his brow, turns to Zobéide, and announces his intention of setting forth
upon a hunting expedition. Such a plan inevitably implies an absence
from the palace, and at the intimation sidelong glances of meaning are
covertly exchanged amongst the women. But incipient smiles of
anticipatory pleasure are suppressed, and under a mask of disappointment
and regret, the harem makes as though to turn its master from his
purpose. Is he not their sun? Must the light of his presence be so soon
removed, and joy and happiness thereby eclipsed?
Zobéide alone refrains from this cajolery. Flinging herself upon the
piled-up cushions, she broods darkly upon this whim her husband so
suddenly proposes to indulge. Half hopeful that petulance may succeed
where blandishments have failed, she ignores the glances which the
Sultan casts towards her. Plainly he is loth to go, but the poison
which his brother has instilled works actively within him, and he makes
no sign of condescension to her.
Armed retainers enter, attendants bring habiliments of the chase. With
these the Sultan is invested by the deft fingers of the women, who make
what use they can of such opportunity as this service offers to exercise
their fascinations. Schah-Zeman is attended by the eunuchs, who buckle
his armour upon him and hand him the long hunting spear. Thus equipped,
the Sultan’s brother makes towards the door. Schariar follows him, but
pauses to bestow a last curious glance at Zobéide. The latter makes no
sign, and the Sultan, brushing aside the last fawning attentions of the
women, strides moodily forth. As he passes out of the chamber, Zobéide,
repenting of her petulance and simulated coldness, since they seem to
have failed in their object, springs quickly from her cushions and
hurries after him in a belated effort at detention.
Among the other women, however, no further sign of regret, real or
simulated, is to be seen. On all sides faces are wreathed in smiles.
Excitement seethes in the harem. The violence of suppression which the
presence of their lord demands, on pain of dire and instant punishment,
is the measure of the almost childish glee with which, that menace
momentarily out of mind, the women fly to the illicit pleasures their
appetite for intrigue, unduly nurtured, has devised. On the tiptoe of
expectation they scamper one to another, but ever returning to the three
doors which stand in the background, hiding one knows not what. Before
these mysterious portals the women cluster in chattering groups, while
two of their number are sent upon some urgent errand. Anon the latter
return dragging with them, in hysterical mirth, the clumsy, grotesque
person of the chief eunuch. In the bunch of metal which jingles at the
latter’s side are the keys which alone will open
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
the doors so eagerly besieged, and the women, swarming round him like
busy flies, begin at once to pester him, with arch and fawning
supplications, to turn them in the locks.
But the old janitor refuses. He pretends amazement--is horrified at the
bare idea, and will none of it. The women press coaxingly upon him,
lavishing endearments. But of what avail the whole battery of female
charms against such as he? With knowing leer upon his unctuous, smooth
face, he wags his head and still says them nay. But though he fancies
himself immune from women’s wiles, he has reckoned without the full
measure of feminine cunning. He has his vulnerable point; whatever else
he lacks he has at least male vanity. Is he not _chief_ of the eunuchs?
are not the keys he loves to jingle a visible symbol of the power which
he wields? Look you, he is a person of no small authority and
importance.
With quiet change of tactics the women shift their attack to a different
angle. In place of supplication they heap compliments upon him. They
slaver him with blandishments, flattering him to the utmost of his bent.
The fatuous old fool swallows their fulsome praises with avidity, his
flabby cheeks puffed out with complacency and self-conceit. But then the
women change their tune. Mockingly one hints that his vaunted power is
but a sham; others are quick to press the suggestion home. Plainly it
can be no real authority which he is feared to exercise. They challenge
him with jeers to prove his power; they dare him to use the keys of
which he is so proud.
The poor fool is not proof against this insidious assault. Lacking real
respect, he clings fondly to its shadow; rather than sacrifice that his
vanity will endure any risk. His fat face, but now wreathed in gratified
smiles, grows glum and peevish as praise gives place to irony. He
hesitates, and is lost. The women press their advantage, and their
victim yields. Determined at all costs to demonstrate his power, he
thrusts a key into the first door and petulantly turns it.
The door swings open, and from the corridor behind emerges a band of
negroes, supple swarthy minions clad in copper-ornamented robes. With
stealthy tread they glide among the waiting women, and quickly each
finds a consort, eager for her favourite’s embraces.
