_Still at Royat. Hotel Continental.--A propos_ of PULLER "airing
his French" Miss LOUISA METTERBRUN said something delighful to him
the other day at dinner. PULLER had been instructing us all in some
French idioms until Madame METTERBRUN set him right in his
pronunciation. He owned that he had made a slip. "But," says he,
wagging his head and pulling up his wristbands with the air of a
man thoroughly well satisfied with himself generally, "but I think
you'll allow that I can speak French better than most Englishmen,
eh?"
Madame METTERBRUN doesn't exactly know what to say, but Miss LOUISA
comes to the rescue. "O Mr. PULLER"--he is frequently at their house
in London, and they know him intimately--"I always say to Mamma, when
we're abroad, that I do like to hear you talk French"--PULLER
smirks and thinks to himself that this is a girl of sense and rare
appreciation--"because," she goes on quietly, and all at table are
listening, "because your speaking French reminds me so of home." Her
home is London. I think PULLER won't ask Miss LOUISA for an opinion on
his French accent again in a hurry.
* * * * *
I have just been reading VICTOR HUGO'S _Choses Vues_. Admirable!
_Fuite de Louis Philippe!_ What a pitiful story. Then his account,
marvellously told, and the whole point of the narrative given in two
lines, of what became of the brain of TALLEYRAND. Graphically written
is his visit to THIERS on behalf of ROCHEFORT. Says THIERS to him,
"_Cent journaux me trainent tous les matins dans la boue. Mais
savez-vous mon procede? Je ne les lis pas._" To which HUGO rejoined,
"_C'est precisement ce que je fais. Lire les diatribes, c'est respirer
les latrines de sa renommee._" Most public men, certainly most
authors, artists, and actors, would do well to remember this advice,
and act upon it.
* * * * *
"_Choses Vues_," written "_Shows Vues_" would be a good heading for an
all-round-about theatrical and entertainment article in _Mr. Punch's_
pages. Patent this.
* * * * *
PULLER has recovered his high spirits. The temperature has changed:
the waters are agreeing with him. So is the dinner hour, which M.
HALL, our landlord, kindly permits us to have at the exceptional
and un-Royat-like hour of 7.30. At dinner he is convivial. Madame
METTERBRUN and her two daughters are discussing music. Cousin JANE
is deeply interested in listening to Madame METTERBRUN on WAGNER. The
young Ladies are thorough Wagnerites. La Contessa is unable to get
a word in about SHAKSPEARE and SALVINI, and her daughter, who,
in a quiet tone and with a most deliberate manner, announces herself
as belonging to the "Take-everything-easy Society," is not at this
particular moment interested in anything except the _menu_, which she
is lazily scrutinising through her long-handled _pince-nez_.
Mrs. DINDERLIN, having succumbed to the usual first attack of Royat
depression, is leaning back in her chair, smelling salts and nodding
assent to the Wagnerite theories, with which she entirely agrees.
For my own part, I am neutral; but as the METTERBRUNS are thorough
musicians,--the mother being a magnificent pianist, and the eldest
daughter a composer,--I am really interested in hearing all they have
to say on the subject. Our bias is, temporarily, decidedly Wagnerian,
for Cousin JANE, who is really in favour of "tune," and plenty of
it,--being specially fond of BELLINI and DONIZETTI,--in scientific
musical society has not the courage of her opinions.
