THE STRANGER WITHIN THE GATES OF PARIS. by Lucy H. Hooper.
OUR MONTHLY GOSSIP.
GYPSY MUSIC IN HUNGARY. by E.C.R.
THE "GIORNO DEI MORTI." by T.A.T.
MR. MILL'S MOTHER.
NOTES.
LITERATURE OF THE DAY.
Books Received.
FOOTNOTES
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
TEMPLE OF THE CLITUMNUS.
THE FALLS OF TERNI.
ORVIETO.
CIVITÀ BAGNOREA.
THE TIBER, FROM ORTE.
BORGHETTO.
ST. PETER'S AND THE VATICAN, FROM THE FALLS OF THE TIBER.
THE CASTLE OF ST. ANGELO.
ISLAND OF THE TIBER.
CUPOLA OF ST. PETER'S.
THE PINCIO, FROM THE VILLA BORGHESE.
SORACTE.
VEII, FROM THE CAMPAGNA.
TIVOLI.
CASTLE AT OSTIA.
HEAD OF THE TRAJAN CANAL, NEAR OSTIA.
FOLLOWING THE TIBER.
CONCLUDING PAPER.
[Illustration: TEMPLE OF THE CLITUMNUS.]
One branch of the little river which encompasses Assisi is the
Clitumnus, the delight of philosophers and poets in the Augustan age.
Near its source stands a beautiful little temple to the divinity of the
stream. Although the ancients resorted hither for the loveliness of the
spot, they did not bathe in the springs, a gentle superstition holding
it sacrilege for the human body to lave itself in a stream near its
source.
[Illustration: THE FALLS OF TERNI.]
They came by the Via Flaminia, the old high-road from Rome to Florence,
which crosses the modern railroad hard by. Following its course, which
takes a more direct line than the devious Tiber, past Spoleto on its
woody castellated height, the traveler reaches Terni on the tumultuous
Nar, the wildest and most rebellious of all the tributaries. It was to
save the surrounding country from its outbreaks that the channel was
made by the Romans B.C. 271, the first of several experiments which
resulted in these cascades, which have been more sung and oftener
painted than any other in the world. The beauty of Terni is so hackneyed
that enthusiasm over it becomes cockney, yet the beauty of hackneyed
things is as eternal as the verity of truisms, and no more loses its
charm than the other its point. But one must not talk about it. The
foaming torrent rages along between its rocky walls until spanned by the
bridge of Augustus at Narni, a magnificent viaduct sixty feet high,
thrown from ridge to ridge across the ravine for the passage of the
Flaminian Way--a wreck now, for two of the arches have fallen, but
through the last there is a glimpse of the rugged hillsides with their
thick forests and the turbulent waters rushing through the chasm. Higher
still is Narni, looking over her embattled walls. It is one of the most
striking positions on the way from Florence to Rome, and the next half
hour, through savage gorges and black tunnels, ever beside the tormented
waters of the Nar until they meet the Tiber, swollen by the tributes of
the Paglia and Chiana, is singularly fine.
[Illustration: ORVIETO.]
Where the Paglia and Chiana flow together, at the issue of the charming
Val di Chiana, stands Orvieto on its steep and sudden rock, crowned with
one of the triumphs of Italian Gothic, the glorious cathedral. After
toiling up the ladder-like paths which lead from the plain to the summit
of the bluff, and passing through the grand mediæval gateway along the
slanting streets, where even the peasants dismount and walk beside their
donkeys, seeing nothing within the whole small compass of the walls save
what speaks of the narrowest and humblest life in the most remote of
hill-fastnesses, a few deserted and dilapidated palaces alone telling of
a period of importance long past, nothing can describe the effect of
coming out of this indigence and insignificance upon the silent,
solitary piazza where the incomparable cathedral rears its front,
covered from base to pinnacle with the richest sculpture and most
brilliant mosaic. The volcanic mass on which the town is built is over
seven hundred feet high, and nearly half as much in circumference: it
would be a fitting pedestal for this gorgeous duomo if it stood there
alone. But it is almost wedged in among the crooked streets, a few paces
of grass-grown stones allowing less than space enough to embrace the
whole result of proportion and color: one cannot go far enough off to
escape details. An account of those details would require a volume, and
one has already been written which leaves no more to be said;[1] yet
fain would we take the reader with us into that noble nave, where the
"glorious company of the apostles" stands colossal in marble beside the
pillars whose sculptured capitals are like leafy branches blown by the
wind; where the light comes rich and mellow through stained glass and
semilucent alabaster, like Indian-summer sunshine in autumn woods; where
Fra Angelico's and Benozzo Gozzoli's angelic host smile upon us with
ineffable mildness from above the struggle and strife of Luca
Signorelli's "Last Judgment," the great forerunner of Michael Angelo's.
It added greatly to the impressiveness that there was never a single
human being in the cathedral: except one afternoon at vespers we had it
all to ourselves. There is little else to see in the place, although it
is highly picturesque and the inhabitants wear a more complete costume
than any other I saw in Italy--the women, bright bodices, striped skirts
and red stockings; the men, jaunty jackets and breeches, peaked hats and
splendid sashes.
The discomfort of Perugia was luxury to what we found at Orvieto, and it
was no longer May but December, when it is nearly as cold north of Rome
as with us; and Rome was drawing us with her mighty magnet. So, one
wintry morning, soon after daybreak, we set out in a close carriage with
four horses, wrapped as if we were going in a sleigh, with a
_scaldino_ (or little brazier) under our feet, for the nearest
railway station on our route, a nine hours' drive. Our way lay through
the snow-covered hills and their leafless forest, and long after we had
left Orvieto behind again and again a rise in the road would bring it
full in sight on its base of tufa, girt by its walls, the Gothic lines
of the cathedral sharp against the clear, brightening sky. At our last
look the sun was not up, but broad shafts of light, such as painters
throw before the chariot of Phoebus, refracted against the pure æther,
spread like a halo round the threefold pinnacles: a moment more and
Orvieto was hidden behind a higher hill, not to be seen again. All day
we drove among the snow-bound hills and woods, past the Lake of Bolsena
in its forbidding beauty; past small valleys full of naked fruit trees
and shivering olives, which must be nooks of loveliness in spring; past
defiant little towns aloft on their islands of tufa, like Bagnorea with
its single slender bell-tower; past Montefiascone with its good old
story about Cardinal Fugger and the native wine.
[Illustration: CIVITÀ BAGNOREA.]
We stopped to lunch at Viterbo, a town more closely connected with the
history of the Papacy than any except Rome itself, and full of legends
and romantic associations: it is dirty and dilapidated, and has great
need of all its memories. Being but eight miles from Montefiascone, we
called for a bottle of the fatal Est, which we had tasted once at
Augsburg, where the host of the Three Moors has it in his cellar, in
honor perhaps of the departed Fugger family, whose palace has become his
hotel: there we had found it delicious--a wine as sweet as cordial, with
a soul of fire and a penetrating but delicate flavor of its own--how
different from the thin, sour stuff they brought us in the long-necked,
straw-covered flask, nothing to attest its relationship to the generous
juice at the Three Moors except the singular, unique flavor! After this
little disappointment we left Viterbo, and drove on through the same
sort of scenery, which seemed to grow more and more beautiful in the
rosy light of the sinking sun. But it is hard to tell, for nothing makes
a journey so beautiful as to know that Rome is the goal. As the last
rays were flushing the hill-tops we came in sight of Orte, with its
irregular lines of building clinging to the sides of its precipitous
cliff in such eyrie-wise that it is difficult to say what is house and
what is rock, and whether the arched passages with which it is pierced
are masonry or natural grottoes; and there was the Tiber--already the
yellow Tiber--winding through the valley as far as eye could follow.
Here we waited for the train, which was ten minutes late, and tried to
make up for lost time by leaving our luggage, all duly marked and ready,
standing on the track. We soon began to greet familiar sites as we
flitted by: the last we made out plainly was Borghetto, a handful of
houses, with a ruined castle keeping watch on a hill hard by: then
twilight gathered, and we strained our eyes in vain for the earliest
glimpse of Mount Soracte, and night came down before we could descry the
first landmarks of the Agro Romano, the outposts of our excursions, the
farm-towers we knew by name, the farthest fragments of the aqueducts.
