no bounds. She insulted the Lieutenant of Police and was, in
consequence, placed under arrest for twenty-four hours; she made biting
epigrams about Ministers and other distinguished persons, which, no
doubt, duly reached her victims’ ears; she behaved with such “unexampled
audacity” and “essential want of respect” towards Madame du Barry, on
the occasion of a performance before the Court, at Fontainebleau, that,
but for the intervention of the injured lady--the most sweet-tempered
left-hand queen who ever degraded a throne--she would have spent the
next six months as a prisoner in the Hôpital,[36] and she drove the
unfortunate directors of the Opera to the verge of distraction with her
whims and caprices.
The race of prime donne is proverbially a capricious one; the
profession of an impresario one of the most trying which can fall to the
lot of man. Yet, it may be doubted whether any queen of song since opera
was invented can have occasioned her managers anything approaching the
anxiety and annoyance caused by Mlle. Sophie Arnould. She knew she was
necessary, well-nigh indispensable, and she abused her position. Dearly
did the administration pay for the increased receipts which her
popularity brought them. Every day she had some new grievance, some
unexpected whim. She wished to sing and she did not wish to sing, she
retired and she reappeared. Sometimes she would create a part in an
opera, sing divinely to crowded houses for three or four nights, then
suddenly discover that it was unsuited to her or made too great demands
upon her strength, and insist upon another singer taking her place for
the remainder of the run of the piece. A few evenings later, jealous
perhaps of the applause which her successor was receiving, she would
come down to the theatre and announce her intention of resuming her
part, only to throw it up again so soon as she considered that she had
asserted her superiority.
To revive an opera in which she had scored a success was often as risky
a venture as to produce a new one, since it might, and very often did,
happen, that Mlle. Arnould--who, it should be mentioned, unlike the
majority of public performers, cared very little for applause--would be
indisposed, that is to say, indisposed to exert her full powers, with
the result that the once popular piece would be received in comparative
silence. In February 1769, _Dardanus_ was revived. Iphise, the heroine,
was one of Sophie’s greatest rôles, but on the first night she either
could not or would not sing, and the opera became, in consequence,
“almost a burlesque.”
It is only, however, fair to say that she made ample atonement on the
following evening. Thinking perhaps, as one of her biographers suggests,
that any one was good enough to sing with a voiceless prima donna, the
management entrusted the part of Dardanus to a new tenor named Muguet,
“who had neither voice, figure, nor expression.” The audience not
unnaturally resented the experiment, and M. Muguet and the opera with
him were in a fair way to be hissed off the stage, when Sophie came to
the rescue and, by superb singing and impassioned acting, restored the
house to good humour and converted a complete failure into something
approaching a success.
Seeing that the ladies of the Opera were the King’s servants in the
literal sense of the phrase, and that misbehaviour on their part was
wont to be construed as disobedience to his Majesty’s commands and
punished accordingly, why, it may well be asked, was such conduct
tolerated? Why did not the chief of the King’s Household intervene with
one of those _lettres de cachet_ which were generally so efficacious in
bringing contumacious artistes to their senses? The answer is that
Sophie had so many noble admirers always ready to espouse her cause that
to punish her as she deserved could not have failed to create a great
deal of unpleasantness; for which reason, though the directors appealed
again and again to the Comte de Saint-Florentin to exercise his
authority, their representations were without effect. Here is an
instance:
On March 24, 1772, Sophie, who was announced to take the part of
Thélaïre, in Rameau’s _Castor et Pollux_, had not arrived when the time
came for the opera to begin, and her place was, therefore, taken by her
understudy, Mlle. Beaumesnil. As no intimation of her inability to
appear that evening had reached them, the directors naturally concluded
that she had been suddenly taken ill, and their astonishment and
indignation may be imagined when they presently espied the lady in a
box, laughing and talking with several of her admirers, and, seemingly,
in the best of health and spirits. A message demanding an explanation of
what she meant by appearing in the front of the house when she was
“billed” to play a part produced the impertinent reply that she had come
to take a lesson from Mlle. Beaumesnil! The angry directors thereupon
appealed to the chief of the King’s Household and begged him to send the
recalcitrant actress to For l’Évêque. But the Prince d’Hénin, or some
other influential adorer, interceded on her behalf, and the only
punishment she received was “a severe reprimand.”