From composers the conversation travels to executants, and we name the
favourite singers. After we have pretty well exhausted the list, and
objected to this one as having a head voice, or to that as using the
_vibrato_, or to the other as dwelling on an upper note ("queer sort
of existence," says PULLER, gradually coming up, as it were to the
surface to open his mouth for breath,--whereat Cousin JANE smiles, and
Miss CASANOVA lazily nods approbation of the joke--while the rest of
us ignore PULLER, putting him aside as not wanted just now,--when
down he goes again), we generally agree that GAYARRE is about the
best tenor we have had in London for some time; that SANTLEY is still
unequalled as a baritone; that there is no one now to play and sing
_Mephistopheles_ like FAURE; that M. MAUREL is about the finest
representative of _Don Giovanni_; that Miss ARNOLDSON shows great
promise; that ALBANY is unrivalled; that MARIE ROZE is difficult to
beat as _Carmen_; and that it is a pity that PATTI'S demands are so
exorbitant; and having exhausted the list of operatic artists,--Madame
and her daughters holding that certain Germans, with whose names we,
unfortunately for us, are not even acquainted, are far superior to any
French or Italian singers that can be named--there ensues a pause in
the conversation, of which the Countess CASANOVA takes advantage,
and extending her right hand, which movement sharply jingles her
bracelets, and so, as it were, sounds a bell to call us to attention,
cuts in quickly with an emphatic, "Well, I don't profess to understand
music as _you_ do. I know what I like"--("Hear! hear!" _sotto voce_
from PULLER, coming up again to the surface, which draws a languidly
approving inclination of the head from Miss CASANOVA, and a smile,
deprecating the interruption, from Cousin JANE),--"and I must say,"
continues the Countess, emphatically, "I would rather have one hour
of SALVINI in _Othello_, than a whole month of the best Operas by
the best composers,--WAGNER included," and down comes her hand on the
table, all the bracelets ringing down the curtain on the first act.
We, the non-combatants, feel that the mailed gauntlet has been thrown
down by the Countess as a challenge to the METTERBRUNS.
"O Mother!" faintly remonstrates Miss CASANOVA, who loves a stall at
the Opera. She fears that her mother's energetic declaration means
war, and fans herself helplessly.
I am preparing to reconcile music and the drama, and am getting ready
a supply of oil for what I foresee will be troubled waters, as the
METTERBRUNS are beginning to rustle their feathers and flap their
wings,--when PULLER, leaning well forward, and stretching out an
explanatory hand, with his elbow planted firmly on the table, ("Very
bad manners," says Cousin JANE afterwards to me) says genially, "Well,
_voyez vous_, look here, you may talk of your WAGNERS and SHAKSPEARES,
and GAYARRES, and PATTIS, but, for singing and acting, give me ARTHUR
ROBERTS. Yes," he repeats pleasantly but defiantly, and taking up,
as it were, the Countess's gauntlet, "SALVINI'S not in it with ARTHUR
ROBERTS."
The Countess's fan spreads out and works furiously. The steam is
getting up. The METTERBRUNS open their eyes, and regard one another in
consternation. They don't know who ARTHUR ROBERTS is.
"Not know!" exclaims PULLER, quite in his element. "Well, when you
come to London, you send to me, and I'll take you to hear him."
"He's a Music-Hall singer," says the Countess, fanning herself with an
air of contemptuous indifference.
"Music-Hall Ar-_tiste_!" returns PULLER, emphasising the second
syllable, which to his mind expresses a great deal, and makes all the
difference. "Now, Miladi," he goes on, imitating the manner of one
of his own favourite counsel, engaged by PULLER & CO., conducting a
cross-examination, "Have you ever seen him?"
"Yes," she replies, shrugging her shoulders, "once. And," she adds,
making the bracelets jingle again, as with a tragedy queen's action of
the right arm she sweeps away into space whole realms of Music Halls
and comic singers, "that was quite enough."
"Didn't he make you laugh?" continues PULLER, still in the character
of a stern cross-examiner.
"Laugh!" almost shrieks the Countess, extending her hands so suddenly
that I have only time to throw myself back to avoid a sharp tap on
the head from her fan. "Heavens! not a bit! not the least bit in the
world! He made me sad! I saw the people in the stalls laughing, and I
said,"--here she appeals with both hands to the majority of sensible
people at large--still at large--"'Am I stupid? am I dull? Do I not
understand?'"
"O Mother!" expostulates her daughter, in her most languid manner, "he
_was_ funny!"
"Funny!" ejaculates the Countess, tossing her head.
"I'd rather see ARTHUR ROBERTS than SALVINI," says PULLER, waggishly,
but with conviction.
"I think I would, for choice," says Miss CASANOVA, meditatively, but
seeing the Countess's horrified expression of countenance, she takes
care to add more languidly than ever, as if taking the smallest part
in an argument were really too exhausting, "but then, you know, I
really don't understand tragedy, and I love a laugh."
"Prefers ARTHUR ROBERTS to SALVINI!" exclaims the Countess, and throws
up her hands and eyes to the ceiling as if imploring Heaven not to
visit on her the awful heresy of her child.
