A FEW PROMINENT PARISIAN HOSTESSES
Among the great ladies who began to receive society in their ancestral
houses during the presidency of Marshal MacMahon can be mentioned the
Duchesse de Rohan, at that time still Princesse de Léon; the Duchesse de
Galliera, of whom I have already spoken; and a crowd of hostesses of
minor standing within the social horizon, who hastened with more or less
alacrity to follow their example. The Comtesse Mélanie de Pourtalès
opened once more the doors of her hotel in the Rue Tronchet, as did the
Baroness Alphonse de Rothschild her magnificent palace in the Rue St.
Florentin, whilst Madame Edouard André very soon contrived, thanks to
her husband’s enormous fortune and her own great talent as a painter, to
introduce herself into the most select circles of Paris society, and to
have all its celebrities at her receptions given in her splendid
dwelling on the Boulevard Haussmann.
Little by little social life began to re-establish itself, though on an
entirely different scale than formerly, and, strange to say, society
became ever so much less exclusive than when a distinct line of
separation existed between the Monde des Tuileries, as it was called,
and the other coteries which abounded in the capital.
Madame de Galliera was one of the last representatives of the _grandes
dames_ of the time of Louis Philippe, when even great ladies got imbued
with a certain tinge of middle-class leanings, which were the
distinctive feature of that middle-class Court over which Queen Marie
Amélie presided, where it was not considered as against etiquette to
appear before the Sovereigns with an umbrella, and where the King did
not hesitate to peel a fruit with a penknife. Madame de Galliera was
polite and amiable, very correct in everything she did, and very much
convinced of the exceptional importance which her numerous millions gave
her in the world where she moved with more ease than pleasure. She
belonged to a coterie composed of widely differing elements, and where
rigid dames could be found together with some who posed as such, though
with the heavy burden of a well-filled past upon their shoulders. Such,
for instance, as the Duchesse de Dino, who in her young days had been a
friend of Madame de Galliera, though considerably older than the latter.
At the time I am talking about, that descendant of the Genoese Doges and
daughter of the ancient house of Brignole-Sale was affecting the most
considerable devotion to the Orleans family, and had put her sumptuous
house at the disposal of the Comte de Paris, who inhabited it until the
decree of expulsion was enforced against him. He held there the
reception on the occasion of the wedding of his daughter, the Princess
Amélie, with the heir to the throne of Portugal. This reception, brought
him bad luck in general, because it was the cause of a quarrel between
him and his capricious hostess, who, instead of leaving him her vast
fortune as she had intended, willed a considerable portion of it to the
Empress Frederick of Germany, with whom she had struck up a violent
friendship at the time the Emperor was struggling with the horrors of
his last illness at San Remo. She left her house in Paris to the
Austrian Emperor, whose Embassy has been located in it ever since.
Madame de Galliera was a very considerable personality in Paris
society, but no one liked her, and not a few stood in fear of her
because she could be terribly rude when she liked, and had a peculiar
way of entirely crushing those she did not care for, or against whom she
thought she had a grudge. Her relations with her only son were peculiar,
and for reasons it is not for me to discuss he refused to accept the
slightest portion of her enormous wealth, or to be known by any of the
numerous titles that belonged to her, calling himself plain M. Ferrari,
and preferring to earn his own living rather than enjoy millions to
which he felt he had no moral right. His strong principles rebelled
against compromises, about which no one else would have been troubled.
The present Duchesse de Rohan, at that time still Princesse de Léon, was
a very different person from Madame de Galliera. Mademoiselle de
Verteillac by birth, she brought an immense dowry to the Prince de Léon
when she married him; it restored to the house of Rohan some of its past
splendours. With her money she rebuilt the old castle of Josselin, and
made it one of the landmarks of Brittany. The receptions she held in her
house on the Boulevard des Invalides were exceedingly sumptuous and
numerous; some of the fancy balls that took place there, indeed, are
still talked of. She was hospitable, kind, clever in her way, but rather
inclined to vulgarity, perhaps on account of her stoutness, and partly
because her whole manner was too good-natured to be distinguished.
Looking at her, one might have thought her to be anything but a Duchesse
de Rohan, but she was and is still very much liked, because she has
always shown herself generous, indulgent for others, and absolutely
devoid of snobbishness. Madame de Rohan has pretensions to be considered
a literary person, and has written a few books, which her title and
position in society have helped to make popular. She is now an old
woman, who has known the sorrows of life, having lost a charming
daughter, the Comtesse de Périgord, who was snatched away from her in
the flower of her youth and beauty; but the Duchesse has kept her
pleasant smile and kind welcome, and is decidedly a popular personage in
Parisian society.
