Rousseau, a man of decidedly musical organization, and who wrote so
brilliantly on the subject of the art he loved (but who cared more for
music than he did for truth and honor, as he showed by stealing the
music of two operas, "Pygmalion" and "Le Devin du Village," and passing
it off for his own), has given us some very racy descriptions of French
opera in the latter part of the eighteenth century in his "Dictionnaire
Musicale," in his "Lettre sur la Musique Française," and, above all,
in the "Nouvelle Héloïse." In the mouth of Saint Preux, the hero of the
latter novel, he puts some very animated sketches:
"The opera at Paris passes for the most pompous, the most voluptuous,
the most admirable spectacle that human art has ever invented. It is,
say its admirers, the most superb monument of the magnificence of Louis
XIV. Here you may dispute about anything except music and the opera; on
these topics alone it is dangerous not to dissemble. French music,
too, is defended by a very vigorous inquisition, and the first thing
indicated is a warning to strangers who visit this country that all
foreigners admit there is nothing so fine as the grand opera at Paris.
The fact is, discreet people hold their tongues and laugh in their
sleeves. It must, however, be conceded that not only all the marvels of
nature, but many other marvels much greater, which no one has ever seen,
are represented at great cost at this theatre; and certainly Pope must
have alluded to it when he describes a stage on which were seen gods,
hobgoblins, monsters, kings, shepherds, fairies, fury, joy, fire, a jig,
a battle, and a ball.*...
* Addison gives some such description of the French opera in
No. 29 of the "Spectator."
Having told you what others say of this brilliant spectacle, I will
now tell you what I have seen myself. Imagine an inclosure fifteen feet
broad and long in proportion; this inclosure is the theatre. On its two
sides are placed at intervals screens, on which are grossly painted
the objects which the scene is about to represent. At the back of the
inclosure hangs a great curtain painted in like manner, and nearly
always pierced and torn, that it may represent at a little distance
gulfs on the earth or holes in the sky. Every one who passes behind this
stage or touches the curtain produces a sort of earthquake, which has a
double effect. The sky is made from certain bluish rags suspended
from poles or from cords, as linen may be seen hung out to dry in any
washerwoman's yard. The sun (for it is seen here sometimes) is a lighted
torch in a lantern. The cars of the gods and goddesses are composed of
four rafters, squared and hung on a thick rope in the form of a swing or
seesaw; between the rafters is a cross-plank on which the god sits down,
and in front hangs a piece of coarse cloth well dirtied, which acts the
part of clouds for the magnificent car. One may see toward the bottom of
the machine two or three stinking candles, badly snuffed, which, while
the great personage dementedly presents himself, swinging in his seesaw,
fumigate him with an incense worthy of his dignity. The agitated sea
is composed of long lanterns of cloth and blue pasteboard, strung on
parallel spits which are turned by little blackguard boys. The thunder
is a heavy cart, rolled over an arch, and is not the least agreeable
instrument one hears. The flashes of lightning are made of pinches of
rosin thrown on a flame, and the thunder is a cracker at the end of
a fusee. The theatre is furnished, moreover, with little square
trap-doors, through which the demons issue from their cave. When they
have to rise into the air, little devils of stuffed brown cloth are
substituted, or perhaps live chimney-sweeps, who swing suspended and
smothered in rags. The accidents which happen are sometimes tragical,
sometimes farcical. When the ropes break, then infernal spirits and
immortal deities fall together, laming and sometimes killing each other.
Add to all this the monsters which render some scenes very pathetic,
such as dragons, lizards, tortoises, and large toads, which promenade
the theatre with a menacing air, and display at the opera all the
temptations of St. Anthony. Each of these figures is animated by a lout
of a Savoyard, who has not even intelligence enough to play the beast."
Saint Preux is also made to say of the singers: "One sees actresses
nearly in convulsions, tearing yelps and howls violently out of their
lungs, closed hands pressed on their breasts, heads thrown back, faces
inflamed, veins swollen, and stomach panting. I know not which of the
two, eye or ear, is more agreeably affected by this display.... For my
part, I am certain that people applaud the outcries of an actress at the
opera as they would the feats of a tumbler or rope-dancer at a fair....
