Every evening at eight o'clock--although, honestly ashamed of having
been the cause of such a change in the household, we made every
effort to prevent it--every evening at eight o'clock, the door of the
drawing-room opened and Jacob announced the supper.
The dining-room was rather small and narrow, and was nearly filled by
the oblong table, at one end of which Wagner took his place.
To the supper, consisting of cold meats, salad, cakes and fruit, the
Master loved to add some of the champagne of his friend Chandon, and
this, he said, we could drink without hesitation because his French
admirer had presented him with more than he could use.
Wagner enjoyed this supper and declared that he could not understand
why he had not instituted it long before.
"We never thought of it," said he. "It is an incredible oversight not
to have thought of a thing so agreeable, even indispensable! In future,
it shall always be served, and we shall bless the reform that was
brought about by your fasting of the first evening."
We lingered at table, talking. The Master's words, now violent and
impassioned, now joyous, but always sincere, made an intense, almost a
magnetic impression upon us. We passed through all the phases that they
described--enthusiasm, indignation, despair. Each circumstance that
he recalled of his life, so full of vexations, _"les misérabilités,"_
as he said, he seemed to live over again, and we also endured with him
all the heart-breaks and the pangs. Yet, if he saw us becoming too
deeply moved, in order that we might recover ourselves, he would give
expression, without any change of voice, to some irresistible bit of
fun, and end by making us shout with laughter.
The pug-dog, "Cos," having a slight irritation of the skin, was on a
diet, and meat had been forbidden him. If, unable to resist his urgent
pleadings, one of the company stealthily gave him a little morsel,
Wagner stopped abruptly in whatever he was saying, and emphatically
repeated the doctor's orders. It was wonderful, that considerate
thoughtfulness, in which nothing escaped him; and it revealed to us the
infinite goodness, the boundless altruism of that great man, with his
overwhelming personality.