Such misplaced leniency, Bachaumont tells us, was highly displeasing to
a certain section of the Opera’s patrons, and when, an evening or two
later, Mademoiselle did condescend to appear, a number of people came to
the theatre “with the intention of humiliating her by hissing.” Sophie,
however, perhaps desirous of making atonement to the public for its
previous disappointment, put forth all her powers and sang and acted so
admirably that the malcontents’ courage failed them, and, finally,
forgetting the object which had brought them thither, they joined
heartily in the general applause.[37]
Owing to the cares of maternity and other causes, chief of which would
seem to have been a pronounced antipathy to hard work, Sophie’s
appearances at the Opera were very irregular, and sometimes her name did
not find a place in the bills for several months together. Thus, she was
absent from October 1761 to the following February; again from November
1766 to August 1767; while in 1770 she does not appear to have sung at
all. A less popular actress, or one whose life outside the theatre was
less notorious, might have incurred some risk of finding herself
forgotten. But Sophie’s admirers were numerous and faithful, and when
she had a part which suited her, and was in the humour to do herself
justice, her singing and, more especially, her acting were so superior
to her rivals that the house was invariably crowded. Among her triumphs
may be mentioned: Thisbé, in _Pyrame et Thisbé_; Oriane, in _Amadis de
Gaule_;[38] Aline, in _Aline, Reine de Golconde_,[39] “which,” says
Bachaumont, “she endowed with all the delicate graces of sentiment,
beauty, and talent”; Psyché, in _L’Amour et Psyché_; Iphise, in
_Dardanus_, and Thélaïre, in _Castor et Pollux_, when the critic of the
_Mercure_ declared that she was “not a character of the piece, but
Thélaïre herself, and that the feelings she depicted passed
involuntarily into the souls of the spectators.”[40]
* * * * *
Although Bélanger was Mlle. Arnould’s _amant de cœur_, the Prince
d’Hénin remained her titular protector. The prince was an exceedingly
dull and fatuous person, with the most absurdly exaggerated idea of his
own importance, and bored the lady insufferably, although financial
considerations compelled her to tolerate him. At the same time, she was
at no pains to conceal from her friends the _ennui_ which his visits
occasioned her, and when, at the beginning of the year 1774, the Comte
de Lauraguais, with whom she still maintained friendly relations,
returned from a lengthy visit to England, she hastened to pour her
troubles into his sympathetic ear. Perhaps Lauraguais would have been
not unwilling to resume his connection with Sophie, had there been no
Prince d’Hénin in the way, and cherished a grudge against that nobleman
for taking the place which had so long been his own. Perhaps he had some
other grievance against him, for the prince was by no means universally
beloved. Any way, he determined to have a little diversion at his
expense. We read in the _Mémoires secrets:_
“February 19, 1774.--The Comte de Lauraguais, that amiable nobleman,
whose inextinguishable gaiety is so marvellously seconded by his lively
imagination, after having amused London, has come to enliven this
capital with his sallies and ingenious pleasantries, of which one
relates a charming instance: Some days ago, he summoned four doctors of
the Faculty of Medicine to a consultation, in order to know whether it
were possible for any one to die of _ennui_. They replied in the
affirmative and, after a long preamble, setting forth the reasons for
their decision, signed a paper to that effect, in all good faith. The
family of Brancas is so generally composed of lunatics, hypochondriacs,
hysterical and melancholy persons, and so forth, that they imagined that
the question put to them concerned some relative of the consultant, and
agreed that the only means of effecting a cure was to remove out of the
patient’s sight the object which occasioned this condition of inertia
and stagnation.
“Armed with this document duly signed and witnessed, the facetious
nobleman proceeded to lay it before a Commissary of Police and, at the
same time, to lodge a complaint against the Prince d’Hénin, who, by his
continual _obsession_ of Mlle. Arnoux (_sic_), would infallibly cause
that actress to perish of _ennui_, and the public to lose one whom it
valued highly, and whom he especially desired to preserve.”