But it was not so obscure that we could not discern the Tiber between
his low banks showing us the way, the lights quivering in the Anio as
the train rushed over the bridge; and when at length we saw against the
clear night-sky a great dark barrier stretching right and left, we knew
that the walls of Rome were once more before us: in a moment we had
glided through with slackening speed, and her embrace enfolded us again.
[Illustration: THE TIBER, FROM ORTE.]
[Illustration: BORGHETTO.]
[Illustration: ST. PETER'S AND THE VATICAN, FROM THE FALLS OF
THE TIBER.]
The Tiber, winding as it does like a great artery through the heart of
Rome, is seldom long either out of sight or mind. One constantly comes
upon it in the most unexpected manner, for there is no river front to
the city. There is a wide open space on the Ripetta--a street which runs
from the Piazza del Popolo, at the head of the foreign quarter, to
remoter parts--where a broad flight of marble steps descends to the
level of the flood, and a ferry crosses to the opposite bank: looking
over at the trees and fields, it is like the open country, yet beyond
are St. Peter's and the Vatican, and the whole of what is known as the
Leonine City. But one cannot follow the Tiber through the streets of
Rome as one may the Seine in Paris: in the thickly-built quarters the
houses back upon the stream and its yellow waves wash their foundations,
working wrath and woe from time to time, as those who were there in the
winter of 1870 will recollect. Sometimes it is lost to sight for half a
mile together, unless one catches a glimpse of it through the
carriage-way of a palace. From the wharf of the Ripetta it disappears
until you come upon it again at the bridge of St. Angelo, the Ælian
bridge of ancient Rome, which is the most direct passage from the
fashionable and foreign quarter to the Trastevere. It must be confessed
that the idle sense of mere pleasure generally supersedes recollection
and association after one's first astonishment to find one's self among
the historic places subsides; yet how often, as our horses' hoofs rang
on the slippery stones, my thoughts went suddenly back to the scene when
Saint Gregory passed over, chanting litanies, at the head of the whole
populace, who formed one vast penitential procession, and saw the
avenging angel alight on the mausoleum of Adrian and sheath his sword in
sign that the plague was stayed; or to that terrible day when the
ferocious mercenaries of the Constable de Bourbon and the wretched
inhabitants given over to sack and slaughter swarmed across together,
butchering and butchered, while the troops in the castle hurled down
what was left of its classic statues upon the heads of friend and foe,
and the Tiber was turned to blood!
[Illustration: THE CASTLE OF ST. ANGELO.]
[Illustration: ISLAND OF THE TIBER.]
From the bridge of St. Angelo the river is lost again for a long
distance, although one can make one's way to it at various points--where
at low water the submerged piers of the Pons Triumphalis are to be seen,
where the Ponte Sisto leads to the foot of the Janiculum Hill, and on
the opposite bank the orange-groves of the Farnesina palace hang their
golden fruit and dusky foliage over the long garden-wall upon the
river--until we come to the Ponte Quatro Capi (Bridge of the Four Heads)
and the island of the Tiber. This is said to have been formed in the
kingly period by the accumulation of a harvest cast into the stream a
little way above, which the current could not sweep away: it made a
nucleus for alluvial deposit, and the island gradually arose. Several
hundred years afterward it was built into the form of a ship, as bridges
and wharves are built, with a temple in the midst, and a tall obelisk
set up in guise of its mast. In mediæval days a church replaced the
heathen fane, and now it stands between its two bridges, a huddle of
houses, terraces and gardens, whence one looks down on the fine mass of
the Ponte Rotto (Broken Bridge), whose shattered arches pause in
mid-stream, and across to the low arch of the Cloaca Maxima and the
exquisite little circular temple of Vesta. From here down, the river is
in full view from either side until it passes beyond the walls near the
Monte Testaccio--on one side the Ripa Grande (Great Bank or Wharf), a
long series of quays, on the other the Marmorata or marble landing,
where the ships from the quarries unload. Here, on each side, all sorts
of small craft lie moored, not betokening a very extensive commerce from
their size and shape, but quaint and oddly rigged, making a very good
fore-or back-ground, according as one looks at the picture. The
Marmorata is at the foot of the Aventine, the most lonely and unvisited
of the Seven Hills. From among the vegetable-gardens and cypress-groves
which clothe its long flank rise large, formless piles, whose
foundations are as old as the Eternal City, and whose superstructures
are the wreck of temples of the kingly and republican periods, and
palaces and villas of imperial times, and haughty feudal abodes, only to
be distinguished from one another by the antiquary amid their
indiscriminate ruin and the tangle of wild-briers and fern, ivy and
trailers with which they are overgrown. On the summit no trace of
ancient Rome is to be seen. There are no dwellings of men on this
deserted ground: a few small and very early Christian churches have
replaced the temples which once stood here, to be in their turn
neglected and forsaken: they stand forlornly apart, separated by
vineyards and high blank walls. On the brow of the hill is the esplanade
of a modern fort, and within its quiet precincts are the church and
priory of the Knights of Malta--nothing but a chapel and small villa as
abandoned as the rest. After toiling up a steep and narrow lane between
two walls, our carriage stopped at a solid wooden gateway, and the
coachman told us to get out and look through the keyhole. We were
aghast, but he insisted, laughing and nodding; so we pocketed our pride
and peeped. Through an overarching vista of dark foliage was seen, white
and golden in a blaze of sunshine, the cupola of St. Peter's, which is
at the farthest end of the city, two miles at the least as the crow
flies. When the gate was opened we entered a sweet little garden full of
violets, traversed by an alley of old ilex trees, through which appeared
the noble dome, and which led from the gate to a terrace overhanging the
Tiber--I will not venture to guess how far below--more like two than one
hundred feet; perhaps still farther. On the edge of the terrace was an
arbor, and here we sank down enchanted, to drink in the view of the
city, which spread out under our eyes as we had never seen it from any
other point. But the custodino's wife urged us to come into the Priorato
and see the view from the upper story. We followed her, reluctant to
leave the sunshine and soft air, up a stiff winding staircase, through
large, dark, chilly, long-closed apartments, until we reached the top,
where there was a great square room occupying the whole floor. She flung
open the windows, and never did such a panorama meet my eyes. There were
windows on every side: to the north, one looked across the city to St.
Peter's, the Vatican, the Castle of St. Angelo, the Tiber with its great
bends and many bridges, and to lonely, far-away Soracte; westward, on
the other side of the river, rose the Janiculum with its close-wedged
houses, grade on grade, and on its summit the church of San Pietro in
Montorio and the flashing cataract of the Acqua Paola fountain, the
stone-pines of the Villa Dolia cresting the ridge above; eastward, the
Palatine, a world of ruins in a world of gardens, lay between us and the
Coliseum, and over them and the wall, the aqueducts, the plain, the eye
ranged to the snow-capped Sabine Hills, on whose many-colored
declivities tiny white towns were dotted like browsing sheep; southward,
we gazed down upon the Pyramid of Cestius, upon the beautiful Protestant
cemetery with its white monuments and dark cypresses where lie Shelley
and Keats, upon the stately Porta San Paolo, a great mediæval gateway
flanked with towers, and beyond, the Campagna, purple, violet,
ultramarine, oceanic, rolling out toward the Alban Hills, which
glittered with snow, rising sharply like island-peaks and sloping down
like promontories into the plain; and over all the sun and sky and
shadows of Italy.
[Illustration: CUPOLA OF ST. PETER'S.]
[Illustration: THE PINCIO, FROM THE VILLA BORGHESE.]
The prospect from the Priorato surpasses anything in Rome--even the
wonderful view from the Janiculum, even the enchanting outlook from the
Pincian Hill. But the last was at our very doors: we could go thither in
the morning to watch the white mist curl up from the valleys and hang
about the mountain-brows, and at noon, when even in January the cool
avenues and splashing fountains were grateful, and at sunset, when the
city lay before us steeped in splendor. That was the view of our daily
walks--the beloved view of which one thinks most often and fondly in
remembering Rome.
[Illustration: SORACTE.]
