MADAME'S IMPRESSIONS
The marriage ceremony at the Town Hall has, no doubt, a tolerable
importance; but is it really possible for a well-bred person to regard
this importance seriously? I have been through it; I have undergone like
every one else this painful formality, and I can not look back on it
without feeling a kind of humiliation. On alighting from the carriage
I descried a muddy staircase; walls placarded with bills of every color,
and in front of one of them a man in a snuff-colored coat, bare-headed, a
pen behind his ear, and papers under his arm, who was rolling a cigarette
between his inky fingers. To the left a door opened and I caught a
glimpse of a low dark room in which a dozen fellows belonging to the
National Guard were smoking black pipes. My first thought on entering
this barrack-room was that I had done wisely in not putting on my gray
dress. We ascended the staircase and I saw a long, dirty, dim passage,
with a number of half-glass doors, on which I read: "Burials. Turn the
handle," "Expropriations," "Deaths. Knock loudly," "Inquiries,"
"Births," "Public Health," etc., and at length "Marriages."
We entered in company with a small lad who was carrying a bottle of ink;
the atmosphere was thick, heavy, and hot, and made one feel ill.
Happily, an attendant in a blue livery, resembling in appearance the
soldiers I had seen below, stepped forward to ask us to excuse him for
not having at once ushered us into the Mayor's drawing-room, which is no
other than the first-class waiting-room. I darted into it as one jumps
into a cab when it begins to rain suddenly. Almost immediately two
serious persons, one of whom greatly resembled the old cashier at the
Petit-Saint-Thomas, brought in two registers, and, opening them, wrote
for some time; only stopping occasionally to ask the name, age, and
baptismal names of both of us, then, saying to themselves, "Semi-colon .
. . between the aforesaid . . . fresh paragraph, etc., etc."
When he had done, the one like the man cashier at the Petit-Saint-Thomas
read aloud, through his nose, that which he had put down, and of which I
could understand nothing, except that my name was several times repeated
as well as that of the other "aforesaid." A pen was handed to us and we
signed. Voila.
"Is it over?" said I to Georges, who to my great surprise was very pale.
"Not yet, dear," said he; "we must now go into the hall, where the
marriage ceremony takes place."
We entered a large, empty hall with bare walls; a bust of the Emperor was
at the farther end over a raised platform, some armchairs, and some
benches behind them, and dust upon everything. I must have been in a
wrong mood, for it seemed to me I was entering the waiting-room at a
railway-station; nor could I help looking at my aunts, who were very
merry, over the empty chairs. The gentlemen, who no doubt affected not
to think as we did, were, on the contrary, all very serious, and I could
discern very well that Georges was actually trembling. At length the
Mayor came in by a little door and appeared before us, awkward and podgy
in his dress-coat, which was too large for him, and which his scarf
caused to rise up. He was a very respectable man who had amassed a
decent fortune from the sale of iron bedsteads; yet how could I bring
myself to think that this embarrassed-looking, ill-dressed, timid little
creature could, with a word hesitatingly uttered, unite me in eternal
bonds? Moreover, he had a fatal likeness to my piano-tuner.
The Mayor, after bowing to us, as a man bows when without his hat, and in
a white cravat, that is to say, clumsily, blew his nose, to the great
relief of his two arms which he did not know what to do with, and briskly
began the little ceremony. He hurriedly mumbled over several passages of
the Code, giving the numbers of the paragraphs; and I was given
confusedly to understand that I was threatened with the police if I did
not blindly obey all the orders and crotchets of my husband, and if I did
not follow wherever he might choose to take me, even if it should be to a
sixth floor in the Rue-Saint-Victor. A score of times I was on the point
of interrupting the Mayor, and saying, "Excuse me, Monsieur, but those
remarks are hardly polite as regards myself, and you yourself must know
that they are devoid of meaning."
But I restrained myself for fear I might frighten the magistrate, who
seemed to me to be in a hurry to finish. He added, however, a few words
on the mutual duties of husband and wife--copartnership--paternity, etc.,
etc.; but all these things, which would perhaps have made me weep
anywhere else, seemed grotesque to me, and I could not forget that dozen
of soldiers playing piquet round the stove, and that row of doors on
which I had read "Public Health," "Burials," "Deaths," "Expropriations,"
etc. I should have been aggrieved at this dealer in iron bedsteads
touching on my cherished dreams if the comic side of the situation had
not absorbed my whole attention, and if a mad wish to laugh outright had
not seized me.
"Monsieur Georges -------- , do you swear to take for your wife
Mademoiselle ----------- ," said the Mayor, bending forward.
