_I repeat that I don't give myself as an example. My opinion is formed by
all the sad things I have seen elsewhere; all the misunderstandings
so frequent in the households of artists, and caused solely by their
abnormal life. Look at that sculptor who, in full maturity of age and
talent, has just exiled himself, leaving wife and children behind him.
Public opinion condemns him, and certainly I offer no excuse for him.
And, nevertheless, I can well understand how he arrived at such a point!
Here was a fellow who adored his art, and had a horror of the world, and
society. The wife, though amiable and intelligent, instead of shielding
him from the social obligations he loathed, condemned him for some
ten years to all the exactions they involved. Thus she induced him to
undertake a lot of official busts, horrible respectabilities in velvet
skull caps, frights of women utterly devoid of grace; she disturbed him
ten times a day with importunate visitors, and then every evening
laid out for him a dress suit and light gloves, and dragged him from
drawing-room to drawing-room. You will tell me he could have rebelled,
could have replied point-blank: "No!" But don't you know that the very
fact of our sedentary existences leaves us more than other men dependent
on domestic influence? The atmosphere of the home envelopes us, and if
some touch of the ideal does not lighten it, soon wearies and drags us
down. Moreover, the artist as a rule puts what force and energy he
has into his work, and after his solitary and patient struggles, finds
himself left with no will to oppose to the petty importunities of life.
With him, feminine tyrannies have free play. No one is more easily
conquered and subdued. Only, beware! He must not be made to feel the
yoke too heavily. If one day the invisible bonds with which he is
surreptitiously fettered are drawn too tight and arrest the artistic
effort, he will all at once tear them asunder, and, mistrusting his own
weakness, will fly like our sculptor, over the hills and far away._
_The wife of this sculptor was astounded at his flight. The unhappy
creature is still wondering: "What can I have done to him?" Nothing.
She simply did not understand him. For it is not enough to be good and
intelligent to be the true helpmate of an artist, A woman must also
possess infinite tact, smiling abnegation; and all this is found only by
a miracle in a young creature, curious though ignorant as regards life.
She is pretty, she has married a well-known man, received everywhere;
why should she not wish to show herself a little on his arm? Is it
not quite natural? The husband, on the contrary, growing intolerant
of society as his talent progresses, finding time short, and art
engrossing, refuses to be exhibited. Behold them both miserable, and
whether the man gives in or resists, his life is henceforward turned
from its course, and from its tranquillity. Ah! how many of these
ill-matched couples have I known, where the wife was sometimes
executioner, sometimes victim, but more often executioner, and nearly
always unwittingly so! The other evening I was at Dargenty's, the
musician. There were but a few guests, and he was asked to play. Hardly
had he begun one off those pretty mazurkas with a Polish rhythm, which
make him the successor of Chopin, when his wife began to talk, quite
low at first, then a little louder. By degrees the fire of conversation
spread. At the end of a minute I was the only listener. Then he shut the
piano, and said to me with a heart-rent smile: "It is always like this
here--my wife does not care for music." Can you imagine anything more
terrible than to marry a woman who does not care for your art? Take my
word for it, my friend, and don't marry. You are alone, you are free;
keep as precious things, your liberty and your loneliness._