The years that have sat rather heavily on the Duchesse de Léon have
spared the lovely Countess Mélanie de Pourtalès, who, although a
great-grandmother at present, is just as lovely an old woman as she was
a splendid young one. The smile, the eyes, the expression, have retained
their former charm and the soft melodious voice its youthful ring. One
cannot call Madame de Pourtalès a great lady, in the sense which the
French attach to this expression of _grande dame_, which has no equal in
any other language; but she was essentially the _femme charmante_ of the
time in which she was born, pleasant, simple, with no shred of
affectation about her a thoughtful hostess, and a faithful friend to
those to whom she had attached herself; moreover, of no mean
intelligence, of perfect tact, and with a wonderful knowledge of the
world. She saw at her feet all the men of her own generation, and went
on gathering the admiration of those who belonged to a later one. Her
receptions were select, in the sense that at them one only met social
stars; they were not exclusive--bankers and financial magnates elbowed
young beauties in their prime, or authors, whether of repute or simply
fashionable for the moment. When she passes away she will not be
forgotten, and her name will always remain associated with the fate of
the Second Empire and with the Third Republic.
I have spoken of Madame Edouard André; before her marriage she had been
known as Mademoiselle Nelly Jacquemard, a painter of wonderful talent,
whose portraits of M. Thiers and M. Dufaure will rank among the most
remarkable works of art of the end of the nineteenth century in France.
She had fascinated M. André, the son of a banker, blessed with a
considerable number of millions, who had been one of the most
fashionable men of the Société des Tuileries towards the end of the
reign of Napoleon III. M. André, already old and nearly paralysed, had
fallen in love with the artist at the time she was painting his picture,
and finding that their tastes in many things harmonised he had married
her. Mlle. Jacquemard proved herself grateful, and made an excellent
wife to the tired, weary man, who found in her what he had wished--a
companion and a nurse. When he died he left her all his riches, together
with his wonderful house and the numerous works of art that it
contained, and to which she considerably added.
Madame André was an amusing little woman, absolutely vulgar in
appearance and manners, but who moved in the best society, and whose
entertainments, absolutely devoid of stiffness, were as amusing as large
receptions can be. She was made very much of by the Orleans family, who
flattered her in the secret hope that she would be induced to make a
will in their favour, but that hope was to prove a barren one, because
Madame André left all that she possessed to the Institut de France, with
injunctions to transform her palace into a museum. She is supposed to
have said, not without a certain malice, that in doing so she was
following the example given to her by the Duc d’Aumale, and that
consequently she believed the way she had disposed of her property would
meet the approval of the latter’s numerous nephews and nieces.
By an extraordinary freak of her rather peculiar character Madame André,
after her marriage, entirely neglected the art to which she had owed her
former celebrity. She absolutely refused to take again a brush or a
pencil in her hand, and was even angry when anyone made an allusion to
her wonderful talent in that line. It seemed as if she was ashamed of
Nelly Jacquemard, and yet it was to Nelly Jacquemard she had owed the
conquest that she had made of M. Edouard André and his many millions.
The Rothschild family, who perhaps had been more powerful during the
reign of Louis Philippe than later on, at least as regards the political
influence and power which they wielded, had acquired a far greater
social position during the Second Empire, and one which became even
stronger after its fall, when for one brief moment they transferred
their allegiance to the Comte de Paris and to the whole Orleans family.
The Baron Alphonse was a very great personage indeed, and one of whom
even kings and countries stood in awe. He had married one of his
cousins, the daughter of the London Rothschild, and the grace, beauty,
and intelligence of his wife won them many friends among Parisian
society. The couple entertained on a large scale, and their balls,
dinners, and shooting parties at their lovely castle of Férrières were
celebrated for the luxury displayed at them and for the discriminating
choice of the guests invited. It was at Férrières that the Princess
Amélie, the daughter of the Comte de Paris, made her début in society,
and later on, especially during the Exhibition of 1878, the Rothschilds
opened their doors widely to the best French and foreign society. The
death of their eldest daughter, Bettina, married to her cousin, Baron
Albert Rothschild of Vienna, put an end to those brilliant festivities.
The Baroness Alphonse hardly ever went out after that, and contented
herself with seeing a few intimate friends at her own house. The only
other great function at the hotel in the Rue St. Florentin was the
reception given in honour of the marriage of Edouard, the only son of
Baron and Baroness Alphonse de Rothschild, with the lovely Mademoiselle
Halphen, an event which was very shortly followed by the death of the
old Baron.