Futile the eunuch’s protestations that now he has done enough to
vindicate his authority; impatiently the women who remain demand that
having done so much he shall complete his work. Already repentant of the
rash betrayal of his master’s trust, the wretched janitor would stay his
hand, but the mischief is done, and bowing to the logic of his own
folly, he unlocks the second door. Forth troops a second band of
negroes, decked in ornaments of silver, to be received with not less
complaisance than the others.
No longer assailed by the insistent beseechings of his charges, the
janitor fearfully surveys the scene. Everywhere, dispersed throughout
the chamber, amorous couples meet his eye. With sudden terror in the
realisation of the frightful risk he has incurred, he turns to go. At
least let him make sure that watch is set for his master’s return. But
as he turns he is confronted by the imperious figure of Zobéide, who has
been leaning, observant, during all that has passed, beside the third
door--the door as yet unopened. Avidly she demands the unlocking of this
last, with fierce insistent finger pointing her order.
Here is a pretty dilemma for the luckless janitor, a searching test of
his vaunted power and authority. His servile instinct quails before the
regal mien of Zobéide, her gesture of command and blazing eyes that
brook neither prevarication nor delay. Like the slave that he truly is,
he turns to do her behest; but even as he fumbles for the key the
enormity of that to which he is accessory
[Illustration]
strikes him with horror. The others--that is bad enough, and like to be
paid for dearly if discovery--he trembles at the thought--should ensue.
But the Sultana, his master’s wedded wife.... Panic seizes him, and with
a frantic effort to assert the authority he has boasted, he refuses.
The fires of passion smouldering in the breast of Zobéide leap forth on
the instant. A woman scorned or a woman denied--her fury is a thing few
men, and least of all an emasculate poltroon, can face. A frightful
paroxysm shakes the panting queen. Like a tigress baulked of her prey,
she turns upon the grovelling creature who dares to thwart her thus,
hardly restrained from flinging herself upon him. To a contest of wills
so unequal one ending only is possible. The wretched eunuch cringes
before this awful apparition of his royal mistress, all other terrors
swamped by the urgency of present fear. The long crescendo of the music
rises to a blaring climax as he flings wide the remaining door.
Palpitating with the vehemence of her expectant desires, Zobéide stands
before the open portal, clutching her breasts, with eyes glued to the
dim recesses beyond. There is a pause, which adds a new delicious
torture to her thirsty cravings; then with agile bound, light-footed,
there comes leaping towards her a young negro. Round his naked chest he
wears a broad, gem-studded band of gold, that enhances the smooth and
supple beauty of his dusky arms and neck. Great pearls are pendant from
his ears, a golden turban is twisted round his head. His flowing
pantaloons cover, but do not hide, despite voluminous folds, his perfect
symmetry and grace.
Zobéide feasts her gloating eyes upon her favourite, holding herself
back, as children with a box of sweets reserve the most coveted tit-bit
to the last. But when he turns towards her she can contain herself no
longer. She springs upon him, and clutching his head in both her hands,
peers fiercely into his face. The slave, with lascivious grin, submits
unresistingly; though he is the queen’s paramour, he is not the less her
slave, her chattel. It is she who is the lover, and the slave knows his
place. The episode has no savour of romance.
Full length upon the divan Zobéide flings herself, the dusky favourite
usurping the place of her rightful lord. The hour for revelry has come,
for reckless abandon to the impulse of the moment. Enters a retinue of
youths and girls bearing fruits and other dainties upon gorgeous
salvers. They pair among themselves, they dance, they bring a riotous
infection into the atmosphere of languorous dalliance. The negroes and
their fond mistresses are moved to join them, the silver and the copper
ornaments gleaming amidst the whirl of multi-coloured draperies, as the
fever of the dance increases. Springing from the couch, Zobéide’s
favourite precipitates himself into the moving throng. Before his wild
_élan_ the utmost efforts of the others pale; with one accord they pause
to watch with ecstasy the frenzied leaping of the peerless dancer. From
her cushions Zobéide, too, is watching, the fierceness of her momentary
restraint giving place of a sudden to an equal fierceness of abandon as
she darts upon the object of her desires, and submits herself with him
to the music’s intoxicating rhythm.
At length exhausted, they decline once more upon the silken cushions.
The slave, emboldened, ventures now upon solicitations. But he is wary
in the liberties he takes, fearful lest he go too far ere he has rightly
gauged the mood of his imperious mistress. Cunning tells him there is
peril in presumption.
