BOHEMIAN PARIS OF TO-DAY
By W. C. Morrow
From Notes By Edouard Cucuel
Illustrated By Edouard Cucuel
Second Edition
Philadelphia & London J. B. Lippincott Company 1900
[Illustration: 0001]
[Illustration: 0008]
[Illustration: 0009]
INTRODUCTION
THIS volume is written to show the life of the students in the Paris of
to-day. It has an additional interest in opening to inspection certain
phases of Bohemian life in Paris that are shared both by the students
and the public, but that are generally unfamiliar to visitors to that
wonderful city, and even to a very large part of the city's population
itself. It depicts the under-side of such life as the students
find,--the loose, unconventional life of the humbler strugglers in
literature and art, with no attempt to spare its salient features, its
poverty and picturesqueness, and its lack of adherence to generally
accepted standards of morals and conduct.
As is told in the article describing that incomparably brilliant
spectacle, the ball of the Four Arts, extreme care is taken to exclude
the public and admit only artists and students, all of whom must be
properly accredited and fully identified. It is well understood that
such a spectacle would not be suitable for any but artists and students.
It is given solely for their benefit, and with the high aim, fully
justified by the experience of the masters who direct the students,
that the event, with its marvellous brilliancy, its splendid artistic
effects, and its freedom and abandon, has a stimulating and broadening
effect of the greatest value to art. The artists and students see in
these annual spectacles only grace, beauty, and majesty; their training
in the studios, where they learn to regard models merely as tools of
their craft, fits them, and them alone, for the wholesome enjoyment of
the great ball.
It is a student that presents the insight which this volume gives into
the life of the students and other Bohemians of Paris. It is set forth
with the frankness of a student. Coming from such a source, and having
such treatment, it will have a special charm and value for the wise.
The students are the pets of Paris. They lend to the city a
picturesqueness that no other city enjoys. So long as they avoid riots
aimed at a government that may now and then offend their sense of
right, their ways of living, their escapades, their noisy and joyous
manifestations of healthy young animal life, are good-naturedly
overlooked. Underneath such a life there lies, concealed from casual
view, another life that they lead,--one of hard work, of hope, of
aspiration, and often of pinching poverty and cruel self-denial. The
stress upon them, of many kinds, is great. The utter absence of an
effort to reorganize their lives upon conventional lines is from a
philosophical belief that if they fail to pass unscathed through it all,
they lack the fine, strong metal from which worthy artists are made.
The stranger in Paris will here find opened to him places in which he
may study for himself the Bohemian life of the city in all its careless
disregard of conventions. The cafés, cabarets, and dance-halls herein
described and illustrated have a charm that wholesome, well-balanced
minds will enjoy. The drawings for the illustrations were all made
from the actual scenes that they depict; they partake of the engaging
frankness of the text and of its purpose to show Bohemian life in the
Paris of to-day without any effort at concealment.
W. C. M.
BOHEMIAN PARIS
OUR STUDIO
WE were in wonderful Paris at last--Bishop and I--after a memorable
passage full of interest from New York to Havre. Years of hard work were
ahead of us, for Bishop would be an artist and I a sculptor.
[Illustration: 8023]
For two weeks we had been lodging temporarily in the top of a
comfortable little hotel, called the Grand something (most of the
Parisian hotels are Grand), the window of which commanded a superb view
of the great city, the vaudeville playhouse of the world.
_Pour la première fois_ the dazzle and glitter had burst upon us,
confusing first, but now assuming form and coherence. If we and
incomprehensible at could have had each a dozen eyes instead of two, or
less greed to see and more patience to learn!
Day by day we had put off the inevitable evil of finding a studio.
Every night found us in the cheapest seats of some theatre, and often we
lolled on the terraces of the Café de la Paix, watching the pretty girls
as they passed, their silken skirts saucily pulled up, revealing dainty
laces and ankles. From the slippery floor of the Louvre galleries we had
studied the masterpieces of David, Rubens, Rembrandt, and the rest; had
visited the Panthéon, the Musée Cluny; had climbed the Eiffel Tower,
and traversed the Bois de Boulogne and the Champs-Elysées. Then came the
search for a studio and the settling to work. It would be famous to have
a little home of our very own, where we could have little dinners of our
very own cooking!
It is with a shudder that I recall those eleven days of ceaseless
studio-hunting. We dragged ourselves through miles of Quartier Latin
streets, and up hundreds of flights of polished waxed stairs, behind
puffing concierges in carpet slippers, the puffing changing to
grumbling, as, dissatisfied, the concierges followed us down the stairs.
The Quartier abounds with placards reading, "_Atelier d'Artiste à
Louer!_" The rentals ranged from two hundred to two thousand francs
a year, and the sizes from cigar-boxes to barns. But there was always
something lacking. On the eleventh day we found a suitable place on the
sixth (top) floor of a quaint old house in a passage off the _Rue St.-
André-des-Arts_. There were overhead and side lights, and from the
window a noble view of Paris over the house-tops.
[Illustration: 0023]
A room of fair size joined the studio, and from its vine-laced window we
could look into the houses across the court, and down to the bottom of
the court as well. The studio walls were delightfully dirty and low in
tone, and were covered with sketches and cartoons in oil and charcoal.