But it is in riding that one grows to feel most familiar with the Tiber
and all his Roman children, whether it be strolling somewhat sulkily in
a line with his banks by the Via Flaminia or the Via Cassia, impatient
to get away from their stones and dust to the soft, springing turf; or
hailing him from afar as a guide after losing one's self in the endless
undulations of the open country; or cantering over daffodil-sheeted
meadows beside the Anio at the foot of the grassy heights on which
Antemnæ stood; or threading one's way doubtfully among the ravines which
intersect the course of the little Cremera as one goes to Veii. The last
is a most beautiful and interesting expedition, for, what with the
distance--more than twelve miles--and the difficulty of finding the way,
it is quite an enterprise. As one turns his horse's head away from the
river, off the high-road, to the high grassy flats, the whole Campagna
seems to lie before one like a vast table-land, with nothing between
one's self and Soracte as he lifts his heavy shoulder from the
plain--not half hidden by intervening mountains, as from some points of
view, but majestic and isolated, thirty miles away to the north. But
here, as in every other part of the Campagna, one cannot go far without
finding hillocks and hollows, long steep slopes and sudden little dells,
and, stranger still, unsuspected tracts of woodland, for the general
effect of the Roman landscape is quite treeless. So there is a few
miles' gallop across the trackless turf, sometimes asking the way of a
solitary shepherd, who looms up against the sky like a tower, sometimes
following it by faint landmarks, few and far between, of which we have
been told, and hard to find in that waste, until we pass a curious
little patriarchal abode shaped like a wigwam, where, in the midst of
these wide pastures dwells a herdsman surrounded by his family, his
cattle, his dogs, his goats and his fowls--the beautiful animals of the
Campagna, long-haired, soft-eyed, rich-colored, like the human children
of the soil. Then we strike the Cremera, and exploring begins among its
rocky gullies, up and down which the spirited, sure-footed horses
scramble like chamois. Thick woods of cork-oak clothe their sides, and
copses of a deciduous tree which I never saw in its summer dress of
green, but which keeps its dead leaves all through the winter, a full
suit of soft, pale brown contrasting with the dark evergreens. Among
these woods grow all the wild-flowers of the long Roman spring from
January to May--flowers that I never saw in bloom at the same time
anywhere else. On banks overcanopied by faded boughs nodded myriads of
snowdrops; farther on we held our horses' heads well up as they slipped,
almost sitting, down the damp rocky clefts of a gorge whose sides were
purple with violets, mingling their delicious odor, the sweetest and
most sentimental of perfumes, with the fresh, geranium-like scent of the
cyclamen, which here and there flung back its delicate pinkish petals
like one amazed: then came acres of anemones--not our pale wind-shaken
flower, but brave asters of half a dozen superb kinds. Up and down these
passes we forced our way through interlacing branches, which drooped too
low, until we had crossed the ridges on either side the Cremera, and
gained the valley at the head of which is Isola Farnese, the
rock-fortress supposed to occupy the site of the citadel of Etruscan
Veii. It is not really an island, in spite of its name; only a bold
peninsula, round whose base two rivulets flow and nearly meet. It is
called a village, and so it is, with quite a population, but the great
courtyard of the fifteenth-century castle contains them all, and the
huts, pig-pens, kennels and coops which they seem to inhabit
indiscriminately. Except where the bluff overlooks the valley,
everything is closed and shut in by rocks and gorges, through one of
which a lovely waterfall drips from a covert of boughs and shrubbery and
wreathing ferns and creepers into a little stream, which with musical
clamor rushes at a picturesque old mill: through another the road from
the castle passes through a narrow issue to the outer world. And this
stranded and shipwrecked fortress in the midst of so wild a scene is all
that exists to mark where Veii stood, the powerful city which kept Rome
at bay for ten years, and fell at length by stratagem! Its site was
forgotten for nearly two thousand years, but in this century the
discovery of some tombs revealed the secret.
[Illustration: VEII, FROM THE CAMPAGNA.]
[Illustration: TIVOLI.]
The scenery differs entirely on different sides of Rome. Here there is
not a ruin, not a vestige, except a few low heaps of stone-or brickwork
hidden by weeds: on the other, toward Tivoli, much of the beauty is due
to the work of man--the stately remnants of ancient aqueduct, temple and
tomb; the tall square towers of feudal barons, round which cluster low
farm-buildings scarcely less old and solid; the vast, gloomy grottoes of
Cerbara, which look like the underground palace of a bygone race, but
which are the tufa-quarries of classic times; the ruined baths of
Zenobia, where the rushing milky waters of the Aquæ Albulæ fill the air
with sulphurous fumes; and, as a climax, the Villa of Hadrian, less a
country-place than a whole region, a town-in-country, with palace,
temples, circus, theatres, baths amidst a tract of garden and
pleasure-ground ten miles in circumference. Even when one is familiar
with the enormous height and bulk of the Coliseum or the Baths of
Caracalla, the extent of the ruins of Hadrian's Villa is overwhelming.
Numerous fragments are still standing, graceful and elegant, but a vast
many more are buried deep under turf and violets and fern: large
cypresses and ilexes have struck root among their stones, and they form
artificial hills and vales and great wide plateaus covered with herbage
and shrubbery, hardly to be distinguished from the natural accidents of
the land. The solitude is as immense as the space. After leaving our
carriage we wandered about for hours, sometimes lying in the sunshine at
the edge of a great grassy terrace which commands the Campagna and the
Agro Romano--beyond whose limits we had come--to where, like a little
bell, St. Peter's dome hung faint and blue upon the horizon; sometimes
exploring the innumerable porticoes and galleries, and replacing in
fancy the Venus de Medici, the Dancing Faun, and all the other shapes of
beauty which once occupied these ravished pedestals and niches;
sometimes rambling about the flowery fields, and up and down among the
hillocks and dells, meeting no one, until at length, when completely
bewildered and lost, we fell in with a rustic belonging to the estate,
who guided us back. We left the place with the sense of having been in a
separate realm, another country, belonging to another age. The whole of
that visit to Tivoli was like a dream. The sun was sinking when we left
the precincts of the villa, and twilight stole upon us, wrapping all the
landscape on which we looked back in softer folds of shade, and
resolving its features into large, calm masses, as the horses labored up
the narrow, stony road into a mysterious wood of gigantic olives,
gnarled, twisted and rent as no other tree could be and live. The scene
was wild and weird in the dying light, and it grew almost savage as we
wound upward among the robber-haunted hills. Night had fallen before we
reached the mountain-town. Our coachman dashed through the dark slits of
streets, where it seemed as if our wheels must strike the houses on each
side, cracking his whip and jingling the bells of the harness. Under
black archways sat groups of peasants, their swart visages lit up from
below by the glow of a brazier, while a flaring torch stuck through a
ring overhead threw fierce lights and shadows across the scene. Sharp
cries and shouts like maledictions rose as we passed, and as we turned
into the little square on which the inn stands we wondered in what sort
of den we should have to lodge. We followed our host of the little
Albergo della Regnia up the steep stone staircase with many misgivings:
he flung open a door, and we beheld a carpeted room, all furnished and
hung with pink chintz covered with cupids and garlands. There were
sofas, low arm-chairs, a writing-table with appurtenances, a tea-table
with snowy linen and a hissing brass tea-kettle. Opening from this were
two little white nests of bed-rooms, with tin bath-tubs and an abundance
of towels. We could not believe our eyes: here were English comfort and
French taste. Were we in May Fair or the Rue de Rivoli? Or was it a
fairy-tale?
[Illustration: CASTLE AT OSTIA.]
