The Paris Sketch Book of Mr. M. A. Titmarsh Part 11

"He was then a young man of eighteen, with a tall, slim figure, a broad chest, and a flaming black eye, out of all which personal charms he knew how to draw the most advantage; and though his costume was such as Staub might probably have criticised, he had, nevertheless, a style peculiar to himself--to himself and the students, among whom he was the leader of the fas.h.i.+on. A tight black coat, b.u.t.toned up to the chin, across the chest, set off that part of his person; a low-crowned hat, with a voluminous rim, cast solemn shadows over a countenance bronzed by a southern sun: he wore, at one time, enormous flowing black locks, which he sacrificed pitilessly, however, and adopted a Brutus, as being more revolutionary: finally, he carried an enormous club, that was his code and digest: in like manner, De Retz used to carry a stiletto in his pocket by way of a breviary.

"Although of different ways of thinking in politics, certain sympathies of character and conduct united Dambergeac and myself, and we speedily became close friends. I don't think, in the whole course of his three years' residence, Dambergeac ever went through a single course of lectures. For the examinations, he trusted to luck, and to his own facility, which was prodigious: as for honors, he never aimed at them, but was content to do exactly as little as was necessary for him to gain his degree. In like manner he sedulously avoided those horrible circulating libraries, where daily are seen to congregate the 'reading men' of our schools. But, in revenge, there was not a milliner's shop, or a lingere's, in all our quartier Latin, which he did not industriously frequent, and of which he was not the oracle. Nay, it was said that his victories were not confined to the left bank of the Seine; reports did occasionally come to us of fabulous adventures by him accomplished in the far regions of the Rue de la Paix and the Boulevard Poissonniere. Such recitals were, for us less favored mortals, like tales of Bacchus conquering in the East; they excited our ambition, but not our jealousy; for the superiority of Harmodius was acknowledged by us all, and we never thought of a rivalry with him. No man ever cantered a hack through the Champs Elysees with such elegant a.s.surance; no man ever made such a ma.s.sacre of dolls at the shooting-gallery; or won you a rubber at billiards with more easy grace; or thundered out a couplet out of Beranger with such a roaring melodious ba.s.s. He was the monarch of the Prado in winter: in summer of the Chaumiere and Mont Parna.s.se. Not a frequenter of those fas.h.i.+onable places of entertainment showed a more amiable laisser-aller in the dance--that peculiar dance at which gendarmes think proper to blush, and which squeamish society has banished from her salons. In a word, Harmodius was the prince of mauvais sujets, a youth with all the accomplishments of Gottingen and Jena, and all the eminent graces of his own country.

"Besides dissipation and gallantry, our friend had one other vast and absorbing occupation--politics, namely; in which he was as turbulent and enthusiastic as in pleasure. La Patrie was his idol, his heaven, his nightmare; by day he spouted, by night he dreamed, of his country. I have spoken to you of his coiffure a la Sylla; need I mention his pipe, his meerschaum pipe, of which General Foy's head was the bowl; his handkerchief with the Charte printed thereon; and his celebrated tricolor braces, which kept the rallying sign of his country ever close to his heart? Besides these outward and visible signs of sedition, he had inward and secret plans of revolution: he belonged to clubs, frequented a.s.sociations, read the Const.i.tutionnel (Liberals, in those days, swore by the Const.i.tutionnel), harangued peers and deputies who had deserved well of their country; and if death happened to fall on such, and the Const.i.tutionnel declared their merit, Harmodius was the very first to attend their obsequies, or to set his shoulder to their coffins.

"Such were his tastes and pa.s.sions: his antipathies were not less lively. He detested three things: a Jesuit, a gendarme, and a claqueur at a theatre. At this period, missionaries were rife about Paris, and endeavored to re-illume the zeal of the faithful by public preachings in the churches. 'Infames jesuites!' would Harmodius exclaim, who, in the excess of his toleration, tolerated nothing; and, at the head of a band of philosophers like himself, would attend with scrupulous exact.i.tude the meetings of the reverend gentlemen. But, instead of a contrite heart, Harmodius only brought the abomination of desolation into their sanctuary. A perpetual fire of fulminating b.a.l.l.s would bang from under the feet of the faithful; odors of impure a.s.safoetida would mingle with the fumes of the incense; and wicked drinking choruses would rise up along with the holy canticles, in hideous dissonance, reminding one of the old orgies under the reign of the Abbot of Unreason.