The price was eight hundred francs a year, and from the concierge's
eloquent catalogue of its charms it seemed a great bargain. The walls
settled our fate,--we took the studio.
It was one thing to agree on the price and another to settle the
details. Our French was ailing, and the concierge's French
was--concierges' French. Bishop found that his pet theory that French
should be spoken with the hands, head, and shoulders carried weak spots
which a concierge could discover; and then, being somewhat mercurial, he
began floundering in a mixture of French and English words and French
and American gestures, ending in despair with the observation that the
concierge was a d------ fool. At the end of an hour we had learned that
we must sign an iron-bound, government-stamped contract, agreeing to
occupy the studio for not less than one year, to give six months' notice
of our leaving, and to pay three months' rental in advance, besides the
taxes for one year on all the doors and windows, and ten francs or more
to the concierge. This was all finally settled.
As there was no running water in the rooms (such a luxury being unknown
here), we had to supply our needs from a clumsy old iron pump in the
court, and employ six flights of stairs in the process.
Then the studio had to be furnished, and there came endless battles
with the furniture dealers in the neighborhood, who kept their stock
replenished from the goods of bankrupt artists and suspended ménages.
[Illustration: 0025]
These _marchands de meubles_ are a wily race, but Bishop pursued a plan
in dealing with them that worked admirably. He would enter a shop and
price an article that we wanted, and then throw up his hands in horror
and leave the place as though it were haunted with a plague. The dealer
would always come tumbling after him and offer him the article for a
half or a third of the former price. In this way Bishop bought chairs,
tables, a large easel, beds, a studio stove, book-shelves, linen,
drapings, water pitchers and buckets, dishes, cooking utensils, and
many other things, the cost of the whole being less than one hundred and
fifty francs,--and thus we were established. The studio became quite a
snug and hospitable retreat, in spite of the alarming arrangement that
Bishop adopted, "to help the composition of the room." His favorite
cast, the Unknown Woman, occupied the place of honor over his couch,
where he could see it the first thing in the morning, when the dawn,
stealing through the skylight, brought out those strange and subtle
features which he swore inspired him from day to day. My room was filled
with brilliant posters by Chéret and Mucha and Steinlen,--they were too
bold and showy for the low tone of Bishop's studio. It all made a pretty
picture,--the dizzy posters, the solemn trunks, the books, the bed with
its gaudy print coverings, and the little crooked-pane window hung
with bright green vines that ran thither from a box in the window of
an adjoining apartment. And it was all completed by the bright faces
of three pretty seamstresses, who sat sewing every day at their window
across the passage.
Under our housekeeping agreement Bishop was made cook, and I chambermaid
and water-carrier. It was Bishop's duty to obey the alarm clock at six
every morning and light the fire, while I went down for water at the
pump, and for milk at the stand beside the court entrance, where fat
Madame Gioté sold _café-au-lait_ and _lait froid ou chaud_, from a
_sou_'s worth up. Then, after breakfast, I did the chamber work while
Bishop washed the dishes. Bishop could make for breakfast the most
delicious coffee and flapjacks and omelette in the whole of Paris. By
eight o'clock all was in order; Bishop was smoking his pipe and singing
"Down on the Farm" while working on his life study, and I was off to my
modelling in clay.
Bishop soon had the hearts of all the shop-keepers in the neighborhood.
The baker's dimple-cheeked daughter never worried if the scales hung a
little in his favor, at the boucherie he was served with the choicest
cuts of meat, and the fried-potato women called him "_mon fils_"
and fried a fresh lot of potatoes for him. Even Madame Tonneau, the
_marchande de tabac_, saw that he had the freshest packages in the shop.
Often, when I was returning home at night, I encountered him making
cheerily for the studio, bearing bread by the yard, his pockets bulging
with other material for dinner. Ah, he was a wonderful cook, and we had
marvellous appetites! So famous did he soon become that the models (the
lady ones, of course) were eager to dine _avec nous_; and when they did
they helped to set the table, they sewed buttons on our clothes, and
they made themselves agreeable and perfectly at home with that charming
grace which is so peculiarly French. Ah, those were jolly times!
The court, or, more properly, _le passage_, on which our window looked
was a narrow little thoroughfare leading from the Rue St.-André-des-Arts
to the Boulevard St.-Germain. It bore little traffic, but was a busy
way withal. It had iron-workers' shops, where hot iron was beaten
into artistic lamps, grills, and bed-frames; a tinsmith's shop; a
blanchisserie, where our shirts were made white and smooth by the pretty
blanchisseuses singing all day over their work; a wine-cellar, whose
barrels were eternally blocking one end of the passage; an embossed
picture-card factory, where twoscore women, with little hammers and
steel dies, beat pictures into cards; a furniture shop, where everything
old and artistic was sold, the Hôtel du Passage, and a bookbinder's
shop.
Each of the eight buildings facing the passage was ruled by a formidable
concierge, who had her dark little living apartments near the entrances.