Needless to say, the commissary did not issue the warrant demanded; but,
equally needless to say, he related the jest to every one he happened to
meet that morning, with the result that, in a very few hours, this
“charming instance of the inextinguishable humour of the Comte de
Lauraguais” was the talk of Paris, and was voted the best comedy that
had been played for many a long day. The Prince d’Hénin naturally did
not look at the matter in quite the same light, and talked about
sending the count a challenge. According to one account, he actually did
so, and a bloodless duel followed. But since, as we shall presently see,
he was a nobleman by no means remarkable for his courage, it is more
probable that he ultimately decided to pocket the affront.
In the course of that same month, Sophie Arnould determined to withdraw
altogether from the Opera and, accordingly, sent in her resignation,
giving as her reason the unsatisfactory state of her health. The Duc de
la Vrillière, however, declined to accept it, at the same time assuring
her, in a courteous letter, that, “under no circumstances would more be
required of her than her strength would permit of her undertaking.”
Although it would appear that Sophie was really somewhat out of health
at that time--so that Lauraguais’s charge against the poor Prince
d’Hénin was not without a basis of truth--her resolution to quit the
scene of her many triumphs was dictated by a very different reason. The
fact of the matter was that the Sophie Arnould of 1774 was not the
Sophie Arnould of 1758--not the singer who had charmed all Paris in _Les
Amours des Dieux_ and _Énée et Lavinie_. Her voice, always more
expressive than powerful, was becoming perceptibly weaker. Her beauty,
though she was still very attractive, had lost its freshness. Her
frequent absences, her endless caprices, her arrogance and insolence, so
long tolerated, had begun to weary not only the long-suffering directors
of the Opera, but the public and the critics who influenced it. Where
there had been applause, there was now silence. Where there had been
praise, there was now criticism, and criticism sometimes of a peculiarly
galling kind. In a word, Sophie’s long reign was drawing to a close. And
Paris was eagerly awaiting the arrival of a new composer. Gluck, who
was to revolutionise opera in France, was coming, at the invitation of
Marie Antoinette, to give a series of “musical dramas”--as he himself
called them--reconstructed from those which had delighted Vienna and
Italy. Supported as he would be by the young Dauphiness and the Court,
his success was a foregone conclusion. What unthinkable humiliation for
her if, when the principal parts came to be allotted, she should be
passed over in favour of one of her youthful competitors: Mlle. Laguerre
or, worse still, Rosalie Levasseur, the mistress of Mercy-Argenteau, the
Austrian Ambassador, between whom and herself the bitterest rivalry
existed! Rather than incur such a risk, she would retire of her own
accord, while her laurels were still untarnished, while her sovereignty
was still acknowledged.
[Illustration: GLUCK
After the painting by N. F. DUPLESSIS]
But, as we have just seen, her resignation was not accepted, and when
Gluck arrived in Paris, he appears to have had little difficulty in
deciding to entrust the title-part in his _Iphigénie en Aulide_ to her,
though his choice was probably influenced more by Sophie’s histrionic
than her vocal capabilities, for while her voice was neither so powerful
nor so fresh as those of the two ladies mentioned above, her acting was
immeasurably superior to theirs.