One may interrupt the narrative here, perhaps, to comment on the
subtlety of Nijinsky’s impersonation of the negro favourite. This is not
a rôle in which his distinction as a dancer is revealed to its fullest,
but in no other ballet is his genius as a mime more strikingly
exhibited. One expects from Nijinsky originality in all
[Illustration]
that he attempts, and his conception of Zobéide’s favourite does not
disappoint. The part is not one which, upon a first consideration, would
seem to demand a very subtle art, but the emphasis, already alluded to,
which the actor lays upon the minion’s _servile_ character is only to be
conveyed by very delicate shades of suggestion. The essential servility
is most convincingly realised, and if Nijinsky’s conception of the part
contains (in some eyes) elements of offence, it is at least a logical
outcome of the premises from which the ballet starts, and in performance
brilliant beyond praise. In Nijinsky’s hands the negro is, indeed,
lasciviousness personified. His ingratiating leer, the furtive roll of
his eyes, his whole insinuating aspect as he plies his shameful
ministrations, impress a vivid picture on the mind. His ready, even
eager, submission to the domination of his mistress, his base delight in
her favour, wears a horrid air; one feels that in his different way the
creature is as little of a man as the poor beardless janitor. He is lust
reft of its virtue, and repels, like lechery, even while he attracts.
But the music’s fevered pulse allows no long quiescence. Again the lithe
figure, starting abruptly from Zobéide’s side, leaps madly into the
dance--a point of focus to which all speedily converge, the centre of a
giddy whirlpool into which the amorous pairs, swept from dalliance to
their feet as by a surging wave, are irresistibly drawn. Intoxication
grows to bacchic frenzy, as the urging music swells to an impending
climax. The eye would reel before the blurr of brilliant moving figures
but for that clue to the shifty mazy dance which the central figures of
the libidinous Sultana and her paramour provide.
Suddenly into the chamber stalks the Sultan. The dancers stop in
mid-career. For a moment they stand fascinated by the apparition of this
grim figure of vengeance. The Sultan, too, speechless and paralysed
with rage, seems rooted to the spot. Then panic seizes the culprits;
helter-skelter they flee in abject terror.
[Illustration]
Schah-Zeman, cynically smiling to see enacted once again the scene which
so lately desecrated his own household, is at his brother’s elbow. Armed
men with naked scimitars have invaded the chamber, and with them are
others whose dress proclaims them eunuchs of the palace, underlings of
the hapless janitor who is now to reap his folly. Women, slaves, young
men, are striving pitifully, in the last extremity of terror, to hide
themselves behind curtains, in alcoves--anywhere that seems to offer any
possibility of concealment. Zobéide, alone of them all, scorns flight.
She crouches apart, with heaving bosom, awaiting the anger of her lord.
Her villainous paramour, like the slave that he is, has fled for safety.
With lowering glance the Sultan sweeps the scene, and signs furiously to
the guards. At once the work of execution begins. Instant slaughter is
the doom of all. The eunuchs seize their traitorous chief, and flinging
his craven body to the floor, throttle him where he lies. To and fro
dash the guards, dragging from vain hiding-places, beneath uplifted
weapons, their helpless victims. The floor is strewn with corpses, and
in very act of stumbling over such dreadful obstacles, some poor
fugitives are caught by ruthless pursuers and put to the avenging sword.
Silent, abashed before her husband’s stern gaze, Zobéide cowers amidst
all the carnage. A violent tremor shakes her as the cowardly partner of
her guilt, vainly seeking to escape his doom, is stabbed in mid-flight
and expires convulsively at her feet; but without attempt at exculpation
she continues to await her doom.
At length the bloody business is finished; or almost finished, for
Zobéide remains. Her the eunuchs and the guards dare not touch without a
further sign. Stealthily they advance to where she stands; scimitars are
lifted, daggers poised. It needs only the Sultan’s signal for the fatal
blow to be struck. But Schariar is torn by a conflict of emotions. Love
for the cherished wife of his bosom urges pardon; jealousy, wounded
pride, the outrage on his kingly dignity cry vengeance! To the dull
minds of his attendants but one issue is possible--were it not for his
restraining gesture the keen blades would fall at once.