The fairy-tale went on next day, when, after wending our way through the
dirty, crooked little streets, we crossed a courtyard and descended a
long subterranean stairway to emerge on a magnificent terrace with a
heavy marble balustrade, whence flights of steps led down to lower
grades, amid statues, urns, vases, fountains, reservoirs, camellias in
bloom mingled with laurel and myrtle and laurustinums covered with
creamy flowers, cypresses tall as cathedral spires, ilex avenues, and
broad straight walks between huge walls of box: the whole space was
filled with the song of nightingales, the tinkle of falling water, with
whiffs of aromatic shrubs and the breath of hidden roses and violets;--a
princely garden, a royal pleasaunce, but in exquisite disorder and
neglect; the shrubbery too thick and straggling, the flowers straying
beyond their rightful boundaries, the statues stained and moss-grown,
the balusters entangled in clinging luxuriance, the fountains dripping
through fern and maiden-hair--Nature supreme, as one always sees her in
this land of Art. It was the Villa d'Este, famous these three hundred
years for its fountains and cypresses. Nor did the wonder cease when we
forsook this enchanting spot for the mountain-road which overhangs the
great ravine. Opposite, backed by mountains, rose the crags topped by
the clustering town and all its towers, arches, niches, battlements,
bridges, long lines of classic ruins, and on the edge of the abyss the
perfect little temple of the Sibyl; rushing down from everywhere the
waterfalls, one great column plunging at the head of the gorge, and
countless frolic streams, the _cascatelle_, leaping and dancing
from rock to rock through mist and rainbow and extravagance of emerald
moss and herbage, down among sea-green, silvery olives, finally sliding
away, between softer foliage and verdure, through the valley into the
plain--the immense azure plain, with its grand symphonic harmonies of
form and color. O land of dreams fulfilled, of satisfied longing! when
across these thousands of miles I recall your entrancing charm, your
unimaginable beauty, I sometimes wonder if you were _not_ a dream,
if you have any place in this real existence, this lower earth: are you
still delighting other eyes with the rapture of your loveliness, or were
you only an illusion, a vision, which vanishes like the glow of sunset
or "golden exhalations of the dawn "?
The Campagna has one more aspect, different from all the rest, where the
Tiber, weary with his long wanderings, rolls lazily to the sea. It is a
dreary waste of swamp and sandhill and scrub growth, but with a forlorn
beauty of its own, and the beauty of color, never absent in Italy. The
tall, coarse grass and reeds pass through a series of vivid tones,
culminating in tawny gold and deep orange, against which the
silver-fretted violet blue-green of the Mediterranean assumes a magical
splendor. Small, shaggy buffaloes with ferocious eyes, and sometimes a
peasant as wild-looking as they, are the only inhabitants of this
wilderness. The machicolated towers of Castel Fusano among its grand
stone-pines stand up from the marshes, and farther seaward another
castle with a single pine; but they only enhance the surrounding
loneliness. Ostia, the ancient port, which sea and river have both
deserted, is now a city of the dead, a Pompeii above ground, whose
avenues of tombs lead to streets of human dwellings more desolate still.
It is no longer by Ostia, nor even by the Tiber, that one can reach the
sea: the way was choked by sand and silt seventeen centuries ago, and
Trajan caused the canal to be made which bears his name; and this is
still the outlet from Rome to the Mediterranean, while the river expires
among the pestilential marshes.
[Illustration: HEAD OF THE TRAJAN CANAL, NEAR OSTIA.]
SIX MONTHS AMONG CANNIBALS.
[Illustration: A HALT IN THE BRUSH.]
Perhaps as good an illustration of the purely absurd (according to
civilized notions) as can be imagined is a congregation of cannibals in
a missionary church weeping bitterly over the story of Calvary. Fresh
from their revolting feasts upon the flesh of their conquered enemies,
these gentle savages weep over the sufferings of One separated from them
by race, by distance, by almost every conceivable lack of the conditions
for natural sympathy, and by over eighteen hundred years of time! Surely
there must be hope for people who manifest such sensibility, and we may
fairly question whether cannibalism be necessarily the sign of the
lowest human degradation. A good deal of light is thrown upon the
subject by the writings of the young engineer, Jules Garnier, who was
lately charged by the French minister of the interior with a mission of
exploration in New Caledonia, the Pacific island discovered by Captain
Cook just one hundred years ago, and ceded to the French in 1853.
It is about three hundred and sixty miles from Sydney to New Caledonia,
a long, narrow island lying just north of the Tropic of Capricorn, and
completely surrounded by belts of coral reef crenellated here and there,
and forming channels or passes where ships may enter. Navigation through
these channels is, however, exceedingly hazardous in any but calm
weather; and it was formerly thought that the island was on this account
practically valueless for colonization. Once inside them, however,
vessels may anchor safely anywhere, for there is in effect a continuous
roadstead all around the island. The passage through the narrow pass of
Dumbea, just outside of Noumea, affords a striking spectacle. On each
side of the ship is a wall of foam, and the reverberating thunder of the
waves dashing and breaking upon the jagged reefs keeps the mind in
breathless suspense.
The site of Noumea seems to be the most unfortunate that could be
chosen. It is a barren, rocky spot, divested of all luxuriance of
vegetation, and the nearest water, a brook called Pont des Français, is
ten miles away. The appearance of the town, which fronts the harbor in
the form of an amphitheatre, the houses and gardens rising higher and
higher as they recede from the sea, tended somewhat to reassure the
explorer, who had been wondering that human stupidity should have been
equal to selecting in a tropical country, and in one of the best-watered
islands of the world, such a situation for its capital. Wells are of
little account, for the water thus obtained is at the level of the sea,
and always salt. The population has to depend upon the rain that falls
on roofs, and as the cleanliness of these is of prime importance,
domesticating pigeons is strictly forbidden. This might not be much of a
deprivation in most places, but in New Caledonia, of all the world,
there is a kind of giant pigeon as large as a common hen! This is the
_noton_, (sic) the _Carpophage Goliath_ of the naturalist.
The hotel at Noumea was a kind of barracks, with partitions so slight
that every guest was forced to hear every sound in his neighbors' rooms.
M. Garnier, to escape this inconvenience, purchased a garden-plot, had a
cottage built in a few days, and so became a proprietor in Oceanica.
Before setting out on his exploring expedition into the interior he
tried to interest the government in a plan for cisterns to supply the
city with water--a project easy of execution from the natural
conformation of the locality. But his scheme received no encouragement
from the old-fogyish authorities. They were at that moment entertaining
one which for simplicity reminded Garnier of the egg problem of
Columbus. This was to distill the sea-water. He made a calculation of
the cost of thus supplying each of the sixteen hundred inhabitants with
five quarts of water a day, which showed that the proposition was
impracticable under the circumstances.
From the showing of official accounts, this French colony of New
Caledonia must be one of the most absurd that exists. The military and
naval force far exceeds in number the whole civil population; and this,
too, when the natives are quiet and submissive, few in number, and fast
dying out through the inordinate use of the worst kind of tobacco,
pulmonary consumption and other concomitants of civilization not
necessary to enumerate. Contrast this with the rich and populous
province of Victoria, which has only three hundred and fifty soldiers;
with Brisbane, which has only sixteen to a population of one hundred
thousand; and finally Tasmania, which has only seven soldiers for two
hundred thousand colonists!
It was believed formerly that New Caledonia was rich in gold-mines, and
the principal object of the expedition of M. Garnier was to discover
these. After one or two short excursions in the neighborhood of Noumea
he set out on an eight months' journey through the entire eastern
portion of the island. The plan which he adopted was to double the
southern extremity of the island, sail up the eastern coast between the
reefs and the mainland, as is the custom, stopping at the principal
stations and making long excursions into the interior, accompanied by a
guard of seven men. This plan he carried out, though some parts of the
country to be explored were inhabited by tribes that had seldom or never
seen a European. His testimony as to the almost unexceptionable kindness
of the natives, cannibals though they are, must be gratifying to those
who accept the doctrine of the brotherhood of man. Of the natives near
Balarde he says: "The moment you land all offer to guide your steps, and
in every way they can to satisfy your needs. Do you wish to hunt? A
native is ever ready to show you the marsh where ducks most abound. Are
you hungry or thirsty? They fly to the cocoanut plantation with the
agility of monkeys. If a swamp or a brook stops your course, the
shoulders of the first comer are ever ready to carry you across. If it
rains, they run to bring banana-leaves or make you a shelter of bark.
When night comes they light your way with resinous torches, and finally,
when you leave them, you read in their faces signs of sincere regret."
Captain Cook, in his eulogies of these gentle savages, probably never
dreamed that they were anthropophagi, and if he had known the fact, his
kindly nature would have found some extenuation for them. Cannibals, as
a rule--certainly those of New Caledonia--do not eat each other
indiscriminately. For example, they dispose of their dead with tender
care, though they despatch with their clubs even their best friends when
dying; but this is with them a religious duty. They only eat their
enemies when they have killed them in battle. This also, in their code
of morals, appears to be a duty. Toussenel, in his _Zoölogie
Passionelle_, has a kind word even for these savages: "Let us pity
the cannibal, and not blame him too severely. We who boast of our
refined Christian civilization murder men by tens of thousands from
motives less excusable than hunger. The crime lies not in roasting our
dead enemy, but in killing him when he wishes to live."