These are the despots of the court, and their function is to make life
miserable for their lodgers. When they are not doing that they are
eternally scrubbing and polishing. They are all married. M. Mayé, _le
mari de notre concierge_, is a tailor. He sits at the window and mends
and sews all day long, or acts as concierge when his wife is away. The
husband of the concierge next door is a sergeant de ville at night, but
in the early mornings as, in a soiled blouse, he empties ash-cans, he
looks very unlike the personage dressed at night in a neat blue
uniform and wearing a short sword Another concierge's husband _fait des
courses_--runs errands--for sufficient pay.
[Illustration: 9030]
Should you fail to clean your boots on the mat, and thus soil the glossy
stairs, have a care!--a concierge's tongue has inherited the warlike
characteristics of the Caesars. Rugs and carpets must not be shaken out
of the windows after nine o'clock. Ashes and other refuse must be thrown
into the big bin of the house not later than seven. Sharp at eleven in
the evening the lights are extinguished and the doors locked for the
night; and then all revelry must immediately cease. Should you arrive
_en retard_,--that is, after eleven,--you must ring the bell violently
until the despot, generally after listening for an hour to the bell,
unlocks the catch from her couch. Then when you close the door and pass
her lodge you must call out your name. If you are out often or till very
late, be prepared for a lecture on the crime of breaking the rest of
hard-working concierges. After the day's work the concierges draw their
chairs out into the court and gossip about their tenants. The nearer the
roof the lodger the less the respect he commands. Would he not live on a
lower floor if he were able? And then, the top floor gives small tips!
It is noticeable that the entresol and premiers étages are clean and
highly polished, and that the cleanliness and polish diminish steadily
toward the top, where they almost disappear. Ah, _les concierges!_ But
what would Paris be without them?
Directly beneath us an elderly couple have apartments. Every morning at
five the old gentleman starts French oaths rattling through the court by
beating his rugs out of his window. At six he rouses the ire of a widow
below him by watering his plants and incidentally drenching her bird-
cages. Not long ago she rose in violent rebellion, and he hurled a
flower pot at her protruding head. It smashed on her window-sill; she
screamed "Murder!" and the whole court was in an uproar. The concierges
and the old gentleman's pacific wife finally restored order--till the
next morning.
Next, to my room are an elderly lady and her sweet, sad-faced daughter.
They are very quiet and dignified, and rarely fraternize with their
neighbors. It is their vine that creeps over to my window, and it is
carefully tended by the daughter. And all the doves and sparrows of the
court come regularly to eat out of her hand, and a lively chatter they
have over it. The ladies are the widow and daughter of a once prosperous
stock-broker on the Bourse, whom an unlucky turn of the wheel drove to
poverty and suicide.
The three seamstresses over the way are the sunshine of the court. They
are not so busy sewing and singing but that they find time to send arch
glances toward our window, and their blushes and smiles when Bishop
sends them sketches of them that he has made from memory are more than
remunerative.
A young Scotch student from Glasgow, named Cameron, has a studio
adjoining ours. He is a fine, jovial fellow, and we usually assist him
to dispose of his excellent brew of tea at five o'clock. Every Thursday
evening there was given a musical chez lui, in which Bishop and I
assisted with mandolin and guitar, while Cameron played the flute.
For these occasions Cameron donned his breeks and kilt, and danced the
sword-dance round two table-knives crossed. The American songs strike
him as being strange and incomprehensible. He cannot understand the
negro dialect, and wonders if America is filled with negroes and cotton
plantations; but he is always delighted with Bishop's "Down on the
Farm."
[Illustration: 0033]
Life begins at five o'clock in our court. The old gentleman beats his
rugs, the milk-bottles rattle, the bread-carts rumble, Madame Gioté
opens her milkstand, and the concierges drag the ash-cans out into the
court, where a drove of rag-pickers fall upon them. These gleaners are
a queer lot. Individuals and families pursue the quest, each with a
distinct purpose. One will seek nothing but bones, glass, and crockery;
another sifts the ashes for coal; another takes only paper and rags;
another old shoes and hats; and so on, from can to can, none interfering
with any of the others. The dogs are the first at the bins. They are
regularly organized in working squads, travelling in fours and fives.
They are quite adept at digging through the refuse for food, and they
rarely quarrel; and they never leave one bin for another until they have
searched it thoroughly.
The swish of water and a coarse brush broom announces the big, strong
woman who sweeps the gutters of the Rue St.-André-des-Arts. With broad
sweeps of the broom she spreads the water over half the street and back
into the gutter, making the worn yellow stones shine. She is coarsely
clad and wears black sabots; and God knows how she can swear when the
gleaners scatter the refuse into the gutter!
The long wail of the fish-and-mussel woman, "_J'ai des beaux maquereaux,
des moules, poissons à frire, à frire!_" as she pushes her cart, means
seven o'clock.
The day now really begins. Water-pails are clanging and sabots are
clicking on the stones. The wine people set up a rumble by cleaning
their casks with chains and water. The anvils of the iron-workers are
ringing, and there comes the tink-tink-tink of the little hammers in
the embossed-picture factory. The lumbering garbage-cart arrives to bear
away the ash-bins, the lead-horse shaking his head to ring the bell on
his neck in announcement of the approach. Street-venders and hawkers of
various comestibles, each with his or her quaint musical cry, come in
numbers. "_J'ai des beaux choux-fleurs! O, comme ils sont beaux!_" The
fruit- and potato-women come after, and then the chair-menders. These
market-women are early risers. They are at the great Halles Centrales
at four o'clock to bargain for their wares; and besides good lungs
they have a marvellous shrewdness, born of long dealings with French
housewives.