We are inclined to think, however, that even if Sophie had been much
less fitted than she was to undertake the difficult rôle of Iphigénie,
Gluck would still have hesitated before passing her over, since to have
done so would have been certain to arouse a storm of hostile criticism,
a singularly inauspicious opening to his Paris campaign. As matters
stood, his position was, at first, far from an easy one. The musical
world of Paris was the most critical and contentious of any capital in
Europe, and the advent of a foreign operatic troupe or a new composer
was invariably the sign for the amateurs of music to range themselves
into hostile camps and to discuss the merits and demerits of the
innovation with as much warmth as, in the present day, rival schools of
politicians might debate a question of international importance. Just as
in 1752, when an Italian troupe came to perform the _Serva Padrona_ of
Pergolese and other works of the Italian buffo order, all musical Paris
was divided into Buffonists and anti-Buffonists; so now, immediately on
Gluck’s arrival, two parties were formed, one prepared to laud to the
skies everything the master might compose, the other resolved to uphold
the traditions of the old French opera at all costs and to drive the
daring reformer from the field.[41]
Gluck found the task of producing _Iphigénie_ the most difficult of any
which he had yet undertaken. What he saw and heard at the Palais-Royal
disgusted as much as it astonished him; orchestra, singers, chorus,
ballet--all were lamentably inefficient, and it was obvious that a
course of the most rigorous training would be required ere they would be
competent to do his work anything like justice. The state of the Paris
Opera at this time was indeed almost incredible. “Disorder, abuse,
caprice, routine, inertia,” says Desnoiresterres, “were despotically
enthroned there, without a protest from any one. If reform were urgent,
so many persons were interested in the _statu quo_ that there was
scarcely any hope of obtaining from the administration, from this
ignorant and prejudiced crowd, any improvement that was at all
practical. In the midst of all the pomp and expenditure was a
carelessness, an anarchy, a disorder past all belief. Actors and
actresses pushed indecency to such a point as to appear outside the
_coulisses_, the latter in white camisoles with a _culotte d’argent_ and
a band across the forehead; the former in a simple peignoir. It was not
an infrequent sight, while the foreground was occupied by Jupiter or
Theseus, to see, through the scenes, the dancers moving and fluttering
about, they having actually chosen the background of the stage to
practise their steps and make their _jetés-battus_.”[42] The choruses
drew themselves up in a semi-circle, impassive, without a gesture, like
grenadiers on guard, and evinced not the slightest interest either in
the words they had to sing or in the action of the principal performers.
The latter went to the opposite extreme. “One sees the actresses, almost
in convulsions, violently tear the yelps out of their lungs, their fists
clenched against their chest, the head thrown back, the face inflamed,
the veins swollen, the stomach heaving; one does not know which is the
more disagreeably affected, the eye or the ear; their exertion gives as
much pain to those who see them as their singing does to those who hear
them.”[43]
The orchestra, which in winter was in the habit of performing in gloves,
is compared by Mercier, the author of _Le Tableau de Paris_, to “an old
coach drawn by consumptive horses and led by one deaf from his birth,”
and besides being careless and indifferent, was continually at variance
with the singers on the question whether the latter should follow the
musicians or the musicians follow them. Grétry relates the following
conversation, which took place between Sophie Arnould and Francœur,
the conductor of the orchestra, during a rehearsal of his own opera of
_Céphale et Procris_, in 1773:
“What is the meaning of this, Monsieur? The orchestra seems in a state
of rebellion?”
“What do you mean by rebellion, Mademoiselle? We are all here for the
service of the King, and we serve him zealously.”
“I should like to serve him also, but your orchestra puts me out and
spoils my singing.”
“Nevertheless, Mademoiselle, we play in time.”
“In time! _Quelle bête est-ce là?_ Follow me, Monsieur, and understand
that your accompaniment is the very humble servant of the actress who is
reciting!”
As the Goncourts point out, under the apparent insolence of her claim,
Sophie was here asserting the rights of the dramatic vocalist before the
musical revolution, of which Gluck was the pioneer, when opera-singers
were regarded merely as men and women reciting musical tragedy with
intonations indicated by a musician. Until then they had enjoyed the
most complete independence as to the manner of presenting their phrases.
Until then they had been at liberty to hurry or slacken the time, to
pause on or shorten any particular note, according to the inspiration of
the moment, or even as they felt more or less fatigued, the orchestra
following as best it could. “‘_Quelle bête est-ce là?_’ Sophie had but
little doubt when she uttered these words that _cette bête_ was on the
eve of reducing her talent and reputation to nothing.”[44]
The pretension, however, was one which a composer, like Gluck, “who took
the trouble to note not only the inflections of the voice, but also the
long notes and the short ones, the accent and the time,” could not for
one moment tolerate; and his insistence on its abandonment was the
cause of endless wrangling at rehearsals, where the principal vocalists
roundly declared that, if he refused them the liberty which had so long
been theirs, their talent would become superfluous and they would be
reduced to the level of mere chorus-singers.