"His hatred of the gendarmes was equally ferocious: and as for the claqueurs, woe be to them when Harmodius was in the pit! They knew him, and trembled before him, like the earth before Alexander; and his famous war-cry, 'La Carte au chapeau!' was so much dreaded, that the 'entrepreneurs de succes dramatiques' demanded twice as much to do the Odeon Theatre (which we students and Harmodius frequented), as to applaud at any other place of amus.e.m.e.nt: and, indeed, their double pay was hardly gained; Harmodius taking care that they should earn the most of it under the benches."

This pa.s.sage, with which we have taken some liberties, will give the reader a more lively idea of the reckless, jovial, turbulent Paris student, than any with which a foreigner could furnish him: the grisette is his heroine; and dear old Beranger, the cynic-epicurean, has celebrated him and her in the most delightful verses in the world. Of these we may have occasion to say a word or two anon. Meanwhile let us follow Monsieur de Bernard in his amusing descriptions of his countrymen somewhat farther; and, having seen how Dambergeac was a ferocious republican, being a bachelor, let us see how age, sense, and a little government pay--the great agent of conversions in France--nay, in England--has reduced him to be a pompous, quiet, loyal supporter of the juste milieu: his former portrait was that of the student, the present will stand for an admirable lively likeness of

THE SOUS-PReFET.

"Saying that I would wait for Dambergeac in his own study, I was introduced into that apartment, and saw around me the usual furniture of a man in his station. There was, in the middle of the room, a large bureau, surrounded by orthodox arm-chairs; and there were many shelves with boxes duly ticketed; there were a number of maps, and among them a great one of the department over which Dambergeac ruled; and facing the windows, on a wooden pedestal, stood a plaster-cast of the 'Roi des Francais.' Recollecting my friend's former republicanism, I smiled at this piece of furniture; but before I had time to carry my observations any farther, a heavy rolling sound of carriage-wheels, that caused the windows to rattle and seemed to shake the whole edifice of the sub-prefecture, called my attention to the court without. Its iron gates were flung open, and in rolled, with a great deal of din, a chariot escorted by a brace of gendarmes, sword in hand. A tall gentleman, with a c.o.c.ked-hat and feathers, wearing a blue and silver uniform coat, descended from the vehicle; and having, with much grave condescension, saluted his escort, mounted the stair. A moment afterwards the door of the study was opened, and I embraced my friend.

"After the first warmth and salutations, we began to examine each other with an equal curiosity, for eight years had elapsed since we had last met.

"'You are grown very thin and pale,' said Harmodius, after a moment.

"'In revenge I find you fat and rosy: if I am a walking satire on celibacy,--you, at least, are a living panegyric on marriage.'

"In fact a great change, and such an one as many people would call a change for the better, had taken place in my friend: he had grown fat, and announced a decided disposition to become what French people call a bel homme: that is, a very fat one. His complexion, bronzed before, was now clear white and red: there were no more political allusions in his hair, which was, on the contrary, neatly frizzed, and brushed over the forehead, sh.e.l.l-shape. This head-dress, joined to a thin pair of whiskers, cut crescent-wise from the ear to the nose, gave my friend a regular bourgeois physiognomy, wax-doll-like: he looked a great deal too well; and, added to this, the solemnity of his prefectural costume, gave his whole appearance a pompous well-fed look that by no means pleased.

"'I surprise you,' said I, 'in the midst of your splendor: do you know that this costume and yonder attendants have a look excessively awful and splendid? You entered your palace just now with the air of a pasha.'

"'You see me in uniform in honor of Monseigneur the Bishop, who has just made his diocesan visit, and whom I have just conducted to the limit of the arrondiss.e.m.e.nt.'

"'What!' said I, 'you have gendarmes for guards, and dance attendance on bishops? There are no more janissaries and Jesuits, I suppose?' The sub-prefect smiled.