Always near eight may be heard, "_Du mouron pour les petits oiseaux!_"
and all the birds in the court, familiar with the cry, pipe up for their
chickweed. "_Voilà le bon fromage à la crème pour trois sous!_" cries
a keen-faced little woman, her three-wheeled cart loaded with cream
cheeses; and she gives a soup-plate full of them, with cream poured
generously over, and as she pockets the money says, "_Voilà! ce que
c'est bon avec des confitures!_" Cream cheeses and prayer! On Sunday
mornings during the spring and summer the goat's-milk vender, blowing
a reed-pipe, invades the passage with his living milk-cans,--a flock of
eight hairy goats that know the route as well as he, and they are always
willing to be milked when a customer offers a bowl. The tripe-man with
his wares and bell is the last of the food-sellers of the day. The
window-glass repairer, "_Vitrier!_" passes at nine, and then the
beggars and strolling musicians and singers put in an appearance. In
the afternoon the old-clo' man comes hobbling under his load of cast-off
clothes, crying, "_Marchand d'habits!_" of which you can catch only
"'_Chand d'habits!_" and the barrel-buyer, "Marchand de tonneaux!" The
most musical of them all is the porcelain-mender, who cries, "_Voici le
raccommodeur de porcelaines, faïence, cristal, poseur de robinets!_" and
then plays a fragment of a hunting-song.
[Illustration: 0037]
The beggars and musicians also have regular routes and fixed hours. Cold
and stormy days are welcomed by them, for then pity lends activity to-
sous. A piratical old beggar has his stand near the entrance to the
court, where he kneels on the stones, his faithful mongrel dog beside
him. He occasionally poses for the artists when times are dull, but he
prefers begging,--it is easier and more remunerative. Three times a week
we are treated to some really good singing by a blind old man, evidently
an artist in his day. When the familiar sound of his guitar is heard
all noises in the passage cease, and all windows are opened to hear.
He sings arias from the operas. His little old wife gathers up the sous
that ring on the flags. Sometimes a strolling troupe of two actors and
three musicians makes its appearance, and invariably plays to a full
house. There are droves of sham singers who do not sing at all, but
give mournful howls and tell their woes to deaf windows. One of them, a
tattered woman with two babies, refused to pose for Bishop, although he
offered her five francs for the afternoon.
Her babies never grow older or bigger as the years pass.
We all know when anybody in the passage is going to take a bath. There
are no bath-tubs in these old houses, but that difficulty is surmounted
by a bathing establishment on the Boulevard St.-Michel. It sends around
a cart bearing a tank of hot water and a zinc tub. The man who pulls the
cart carries the tub to the room, and fills it by carrying up the water
in buckets. Then he remains below until the bath is finished, to regain
his tub and collect a franc.
Since we have been here the court entrance has been once draped in
mourning. At the head of the casket of old Madame Courtoise, who lived
across the way, stood a stately crucifix, and candles burned, and there
were mourners and yellow bead wreaths. A quiet sadness sat upon the
court, and the people spoke in whispers only.
And there have been two weddings,--one at the blanchisserie, where the
master's daughter was married to a young mechanic from the iron shop.
There were glorious times at the laundry that night, for the whole court
was present. It was four in the morning when the party broke up, and
then our shirts were two days late.
Thus ran the first months of the four years of our student life in
Paris; in its domestic aspects it was typical of all that followed. We
soon became members of the American Art Association, and gradually made
friends in charming French homes. Then there was the strange Bohemian
life lying outside as well as within the students' pale, and into
the spirit of it all we found our way. It is to the Bohemian, not
the social, life of Paris that these papers are devoted--a life
both picturesque and pathetic, filled with the oddest contrasts and
incongruities, with much suffering but more content, and spectacular
and fascinating in all its phases. No one can have seen and known
Paris without a study of this its living, struggling artistic side,
so strange, so remote from the commonplace world surging and roaring
unheeded about it.
On New Year's Day we had an overwhelming number of callers. First came
the concierge, who cleaned our door-knob and wished us a prosperous and
bonne année. She got ten francs,--we did not know what was coming. The
chic little blanchisseuse called next with our linen. That meant two
francs. Then came in succession two telegraph boys, the facteur, or
postman, who presented us with a cheap calendar, and another postman,
who delivers only second-class mail. They got a franc each. Then the
_marchand de charbon_'s boy called with a clean face and received fifty
centimes, and everybody else with whom we had had dealings; and our
offerings had a steadily diminishing value.
We could well bear all this, however, in view of the great day, but a
week old, when we had celebrated Christmas. Bishop prepared a dinner
fit for a king, giving the greater part of his time for a week to
preparations for the great event. Besides a great many French dishes, we
had turkey and goose, cooked for us at the rôtisserie near by, and soup,
oysters, American pastries, and a big, blazing plum-pudding. We and our
guests (there were eight in all) donned full dress for the occasion,
and a bonne, hired for the evening, brought on the surprises one after
another. But why should not it have been a glorious evening high up
among the chimney-pots of old Paris? for did we not drink to the loved
ones in a distant land, and were not our guests the prettiest among the
pretty toilers of our court?