During M. Garnier's expedition he met the chief Onime, once the head of
a powerful tribe, now old and dispossessed of his power through the
revolt of his tribe some years previous. At that time a price had been
put upon his head, and he took refuge in the mountains. There was no
sign of discouragement or cruelty in his manners, but his face expressed
a bitter and profound sorrow. There was not a pig or a chicken on his
place--for he would have nothing imported by the _papalés_, or
Europeans--but he gave his guests a large quantity of yams, for which he
would accept no return except a little tobacco. When, however, Garnier
tied a pretty crimson handkerchief about the head of Onime's child, who
danced for joy at the possession of such a treasure, the old chief was
visibly moved, and gave his hand to the stranger. Two years later this
old man, being suspected of complicity in the assassination of a
colonist, was arrested, bound in chains and thrown into a dungeon. Three
times he broke his chains and escaped, and each time was recaptured. He
was then transported to Noumea. M. Garnier happened to be on the same
ship. The condition of the old man was pitiful. Deep wounds, exposing
the bones, were worn into his wrists and ankles in his attempts to free
himself from his chains. Three days later he died, and on a subsequent
examination of facts M. Garnier became convinced that Onime was innocent
of the crime charged against him. On the ship he recognized Garnier, and
accepted from him a little tobacco. Tobacco is more coveted by these
people than anything else in the world, and the stronger it is the
better. The child almost as soon as he can walk will smoke in an old
pipe the poisonous tobacco furnished specially for the natives, which is
so strong that it makes the most inveterate European smoker ill. "Gin
and brandy have been introduced successfully," but the natives as a rule
make horrible grimaces in drinking them, and invariably drink two or
three cups of water immediately _to put out the fire_, as they say.
These natives speak a kind of "pigeon English." It would be pigeon
French, doubtless, had their first relations been with the French
instead of the English. The government has now stopped the sale of
spirituous liquors to the natives, and recommended the chiefs to forbid
their subjects smoking until a certain age, but no precautions yet taken
have had much influence upon their physical condition. They are rapidly
dying out. The most prevalent disease is pulmonary consumption, which
they declare has been given them by the Europeans. Fewer and fewer
children are born every year, and in the tribes about Poöbo and some
others these are almost all males. Here is a curious fact for
scientists. Is not the cause to be found in the deteriorated physical
condition of the women? Mary Trist, in her careful and extensive
experimentation with butterfly grubs, has shown that by generous feeding
these all develop into females, while by starving males only appear.
M. Garnier believes that the principal cause of the deterioration and
decay of the natives in New Caledonia is the terrible tobacco that is
furnished to them. "Everybody pays for any service from the natives in
this poison." A missionary once asked a native convert why he had not
attended mass. "Because you don't give me any tobacco," replied this
hopeful Christian. To him, as to many others, says M. Garnier, going to
church means working for the missionary, just as much as digging in his
garden, and he therefore expects remuneration. The young girls in
regions where there are missions established all wear chaplets, for they
are good Catholics after a fashion, and generally refuse to marry
pagans. This operates to bring the young men under the religious yoke.
Self-interest is their strong motive generally. The missionary makes
them understand the value of his counsel in their tribes. It means their
raising cocoanuts for their oil, flocks of chickens and droves of hogs,
for all of which they can obtain pipes, quantities of tobacco, a gun,
and gaudy-colored cottons. When the chiefs find that their power is
gradually passing from them into the hands of the missionaries, they
only smoke more poisonous tobacco, expose themselves all the more to the
weather through the cheap fragmentary dress they have adopted, and so
the ravages of consumption are accelerated. Pious Christian women, who
have always given freely of their store to missionary causes, begin to
see that the results are not commensurate with their sacrifices--that
their charity, even their personal work among heathens, teaching them to
read and write and study the catechism, to cover their bodies with dress
and to love the arts of civilization, can avail little against the rum,
tobacco and nameless maladies legally or illegally introduced with
Christianity.
During one of M. Garnier's excursions into the interior he came across
one of the sacred groves where the natives bury their dead, if hanging
them up in trees can be so designated. His guides all refused to
accompany him, fearing to excite the anger of the manes of their
ancestors. He therefore entered the high grove alone. Numerous corpses,
enveloped in carefully-woven mats and then bound in a kind of basket,
were suspended from the branches of the trees. Some of these were
falling in pieces, and the ground was strewn with whitened bones. It
seems strange that this form of burial should be chosen in a country
where at least once a year there occurs a terrible cyclone that destroys
crops, unroofs houses, uproots trees, and often sends these
basket-caskets flying with the cocoanuts through the air.
In New Caledonia there are no ferocious beasts, and the largest animal
is a very rare bird which the natives call the kagon. When, therefore,
they saw the English eating the meat from beef bones they inferred that
these were the bones of giants, and naïvely inquired how they were
captured and what weapons of war they used. The confidence and
admiration of these children of Nature are easily gained, and under such
circumstances they talk freely and delight in imparting all the
information they possess. Among one of the tribes near Balarde, M.
Garnier noticed a young woman of superior beauty, and made inquiries
about her. This was Iarat, daughter of the chief Oundo. The hornlike
protuberances on her head were two "scarlet flowers, which were very
becoming in her dark hair."
[Illustration: IARAT, DAUGHTER OF THE CHIEF OUNDO.]
This poor little woman had a history. It is told in a few words: her
father sold her to the captain of a trading-vessel for a cask of brandy.
The "extenuating circumstances" in this case are that Oundo had been
invited on board the captain's ship, plied with brandy, and when nearly
drunk assented to the shameless bargain. When Oundo became sober he
repented of his act, and the more bitterly because the young girl was
betrothed to the young chief of a neighboring tribe. But he had given
his word, and was as great a moral coward as many of his betters are,
who think that honor may be preserved by dishonor. Nearly every coaster
has a native woman on board--some poor girl of low extraction, or some
orphan left to the mercy of her chief and sold for a hatchet or a few
yards of tawdry calico; but the daughters of chiefs are not thus
delivered over to the lusts of Europeans. The case of Iarat was an
exception. These coasters' wives, if such they may be called, are said
to be very devoted mothers and faithful servants. All day long they may
be seen managing the rudder or cooking in the narrow kitchen on deck.
The vessel in the service of M. Garnier left him at Balarde, near the
north-eastern extremity of the island, but, having determined to explore
farther north, he applied to Oundo, who furnished him with a native boat
or canoe and two men for the expedition. In this boat were stowed the
camping and exploring apparatus and cooking utensils, and three of his
men, who were too fatigued by late excursions to follow Garnier on foot.
The canoe was not very large, and this freight sunk it very low in the
water; yet as the sea was perfectly calm, no danger was apprehended
until, a slight breeze springing up, a sail was hoisted. The shore-party
continued their course, exploring, digging, breaking minerals, etc.,
generally in sight of the canoe, which M. Garnier watched with some
anxiety. Suddenly, Poulone, his faithful native guide, exclaimed,
"Captain, the pirogue sinks!" There was no time to be lost, for one of
the men could not swim at all, and the other two but indifferently.
Fortunately, the trunk of a tree was found near the water, some paddles
were improvised, and this primitive kind of boat was quickly afloat,
with the captain and Poulone on board. The canoe was some rods from the
shore, but the three men were picked up, having been supported meanwhile
by their dark companions. The latter did not swim ashore, but the moment
they were relieved from their charges, and without a word, set about
getting the canoe afloat. As to the cargo, it was all in plain sight,
but more than twenty feet under the limpid water. This was a great
misfortune. Some of the instruments were valuable, and could not be
replaced. If not recovered, the expedition to the north of the island
must be abandoned. In this strait Garnier despatched a messenger back to
Oundo, asking the old chief to come to the rescue with all his tribe. "I
did not count in vain," says he, "upon the generosity of this man, for
very soon I saw him approach, followed by the young people of his
tribe." He listened to the recital of the misfortune with every sign of
sympathy.
"Oundo," said M. Garnier, "I expect that you will once more show your
well-tried friendship for the French people by rendering me a great
service. Do you think you can recover these things for me?"
"Oundo will try," replied the chief simply. He then addressed his people
and gave his commands. In a moment, and with a loud cry of approbation
and good-will, they dashed into the water and swam out to the scene of
disaster.