"'I a.s.sure you that my gendarmes are very worthy fellows; and that among the gentlemen who compose our clergy there are some of the very best rank and talent: besides, my wife is niece to one of the vicars-general.'

"'What have you done with that great Ta.s.so beard that poor Armandine used to love so?'

"'My wife does not like a beard; and you know that what is permitted to a student is not very becoming to a magistrate.'

"I began to laugh. 'Harmodius and a magistrate!--how shall I ever couple the two words together? But tell me, in your correspondences, your audiences, your sittings with village mayors and petty councils, how do you manage to remain awake?'

"'In the commencement,' said Harmodius, gravely, 'it WAS very difficult; and, in order to keep my eyes open, I used to stick pins into my legs: now, however, I am used to it; and I'm sure I don't take more than fifty pinches of snuff at a sitting.'

"'Ah! apropos of snuff: you are near Spain here, and were always a famous smoker. Give me a cigar,--it will take away the musty odor of these piles of papers.'

"'Impossible, my dear; I don't smoke; my wife cannot bear a cigar.'

"His wife! thought I; always his wife: and I remember Juliette, who really grew sick at the smell of a pipe, and Harmodius would smoke, until, at last, the poor thing grew to smoke herself, like a trooper.

To compensate, however, as much as possible for the loss of my cigar, Dambergeac drew from his pocket an enormous gold snuff-box, on which figured the self-same head that I had before remarked in plaster, but this time surrounded with a ring of pretty princes and princesses, all nicely painted in miniature. As for the statue of Louis Philippe, that, in the cabinet of an official, is a thing of course; but the snuff-box seemed to indicate a degree of sentimental and personal devotion, such as the old Royalists were only supposed to be guilty of.

"'What! you are turned decided juste milieu?' said I.

"'I am a sous-prefet,' answered Harmodius.

"I had nothing to say, but held my tongue, wondering, not at the change which had taken place in the habits, manners, and opinions of my friend, but at my own folly, which led me to fancy that I should find the student of '26 in the functionary of '34. At this moment a domestic appeared.

"'Madame is waiting for Monsieur,' said he: 'the last bell has gone, and ma.s.s beginning.'

"'Ma.s.s!' said I, bounding up from my chair. 'You at ma.s.s like a decent serious Christian, without crackers in your pocket, and bored keys to whistle through?'--The sous-prefet rose, his countenance was calm, and an indulgent smile played upon his lips, as he said, 'My arrondiss.e.m.e.nt is very devout; and not to interfere with the belief of the population is the maxim of every wise politician: I have precise orders from Government on the point, too, and go to eleven o'clock ma.s.s every Sunday."'

There is a great deal of curious matter for speculation in the accounts here so wittily given by M. de Bernard: but, perhaps, it is still more curious to think of what he has NOT written, and to judge of his characters, not so much by the words in which he describes them, as by the unconscious testimony that the words all together convey. In the first place, our author describes a swindler imitating the manners of a dandy; and many swindlers and dandies be there, doubtless, in London as well as in Paris. But there is about the present swindler, and about Monsieur Dambergeac the student, and Monsieur Dambergeac the sous-prefet, and his friend, a rich store of calm internal debauch, which does not, let us hope and pray, exist in England. Hearken to M.

de Gustan, and his smirking whispers, about the d.u.c.h.ess of San Severino, who pour son bonheur particulier, &c. &c. Listen to Monsieur Dambergeac's friend's remonstrances concerning pauvre Juliette who grew sick at the smell of a pipe; to his nave admiration at the fact that the sous-prefet goes to church: and we may set down, as axioms, that religion is so uncommon among the Parisians, as to awaken the surprise of all candid observers; that gallantry is so common as to create no remark, and to be considered as a matter of course. With us, at least, the converse of the proposition prevails: it is the man professing irreligion who would be remarked and reprehended in England; and, if the second-named vice exists, at any rate, it adopts the decency of secrecy and is not made patent and notorious to all the world. A French gentleman thinks no more of proclaiming that he has a mistress than that he has a tailor; and one lives the time of Boccaccio over again, in the thousand and one French novels which depict society in that country.

