Paris and the Parisians in 1835 Volume I Part 14

Often as I have visited the enclosure of Pere Lachaise, it was with feelings of renewed curiosity and interest that I yesterday accompanied thither those of my party who had not yet seen it. I was well pleased to wander once more through the cypress alleys, now grown into fine gloomy funereal shades, and once more to feel that wavering sort of emotion which I always experience there;--one moment being tempted to smile at the fantastic manner in which affection has been manifested,--and the next, moved to tears by some touch of tenderness, that makes itself felt even amidst the vast collection of childish superst.i.tions with which the place abounds.

This mournful garden is altogether a very solemn and impressive spectacle. What a world of mortality does one take in at one glance!

It will set one thinking a little, however fresh from the busy idleness of Paris,--of Paris, that antidote to all serious thought, that especial paradise for the wors.h.i.+ppers of SANS SOUCI.

A profusion of spring flowers are at this season hourly shedding their blossoms over every little cherished enclosure. There is beauty, freshness, fragrance on the surface.... It is a fearful contrast!

I do not remember any spot, either in church or churchyard, where the unequal dignity of the memorials raised above the dust which lies so very equally beneath them all is shown in a manner to strike the heart so forcibly as it does at Pere Lachaise. Here, a shovelful of weeds have hardly room to grow; and there rises a costly pile, shadowing its lowly neighbour. On this side the narrow path, sorrow is wrapped round and hid from notice by the very poverty that renders it more bitter; while, on the other, wealth, rank, and pride heap decorations over the worthless clay, striving vainly to conceal its nothingness. It is an epitome of the world they have left: remove the marble and disturb the turf, human nature will be found to wear the same aspect under both.

Many groups in deep mourning were wandering among the tombs; so many indeed, that when we turned aside from one, with the reverence one always feels disposed to pay to sorrow, we were sure to encounter another. This manner of lamenting in public seems so strange to us!

How would it be for a shy English mother, who sobs inwardly and hides the aching sorrow in her heart's core,--how would she bear to bargain at the public gate for a pretty garland, then enter amidst an idle throng, with the toy hanging on her finger, and, before the eyes of all who choose to look, suspend it over the grave of her lost child?

An Englishwoman surely must lose her reason either before or after such an act;--if it were not the effect of madness, it would be the cause of it. Yet such is the effect of habit, or rather of the different tone of manners and of mind here, that one may daily and hourly see parents, most devoted to their children during their lives, and most heart-broken when divided from them by death, perform with streaming eyes these public lamentations.

It is nevertheless impossible, let the manner of it differ from our own as much as it may, to look at the freshly-trimmed flowers, the garlands, and all the pretty tokens of tender care which meet the eye in every part of this wide-spread ma.s.s of mortal nothingness, without feeling that real love and real sorrow have been at work.

One small enclosure attracted my attention as at once the most _bizarre_ and the most touching of all. It held the little gra.s.sy tomb of a young child, planted round with choice flowers; and at its head rose a semicircular recess, containing, together with a crucifix and other religious emblems, several common playthings, which had doubtless been the latest joy of the lost darling. His age was stated to have been three years, and he was mourned as the first and only child after twelve years of marriage.

Below this melancholy statement was inscribed--

"Pa.s.sans! priez pour sa malheureuse mere!"

Might we not say, that

Thought and affliction, pa.s.sion, death itself, They turn to favour and to prettiness?

It would, I believe, be more just, as well as more generous, instead of accusing the whole nation of being the victims of affectation instead of sorrow under every affliction that death can cause, to believe that they feel quite as sincerely as ourselves; though they have certainly a very different way of showing it.

I wish they, whoever they are, who had the command of such matters, would have let the curious tomb of Abelard and Elosa remain in decent tranquillity in its original position. Nothing can a.s.similate worse than do its Gothic form and decorations with every object around it.

The paltry plaster tablet too, that has been stuck upon it for the purpose of recording the history of the tomb rather than of those who lie buried in it, is in villanously bad taste; and we can only hope that the elements will complete the work they have begun, and then this barbarous defacing will crumble away before our grandchildren shall know anything about it.

The thickly-planted trees and shrubs have grown so rapidly, as in many places to make it difficult to pa.s.s through them; and the ground appears to be extremely crowded nearly over its whole extent. A few neighbouring acres have been lately added to it; but their bleak, naked, and unornamented surface forbids the eye as yet to recognise this s.p.a.ce as part of the enclosure. One pale solitary tomb is placed within it, at the very verge of the dark cypress line that marks the original boundary; and it looks like a sheeted ghost hovering about between night and morning.