My husband bowed and answered "Yes" in a very low voice. He has since
acknowledged to me that he never felt more emotion in his life than in
uttering that "Yes."
"Mademoiselle Berthe -------- ," continued the magistrate, turning to me,
"do you swear to take for your husband -----------"
I bowed, with a smile, and said to myself: "Certainly; that is plain
enough; I came here for that express purpose."
That was all. I was married!
My father and my husband shook hands like men who had not met for twenty
years; the eyes of both were moist. As for myself, it was impossible for
me to share their emotion. I was very hungry, and mamma and I had the
carriage pulled up at the pastry-cook's before going on to the
dressmaker's.
The next morning was the great event, and when I awoke it was hardly
daylight. I opened the door leading into the drawing-room; there my
dress was spread out on the sofa, the veil folded beside it, my shoes, my
wreath in a large white box, nothing was lacking. I drank a glass of
water. I was nervous, uneasy, happy, trembling. It seemed like the
morning of a battle when one is sure of winning a medal. I thought of
neither my past nor my future; I was wholly taken up with the idea of the
ceremony, of that sacrament, the most solemn of all, of the oath I was
about to take before God, and also by the thought of the crowd gathered
expressly to see me pass.
We breakfasted early. My father was in his boots, his trousers, his
white tie, and his dressing-gown. My mother also was half dressed. It
seemed to me that the servants took greater pains in waiting on me and
showed me more respect. I even remember that Marie said, "The
hairdresser has come, Madame." Madame! Good girl, I have not forgotten
it.
It was impossible for me to eat; my throat was parched and I experienced
all over me shudders of impatience, something like the sensation one has
when one is very-thirsty and is waiting for the sugar to melt. The tones
of the organ seemed to haunt me, and the wedding of Emma and Louis
recurred to my mind. I dressed; the hairdresser called me "Madame" too,
and arranged my hair so nicely that I said, I remember, "Things are
beginning well; this coiffure is a good omen." I stopped Marie, who
wished to lace me tighter than usual. I know that white makes one look
stouter and that Marie was right; but I was afraid lest it should send
the blood to my head. I have always had a horror of brides who looked as
if they had just got up from table. Religious emotions should be too
profound to be expressed by anything save pallor. It is silly to blush
under certain circumstances.
When I was dressed I entered the drawing-room to have a little more room
and to spread out my trailing skirts. My father and Georges were already
there, talking busily.
"Have the carriages come?--yes--and about the 'Salutaris'?--very good,
then, you will see to everything--and the marriage coin--certainly,
I have the ring--Mon Dieu! where is my certificate of confession? Ah!
good, I left it in the carriage."
They were saying all this hurriedly and gesticulating like people having
great business on hand. When Georges caught sight of me he kissed my
hand, and while the maids kneeling about me were settling the skirt, and
the hairdresser was clipping the tulle of the veil, he said in a husky
voice, "You look charming, dear."
He was not thinking in the least of what he was saying, and I answered
mechanically:
"Do you think so? Not too short, the veil, Monsieur Silvani. Don't
forget the bow on the bodice, Marie."
When one has to look after everything, one needs all one's wits.
However, Georges' husky voice recurred to me, and I said to myself, "I am
sure that he has caught a cold; it is plain that he has had his hair cut
too short."
I soon got at the true state of the case.
"You have a cold, my dear fellow," said my father.
"Don't speak of it," he answered in a low voice. And still lower, and
with a somewhat embarrassed smile: "Will you be so kind as to give me an
extra pocket-handkerchief? I have but one--"
"Certainly, my dear boy."
"Thanks, very much."
It was a trifle, to be sure, but I felt vexed, and I remember that, when
going downstairs with them holding up my train behind me, I said to
myself, "I do hope that he does not sneeze at the altar."
I soon forgot all about it. We got into the carriage; I felt that every
one was looking at me, and I caught sight of groups of spectators in the
street beyond the carriage gates. What I felt is impossible to describe,
but it was something delightful. The sound of the beadles' canes on the
pavement will forever reecho in my heart. We halted for a moment on the
red drugget. The great organ poured forth the full tones of a triumphal
march; thousands of eager faces turned toward me, and there in the
background, amidst an atmosphere of sunshine, incense, velvet, and gold,
were two gilt armchairs for us to seat ourselves on before the altar.
I do not know why an old engraving in my father's study crossed my mind.
It represents the entry of Alexander the Great into Babylon; he is on an
elephant which is glittering with precious stones. You must know it.
Only, Alexander was a heathen who had many things to reproach himself
with, while I was not.