[Illustration: 0042]
THE ÉCOLE DES BEAUX-ARTS
IT is about the fifteenth of October, after the long summer vacation,
that the doors of the great École des Beaux-Arts are thrown open.
[Illustration: 0043]
The first week, called "_la semaine des nouveaux_," is devoted to the
initiation and hazing of the new students, who come mostly from foreign
countries and the French provinces. These festivities can never be
forgotten--by the _nouveaux_.
[Illustration: 0044]
Bishop had condescendingly decided to become _un élève de Gérôme_--with
some misgivings, for Bishop had developed ideas of a large and free
American art, while Gérôme was hard and academic. One day he gathered
up some of his best drawings and studies (which he regarded as
masterpieces) and, climbing to the impériale of a Clichy 'bus, rode
over to Montmartre, where Gérôme had his private studio. He was politely
ushered in by a manservant, and conducted to the door of the master's
studio through a hall and gallery filled with wonderful marble groups.
Gérôme himself opened the door, and Bishop found himself in the great
man's workshop. For a moment Bishop stood dazed in the middle of the
splendid room, with its great sculptures and paintings, some still
unfinished, and a famous collection of barbaric arms and costumes. A
beautiful model was posing upon a rug. But most impressive of all was
the white-haired master, regarding him with a thoughtful and searching,
but kindly, glance. Bishop presently found a tongue with which to
stammer out his mission,--he would be a pupil of the great Gérôme.
The old man smiled, and, bidding his model retire, inspected carefully
the array of drawings that Bishop spread at his feet,--Gérôme must
have evidence of some ability for the magic of his brain and touch to
develop.
"_Sont pas mal, mon ami_," he said, after he had studied all the
drawings; "_non, pas mal_." Bishop's heart bounded,--his work was not
bad! "_Vous êtes Américain?_" continued the master. "_C'est un pays que
j'aimerais bien visiter si le temps ne me manquait pas_."
Thus he chatted on, putting Bishop more and more at his ease. He talked
of America and the promising future that she has for art; then he went
into his little office, and, asking Bishop's name, filled out the blank
that made him a happy pupil of Gérôme. He handed it to Bishop with this
parting-advice, spoken with great earnestness:
"_Il faut travailler, mon ami--travailler! Pour arriver, travailler
toujours, sérieusement, bien entendu!_"
Bishop was so proud and happy that he ran all the way up the six flights
of stairs to our floor, burst into the studio, and executed a war-dance
that would have shamed an Apache, stepping into his paint-box and nearly
destroying his sacred Unknown. That night we had a glorious supper, with
des escargots to start with.
Early on the fifteenth of October, with his head erect and hope filling
his soul, Bishop started for the Beaux-Arts, which was in the Rue
Bonaparte, quite near. That night he returned wise and saddened.
He had bought a new easel and two rush-bottomed tabourets, which every
new student must provide, and, loaded with these, he made for the Ecole.
Gathered at the big gates was a great crowd of models of all sorts, men,
women, and children, fat, lean, and of all possible sizes. In the court-
yard, behind the gates, was a mob of long-haired students, who had a
year or more ago passed the initiatory ordeal and become ancients. Their
business now was to yell chaff at the arriving nouveaux. The concierge
conducted Bishop up-stairs to the Administration, where he joined a
long line of other nouveaux waiting for the opening of the office at ten
o'clock.
Then he produced his papers and was enrolled as a student of the Ecole.
It is only in this government school of the four arts that the typical
Bohemian students of Paris may be found, including the genuine type
of French student, with his long hair, his whiskers, his Latin Quarter
"plug" hat, his cape, blouse, wide corduroy trousers, sash, expansive
necktie, and immense cane. The Ecole preserves this type more
effectually than the other schools, such as Julian's and Colarossi's,
where most of the students are foreigners in conventional dress.
Among the others who entered Gérôme's atelier at the same time that
Bishop did was a Turk named Haidor (fresh from the Ottoman capital), a
Hungarian, a Siamese, an American from the plains of Nebraska, and five
Frenchmen from the provinces.
They all tried to speak French and be agreeable as they entered the
atelier together. At the door stood a gardien, whose principal business
is to mark absentees and suppress riots. Then they passed to the gentle
mercies of the reception committee and the _massier_ within.
The _massier_ is a student who manages the studio, models, and _masse_
money. This one, a large fellow with golden whiskers (size and strength
are valuable elements of the massier's efficiency), demanded twenty-five
francs from each of the new-comers,--this being the _masse_ money, to
pay for fixtures, turpentine, soap, and clean towels, _et pour payer
à boire_. The Turk refused to pay, protesting that he had but thirty
francs to last him the month; but menacing stools and sticks opened
his purse; his punishment was to come later. After the money had
been collected from all the nouveaux the entire atelier of over sixty
students, dressed in working blouses and old coats, formed in line, and
with deafening shouts of "_A boire! à boire!_" placed the _nouveaux_
in front to carry the class banner, and thus marched out into the _Rue
Bonaparte_ to the _Café des Deux Magots_, singing songs fit only for
the studio. Their singing, shouting, and ridiculous capers drew a great
crowd. At the café they created consternation with their shouting
and howling until the arrival of great bowls of "_grog Américain_,"
cigarettes, and _gâteaux_. Rousing cheers were given to a marriage-party
across the Place St.-Germain. The Turk was forced to do a Turkish dance
on a table and sing Turkish songs, and to submit to merciless ridicule.