For instance, here are before us a few specimens (do not, madam, be alarmed, you can skip the sentence if you like,) to be found in as many admirable witty tales, by the before-lauded Monsieur de Bernard. He is more remarkable than any other French author, to our notion, for writing like a gentleman: there is ease, grace and ton, in his style, which, if we judge aright, cannot be discovered in Balzac, or Soulie, or Dumas. We have then--"Gerfaut," a novel: a lovely creature is married to a brave, haughty, Alsacian n.o.bleman, who allows her to spend her winters at Paris, he remaining on his terres, cultivating, carousing, and hunting the boar. The lovely-creature meets the fascinating Gerfaut at Paris; instantly the latter makes love to her; a duel takes place: baron killed; wife throws herself out of window; Gerfaut plunges into dissipation; and so the tale ends.

Next: "La Femme de Quarante Ans," a capital tale, full of exquisite fun and sparkling satire: La femme de quarante ans has a husband and THREE lovers; all of whom find out their mutual connection one starry night; for the lady of forty is of a romantic poetical turn, and has given her three admirers A STAR APIECE; saying to one and the other, "Alphonse, when yon pale orb rises in heaven, think of me;" "Isadore, when that bright planet sparkles in the sky, remember your Caroline," &c.

"Un Acte de Vertu," from which we have taken Dambergeac's history, contains him, the husband--a wife--and a brace of lovers; and a great deal of fun takes place in the manner in which one lover supplants the other.--Pretty morals truly!

If we examine an author who rejoices in the aristocratic name of le Comte Horace de Viel-Castel, we find, though with infinitely less wit, exactly the same intrigues going on. A n.o.ble Count lives in the Faubourg St. Honore, and has a n.o.ble d.u.c.h.ess for a mistress: he introduces her Grace to the Countess his wife. The Countess his wife, in order to ramener her lord to his conjugal duties, is counselled, by a friend, TO PRETEND TO TAKE A LOVER: one is found, who, poor fellow! takes the affair in earnest: climax--duel, death, despair, and what not? In the "Faubourg St. Germain," another novel by the same writer, which professes to describe the very pink of that society which Napoleon dreaded more than Russia, Prussia, and Austria, there is an old husband, of course; a sentimental young German n.o.bleman, who falls in love with his wife; and the moral of the piece lies in the showing up of the conduct of the lady, who is reprehended--not for deceiving her husband (poor devil!)--but for being a flirt, AND TAKING A SECOND LOVER, to the utter despair, confusion, and annihilation of the first.

Why, ye G.o.ds, do Frenchmen marry at all? Had Pere Enfantin (who, it is said, has shaved his ambrosial beard, and is now a clerk in a banking-house) been allowed to carry out his chaste, just, dignified social scheme, what a deal of marital discomfort might have been avoided:--would it not be advisable that a great reformer and lawgiver of our own, Mr. Robert Owen, should be presented at the Tuileries, and there propound his scheme for the regeneration of France?

He might, perhaps, be spared, for our country is not yet sufficiently advanced to give such a philosopher fair play. In London, as yet, there are no blessed Bureaux de Mariage, where an old bachelor may have a charming young maiden--for his money; or a widow of seventy may buy a gay young fellow of twenty, for a certain number of bank-billets. If mariages de convenance take place here (as they will wherever avarice, and poverty, and desire, and yearning after riches are to be found), at least, thank G.o.d, such unions are not arranged upon a regular organized SYSTEM: there is a fiction of attachment with us, and there is a consolation in the deceit ("the homage," according to the old mot of Rochefoucauld) "which vice pays to virtue"; for the very falsehood shows that the virtue exists somewhere. We once heard a furious old French colonel inveighing against the chast.i.ty of English demoiselles: "Figurez-vous, sir," said he (he had been a prisoner in England), "that these women come down to dinner in low dresses, and walk out alone with the men!"--and, pray heaven, so may they walk, fancy-free in all sorts of maiden meditations, and suffer no more molestation than that young lady of whom Moore sings, and who (there must have been a famous lord-lieutenant in those days) walked through all Ireland, with rich and rare gems, beauty, and a gold ring on her stick, without meeting or thinking of harm.