Imagine this style of singing employed to express the delicate gallantry
and tenderness of Quinault. Imagine the Muses, the Graces, the Loves,
Venus herself, expressing themselves this way, and judge the effect. As
for devils, it might pass, for this music has something infernal in it,
and is not ill adapted to such beings."
From this and similar accounts it will be seen that opera in France
during the latter part of the eighteenth century had, notwithstanding
Jean Jacques's garrulous sarcasms, advanced a considerable way toward
that artificial perfection which characterizes it now. Music was a topic
of discussion, which absorbed the interest of the polite world far more
than the mutterings in the politi-cal horizon, which portended so fierce
a convulsion of the social _régime_. Wits, philosophers, courtiers, and
fine ladies joined in the acrimonious controversy, first between the
adherents of Lulli and Rameau, then between those of Gluck and Piccini.
The young gallants of the day were wont to occupy part of the stage
itself and criticise the performance of the opera; and often they
adjourned from the theatre to the dueling-ground to settle a difficulty
too hard for their wits to unravel. The intense interest appertaining to
all things connected with music and the theatre noticeable in the French
of to-day, was tenfold as eager a century ago. Passionate curiosity,
even extending to enthusiasm, with which that worn-out and utterly
corrupt society, by some subtile contradiction, threw itself into all
questions concerning philosophy, science, literature, and art, found
its most characteristic expression in its relation to the music of the
stage.
It was at this strange and picturesque period, when everything in
politics, society, literature, and art was fermenting for the terrible
Hecate's brew which the French world was soon to drink to the dregs,
that there appeared on the stage one of the most remarkable figures
in its history, a woman of great beauty and brilliancy, as well as an
artist of unique genius--Sophie Arnould. Her name is lustrous in French
memoirs for the splendor of her wit and conversational talent; and
Arsène Houssaye has thought it worthy to preserve her _bon-mots_ in
a volume of table-talk, called "Arnouldiana," which will compare with
anything of its kind in the French language. For a dozen years prior to
the Revolution Sophie Arnould was a queen of society as well as of
art; and in her elegant _salon_, which was a museum of art _curios_
and bric-à-brac, she held a brilliant court, where men of the highest
distinction, both native and foreign, were proud to pay their homage
at the shrine of beauty and genius. There might be seen D'Alembert, the
learned and scholarly, rough and independent in manner, who deserted the
drawing-rooms of the great for saloons where he could move at his ease.
There, also, Diderot would often delight his circle of admirers by the
fluency and richness of his conversation, his friends extolling his
disinterestedness and honesty, his enemies whispering about his cunning
and selfishness. The novelist Duclos, with his keen power of penetrating
human character, would move leisurely through the throng, picking
up material for his romances; and Mably would talk politics and drop
ill-natured remarks. The learned metaphysician Helvetius, too, was
often there, seeking for compliments, his appetite for applause being
voracious; so insatiable, indeed, that he even danced one night at the
opera. It was said that he was led to study mathematics by seeing a
circle of beautiful ladies surrounding the ugly geometrician Maupertuis
in the gardens of the Tuileries. Dorât, who wasted his time in
writing bad tragedies, and his property in publishing them; the gay,
good-hearted Marmontel; Bernard--called by Voltaire _le gentil_--who
wrote the libretto of "Castor et Pollux," esteemed for years a
masterpiece of lyric poetry; Rameau, the popular composer, in whose
pieces Sophie always appeared; and Francoeur, the leader of the
orchestra, were also among her guests. J. J. Rousseau was the great
lion, courted and petted by all. When Benjamin Franklin arrived in
Paris, where he was received with unbounded hospitality by the most
distinguished of French society, he confessed that nowhere did he find
such pleasure, such wit, such brilliancy, as in the _salon_ of Mile.