It is a fine sight to see these natives of Oceanica, the best swimmers
in the world, darting under the water like bronze tritons. They
generally swim beneath the surface, coming up from time to time to
breathe, and shaking the water from their thick curly hair. M. Garnier
followed the natives on the log that had served as a lifeboat, and to
encourage them by example undressed and threw himself into the water.
The work commenced. Twenty or thirty feet is not much of a dive for a
South Sea Islander. Every minute the divers brought up some object with
a shout of triumph. They were in their element, and so spiritedly did
they undertake the task that women, and even the children, dived to the
bottom and constantly brought up some small object. The three guns of
the men, their trappings, the heavy box of zoological specimens, all the
instruments, were brought up in succession. Even the sole cooking-pot of
the expedition and the tin plates were recovered. The work occupied some
six hours. M. Garnier thanked the chief and his brave people, who when
the work was finished returned to their huts as quietly as they came.
And this chief was the man who had sold his daughter for a keg of
brandy!
Another chief, named Bourarte, the head of a great tribe near Hienguène,
deserves a few words. He was a chief of very superior experience and
intelligence. He had studied civilization diligently, enjoyed the
society of Europeans and knew that his people were barbarians. His story
is a most touching one. He said: "I always loved the English. They
treated me as a chief, and paid me honestly for all they received. One
day I consented to go with them to their great city of Sydney. It was
there that I learned the weakness of my people. I was well received
everywhere, but I longed to return. It was with pleasure that I saw
again our mountains and heard the joyful cries of welcome from my tribe.
About that time your people came. I paid little attention to them at
first, but because one of my men killed a Kanacka who was a protégé of
the missionaries there came a great ship (the Styx) into my port. The
captain sent for me. I went on board without fear, but my confidence was
betrayed. I was made a prisoner and transported to Tahiti. It was six
years before I saw my tribe again: they had already mourned me as dead.
I will tell you what happened in my absence. My people prepared for
vengeance: the French were apprised of the fact. They came again. And as
my people, filled with curiosity, flocked to the shore, the French fired
their cannon into the crowd. My people were frightened and fled into the
woods. Your soldiers landed, and for three days they burned our huts,
destroyed our plantations and cut down our cocoa trees. And all this
time," added the old chief with a heavy sigh, "I was a prisoner at
Tahiti, braiding baskets to gain a little food, and the grief that I
suffered whitened my head before the time."
[Illustration: A KANACKA FAMILY TRAVELING.]
After a long pause, during which the old Bourarte seemed lost in
thought, he said, "It is true that my people revenged themselves. They
killed a good many, and among them one of your chiefs. What is most
strange about this war is, that three English colonists, who lived
peacefully among us by their commerce and fishing, were taken by the
French and shot. Another Englishman, Captain Paddon, to whom I had sold
many a cargo of sandal-wood, on learning the fate of his compatriots,
fled on board a little boat with one Kanacka and a few provisions, got
out to sea, and, as I have been told, actually gained the port of
Sydney." This, it seems, is a historical fact. It was a boat without a
deck, and the distance is three hundred and sixty marine miles!
The result of the exploring mission of M. Garnier was not a discovery of
gold-mines, as so many had hoped. He is of the opinion that gold
deposits are scarce in the island. His report of the natives is on the
whole favorable, and confirms the testimony of missionaries and others,
that they are superior savages, easily civilized and Christianized, but
from some cause or combination of causes fast dying out before the
advance of civilization. In some respects they are less rude than other
South Sea Islanders, but they treat their women in much the same way. M.
Garnier gives us a photograph of a New Caledonia family on the road, the
head of the family, a big, stolid brute apparently, burdened only with
his club, while his wife staggers along under the combined load of
sugar-canes, yams, dried fishes and other provisions.
A more revolting, but also, happily, a far rarer sight, was that of a
cannibal banquet, of which M. Garnier was a concealed witness. The scene
was a thicket in the wildest portion of the country, and only the chiefs
of the tribe, which had just gained a victory over its enemies, took
part in the feast. A blazing fire threw its bright glare on a dozen
figures seated around huge banana-leaves, on which were spread the
smoking viands of the diabolical repast. A disgusting odor was wafted
toward the spot where our Frenchman and his companions lay perdu,
enchained by a horrible fascination which produced the sensation of
nightmare. Directly in front of them was an old chief with long white
beard and wrinkled skin, who gnawed a head still covered with the singed
hair. Thrusting a pointed stick into the eye-sockets, he contrived to
extract a portion of the brain, afterward placing the skull in the
hottest part of the fire, and thus separating the bones to obtain a
wider aperture. The click of a trigger close to his ear recalled M.
Garnier to his senses, and arresting the arm of his sergeant, who,
excited to indignation, had brought his musket to his shoulder, he
hurried from a scene calculated, beyond all others, to thrill the nerves
and curdle the blood of a civilized spectator.
AN AMERICAN GIRL AND HER LOVERS.
In the spring of 1869 I was induced, for the sake of rest and
recreation, to take charge of a young American girl during a tour in
Europe. This young girl was Miss Helen St. Clair of Detroit, Michigan.
We two were by no means strangers. She had been my pupil since the time
when she was the prettiest little creature that ever wore a scarlet
hood. I have a little picture, scarlet hood and all, that I would not
exchange for the most beautiful one that Greuze ever painted. Not that
her face bore any resemblance to the pictures of Greuze. It had neither
the sweet simplicity of the girl in "The Broken Pitcher," nor the
sentimental graces which he bestows on his court beauties. It was an
exceedingly piquant, animated face, never at rest, always kindling,
flashing, gleaming, whether with sunlight or lightning. Her movements
were quick and darting, like those of a humming-bird. Her enunciation,
though perfectly distinct, was marvelously rapid. The same quickness
characterized her mental operations. Her conclusions, right or wrong,
were always instantaneous. Her prompt decisiveness, her talent for
mimicry and her witchery of grace and beauty won her a devoted following
of school-girls, to whom her tastes and opinions were as authoritative
as ever were those of Eugénie to the ladies of her court. School-girls,
like college-boys, are very apt in nicknames, and Helen's was the
"Little Princess," which her pretty, imperious ways made peculiarly
appropriate.
I do not know how her parents dared trust her to me for a year beyond
the sea, but they did. We set off in high enthusiasm, and Helen was full
of mirth and laughter till we were fairly on board the steamer in New
York harbor, when she threw herself on her father's breast with a
gesture of utter abandonment that would have made the fortune of a
débutante on any stage in the world. It was so unlooked-for that we all
broke down, and Mr. St. Clair was strongly inclined to take her home
with him. But so sudden was she in all her moods that his foot had
scarcely touched the shore before she was again radiant with
anticipation.
I will not linger on the pleasant summer travel, the Rhine majesty, the
Alpine glory. September saw us established in the city of cities--Paris.
Everywhere we had met throngs of Americans. Neighbors from over the way
in our own city greeted us warmly in most unexpected places. But we had
not crossed the ocean merely to see our own countrymen. In Paris we were
determined to eschew hotels and pensions and to become the inmates of a
French home. Everybody told us this would be impossible, but I find
nothing so stimulating as the assertion that a thing can't be done. Two
weeks of eager inquiry, and we were received into a family which could
not have been more to our wish if it had been created expressly for us.
It was that of Monsieur Le Fort, a professor in the Medical College, a
handsome elderly man with the bit of red ribbon coveted by Frenchmen in
his buttonhole. Madame Le Fort, a charming, graceful woman midway
between thirty and forty, and a pretty daughter of seventeen, completed
the family. With great satisfaction we took possession of the pretty
rooms, all white and gold, that overlooked the Rond Point des Champs
Élysées.
My little princess had found a prince in her own country, and,
considering the laws of attraction, his sudden appearance in Paris ought
not to have been a surprise to her. But, to his discomfiture, and even
anger, Helen refused to see him. She had bidden him good-bye at home,
she said; they would not be married for three years, if they ever were:
she was going to devote herself to her music; and she did not wish to
see him here. When he had completed his studies and their engagement was
announced (it was only a mutual understanding now) there would be time
enough to see each other at home. Excellent reasoning! but a fortnight
later a tiny hand slipped between my eyes and the _Figaro_ a little
note on which I read:
"DEAR FRED: I think I should like to say good-bye again.