One very n.o.ble monument has been added since I last visited the garden: it is dedicated to the memory of a n.o.ble Russian lady, whose long unspellable name I forget. It is of white or greyish marble, and of magnificent proportions,--lofty and elegant, yet ma.s.sive and entirely simple. Altogether, it appeared to me to be as perfect in taste as any specimen of monumental architecture that I have ever seen, though it had not the last best grace of sculpture to adorn it.

There is no effigy--no statue--scarcely an ornament of any kind, but it seems constructed with a view to unite equally the appearance of imposing majesty and enduring strength. This splendid mausoleum stands towards the top of the garden, and forms a predominating and very beautiful object from various parts of it.

Among the hundreds of names which one reads in pa.s.sing,--I hardly know why, for they certainly convey but small interest to the mind,--we met with that of the _Baron Munchausen_. It was a small and unpretending-looking stone, but bore a host of blazing t.i.tles, by which it appears that this Baron, whom I, and all my generation, I believe, have ever looked upon as an imaginary personage, was in fact something or other very important to somebody or other who was very powerful. Why his n.o.ble name has been made such use of among us, I cannot imagine.

In the course of our wanderings we came upon this singular inscription:--

"Ci-git Caroline,"--(I think the name is Caroline,)--"fille de Mademoiselle Mars."

Is it not wonderful what a difference twenty-one miles of salt-water can make in the ways and manners of people?

There are not many statues in the cemetery, and none of sufficient merit to add much to its embellishment; but there is one recently placed there, and standing loftily predominant above every surrounding object, which is strongly indicative of the period of its erection, and of the temper of the people to whom it seems to address itself.

This is a colossal figure of Manuel. The countenance is vulgar, and the expression of the features violent and exaggerated: it might stand as the portrait of a bold factious rebel for ever.

LETTER XXIII.

Remarkable People.--Distinguished People.--Metaphysical Lady.

Last night we pa.s.sed our _soiree_ at the house of a lady who had been introduced to me with this recommendation:--"You will be certain of meeting at Madame de V----'s many REMARKABLE PEOPLE."

This is, I think, exactly the sort of introduction which would in any city give the most piquant interest to a new acquaintance; but it does so particularly at Paris; for this attractive capital draws its collection of remarkable people from a greater variety of nations, cla.s.ses, and creeds, than any other.

Nevertheless, this term "remarkable people" must not be taken too confidently to mean individuals so distinguished that all men would desire to gaze upon them; the phrase varying in its value and its meaning according to the feelings, faculties, and station of the speaker.

Everybody has got his or her own "remarkable people" to introduce to you; and I have begun to find out, among the houses that are open to me, what species of "remarkable people" I am likely to meet at each.

When Madame A---- whispers to me as I enter her drawing-room--"Ah!

vous voila! c'est bon; j'aurais ete bien fachee si vous m'aviez manquee; il y a ici, ce soir, une personne bien remarquable, qu'il faut absolument vous presenter,"--I am quite sure that I shall see some one who has been a marshal, or a duke, or a general, or a physician, or an actor, or an artist, to Napoleon.

But if it were Madame B---- who said the same thing, I should be equally certain that it must be a comfortable-looking doctrinaire, who was, had been, or was about to be in place, and who had made his voice heard on the winning side.

Madame C----, on the contrary, would not deign to bestow such an epithet on any one whose views and occupations were so earthward. It could only be some philosopher, pale with the labour of reconciling paradoxes or discovering a new element.

My charming, quiet, graceful, gentle Madame D---- could use it only when speaking of an ex-chancellor, or chamberlain, or friend, or faithful servant of the exiled dynasty.

As for the tall dark-browed Madame E----, with her thin lips and sinister smile, though she professes to hold a _salon_ where talent of every party is welcome, she never cares much, I am very sure, for any remarkableness that is not connected with the great and immortal mischief of some revolution. She is not quite old enough to have had anything to do with the first; but I have no doubt that she was very busy during the last, and I am positive that she will never know peace by night or day till another can be got up. If her hopes fail on this point, she will die of atrophy; for nothing affords her nourishment but what is mixed up with rebellion against const.i.tuted authority.

I know that she dislikes me; and I suspect I owe the honour of being admitted to appear in her presence solely to her determination that I should hear everything that she thinks it would be disagreeable for me to listen to. I believe she fancies that I do not like to meet Americans; but she is as much mistaken in this as in most other of her speculations.