The timid little Siamese also had to do a turn, as did Bishop and
W------, the American from Nebraska, who had been a cowboy at home.
After yelling themselves hoarse and nearly wrecking the café, the
students marched back in a disorderly mob to the Ecole. Then the real
trouble began.
The gardien having conveniently disappeared, the students closed
and barricaded the door. "_A poil! à poil!_" they yelled, dancing
frantically about the frightened nouveaux; "_à poil les sales nouveaux!
à poil!_" They seized the Turk and stripped him, despite his desperate
resistance; then they tied his hands behind him and with paint and
brushes decorated his body in the most fantastic designs that they could
conceive. His oaths were frightful. He cursed them in the name of Allah,
and swore to have the blood of all Frenchmen for desecrating the sacred
person of a Moslem. He called them dogs of infidels and Christians. But
all this was in Turkish, and the students enjoyed it immensely. "_En
broche!_" they yelled, after they had made him a spectacle with the
brushes; "_en broche! Il faut le mettre en broche!_" This was quickly
done. They forced the Turk to his haunches, bound his wrists in front of
his upraised knees, thrust a long pole between his elbows and knees,
and thus bore him round the atelier at the head of a singing procession.
Four times they went round; then they placed the helpless M. Haidor on
the model-stand for future reference. The bad French that the victim
occasionally mixed with his tirade indicated the fearful damnation that
he was doubtless dealing out in Turkish.
A circle was then formed about him, and a solemn silence fell upon the
crowd. A Frenchman named Joncierge, head of the reception committee,
stepped forth, and in slow and impressive speech announced that it was
one of the requirements of the Atelier Gérôme to brand all nouveaux over
the heart with the name of the atelier, and that the branding of the
Turk would now proceed. Upon hearing this, M. Haidor emitted a fearful
howl. But he was turned to face the red-hot studio stove and watch
the branding-iron slowly redden in the coals. During this interval the
students sang the national song, and followed it with a funeral march.
Behind the Turk's back a second poker was being painted to resemble a
red-hot one.
The hot poker was taken from the fire, and its usefulness tested by
burning a string with it. Haidor grew deathly pale. An intense silence
sat upon the atelier as the iron was brought near the helpless young
man. In a moment, with wonderful cleverness, the painted poker was
substituted for the hot one and placed quickly against his breast. When
the cold iron touched him he roared like a maddened bull, and rolled
quivering and moaning upon the floor. The students were frantic with
delight.
It was some time before Haidor could realize that he was not burned to
a crisp. He was then taken across the atelier and hoisted to a narrow
shelf fifteen feet from the floor, where he was left to compose himself
and enjoy the tortures of the other nouveaux. He dared not move,
however, lest he fall; and because he refused to take anything in good-
nature, but glared hatred and vengeance down at them, they pelted him at
intervals with water-soaked sponges.
The Hungarian and one of the French nouveaux were next seized and
stripped. Then they were ordered to fight a duel, in this fashion: they
were made to mount two stools about four feet apart. The Hungarian was
handed a long paint-brush dripping with Prussian blue, and the Frenchman
a similar brush soaked with crimson lake. Then the battle began. Each
hesitated to splash the other at first, but as they warmed to their work
under the shouting of the committee they went in with a will. When the
Frenchman had received a broad splash on the mouth in return for a chest
decoration of his adversary, his blood rose, and then the serious work
began.
[Illustration: 0051]
Both quickly lost their temper. When they were unwillingly made to
desist the product of their labors was startling, though not beautiful.
Then they were rubbed down vigorously with turpentine and soiled towels,
and were given a franc each for a bath, because they had behaved so
handsomely.
Bishop came next. He had made up his mind to stand the initiation
philosophically, whatever it might be, but when he was ordered to strip
he became apprehensive and then angry. Nothing so delights the students
as for a _nouveau_ to lose his temper. Bishop squared off to face the
whole atelier, and looked ugly. The students silently deployed on three
sides, and with a yell rushed in, but not before three of them had gone
down under his fists did they pin him to the floor and strip him. While
Bishop was thus being prepared, the Nebraskan was being dealt with. He
had the wisdom not to lose his temper, and that made his resistance
all the more formidable. Laughing all the time, he nevertheless dodged,
tripped, wrestled, threw stools, and did so many other astonishing and
baffling things that the students, though able to have conquered him
in the end, were glad to make terms with him. In this arrangement he
compelled them to include Bishop. As a result, those two mounted the
model throne naked, and sang together and danced a jig, all so cleverly
that the Frenchmen were frantic with delight, and welcomed them as _des
bons amis_. The amazing readiness and capability of the American fist
bring endless delight and perennial surprise to the French.