Then Zobéide, snatching at a last hope, abases herself before her
husband. She pleads, she implores, she summons all her wits, her arts,
to help her in her dire necessity. Schariar is moved, and as he gazes
at the fair form of the woman he has loved so ardently the sternness of
his look relaxes. He wavers.
But Zobéide has to reckon with an enemy more dangerous, more implacable
than her husband’s wounded pride. Schah-Zeman, self-appointed guardian
of his brother’s dignity and honour, observes the scene with undisguised
hostility. To him, as to the eunuchs, there appears but one conclusion
fit and proper. By no consent of his shall there be any other. Scanning
his brother narrowly, he sees the advantage which Zobéide is momentarily
gaining. Disgustedly he confronts his brother, and, as Schariar turns
his head, with contemptuous foot rolls the dead negro’s carcase on its
back. The dusky face leers grinningly upward.
Livid with rage, the Sultan casts his faithless consort from him, and
motions impetuously to the armed men. A dozen hands are stretched to
seize the victim, but before the threatening blades can fall, Zobéide
swiftly turns upon her executioners. Imperiously she waves them back,
and snatching a dagger from the nearest hand, plunges it into her side.
The thrust is truly aimed, and sinking to the floor before her husband,
with a last vain effort to clutch the hem of his robe, she expires at
his feet.
Averting his eyes, the stricken Schariar staggers from the fatal spot.
In silence, his foot upon the golden corselet of the slave, Schah-Zeman
lets him go.
[Illustration: Le Spectre de la Rose]
LE SPECTRE DE LA ROSE.
FROM A POEM BY THÉOPHILE GAUTIER, ADAPTED BY J. L. VAUDOYER.
MUSIC BY WEBER, ORCHESTRATED BY BERLIOZ.
SCENES AND DANCES BY MICHEL FOKINE.
SCENERY AND COSTUMES DESIGNED BY LÉON BAKST.
Nothing is more eloquent of the Russians’ art than the distinction they
are able to give to a theme which, less sensitively treated, would be
merely commonplace, if not banal. In no ballet is this refining instinct
more delicately employed than in “Le Spectre de la Rose,” which Nijinsky
and Karsavina dance to the familiar strains of “L’ Invitation à la
Valse.”
It might not be just to call Weber’s music commonplace; but sentimental
it certainly is, and with such a “plot” (if an incident so slight can
thus be termed) as the Russians, inspired by a dainty poem of Théophile
Gautier, have devised for the music’s accompaniment, the faintest excess
would have turned it sugary--and sickly. In the nice restraint which
they display, the two artists vie with each other--Karsavina as a
picture of youth and innocence, of unsophisticated sentiment: Nijinsky
as a phantom, conveying the suggestion of being verily the mere figment
of a dream, without recourse to that note of the bizarre by which one of
less subtle perceptions might seek to insinuate a spectral character.
To the restraint of the dancers is added that of Léon Bakst, whose
setting for this sentimental idyll has that simplicity which the
situation requires. It is a quaint, almost queer, little bedroom which
is disclosed after the opening bars have been played by the
orchestra--an apartment daintily decked, and arranged with a kind of
prim formality as engaging as the crinoline and flounces of Victorian
girlhood: a completely unsophisticated chamber, in short.
Long windows, open to the summer night, show a garden beyond, flooded
with romantic moonshine, and at one of these stands a young girl, loth
to break the reverie in which her thoughts are held. Her backward glance
drinks in the beauty of the night, her pulses more than faintly stirred
by the glamour of the dance so lately ended, her whole self thrilling to
a potent magic but half understood.
Reluctantly she turns her head from the moonlit garden and passes from
the window. She lifts her hands abstractedly to remove the wrap from her
shoulders, and in so doing touches the rose that droops upon her bosom.
Her fingers close upon it: she plucks it from her dress, presses it to
her lips, and though its first fresh fragrance has gone, lingers
tenderly over the faint aroma which remains. The crimson rose gives form
and colour, deep colour, to the vague sentimental imaginings of the
young girl’s mind. She clasps it tightly as she crosses the room,
keeping her gaze upon it as she presently sinks into a chair. It is the
heart and focus of her thoughts. But lassitude overcomes her, her
eyelids droop, and the rose, slipping through her loosened fingers,
falls from her lap to the floor.