God smiled on me, and with His paternal hand invited me to seat myself in
His house, on His red drugget, in His gilt armchair. The heavens, full
of joy, made music for me, and on high, through the glittering stained-
glass windows, the archangels, full of kind feeling, whispered as they
watched me. As I advanced, heads were bent as a wheat-field bends
beneath the breeze. My friends, my relatives, my enemies, bowed to us,
and I saw--for one sees everything in spite of one's self on these solemn
occasions--that they did not think that I looked ugly. On reaching the
gilt chair, I bent forward with restrained eagerness--my chignon was
high, revealing my neck, which is passable--and thanked the Lord. The
organ ceased its triumphal song and I could hear my poor mother bursting
into tears beside me. Oh! I understand what a mother's heart must feel
during such a ceremony. While watching with satisfaction the clergy who
were solemnly advancing, I noticed Georges; he seemed irritated; he was
stiff, upright, his nostrils dilated, and his lips set. I have always
been rather vexed at him for not having been a little more sensible to
what I was experiencing that day, but men do not understand this kind of
poetry.
The discourse of his Reverence who married us was a masterpiece, and was
delivered, moreover, with that unction, that dignity, that persuasive
charm peculiar to him. He spoke of our two families "in which pious
belief was hereditary, like honor." You could have heard a pin drop,
such was the attention with which the prelate's voice was listened to.
Then at one point he turned toward me, and gave me to understand with a
thousand delicacies that I was wedding one of the noblest officers in the
army. "Heaven smiles," said he, "on the warrior who places at the
service of his country a sword blessed by God, and who, when he darts
into the fray, can place his hand upon his heart and shout to the enemy
that noble war-cry, 'I believe!'" How well that was turned! What
grandeur in this holy eloquence! A thrill ran through the assembly.
But that was not all. His Lordship then addressed Georges in a voice as
soft and unctuous as it had before been ringing and enthusiastic.
"Monsieur, you are about to take as your companion a young girl"--I
scarcely dare recall the graceful and delicate things that his Reverence
said respecting me--"piously reared by a Christian mother who has been
able to share with her, if I may say so, all the virtues of her heart,
all the charms of her mind." (Mamma was sobbing.) "She will love her
husband as she has loved her father, that father full of kindness, who,
from the cradle, implanted in her the sentiments of nobility and
disinterestedness which--" (Papa smiled despite himself.) "Her father,
whose name is known to the poor, and who in the house of God has his
place marked among the elect." (Since his retirement, papa has become
churchwarden.) "And you, Monsieur, will respect, I feel certain, so much
purity, such ineffable candor"--I felt my eyes grow moist--"and without
forgetting the physical and perishable charms of this angel whom God
bestows upon you, you will thank Heaven for those qualities a thousand
times more precious and more lasting contained in her heart and her
mind."
We were bidden to stand up, and stood face to face with one another like
the divine spouses in the picture of Raphael. We exchanged the golden
ring, and his Reverence, in a slow, grave voice, uttered some Latin
words, the sense of which I did not understand, but which greatly moved
me, for the prelate's hand, white, delicate, and transparent, seemed to
be blessing me. The censer, with its bluish smoke, swung by the hands of
children, shed in the air its holy perfume. What a day, great heavens!
All that subsequently took place grows confused in my memory. I was
dazzled, I was transported. I can remember, however, the bonnet with
white roses in which Louise had decked herself out. Strange it is how
some people are quite wanting in taste!
Going to the vestry, I leaned on the General's arm, and it was then that
I saw the spectators' faces. All seemed touched.
Soon they thronged round to greet me. The vestry was full, they pushed
and pressed round me, and I replied to all these smiles, to all these
compliments, by a slight bow in which religious emotion peeped forth in
spite of me. I felt conscious that something solemn had just taken place
before God and man; I felt conscious of being linked in eternal bonds.
I was married!
By a strange fancy I then fell to thinking of the pitiful ceremony of the
day before. I compared--God forgive me for doing so!--the ex-dealer in
iron bedsteads, ill at ease in his dress-coat, to the priest; the trivial
and commonplace words of the mayor, with the eloquent outbursts of the
venerable prelate. What a lesson! There earth, here heaven; there the
coarse prose of the man of business, here celestial poesy.
Georges, to whom I lately spoke about this, said:
"But, my dear, perhaps you don't know that marriage at the Town Hall
before the registrar is gratis, while--" I put my hand over his mouth to
prevent him from finishing; it seemed to me that he was about to utter
some impiety.
Gratis, gratis. That is exactly what I find so very unseemly.