[Illustration: 0053]
The rest of the nouveaux were variously treated. Some, after being
stripped, were grotesquely decorated with designs and pictures not
suitable for general inspection. Others were made to sing, to recite, or
to act scenes from familiar plays, or, in default of that, to improvise
scenes, some of which were exceedingly funny. Others, attached to a rope
depending from the ceiling, were swung at a perilous rate across the
atelier, dodging easels in their flight.
At half-past twelve the sport was over. The barricade was removed,
the Turk's clothes hidden, the Turk left howling on his shelf, and the
atelier abandoned. The next morning there was trouble. The director was
furious, and threatened to close the atelier for a month, because the
Turk had not been discovered until five o'clock, when his hoarse howls
attracted the attention of the gardien of the fires. His trousers and
one shoe could not be found. It was three months before Haidor appeared
at the atelier again, and then everything had been forgotten.
Bishop was made miserable during the ensuing week. He would find himself
roasting over paper fires kindled under his stool. Paint was smeared
upon his easel to stain his hands. His painting was altered and entirely
re-designed in his absence. Strong-smelling cheeses were placed in the
lining of his "plug" hat. His stool-legs were so loosened that when
he sat down he struck the floor with a crash. His painting-blouse was
richly decorated inside and out with shocking coats of arms that would
not wash out. One day he discovered that he had been painting for a
whole hour with currant jelly from a tube that he thought contained
laque.
Then, being a _nouveau_, he could never get a good position in which to
draw from the model. Every Monday morning a new model is posed for the
week, and the students select places according to the length of time
they have been attending. The nouveaux have to take what is left. And
they must be servants to the ancients,--run out for tobacco, get soap
and clean towels, clean paint-brushes, and keep the studio in order.
With the sculptors and architects it is worse. The sculptors must sweep
the dirty, clay-grimed floor regularly, fetch clean water, mix the clay
and keep it fresh and moist, and on Saturdays, when the week's work is
finished, must break up the forty or more clay figures, and restore
them to clay for next week's operations. The architects must build heavy
wooden frames, mount the projects and drawings, and cart them about
Paris to the different exhibition rooms.
At the end of a year the _nouveau_ drops his hated title and becomes a
proud ancient, to bully to his heart's content, as those before him.
Mondays and Wednesdays are criticism days, for then M. Gérôme comes down
and goes over the work of his pupils. He is very early and punctual,
never arriving later than half-past eight, usually before half the
students are awake. The moment he enters all noises cease, and all seem
desperately hard at work, although a moment before the place may have
been in an uproar. Gérôme plumps down upon the man nearest to him, and
then visits each of his _élèves_, storming and scolding mercilessly
when his pupils have failed to follow his instructions. As soon as a
student's criticism is finished he rises and follows the master to hear
the other criticisms, so that toward the close the procession is large.
[Illustration: 0057]
Bishop's first criticism took him all aback. "_Comment!_" gasped the
master, gazing at the canvas in horror. "_Qu'est-ce que vous avez
fait?_" he sternly demanded, glaring at the luckless student, who, in
order to cultivate a striking individuality, was painting the model in
broad, thick dashes of color. Gérôme glanced at Bishop's palette, and
saw a complete absence of black upon it. "_Comment, vous n'avez pas de
noir?_" he roared. "_C'est très important, la partie matérielle! Vous
ne m'écoutez pas, mon ami,---je parle dans le désert! Vous n'avez pas
d'aspect général, mon ami,_" and much more, while Bishop sat cold to the
marrow. The students, crowded about, enjoyed his discomfiture immensely,
and, behind Gérôme's back, laughed in their sleeves and made faces at
Bishop. But many others suffered, and Bishop had his inning with them.
All during Gérôme's tour of inspection the model must maintain his pose,
however difficult and exhausting. Often he is kept on a fearful strain
for two hours. After the criticism the boys show Gérôme sketches and
studies that they have made outside the Ecole, and it is in discussing
them that his geniality and kindliness appear. Gérôme imperiously
demands two things,--that his pupils, before starting to paint, lay on a
red or yellow tone, and that they keep their brushes scrupulously clean.
Woe to him who disobeys!
After he leaves with a cheery "_Bon jour, messieurs!_" pandemonium
breaks loose, if the day be Saturday. Easels, stools, and studies are
mowed down as by a whirlwind, yells shake the building, the model is
released, a tattoo is beaten on the sheet-iron stove-guard, everything
else capable of making a noise is brought into service, and either the
model is made to do the _danse du ventre_ or a _nouveau_ is hazed.
The models--what stories are there! Every Monday morning from ten to
twenty present themselves, male and female, for inspection in _puris
naturalibus_ before the critical gaze of the students of the different
ateliers. One after another they mount the throne and assume such
academic poses of their own choosing as they imagine will display their
points to the best advantage. The students then vote upon them, for and
against, by raising the hand. The massier, standing beside the model,
announces the result, and, if the vote is favorable, enrols the model
for a certain week to come.
There is intense rivalry among the models. Strange to say, most of the
male models in the schools of Paris are from Italy, the southern part
especially. As a rule, they have very good figures. They begin posing
at the age of five or six, and follow the business until old age retires
them. Crowds of them are at the gates of the Beaux-Arts early on Monday
mornings. In the voting, a child may be preferred to his seniors, and
yet the rate of payment is the same,--thirty francs a week.