"Yours, HELEN."
The dark eyes looked half shyly, half coaxingly into mine.
"Well," said I, "Katrine will mail it for you."
The next day I saw for the first time Mr. Frederic Denham. He was tall
and slender; with a sallow complexion, rather dull gray eyes and black
hair, by no means handsome, but sufficiently well-looking to please a
friendly eye. In his manners there was a coldness and reserve which
passed for haughtiness. He was said to possess great talents and
ambition, and Helen had the fullest belief in his genius and success.
Not Goethe himself was a greater man in her eyes.
I had frequent opportunities of seeing them together, for, according to
French ideas, nothing is more improper than to leave a young man and
woman a moment by themselves. Was it my fancy that he seemed too much
absorbed in himself, too little sensible of the rare good-fortune which
made him the favored lover of the beautiful Miss St. Clair? It might be
so, but others shared it.
"What ails the American?" asked Madame Le Fort. "Is it possible that he
is not in love with that fascinating young creature? Or are all your
countrymen so cold and inanimate? Elle est ravissante, adorable! I
cannot comprehend it."
"Probably," I replied, "he has too much reserve and delicacy to make a
display of his feelings in the presence strangers."
But I was not satisfied. The more I watched them, the more I perceived a
lack of deference to her opinions and respect for her judgment--an
irritating assumption of superior wisdom, as if he had worn the visible
inscription, "I will accept homage, but not suggestions. Offer incense
and be content." Would the little princess be content? I saw symptoms of
rebellion.
"Do _you_ think I am a little fool, Madame Fleming?" she asked with
heightened color and impetuous tone, turning suddenly to me while they
were conversing apart one evening.
November came, and we were launched on the full tide of Parisian
society. Mr. Denham had gone to Germany to complete certain scientific
studies, and he left his fair betrothed with a parting injunction not to
dance with any foreigner. As well shut her up in a cell! Nowhere is
there such a furore for dancing as in Paris. Every family has its weekly
reception, and every card of invitation bears in the corner, "On
dansera." These receptions are the freest and gayest imaginable. Any
person who has the entrée of the house comes when he feels inclined.
Introductions are not indispensable as with us: any gentleman may ask a
lady to dance with him, whether he has been formally presented or not,
and it would be an affront to decline except for a previous engagement.
The company assemble about ten, and often dance till three or four in
the morning. In any one house we see nearly the same people once a week
for the whole winter, and such frequent companionship gives a feeling of
intimacy. It is surprising how many French men and French women have
some special artistic talent, dramatic or musical, and with what ready
good-humor each contributes to the entertainment of the rest. In every
assembly, with all its sparkle of youth and gayety, there is a
background of mature age; but though a card-room is generally open, it
never seems to draw many from the salons de danse.
In these salons the little princess entered, at once upon her royalty.
Her dancing was the poetry of motion. She sang, and the most brilliant
men hung over her enraptured. "She was like Adelina Patti," they said,
"but of a more perfect and delicate type of beauty. What wonderful eyes,
with the long thick lashes veiling Oriental depths of liquid light! How
the music trickled from her fingers, and poured from her small throat
like the delicious warble of a nightingale! What a loss to art that her
position precluded her from singing in the opera! Not Malibran or Grisi
ever had triumphs that would equal hers." Eminent painters wished to
make a study of her face. Authors who had received the prizes of the
Academy for grave historical works sent her adulatory verses. "May
I--flirtation--wid you--loavely meess?" asked one of "the immortal
forty," displaying his English.
It grew rather annoying. I was importuned with questions, such as "Will
you receive proposals of marriage for Miss St. Clair?" "What is her
dowry?" "Are you entrusted to find a husband for her abroad?" I was
tired of answering, "Miss St. Clair will probably marry in her own
country." "Her parents would be very reluctant to consent to any foreign
marriage." "I cannot tell what Mr. St. Clair will give his daughter. It
is not the custom to give dowries with us, as with you."
One evening we saw at Madame Le Fort's reception a young man so
distinguished in appearance that he was known as "le beau Vergniaud." He
was six feet in height and well made, with abundant chestnut hair, dark
hazel eyes, clearly-cut, regular features, and a complexion needlessly
fine for a man. From that time he was invariably present, not only at
Madame Le Fort's, but wherever we went.
One day Helen said to me, "I made a silly speech last evening. I was
dancing with M. Vergniaud, and we were talking of that charming Madame
de Launay. I said, 'I should think she might be happy, having an elegant
house in Paris, a château in the country, and such a handsome husband so
devoted to her.' And he rejoined instantly, very low, 'My dear Miss St.
Clair, can I not give you all this?' It was not fair to take advantage
of me in that way."
"What did you say?"
"Oh, I laughed it off. I did not think he was in earnest, but he spoke
to me again before he went away."
That afternoon Madame Le Fort came into my room with the look of one who
has something important to communicate. "I have been wishing to see
you," she said. "M. Vergniaud has taken me into his confidence. He has
formed a serious attachment to Miss St. Clair, and wishes to make her
his wife. It is a splendid alliance," she continued, warming with her
theme: "if he had asked for my daughter I would give her to him
blindfold. He belongs to one of our old families. You should see his
house on the Avenue de Montaigne. Have you never seen him driving with
his superb horses in the Bois de Boulogne? He has an estate with a fine
old château in Touraine, a family inheritance. His character and habits
are unexceptionable too," she added by way of parenthesis. "It is not
often that you find all that in a man of twenty-six. So handsome
besides!"
"True," said I, "but you forget Mr. Denham."
"On the contrary, I remember him too well to conceive the possibility of
his being a rival to René Vergniaud."
"But did you mention him to M. Vergniaud?"
"Yes, and he was greatly disturbed at first, but when I told him that he
had no expectation of marrying for two or three years to come, he
laughed and said it was of no importance. M. Vergniaud would like to be
married in a few weeks, as is the custom with us, but I suppose it will
take longer to adjust the preliminaries on account of her parents being
across the Atlantic. What dowry has my little jewel?" (The inevitable
question, always put with as much simplicity and directness as if one
were asking the time of day.)
"I do not know," I replied. "It is so contrary to all our notions. I do
not think there is a man in America who in asking a father for the hand
of his daughter would inquire how much money he was to have with her. It
would be considered an insult."
"Perhaps Mr. St. Clair would prefer to settle an annuity on his
daughter. Is that the way the thing is managed in your country?"
"It is not managed at all. A man gives his daughter what he likes, or he
gives her nothing but her bridal outfit. It is never a condition of the
marriage."
"How strange all that is! One can hardly believe it in France. We set by
a sum of money for Clarice's dowry almost as soon as she was born, and
it would be a hard necessity that could compel us to diminish it by a
single sou. If you would like it, in a couple of days I can give you an
exact inventory of all M. Vergniaud's property and possessions. I could
guarantee that it will not vary twenty napoleons from the fact. We do
everything so systematically here."
"Thanks! I think it will hardly be necessary. I do not know that Helen
likes him particularly."
"Nobody admires that little paragon more than I--I should be frantically
in love with her if I were a man--but she had better think twice before
rejecting such a _parti_ as René Vergniaud, especially if she has
no dowry. You will surely not permit her to do so without communicating
with her father? He will understand her interests better."
"In this case I shall let her do just as she pleases, as her father
would if he were here."
Madame Le Fort's look of amazed incredulity was truly comical. What
ought I to do? I queried. On the whole, I decided to do the easiest
thing--wait.
The next day I was honored with a call from M. Vergniaud. He believed
that Madame Le Fort had spoken to me of his profound attachment to the
lovely Miss St. Clair--the most passionate, the most devoted. Might he
hope for my influence with her father and mother? The matter of dowry
was indifferent to him: his income was sufficiently large, and, alas! he
had no parents to consult. Would I favor him with Mr. St. Clair's
address and a few words of introduction to him? He should be under
everlasting obligations to me, and if there was anything he could do to
show his gratitude, his appreciation--
I interrupted these protestations: "I doubt if Mr. St. Clair would
consent to any marriage which would separate him from his daughter,
however advantageous it might be in other respects."
"My dear madame, who asks it? I have no business or profession: we could
easily spend a part of every year in America if it were desirable."
"That would certainly make it easier, but it will be better to defer
writing till we have some intimation of Miss St. Clair's sentiments. Her
father will be guided chiefly by her inclination."