His widow only survived him for a short time. She had grown very
eccentric towards the last, and suffered from the mania of thinking
herself poor and obliged to economise. Madame Edmond de Pourtalès was
about the only person whom she cared to see, and the latter remained
with her constantly, never leaving her bedside during her last short
illness. The hotel in the Rue St. Florentin still remains closed, as its
present owners do not seem to care much for society, and it is very much
to be doubted whether it will ever witness the sumptuous entertainments
that had won for it such fame in past times.
Another house which has passed into other hands, being now occupied by
M. Seligmann, a merchant of curiosities, is the Hotel de Sagan, Rue St.
Dominique, where the Princesse de Sagan, the daughter of the banker
Seillères, used so frequently to entertain from the days when her
marriage brought her into the most exclusive set of Paris society.
Madame de Sagan was a tall, slight, fair woman, with pleasant manners,
who was very much liked by a good many men, but had never been able to
get on with her own husband. He was the eldest son of the Duc de
Valencay and the grandson of the famous Duchesse de Dino. He spent right
and left, and as his father either could not, or would not, give him
more, he had been obliged to seek among the daughters of financial
houses a companion of his life. He did not care in the least for his
wife, though he tried to launch her into society, and to help her in
acquiring a great position. The Princess made the best of his advice,
but very soon discovered that if she wanted to keep her prestige in the
eyes of the world, she had better remove her fortune from the control of
her husband. The couple separated after stormy quarrels, that formed
the main topic of public conversation for a long time, and the Princess
found many people willing to console her in her solitude. From time to
time an ugly scandal arose in connection with either her doings or those
of the Prince, who very often found need to have recourse to his wife’s
purse. He obliged her to pay dearly for his silence concerning things
that, if revealed, might have impaired that worldly position for which
she cared above everything else.
It is related that once when the heir to one of the thrones of Europe
had signified his intention to be present at an entertainment given by
Madame de Sagan, some relatives had explained to her that it would be
more suitable, especially in view of the fact that the Prince’s wife
would also be present, to have a master of the house to play the host,
and to receive them together with her. She then began negotiations with
the Prince de Sagan, who first of all stipulated he should be given a
handsome cheque of not less than four figures, to ensure his presence in
his wife’s house, and who consented, after having received it, to make
an appearance in his former home, to give a look at all the arrangements
made in honour of the occasion, and after having received the royal
couple at the bottom of the staircase of the hotel in the Rue St.
Dominique, to play the host with the perfection that he always performed
his social duties. When the last guest had left, he kissed his wife’s
hand with courtly grace, and took leave of her in his turn with a
playful remark of some kind or other, and for a long time the couple did
not meet again.
The Prince de Sagan was considered the leader of everything that was
fashionable in Paris. It was he who organised the racecourse of Auteuil,
and who helped greatly to popularise Americans among Parisian society,
where, for a handsome consideration, so at least it was rumoured, he
introduced them into his particular set, where every word he uttered was
law, which, like those of the Medes and Persians, altered not. One used
to see him often at the Opera in the box belonging to the Jockey Club,
with his inevitable eyeglass hanging on a broad black ribbon, a fashion
he was the first to introduce. He occupied two small rooms at the club
of the Union, not being possessed of enough means and having too many
creditors to be able to indulge in the luxury of a private apartment,
and it was there that he was stricken with paralysis, from which he
never recovered, and which deprived him both of his speech and of his
mental faculties. It was at this juncture that Madame de Sagan behaved
with great generosity and a singular power of forgiveness for past
injuries. As soon as she heard of the lamentable condition to which her
husband had been reduced, she drove to the club, and had him removed to
her own house, where she nursed him with the utmost devotion; thereafter
the large receptions and garden parties which she regularly gave in
spring and which constituted a feature of the Paris season, became a
thing of the past, and the hospitable gates of the hotel in the Rue St.
Dominique were closed for ever.
The Princesse de Sagan, who in the meanwhile, through the death of her
father-in-law, had become the Duchesse de Talleyrand, was not rewarded
for her self-sacrifice. She died quite suddenly, before the Duc, who was
left alone and infirm to the mercies of his two sons and of hired
servants. The old man dragged out an existence for something like ten
years or so, and at last died in poverty and solitude, expiating his
formerly brilliant life more cruelly and more bitterly than he perhaps
deserved.
One of his sons, the present Duc de Talleyrand, to whom I shall refer
again, is married to the American heiress, Miss Anna Gould, whose
divorce from the Comte de Castellane made such a sensation a few years
ago, but the hotel in the Rue St. Dominique has been sold, and already
half the magnificent garden in which it stood has been built upon with
huge houses, whilst the inside of the palace is turned into an
antiquary’s shop; bric-à-brac of all kinds encumbers the lofty rooms
where kings and queens moved with stately grace; it dishonours the
famous staircase at the top of which the Princesse de Sagan, dressed in
the costume of a Persian Empress covered with priceless jewels and with
a little negro boy holding a sunshade over her head, received her guests
at one of the most famous of her many famous fancy balls.