Now, whether Monsieur de Viel-Castel has given a true picture of the Faubourg St. Germain, it is impossible for most foreigners to say; but some of his descriptions will not fail to astonish the English reader; and all are filled with that remarkable naf contempt of the inst.i.tution called marriage, which we have seen in M. de Bernard. The romantic young n.o.bleman of Westphalia arrives at Paris, and is admitted into what a celebrated female author calls la creme de la creme de la haute volee of Parisian society. He is a youth of about twenty years of age.

"No pa.s.sion had as yet come to move his heart, and give life to his faculties; he was awaiting and fearing the moment of love; calling for it, and yet trembling at its approach; feeling in the depths of his soul, that that moment would create a mighty change in his being, and decide, perhaps, by its influence, the whole of his future life."

Is it not remarkable, that a young n.o.bleman, with these ideas, should not pitch upon a demoiselle, or a widow, at least? but no, the rogue must have a married woman, bad luck to him; and what his fate is to be, is thus recounted by our author, in the shape of

A FRENCH FAs.h.i.+ONABLE CONVERSATION.

"A lady, with a great deal of esprit, to whom forty years' experience of the great world had given a prodigious perspicacity of judgment, the d.u.c.h.ess of Chalux, arbitress of the opinion to be held on all new comers to the Faubourg Saint Germain, and of their destiny and reception in it;--one of those women, in a word, who make or ruin a man,--said, in speaking of Gerard de s...o...b..rg, whom she received at her own house, and met everywhere, 'This young German will never gain for himself the t.i.tle of an exquisite, or a man of bonnes fortunes, among us. In spite of his calm and politeness, I think I can see in his character some rude and insurmountable difficulties, which time will only increase, and which will prevent him for ever from bending to the exigencies of either profession; but, unless I very much deceive myself, he will, one day, be the hero of a veritable romance.'

"'He, madame?' answered a young man, of fair complexion and fair hair, one of the most devoted slaves of the fas.h.i.+on:--'He, Madame la d.u.c.h.esse?

why, the man is, at best, but an original, fished out of the Rhine: a dull, heavy creature, as much capable of understanding a woman's heart as I am of speaking bas-Breton.'

"'Well, Monsieur de Belport, you will speak bas-Breton. Monsieur de s...o...b..rg has not your admirable ease of manner, nor your facility of telling pretty nothings, nor your--in a word, that particular something which makes you the most recherche man of the Faubourg Saint Germain; and even I avow to you that, were I still young, and a coquette, AND THAT I TOOK IT INTO MY HEAD TO HAVE A LOVER, I would prefer you.'

"All this was said by the d.u.c.h.ess, with a certain air of raillery and such a mixture of earnest and malice, that Monsieur de Belport, piqued not a little, could not help saying, as he bowed profoundly before the d.u.c.h.ess's chair, 'And might I, madam, be permitted to ask the reason of this preference?'

"'O mon Dieu, oui,' said the d.u.c.h.ess, always in the same tone; 'because a lover like you would never think of carrying his attachment to the height of pa.s.sion; and these pa.s.sions, do you know, have frightened me all my life. One cannot retreat at will from the grasp of a pa.s.sionate lover; one leaves behind one some fragment of one's moral SELF, or the best part of one's physical life. A pa.s.sion, if it does not kill you, adds cruelly to your years; in a word, it is the very lowest possible taste. And now you understand why I should prefer you, M. de Belport--you who are reputed to be the leader of the fas.h.i.+on.'

"'Perfectly,' murmured the gentleman, piqued more and more.

"'Gerard de s...o...b..rg WILL be pa.s.sionate. I don't know what woman will please him, or will be pleased by him' (here the d.u.c.h.ess of Chalux spoke more gravely); 'but his love will be no play, I repeat it to you once more. All this astonishes you, because you, great leaders of the ton that you are, never fancy that a hero of romance should be found among your number. Gerard de s...o...b..rg--but, look, here he comes!'