Arnould. M. André de Murville was one of the more noteworthy men of wit
who attended her _soirées_, and he became so madly in love with her that
he offered her his hand; but she cared very little about him. One day
he told her that if he were not in the Académie within thirty years, he
would blow out his brains. She looked steadily at him, and then, smiling
sarcastically, said, "I thought you had done that long ago." Poets
sang her praises; painters eagerly desired to transfer her exquisite
lineaments to canvas. All this flattery intoxicated her. She wished
to be classed with Ninon, Lais, and Aspasia, and was proud to be the
subject of the verses of Dorat, Bernard, Rulhière, Marmontel, and
Favart. Sophie's wit never hesitated to break a lance even on those she
liked. "What are you thinking of?" she said to Bernard, in one of his
abstracted moods. "I was talking to myself," he replied. "Be careful,"
she said archly; "you gossip with a flatterer." To a physician, whom she
met with a gun under his arm, she laughed aloud, "Ah, doctor, you are
afraid of your professional resources failing." Her racy repartees were
in every mouth from Paris to Versailles, and she was in all respects a
brilliant personage among the intellectual lights of the age.
In the Rue de Béthisy, Paris, stood a house, the Hôtel de Châtillon,
from the window of one of whose rooms assassins flung the gory head of
the great Admiral de Coligni down to the Duke de Guise on the night of
Saint Bartholomew, 1572. In that same room was born, February 14, 1744,
Sophie Arnould, the daughter of the proprietor, who had transformed the
historic dwelling into a hostelry. She grew up a bright, lively, and
beautiful child, and was conscious from an early age of the value of her
talents. Anne, as she was then called (for the change to Sophie was made
afterward), would say with exultation: "We shall be as rich as princes.
A good fairy has given me a talisman to transform everything into gold
and diamonds at the sound of my voice."
Accident brought her talent to light. It was then the fashion for
ladies, after confessing their sins in Passion Week, to retire for some
days to a religious house, there to expiate by fasting the faults and
misdemeanors committed during the gayeties of the Carnival. It chanced
that when Anne was about twelve years old the Princess of Modena retired
to the convent of Val-de-Grace, and in attending vespers heard one voice
which, for power and purity, she thought had never been surpassed.
Fine voices were at a premium then in France, and the Princess at once
decided that she had discovered a treasure. She inquired who was the
owner of this exquisite organ, and was informed that it was little Anne
Arnould. The Princess sent for the child, who came readily, and was not
in the least abashed by the presence of the great lady, but sang like a
nightingale and chattered like a magpie. The wit and beauty of the girl
charmed the Princess, and she threw a costly necklace about her throat.
"Come, my lovely child," said she; "you sing like an angel, and you
have more wit than an angel. Your fortune is made." As a result of the
praises so loudly chanted by the Princess of Modena, the child was
sent for to sing in the King's Chapel, and, in spite of the aversion of
Anne's pious mother, who was afraid with good reason of the influences
of the dissipated court, she was placed thus in contact with power and
royalty. The beautiful Pompadour heard her charming voice, and remarked,
with that effusion of sentiment which veneered her cruel selfishness,
"Ah! with such a talent, she might become a princess." This opinion of
the imperious and all-powerful favorite decided the girl's fate; for it
was equivalent to a mandate for her _début_. The precocious child knew
the danger of the path opened for her. To the remonstrances of her
mother she said with a shrug of her pretty shoulders: "To go to the
opera is to go to the devil. But what matters it? It is my destiny."
Poor Mme. Arnould scolded, shuddered, and prayed, and ended it, as she
thought, by shutting the girl up in a convent. But Louis XV. got wind
of this threatened checkmate, and a royal mandate took her out of the
convent walls which had threatened to immure her for life. Anne was
placed with Clairon, the great tragedienne, to learn acting, and with
Mlle. Fel to learn singing. As a consequence, while she had some
rivals in the beauty of her voice, her acting surpassed anything on the
operatic stage of that era.