[Illustration: 0061]
Many of the older models are quite proud of their profession, spending
idle hours in studying the attitudes of figures in great paintings and
in sculptures in the Louvre or the Luxembourg, and adopting these poses
when exhibiting themselves to artists; but the trick is worthless.
Few of the women models remain long in the profession. Posing is hard
and fatiguing work, and the students are merciless in their criticisms
of any defects of figure that the models may have,--the French are born
critics. During the many years that I have studied and worked in Paris
I have seen scores of models begin their profession with a serious
determination to make it their life-work.
[Illustration: 9062]
They would appear regularly at the different ateliers for about two
years, and would be gratified to observe endless reproductions of their
graces in the prize rows on the studio walls. Then their appearance
would be less and less regular, and they would finally disappear
altogether--whither? Some become contented companions of students
and artists, but the cafés along the _Boul' Mich'_, the cabarets of
Montmartre, and the dance-halls of the Moulin Rouge and the Bal Bullier
have their own story to tell. Some are happily married; for instance,
one, noted for her beauty of face and figure, is the wife of a New York
millionaire. But she was clever as well as beautiful, and few models
are that. Most of them are ordinaire, living the easy life of Bohemian
Paris, and having little knowledge of _le monde propre._ But, oh, how
they all love dress! and therein lies most of the story. When Marcelle
or Hélène appears, all of a sudden, radiant in silks and creamy lace
petticoats, and sweeps proudly into the crowded studios, flushed and
happy, and hears the dear compliments that the students heap upon her,
we know that thirty francs a week could not have changed the gray grub
into a gorgeous butterfly.
"_C'est mon amant qui m'a fait cadeau,_" Marcelle will explain, deeming
some explanation necessary. There is none to dispute you, Marcelle. This
vast whirlpool has seized many another like you, and will seize many
another more. And to poor Marcelle it seems so small a price to pay to
become one of the grand ladies of Paris, with their dazzling jewels and
rich clothes!
An odd whim may overtake one here and there. One young demoiselle,
beautiful as a girl and successful as a model a year ago, may now be
seen nightly at the _Cabaret du Soleil d'Or_, frowsy and languishing, in
keeping with the spirit of her confrères there, singing her famous
"_Le Petit Caporal_" to thunderous applause, and happy with the love,
squalor, dirt, and hunger that she finds with the luckless poet whose
fortunes she shares. It was not a matter of clothes with her.
It is a short and easy step from the studio to the _café_. At the studio
it is all little money, hard posing, dulness, and poor clothes; at
the _cafés_ are the brilliant lights, showy clothes, tinkling money,
clinking glasses, popping corks, unrestrained abandon, and midnight
suppers. And the studios and the _cafés_ are but adjoining apartments,
one may say, in the great house of Bohemia. The studio is the
introduction to the _café_; the _café_ is the burst of sunshine after
the dreariness of the studio; and Marcelle determines that for once she
will bask in the warmth and glow.... Ah, what a jolly night it was, and
a louis d'or in her purse besides! Marcelle's face was pretty--and new.
She is late at the studio next morning, and is sleepy and cross. The
students grumble. The room is stifling, and its gray walls seem ready to
crush her. It is so tiresome, so stupid--and only thirty francs a week!
Bah!... Marcelle appears no more.
All the great painters have their exclusive model or models, paying them
a permanent salary. These favored ones move in a special circle, into
which the ordinaire may not enter, unless she becomes the favorite of
some grand homme. They are never seen at the academies, and rarely or
never pose in the schools, unless it was there they began their career.
Perhaps the most famous of the models of Paris was Sarah Brown, whose
wild and exciting life has been the talk of the world. Her beautiful
figure and glorious golden hair opened to her the whole field of
modeldom. Offers for her services as model were more numerous than she
could accept, and the prices that she received were very high. She
was the mistress of one great painter after another, and she lived and
reigned like a queen. Impulsive, headstrong, passionate, she would do
the most reckless things. She would desert an artist in the middle of
his masterpiece and come down to the studio to pose for the students
at thirty francs a week. Gorgeously apparelled, she would glide into a
studio, overturn all the easels that she could reach, and then shriek
with laughter over the havoc and consternation that she had created. The
students would greet her with shouts and form a circle about her, while
she would banteringly call them her friends. Then she would jump upon
the throne, dispossess the model there, and give a dance or make a
speech, knocking off every hat that her parasol could reach. But no one
could resist Sarah.
She came up to the _Atelier Gérôme_ one morning and demanded une semaine
de femme. The _massier_ booked her for the following week. She arrived
promptly on time and was posed. Wednesday a whim seized her to wear her
plumed hat and silk stockings. "_C'est beaucoup plus chic_," she naively
explained. When Gérôme entered the studio and saw her posing thus she
smiled saucily at him, but he turned in a rage and left the studio
without a word. Thursday she tired of the pose and took one to please
herself, donning a skirt. Of course protests were useless, so the
students had to recommence their work. The remainder of the week she sat
upon the throne in full costume, refusing to pose. She amused herself
with smoking cigarettes and keeping the _nouveaux_ running errands for
her.