ALLEGRO VIVACE.--A spectral form leaps swiftly into the pale moonbeams,
and alights at the threshold of the open window. The visitant thus
lightly appearing, like a leaf before the fitful eddy of a
[Illustration]
summer’s evening breeze, is seen to have the semblance of a comely
youth, but strangely garbed in rose leaves of crimson-purple hue. It is,
indeed, the spectre of the fallen rose, the embodiment of the young
girl’s sentimental impulses and imaginings. An image more material would
be too gross for maiden meditations so innocent and youthful: it needs
must be fantastically that the gentle sleeper’s dream takes shape before
our eyes.
It would be as vain to describe the movements of the phantom visitant,
as to seek to convey the sound of language without regard for the
meaning it expresses. Movements may have an intrinsic grace and beauty,
as words that utter no meaning may possess a splendour of sound. But the
dance is to movement what language is to words: it implies selection and
co-ordination for the purpose of expressing something--in this case the
very essence of the sentimental emotions which the vibrant music of the
strings evokes. Never was the ecstasy of the valse so irresistibly
expressed. Leaping, swaying, its whole being abandoned to the
intoxicating rhythm, the dancing phantom seems to draw the very power
which animates it from the music’s throbbing pulse.
Deep in her romantic dream the young girl slumbers passive in her chair,
till presently the spectral visitant pauses by her side. It leans
towards her, while its hands make gentle passes that subdue her utterly
to the magic rhythm. Obedient to the spell she rises to her feet and,
yielding herself to the tender guidance proffered, she joins her phantom
partner in the dance.
It is a scene of exquisite beauty, this vision of a young girl’s
innocent dream of love and joy. Abandoning herself to the allurement of
the moment, she dances long and joyously until, at length exhausted, she
sinks once more upon her cushions, with her fantastic ideal--climax of
ecstasy--prostrate at her feet. She has but to stretch forth her hand.
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
But the throbbing rhythm has died away: the dream is nearing an end.
Swiftly the phantom rises, and makes as if to go. Tenderly it stoops
over the fair face of the sleeper, and imprints a single kiss upon her
brow. The music draws to a close, the appointed hour inexorably
approaches. Longingly the phantom lingers, till a fear assails one, lest
it tarry too long. But at the last moment it turns, and with a swift
run, a magic leap through the open window, vanishes--is gone at the very
instant when the music ends.
There is a brief pause. The sleeper stirs and wakes. She starts from the
chair and casts a startled look towards the window through which her
spectral visitant has fled. But no form, however shadowy, intercepts the
moonbeams which lie athwart the garden. Dazed, she turns her eyes
towards the floor. There lies the crumpled rose which dropped from her
grasp as she fell asleep. At sight of it she recollects her thoughts:
full memory of her dream so lately passed comes flooding into her mind.
She picks the rose from the floor, and as she presses it to her lips,
turns wonderingly to the open window and the still garden beyond.
[Illustration: NARCISSE]
NARCISSE.
MYTHOLOGICAL DRAMA BY LÉON BAKST.
MUSIC BY N. TCHEREPNIN.
DANCES BY MICHEL FOKINE.
SCENERY AND COSTUMES DESIGNED BY LÉON BAKST.
Without reference to “Hélène de Sparte” and “Daphnis et Chlöe,” two
ballets in their repertoire which the Russians seem chary of presenting
in London, it would be unfair to say that the Greek view of life baffles
them. But their performance of “Narcisse,” despite its many beauties,
suggests no very confident or happy exploration into classic mythology.
One fancies their temperament is too restless, too sensuous, to
appreciate the cool, almost austere, repose of Greek ideas. “Nothing in
excess” is hardly a motto to appeal to the creators of “Scheherazade,”
“Cléopâtre” and “L’Oiseau de Feu.” As a result their treatment is too
florid, and at times clumsy. It is not so much that they do not know
when to stop, as that they fail to strike the right note in starting.
The scene is a sylvan glade containing a shrine of the goddess Pomona.
There is a spring beside the shrine which feeds a glassy pool and gives
that cool humidity to the air which Léon Bakst has well suggested by the
luxuriance of the green vegetation all around. The glade is shrouded in
mysterious twilight when the curtain rises, and the queer forms of
sylvan imps are dimly seen, frolicking to the woodland music of a flute.
The orchestral accompaniment is charming, but it is unfortunate that
the growing light should presently destroy illusion, and reveal what had
seemed true elfin sprites as dancers clad in cloth overalls and wearing
grotesque masks. One resents the needless clumsiness.