There was one salon in Paris which was not by any means so brilliant as
that of the Comtesse de Pourtalès, the Princesse de Sagan, and the
Duchesse de Bisaccia, but which enjoyed a popularity that has never been
equalled. I am thinking of that of the Duchesse de Maillé, that stately
old lady with the many charming daughters who, without any affectation
of pomp and without the least shade of stiffness, welcomed almost every
evening her many friends with her bright smile and kind words. Madame de
Maillé was one of those women that are but seldom met with, who combine
the dignity of the _grande dame_ with the indulgence and the abandon, if
one can use such a word, of the perfect woman of the world. She was
clever, and she appreciated cleverness in others; she could talk well,
and listen even better still; she knew how to bring into evidence all
the perfections and qualities of her friends, and she always found
reasons to excuse their faults or their imperfections. She was discreet,
and never made use of the many confidences that were constantly poured
into her ear; she had always ready some good advice to give to those who
required it, and she liked to see people happy around her, to watch
young people amuse themselves, and though excessively strict in
everything that was connected with appearances, so very polite that
somehow in her presence no one dreamed of breaking the code established
by society in that respect. Madame de Maillé loved politics, and enjoyed
exceedingly the conversation of literary people. Almost all the
celebrities that Paris could boast of were the habitués of her salon.
She used to receive them seated by her fireside, in her plain black
gown, with a lace cap over her silvery hair and her everlasting knitting
in her hands. She at once put them at their ease, and found out the most
appropriate things to tell them. Her house was restful in our age of
restlessness, and though there was not the least shade of hauteur about
the old Duchesse, the last representative of the ancient family of the
Marquis d’Osmond, yet one felt at once, on seeing her, that one stood in
the presence of a really great lady.
Now this hospitable salon is also a thing of the past. The Duchesse de
Maillé has been dead these last ten years or so, and all her children
have settled in houses of their own. Her daughters, Madame de Nadaillac,
the Marquise de Ganay, and Madame de Fleury, though all distinguished
and amiable women, perhaps because they are still too young, have not
acquired that inimitable charm, ease in their manners, and dignity in
their bearing which belonged exclusively to their charming mother.
The Duchesse de Maillé was an exception among the old ladies of
aristocratic Paris. There was no stiffness, such as, for instance,
distinguished the old Princesse de Ligne and the Duchesse de Mirepoix,
and some others whose names I have already forgotten. I do not think
that anything more solemn than the receptions of the Princess de Ligne
have ever been invented. She was a Pole by birth, belonging to the old
family of Lubomirski, a representative of which, Prince Joseph
Lubomirski, was at one time a well-known boulevardier. Anything more
formidable in the shape of a dowager could hardly be found in the whole
world. One could not dream even of sitting in a chair in her august
presence, and generally dropped down meekly on one of the numerous
stools which adorned her drawing-room and which reminded one of a church
without an altar. She was ill-natured, too, cruel when she liked--and
she liked it often; severe in her judgments, and inexorable in her
decisions. Her numerous grandchildren were all afraid of her, and when
she decided that the head of the house of Ligne was to marry her own
granddaughter, Mlle. de La Rochefoucauld Bisaccia, neither one nor the
other, to their own future sorrow, dared to say a word in opposition,
for never was there a union more ill-assorted. When it ended in a
divorce no one felt surprised. At the time this last-mentioned fact took
place the Princess Hedwige de Ligne had long been dead.
There were other houses in Paris which, perhaps, were less select, but
certainly more amusing and agreeable than those in the high circles I
have just mentioned. There existed salons which were truly Bohemian, but
which also exercised a considerable influence on the sayings and doings
of society. I have mentioned already old Madame Lacroix, whose house saw
purely literary receptions, and at whose hospitable hearth all the
distinguished foreigners who arrived in Paris used to meet. Then there
was the salon of Madame Aubernon de Nerville, where Academicians were
usually to be met, that of Madame de Luynes, and last, but not least,
the salon of Madame Juliette Adam, who wielded a really regal power
among a certain set, and who certainly succeeded in being considered as
a political power, especially after Gambetta began to seek her advice in
matters pertaining to the affairs of the government. But this last
house, as well as its amiable and clever mistress, deserve more than a
passing mention; they require a chapter to themselves in order to be
duly appreciated.