These disputes were chiefly with the lady members of the troupe, though
the male singers did not fail to occasion the composer an infinity of
trouble. Legros, who had been cast for the part of Achilles, had an
admirable voice, but his singing was totally lacking in expression,
while his movements on the stage were stiff and awkward; and though
Gluck laboured unceasingly to remedy these faults, it was some months
ere he succeeded. Larrivée, to whom had been entrusted the rôle of
Agamemnon, was even more difficult to deal with, being so obstinate and
self-opinionated that to remonstrate with him seemed almost waste of
breath. Once the composer was forced to tell him that he seemed to have
no comprehension of his part, and to be unable to enter into the spirit
of it. “Wait till I put on my costume,” answered the singer
complacently; “you won’t recognise me then.” At the general rehearsal
Gluck took his seat in a box. Larrivée reappeared, in the costume of
Agamemnon, but his interpretation remained the same. “Ah, my friend!”
cried the composer, “I recognise you perfectly!”[45] Finally, Gluck had
to contend with the ballet, and, in particular, with its chief, the
celebrated Gaetano Vestris--“_le dieu de la danse_”--who once observed
that there were only three great men in Europe: Frederick II., Voltaire,
and himself! Vestris naturally considered the dancing by far the most
important feature of an opera, and, although there were already several
ballets in _Iphigénie_, wanted yet another. Gluck angrily refused.
“_Quoi!_” stammered Vestris; “_moi! le dieu de la danse!_”
“If you are the God of Dancing, Monsieur,” replied the composer, “dance
in heaven, not in my opera!”[46]
When, some months later, _Orphée_ was being rehearsed, the ballet-master
asked Gluck to write him the music of a chaconne. The latter, who had
strongly objected to the introduction of any dancing whatever into
_Orphée_, being of opinion that it would interfere with the seriousness
and pathos of the general action, was horrified.
“A chaconne!” he cried. “Do you suppose, Monsieur, that the Greeks,
whose manners I am endeavouring to depict, knew what a chaconne was?”
“Did they not?” rejoined the God of Dancing. “Then they are much to be
pitied!”
In those days it was the custom to attend the rehearsals of a piece
which happened to be arousing an unusual amount of interest, and the
demand for admission to those of _Iphigénie_ was so great that La
Vrillière wrote to the directors of the Opera, ordering them to take
special precautions to avoid any disturbance and to allow no one to
enter without a ticket signed by themselves. The desire to be present is
not difficult to understand, since to see Gluck at a rehearsal must have
been a sight not easily forgotten. Throwing off his coat and replacing
his wig by an old cotton night-cap, he would dart about the stage,
imploring Mlle. Arnould to follow his music, M. Larrivée not to sing
through his nose, M. Legros to endeavour to express something at least
of the dignity and nobility which one was accustomed to associate with
the great champion of the Greeks, and the chorus to endeavour to look
and move a little less like automata. “Look you, Mademoiselle!” he would
cry, purple with passion, when Sophie or some other actress proved more
than usually contumacious, “I am here to make you perform _Iphigénie_.
If you are willing to sing, nothing can be better. If you are not
willing to do so, do not trouble. I will go and see Madame la Dauphine
and tell her what you say. If it is impossible for me to get my opera
produced, I shall order my travelling-carriage and take the road to
Vienna.”
This indeed was no idle threat, and had it not been for the support
accorded him by Marie Antoinette, there can be very little doubt that he
would have shaken the dust of Paris off his feet. But, with the
Dauphiness behind him, the malcontents, grumble as they might, had no
option but to obey this terrible man, whom they devoutly wished at the
bottom of the Seine.
The first performance was fixed for April 13, 1774, but almost at the
last moment Legros announced that he was too ill to appear. Gluck
immediately demanded the postponement of the opera. The management
pointed out that the Royal Family were to be present, and that all
arrangements had been made for their reception, and begged him to allow
another singer to take the place of the absent tenor. The composer
rejoined that, rather than see his work mutilated by an inferior
rendering of so important a part, he would throw it into the fire; and
the directors were compelled to give way.