied me at all. The dear old days in St.
Petersburg were a little brought back to me, as I sat holding her hand,
and listening to all she had to tell us of what had happened since we
last met. But she was somewhat depressed, having just parted with her
third daughter who had recently married an Italian Count, and unable to
resign herself to the separation. “Only think what it means,” she said
to my mother,--“to have brought up one’s child, loved and cared for her
all these years, and then some stranger comes along, and carries her
off, one knows not to what!” Again my mother kept silence, but I could
not help thinking that there was quite a strange expression on her face.
When we left, there was only just time to dress for the concert. My
toilette was very hurriedly made, in spite of the satisfaction I felt in
the very pretty and becoming dress--a white flowered silk over a pale
blue underskirt--which I was to wear, for my one fear was of missing any
of the music! But whilst I was dressing, the Prince of Roumania had been
announced, and stayed, and stayed, and I could hardly control my
impatience, till at last I heard him leave, and rushed to my mother, to
hurry her. But the serious look with which she met me checked the
impatient exclamation on my lips. Taking my arm in hers, she began to
pace the room with me, saying, “The Prince of Roumania was here just now
to ask you to be his wife.” She stopped and looked at me, half expecting
the decided refusal, with which all such proposals had hitherto been
met. But instead,--“Already?” was the only word I brought out. I said to
myself,--he hardly knows me, he cannot love me, he happens to have heard
how well and carefully I have been brought up, he thinks I may prove the
suitable companion, the fittest helpmate for him in the work he has set
himself. And a thousand similar thoughts flashed like lightning through
my brain. But through it all I heard my mother telling me of the high
and noble mission awaiting me, should I accept the Prince’s hand, of the
wide field in which my energies might find scope, and the honour she
accounted it that his choice should have fallen on me. As she went on
talking, my hesitation seemed to fade away, and it was not long before
I said to her,--“Let him come! He is the right one!” In a very short
time the Prince had returned, I was summoned to the room, and remember
going towards him with my hand outstretched, which he raised to his
lips, and I remember too the words he spoke; but my words to him I do
not recall, though my mother treasured them in her heart, and had them
engraved below my portrait she sent him. She had already sent a little
word in all haste to Mme. Schumann, telling her of my betrothal, and
that she must not count on us for that evening. The rest of it passed
quickly indeed, the Prince having only a very few hours to spend with
us, as he had to return to Paris that same night. As long as he was with
us, telling me of the work we should accomplish together, of the
difficulties we must encounter and overcome, so far, all was well, I had
caught the fire of his enthusiasm, and felt equal to all that might be
demanded of me. But no sooner was he gone, than doubts and hesitations
once more assailed me. Had I not been too hasty, too precipitate, in
making up my mind on a question of such importance, on which depended
all the happiness of my future life? I was no longer so young, very
nearly six-and-twenty, and that would perhaps make it all the harder for
me, to give up my freedom and independence, resigning myself as it were
to another’s control. One of whom, after all, I knew so little, beyond
what everyone else knew and could read of him in the newspapers! Was
that a sufficient guarantee of happiness, I asked myself, that his
chivalrous character pleased me, that I knew him to be the soul of
honour, and that his mother had
[Illustration: H. M. KING CHARLES OF ROUMANIA]
ever been one of the idols of my girlhood? Unluckily too, the photograph
which he had given me made him look very stern, and that quite alarmed
me. I thought, if he can ever look like that, I shall be frightened to
death! But I took comfort in looking at the little opal cross he had
also given me, finding in the soft pure flame of the beautiful
milk-white stones, a sort of presage of everything that is good and
noble, and my fears gradually quieted down. Not altogether, though. They
came back often during the four weeks of my engagement, and only left me
entirely when I stood with my affianced husband before the altar.
With all this, alas! I never saw my dear Mme. Schumann again. I had
little thought when we left her that eventful day, looking forward to
meeting again the same evening at the concert, that it was the very last
time we should meet on earth! I wonder if she ever guessed the extent of
my affection and veneration. Two days before the wedding a concert was
given in honour of the bridegroom and myself, and for this my brother
tried to arrange for Mme. Schumann to come, but she was unfortunately
prevented. After that I was myself so far away, plunged heart and soul
in the new duties that were now to be my lifework, and so much absorbed
by these, that I only returned twice to my old home in the course of the
next ten years. Besides, in the meantime I had become a mother--that
unspeakable happiness was mine, and then--and then it was taken from me,
and all was dark around me, nevermore to become light for me henceforth
on earth!