"It is a nice country for young girls, America," said he with a smile.
"I shall do all that is possible to win Miss St. Clair's favor, for life
would be worthless without her." And he bowed himself gracefully out.
Is it possible that Helen will be indifferent to this young Antinous?
thought I. Poor Mr. Denham would have small chance with me if I were in
her place.
An hour later the concierge sent up to me an exquisite bouquet of
violets and white camellias, with the card of René Vergniaud and a
folded note: "If Madame Fleming does not think it improper, will she be
so kind as to give these flowers to my beautiful queen?"
M. Vergniaud had asked Madame Le Fort's permission to call on Miss St.
Clair. "Certainly not," she replied. "I am astounded at such
presumption! But you may call to see _me_. To-morrow evening we go
to the opera, and Wednesday to Madame Perier's, and Thursday is my
reception, and Friday we have tickets to _Phèdre_ at the Français.
Saturday, then: it is the first evening we have free."
We were all assembled in the salon as usual after dinner when M.
Vergniaud was announced. The little princess was radiant. She had never
been merrier in a school-girl frolic or more ready with gibe and jest
and laughter. She sang her best songs, putting her whole soul into
them--"Si tu savais comme je l'aime." René Vergniaud was so dazed that
he came near bidding farewell to his senses for ever. He evidently
thought that all this brilliancy was for him, and was in such a rapture
of delight that he never noticed Madame Le Fort's repeated glances at
the clock, and was only roused by the polite invitation to come
_again_. He was not too disconcerted to make a charming apology,
like a true Parisian, and tore himself away.
Late as it was, as soon as we were in our own little parlor I could not
forbear saying, "I was surprised at you to-night, Helen. How
_could_ you run on so? Madame Le Turc there, too! and you know the
young French girls never open their lips to say more than 'Oui,
monsieur'--'Non, monsieur,' to a gentleman. What will M. Vergniaud
think?"
"I don't care what he thinks," flinging herself down on an ottoman with
her head in my lap; "but I _do_ care what you think, Madame
Fleming. Did I behave so very badly? I didn't mean to, but I was
resolved he should not get a chance to talk any nonsense to-night; and
he _did_, after all. I hate being made love to before a whole room
full. I _had_ to laugh or else cry." And the little fairy dissolved
in a shower of tears, like another Undine.
Another week went by. On Saturday afternoon Helen asked, "Will you be so
kind as to take me to the little Protestant church beyond the Arc
d'Étoile this evening, Madame Fleming? I should like so much to hear
that good M. Bercier."
"So should I. But you have not forgotten that M. Vergniaud will be
here."
"I am under no obligation to entertain Madame Le Fort's callers."
"But you know, Helen, that he comes for your sake. It is well for you to
consider that the future Madame Vergniaud will have in some respects a
more brilliant position than perhaps any man in our country could offer
you."
"I know all that, and I don't pretend to say that I should not like it.
I am ashamed of being so worldly, but to have a superb establishment and
all this charming Parisian society, and give a grand ball whenever I
liked, would be just paradise. And to have it all in my grasp, and not
be able to take it, is too aggravating. It is so vexatious that the
right man never has the right things."
We went to church. M. Vergniaud called, but recollected an engagement
which took him away early. Monday evening he dropped in again just after
dinner: "Do not let me derange you in the least, je vous en prie,
madame. I come early because I am engaged to three balls to-night."
Miss St. Clair could hardly have been more mute and statue-like if she
had been born and bred in France, where in the presence of gentlemen
young girls silently adhere to their brilliant mothers, whose wit and
grace and social tact make the charm of the Parisian salons. Apparently,
the French consider that the combined attractions of youthful faces and
sprightly conversation would be too much for any man, and mercifully
divide the two. And this leaves them helpless before a little American
girl, laughing, talking, jesting, teasing, till, bewildered by such a
phenomenon, they are swept down so easily that one is reminded of
Attila's taunt to the Romans, "The thicker the grass, the quicker it is
mowed."
This social etiquette was very irksome to my little firefly, who seemed
always opening and shutting her wings. In the course of the evening M.
Vergniaud slipped into her hand, unperceived by any of us, a closed
envelope with the whisper, "Put it in your pocket. Do not let any one
see you."
She opened it deliberately: "M. Vergniaud is so kind as to give me his
photograph, Madame Fleming. Do you think it a good likeness?"
The mystery which French people are fond of attaching to harmless
trifles is inconceivable. One evening, in the earlier part of our stay
in Paris, a cousin of Miss St. Clair's, who was in the same hotel with
Mr. Denham, called on us, and when he was taking leave she held out an
unsealed note: "Will you give this to Fred? Don't forget it."
Madame Le Fort was thunderstruck: "Is it possible? Send a note to a
young gentleman right before Madame Fleming and all of us!"
"Why," said I, "do young people never write notes to each other in
France?" "Not openly like that--little three-cornered notes to slip
into the hand while dancing."
"This is the way to fold them," said Clarice, taking up a small sheet of
paper. "You see that will just fit into the hollow of the hand, and
nobody could ever see it."
"I like our way much better. What is done openly is not half so
mischievous."
"Nor half so interesting," rejoined Clarice.
The nimble hours danced on, as they had a trick of doing in Madame Le
Fort's salon. "I am afraid you forget the three balls, M. Vergniaud."
"How can you be so cruel, mademoiselle? I shall only make my compliments
to the hostess and dance one set at each. I never do more except when I
come here."
A few days later I asked Helen, "Have you made up your mind what answer
to give M. Vergniaud? He intends to write to your father. He was
speaking to me about it again to-day."
"I won't have him writing to my father," she replied with her wonted
impetuosity. "I will not have my father worried about nothing. It would
be a month before I could set it right."
"He seems to be very much in love with you. He says he shall be in
despair, wretched for ever, if you reject him."
"So they all say. I don't believe a word of it, and I can't help it if
they are. I can't marry more than one of them, and I don't believe I
shall ever marry anybody. I won't be persecuted to death."
The little princess was irritated. Something had evidently gone wrong.
It soon came out: "I had a letter from Fred this morning--a very
disagreeable letter."
"Indeed! You have not yet answered it, I suppose."
"No: he will have to write differently from that before he gets any
answer from me. I am not going to be lessoned and scolded as if I were a
little girl. Father never does it, and I will not submit to it from
_him_" After a pause: "He is not so much to blame. It is that
odious Mr. Wilkins, who keeps writing to him how much attention I
receive, and all that. As if I could help it! Poor old Fred! We have
known each other ever since we were children."
That explains it, I thought. "Helen, if you have decided to say no to M.
Vergniaud, the sooner you say it the better."
"I have said it, and he doesn't mind it in the least. I wish you would
tell him: you always speak so that people know you are in earnest and
can't help believing you."
"Very well, Helen. I will ask Madame Le Fort to tell him that his suit
is hopeless, and that he must not annoy you by persisting in it."
Early in February the Belgian ambassador, M. le comte de Beyens, and
Madame la comtesse, kindly took charge of Miss St. Clair to the imperial
ball at the Tuileries. She had never looked more charming than in the
exquisite costume of pale rose-colored faille, with a floating mist of
white tulle, caught here and there by rosebuds that might have grown in
Chrimhild's garden. The airy figure, so graceful in every motion, the
well-poised head with its flutter of shining curls, the wonderful dark
eyes, the perfect eyebrows, the delicious little mouth where love seemed
to nestle--when she had vanished "it seemed like the ceasing of
exquisite music." Madame la comtesse congratulated me on her appearance,
and afterward on her success. The emperor had distinguished her in a
very flattering manner, and Eugénie, looking earnestly at her, said to
the comtesse, "Nothing is so beautiful as youth," perhaps beginning to
regret her own. No one had made so decided a sensation.
At Madame Le Fort's next reception there was a sudden influx of new
guests--a young Belgian baron of old historic name, slim and stiff as a
poker; a brisk French viscount, who told me that he had been connected
with the embassy at Washington, and had quite fallen in love with our
institutions; an Italian chevalier, a Russian prince.
Ugliness has its compensations, thought I. Nobody makes such a fuss over
a pretty girl at home (they are not so uncommon), and I will never bring
one to Paris again. Thank Heaven! we are going to Italy soon.