Here I interpose. SALVINI, I say, is a great _Artiste_, no doubt of
it, a marvellous Tragedian; and ARTHUR ROBERTS is not, in the true
dramatic sense of the word, a genuine Comedian; but he is, in another
sense a true Comedian, though of the Music-Hall school.
"What a school!" murmurs the Countess, and with a pained expression of
countenance as though she were suffering agonies.
The METTERBRUNS see the difference. Madame remembers a fat comic man
in Berlin, at some garden, who used to wear a big hat and carry
a large pipe, and make her laugh very much when she was a girl.
Certainly, in his way, he was an artist. Is this ARTHUR ROBERTS
anything like MAX SPLUeTTERWESSEL? At this point, as we have finished
coffee, and the Countess finds the room hot, I propose adjourning the
debate to the Restaurant in the garden, as we are too late for the
band at the Casino Samie.
The party is broken up in order to walk down to our rendezvous.
PULLER, whose idea of making things pleasant, and, as he expresses it,
"sweetening everyone all round," is to order "drinks" for everybody,
insists upon the party taking "_consommations_"--he loves saying this
word--at his expense. The Countess at first objects, as also does
Madame METTERBRUN; but, on PULLER'S explaining that he belongs to
"The Two-with-you Society," they accept this explanation as utterly
unintelligible but perfectly satisfactory; and so, accepting PULLER'S
_al fresco_ hospitality, we form a cheerful group round two tables
put together for our accommodation. PULLER'S hospitality has taken the
form of grenadines, chartreuses, and "sherry-gobblers,"--he loves this
word too,--for us all round, and he has ordered for himself a strange
mixture, which perfumes the night air as if some nauseous draught
had been brought out of a chemist's shop, and which looks like green
stagnant water in a big glass. It is called by PULLER, with great
glee, an "Absinthe gummy."
Anything nastier to look at or to smell I am not acquainted with in
the way of drinks. However, he is our host, and I have a grenadine
before me of his ordering, and between my lips an excellent cigar
which is his gift. I can only say mildly, "It looks nasty;" and Cousin
JANE expresses herself to the same effect, remarking also as she looks
significantly towards me, that it is late, and that I am not keeping
Royat hours. I promise to come away in ten minutes. PULLER is in the
highest possible spirits: surrounded by this company, all drinking his
drinks, he as it were takes the chair and presides. He knocks on the
table, which brings the waiter, to whom he says, holding up a couple
of fingers "Two with you,"--whereat the waiter only smiles upon the
eccentric Englishman, shakes his head, and wisely retires.
"Ah, Miladi," says PULLER, "you must take a course of ROBERTS. He's a
rum 'un." Then he sings, "He's all right when you know him, but you've
got to hear him _fust_."
His guests politely smile, all except the Countess. I preserve a
discreet silence. Taking this on the whole for encouragement, PULLER
commences the song from which he has already quoted the chorus. What
the words are I do not catch, but as PULLER reproduces to the life the
style and manner of a London Music-Hall singer, and cocks his hat on
one side, it is no wonder that the French people at the other table
turn towards us in amazement.
"For goodness sake, MR. PULLER!" cries the Countess, rising from her
chair in consternation. JANE also rises, Miss CASANOVA is laughing
nervously. The METTERBRUNS look utterly astonished. I feel I must stop
this at once.
"My dear fellow," I say, magisterially, "you really mustn't do
this sort of thing"--he is breaking out again with "_O what a
surprise!_"--but I get up from my seat to reprove him gravely. "You
would not do this if you were in a London Restaurant."
"No," he replies, not in the least offended--"that's the lark of it.
I belong to 'The Out-for-a-lark-and-Two-with-you Society.' Don't you
mind me," he adds; then turning with a pleasant wink to the ladies,
who have been putting on their wraps and mantles, and are preparing to
leave, he sings again,--
"I'm all right when you know me--
But----"
We leave him to finish the song by himself.
And to think that my friend PULLER, with his hat cocked on one side,
a big cigar in his mouth, a tumbler of "absinthe gummy" before him, a
rakish expression in his eye, is the same PULLER to whom, as partner
in the firm of HORLER, PULLER, PULLER (J), BAKER AND DAYVILLE,
Solicitors, I would trust my dearest interests in any matter of
property, of character, even of life itself! The strange story of
_Hyde_ and _Jekyll_ is no fiction, after all.
* * * * *