I really never saw or heard of any fanaticism equal to that, with which this lady wors.h.i.+ps destruction. That whatever is, is wrong, is the rule by which her judgment is guided in all things. It is enough for her that a law on any point is established, to render the thing legalised detestable; and were the republic about which she raves, and of which she knows as much as her lap-dog, to be established throughout France to-morrow, I am quite persuaded that we should have her embroidering a regal robe for the most legitimate king she could find, before next Monday.

Madame F----'s _remarkables_ are almost all of them foreigners of the philosophic revolutionary cla.s.s; any gentry that are not particularly well off at home, and who would rather prefer being remarkable and remarked a few hundred miles from their own country than in it.

Madame G----'s are chiefly musical personages. "Croyez-moi, madame,"

she says, "il n'y a que lui pour toucher le piano.... Vous n'avez pas encore entendu Mademoiselle Z----.... Quelle voix superbe!... Elle fera, j'en suis sure, une fortune immense a Londres."

Madame H----'s acquaintance are not so "remarkable" for anything peculiar in each or any of them, as for being in all things exactly opposed to each other. She likes to have her parties described as "Les soirees ant.i.thestiques de Madame H----," and has a peculiar sort of pleasure in seeing people sitting side by side on her hearth-rug, who would be very likely to salute each other with a pistol-shot were they to meet elsewhere. It is rather a singular device for arranging a sociable party; but her _soirees_ are very delightful _soirees_, for all that.

Madame J----'s friends are not "remarkable;" they are "distinguished."

It is quite extraordinary what a number of distinguished individuals I have met at her house.

But I must not go through the whole alphabet, lest I should tire you.

So let me return to the point from whence I set out, and take you with me to Madame de V----'s _soiree_. A large party is almost always a sort of lottery, and your good or bad fortune depends on the accidental vicinity of pleasant or unpleasant neighbours.

I cannot consider myself to have gained a prize last night; and Fortune, if she means to make things even, must place me to-night next the most agreeable person in Paris. I really think that should the same evil chance that beset me yesterday pursue me for a week, I should leave the country to escape from it. I will describe to you the manner of my torment as well as I can, but must fail, I think, to give you an adequate idea of it.

A lady I had never seen before walked across the room to me last night soon after I entered it, and making prisoner of Madame de V---- in the way, was presented to me in due form. I was placed on a sofa by an old gentleman with whom we have formed a great friends.h.i.+p, and for whose conversation I have a particular liking: he had just seated himself beside me, when my new acquaintance dislodged him by saying, as she attempted to squeeze herself in between us, "Pardon, monsieur; ne vous derangez pas! ... mais si madame voulait bien me permettre" ... and before she could finish her speech, my old acquaintance was far away and my new one close beside me.

She began the conversation by some very obliging a.s.surances of her wish to make my acquaintance. "I want to discuss with you," said she.

I bowed, but trembled inwardly, for I do not like discussions, especially with "remarkable" ladies. "Yes," she continued, "I want to discuss with you many topics of vital interest to us all--topics on which I believe we now think differently, but on which I feel quite sure that we should agree, would you but listen to me."

I smiled and bowed, and muttered something civil, and looked as much pleased as I possibly could,--and recollected, too, how large Paris was, and how easy it would be to turn my back upon conviction, if I found that I could not face it agreeably. But, to say truth, there was something in the eye and manner of my new friend that rather alarmed me. She is rather pretty, nevertheless; but her bright eyes are never still for an instant, and she is one of those who aid the power of speech by that of touch, to which she has incessant recourse. Had she been a man, she would have seized all her friends by the b.u.t.ton: but as it is, she can only lay her fingers with emphasis upon your arm, or grasp a handful of your sleeve, when she sees reason to fear that your attention wanders.

"You are a legitimatist! ... quel dommage! Ah! you smile. But did you know the incalculable injury done to the intellect by putting chains upon it!... My studies, observe, are confined almost wholly to one subject,--the philosophy of the human mind. Metaphysics have been the great object of my life from a very early age." (I should think she was now about seven or eight-and-twenty.) "Yet sometimes I have the weakness to turn aside from this n.o.ble pursuit to look upon the troubled current of human affairs that is rolling past me. I do not pretend to enter deeply into politics--I have no time for it; but I see enough to make me shrink from despotism and legitimacy. Believe me, it cramps the mind; and be a.s.sured that a constant succession of political changes keeps the faculties of a nation on the _qui vive_, and, abstractedly considered as a mental operation, must be incalculably more beneficial than the half-dormant state which takes place after any long continuance in one position, let it be what it may."